America Tries, Again, to End the Endless Conflict
By SERGE SCHMEMANN
New York Times
November 25, 2001
RARELY has there been such an urgent, unanimous sense among the world's powers that the long, violent impasse in the Israeli-Palestinian struggle must now end.
This is not because the conflict somehow precipitated the Sept. 11 terror attacks; Osama bin Laden's hatreds had plenty of other sources. But the attacks were stark reminders of a major irritant in a highly unstable region, and of the Bush administration's disengagement.
Among Arab and Islamic countries called on by President Bush to assist in the war on terrorism, it was almost an article of faith that the administration had to reciprocate by getting back into the Middle Eastern fray. That perception seemed universal at the United Nations General Assembly, too, where over the past two weeks virtually every speaker, while declaring support for the American campaign, also referred to the need to resolve the conflict.
Meanwhile, the Europeans felt so strongly that American inaction in the Middle East was undermining support for the war that they invited the Palestinian leader, Yasir Arafat, and Shimon Peres, the Israeli foreign minister, to meet with European Union leaders in Brussels earlier this month.
So when Secretary of State Colin L. Powell announced last week that the Bush administration was at last plunging into the Middle East, declaring that "We will push, we will prod, we will present ideas," there was the sense that a major effort was underway. Against the backdrop of a global war on terrorism, and after a period that saw the two sides come right to the edge of agreement, and then fall back into destructive violence, there was a sense that this must be the final round.
An agreement in the past has seemed so imperative, so close, that some veterans of the process have voiced the wish that a solution could simply be imposed. The two sides had gone as far as they could go by themselves, and the end result was known and inevitable. So why not, some on both sides of the negotiatons have wistfully asked, just present both sides with the blueprint of a solution?
This was almost certainly not what the administration had in mind. There were indications that the White House remained highly reluctant to follow Bill Clinton into the Middle Eastern morass, in which he shed so much prestige only to watch the region go up in flames. And with the campaign in Afghanistan looking ever more successful, there was the chance that the need to mollify Arab and Muslim leaders would diminish.
While General Powell asserted that "the goal can be nothing less than an end to conflict and a resolution of outstanding claims," the concrete steps he announced were focused on the more immediate goal of securing a cease-fire and restoring limited talks.
The plan was one proposed earlier this year by a commission headed by former Senator George Mitchell, which also called for a "cooling-off" period of six weeks, a Palestinian crackdown on militants, and an end to the expansion of Israeli settlements on occupied lands.
Even that could prove difficult after 14 months of intifada and the collapse of mutual trust between Israelis and Palestinians. Yet the very fact that General Powell was dispatching a tough retired Marine general, Anthony Zinni, along with a State Department envoy, William Burns, to the Middle East while fighting raged in Afghanistan created expectations far beyond a cease- fire. The extraordinary difficulty of their mission was underscored Friday when missiles from an Israeli helicopter killed the senior West Bank leader of Hamas's military wing, virtually insuring retaliation by the group and threatening a new cycle of violence.
But the background to the mission remained: However haltingly and despite enormous suffering on both sides, the Israelis and Palestinians had made remarkable strides since they agreed to the Oslo process in 1993. The Oslo agreement was based on the premise that by first taking gentle steps toward peace, the two sides would build the strength and stamina to tackle the big issues. Though both sides failed to live up to many of their obligations, and most deadlines were missed — including a goal of reaching final agreement by May 1999 — it did elicit the recognition that both sides would have to live in neighboring states.
BY the time President Clinton summoned the two sides to Camp David in July 2000, it was already with the understanding that the time of interim agreements was over.
There is a fierce, ongoing dispute over what led to the failure of Camp David. But the fact is that the great taboos of refugees and Jerusalem were breached, and that the Camp David talks and the subsequent, secret meetings between Israeli and Palestinian negotiators in Jerusalem and finally in Taba, Egypt, that continued through last January sketched the outlines of a comprehensive settlement.
Though nothing was translated into formal agreements, and though Mr. Sharon has rejected many of the concessions made by the Israeli negotiators, who were from the opposite end of the ideological spectrum, those talks defined what each side expected of the other, and what outside mediators — the United States included — would consider the basis for future negotiations.
Mr. Arafat made clear in his recent speech to the United Nations that he no longer trusted any process that did not declare a final settlement as its sole purpose. What the process required, Mr. Arafat said, was that the United States join with other countries "to introduce immediately a comprehensive framework for a permanent solution."
