The following development underlines once more the futility of peace negotiations with the Israeli government, as both the people and actions that aggravate relations are seemingly rewarded:

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has offered an advisory post to a Jewish settler leader involved in a 1988 killing of a Palestinian youth during an anti-Israeli protest, a settler spokeswoman said on Monday.

Netanyahu’s spokesmen would neither confirm or deny he had asked Pinchas Wallerstein, 60, director-general of the settlers’ YESHA council, to serve as the prime minister’s adviser on settlement affairs.

In 1988, Wallerstein was sentenced to four months’ community service after being convicted of “causing death by negligence” in the shooting of a 16-year-old Palestinian in the West Bank.

A spokeswoman for Wallerstein said he and a bodyguard had chased and opened fire at the youngster and other Palestinian protesters who were throwing stones and burning tyres. [Source]

Two things spring to mind: foremost, if – and when – a Palestinian is appointed to a high ranking position in the Palestinian government and it emerges that he has Israeli blood on his hands, the media goes nuts.

The news that Wallerstein was sentenced for his role in the death of a Palestinian teenager – four months! – has been greeted with insouciance.

Secondly, Wallerstein has made it a condition of his appointment that Israel continues to reject President Obama’s demands to halt the construction of settlements in the West Bank.

The offer is therefore indicative of two things: that the death of a Palestinian child is no impediment to a political career in what is dubbed ‘the region’s only democratic state’ and that Netanyahu does not consider the settlement issue an ‘issue’ per se.

Indeed, the appointment of Wallerstein is the equivilent of the two-fingered salute to Obama’s request.

No address could have made this stance clearer.