Statehood resolution gets no one any closer to peace in Mideast

There is no question that an at- tempt by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to win United Nations recognition of a Palestinian state will fail.

The motion needs nine of 15 votes in the Security Council, and U.S. diplomats will be lobbying hard to get six other members to vote against the measure. Otherwise, the United States will have to use its veto to block the motion. The five permanent members of the Security Council are China, France, Russian Federation, the United Kingdom and the United States. The other 10, serving two-year terms, are Bosnia and Herzegovina, Germany, Portugal, Brazil, India, South Africa, Colombia, Lebanon, Gabon and Nigeria.

Those members of the Security Council who expect the United States to continue to carry a disproportionate part of the burden in seeking peace in the Middle East should weigh their own votes carefully.

The United States has endorsed a two-state solution for the Middle East, but has been consistent with two messages. Such a solution must contain the explicit recognition of Israel’s right to exist. And it must be reached through negotiations in which both sides make difficult concessions.

The problem with negotiation

That is not an unreasonable position. Of course both the Israelis and the Palestinians accuse each other of refusing to bargain. And each can cite examples to back them up. Such is the challenge for anyone attempting to negotiate a settlement. Since 2006, envoys from the United States, the European Union, Russia and the United Nations have been working toward a resolution and making some progress. It’s difficult to see a future for that coalition if three of the four make it necessary for the United States to veto recognition of a Palestinian state based on pre-1967 borders.

And it is impossible to predict what the reaction will be in the Palestinian territories after Abbas has raised what are clearly unrealistic expectations. But in this year of freedom movements taking over public squares in other Middle Eastern and North African countries, the possibility for further destabilization between the Palestinian Authority and Israel is a real danger.

And in keeping with the theme that no political issue is simple in the Middle East, be assured that some of Israel’s neighbors who are on the wrong side of the Arab Spring themselves would be more than happy to foment discontent and even violence in Israel.

Abbas apparently felt he was unable to resist calls for him to pursue U.N.-sanctioned statehood now, but is he going to be able to deal with what could come after defeat of the resolution?

For more than 40 years, the peace process in the Middle East has been two steps forward and one step back — and sometimes one step forward and two back. But if the United Nations, Russia, Europe and the United States can’t find a way around this statehood resolution, it could be no steps forward and a giant leap back.