Arab solidarity?

Are Arab governments sincere about helping the Palestinian Hamas-led government? Sherine Bahaa sounds out the voices of scepticism

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After two months of Hamas in government, the international community has proven that honest democracy does not further peace and justice. Hamas, the Palestinian Islamic resistance movement, came to power as a result of free and fair elections. It was a dramatic change in government: a trading of places between a long-dominant incumbent, Fatah, and an opposition minority. The healthy dynamic, however, stopped there. Punishment of the Palestinians for their democratic choice began. This is not the message that should be delivered to Arabs at this critical juncture in their history where calls for reform and democracy are buzzing everywhere.

With international pressure increasing, the Palestinian Hamas-led government may collapse and chaos result. Do Arab regimes have an interest in this?

In a bid to appear as co-opting Hamas, and to soothe their own people, Arab governments have reinvented the four-year-old "Arab initiative" as the carrot that would make life brighter for the Palestinians. According to the initiative, prepared by Saudi Arabia and accepted at the Beirut Summit in 2002, all Arab countries are expected to recognise Israel in exchange for the return of Arab lands occupied in 1967. Though Israel never accepted the initiative, and the US deliberately ignored it, Palestinians are being asked by Arab governments to recognise Israel, without knowing its precise boundaries, while Israel has never recognised Palestinian national rights.

Commenting on the Arab offer for the first time since it re-emerged during his Arab tour last month, Palestinian Foreign Minister Mahmoud Al-Zahhar expressed this week reservations about the Saudi plan, saying the Hamas cabinet had studied it thoroughly and had two reservations: "recognition of Israel and normalisation of ties." He added that the roadmap plan for peace was also irrelevant because "Israel had already made 14 reservations about it."

What Arab governments have been trying to do is to pressure Hamas to accept the Arab initiative while at the same time offering nothing in the way of guarantees that if Hamas accepts it, Israel will too. Nor have Arab governments discussed with the US the possibility of integrating the initiative into the roadmap peace plan, as the maximum Arabs could concede or compromise. Naturally, final agreements are by definition less than starting point aspirations. This is natural in processes of negotiation. Thus, no one can blame Hamas for not accepting a starting point that offers them nothing.

"The whole problem is with the other side -- the Israeli side -- which does not respect anything submitted by the world, the Arabs or anyone else," Al-Zahhar added. Still, it was Al-Zahhar who in January said that, "negotiations are not a taboo. The political crime is when we sit with the Israelis and then come out with a wide smile to tell the Palestinian people that there is progress, when in fact there is not."

Wise words, though for Arab governments they were interpreted as intransigence. Some observers responded that if this was intransigence, is only submission sufficient?

Oraib Al-Rantawi, director of Al-Quds Centre for Political Studies, believes that the Arab peace initiative was born "dead". In an interview with Al-Ahram Weekly, Al-Rantawi explained the initiative has "no mechanism, no charisma. It has been postponed from one summit to another," through the past five summits. "Arab countries who met last month in Khartoum knew quite well that the only applicable policy today -- and even over the past five years -- is [Israeli] unilateralism," Al-Rantawi stressed.

Al-Rantawi views the re-emergence of the Arab initiative as a tactical step to merge Hamas into the peace process; a means for Hamas to come down from its high horse and reduce the gap between itself, the Quartet and the international community. Alone, the Arab initiative is not a means to solve the Arab-Israeli conflict, according to Al-Rantawi. In addition, Arab governments have different agendas with regard to Hamas: "Some still believe in the peace process while others want to embarrass Hamas and push it out," he said.

Of the latter, some Arab governments are ignoring Hamas, shunning visits by its officials and avoiding mention of its name. Such Arab countries are trying to ostracise the Hamas government while maintaining strong ties with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, believing that this is the only way to maintain balance both domestically and internationally, in adopting the role of "peace brokers".

To be sure, Hamas has become irksome for some neighbouring countries, fearing that its rise could empower Islamic movements on their own domestic fronts, threatening current entrenched regimes. Yet Al-Rantawi warns: "those who believe that Fatah is the alternative to Hamas are mistaken." Governments, rather, should work with Hamas, lest "a new political Islam emerge; either a Shia, revolutionary, Iranian-style [political Islam] on the pattern of the Revolutionary Guard, Hizbullah, Islamic Jihad, or else worse; a Salafi Jihad, like Al-Qaeda."

In fact, Al-Rantawi is not exaggerating. Palestinian President Abbas recently appealed to Hizbullah to stop supporting Al-Aqsa Brigades, the military wing of Fatah. And a few weeks earlier Abbas said Al-Qaeda had penetrated Palestine.

Is the Middle East Arab initiative an all-inclusive package? Most Arab observers say this is not the case. "The Arab initiative would not grant the Hamas-led government anything satisfying. It is more like a fig leaf to hide other aspects of significant issues," said Helmi Moussa, an expert on Palestinian affairs in the Lebanese daily As-Safir, to the Weekly. Moussa argues that, "the stance adopted by the Arab countries regarding Hamas is only an indication of their impotence."

The Arab position towards the Palestinian issue already reached its lowest ebb even before the power shift to Hamas, added Moussa. "We should be aware that reinventing the Arab peace initiative is only an attempt to adapt to Western demands; it does not indicate that the Arabs have an independent agenda. This prospect has been ruled out for a long time now," he concludes.