Peacemaking

Then they look out of their windows and see land they believe is theirs disappearing under concrete, as Israel builds homes for Jews in the occupied territories.
That is why the Obama administration in Washington has been pushing hard for a freeze on settlement building, to create a better atmosphere for talks.
Israelis are surprised, hurt and a little angry that an American president appears to be putting the feelings of the other side above theirs.
A former American negotiator looked back on the long record of failure in peace talks and said that one of the problems was that the US acted as Israel’s attorney.
America’s commitment to Israel is still unshakeable but it looks as if President Obama wants to try to be more like an honest broker, not the family lawyer.
By the way, there is plenty of pressure on the Palestinians too. But that is as predictable as the summer sun around here.
When the BBC sent me to live in Jerusalem in 1995, it was in the early days of the Oslo peace process. I left behind a perfectly good news story in Bosnia, with which I was somewhat in love. A Spanish colleague in Sarajevo asked me what on earth I was doing.
“They’ve made peace in the Middle East,” she said. “You’re nuts. The story’s over.”
But a couple of months after I arrived, a Jewish fanatic shot Israel’s prime minister dead and that peace process started taking blows that in the end killed it. A couple of years later my Spanish friend moved to Jerusalem.
Every attempt at peacemaking has failed. The fundamental problem has not been solved.
Two peoples, both haunted by the past, want the same piece of land and cannot find a mutually acceptable way to share it, or split it.
Until they do, there will not be peace here or anything like it.