Trying to Revive Mideast Peace Talks, Kerry Finds a Conflicted Israel - NYTimes.com

JERUSALEM — The intractable Israeli-Palestinian conflict can be seen as a trio of conflicts.

There is, of course, the bitter enmity between Israelis and Palestinians, hardened over decades, with many on each side questioning the other’s claim to the land bridging the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea. There is the deep rift between the Palestinian Fatah and Hamas factions that many recent reconciliation meetings have failed to resolve. And there is a cleavage within Israel over whether the two-state solution is desirable or even possible.

With Secretary of State John Kerry planning his fifth visit here in three months to revive peace talks, the Israeli divide was on stark display last week, as several right-wing ministers in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government professed their profound opposition to a Palestinian state and promised to prevent one. While Mr. Netanyahu distanced himself from the remarks, questions about the sincerity of his recent pleas for peace resurfaced. Clearly, a dissonance exists in Israeli public opinion, where a strong majority supports two states, but only along parameters the Palestinians have roundly rejected.

“One of the tragedies of the last decade is that the security fears and pressures have dulled the Israeli conscience,” said Yossi Klein Halevi, an author and fellow at the Shalom Hartman Institute here. “You come to a certain point where the disparity between what Israelis want and what Israelis believe is possible starts to break down. Given that there are no good alternatives, that’s a frightening possibility in the evolution of Israeli thinking.”

Dore Gold, president of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, said there was a consensus in Israel favoring a Palestinian state, but not along the 1967 borders (as the Palestinian leadership insists); not with East Jerusalem as its capital (a cornerstone of every Palestinian plan); and not without maintaining an Israeli military presence in the Jordan Valley (which Palestinians reject as a challenge to their sovereignty). Israelis have also become more vigilant about security and less trusting of so-called moderate Arab leaders in the wake of the Arab uprisings exploding around them.

“There’s the idea of a two-state solution in the abstract, and then there’s converting it into a map,” said Mr. Gold, a former peace negotiator and Netanyahu adviser. “Israelis want negotiations, they want to see a settlement that addresses the issue, but they also have certain red lines that they don’t want any arrangement to cross.”

Trying to Revive Mideast Peace Talks, Kerry Finds a Conflicted Israel - NYTimes.com