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JVP News Roundup, July 22, 2007 Arab League
The President announced this week that he intends to convene a
conference in the fall to "restart" the Middle East peace process.
Perhaps it is not surprising that the announcement has generated little
enthusiasm. Years of neglect and backward policies have led Israelis
and Palestinians down a black hole where a resolution to this conflict,
along virtually any theoretical lines, is more distant than ever.Syria Egypt In Israel In the Palestinian Territories Bush almost immediately backed off his dramatic announcement, saying the conference was "just a meeting." In either case, it is highly unlikely to produce material progress. The feeling that a two-state solution is no longer a realistic possibility is growing in both Israel and the Occupied Territories. The reasons for this are illustrated in this report from Peace Now in Israel. Not only are settlements dotting the West Bank, not only are they subsuming extra land for bypass roads and military and police functions, but they are also building far beyond even the boundaries set out by the Israeli government. Despite many strong-sounding declarations, the Israeli government has not even made a serious effort to remove so-called "illegal outposts" in the West Bank, let alone tried to regulate the behavior of the settlers in any substantial way. So, it is against this backdrop that Bush is calling for international meetings. Add that to the weakness of both the Bush and Olmert administrations, the fractured state of Palestinian leadership, restrictions against Palestinian travel in areas like the Jordan Valley, and continued fighting among Palestinians and it is obvious that concrete action on the ground is needed before a even the most ambitious of international conferences can have any effect. And this won't be such a meeting in case. Bush made it clear yet again that he does not understand or does not care that steps must be taken on both sides to resuscitate realistic hopes for a Palestinian state. Despite many knowledgeable people, including a retired Israeli general here, trying to convince the parties of what should be axiomatic, Bush, Olmert and Abbas intend to continue to try to press forward while ignoring a significant chunk of the Palestinian population. Moreover, almost all of the president's statements, both regarding this conference and regarding Tony Blair's envoy role, focus on "Palestinian reforms", without a mention of the need for Israel to start removing, at the least, the settlements the Israeli government calls illegal. Settlements seem to be an almost forgotten issue these days, nearly accepted as a fact of life. But this is also the one place where US influence could be felt and is the one place where substantive action would actually demonstrate to Palestinians that Abbas can accomplish something. This is important, as despite his legal maneuverings to create a new government without Hamas, and despite the fact that Hamas is widely criticized, more so than Fatah, for the current split among Palestinians, Abbas is still not seen as a legitimate leader. Arab League Jordan and Egypt have had peace treaties with Israel which have remained unbroken for many years. Their diplomats regularly visit Israel. But their upcoming visit will be very different, as they are coming under the auspices of the Arab League. The visit, which was delayed by a week, marks the first time the Arab league has sent an official delegation to Israel. This is quite a remarkable development, and along with the peace offer made in the Spring represents a major change in the Arab league's attitude toward Israel. For all the attention the issue of Palestine gets, in the last analysis, Arab leaders have different concerns, as former Mideast envoy James Wolfensohn points out. Iran's quest for greater regional influence, the rise of Islamist movements and regional stability in general, particularly in the wake of the American misadventure in Iraq are all providing much greater impetus than has ever existed in the past to settle the Israel-Palestine issue once and for all. Underpinning that thinking is that, with the exception of Syria, most Arab leaders no longer feel a great need to confront Israel. Conspiracy theories regarding Israeli control of US policy as well as the ongoing brutality of the occupation and the economic strangulation of Gaza continue to enflame emotions in the Arab street. But Arab leaders, as well as a growing sector of Arab society, eager to work with the West to combat what they see as regional threats, have apparently concluded that they have bigger fish to fry. That doesn't imply a sudden love of Israel or an embrace of Zionism, merely a pragmatism that is often lost on the rest of the world--that the Middle East is not defined by Israel and Palestine. Syria This shift has certainly been noted in Tel Aviv and Washington, yet the response has been less enthusiastic than one might hope. This is due to the same factors that have always made Israel and the US nervous about peace--the price it would entail. Talking about the refugees, taking on the issue of settlements, borders at least close to those of early 1967 and sharing Jerusalem are all issues that have huge political consequences in Israel. Pushing Israel on them, while possible, would mean the expenditure of great political capital in the US. Also, an agreement with Syria must be part of this, something the US does not wish to see as it undermines the "axis of evil" paradigm the Bush Administration has been working under. Recent calls by Syria for peace talks surely concerned the US, which had previously forbidden Israel to talk to Syria at all, then allowed them to talk as long as the discussions