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Al-Ahram Weekly 2 - 8 March 2000 Issue No. 471 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 2 - 8 March 2000 Issue No. 471
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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As the Arab-Israeli peace process enters what may well be its terminal phase, Al-Ahram Weekly turned to renowned analyst and commentator
Mohamed Hassanein Heikal for his vision of Egypt's role in the future of the Middle East
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Living with contradiction
Times change quickly. At the turn of the new century, the peace process seemed pregnant with possibilities; now it has been reduced to a shambles on all tracks. The optimism triggered by US President Bill Clinton's 8 December announcement of the resumption of Israeli-Syrian negotiations -- which were to begin again from "the point at which they had stopped" -- did not survive two rounds of talks, let alone as many months. The abasement of the Palestinians plumbed new depths, and the 13 February deadline for a Framework Agreement on Final Status issues was contemptuously passed over. Israel launched yet another frenzied and futile war against Lebanon, and Israeli bombs and missiles once again rained down on Lebanese civilians and civil installations, in collective punishment for the humiliation of Israel's occupation army at the hands of Hizbullah resistance fighters.
While Israeli Foreign Minister David Levi continued to issue his genocidal threats to "burn Lebanon", President Hosni Mubarak made an unprecedented solidarity visit to Beirut. Suddenly, all hell broke loose. Israeli officials and media feverishly lambasted Egypt for "supporting Hizbullah terrorism" -- a charge that found sympathetic ears in the US administration and media, despite the fact that Hizbullah has not targeted a single Israeli civilian. But Egypt refused to back down. In an interview with the German magazine Der Spiegel, Mubarak did not pull his punches: Hizbullah was fighting on occupied Lebanese territory, he told his interviewers; people's resistance to foreign occupation is a legitimate and fundamental right.
The "window of opportunity" which US President Bill Clinton's few remaining months in office at first seemed to promise, now appears to have been firmly shut. The peace process is bogged down in yet another indefinitely extendable hiatus and Egyptian-Israeli relations are at an all-time low. The great irony is that all this has come to pass at a time when the two countries were supposed to be marking the 20th anniversary of their diplomatic relations. No wonder then that the historic occasion has passed virtually unremarked.
So now we seem to be embarking on a new phase in Arab-Israeli -- and particularly, Egyptian-Israeli -- relations. But what will this new phase look like? And what, more specifically, will it mean for Egypt's status and role in the region? After all, everyone realises that in determining the course of Egyptian-Israeli relations, questions of a purely bilateral nature are far less important than the relative weight of the two countries within the region, and the roles which they are called to act out on a broader stage. Such considerations, after all, have always been the key factor in defining the configuration of power in the region.
So what now are the likely scenarios? And in what different ways might Egypt seek to play her hand? Who better to answer these questions for us, than Mohamed Hassanein Heikal.
'I believe the coming challenge for Egypt is to provide careful and imaginative coverage for the halt in the peace process. This can be achieved by putting Mubarak's Lebanese visit, the reactions it triggered, and the subsequent decision to hold a meeting of the Arab League Council in Beirut, under a microscope. The anatomy of that episode should provide you with the parameters of a policy.'
"The five hours that Mubarak spent in Beirut have asserted -- or at the very least, served as a reminder of -- Egypt's regional role," Heikal begins. Egypt's leadership of the region has been much discussed over the last few years, he notes, "but a leadership role is not something that one can claim while shying away from the responsibilities associated with it. This would just be empty pretention. If, however, you respond to the call that your responsibility in your region implies, and if the region welcomes this response, then it is the region that has laid on you the mantle of leadership."
A leadership role, explains Heikal, "is a function of the recognition of others." He cites the example of Egypt's leading role in the Non-Aligned Movement in the '50s and '60s. This was not a role which the country claimed for itself, but one which others bestowed upon it in recognition of the responsibilities it had assumed. Similarly, Mubarak's visit has triggered a new sense of confidence in Arab public opinion because "Egypt has acted." "To claim leadership is very easy. To act is altogether a different matter," Heikal asserts.
For Heikal, Egypt's role as leader in the Arab world is completely at odds with another role -- that of "matchmaker" in the current peace process. Indeed, the two functions are mutually exclusive.
"A matchmaker may succeed or fail. It is a thankless task in either case. If it succeeds, once the matchmaker has been paid off, the most that can be hoped for is an invitation to attend the wedding party. And if it fails, there will be no wedding to start with."
