Issue No. 607
Opinion
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10 - 16 October 2002 Issue No. 607 Opinion |
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 | Recommend this page | ||
Jerusalem.. Israel's capital?
Has the Bush administration decided to take the recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital one step further? asks Mohamed Sid-Ahmed
The new US legislation requiring all official American documents to identify the occupied city of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel has triggered angry reactions throughout the Islamic world. Thousands of demonstrators marched through Gaza, threatening to intensify suicide bombings inside Israel, while popular and religious leaders called on Arab and Islamic parliaments to adopt a strong stance against this latest outrage, calling, among other things, for a boycott of American goods. Commenting on the legislation, the Islamic Conference declared that it is bound to undermine relations between the Islamic world and the United States. Angrily denouncing the new law as "a catastrophe", President Arafat urged "Muslim and Christian nations to oppose any decision attacking the status of Jerusalem." He also called for an emergency Arab summit, then passed a law declaring Jerusalem the capital of Arab Palestine. But so far, these reactions have not engendered any concrete actions by Arab capitals.
Meanwhile, Bush claimed that, although he had signed the draft bill into law on 30 September, US policy on Jerusalem had not changed. According to Reuters, an American official described as 'prominent' said the White House was planning to issue a statement explaining that the legislation "reflected the feelings of Congress" towards the issue, but did not necessarily commit American foreign policy.
The controversial provision is part of the Foreign Relations Authorisation Act for 2003, which allocates more than $4 billion to the State Department for its programmes across the globe during the next fiscal year. However, the Bush administration has described the provision as advisory rather than mandatory, and continues to insist that it is non- binding. To emphasise this, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher declared that the American consulate in Jerusalem will continue to report directly to Washington, not to the American ambassador in Israel as stipulated by the legislation signed by Bush a few days ago.
The US Congress has repeatedly urged successive administrations to consider Jerusalem the capital of Israel and to move the US embassy there from Tel Aviv. However, no US president was willing to take a final decision on the matter, because all were aware of the dramatic repercussions such a move would have on America's relations with the Muslim and Arab worlds.
Theoretically, it is the president's right to reject congressional calls to identify Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. But the part concerning Jerusalem is only a tiny segment of the legislation which covers all parts of the world and provides the State Department with the funds it needs to conduct American foreign policy. In an attempt to placate Arab feelings, Boucher said that on the question of Jerusalem the Bush administration stands by existing US policy and that the status of the city "must be established during final settlement negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians". He maintained further that the State Department "has always opposed legislative action that hinders the president's prerogatives on advancing our interests in the region. It must be left to the White House to decide how to deal with the issue".
However, with congressmen, both Republicans and Democrats, falling over themselves to establish their pro-Israel credentials before the mid-term congressional elections next November, and with Bush himself bound by his election campaign promise to back Israel's claim to Jerusalem as its eternal capital, the White House appears to be moving towards a reversal of its traditional policy on the subject. While the new law merely urges the administration to immediately start the process of relocating the embassy to Jerusalem, it adds three provisions that cannot be dismissed as merely advisory.
The first is that the administration cannot spend money on the US consulate in Jerusalem unless the consulate is under the supervision of the US ambassador to Israel. The second is that any US government document which lists countries and their capitals will have to identify Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. The third is that in official US documents such as passports, birth certificates and nationality certifications, US citizens born in Jerusalem may insist that the documents record their place of birth as Israel.
These provisions are the most blatant legal manouevre to date towards recognising Israel's annexation of East Jerusalem. If Bush balks at implementing them, it is not because he disagrees with them in substance but only for procedural considerations related to the negotiations over the Palestinian problem, and to avoid a further deterioration of the situation. In other words, for tactical reasons that do not reflect his real intentions.
During the presidential campaign, he promised that if he were elected he would immediately enact a bill calling for the recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital. But the 11 September attacks, the worsening situation in the occupied territories and now the crisis over Iraq forced him to defer making good on his promise until conditions were more favourable. Which begs the question, why now?
Some analysts believe the Jerusalem provision is a test balloon, that it was smuggled, as it were, into a long text on financial issues in the hope that it would not attract too much attention, especially with everybody focussed on the possibility of a war in Iraq, with the Palestinian problem at an all-time low and with Israeli commandos 'rehearsing' a military operation to hijack Arafat and fly him into exile where he can have no impact on the course of events.
Obviously, it was no accident that the provision on Jerusalem, whose final status is the most contentious of the many contentious issues between the Palestinians and Israel, should have provoked such an outcry. After all, if Israel succeeds in torpedoing the Palestinian demand that Jerusalem also become the capital of a Palestinian state, it will become easier to undermine other aspects of the Palestinian problem such as the right of return or the issues of settlements, water, etc.
Was it the Bush administration that took advantage of the situation or was it due to pressure from a variety of lobbies, whether internal or external, whether Jewish-Zionist (mainly rooted in the Democratic Party) or Christian- Zionist (some 250 Christian societies from the conservative far-right, with roots in the Republican Party)? In other words, is the Bush administration or Congress behind the initiative and, inside Congress, is it the Republicans or the Democrats, now enjoying a one-seat majority?
As a whole, it can be said that the US administration is more ready to respond to the parties better placed to exert pressure on it. Therefore, its readiness to stand up to the strong pressures of Zionist elements on Congress will depend, to a very far extent, on how the Arab parties act and to what extent they are ready to apply pressure as well. What has happened so far is by no means promising. And whatever the reasons for which Arab parties have kept a conspicuously low profile on Jerusalem, it is certain that it will be interpreted as a willingness to give in, not on Jerusalem only, but on a wide range of issues concerning the key Middle East problems.
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