The Palestine Papers

As many of you know, I really try to avoid working on issues related to the Israelis and Palestinians. The whole mess reminds me of the Western Front, with both sides entrenched in their fighting positions and lobbing round after round of heavy artillery at the other side. I mean, on the one hand, I have spent a lot of time in the Arabic-speaking world, have traveled widely through Israel and the Palestinian Territories, speak one of the relevant languages, and genuinely like visiting Israel and its neighbors (where I have many friends). So I really should take an active interest in the issues. On the other hand, though, I have instead chosen to spend my days trying to think of ways to win a counterinsurgency campaign in a landlocked mountainous state in Central Asia in part because it's a lot more "do-able" than brokering peace in the Levant, and no one is going to call me ugly names if I suggest, to pick one example, talking with our violent Islamist adversaries.

That having been said, I know enough about the issues to know that the release of the so-called "Palestine Papers" is kind of a big deal. So if you have any interest whatsoever in the Middle East "Peace Process" and are not otherwise busy breaking down Green Bay's blitz packages or pondering what President Obama will say in tomorrow's State of the Union Address, you'll want to follow their release, which you can do here, as well as the commentary, which you can do here.

Have fun with that. Let me know how everything turns out.