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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Ilaine who wrote (24511)	4/11/2002 1:00:02 AM
From: Nadine Carroll	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

The body of the article doesn't quite follow the headline. Question: who is running US foreign policy right now? And is there any chance of a consistent policy from week to week? The simplest explanation, and it's not a happy one, is that the Administration has been see-sawing between the Cheney and Powell camp. Defiant Sharon Losing Support in White House By Mike Allen and John Lancaster Washington Post Staff Writers Thursday, April 11, 2002; Page A01 Israel's continued defiance of President Bush's demand for an immediate withdrawal of Israeli forces from Palestinian cities and towns is eroding support for Prime Minister Ariel Sharon inside the White House, administration sources said yesterday. After months of steadfast backing of Sharon by the Bush administration, senior White House aides are beginning to express doubts about whether the Israeli leader can be a long-term partner in achieving the administration's goals in the Middle East. White House aides also fear that Sharon's intransigence in the face of Bush's repeated demands over the past week for an end to the Israeli attacks could make the president appear ineffective and erode his standing in the world. As part of the emerging shift of opinion about the Israeli leader, some White House officials are now making a distinction between support for Israel and support for Sharon. "Sharon is arguably doing what he thinks needs to be done," a senior administration official said. "After he's finished, what's next? The fear is that he knows no other way than being tough." The administration's tougher line on Israel is already facing resistance in Congress, with some lawmakers accusing the White House of compromising the moral clarity of its anti-terrorism crusade. Support is building for draft legislation proposed by Sens. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) that would designate the Palestine Liberation Organization as a terrorist group, close down its Washington office and deny visas to its top officials. The State Department successfully lobbied against a similar measure last fall. Lobbyists for major American Jewish organizations have also been busy in Congress, "expressing concern about the kind of pressure that's being brought to bear" on Sharon's government by the administration, according to someone involved in the discussions. Relations between the administration and Israel have grown increasingly tense this week as Secretary of State Colin L. Powell held talks with Arab and European leaders in the region in preparation for his scheduled arrival in Israel today. In addition to meeting with Sharon, Powell intends to see Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat for cease-fire talks that the Bush administration hopes will lead quickly to new negotiations over the political issues underlying the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The administration, along with Israel, had been insisting for weeks that negotiations could begin only once a truce was in place. Powell's statement on Tuesday that a truce would be "instantly linked" to political discussions represented a major shift in policy. For months, Bush had expressed unswerving support for Sharon, had put the onus on Arafat to stop Palestinian suicide attacks on Israeli civilians and had remained steadfast in refusing to involve his administration at the highest levels in seeking a solution to the conflict. But as Israeli troops and tanks occupied most of the cities of the West Bank over the past two weeks, Bush came under mounting pressure from Europe and the Arab world to act. Last Thursday, Bush for the first time called on Israel to withdraw its forces and announced that he was sending Powell to the Middle East. He followed that with a telephone call to Sharon on Saturday in which he said Israel must begin its pullout "without delay." Although Israel moved out of two towns on Monday, Sharon has insisted that the offensive will continue, telling Israeli forces yesterday that he had told Bush on Saturday that Israel was "in the middle of a battle" and would leave only when the job was finished. Bush continued to call for patience with Israel during a meeting yesterday with 16 Republican congressional leaders. "We're Israel's close friend, and we are trying to get the process started to bring stability to the region," Bush said, according to sources. At a briefing yesterday, White House press secretary Ari Fleischer said that Powell is looking forward to meeting with Sharon and that the United States has presented its demands to Israel "on the basis of friendship, on the basis of respect." "Israel remains America's friend," Fleischer said. "The violence has gotten to the point now where both parties are so engaged in the ongoing struggle for the Middle East that the president wants to find a way to help the parties to help themselves." Some administration officials said Sharon has been more receptive to Bush's request than is publicly apparent. "We're being precipitous if we base what we say only on what we see," one official said but would not elaborate. Administration officials said they fear that expectations for Powell's mission are rising to an unreasonable level, and they repeated Powell's warning on Sunday before he left for the region that he might not achieve anything tangible. "We're going to have to give it some time – probably more time than people want to," a senior official said. "To expect an instant solution is ridiculous." On Capitol Hill yesterday, about 20 senators gave a warm reception to former Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu, who expressed concern that Israel "is being pressed to back down just when it is on the verge of uprooting Palestinian terror." He asked whether the United States is preparing to "selectively abandon" its principles and asserted the pointlessness of further negotiations with Arafat. Several lawmakers praised Netanyahu's remarks, suggesting that Bush erred last week when he asked the Sharon government to end the military incursion. The intensity of feeling surrounding Powell's trip reflects the enduring clout of Israel and its American allies on Capitol Hill. It could also limit Powell's diplomatic maneuvering room by exposing the administration to criticism from its conservative base and others that its approach to fighting terrorism is inconsistent. "Despite the fact that the president and secretary of state have said repeatedly that they will not meet with Yasser Arafat till he renounces terrorism and takes some steps to end the violence, now we're meeting with him without any preconditions," Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) complained in a floor speech yesterday. "At the same time we're telling Israel, which is simply trying to defend herself, to pull back." Powell's mission has its defenders in Congress. In an interview, Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.) praised the administration for adopting a more nuanced approach to Middle East diplomacy after what he described as Bush's earlier, mistaken attempt to define the war on terrorism in black-and-white terms. "This is a world with a lot of gray," he said. "We can choose either to live in an abstract world or choose to engage in the real world. . . . The reality of that has started to set in with this administration." Lawmakers have been out of town during much of the recent surge of violence in the Middle East, having returned only on Monday after their two-week Easter recess. But they have since begun to weigh in heavily on the crisis. In the House, members from both parties spoke late into the night Tuesday on Israel's behalf. Rep. Tom Lantos (Calif.), the ranking Democrat on the House International Relations Committee, said he may introduce a resolution expressing support for Israel. Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (D-Conn.), who met with Netanyahu yesterday morning, is considering doing the same. washingtonpost.com