In the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks, when the US started planning its response against the Taleban, there were reports in Washington of a split in the Bush administration between hawks and doves. It was said that President Bush was listening to the hawks led by Vice President Dick Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld; the doves by Secretary of State Colin Powell did not have his ears. It looks that the same is happening again.
Powell’s mission has received no evident practical backup so far from President Bush. The language Powell himself used before he left the US — demanding an immediate Israeli pullout from reoccupied Palestinian territories — was unambiguous: “immediate” means now. But Sharon blatantly spurns American demands. Had such a response come from the leader of any other country, it would have resulted in furious denunciations and threats from the White House. A speech from President Bush containing a few verbal broadsides, including a threat to cut support back, and a specific condemnation or two of Sharon himself, with blunt warnings, would make all the difference. And the White House knows it. But no such warnings come. There has to be a reason for their absence and why Powell appears so frustrated and why his is a mission adrift.
Most Arabs are convinced they know that reason. For them, the silence says one thing: that Powell was never meant to succeed, that his mission was a confidence trick to deceive them into believing that Washington had decided to rein in its bellicose protégé and that it was actually doing something to that effect. Is this the reason? Or is it that Bush does not dare to stand up to Sharon? Is it that he cannot do anything or will not do anything? It is impossible, to believe that Israel holds the US in such thrall. Washington has the skills and power to make Israel comply, if it wants to. The conclusion has to be that it does not have the urge to stand up to Sharon.
In which case, watch out for Washington coming up with other ways of claiming that progress is being made. There is already a worrying willingness to go along with Sharon’s suggestion of a regional peace conference, where the US would host talks between Israel, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Morocco and Palestinian representatives and other interested parties. Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat says he will accept the Israeli proposal if it has American backing, but there are two fundamental flaws to it. The first is that the Israelis still think that they can do a deal with Arab states which the Palestinians will then be forced to accept. The second is their attempt to exclude Arafat from the process.
The Israelis have to understand that their conflict is first and foremost with the Palestinians and that no Arab state is going to sign up to a deal they oppose. They also need to realize that it is not in their power to decide who is the Palestinian leader any more than the Palestinians can decide who speaks for Israel. The sooner they accept that the Palestinians have minds and wills of their own and that they will not accept being crushed, the sooner a peace that guarantees Israel’s security will happen. It is something the Americans need to understand as well.
