NETANYAHU VICTOR (for now)

The Israeli P.M. did it again. He won, by a slim majority. The political machine worked and Israel proved yet again that democracy--albeit far from perfect--is a reliable model in a region in permanent chaos.

Netanyahu is a formidable politician, not to everybody's taste. The man is more than the sum of his antecedents (some traumatic, some dubious). He could still make a historical choice for peace--a difficult, existential decision--or he might continue on a path of irreductibles. The many aberrations in the Arab world and among the Palestinians, as well as the divisions in Israeli society create a climate of overall frustration. Until now the P.M. has chosen for a hard line which follows the Trump scenario that is currently overruling any form of decency. It is not too late to change course.

Israel often acts in a simplistic mindset. It tends to consider any disagreement with its policies as some form or other of anti- semitism. The former is a growing creepy problem indeed, unfortunately, but to equalize criticism of certain policies and decisions with anti-Jewish prejudice is totally unfair. That Likud sees in Trump and American evangelicals the gatekeepers of a better and larger tomorrow is more than an irony, it's an aberration.

Jarred Kushner should come up with his proposals for a durable arrangement between Israel and the Palestinians. One should remain open-minded in this regard. Steps towards peace or rapprochement have followed stranger paths:  Kissinger, Sadat/Golda Meir, Oslo, Camp David, Madrid, Rabin. Let us not forget that Netanyahu who was feted in the Trump White House last week is the same man who was blackballed by James Baker in the past. It looks as if the Middle East, unfortunate mother of too many religions, is also the cause for too many reversals of fortune and power.

The region as a whole is often existentially unattractive. Iran is taken hostage by a hellish regime, while its arch enemy Saudi Arabia continues on its gold plated path of Trump-like vanities. Egypt might be a gift of the Nile but it is cursed by the military, after having been knocked out by the Muslim Brotherhood. Libya, Sudan and Algeria are in various forms of limbo. Turkey looks stuck in yet another "city versus countryside paradigm". Only Israel navigates with flair but it is not out of danger: the sacred and the profane cohabit with more reciprocal loathing than sympathy. There is a world in between the Israel laboratory of arts, fashion, architecture and development and its conservative religious anti-thesis.

Unfortunately the former famous Arabists in the State Department are gone. The American envoy in Jerusalem has the profile that fits in the closed minds of the current amateurs who are in charge in Washington. The former role of the Quartet or the EU is a thing of the past...Remember the MENA hype? Russia is the cynical alternative, waiting until America loses its "indispensability" for good. Other takers, there are not. Meanwhile, the Palestinians are waiting for their own Balfour declaration, which they don't really need.  After all they are home, too.