Freedom in Pakistan, Justice in Palestine Fall Victim to Bush’s War on “Extremists”
| WRMEA Archives 2006-2010 - 2008 January-February |
Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, January-February 2008, pages 7-9
Special Report
Freedom in Pakistan, Justice in Palestine Fall Victim to Bush’s War on “Extremists”
By Rachelle Marshall
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AS GEORGE BUSH entered the last year of his presidency, the enormity of the damage his administration has done was evident across the Middle East, from Mogadishu to Baghdad, from Islamabad to Gaza. In all of these areas, actions by the U.S. and its allies have led to more human suffering and greater erosion of freedom than the cruelest terrorist could wish for, and encouraged the extremism they were designed to eliminate.
President Pervez Musharraf’s imposition of martial law in Pakistan, and a peace conference in November that left Palestinians with only empty promises, brought into sharp focus the dangers inherent in a Middle East policy that was aimed from the beginning at eliminating potential challengers to U.S. and Israeli dominance over the region. Bush’s post-9/11 “war on terror” provided the rationale for achieving this goal by force.
Immediately after the World Trade Center attacks, Philip C. Wilcox, Jr., who was U.S. ambassador at large for counterterrorism between 1994 and 1997, warned against responding with military action. In an article written on Sept. 19, 2001 for the Nov. 9 issue of the New York Review of Books, Wilcox called instead for an international police action against the perpetrators, and a change in U.S. foreign policy. He specifically urged a reappraisal of U.S. policies concerning the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and Iraq, citing them as a cause of “deep anger against America in the Arab and Islamic world.”
Wilcox’s words are even more relevant today. The terrorists of 9/11 were conscienceless killers, but they undoubtedly expressed the anger of many in the world at an America that in the 1991 Gulf war had leveled Iraq’s infrastructure and killed tens of thousands of Iraqis, and afterwards imposed sanctions responsible for the death of at least half a million Iraqi children. They saw an America that preached democracy while arming brutal dictators and corrupt rulers, that talked about human rights while supporting Israel’s oppression of the Palestinians.
The hypocrisy and folly of U.S. policy were vividly revealed last November, when the Bush administration found itself tied to Pakistan’s military dictator as he filled the jails with judges, lawyers, human rights activists and political opponents, and shut down the country’s independent media. The costs of Bush’s war on terror have long been evident in Iraq’s broken society, in our own military cemeteries and hospitals, and in the erosion of our system of justice. Last fall those costs were illustrated in pictures of bloodied lawyers in Islamabad being driven off to prison.
As Musharraf’s police were rounding up thousands of peaceful protestors, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice criticized his “bad decision,” but described him as “someone who has tried to fight terrorism and...unravel some of the extremist elements.” When Musharraf scheduled elections while refusing to lift martial law, Bush said the general “truly is someone who believes in democracy.” When Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte went to Islamabad to urge the release of prisoners and an end to the state of emergency and was rebuffed, he said of the man who had just thrown all his political opponents in jail, “President Musharraf has been and continues to be a strong voice against extremism.”
Musharraf knew he was on safe ground. The U.S. investment in Pakistan is now too great to walk away from. The administration has poured out $10 billion in aid to Pakistan since 2001, with almost all of it going to the military and to support for the government. In 2006 retired Ambassador Teresita Schaffer, the State Department’s leading specialist on Pakistan, urged that the U.S. provide aid to educational and civic institutions rather than the military, warning that otherwise “the troubles that afflict today’s Pakistan are likely to intensify.” Washington ignored her appeal.
Despite Musharraf’s claims to be fighting terrorists, the mass arrests and silencing of the media were aimed almost solely at protecting his own position against challenges from the courts and from political opponents who favor consitutional democracy. Meanwhile his army has been unable, or unwilling, to cope with Pashtun tribesmen in northwest Pakistan. Once the bane of British and Russian invaders, they now have risen up in opposition to the U.S.-NATO intervention in Afghanistan and to Pakistan’s close ties to the Bush administration. The Pentagon is now proposing to send more American soldiers into the tribal areas to train local militias and strengthen Pakistan’s largely ineffective Frontier Force.
