OUR NEW/OLD MIDEAST FANTASIES - AT 7:46 A.M. ET:  While Bob Gates (see just below) hustles to reassure Asia that we're not wimping out on North Korea, policy changes are underway in the Mideast to get tough with an ally.  Jackson Diehl, in the Washington Post, nails it:

From its first days the Bush administration made it clear that the onus for change in the Middle East was on the Palestinians: Until they put an end to terrorism, established a democratic government and accepted the basic parameters for a settlement, the United States was not going to expect major concessions from Israel.

Obama, in contrast, has repeatedly and publicly stressed the need for a West Bank settlement freeze, with no exceptions. In so doing he has shifted the focus to Israel. He has revived a long-dormant Palestinian fantasy: that the United States will simply force Israel to make critical concessions, whether or not its democratic government agrees, while Arabs passively watch and applaud.

Diehl notes that there's a, well, a history here.  Maybe the president just doesn't know:

Setting aside Hamas and its insistence that Israel must be liquidated, Abbas -- usually described as the most moderate of Palestinian leaders -- last year helped doom Netanyahu's predecessor, Ehud Olmert, by rejecting a generous outline for Palestinian statehood.

Yeah.  And it wasn't the first time the Palestinians turned down a generous proposal.  Arafat did it during the Clinton administration.

Now, according to Diehl, the Palestinians feel they can just sit back, do nothing, and wait for the Israeli government to collapse.  Diehl concludes:

In the Obama administration, so far, it's easy being Palestinian.

COMMENT:  So far, Obama's allies in Congress have given him a pass on the Mideast, in part because he's concentrating on the settlements, which are unpopular here.  That pass may have limits, though.

Next week Mr. Obama will be making his much-anticipated speech to the Muslim world, from Egypt.  We will watch every word.  Will he grovel?  Will he accept "moral equivalence" between 9-11 and our action in Iraq?  Will he play to the American and European left?  Will he throw Israel, if not under the bus, then a little closer to it?  Will he abandon our support for democracy in the Muslim world, and the fair treatment of women?

Those are the questions.  We will ask them together.

May 29, 2009