Obama trying to earn that Nobel? Good luck.

Today the Obama administration trumpeted their success in getting Israelis and Palestinians to agree to indirect talks. U.S. envoy George Mitchell will be the intermediary. How sad that we consider getting two countries to talk through a third party a peace process. It reminds me of two angry 4th graders having a fight, refusing to talk to one another, and using a friend as their messenger.

Both sides have grudgingly agreed to talks, and Israel expressed frustration when the U.S. questioned their building of settlements in violation of a moratorium on settlement building. Israel's settlement construction on the eve of talks shows they don't take the peace process seriously, and the fact that many Hamas' leaders have thumbed their noses at the talks show that they likely don't take it seriously either. There is a reason both sides may not actually want the talks to succeed. The following is my rough translation of their thoughts:

Israeli Government: Please, U.S., butt out of our business and let us continue to play both the victim and the oppressor. It has worked for us for a long time, keeps our military stocked with a never-ending supply of young people, and lets us justify the horrible and unfair misery we inflict on the Palestinian people. If peace is achieved, we will have to deal with all the Zionist extremists living in far-flung settlements in the West Bank, and maybe even face our own misdeeds.

Hamas: We exist mainly because of all the injustices of the Israeli government. If we reach peace with Israel, the Palestinian people may realize that our acts of violence have done nothing but draw more incursions of violence from the Israeli military into Palestinian territories. We feed off anger and fear, don't take these away from us through conflict resolution!

I realize of course, that the situation is far more complex than this and involves water rights, security, thousands of years of history, and countless other things, but sometimes it just boils down to government officials acting like children and we have to call it like we see it.