By reinforcing the U.S. military alliance with Pakistan’s fragile dictatorship, the Bush administration is likely to encourage more extremism, not less. In an article for the Nov. 19 issue of The Nation, Sherle R. Schwenninger of the World Policy Institute wrote, “It is not a coincidence that the greatest amount of Islamic terrorism stems from resistance to foreign military occupation or that governments that feel most vulnerable to Islamic jihadism are those that have had a close association with the United States or on whose soil the United States has left the heaviest footprint.”
Schwenninger’s observation is especially relevant to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Resolving that conflict is crucial to stability in the Middle East, but Washington’s unwavering support for Israel and its refusal to distinguish between stateless extremists and nationalist resistance groups is making a just solution more difficult to achieve and adding to the ranks of extremists.
Increasing the Odds of Failure
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When Bush last July announced a conference designed to achieve a comprehensive Middle East peace, the odds against success seemed formidable. The odds are even greater now that the conference is over. Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas originally wanted the meeting to deal with the core issues, including the status of Jerusalem, the borders of a Palestinian state, return of Palestinian refugees, and the dismantling of Israeli settlements; and draw up a timetable for implementing the resulting agreement. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert insisted on negotiating only a “framework” for future discussions. It was no contest, and the conference fizzled out with both sides agreeing only to negotiate a peace treaty by the end of 2008. Meanwhile the U.S. would monitor their progress, but would not otherwise intervene.
As Israel remained opposed to substantive negotiations, Secretary of State Rice kept backpedalling until the conference was reduced to a one-day talk session attended by representatives of 49 nations, including Senegal and Brazil. “People are starting to see Annapolis as the beginning of a process, not a single point in time,” Rice said finally. It is doubtful that the “people” she referred to included the Palestinians, who have suffered under Israel’s occupation for 40 years.
As the date for the conference approached, the crucial question was not what issues would be settled—the answer was none—but whether the Arab nations would attend. The Arab League, including Saudi Arabia and Syria, finally voted to come after being assured that Israel’s return of the Golan would be on the agenda. It was, but only as a formality. Hours after the conference ended, Prime Minister Olmert said, “Conditions are not yet at the point” for talks with Syria, and U.S. national security adviser Stephen Hadley said Syria had to “give up their support for terror, let Lebanon alone, and support a new Iraqi government” before talks on the Golan Heights could begin.
In the weeks before the conference, Olmert reaffirmed his hard-line position. He agreed to build no new settlements but said Israel would continue to expand existing ones to allow for “natural growth.” According to Peace Now, 88 West Bank settlements are currently being enlarged. Olmert’s peace terms also call for Israel to retain the huge settlement blocs that lie on the West Bank’s main water acquifers, a position Bush has endorsed.
An almost certain deal breaker in future negotiations is Israel’s insistence that the Palestinians recognize Israel as a “Jewish state,” which would mean giving up the right of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes in Israel. As minister for immigration in 2004, Foreign Minister Tsipi Livni convinced Rice and Bush to break with previous State Department policy and endorse Israel’s position on the refugees. But it is doubtful that any Palestinian leader, including Abbas, could long remain in office after formally relinquishing the rights of the refugees.
Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal addressed Israel’s demand almost as soon as he arrived in Washington. “Here is an issue,” he said, “where people not from Palestine come to land in Palestine that happened to have people living there, and now they want to consider these people illegal in a purely Jewish homeland. Why? If you come to a neighborhood by choice you have to live with the people in the neighborhood.”
The conference did nothing to change the realities on the ground. Both sides agreed to revive the long moribund “road map,” which Bush proposed in 2003. It emphasizes Israel’s need for security and requires the Palestinians to disarm all militant groups. Israel in exchange must freeze settlement construction and begin confidence-building efforts, but there is no mechanism to compel Israel to lift the hundreds of checkpoints and barriers that obstruct all movement on the West Bank, or begin dismantling the road network that locks Palestinians into separate enclaves. There will be no outside pressure on Israel to release the 11,500 Palestinian prisoners or protect Palestinian villagers from settlers who, unhindered by the Israeli army, poison their flocks and uproot their olive trees.
