Does the US have close economic/military relationships with Israel-bashing Arab countries? It does. Although they are not the best possible alliances (not ideological similarity), they are convenient. So theory holds out in practice, doesn't it? ;)
There was a time in the 70s when Arab governments did the whole embargo thing, but they quickly realized that its not in their best interest. And the US-Israel relationship has only improved, hasn't it? I don't think back then there was a deep military relationship between the countries.
As for the push in the right direction - I think there are some limits to what you can practically do in this relationship as in any. You don't want to risk the favorable strategic terms of the status quo in any way and you want some changes. It gets tougher when your job as a politician is to win votes. Maybe this special relationship is the barrier to solution and not an endless limbo. This is a question too deep of foreign policy, too many books on the subject. I like those from Fareed Zakaria, because he deals in much more broader terms than local issues.
Remember that with constant escalation coming from the Balkans, the world entered World War I. Just the same, is the question of who is right and wrong and what is doing locally that important in the much larger , global scope? And then again, what credibility does a 'global concert' have if it cannot resolve a given issue for 60 years?
Does the US have close economic/military relationships with Israel-bashing Arab countries? It does. Although they are not the best possible alliances (not ideological similarity), they are convenient. So theory holds out in practice, doesn't it? ;)
There was a time in the 70s when Arab governments did the whole embargo thing, but they quickly realized that its not in their best interest. And the US-Israel relationship has only improved, hasn't it? I don't think back then there was a deep military relationship between the countries.
As for the push in the right direction - I think there are some limits to what you can practically do in this relationship as in any. You don't want to risk the favorable strategic terms of the status quo in any way and you want some changes. It gets tougher when your job as a politician is to win votes. Maybe this special relationship is the barrier to solution and not an endless limbo. This is a question too deep of foreign policy, too many books on the subject. I like those from Fareed Zakaria, because he deals in much more broader terms than local issues.
Remember that with constant escalation coming from the Balkans, the world entered World War I. Just the same, is the question of who is right and wrong and what is doing locally that important in the much larger , global scope? And then again, what credibility does a 'global concert' have if it cannot resolve a given issue for 60 years?