President Barack Obama met yesterday with Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas to advance a U.S.-backed framework outlining a comprehensive peace deal between Israel and the Palestinians, after weeks in which – per the Washington Post’s Jackson Diehl – Abbas “publicly campaign[ed] against the U.S. and Israeli position even before arriving in Washington.”

Why does Abbas dare to publicly campaign against the U.S. and Israeli position even before arriving in Washington? Simple: “Abbas believes he can say no to Obama because the U.S. administration will not take any retaliatory measures against the Palestinian Authority,” writes the veteran Israeli-Palestinian journalist Khaled Abu Toameh. Instead, Abbas expects to sit back if the talks fail, submit petitions to the United Nations and watch the anti-Israel boycotts mushroom, while paying no price of his own.

The Palestinian leader had specifically rejected bridging proposals from Secretary of State John Kerry on a range of issues, including proposals for sharing East Jerusalem, for meeting Israeli security needs along the border with Jordan, for formally giving up the demand that Israel accept millions of Palestinians from beyond its borders, and for recognizing Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people.

USA Today quoted Abbas declaring at Monday’s meeting that turmoil in the region meant that the Palestinians “don’t have any time to waste” and that “time is not on [their] side” regarding efforts to establish a viable Palestinian state, an assessment in tension with that of some foreign policy experts who insist that the Palestinians have the luxury of time while the clock is ticking against Israel.

For its part The Guardian reported on rallies held in the West Bank urging Abbas to “stand up to Obama… [and] resist calls to make concessions, especially on the issue of recognizing Israel as a Jewish state.”

Underscoring the pressure, hundreds of Abbas supporters in several cities across the West Bank staged rallies calling for him to stand up to Obama. Demonstrators held up posters of Abbas, pounded drums and urged him to resist calls to make concessions, especially on the issue of recognizing Israel as a Jewish state.

The rallies echoed violent anti-Obama demonstrations which took place in the West Bank during the U.S. President’s March 2013 visit to the territory.

[Photo: The White House / YouTube]