Tuesday, December 11, 2012

Benign Neglect.


When the UN granted non mem peeking Tom privs to the twin Palestines - the West Bank and the rocket rich Strip's Preacher Command - Little Satan fired back by announcing more shopping malls, apartments and bookstores will be all crunk up in E 1 Wester Bank - effectively LOLing any chiz about the 2 State Solution.

Europa freaked and talked about recalling their ambassadors to Little Satan.
And Great Satan didn't really do much at all.

It's 44's new Palestine/Little Satan strat: Benign Neglect!

See,
Contrary to reports in Little Satan's press, Team 44 didn’t mastermind the angry European response. But neither did they tamp it down. Even though E1 has long been an American red line. And even though the Israelis alerted the White House mere hours before they announced the decision, the Obama administration’s response was pro forma and bland. Publicly, 44 said nothing. It was the first sign of what senior administration officials predict may be a new approach to the conflict in 44’s second term: benign neglect.

Consider the view from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. On the one hand, BiBi keeps doing things—like expanding settlements and refusing to accept the 1967 lines as the parameters for peace talks—that American officials consider bad for America and catastrophic for Little Satan. On the other, every time 44 has tried to make Netanyahu change course—in 2009 when he demanded a settlement freeze and in 2011 when he set parameters for peace talks—the White House has been politically clobbered. Administration officials might like to orchestrate BiBi’s defeat in next month’s Little Satan's elections, as 42 did when he sent political consultants to convince cats to replace BiBi with Ehud in 1999. But they can’t because BiBi has no serious rivals for power.

So instead of confronting BiBi directly, Team 44 has hit upon a different strategy: stand back and let the rest of the world do the confronting. Once America stops trying to save Little Satan from the consequences of her actions, the logic goes, and once she feels the full brunt of its mounting international isolation, her leaders will be scared into changing course.
Administration officials are quick to note that this new approach does not mean America won’t help protect Little Satan militarily through anti-missile defense systems like the much-heralded Iron Dome. And they add that Great Satan will strongly resist any Palestinian effort to use its newfound U.N. status to bring lawsuits against Little Satan at the International Criminal Court. America will also try to prevent further spasms of violence: by maintaining the funding that keeps Mahmoud Abbas afloat in the West Bank and by working with Egypt to restrain Hamas.

Really?

Look - few cats in Little Satan fear Europa and any press press pressure (pressure) they may bear would prob only make Bibi more better in the rough and crazy tumble of Little Satan's Parliamentary politics. And if ICC chiz is to be all LOLing blocked by Great Satan anywrought - kinda hard to see ointment for the flies.
Team 44 had better hope its hands-off strategy for saving the two-state solution works. Because at this rate, by the time they’re ready to try something else, it will be too late. 

Pic - "Greater Little Satan"

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