Specifics of peace

Robin Wright and Glenn Kessler’s U.S. Faces a Middle East Hungry for Peace Specifics is pretty standard fare.

The Bush administration has so far failed to generate serious traction behind its latest Middle East peace effort, with the opening session of its Washington conference of Arab and Israeli leaders tentatively scheduled for Nov. 15, according to senior Arab and U.S. officials and former U.S. envoys.

Noticeably missing from that list are “senior Israeli officials.” Well this might explain that absence.

Arab nations, notably Saudi Arabia, are looking for specific timelines and language on the most controversial issues, including the final status of Jerusalem, Palestinian refugees, eventual borders between the two states and security guarantees. “If this conference will not discuss serious topics aimed to resolve the conflict, put Arab initiative as a key objective, set an agenda that details issues as required and oblige Israel to withdraw from the occupied territories, this conference will not have any objective and will turn into protracted negotiations,” Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal told reporters last week.

If the “Arab initiative” is the “key objective,” it makes sense that Israeli concerns aren’t at the forefront of those officials interviewed for the article.

Citing insufficient diplomacy, many are pessimistic that anything significant will come from the U.S. efforts. Martin Indyk, a former U.S. ambassador to Israel now at the Brookings Institution’s Saban Center, said Rice has “underestimated the amount of heavy lifting she’ll have to do,” and that “she could succeed, but it’s going to take the kind of legwork that she hasn’t been prepared to take until now.” James A. Baker III, serving as secretary of state, made nine trips in nine months to set up the 1991 Madrid conference on Middle East peace. Then-Secretary of State Madeleine Albright spent more than a year to set up the 1998 Wye River summit that led to an interim agreement that was never implemented, noted Aaron David Miller, former Middle East envoy.

These two paragraphs are particularly interesting. Indyk thinks that the problem is “insufficient diplomacy,” but Miller notes that the result of sufficient (or, more precisely, excessive) diplomacy was “never implemented.” Maybe the problem isn’t diplomacy, but mindset. For example these two Arab officials. “What we want!” Doesn’t sound like they want negotiations or diplomacy, but rather terms dictated.

“The first lesson of diplomacy is that you don’t enter negotiations without knowing what the next step is,” said a senior Arab official. Added another: “Working on an agenda [at this conference] for what happens at a next conference is not what we want. Another failure is not good for the U.S. or the region.”

Finally the survey (mercifully) ends.

But the Bush administration has limited leverage, experts note. “Bush is the lamest-duck president in our lifetimes and now completely preoccupied with dragging out a war in the Middle East, which is extremely unpopular with Arabs across the board,” said Bruce Riedel, who was a negotiator in the 2000 Camp David effort. “He has not in almost seven years in the White House used his political capital to advance the Arab-Israeli peace process. Instead, he has been notably absent.”

Yes Mr. Riedel was a negotiator in 2000. And after all that political was expended on that summit, what exactly was the result? Did Arafat accept the terms that Ehud Barak offered? Did he make a counter offer? Well, no. And despite all of the commotion that he was still committed to negotiation, here’s how his rejection of Camp David was treated in the Arab world. (You know, those folks who are so interested in peace.)

The refusal of Yasir Arafat, the Palestinian leader, to negotiate away his claims to Jerusalem may have dashed American hopes of a Camp David peace agreement today, but it allowed him to return home with his credibility among Arab and Muslim leaders intact, Middle East analysts said.

That’s right, rejection of the offer enhanced his credibility in the Arab world. What’s clear is that those officials who were the source for this story don’t really want specifics. What they want are terms imposed upon Israel. (How much would have to be imposed is a question. I still doubt that however generous PM Olmert is, it will satisfy the demands of the Arab world hungering for specifics.)

Crossposted at Soccer Dad.

peace process, israel, palestinians.