Afghanistan is rightly called "the graveyard of empires." We should call the Mideast "the tomb of peacemakers." In this troubled part of the world, real peace is as elusive and rarely-seen as the white Arabian gazelle.

So we observe, with an abundance of caution, President Barack Obama’s long-awaited Mideast peace offensive.

Many of the administration’s biggest guns have been sent to the Mideast in an all-out effort to get America’s squabbling allies to accept a comprehensive regional peace deal. The only notable absence from the American diplomatic A-team was, interestingly, Hillary Clinton, who was left at home to make nice to a visiting Chinese delegation.

The White House’s big push in the Mideast is being driven in good part by the growing danger of an Israeli attack on Iran and/or Lebanon.

Israel’s Defense Minister, Ehud Barak, openly warned Iran of possible military action if Tehran does not cease its nuclear program – which UN inspectors and US intelligence still says is non-military. Some American experts even worry Israel might use tactical nuclear weapons against deeply buried Iranian nuclear facilities, a cataclysm that would also contaminate Iraq, the Gulf, the oil fields of the Arabian Peninsula, Afghanistan, and all the US military personnel in the region.

US Defense Secretary Robert Gates has emerged as the Obama administration’s foreign policy strongman, eclipsing Hillary Clinton. His preeminence confirms that the Pentagon, not the State Department, continues to spearhead foreign policy, as was the case during the Bush years.

Gates stood next to Barak as the Israeli minister threatened Iran, clearly backing Israel’s threats. Gates warned Iran it had until September to begin talks on dismantling its nuclear energy program – or else.

What happened to Barack Obama, the "peace president"?

Interestingly, the US has lived for more than half a century under the threat of Soviet/Russian nuclear attack, and continues to do so under a strategy known as mutually assure destruction.

The US did not attempt to destroy the Soviet Union’s infant nuclear forces in the mid-1950’s, not even after Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev threatened, "we will bury you!"

But Washington seems to support Israel’s insistence that it cannot live under the possible future threat of Iranian nuclear weapons, if ever developed, even though it now has deployed an indestructible nuclear triad and an effective, layered antimissile system.

In any event, the intensifying power struggle in Iran’s feuding leadership will make any nuclear talks with the Western powers extremely difficult and uncertain.

In an unprecedented act by an Israeli leader, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu openly defied President Obama’s request that Israel cease building or expanding settlements on the West Bank and Golan. Netanyahu’s defiance was a clear sign of the strength of America’s Israel lobby and its domination of the US Congress, which allows the Israeli tail to wag the American dog.

Israel had became used to getting its way with the accommodating Clinton and Bush administrations. Relations with the Obama White House are edgy.

Netanyahu reportedly called Obama’s two most important advisors, Rahm Emanuel (whose father was Israeli) and David Axelrod, "self-hating Jews" for pressing Israel to end colonization and accept a Palestinian state. Netanyahu later denied the comment, but the damage was done.

A key partner in Netanyahu’s Likud-led coalition, Rabbi Ovadia Josef, spiritual leader (if he were in Iran, he’d be a Grand Ayatollah) of the religious Shas Party, called Obama "a slave who wants to rule the world" for urging Israel to halt settlement activity. The pro-Likud Washington Post newspaper dropped its pretense of impartiality and also blasted Obama over the settlement issue.

Meanwhile, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC, America’s powerful Israel lobby, which reflects the policies and thinking of Netanyahu’s Likud Party, reminded Obama not to press Israel into a peace agreement.

While running for president, Obama promised AIPAC he would never force Israel into an agreement it did not favor. He also vowed never to compel Israel to share Jerusalem with a new Palestinian state, a prerequisite to any lasting settlement. So candidate Obama effectively handcuffed President Obama.

In a stinging contradiction to Gates’s threats, the Pentagon’s chief, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen, warned any war with Iran would be extremely dangerous. He expressed the widely held fear among the US military that an Israeli attack on Iran would drag the US into a war it does not want and is not ready to fight. US forces that now ring Iran – in Iraq, the Gulf, Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Central Asia – are also vulnerable to Iranian ground and missile attack in wartime. In effect, they are hostages.

Mullen’s very public warning was another important sign of the deep divisions within the Obama administration over Iran and the Mideast.

Lost in this fracas was the announcement by the militant Palestinian movement, Hamas, that it would accept (though not now formally recognize) Israel within its former 1967 borders. This was a very important step forward as until now, Hamas has refused to accept the very existence of Israel. In turn, Israel has used Hamas’s refusal to avoid any open contacts with the most authentic and popular Palestinian group.

Long-simmering opposition to Israel’s expansionist policies among American Jews has recently erupted into the open, spearheaded by the new "J Street Group," which opposes the pro-Likud AIPAC and supports Israel’s peace movement and the creation of a Palestinian state.

Not surprisingly, the people of "J Street" are being denounced as traitors and "self-hating Jews" by the right-wing Israel lobby. Compared to the 800-lb AIPAC, "J Street" is a minnow. But this split in American Jewish ranks is very significant. There will be no genuine peace agreement nor creation of a viable Palestinian state until the influential American Jewish community supports the peace plan.

But in spite of "J Street" and other liberal Jewish groups, Likud’s lobby is still calling most of the shots when it comes to US Mideast policy.