WASHINGTON, 19 April — Secretary of State Colin Powell met with President Bush yesterday to report on his unsuccessful “peace keeping mission” in the Middle East.
Arab and Europeans, meanwhile, are complaining that Powell’s efforts at peacemaking are being blocked by hawkish supporters of Israel in the Bush administration, particularly officials in the offices of Vice President Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
Saeb Erekat, Yasser Arafat’s adviser, recently said the appearance of Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz at rally for Israel in Washington this week was a sign that their fears were justified.
To understand this growing resentment, one must know who is who in the administration, and where their loyalties lie. Because of them, the frenzy of the administration’s anti-Palestinian campaign (and its embrace of Israel and Sharon) have caught the world, US allies, and many Americans, by surprise.
When George W. Bush was elected, it was thought his administration would be similar with the first Bush administration, which regarded Sharon and the Israeli right wing with real hostility. But… “when it comes to terror and the Arabs, the United States has become more Israeli than the Israelis… raining abuse and demonizing the Palestinians,” wrote Gideon Samet in the Israeli newspaper, Ha’aretz.
The current Bush administration is full with eager and highly ideological Israel supporters. Led by Wolfowitz, Washington insiders believe they make up the powerful and influential decision makers in Bush’s policy making.
Wolfowitz appears to be dealing primarily with broader Middle East issues, particularly targeting Iraq, and is described by one Washington Mideast observer as “over-the-top crazy when it comes to Israel.” He has propagated his views among senior policymakers by created a large network of pro-Israeli officials at the sub-Cabinet level. At the Defense Department, these include: Deputy Secretary for Policy Douglas Feith and Assistant Secretaries Peter Rodman and Dov Zackhiem. A few junior officials at Defense, including the Israel and Syria/Lebanon desk officers, are imports from the pro-Israeli Washington Institute for Near Easy Policy, a think-tank spun off from the pro-Israeli lobbyist group AIPAC.
One source told Arab News that the entire office of the Secretary of Defense is so highly politicized that working there is impossible unless the applicant shares the office’s hard-line views.
At the Cabinet level, there is little difference regarding the Israeli-Palestinian issue. Many diplomats point the finger at National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, who is thought to be behind the administration’s current hard-line rhetoric against Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, and is an ardent — some say blind — supporter of Israeli leader Ariel Sharon.
Elsewhere in the administration, another former Washington Institute fellow, John Hannah, is a key member of Vice President Richard Cheney’s personal National Security group. Cheney’s chief-of-staff, Lew Libby, is a protégé of Wolfowitz, and previously worked with him at both the State and Defense Departments.
On the National Security Council staff, Elliott Abrams, is said to be “noisy” in his support for Israel and his opposition to Arab interests. Undersecretary of State John Bolton is said be at odds with his colleagues there, and is known to network with pro-Israeli friends.
Pro-Israeli activists are also leaders in the information – and disinformation – area, which the US administration has been counting on to revamp the US image overseas. The head of Radio Liberty, once used for Cold War propaganda and now converted to service in the “war on terrorism,” is Thomas Dine, who was the head of AIPAC during the Reagan and Bush years.
Brig. Gen. Simon Worden, who directed the Office of Strategic Influence at the Pentagon, which was recently disbanded over controversy over plans to launch a campaign of deliberate distortion in foreign media, is a protégé of Douglas Feith.
As we are now witnessing, the pro-Israeli camp is definitively winning in the White House.
The State Department, and its Secretary Colin Powell, is viewed as being on the defensive and unable to press for a more balanced Mideast policy.
Palestinians have “muddied their message,” says one former diplomat, by mixing terrorism with other forms of resistance.