Heikal is emphatic. "Israel has always wanted to sideline Egypt, and had partially succeeded. The imposition of an Israeli peace on the region implies, of necessity, that Egypt will eventually be completely isolated. You'll be totally ignored, because all the focus will be on the Fertile Crescent region, and through it, the Gulf. Egypt will find itself confined to Africa, made unwelcome by the North African group and forced to look south, towards the Sudan. The risk then is that it may become too deeply entangled in that country's complex problems."
Israel looks to the Levant and the Gulf as its "vital space", asserts Heikal. It is there that its interests lie, and to freely pursue these interests Israel "will not be content until Egypt is transformed into a country like Bangladesh -- a population bloc deeply embroiled in its own, endless problems."
He scoffs at talk of Egypt's "regional role" under such conditions.
"A 'role' requires a stage to be played on, and a settlement of the sort being envisaged implies first and foremost that Egypt will be removed from the stage. You cannot speak of a role when the space within which you're supposed to play that role is no longer there."
This adversary "will not be transformed into a friend" insists Heikal. He cites "the blatant racism" of a statement made recently by the "dovish" Shimon Peres during the World Economic Forum meeting at Davos, Switzerland, in which the Israeli minister of regional cooperation spoke of Israel as "a clean spot in a polluted environment".
"Look at the way Levi talks [about burning Lebanon]. Can you seriously tell me that this is a man I can have genuine peace with? And what of Barak and his antics? We have tried them all. We've tried Peres, who looks to us as a polluted environment. We've tried Rabin, whose name is now associated with peace, but whom I can only remember as the architect of the 'arm-breaking' policy directed at the children of the Intifada. We have tried Shamir; we have tried the full spectrum of Israeli political leaders. And we have not met with a single response that indicates a genuine desire for real peace."
Indeed, "to speak of peace with Israel -- peace in the real and full sense of the word -- is to suffer from a state of delirium," says Heikal. If not peace, then what? What do the coming years hold in store for Arab -- and more specifically Egyptian -- relations, and conflicts, with Israel?
"You are faced with a totally new configuration," replies Heikal, "one that can only be grasped through novel concepts. If you tell me you are seeking peace, I would say you are chasing an illusion. If you talk of war, my response would be that you are pursuing a myth. But neither can one speak of the kind of 'no-war, no-peace' situation that existed between '67 and '73. That was a state of suspended animation. Then, it was still possible to make the choice between war and peace."
Heikal elaborates: "I was one of the people who opposed [the 1978] Camp David [Accords between Egypt and Israel], and I was imprisoned for it. Nevertheless, there is a difference between conceding the status quo and acting out of a realisation that certain things have in fact taken place. We have to act on the basis of the recognition that -- like it or not -- there is a de facto situation, call it what you will; it is one I cannot ignore, and with which I have to deal."
Heikal envisages an on-going long-term conflict, but one of a very special sort. "The notion of conflict is loaded with a sense of armed confrontation, which is not at all what I'm speaking of," he explains. "When you look at relations between two neighbouring countries, there is a fact that cannot be wished away -- these relations will be characterised either by shared interests, close ties and a kind of natural contiguity, or by conflict -- what we might call, for lack of a better term, contradiction. This is especially true when the two neighbours exist within a region in which both enjoy special status."
For Heikal, an obvious example of this kind of situation is provided by the case of Germany and France, "though one must first underline the significant difference between this case and ours, namely, that while both France and Germany are 'natural' entities, Israel, in my view, is not." France and Germany, Heikal adds, "were able to transcend continuous conflict and war only when they created out of their shared borders a region of economic unity (based on the iron and steel industry), which later became the basis for the European Community and finally the European Union."
A similar example is the integration of Eastern Europe with the western part of the continent after the fall of communism. "We must not forget that the reason Czechoslovakia, and even Poland and Hungary, fit easily with the rest of Europe lies in the fact that these countries had been artificially separated from their natural habitat by force of the Red Army. They share the same heritage. They have strong cultural bonds and had previously been part and parcel of modern Europe's industrial civilisation. When the iron curtain fell, it was natural that they would immediately reintegrate with their natural environment."
None of this is directly applicable to the case of Egypt and Israel, he insists.
"Conflict here exists by necessity, irrespective of our wishes." According to Heikal, the contradiction between Egypt and Israel would exist "even if we disregard the usurpation of Palestine and the dispossession of the Palestinians. For the fact remains that Israel is put there so as to isolate me from an area to which I belong, an area which I claim is a natural extension of my existence -- in Asia -- just as that area views me as its natural extension in Africa. A wall has been put up between Egypt and the Arab east".
