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15 - 21 August 2002 Issue No. 599 Front page |
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Roads to nowhere
The cool reception the Palestinian delegation received in Washington speaks volumes, writes Mohamed El-Sayed Said from the US capital
That the Washington visit by three senior PA officials ended on Saturday with no results has effectively ended speculation on any impending US plan to revive the faltering peace process. The Palestinian delegation, headed by chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Ereikat, met with Secretary of State Colin Powell, National Security Adviser Condoleeza Rice, and CIA Director George Tenet.
Following a 90-minute meeting with the new Palestinian minister of interior, Abdel-Razzaq Al-Yehia, Tenet was reported as being sceptical of any possibility of moving closer to peaceful negotiations between the Palestinians and Israelis and the New York Times reported there were no plans for Tenet to visit the region to oversee the reaching of a security agreement between Israel and the Palestinians.
The Palestinian delegation chief, Ereikat, said talks in Washington had involved an exchange of views rather than any detailed plan of action. He seemed particularly keen on emphasising that the American invitation to his team amounted to a de facto recognition of the futility of ignoring the PA and, consequently, of seeking to oust Palestinian President Yasser Arafat, making the most of the point that he is an Arafat appointee. The Americans, for their part, refused to take the bait, viewing the visit as an opportunity to become further acquainted with Palestinian officials whom they consider "not compromised with terror".
Such was the prism through which US officials sought to view the visit, portraying it as being somehow consistent with President Bush's 24 June speech. It was, administration officials were intent on suggesting, an opportunity to have first hand discussions with potential successors of, or at least parallel leaders to, Arafat.
The three-day visit by PA officials came in the wake of at least two month's informal consultations conducted in Washington with public figures from the occupied territories. The inclusion of the new Palestinian finance minister, Maher Al-Masri, in the delegation, could at least in part be explained by the need to listen to his assessment of humanitarian needs in the occupied territories. But it also offered American officials an opportunity to watch Al- Masri in action, and at a time he is being referred to as the new star in the PA. The same applies to Al-Yehia, who is reported to have got on well with many American officials. He arrived in Washington, however, with a reputation as a man lacking the qualities of aggression needed by successful leaders, an assessment the visit may have left intact.
Such speculation aside, what appears certain is that this getting to know PA figures more closely has gained priority among US officials over serious exchanges on the practical handling of the thorny issues of contention between Palestinians and Israelis.
An even more alarming switch in the present administration's stand towards the peace process was evident in statements made by US Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld on 6 August. Rumsfeld spoke of "so-called settlements" in "the so-called occupied territories", and reiterated demands to change the Palestinian leadership.
While Rumsfeld's statement fell short of reversing the long established American policy regarding territories gained by Israel in the 1967 War as occupied and the settlements established on them as illegal, it was sufficiently alarming for those concerned with peace in the Middle East that Americans for Peace Now, an organisation of American peace activists drawn mostly from the America's Jewish community, demanded the president publicly rebuke Rumsfeld for his comments.
Rumsfeld's pro-Israeli comments, though, fell neatly in line with the Bush administration's increasing focus on the war against Iraq, and the growing belief in Washington that progress in Palestinian-Israeli negotiations is no longer a prerequisite of any military campaign to oust the Iraqi president.
The increasingly dominant view is that promoted by the Zionist think-tanks -- that ousting Saddam militarily takes precedence over the Palestinian issue. And it goes without saying that the advocates of America's military adventure in Iraq play down the importance of Arab public opinion. The failure of the Palestinian delegation's visit, in this context, might be seen as a sign of the Bush administration's general disregard of not just Palestinians, but Arabs in general.
There are alternative explanations for Bush's hesitant approach to the situation in Palestine, not least the contradicting assessments he has been receiving from senior officials in key departments. While some within the administration are keen to keep the door open to the PA, others are confident that Sharon's military machine will eventually prevail, making independent American action less necessary. And the Bush administration is unlikely to depart from its current, whole-hearted support of Sharon unless the latter proves a total failure to the extent that there is a seepage of support both inside Israel and among America's Jewish community.
The recent suicide bombing in Jerusalem and Northern Israel may have strengthened the hand of moderates within the administration, though Sharon's supporters, mostly in the department of defence, still call the shots, bolstered by Israel's drives to liquidate senior and intermediary leaders of the Palestinian resistance movement. Sharon himself seems encouraged by these latest "successes" and may have appealed personally to President Bush for more time to complete his dirty work before any agreement with the Palestinians is made.
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