On one side of the vaunted Palestinian territories, Hamas absolutely refuses to negotiate with Israel, thereby confirming every single thing they've ever said. On the other side Fatah can't handle their own terrorists let alone go after Hamas or Islamic Jihad infiltrators. It's an open question whether they even want to any more:

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Tuesday spurned a new US effort to revive Mideast peace talks, sticking to his position that he will not resume negotiations unless Israel freezes settlement construction. With Abbas digging in, an upcoming diplomatic mission by US Mideast envoy George Mitchell could be doomed from the outset... the US has failed to get Israel to halt construction of Jewish settlements in the West Bank and east Jerusalem, lands the Palestinians want for their state... Abbas said on Tuesday he will not resume talks under the current conditions... "We won't agree to resume negotiations without a full settlement freeze, especially in Jerusalem, for a certain period." The Obama administration has recently suggested bypassing the settlement issue by getting the two sides to discuss the borders of a Palestinian state. US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton has said that by focusing on the endgame, such talks would defuse the problem of settlements.

Yeah, listen. If the US didn't want the Palestinians to focus on settlements they shouldn't have functionally forced the Palestinians to focus on settlements. Abbas had always been willing to negotiate in the face of ongoing Israeli settlement construction, both during the Bush years and during the first months of the Obama administration. Then State and the WH - bragging all the while about publicly slapping around Netanyahu - launched their anti-Israel diplomatic offensive last spring. Among the demands: a full construction freeze. No playgrounds or supermarkets for Jews, not even in Israel's capital. Abbas had to follow along lest he appear less pro-Palestinian than the US President.

In the most generous scenario this was a misguided attempt to move the goalposts, bleeding the Israelis on concessions. More likely the WH actually believed the self-deceiving propaganda of ostensibly pro-Israel groups like J-Street - duly funneled into the Oval Office via a special someone - that the Israeli public is much further left than the last election would indicate. Anti-Israel foreign policy experts like Walt even supplied polling data on the question. You can't argue with science!

The hope was to use settlements as a wedge issue to peel Israeli citizens away from the government, creating a win-win for anti-Israel diplomats. If Netanyahu caved then Obama would see his stock rise in the Arab world, this per the predictions of foreign policy analysts like Marc Lynch. If Netanyahu resisted then he would be toppled via popular disapproval and - by assumption - the next Israeli government would reflect the Israeli public's pro-concessions position.

As will inevitably happen with plans based on pseudo-sophisticated fantasies, the entire stunt backfired and Obama managed to alienate Israel and harden Palestinian demands. Smart power!

References and related after the jump...