Can this obstacle be surmounted or worked around?
"I do not believe it can. There can be no fusion of the arteries of the kind we have seen in the border region between France and Germany. Here the body will reject this kind of implant, because the organ you're implanting is by its very nature one that disjoins rather than fuses. In marked contrast with France and Germany, here we have two countries which are engaged in a contest over their respective presences in the region, one by right of belonging, the other by right of superiority, of hegemony and control."
As far as Heikal is concerned, this contest between Egypt and Israel "is intractable, it is a fact of life. And, as such, any effort Egypt makes towards encouraging the normalisation of relations between Israel and any Arab party can only be at its own expense; these relations are then discounted from the total of Egypt's regional assets."
"And why should the fact of an on-going contradiction between two neighbouring states be so frightening?" asks Heikal.
The question is irreverent. The Middle East peace process, after all, as enshrined at the heart of the sanctimonious discourse of "peace-in-our-time", has for two decades held out the elusive promise of flourishing cooperation.
But Heikal continues, "Look at how China has dealt with Taiwan for over half a century. And what of India and Pakistan, which used to be one country? Why have all 'the angels of reconciliation' come to hover over this region in particular?"
"Why not just accept the fact of being party to an on-going contradiction? Live with it and maintain it at a certain level of tension. This need not be a bad thing. On the contrary, I believe that certain kinds of tension can be creative."
The basic question, Heikal is keen to emphasise, is one of management. "For many years to come, Egypt will be obliged to manage a conflict, or fundamental contradiction, with Israel; one that has not ended, and will not end, in genuine peace, at least in our time. As such, you are faced with a new question: how to manage a long-term, low-grade and strictly controlled conflict, and ensure that it does not spin out of control."
This is not to say that the conflict between Egypt and Israel can be defined as two regional powers competing for regional influence. To put the contradiction in such terms only infuriates Heikal. "It is as if you're talking about two parties competing over the purchase of a turn-key flat. The fundamental question is whether you belong to this Arab world or not. This is not a choice made on the basis of cost-benefit analysis. This is a question of your destiny. Are you a part of this nation? Is your future intractably entwined with its future? Or are you, like Israel, looking at the region as an object of hegemony and exploitation?"
Abstracted from any real sense of history, says Heikal, "the question might be put in terms of 'Who gets the Middle East, us or them?' But this would be a false question. You belong to this area, it is your life, your future. This is your nation, your language, your culture. You have to choose."
The guide-lines, and objectives, for such an exercise in long-term conflict-management are multifarious, according to Heikal. "First of all, you will be giving the [Israeli] project the chance to revise itself. They will have more time during which they can reassess their claims and ambitions. On the other hand, you [Egypt] will not lose the Arab nation." For, as he asks, "Is it reasonable that Egypt should seek an impossible peace at the cost of losing its actual existing environment -- that we should chase an illusion at the cost of giving up reality?"
Heikal is adamant, however, that he will not be inveigled into providing a detailed blueprint for the future. "You exist in a world where no one can claim to see more than five or ten years into the future. If one looks at how the last century began and how it ended, and the pace of change, I would say that looking five years ahead is already very ambitious." Most likely, it is the influence of traditional thinking -- "the notion of perpetual righteousness" -- which, Heikal believes, lies behind the Arabs' propensity to demand blueprints for the future that span decades. "When I hear people talking of Egypt in the 21st century, I get alarmed," he chuckles.
"You are confronted with day-to-day challenges. Leave the challenges of the future to the future. I cannot tell you what should be done in 10 years' time. What we should be able to say is that we have a notion of how to manage this fundamental contradiction for the foreseeable future. As such, we are offering the [Israeli] project itself a chance to work out where it is heading, and in the same vein, the Arab nation and the Egyptian people will get an analogous opportunity, while avoiding the misgivings that have in the past isolated Egypt from the Arab nation and divided Egyptians among theselves."
'For many years to come, Egypt will be obliged to manage a conflict, or fundamental contradiction, with Israel; one that has not ended, and will not end, in genuine peace, at least in our time. As such, you are faced with a new question: how to manage a long-term, low-grade and strictly controlled conflict, and ensure that it does not spin out of control.'
In short, says Heikal, "we need to formulate a new understanding of a new situation, one we can live with without having to abandon the region or give up our fundamental convictions." And in doing so, "we will be dealing with a future that with each new day confronts us with new assumptions." Referring to the work of Israel's New Historians, he exclaims, "Who would've thought the day would come when Israel would be brought face to face with the historical injustice to which the Palestinians were subjected by its founding?"
