It is now all but certain that the road map to Middle East peace will be unveiled sometime this week. The new Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas and his Cabinet are widely expected to be confirmed in a special session tomorrow in Ramallah. Such an appointment was a prerequisite for the United States to trigger publication of the road map which, despite its many flaws, is widely seen as being the best hope for ending the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. But even before the road map is officially unveiled, there is the extremely disturbing position that the United States has taken toward Palestine President Yasser Arafat. The Bush administration is pressing nations to cut back diplomatic contacts with Arafat in an unprecedented attempt to undercut his authority.
Not only is US Secretary of State Colin Powell expected to snub Arafat when he starts his Middle East tour next week, for example, but an effort is well under way to persuade other nations to cut off contact as well. A test of this policy may come over the weekend, with the visit of the Japanese Foreign Minister Yoriko Kawaguchi to Israel. Kawaguchi is being told that if she meets with Arafat she may not be able to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon. Other Bush administration officials are sounding the rallying cry to boycott Arafat. The US assistant secretary of state for European affairs, Elizabeth Jones, has said European leaders should stop visiting Arafat if they want to help the Middle East peace process. “The more European prime ministers go visit Arafat, the more Arafat will feel tempted to interfere in a negative way (in the establishment of a new Palestinian government),” was Jones’ argument. This needs some explaining. In the meantime, she suggested the following: Arafat must understand that he is no longer in charge and that Abbas is.
Naturally, Israel has also sought to convince diplomatic visitors not to meet with Arafat and hold talks only with Abbas. Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom argues that his foreign counterparts due to visit the region in coming weeks “have no reason whatsoever to meet with Arafat since Israel refuses to talk to him” and considers him “irrelevant.” So unhappy is the Israeli leadership with the attention Arafat has been getting from foreign powers lately that Shalom and Sharon are due to discuss what measures to take against those who insist on visiting him.
However, Arafat has his supporters. The European Commission has rebuffed the US call to shun him, saying the European Union would talk to whomever it wanted to. Its stand is that who it contacts or who it doesn’t is its business alone. In the bigger picture, the row over sidelining Arafat has prompted the European Union to insist that its role in the Middle East is no less important than that of the United States. It is adamant that the United States does not have sole ownership of the road map. Although quite frequently it is said that this is America’s road map, it is not the property of one country. It is the road map of the Quartet. And it is one which needs Arafat if it is to be implemented. Arafat remains president of the Palestinians and, notwithstanding a new prime minister, his legitimacy as leader remains undiminished. He remains the political and moral authority of the Palestinian people and neither the United States nor Israel can change that.