The most shameful omission at the conference was any mention of the worsening humanitarian crisis in Gaza. While high-flown phrases filled the Naval Academy’s assembly hall, Gazans were suffering under an Israeli-imposed siege that has paralyzed their economy, caused contamination of their water supply, and subjected a generation of children to hunger and disease.
Neither Hamas nor Iran were invited to Annapolis, although their cooperation is crucial to any peace agreement. Their absence underscored what in fact became the main theme of the conference: the need for Israel, the Palestinians and Arab leaders to present a united front against Iran and the groups it supports, Hamas and Hezbollah. “A battle is underway for the future of the Middle East,” Bush said in his opening speech to the assembly, “and we must not cede victory to the extremists.”
Without naming Hamas, Bush accused extremists of “seeking to impose a dark vision on the Palestinians” and said, “Standing against this dark vision are President Abbas and his government.” His words reflected the deepening split between Hamas and Fatah that the U.S. and Israel have actively fostered since Palestinians elected a Hamas government in 2006. Israel has since jailed dozens of the Hamas legislators, along with several cabinet members, and Abbas now rules the West Bank by decree. Hamas leaders have repeatedly requested talks with Abbas on restoring the unity government, but Abbas insists that they first apologize for their “coup” in Gaza last June, and restore Fatah security officials to their posts.
Palestinian supporters of both parties agree that the U.S.-trained Fatah forces were notoriously corrupt, and that Hamas police brought a degree of peace and security to the streets of Gaza that did not exist before. But the calm in Gaza is a fragile one. The Palestinian Authority, undoubtedly with Israel’s approval, has created a new counterterrorism unit called Al Himaya Wal Isnad that is being trained in Moscow by instructors from the Alpha commando unit that fought Chechen rebels—and more often killed civilians. Similar training courses are being held in Algeria, Germany and France. A Palestinian security officer connected to Al Himaya Wal Isnad said, “We talk about an Israeli invasion of Gaza all the time...We are training for the day after Israel cuts Hamas in half and then we can go in and clean up.”
Israel’s top military commander, Lt. Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi, announced on Dec. 5 that the army had completed plans for a large-scale offensive in Gaza and was only waiting for government approval. Meanwhile, he said, the army will continue “to operate day and night” with air strikes and ground incursions. In the first 10 days following the Annapolis conference, Israeli forces in Gaza and the West Bank killed 32 Palestinians. Most of the targeted victims were Hamas members, although the rocket attacks Israel is attempting to stop are mainly carried out by militants not associated with Hamas.
Meanwhile the exclusion of Hamas from peace talks and the boycott imposed by Israel, the U.S. and the international community have silenced the voices of moderate Hamas leaders who had accepted the Arab peace proposal of 2002, and strengthened the hard-liners, whose words echo those of Israel’s right wing. “Not a single person, not a government, not a single generation has the right to relinquish any area of Palestine,” Hamas member Mahmoud Zahar told a crowd in Gaza in late November. “Any normalization of relations with the enemy is treason.”
The deep division among Palestinians may in the end be as serious an obstacle to peace as Israel’s intransigence, especially since there is a danger of escalating violence between Palestinian factions. In the days following the Annapolis conference, tens of thousands of Gazans came out to protest, and fighting broke out in several West Bank cities between Hamas supporters and Fatah police.
With no help coming from Washington, the Palestinians’ only source of strength as they face negotiations with Israel lies in their unity. Robert Malley, a Middle East peace negotiator under President Bill Clinton, said of the Annapolis meeting, “All this is a fantasy unless internal Palestinian divisions are healed.” But those divisions will not be healed as long as the Bush administration continues to isolate and try to crush groups that resist Israel’s occupation of their land.
Three years ago Bush declared, “It is the policy of the United States to seek and support the growth of democratic movements and institutions in every nation and culture, with the ultimate goal of ending tyranny in our world.”
With Prime Minister Olmert and President Musharraf as America’s closest allies today, and Palestinians destined to go on suffering under a brutal occupation, it will take more than pious rhetoric to cover over the falsity of those words.
Rachelle Marshall is a free-lance editor living in Stanford, CA. A member of the Jewish International Peace Union, she writes frequently on the Middle East.
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