The real Palestinian narrative

This month, opining on the long failed Arab-Israeli peace process, former Israeli ambassador to the United States Zalman Shuval quoted former Israeli foreign minister Abba Eban, stating that "the Arabs never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity." Shuval also remarked that Arab leaders "thwart in advance any Israeli or international initiative that would put them on the road to genuinely and ideologically accepting the existence of the State of Israel." The Palestinian Authority (P.A.) predictably deemed these comments racist and inciting violence against Arabs. The P.A.'s virtue-signaling narrative is a false one. Arab leaders have thwarted multiple attempts at peace (in 1937 [Peel Commission], 1947 [the Partition Plan], 1967 [the Khartoum Resolution], 1967–1968 [the Allon Plan], 2000 [Camp David], 2001 [Taba], 2008 [Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's offer to P.A. president Mahmoud Abbas], and 2019 [President Trump's Peace to Prosperity economic plan]). Arab leaders are now zipping by their eighth missed opportunity at ludicrous speed. Pointing that out is neither racism nor incitement. It is merely a restatement of the facts.