were not substantive. Thus it was a relief that, in the wake of reports that Turkey had been facilitating talks between Israel and Syria, that Bashar Assad departed from his line of recent months, offering talks with no preconditions. He has now taken the stance that Israel must agree to withdraw from the Golan Heights before negotiations can begin, a rather absurd stance that demands that the outcome of negotiations be pre-determined. It also may not be coincidental that this shift in Assad's public stance coincides with Iran's reported agreement to provide a large supply of arms to Syria, a report Iran has denied. Egypt The US and EU are supporting the policy of isolating Hamas, despite the fact that this makes a viable agreement with the Palestinians, as well as meaningful "reforms" much more difficult. For Egypt, though, this raises even more problems. The US Congress, poorly informed as always, has diminished the aid available to Egypt this year from 1.3 to 1.1 billion dollars, based on an assessment that the Egyptians are not doing enough to stop weapons smuggling into the Gaza Strip. Never mind the fact that Israel was unable to do any better in its day, or that smuggling is a global problem which no country has been able to resolve. In fact, Egypt has been working to stem the flow of weapons to Hamas, a group they don't want to see strengthened any more than Israel does. Unlike Israel, however, they must go about this without strengthening the popular appeal of the related Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, which is gradually becoming a more credible opponent of the government. While Egypt has every reason to see Hamas fail, they must proceed carefully due to domestic constraints. Thus, their interests lie in seeing a Palestinian rapprochement, and even facilitating it. Congress has completely failed to realize this, nor to understand the scope of Egypt's efforts along the border (efforts seriously complicated right now by the presence of many stranded Palestinians who cannot get back into Gaza). By undermining Egypt, Congress is not helping their resolve to stop smuggling into Gaza (something Egypt already has a strong interest in), but rather are demonstrating to the Arab world that friendship with the US isn't worth as much as it might seem. In Israel Israelis and Palestinians may lack parity in many ways, but one way in which they are starting to run neck and neck is in despair of a two-state solution. This is also expressed in increasing Israeli-Jewish nationalism. Nationalism in Israel, even before the state was created, has always found a great tension with equality for all of Israel's citizens. At better times, there have been strong calls in Israel for real equality under the law (with the lone exception of the Law of Return) between Jewish and non-Jewish citizens of the state. But in times like these, nationalism rises. This can be seen with the passage of the first reading of a new law which would overturn a Supreme Court decision barring the Israel Land Authority from discriminating against Arabs even in matters concerning land owned by the Jewish National Fund. The bill still needs to pass two more readings before becoming law, and there is hope that public outcry like this will turn the tide away from such a racist ruling. But there is obviously little sentiment for removing settlements in Israel. In fact, a recent report shows that the population of the settlements in the West Bank has grown more than three times the rate of the Israeli population behind the Green Line. And, while legitimate fear of Iran, as well as the more hysterical variety, is certainly high in Israel, it is worth noting that the attempt to lure Iran's Jews to immigrate to Israel was strongly rebuffed by the Jewish community in Iran. One might consider that when assuming that Iranian actions are motivated by anti-Semitism, despite the obvious bigotry of Iran's president. In the Palestinian Territories Despite missiles and mortars being fired at the Kerem Shalom crossing, humanitarian aid continued to come into Gaza. Yet, as reported in our last news roundup, the ongoing closures to all other materiel has essentially destroyed Gaza's economy. Virtually all the money and supplies coming into Gaza now amount to simple subsistence, essentially turning Gaza into a huge and absolute welfare state. For some time, observers have seen this dynamic as part of what donor countries contribute to and that this allows the occupation to move along at a "discount price" to Israel. The idea that donor countries might stop this outside support has always concerned Israel. The threat of such an action could also be a powerful political tool, and this is surely what Israel is concerned about as it warns donor states not to become active politically in the conflict. Yet something in the political air needs to change. The poverty and misery in Gaza is often seen as the future for West Bank Palestinians as well. 73% of Palestinians are afraid that Gaza and the West Bank will move farther apart, which also implies a real despair about re-uniting the Palestinian factions. There is a general lack of faith in the existing leadership of both Hamas and Fatah. The release by Israel of 250 prisoners was certainly a welcome event for the families of those released. But the fanfare it has produced in American media and in Israel is not matched among the Palestinians. If Israel really wants to bolster the Abbas leadership it claims to support, something much more material, something which alleviates the Palestinian condition, something like settlement removal and a substantial easing of restrictions on movement in the West Bank is going to be needed. More articles of interest
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