It is getting harder each day for US President Barack Obama to maintain the illusion of progress in Middle East peacemaking. The UN human rights council’s vote to condemn January’s Israeli assault on Gaza, furiously rejected by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over the weekend, was the latest blow to US efforts to start negotiations on a two-state solution.
Across the region, all the signs point not to reconciliation, but to renewed confrontation. As Washington talks about talks, the Arab world mutters ominously about the prospect of a third intifada.
Obama’s special Middle East envoy George Mitchell will keep up appearances by holding more meetings with Palestinian officials in Washington tomorrow. US ambassador to the UN Susan Rice will visit Israel and the occupied territories this week. After his embarrassingly unproductive summit with Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in New York last month, Obama instructed Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to deliver a progress report by the middle of this month. They are expected to meet after Mitchell’s latest talks. But what can she tell him?
On the Palestinian side, attitudes are hardening as high hopes engendered by Obama’s promise of a brave new dawn fade. Abbas is probably politically weaker now than at any time since becoming president. Fatah officials admit his decision, under US pressure, to delay action on the UN human rights report on Israel’s invasion of Gaza was disastrous. Although Abbas later reversed his position, his misjudgment was a gift for Hamas and other opponents, who argue he is out of touch and dismiss him as a “collaborator.”
In a defiant television address, and during a rare visit to Jenin last week, Abbas denied the charges while appearing to distance himself from US mediation efforts. He called on Mitchell to enforce Washington’s initial demand that Israel end all construction in Jewish settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, a demand that was bluntly rejected by Netanyahu and has subsequently been de-emphasized by Obama. Abbas said recent clashes near the al-Aqsa mosque were a response to an Israeli effort to “erase the Arab and Muslim identity of Jerusalem.” He suggested the Palestinians might increasingly look to the UN and other international bodies to advance their cause.
Egyptian efforts to reconcile the rival Palestinian factions appear, meanwhile, to have stalled, partly due to US meddling. Officials in Cairo say the signing of an outline co-operation agreement between Fatah and Hamas, due on Sunday, has been postponed indefinitely. One reason is the row over the UN report. Another, according to the Israel’s Haaretz newspaper was a US veto. It said Mitchell had told Egypt that the proposed deal would harm the peace process. His objection appears rooted in the US and Israel’s ideological refusal to deal, however loosely, with Hamas.
Hardliners on both sides are exploiting the deepening stalemate. In Damascus, Hamas leader Khaled Meshal said it was time for all Arab states to renew their drive for the “liberation” of Palestine “from the sea to the river” (meaning the destruction of Israel). Avigdor Lieberman, the hawkish Israeli foreign minister, has taken to repeating his view that peace is years way.
More moderate figures, such as King Abdullah of Jordan, are expressing growing pessimism.
“We’re sliding back into the darkness,” he said recently. “We are seeing problems in Jerusalem that will directly destabilize not only the relationship with Jordan ... but will also create a tinderbox that will have a major flashpoint throughout the Islamic world.” Turkey, one of Israel’s few friends in the Middle East, has also fallen out with Netanyahu over Gaza and related frustrations.
If Clinton is frank with Obama, she will tell him that Netanyahu, while insisting he is ready in theory to negotiate a two-state solution, is adopting an ever more inflexible line in practice. Addressing the Knesset last week, the Israeli leader ignored the settlements issue — a key US concern — and reasserted that Palestinians must recognize Israel as a Jewish state if they want a state of their own. After Friday’s vote in Geneva, he is claiming the UN wants nothing less than the “de-legitimization” of Israel and is encouraging global terrorism. These are extreme and confrontational positions.
There can be little doubt that his confidence stems from the perception that after a tense few months, he has “seen off” Obama and his naive peacemaking notions. US diplomats warn that Obama is “a man of steel,” and will not give up. This bold assertion is about to be tested.
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