Kurt Bassuener May 28th, 2008
US President George Bush’s widely covered trip to the Middle East two weeks ago was underwhelming, especially given his administration’s declared desire for a Palestinian-Israeli peace deal before the end of his term in January. Such a deal, never a likely prospect given the administration’s policy of essentially giving Israel a free hand and its own rock-bottom credibility in the region, seems no more likely after the trip.
His May 15 speech commemorating the state’s 60th anniversary to Israel’s Knesset extolled the depth and warmth of the US relationship with Israel, and was replete with the Biblical imagery he clearly revels in employing. But he also conflated this with his “freedom agenda,” lauding Israel’s democratic governance, making the Zionist struggle to build the state of Israel after the Holocaust sound as if it were a people power uprising against oppressive rule. But the struggle of 1948 was not against oppression, but a very European nationalist effort to create a Jewish nation-state in a territory in which Jews still comprised a minority. Israel’s successful foundation was the Palestinian naqba – “the catastrophe” – dispossessing hundreds of thousands. It is much easier to base an alliance on “shared convictions rooted in moral clarity and unswayed by popularity polls or the shifting opinions of international elites” when the messier aspects of the foundation myth are not explored critically. These are far more openly discussed within Israel itself than in the US.
While Bush said that “free people should strive and sacrifice for peace,” he merely commended choices by previous Israeli leaders – without naming what those actually were, though the evacuation from Gaza was probably the implication. He certainly neglected to name the central “sacrifice” that Israel will surely need to make to ensure peace with the Palestinians: evacuation of settlements established in the West Bank since 1967, and some compromise on East Jerusalem. Only an American president can say such things with any credibility to Israel, precisely because the US is an unambiguous friend of Israel, as the wise American analyst Henry Siegman has repeatedly said. In his speech, Bush essentially gave Israel a blank check of American support, regardless of whether Israel’s policies are in American interests.
But not only did Bush avoid this underlying basic reality. He set up a straw man by stating there were people advocating breaking relations with Israel – a rather thin group given the undeniable pro-Israel consensus in the US. He then took the opportunity to accuse those who might consider talking to Hamas – a group which engages in terrorism through suicide bombing and rocket attacks, but which also enjoys broad enough legitimacy to have been elected in 2006 (in elections the US insisted upon) and which is now utterly dominant in Gaza – to be practicing “appeasement.” Many interpreted this to be a shot at Democratic candidate Barack Obama, despite the fact Obama never said he would talk with Hamas (but did say he would talk with Iranian President Ahmedinejad).
Needless to say, Bush’s speech in the Knesset didn’t get rave reviews in the Arab world, seizing on the fact he hardly mentioned the Palestinians, along with the fact that he lumped Iran, Hezbollah, Syria, Hamas, and al Qaeda into an amorphous bloc. In the Arab world, depending on where one is, their activities vary in perceived legitimacy. Hezbollah, while admired for its survival of the 2006 war against Israel that was designed to crush it, is also viewed with trepidation in much of the Sunni Arab world. Perhaps the most universally accepted is Hamas, given the prevalence afforded to “resistance” to Israeli occupation.
In a speech to an international audience at the World Economic Forum Middle East in Sharm el Sheikh, Egypt three days later, Bush made a clear call for democratic governance in the Middle East. It was hard to disagree with much of the speech. Calling on Middle Eastern governments to invest in developing human capital through education, redressing the gross imbalances noted in the Arab Development Report (link) was a good example, and Bush’s offer to assist in improving educational standards should be applauded, as should his highlighting of the role of women in society. He also highlighted the universal appeal of freedom of speech in Lebanon, Iran and Egypt. He called for “vigorous political parties allowed to engage in free and lively debate…(and) the establishment of civic institutions that ensure an election’s legitimacy and hold leaders accountable. And true democracy requires competitive elections in which opposition candidates are allowed to campaign without fear and intimidation.” This last point was a clear swipe at Egypt in particular, which practices a transparently false charade of democracy. In the best single quote from the speech, Bush told those assembled that “Too often in the Middle East, politics has consisted of one leader in power and the opposition in jail.” He then called on the governments of the Middle East to release their prisoners of conscience and allow open political debate in their societies, including liberalization to allow free media and civil society to function. These are messages that Middle Eastern autocracies need to hear.
