Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, November 2001, page 11

Special Report

 

After the Sept. 11 Fall: No New Policy on Peace

 

By Eugene Bird

Two days after the Sept. 11 terrorist disaster, Secretary of State Colin Powell was asked a question about the possibility of aiming for a coalition for peace in the Middle East, instead of just a coalition against terror. Such a peace coalition would perform double duty: It could mollify the widespread criticism of the U.S. as doing nothing about the peace process except in collusion with Israel, and it could solidify support among people on the street for a real fight against terror.

Secretary Powell’s response was to divert the question to a claim that all possibilities were being explored. His expression, however, indicated to some of the correspondents present that it was a new—and perhaps promising—idea to him.

 

Pro-Israel Defense Establishment

The secretary of state, of course, faces a hard-line pro-Israel defense establishment that never misses an opportunity to equate President Yasser Arafat with Osama bin Laden. Even if Powell took the idea of a grand peace coalition to the president, he and the Department of State most likely would not find a friendly reception.

Understandably, President George W. Bush must take vigorous actions to try to root out international terror. But is there no one at the White House or the State Department asking the single question, “Why?” Why do 75 percent of the Arab peoples perceive the U.S as being fully responsible for what is happening to the people of Palestine?

Three-quarters of the Arab peoples—the so-called “street”—in five countries closely tied to the U.S. rank the Palestine issue as their number-one concern. By implication, they are angry at the American government (though not the American people) for protecting Israel from the consequences of its own outrageous violations of international law. The Arab people—even most of the Arab governments—have a love/hate relationship with the U.S.: hatred of its policies, which are destabilizing the entire Middle East, and love for the freedom and openness of the American people.

Nothing in Washington is simple these days as we gird for a long war of attrition against terrorism. No one quite knows where we are going to strike, or when, or if the terrorists may, in their inventive way, pull off another operation to shock the U.S. or Europe.

 

Sharon’s Refusal to Help

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s initial reaction was clear, however. Neither he—nor even his foreign minister, Shimon Peres—would accede to the wishes of the Bush administration and sit down with President Arafat. Three days after the attacks on the World Trade towers and the Pentagon, according to Khader Shkirat, director of LAW in Jerusalem, the Israeli press reported that Sharon had told President Bush, “If you allow Powell to meet with Bin Laden, I will allow Peres to meet with Arafat.”

In the midst of Washington’s effort to put together an anti-terror coalition, Sharon reportedly also said, “It is inconceivable to grant [Arafat] legitimacy because someone thinks that might facilitate the inclusion of Arab countries in this coalition. We will not pay the price for the establishment of this coalition.”

Given this Israeli attitude, even if Secretary Powell were armed with backing from the president it is wholly unlikely that Sharon and his government would agree to remain quiet while a coalition for peace is being created. Such a coalition would have to include some Arab states, and Israel does not want such a presence, no matter how far behind the negotiating table. It has always wanted to deal with Arab states on an individual basis, and until now—with assistance from the Americans—has always gotten its way.

 

Hundreds of Condolences

Hundreds of Palestinians sent letters or made personal calls to the American Consulate General in Jerusalem to express their condolences to the American people. The American media, however, gave their viewers the impression that a small group, primarily children, celebrating the bombing were the true representatives of the Palestinians.

There are approximately 200,000 graduates of American universities in the Arab world, and only a small minority of them go home with any feelings of anti-Americanism. During the 1960s, the leaders of newly independent African countries largely were trained in the West, many of them at Lincoln University in Pennsylvania. Some of these African leaders chose the Soviet side in the Cold War, or at least played footsie with Moscow. Nevertheless, they continued to have admiration for America, American life and the American people.

The situation is different with regard to Arab and Muslim states. The focal point for their deep distrust of America is, quite simply, an Israel that refuses to exchange illegally occupied territory for peace or to share Jerusalem. American refusal ever to effectively criticize Israeli actions against Arabs, and particularly Palestinians, is seen by many people in the street, and even by the leadership of these countries, as grossly unfair and counter to American beliefs and principles. Israel, it is perceived, is the constant exception to all the rules.

So those bent on violence against the West find a haven for their efforts even in countries nominally friendly or half-friendly to the United States. Every evening the hopelessness of the Palestinian situation is driven home to television audiences throughout the Arab world—as are America’s vetoes on behalf of Israel at the U.N. and, more importantly, the overwhelming U.S. financial and diplomatic support Israel enjoys, regardless of what actions it may take to undermine the peace process.

U.S. policy on the Middle East has created a house of mirrors and contradictions in which successive presidents and secretaries of state must live, regardless of the lack of logic and reason in denying our own American principles of one man one vote and the right of all peoples to self-determination. These arguments bear no weight in this administration, even less than in the Clinton governance.

 

The Occupation Will Continue

If not a coalition for peace, then, what? The emerging coalition against terror may have several gaps in its ranks, but it is an easier task diplomatically to in effect coordinate international police work than to take this remarkable moment and deal with the underlying causes. Most likely it will resemble America’s war on drugs, with similar results: a long and mostly unsuccessful effort, but with even greater permissiveness toward Israel as we beg Sharon to remain quiet and at least meet with Arafat.

Such a meeting, of course, would not deal with ending the occupation, Israeli withdrawal to its 1967 borders, and beginning the removal of Jewish colonies on the West Bank and in Gaza. So long as those colonies remain, the Israel Defense Force must remain in place to protect the country’s unpopular colonists.

The incessant ebb and flow of ideas and agendas around Washington, advising the administration either to be more cautious or more hawk-like in its war on terrorism, rarely deal with trying to move forward on quite possibly the most basic cause for outrageous terror against the West, and the U.S. in particular: Israeli occupation of Palestine.

That, apparently, would be too much to expect of an administration fighting a rear-guard action with the pro-Israel lobby and facing a tough mid-term election a year from now, as well as a diminished economy. A coalition for peace would require a dedicated president willing to go to the American people with an imaginative approach for fighting—and ending—this strangest of wars.

Judging by the glint in his eye as he answers questions such as the one cited at the beginning of this article, Secretary Powell appears to have both the imagination and the necessary clout with the president. What he does lack, however, is the freedom to be Colin Powell when it comes to the Middle East.

What Washington needs more than ever is an intifada (shaking off) of traditional American Mideast foreign policy.

Eugene Bird, a retired foreign service officer, is president of the Council for the National Interest and diplomatic correspondent for the Washington Report.

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