That framework already exists. According to published reports and interviews with some participants, it would probably include the following elements:
•Israel would withdraw from all of Gaza and the West Bank, except three concentrations of settlements north, east and south of Jerusalem, and a temporary presence in Hebron. In exchange for the lost territory, the Palestinians would get some additional desert land adjacent to Gaza or the West Bank. Each side could claim victory — Israel would say that the large majority of the settlers would not be displaced, and the Palestinians could claim to have recovered 100 percent of occupied territory.
•A sovereign Palestinian state would be proclaimed, but would agree to remain demilitarized. Israel would retain three early- warning stations in the Jordan Valley, eventually in conjunction with an international military "presence."
•The issue of Palestinian refugees would require more legerdemain. Israel would acknowledge that refugees had suffered and would agree to a one-shot compensatory payment, but would accept no responsibility for their plight.
The refugees would be given several options: to stay where they were, to settle in a third country, to settle in the new state of Palestine, or to settle in Israel in numbers to be agreed on. At Taba, the Palestinians reportedly said 400,000, the Israelis 20,000.
•And finally Jerusalem. There could be some form of international stewardship over the holy places. Or the Temple Mount/Haram al Sharif could be shared, with the Palestinians controlling the surface plateau and the Israelis holding sovereignty underneath, as well as over the Western Wall. The rest of the Old City would be divided up, as it already is, and the outlying portions of the city divided roughly along the lines of who lives where now.
So why not plop these ideas down on the table, with "United States of America" stamped across the top?
One reason is that however far Mr. Sharon has come in accepting the notion of a Palestinian state, there are elements that the conservative military veteran would never accept, such as the partitioning of Jerusalem, which to many Israelis is their "eternal and undivided" capital, or the abandoning of so many settlements or some of the security arrangements. Moreover, if he rejected proposals put before him by Americans, the left would quit his government; if he accepted them, the right would bolt. Either way, his government would fall, and his successor would likely be another conservative, Benjamin Netanyahu.
Nobody expects Washington to challenge Mr. Sharon or Israel so openly. But the United States has exerted painful pressure on Israel in the past and may this time, too. Moreover, Yossi Beilin, a leading left-wing politician who was involved in the Taba negotiations, said it was as wrong to presume that no agreement could be reached with Mr. Sharon, as it was for the Israelis to presume that Mr. Arafat was finished as a negotiating partner.
DESPITE widespread distrust of Mr. Arafat, Americans and Israelis with a long experience of dealing with the Palestinians believe that waiting for him to die or be deposed poses too many unknowns, and that it is better to deal with the one leader likely to have the authority to make an agreement stick.
"Giving up on Arafat is something we cannot afford," Mr. Beilin said. And as for Mr. Sharon, he noted that other right-wing leaders had been led to major concessions by the Americans — Menachem Begin on Sinai, Mr. Netanyahu in the West Bank.
"Since they did that, you can't exclude the possibility that Sharon could do it," Mr. Beilin said. "I don't think he can easily ignore an American wish to pacify the Middle East."
Many on the right would disagree. Natan Sharansky, the housing minister, was among those who bristled at the notion that General Powell would press Israel to drop some of its conditions for peace talks, which included seven days without violence. "It's clear that America is not going to impose on us its own approach, if we feel it endangers our security," he said.
As for Mr. Arafat, there are indications that senior members of the Palestinian Authority are increasingly frustrated with Mr. Arafat's chronic indecisiveness, and increasingly concerned that they are losing control over the Palestinian population because of it.
PEOPLE close to Palestinian affairs say Mr. Arafat's senior lieutenants confronted him earlier this month and told him he needed to move against terror organizations immediately, that the longer he delayed a crackdown, the higher the cost at home and abroad. The confrontation led to a shouting match with Muhammad Dahlan, the chief of security in Gaza and one of the most powerful men in the leadership, who then left on an indefinite "vacation."
Egypt and Jordan would be no more tolerant of Mr. Arafat if he further complicated their relations with a newly assertive American giant. And Europe, Russia and the United Nations seem willing to pitch in if Mr. Arafat finds it difficult to accept the United States as the sole go-between. Terje Larson, the United Nations coordinator in the area, has already formed a "quartet" of the local ambassadors of United States, Russia, the European Union and the United Nations, to press for an end to violence.
Of course, this is still the Middle East, where the greatest strides toward peace have often provoked the greatest resistance. But with the world now seriously anxious to end the fray, and with the United States rampant, there is a sense that something must give. As General Powell put it, "History, fate and success have combined to compel American leadership in the Middle East and around the globe. We welcome the challenge."
Copyright 2001 The New York Times Company |
