Nothing is really dead until buried

Yesterday’s first-rate Middle East Institute/SAIS event on the Palestine/Israel peace process during the second Obama term offered two big takehomes:

1. To be successful, an American president will have to treat making Middle East peace a top American national security priority;
2. The Arab peace initiative, dead but not yet buried, should be revived.

These were the bottom lines of a discussion featuring the all-star cast of former Ambassador to Egypt and Israel. Dan Kurtzer, University of Maryland Professor Shibley Telhami and former Florida Congressman Robert Wexler.  Geoffrey Aronson of the Foundation for Middle East Peace moderated.  I introduced, but that was truly the least remarkable part of the event.

First-term President Obama did, Ambassdor Kurtzer thought, give the Middle East peace process priority, but without the needed strategy and policy follow-through.  He is now giving Secretary Kerry an opportunity to make it work and wants to see progress.  The key to success lies more in the parties’ relationships with the United States than with each other.  Also important is the “Arab street,” whose weight is more strongly felt now than before the Arab awakenings.

Obama should have started with the progress that Palestinian President Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Olmert had made at the end of the second Bush Administration.  Now the best place to start is with the Arab peace initiative, which needs to be deepened beyond the promise of Arab recognition once a deal is reached between Israel and the Palestinians.  The Israelis need to be talking with the Arabs about climate change, economic development and other substantial issues beyond those traditionally part of the peace process.

Professor Telhami also underlined that the peace process has to be important for the United States, something of which President Carter but not President Clinton was convinced.  Carter was therefore much more forceful than Clinton and put forward a detailed US proposal.  9/11 and the Iraq war shifted the priorities in the Bush Administration away from the Israel/Palestine, as war with Iran would do now.  Even without that, Obama has to have his doubts.  The Gulf Cooperation Council countries, especially Saudi Arabia, are much more important now than in the past, because the Arab awakenings have sidelined Egypt.  The Arab peace initiative is the place to start.

Congressman Wexler emphasized the importance of political leadership and strength in determining a president’s effectiveness in an enterprise like the Middle East peace process. Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and Palestinian President Abbas have so far stiffed the President.  If Obama can succeed at two of the three main issues he faces at the moment (immigration, guns and the Federal budget), he will be much stronger than in the past.  There will be an opportunity, after the Iran nuclear issue is resolved, provided Obama is able to deliver on prevention rather than deterrence.  He would then be able to prevail even if there is resistance to an Israel/Palestine deal in Congress.  Jewish Americans will in any case not be an obstacle to a serious deal.

Audience members challenged the panel on two main points:  whether the Arab peace initiative was in fact promising from an Israeli point of view, as it called for the right of return, and whether Israel can expect withdrawal from the West Bank to ensure peace, as that is not what happened with Gaza and Lebanon.  Wexler responded that the Arab peace initiative clearly implied a negotiated solution to the right of return.  Kurtzer reminded that Israeli withdrawals from Jordan and Egypt had led to peace, because they were negotiated and there was a good faith partner on the other end, whereas the unilateral withdrawals from Gaza and Lebanon left a vacuum.

Nothing, the panel suggested, is dead in the Middle East until it is buried.  The peace process and the Arab peace initiative are not yet buried.