Are we then speaking of a possible de-Zionisation of Israel? Heikal does not altogether dismiss the possibility, which would provide a new basis for Israel's relations with the Arab world. It is very difficult to envisage, however. "What remains if Israel is de-Zionised? This question is the fundamental contradiction at the heart of Israel's existence, for if your remove the Zionist basis of Israel, you remove the foundation of the state. This is Israel's basic dilemma: so long as Zionism remains, a state of hostility with the Arabs will remain, but if Zionism goes, so will the state." Thus a South African scenario for the Israelis and Palestinians, says Heikal, automatically poses the question of the legitimacy of the state -- "from whence is it derived."
Meanwhile, Egypt continues to be subject to severe pressures. The uproar created by Mubarak's brief visit to Lebanon is a case in point. How will Egypt be able to manage a long-term conflict with Israel, when the US -- and even Europe -- are willing and able to hit it where it really hurts -- in the economy?
Heikal readily concedes this "fact of life". Noting that the uproar over the president's solidarity visit cost the Egyptian stock exchange a ten-point drop, he expounds, "In this, you have to consider two things: first, the degree of pressure you can withstand; and secondly, how to avoid or minimise that pressure as far as possible. The fundamental question, however, is whether you have a policy or not. If you concede at the outset that you are incapable of withstanding these pressures -- that you find them unbearable -- fine. But then, do not talk about taking on a leadership role in the region, do not talk about belonging to an Arab nation."
Above all, Heikal insists, there is no policy that does not entail taking risks. "You will face pressure, and you have to decide whether you will forever bow to this pressure, or if you will accept the risks, while acting to limit them as much as possible. This is what conflict-management is all about. It does not mean simply submitting to one of the stronger parties to the conflict, but rather finding ways of dealing with that party, identifying the areas where concessions could be made, and which of your fundamental demands you are absolutely unwilling to give up."
This is all the more urgent now that the peace process has reached "a critical stage". "We are now faced with the question of whether Arafat can, or cannot, deliver what is demanded of him. In the case of Hafez Al-Assad, we are speaking of 'a window of opportunity' that is unlikely to remain open beyond April or May."
The fact of the matter is that the peace process has reached its final stage -- the make-or-break point at which Israel has to present its final offer. It is becoming increasingly apparent that this will be an offer Arafat will find very difficult to accept.
"Arafat seems to have reached the end of his ability to offer more concessions. Unless he is really pushed, he cannot make any more concessions on vital questions such as refugees or Jerusalem. Indeed, the indications are that he may have decided to forego any progress in the final status negotiations, and will instead declare a Palestinian state next September, without a final settlement having been reached."
"Arafat is now talking of his problems with the Israeli side in a wider context than simply that which surrounds the current negotiations. This seems to indicate a hardening of his position. I would not bank on it, but there are indications that, ultimately, Arafat cannot sign what he will be called upon to sign; he cannot afford to go down in history as the man who has surrendered Jerusalem and the right of return, the man who has surrendered everything. Even the Lebanese cannot sign an agreement that does not provide a solution to the refugee question."
All this will be decided in a matter of weeks, not months, says Heikal. "Within that short span of time the US president, whose presence is crucial for the peace process, and whose final term has a seductive grip on all the parties involved, will move from being a lame-duck president, to one who is definitively crippled." The new US presidential elections will then begin to dictate the order of the day.
It is this situation which may well define the parameters of Egypt's regional role for some time to come. "I believe the coming challenge for Egypt is to provide careful and imaginative coverage for the halt in the peace process," says Heikal. This can be achieved by putting Mubarak's Lebanese visit, the reactions it triggered, and the subsequent decision to hold a meeting of the Arab League Council in Beirut, "under a microscope". "The anatomy of that episode should provide you with the parameters of a policy -- a well-reasoned policy providing for a reasonable margin of safety, one under which you do not get carried away by rhetoric, where you act but are not easily provoked, where you do not overreact." Such a policy can provide the basis upon which Egypt's regional leadership might be built.
And there is nothing impossible about such an approach, Heikal insists. "Egypt's power in the past was created without an army. It was created by journalists, intellectuals and artists -- people such as Sheikh Mohamed Abduh, Lutfy El-Sayed, Salama Moussa, artists such as Umm Kulthum and Mohamed Abdel-Wahab. The media and culture were among the principal foundations of Egypt's Arab leadership."
Interview by Hosny Guindy
Hani Shukrallah
and Dina Ezzat
