The July 2000 Camp David Summit was clearly a diplomatic failure. It resulted largely, though not exclusively, from the insurmountable gap between Israel and the PLO over the issue of Jerusalem. Prime Minister Ehud Barak and President Bill Clinton insisted on holding the summit apparently assuming that the diplomatic gaps between the parties could ultimately be bridged. Were they equipped with a more accurate assessment of the positions of the principal parties on the Jerusalem question, they might have anticipated that the summit would not succeed. For the PLO, the various Clinton proposals were a non-starter. But for Israel, as well, Barak's readiness to even consider concessions on Jerusalem led to the collapse of parliamentary support for his government, a massive public demonstration against the U.S. proposals, and finally, when combined with Palestinian violence, Barak's loss in national elections by an unprecedented majority to Ariel Sharon. Israel suffered from a more fundamental diplomatic failure of its own, beyond its misreading of the Palestinian position on Jerusalem. The structure of the peace process, whereby Israel has focused all its energies on an abstract, albeit worthy, goal of peace, while the Palestinians' diplomatic energies were concentrated on a concrete goal of achieving a Palestinian state with a capital in Jerusalem, inevitably led the negotiations in the direction of the party with the more articulated objective -- namely, the Palestinian goal of sovereignty in Jerusalem. This diplomatic asymmetry led to a clear-cut erosion of Israel's own claims. Yet, a careful reading of the historical record of the Jewish presence in Jerusalem and an understanding of the international legal rights of the Jewish people to their historical capital might have led negotiators to take a stronger stand on behalf of Israel's rights in the city. This study was conceived with the purpose of providing both a more realistic understanding of the actual positions of the principal parties to the Jerusalem question and a deeper appreciation of the rights Israel possesses in Jerusalem for any future negotiations. For the full study: http://www.jcpa.org/jcprg10.htm

Please send this link to Obama to read. Regards

Please tell me that you are joking.

His influence only goes so far. By the way, who is this al-Husseini?

What's next? Will he declare Jerusalem a separate nation and declare himself its king? This is beginning to sound like the movie "The mouse that roared!"

I don't know about the God of Israel, but I do know that it was American Jewish money and votes that put Obama in. A very recent poll showed that 43 percent of American Jews still would vote for him and 12 percent may still do so. We Jews never learn the lesson.

he can try to construct for the poor Israelis IN Israel.