"... Netanyahu apologized for the timing, NOT the substance of building thousands of apartments in east Jerusalem ..."

Via Friday-Lunch-Club

Politico/ here

An Israeli reader relays the "4-5 important points" from Biden's speech to the Israeli people from Tel Aviv University today, with a few annotations:

* The U.S. will not allow a nuclear Iran. Period (what constitutes "nuclear"? is "threshold" tolerable?)

* Obama is committed to Israel's security and qualitative edge in ways that not many people are aware of.

* A Palestinian state along the 1967 borders with agreed-upon land swaps.

* Israel is in grave demographic danger and will lose its Jewish-democratic identity unless progress is made toward the two-state solution.

* Building in East-Jerusalem is undermining trust and the ability to reach an agreement.

"The demographic realities make it difficult for Israel to be a Jewish homeland and a democratic country," Biden said in his speech today, Haaretz reported. "The status quo is not sustainable."

"To end this historic conflict, both sides must be historically bold," he said. "The most important thing is for these talks to go forward and go forward promptly and go forward in good faith. We can't delay because when progress is postponed, extremists exploit our differences.".......

"Make no mistake," the Israeli source said. "Biden was and still is livid about Netanyahu's antics and the embarrassment he caused him, but refrained from extending it into the speech or ... getting up and leaving because that would have reflected badly on his trip and [have] seal[ed] it as a failure. Note that Netanyahu apologized for the timing, NOT the substance of building thousands of apartments in east Jerusalem, east of the green-line."..."

Posted by G, Z, or B at 10:04 AM

River to Sea
 Uprooted Palestinian