Israel's Lawyers
In May 2005, Aaron David Miller, an American who has a passionate attachment to Israel and was one of President Bill Clinton’s advisors at the Camp David negotiations in the summer of 1999, published a remarkable op-ed in the Washington Post titled “Israel’s Lawyer.”
Miller wrote:
“For far too long, many American officials involved in Arab-Israeli peacemaking, myself included, have acted as Israel’s attorney, catering and coordinating with the Israelis at the expense of successful peace negotiations. If the United States wants to be an honest and effective broker on the Arab-Israeli issue, than surely it can have only one client: the pursuit of a solution that meets the needs and requirements of both sides.”
“With the best of motives and intentions, we listened to and followed Israel’s lead without critically examining what that would mean for our own interests, for those on the Arab side and for the overall success of the negotiations. The “no surprises” policy, under which we had to run everything by Israel first, stripped our policy of the independence and flexibility required for serious peacemaking. If we couldn’t put proposals on the table without checking with the Israelis first, and refused to push back when they said no, how effective could our mediation be? Far too often, particularly when it came to Israeli-Palestinian diplomacy, our departure point was not what was needed to reach an agreement acceptable to both sides but what would pass with only one -- Israel.”
While Miller is to be commended for his honesty, his comments are truly remarkable in that he is effectively admitting that even though he is an American who should have axiomatically privileged the US national interest over Israel’s, he was privileging Israel’s interests over America’s. And note that he says he was not the only one who subordinated the US national interest to Israel’s interests. He surely would include his fellow advisor at Camp David, Dennis Ross, who also has a passionate attachment to Israel.
Obviously, hardly anything has changed since Miller penned his op-ed, as President Trump’s top two advisors who will be negotiating with Israel and Hamas in Egypt this week are ardent Zionists — Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff.
This situation is unacceptable. It is not in the American national interest to have individuals with a dual loyalty — or who might even be “Israel firsters” — negotiating on behalf of the United States. Common sense dictates that the US negotiators in Egypt should be individuals who are solely guided by what is in the American national interest.
Kushner and Witkoff are indeed not honest brokers. Not only are they extremely pro-Zionist, but they also stand to make millions upon millions of dollars from the redevelopment of Gaza, as does by the way, President Trump. The whole process is utterly repugnant.
"Common sense dictates that the US negotiators in Egypt should be individuals who are solely guided by what is in the American national interest."
Well, common sense dictates to me that an "honest broker" should be an individual or a state who has no interest whatsoever in the result of the negotiation. I am sure that over 7 billions humans, there must be very qualified lawyers and diplomats who have integrity, and whose country has nothing to loose or gain to the deal, other than the satisfaction and pride to have been an honest broker and helped create peace somewhere in the world.
I believe one of the first rules of law is the the judge cannot have any interest in the case he is judging. otherwise, he will have a conflict of interest.