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Officials: Kerry Way Out of His League in Talks

Officials said that U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry has 'almost no
understanding of how things work in the Middle East'.

By David Lev

First Publish: 1/9/2014, 7:48 AM

US Secretary of State John Kerry
US Secretary of State John Kerry

After weeks of diplomatic activity, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry
is expected in the coming days to present what is expected to be at
least a temporary agreement or framework for peace between Israel and
the Palestinian Authority, but senior Israeli officials are already
dismissing the plan as “unsophisticated” and “unusable.”

The officials, quoted in Yisrael Hayom, said that Kerry had been
rushing hither and fro in and attempt to hammer out details of what is
expected to be the framework of what he would like to see implemented
in order to pave the way for a final-status agreement. The framework
is expected to lay out the final goals and eventual shape of a
final-status deal, with Israel committing to give up land in Judea and
Samaria, and the PA expected by Kerry to recognize Israel as a Jewish
state and to back off on some of its demands.

But based on Kerry's public statements and conversations with them,
the officials quoted said they don't expect anything useful to emerge
from the process. “Kerry is here in the region a lot, but he has
almost no understanding of how things work in the Middle East.

“As a result, the American plan is unsophisticated, and does not
answer the needs of both sides,” the officials said. “There is no
connection between the positive statements Kerry is making in public
and the details of the deal. He is, to put it mildly, very unfamiliar
with the roots of the conflict, and as a result is incapable of
bringing true solutions to the table. He can't even read maps of the
region properly,” the officials added.

Tags: Peace Process, Yisrael HaYom, John Kerry

John wrote:

Trevor wrote: > One last question: back in 2011 and 2012, you were saying
> something like every other week that it's likely we've seen the
> worst of the violence, that this is an awakening era meaning that
> the people don't want a war. Now you're saying that Syria has
> reached a tipping point and will likely spiral into a regional war
> because it's taken on a life of its own. What prompted the
> change?

You have to look at what's going on. The two Syrian groups are the
SNC and al-Nusra. Those are the Syrian people. They're fighting
al-Assad who's doing well because of massive arms shipments from
Russia and aid from Hezbollah. And they're fighting ISIS, which
consists of foreign fighters, not Syrians. You have to ask what would
happen if Russia abandoned al-Assad, and if ISIS withdrew. Would the
war end at that point? I believe it would. Right now it's a proxy
war, not a civil war. This is an Awakening era for Syria, and the
Syrian people don't want a war, but the Russian arms suppliers and
ISIS do want a war.

A BBC reporter made an interesting statement this morning on the war
in Central African Republic. He said that in the last few days the
war has gotten worse, because it's been neighbor versus neighbor,
rather than militia versus militia.

This also provides some insight into what's happening in Syria. I
haven't seen any reports of "neighbor versus neighbor" fighting, which
would be characteristic of a crisis war. It's all been "militia
versus militia," which is characteristic of a non-crisis war.

Militia versus militia wars can go indefinitely, and indeed many of
them do go on for decades, with violence alternating with peace
agreements that turn out to be temporary.

But neighbor versus neighbor wars can't go on forever, because
eventually you run out of neighbors. These are the crisis wars that
reach an explosive climax, and then there's a peace through
exhaustion.

So using these criteria, the wars in Syria, Iraq and South Sudan are
militia versus militia, while the war in Central African Republic is
increasingly neighbor versus neighbor, which indicates a crisis war.