Success penalised

By Mohamed Sid-Ahmed

With Congress poised to press for impeachment hearings and with the lack of enthusiasm, not to say outright reluctance, with which Israeli officials greeted news of his impending visit to Israel and Gaza, many of Clinton's close advisers urged him to call off his Middle East trip but he insisted that it should go ahead as planned. The visit was meant to achieve two apparently incompatible objectives: first, to salvage the floundering Wye Plantation Accord, and, second, to press for the final settlement talks. But if even the limited agreements reached at Wye Plantation have not been implemented on schedule, it is hard to see how the thorny issues deferred to the final status talks, such as Jerusalem, refugees, settlements and now critical water shortage, can be addressed at all.

Failure to implement the Wye Accord has exacerbated the deep feelings of mistrust and suspicion between the parties to the peace process. For example, Clinton's decision to visit the Palestinian Authority and to touch down in the new Gaza International Airport was interpreted by Netanyahu as signalling Washington's readiness to recognise an independent Palestinian state -- an interpretation reinforced by Hillary Clinton's televised statement some months ago that she favoured the creation of a Palestinian state. Although Hillary's statement was later dismissed as not representing the official US stand, nobody believed it was a simple slip of the tongue.

The highlight of Clinton's Middle East trip was, of course, his witnessing of the Palestinian National Council's near-unanimous vote to rescind the provisions of the Palestinian National Charter that Israelis interpret as denying Israel's right to exist. Although forced to admit that the PNC vote represented a fundamental step forward, Netanyahu did not give the Palestinians any credit for the change, attributing it rather to his own government's firmness and uncompromising stand -- an attitude that faces us with the need to further probe what criterion should be used in 'measuring' progress.

The criterion by which protagonists tend to measure progress is the extent to which the peace process brings them closer to their final goals. This is a purely subjective criterion, because the final goals of each party are viewed from the prism of its own self-interest. Even if the parties try to apply objective criteria, such as the principles of international legality, the question remains: how can goals that can be stated subjectively but cannot be implemented objectively, be regarded as credible or worthy of consideration?

For example, Netanyahu sets as an objective the unfettered establishment of Jewish settlements anywhere in the Occupied Territories. Moreover, he does not consider the handing back of Palestinian territory (let alone the creation of a Palestinian state) to be a prerequisite for peace. Peace, as perceived by Netanyhau, should be reached without ceding one inch of the territory he attributes to biblical Israel. He considers the concessions made in this connection by the previous Labour government to be tantamount to capitulation, an irresponsible policy which compromised the very essence of the Israeli state. How credible can such a stand be at a time Netanyahu not only finds himself obliged to sign the Wye Accord, which stipulates that Israel must pull out of Palestinian territories, albeit from a limited part of those territories, but is also faced with the PNC's near-unanimous vote recognising Israel's right to exist?

To have the accord he signed at Wye ratified by the Knesset, Netanyahu had to depend on the votes of his opponents in the Labour Party, while a substantial proportion of his own ruling coalition, both members of the Knesset and the government, voted against the prime minister. His government would have been brought down had it not been for one of the extreme right-wing parties which secured its temporary survival in exchange for a promise from Netanyahu that he will not implement the Wye Accord. Thus Netanyahu has neither ensured the stability of his government nor honoured his contractual obligations. Can this be considered a success for the Israeli prime minister? Is it justified to say that his position is solid?

One criterion by which to measure the solidity of a protagonist's position is not the degree of success he achieves in having his own agenda implemented, but the degree to which he succeeds in obstructing the implementation of his opponent's agenda. If the Palestinians fail to achieve their goals but succeed in preventing the Israeli government from achieving its goals, should this be looked upon as a plus or a minus for the Palestinians?

Arab supporters of the Wye Accord have argued that a bad agreement is better than no agreement at all and that, despite its shortcomings, the deal struck in Maryland serves the interests of the Palestinians better than it does those of Netanyahu. According to this line of reasoning, the fact that it has at least opened the door to a resumption of the long-stalled peace process is preferable to having to admit yet another failed attempt in that direction. However, to make the criterion of success here the avoidance of a worst-case scenario rather than the realisation of the best possible scenario can adversely affect a fundamental condition in any peace process, which is assumed to operate to the benefit of all the protagonists.

Clinton's Middle East trip was an opportunity for the Palestinians to demonstrate that they are capable of treating the Israelis as subjects, not objects, of history. The tripartite meeting that brought together the protagonists just before Clinton left for home demonstrated that the Palestinian approach has not been reciprocated by Binyamin Netanyahu. Nor is it likely to be reciprocated as long as Clinton's political future hangs in the balance.