The price of success
After 20 months, Barack Obama’s administration may be close to injecting some much-needed stability into the on-again, off-again Israeli-Palestinian peace process. The deal concluded last week in New York between Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — if it gets through the Israeli cabinet and the Palestinians — should allow the ...
After 20 months, Barack Obama’s administration may be close to injecting some much-needed stability into the on-again, off-again Israeli-Palestinian peace process. The deal concluded last week in New York between Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — if it gets through the Israeli cabinet and the Palestinians — should allow the negotiations to resume in the wake of a three-month moratorium on settlements. But as I’ve written before, the administration shouldn’t pray for anything it really doesn’t want and isn’t prepared for. The upcoming challenges will severely test a president and secretary of state who badly need a foreign-policy success.
First, the good news. Any advance in the excruciatingly painful world of Arab-Israeli negotiations is significant. The Obama administration deserves much credit for keeping the Israelis, Palestinians, and key Arab states on board during some very tough times. The U.S. president has seized on this issue and isn’t giving up — a central requirement for success.
Aaron David Miller is a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and a former U.S. State Department Middle East analyst and negotiator in Republican and Democratic administrations. He is the author of The End of Greatness: Why America Can’t Have (and Doesn’t Want) Another Great President. Twitter: @aarondmiller2
More from Foreign Policy

Chinese Hospitals Are Housing Another Deadly Outbreak
Authorities are covering up the spread of antibiotic-resistant pneumonia.

Henry Kissinger, Colossus on the World Stage
The late statesman was a master of realpolitik—whom some regarded as a war criminal.

The West’s False Choice in Ukraine
The crossroads is not between war and compromise, but between victory and defeat.

The Masterminds
Washington wants to get tough on China, and the leaders of the House China Committee are in the driver’s seat.