Containment continues

With Hamas-Israel truce talks on hold, Cairo turns its focus on Palestinian reconciliation, Dina Ezzat reports

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Meetings bringing together representatives of the two main conflicting Palestinian factions, Fatah and Hamas, are being hosted by Cairo in preparation for a soft launch to national reconciliation talks that President Hosni Mubarak promised to convene later this month.

"Egypt is convinced that the Palestinian national reconciliation dialogue it will host 22 February will work," Mubarak said Monday evening in the Bahraini capital Manama following talks with the monarch of Bahrain.

Egypt previously attempted to kick-start Palestinian national reconciliation dialogue last autumn, but attempts were blocked by the decision of Hamas to boycott the meeting at the eleventh hour due to un-met demands (the release of Hamas members held by the Fatah- controlled Palestinian Authority). This time, things seem to be different. Palestinian and Egyptian sources are not promising full- fledged reconciliation soon; nor is the Arab League, that is supposed to take over the reconciliation process once launched by Egypt. The prospect of a new hardline Israeli government is feeding doubt. However, as one Egyptian official said: "The Palestinian factions are showing a new sense of realism. Their attitudes are different than what they showed late last year."

This official acknowledges that Egypt has amended its approach "to some extent". Cairo is now demonstrating "more openness towards Hamas". Cairo has also agreed to sideline, even if temporarily, the involvement of some key Fatah figures that are regarded negatively by Hamas. "Things are slightly different now and we do hope that Cairo is being serious and not just tactical about the change of attitude towards the movement," commented one Hamas source.

The breakthrough between Cairo and Hamas has been prompted by intensive joint work over a truce that Egypt has been trying hard to strike between Hamas in Gaza and Israel. Hamas sources say they welcomed statements made by Mubarak last Monday whereby the president refused a new Israeli condition of linking the truce to the completion of a long-stalled prisoner swap deal between the Palestinians and Israel. Israel wants the truce tied to the release of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, captured by a Palestinian resistance group in June 2006. "The Shalit file is independent and cannot be linked in any way with the efforts underway to secure a truce," Mubarak said.

Mubarak's statements came at a time when both Egypt and Saudi Arabia are sending carefully calculated signals of good intention to Damascus, host of Hamas political leaders in exile. A message delivered this week in Damascus by Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa was carefully tailored to encourage Syria to support truce and Palestinian national reconciliation efforts, thereby easing tension between Damascus and Cairo and Riyadh. Moussa's efforts were backed by a visit of Saudi Intelligence Chief Abdel-Aziz Moqren who conveyed a similar message to Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad.

A statement issued by the Saudi prime minister's office, along with messages conveyed to Syria via Bahrain and Kuwait, had also served to support the same purpose. "We would want the Syrians to be onboard. We have big issues with them. There is no secret about it, but we would welcome a change of attitude that could start with supporting -- because we know that the Syrians cannot decide for [Hamas] -- Hamas signing on to reconciliation and [a] truce," said one Egyptian official on condition of anonymity.

Qatar is also being "encouraged" to act in favour of truce and reconciliation efforts and is being offered a "decent show of Arab leaders" for the regular Arab summit that it should host and chair as of the last week of next month.

"We know that a truce would ultimately be broken if not supported by a firm political process. And we know that a hardline Israeli government might not be able to deliver a productive political process. But we also know that we have to pursue containment because otherwise we face explosive situations such as the three-week Israeli war on Gaza," commented the same Egyptian official.

Meanwhile, Egypt is trying "very hard", Egyptian diplomats argue, to lobby the support of the new US administration to put pressure on the next Israeli government to engage in serious negotiations. For Egypt, this is crucial, not just to back a truce, which has still to be reached, but to sustain the fragile political standing of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas whose legitimacy is contested by Hamas.

"If there is one thing that we clearly see eye- to-eye on with the new administration it would be the need to move on a serious process of engagement," commented one Egyptian diplomat.

This issue was covered during talks held over the weekend in Washington between Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul-Gheit and US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Early next month in Cairo, Clinton and US Envoy to the Middle East George Mitchell will discuss this issue at greater length with Egyptian officials as well as with Israeli and Palestinian officials during a tour that Clinton and Mitchell are planning around the time of the donors conference for the reconstruction of Gaza to be held in Cairo 2 March.

Conscious that the reconstruction issue pitches the Palestinian Authority against the Hamas "authority" in Gaza, Egyptian diplomats nonetheless argue that "launching a reconstruction process against the backdrop of our national reconciliation/truce efforts would help contain the situation on the ground, at least for a few months." According to some, "there is sufficient US interest". Indeed, judging by accounts offered by Egyptian diplomats familiar with the talks held by Abul-Gheit in Washington and the talks held by Senator John Kerry in Cairo this week, the level of consensus between Cairo and Washington is such that a new era in Egyptian-US relations, soured under the Bush administration, may be at hand.

On a parallel track, Egypt is showing openness to French and Russian proposals for a potential peace conference on the Middle East in the coming months. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, on a Middle East tour Tuesday, offered his country's ideas for a meeting at the foreign minister level to re-launch the Middle East peace process. "What we want to see is an active process and we are open to ideas that could lead the region in this direction," commented one Egyptian official on condition of anonymity.