Ken Berwitz

If the UK's Guardian has it right (you decide, after reading the excerpt from yesterday's article which I've posted below), Barack Obama may have found a way to resurrect the so-called "peace process" between Palestinian Arabs and Israel.  The bold print is mine:.

Barack Obama on brink of deal for Middle East peace talks

Barack Obama is close to brokering an Israeli-Palestinian deal that will allow him to announce a resumption of the long-stalled Middle East peace talks before the end of next month, according to US, Israeli, Palestinian and European officials.

Key to bringing Israel on board is a promise by the US to adopt a much tougher line with Iran over its alleged nuclear weapons programme. The US, along with Britain and France, is planning to push the United Nations security council to expand sanctions to include Iran's oil and gas industry, a move that could cripple its economy.

In return, the Israeli government will be expected to agree to a partial freeze on the construction of settlements in the Middle East. In the words of one official close to the negotiations: "The message is: Iran is an existential threat to Israel; settlements are not."

 

Rory McCarthy reports on the hurdles Binyamin Netanyahu might face if he stopped building on occupied territory Link to this audio

Details of the breakthrough deal will be hammered out tomorrow in London, where the Israeli prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, is due to hold talks with the US special envoy, George Mitchell. Netanyahu met Gordon Brown today in Downing Street, where the two discussed both settlements and the Iranian nuclear programme.

Although the negotiations are being held in private, they have reached such an advanced stage that both France and Russia have approached the US offering to host a peace conference.

If true, this means that United States policy toward Iran will finally be what it should have been all along -- because a nuclear Iran threatens our security as well as Israel's. 

And Israel will allow some settlement construction but not all of it - as it would have if there were no "deal" at all. 

In other words, Mr. Netanyahu's agreement is little other than a face-saver for Mr. Obama, who desperately needs one at the moment.

That said, the payoff of all this is what?  The continuation of a 42 year old series of "negotiations", which have absolutely no meaning unless Palestinian Arabs agree to the concept of peaceful coexistence with Israel. 

Until they do, this is nothing more than a dog and pony show.

Yawn.