It's never a good thing to look like a loser. That applies to countries as well as people. Consider Israel, a winning country on so many fronts: It's on the cutting edge of high tech, turns deserts into farmlands, wins awards at film festivals and boasts one of the liveliest, most open societies in the world.
And yet, on the international stage, it's very much a loser.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas addresses the United Nations General Assembly at UN Headquarters in New York on Nov. 29. Photo by Chip East/Reuters
Just look at what happened last week at the United Nations. Israel got creamed by the Palestinians 138 to 9, when more than two-thirds of the world body's 193 member states approved the resolution upgrading the Palestinians to a nonmember observer state.
It's tempting to dismiss the vote as yet another show of anti-Israel bias at the U.N., or to diminish the Palestinian victory by saying that "it hurts the peace process," "it's counterproductive," and so on.
But those are lame responses. The Palestinian goal was never to help the peace process. It was to isolate Israel on the international stage and continue undermining it. And on that, they won big.
The Palestinians don't negotiate. They attack.
Extremists like Hamas attack Israeli homes with missiles, hoping Israel will retaliate and cause civilian casualties that will result in diplomatic disasters like the Goldstone Report.
"Moderates" in the Palestinian Authority attack Israel with verbal missiles, demonizing and libeling Jews as foreign intruders with no connection to Jerusalem. Their repeated rejection of peace offers (including one offer of a Palestinian state on 97 percent of the West Bank and 100 percent of Gaza) and continued promotion of Jew-hatred in their society have exposed their bad faith and made Israelis wary of making further concessions -- a wariness that is then used to paint Israelis as intransigent.
Instead of sitting down to negotiate, these so-called Palestinian "moderates" go behind Israel's back to international bodies already hostile to Israel in the hope of further isolating the Jewish state.
And guess what? They're winning.
Israel may shoot down many missiles with the Iron Dome, but on the international stage, it has allowed diplomatic missiles to wreak havoc on Israel's reputation and legitimacy.
Could Israel have done anything differently to mitigate last week's humiliating defeat?
Yes, but first, it would have had to think differently.
The problem with Israeli diplomacy, as I see it, is that it's too rational and predictable. In the treacherous snake pit of Middle East and U.N. politics, there are moments when you must be sly and nimble.
