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

To: unclewest who wrote (24697)	4/12/2002 5:41:56 AM
From: LindyBill	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 281500

The WSJ lead Editorial for today REVIEW & OUTLOLK Bush in the Bazaar We thought the Mideast was a quagmire. Were we too optimistic? Friday, April 12, 2002 12:01 a.m. EDT When President Bush took his plunge into the Arab-Israeli conflict last week, we worried that he was heading into a quagmire. Judging from a week's worth of evidence, maybe we were optimists. Mr. Bush has tossed his prestige into the Mideast bazaar, and the region's traders are already selling it at a discount. Neither side is listening to his declarations, each one hoping to coax him further in its direction. His Secretary of State, Colin Powell, has spent a week being lectured to by assorted dictators and European leaders. Maybe this will all turn out to be part of a shrewd plan to quiet Palestine and reassert U.S. leadership in the region, but maybe is a long time in the Middle East. A week ago, Mr. Bush declared that "enough is enough," and urged Israelis to withdraw from the West Bank. Two days later, with no withdrawal on the horizon, he said he meant "without delay." A day after that he said he meant "now" and still later it was, "I meant what I said." By yesterday White House spokesman Ari Fleischer was claiming victory because the Israelis were starting to withdraw even as Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon declared that "I informed" the Americans "that our activity will continue--and it will continue." Mr. Powell has found even less accommodation on the Arab side. Barely had he set foot on Moroccan soil when King Mohammed declared within reporters' earshot that he really ought to be in Israel and Palestine instead. The Secretary of State has failed to get any condemnations of terror from his Arab interlocutors. And in southern Lebanon--from which Israel has already withdrawn in accordance with the land-for-peace formula--Hezbollah and its Syrian and Iranian sponsors have launched an unprecedented wave of cross-border attacks. As for Yasser Arafat, his response to Mr. Bush was to call for a fight to the death, encouraging Palestinian fighters to prolong the struggle in cities like Jenin. Early in the week Mr. Powell said he might not meet with Mr. Arafat and Mr. Bush talked about a new generation of Palestinian leaders. But now comes word that the Secretary will meet with Mr. Arafat on Saturday, having dropped the one precondition--a call for end to violence--on which Vice President Dick Cheney had previously insisted. This will only convince the most fanatic suicide bombers that terrorism works. All of this, of course, is being recorded by a press corps that now counts every rejection against Mr. Bush. A reporter asked Mr. Powell yesterday in Amman, Jordan, whether he was on an impossible mission. The usually cool diplomat snapped back, "I don't like wallowing in pessimists." And the Washington Post yesterday caught White House frustration by reporting a deliberate leak "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 the kids say, Duh. We sympathize with Mr. Bush, who was urged by all of elite opinion to enter this maw. Now that he can't work miracles, they find him at fault. Alas, the price for this will be paid not by those who urged Mr. Bush on but by the President himself in lost credibility. As in any war, mediation won't work until both sides are ready to talk. No doubt Mr. Sharon will soon withdraw from the West Bank, after he has cleaned out enough terror cells to have bought a few weeks of peace from suicide bombs. But there is no evidence that the respite will be any longer than that. The sooner Mr. Bush steps out of the Palestine bazaar and sets his compass toward Baghdad, the better for Mideast peace and stability