Unfortunately, Bush seems to have a tin ear for the perception of the US in the Middle East, or he places so much faith in his own sense of “moral clarity” that he thinks other views are irrelevant. He harked back to the Cold War in saying that “terrorist organizations and their state sponsors” are “on the wrong side in a great ideological struggle – and every nation committed to freedom and progress in the Middle East must stand together to defeat them.” This approach, as with the whole “global war on terror” relies on a simplistic analysis, and forces perverse contortions to stick to the ideological script. For example, as Bush was in the Middle East, the Israelis confirmed they were engaging in talks with Syria, brokered by Turkey, regarding the Golan Heights. An unnamed Bush administration official called the talks a “slap in the face” by Israel. Never mind Israel’s interest in coming to terms with a neighbor that could still inflict heavy damage in open conflict. In Bush’s mind, it is more important that Israel stand firm against the Tehran-Damascus-Hezbollah-Hamas Axis of Evil II.
Also at the same time, Lebanon was teetering on the brink of a renewed civil war between the coalition government of Fouad Siniora and opposition militias, most importantly Hezbollah. The US-backed Israeli war in summer 2006 against Hezbollah not only devastated Lebanon, but it also discredited Siniora’s government, strengthened Hezbollah, and put another nail in the coffin of American credibility as a purveyor of democracy in the Middle East, as Eric and I wrote at the time. Arab League/Qatari negotiations led to a settlement in Lebanon last week, changing the political landscape considerably, to the detriment of the March 14 movement which fomented the “Cedar Revolution” in 2005 after the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. Incompetent, blindly ideological (“moral clarity”) statecraft by the US has paradoxically strengthened both Hezbollah and Hamas, and lost opportunities to show it means what it says on freedoms – for example closing Guantanamo and accepting election results in the few cases of real elections.
While Iran and Syria each support Hezbollah and Hamas, both movements have massive domestic constituencies that have to be part of any equation to achieve Bush’s goals of freedom and peace. In the US presidential election campaign, this fact has been sidestepped by all the remaining candidates. Not long ago, Republican candidate John McCain was very sensible: “They’re the government; sooner or later we’re going to have to deal with them, one way or another, and I understand why this administration and previous administrations had such antipathy towards Hamas because of their dedication to violence and the things they not only espouse but practice, so…but it’s a new reality in the Middle East. I think the lesson is people want security and a decent life and decent future, that they want democracy. Fatah was not giving them that.” He might have added that the Fatah of Yassir Arafat and his successors was legendary for its corruption, and this was a major motive for its electoral defeat. Yet in promotional literature, the McCain campaign asserted that Hamas was rooting for a victory by Democratic frontrunner Barack Obama. Obama, to allay fears that he might be “soft on Israel,” made a speech in Boca Raton, Florida to a predominantly Jewish and pro-Israel audience to burnish his pro-Israel bona fides, repudiating the idea of talking to Hamas, which he had never previously espoused. The dynamics of national electoral politics typically leads to greater hawkishness regarding Israel. Bush’s Knesset speech is the pacesetter of this particular bipartisan brand of unconditional devotion to Israel.
In a very worthwhile article published last week, Atlantic correspondent Jeffrey Goldberg made the point that this uncritical and unconditional backing is bad for Israel itself. A vocal constituency in the US, not only Jewish groups but also Christian fundamentalists, press Israeli governments to be more inflexible than their own constituents want them to be – a typical diaspora syndrome seen also in the Balkans and Northern Ireland. In the article, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert noted that this inflexibility on issues like East Jerusalem and settlements (many populated by Americans) made it ever more difficult to achieve a Palestinian state, which he and many other Israeli leaders believe essential to preserve a Jewish majority Israel. “Once, men like (former Prime Minister Ariel) Sharon and Olmert saw the settlers as the vanguards of Zionism; today, the settlements are seen as the forerunner of a binational state. In other words, as the end of Israel as a Jewish majority democracy.” Olmert’s greatest fear is of apartheid-era international isolation of Israel, which he thinks is possible if the Palestinians shift from an “Algeria-style campaign” to a “South Africa-style campaign.” Goldberg notes that the expression of Barack Obama on the issue of settlements – “not helpful” – was tame in comparison to this critique by the Israeli prime minister.
Reasonable people can differ on whether Olmert’s nightmare scenario would really be a nightmare. But no other country could claim it imperative to maintain a demographic majority without verbal brickbats coming its way. One could imagine the response to an American or French presidential candidate who argued that it was essential to maintain a white majority. That’s the preserve of the Pat Buchanans, David Dukes, and Jean-Marie Le Pens. A Jewish homeland need not necessitate a Jewish state.
The separation wall has gutted the Palestinian economy; it is hard to see how it could function without open trade and travel with Israel, with which it was tightly integrated. Israel will ultimately face a growing internal demographic imbalance, with a winnowing of Jewish immigration from the former Soviet Union and a growing Arab Israeli population. My personal view is that a common state for Palestinians and Israelis is the logical end goal and most likely to deliver security for all involved. But given the dire conditions of today, it is hard to see how to get there from here. What is a safe bet is that there will probably not be any forward movement toward any mutually acceptable solution so long as Bush remains president.
