Trudy Rubin Writes Article Highlighting Glaring Omissions of Abraham Accords, In An Article Which Itself Has Glaring Omissions--
(photo, Palestinian whose home was bulldozed)
I think this is an important piece by the Philadelphia Inquirer's Trudy Rubin, who is a well established progressive reporter with extensive Israeli ties, and a strong track record of advocating for both Palestinian and Israeli interests in bringing about an authentic peace process for the Middle East.
It is important both for what it says, and what is left unsaid, which I will try to address.
Rather than attempt to summarize the entire content, I will go right to the heart of the matter. Ms. Rubin takes up the status of last years "Abraham Accords" initiated by the Trump administration and negotiated by Presidential Son-in-Law and Real Estate "gonif," JaVanka twin Jared Kushner.
She identifies the most glaring omission of the so-called accord, which is the utter lack of involvement or benefit for the Palestinian people, whose leaders were excluded from the entire process and were left with nothing by the agreement itself. Remember that the process was initiated between Israel and the Gulf States with direct involvent of the Saudi Kingdom, between Nations which were not in conflict, rather simply had no external relations. Therefore to characterize it as a peace accord is an absurd misnomer.
Ms. Rubin correctly identifies this omission as a leading existential crisis facing Israel, and offers insightful analysis of the consequences of this failure and the dynamics which affect the region and the world as a result. It's important to read this piece as background, from a journalist who has been involved in these issues for decades.
Luckily, I can write certain things that Ms. Rubin cannot, because I don't have an Editorial Board, a boss, or advertisers whose "tuchas" I need to engage in heavy smooching in order to protect my own. And so I will.
First, I will state the undeniable but ugly truth of what this accord was really about, which "The Inquirer" might find distasteful to mention. The intention behind the accord was never to acheive "peace". It was never about Israeli security, regional stability, expanding business opportunities, or starting a real diplomatic process that could resolve the seemingly endless conflict which has gripped the region as a whole for nearly a Century. (Notwithstanding the inclusion of increased tourism and military contracts for sales of fighter jets which is included in Ms. Rubin's report) It was primarily about one thing. Which was the personal desperation and unprincipled fear driven desire of Donald Trump to secure re-election, with the help of attaining one of his main obsessions, a Nobel Peace Prize.
Trump knew then as he does today that he will be involved in criminal investigations and civil litigation for the remainder of his wretched existence, and therefore would resort to any sort of ethical violation, tactic, criminal conspiracy, or deception to keep the protection of the Presidency as his sole remaining legal shield. He has never in his lifetime done anything good for the sake of doing the good. Everything he does, as anyone grounded in reality already knows, is transactional, with a beneficiary of one. Him. Everything and everyone else comes in last on his list of priorities, including his own family, each of whom he is prepared to throw overboard at the point they cross him or no longer serve his purposes. We all know that, and I cannot see the point of not addressing this as a central factor in why the accord was initiated to begin with. The incontrovertible proof of this is the fact that the wholly unqualified and personally conflicted Jared Kushher was delegated to run the entirety of US diplomacy which set this agreement into motion, rather than a qualified career diplomat.
Politically speaking, it is also useful to remember that a great deal of Trump's vengeful and obsessive identity is rooted in his compulsion to outdo Barack Obama, for reasons of egomania, status, and racism driven personal hatred. That is how he is wired. He needed a Nobel Prize, and ran multiple operations through JaVanka and Pompeo's State Department to come up with one, contriving diplomatic initiatives here, there, and everywhere to get it. You will remember Trump's insane proposal to invite the leaders of the Taliban to Camp David on the anniversary of 9-11 to sign a peace accord and announce the US withdrawal from Afghanistan, a plan so demented and perverse that Pompeo and others overruled it. At the time, I wrote a satire on how Trump was attempting to get a Summit photo op at Camp David with Kanye West and Taylor Swift, to announce that he had achieved a resolution for their long standing public feud. Satire indeed, but not all that far from the truth.
Second is the obvious factor of Trump wanting to prop up and legitimize the corrupt regime of Israeli PM Bibi Netanyahu as the strongman fascist dictator of Israel, with his impending corruption trial and political demise paralleling the legal end game which Trump was himself facing. Trump cares little about Israel or Netanyahu in truth, but he needed to save Bibi in order to strengthen his support among American Right Wing Jewish leaders, one of whom was his main financial benefactor, casino kingpin and reputed Mob figure, the deceased Sheldon Adelson. But even more important to Trump was keeping in the fold his huge activist and financial base of support among Evangelical Christian Fundamentalists, whose political fundraising and activity was very much codependent on the anti-Palestinian and pro-settlements regime of Netanyahu. The Abraham Accords were initended to save both Trump and Netanyahu from jail for their voluminous crimes and corruption in office, and the two wannabe dictators needed this photo op opportunity to prop each other up, like two drunken idiots holding each other up while stumbling out of a Bar.
Thirdly, is that the accord process itself was exactly the opposite of a peace process, it was the consolidation of a military and economic Axis of War, a coalition for armed conflict with Iran, which the Trump administration and the Netanyahu government were planning as the ultimate "October Surprise", to influence the US election. They both needed a wartime emergency, and to achieve a legal respite for Netanyahu, suspending his trial for purposes of constructing a wartime Cabinet in Israel. Each of the Gulf States involved in the Abraham Accord diplomacy were deeply allied with the degenerate Saudi Royal Family's proxy war with Iran in Yemen, and were intending to ally with Israel at the point that Bibi gave the go signal for the Israeli Airforce to commence their planned air war against Iran. We now know from the recent book by Bob Woodward about how close we came to that war, and what was done by JCOS Chairman General Milley and the Pentagon Command to prevent it from happening.
Therefore, taking these factors into account, Ms. Rubin's analysis is an important intervention on behalf of both Israel's future, and justice for the Palestinian people, who are otherwise being ignored by the Biden administration, mainly because they are pragmatically politically averse to directly antagonizing the Religious Right in the US on issues related to Israel, which galvanizes their fundraising and activist base.
However, the unresolved state of injustice for Palestinian Arabs goes much further than their lack of recognition by the Abraham Accords. It is the lack of recognition by the current extremist Right Wing Parties of Israel of Palestinians as Human Beings which is the actual existential crisis of Israel. Why? Because the existence of the State of Israel itself was founded on the principle that any regime or government which adopts a view which presupposes that any people be categorized as something less than human, who are denied the full compliment of what are considered "Human Rights", renders itself illegitimate and has lost its moral authority and mandate to govern.
Sometimes even the best people, whether journalists, politicians, or others, become caught up in the particulars of a situation, or adopt tunnel vision in trying to explain the "whos" and the "whats," and for their own reasons are compelled to edit out the historical or strategic context in which events occur. It is a form of self induced myopia. In order to solve the problems facing the US and the world today, methodologically speaking, I believe this might be the most important "existential crisis" we need to solve.
