Sunsets are pretty, unless the sun is setting on prospects for peace (Photo by W. Astore)

b. traven

John Kerry, America’s Secretary of State, has spent the last four months cobbling together a new Palestinian-Israeli peace process charade.  To this end, he’s appointed Martin Indyk as his “Special Envoy for Israeli-Palestinian (Peace) Negotiations.”

Why has the U.S. media failed to assess this appointment in any critical way?  If Indyk had been Muslim I’m sure the right-leaning media would have condemned him.  Doubtless the center-left media would have been tut-tutting about how provocative but fair his selection was.  But the MSM has been neither alarmed nor tut-tutting: just asleep.

Why is this?  Is it because Indyk is the ultimate “safe” choice precisely because he is pro-Israel?

Let’s examine Indyk’s background to see if this newly anointed peace envoy is likely to instill confidence in the Palestinians that the U.S. is serious about being an honest broker.  Indyk, a naturalized U.S. citizen, served two terms as Ambassador to Israel under the Clinton administration. Apparently part of his qualification for that appointment was that he’d been Deputy Research Director for AIPAC, the American Israeli Political Action Committee.  AIPAC is a right wing lobbying group with enormous influence over Republicans and Democrats in Congress.  Its goal is to strengthen U.S. support of Israel while killing any chance of the Palestinians getting a state of their own.

What in Indyk’s background might indicate a unique capability to find a calm road to peace among the storminess surrounding Middle East relations? One finds in Indyk’s background only a rather pro-Israel bias that included defining a “dual containment” policy of Iran and Iraq while he worked as a U.S. government consultant.  Such failed policies of the past have brought the U.S. as well as the Middle East nothing but instability and war.

Mort Sahl, one of the early political stand-up satirists, used to finish his sets with the comment “Is there anyone in the audience I haven’t offended?”  John Kerry’s appointment of Indyk succeeds in offending anyone in the audience looking for true peace between Israelis and Palestinians.