Peace picks June 15-19
1. Calculating the Costs of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict| Monday, June 15th | 12:00-1:15 | Wilson Center | REGISTER TO ATTEND | This event will explore both the economic and the non-economic factors surrounding the conflict that might influence the parties’ decisions and the long-term implications for Israel, the West Bank and Gaza and the international community. Speakers include: C. Ross Anthony, Senior Economist, RAND Corporation and Director, RAND Israeli-Palestinian Initiative; Lucy Kurtzer-Ellenbogen, Director, Arab-Israeli, U.S. Institute of Peace; Aaron David Miller, Vice President for New Initiatives, The Wilson Center; Ambassador Charles Ries, Vice President, International, RAND Corporation. Presentation by C. Ross Anthony and Ambassador Charles Ries.
2. Global Cooperation Under Threat: Adapting the U.N. for the 21st Century | Monday, June 15th | 1:30-3:30 | Brookings Institution | REGISTER TO ATTEND | The Foreign Policy program at Brookings will host Susana Malcorra, Chief of Staff to the United Nations Secretary-General for a discussion exploring how the U.N. is adapting to new geopolitical, transnational, and sub-state challenges. Speakers include: Susana Malcorra, Chief of Staff to the United Nations Secretary-General; Ambassador Thomas Pickering, Fellow of Foreign Policy, Brookings Institution; Bruce Jones, Acting Vice President and Director, Foreign Policy program, Brookings Institution.
3. The Banyan Tree Leadership Forum with K Shanmugam, Foreign Minister of Singapore | Monday, June 15th | 2:30-3:30 | Center for Strategic and International Studies | REGISTER TO ATTEND | Mr. Shanmugam will discuss Singapore’s bilateral relations with the United States, regional relationships, and the opportunities and challenges facing Singapore. Speakers include: Mr. K Shanmugam, Singapore’s Minister for Foreign Affairs and Minister for Law.
4. Can Afghanistan Stabilize as U.S. Forces Plan Their Exit? | Tuesday, June 16th | 10:00-12:00 | United States Institute of Peace | REGISTER TO ATTEND | The United States’ current policy in Afghanistan mandates a “responsible withdrawal” of U.S. forces by January 2017, when President Obama leaves office. With 18 months to go, a sense of crisis is mounting in Afghanistan as the economy sags, Taliban attacks increase, and the eight-month-old unity government remains deadlocked. Speakers include: Dr. William Byrd, Senior Expert in Residence, USIP; Ali Jalali, Former Minister of the Interior of Afghanistan, Senior Expert in Residence, USIP; Scott Smith, Director, Afghanistan and Central Asia Programs, USIP; Dr. Moeed Yusuf, Director, South Asia Programs, USIP. Moderated by Dr. Andrew Wilder, Vice President, Center for South and Central Asia, USIP.
5. Making the Case for Peace: 2015 Global Peace Index| Wednesday, June 17th | 9:30-11:00 | Center for Strategic and International Studies | REGISTER TO ATTEND | What is the state of global peace in 2015? What are the main threats to peace and how can we prevent violence in the future? What are the implications of these trends for foreign policy and aid interventions? The 2015 Global Peace Index discussion will explore these questions, detailing recent trends in militarization, safety and security, and ongoing conflict, with a focus on analyzing the factors that underpin peaceful societies. Speakers include: Ambassador Rick Barton, Former Assistant Secretary of State for the Bureau of Conflict and Stabilization Operations; Melanie Greenberg, Executive Director, Alliance for Peacebuilding; Matt Wuerker, Editorial Cartoonist and Illustrator, Politico. Moderated by Aubrey Fox, Executive Director, Unites States, Institute for Economics and Peace. Global Peace Index results presented by Daniel Hyslop, Research Manager, Institute for Economics and Peace.
6. Gulf Youth and the City | Wednesday, June 17th | 12:00-1:30 | The Arab Gulf States Institute | REGISTER TO ATTEND | Gulf cities have followed similar paths of urbanization and architecture shaped by state planning and commercial development. Recent events across the globe, from the Occupy movements to the 2011 Arab uprisings, have brought the role of cities in political life to the forefront. However, with few exceptions, Gulf cities are known more as glittering global consumer capitals than places of civic engagement or political struggle.With a dynamic younger generation rising in the Gulf, what is the public’s role, especially youth, in the remaking of their cities? Speakers include: Farah Al-Nakib, Director, Center for Gulf Studies, American University of Kuwait; Diane Singerman, Associate Professor, Department of Government, American University. Moderated by Kristin Smith Diwan, Senior Resident Scholar, Arab Gulf States Institute.
7. The New Politics of Religion and Gender in Israel | Thursday, June 18th | 2:00-3:30 | Brookings Institution | REGISTER TO ATTEND | This year’s Israeli elections provoked resurgent debates over religion and saw the emergence of powerful female voices in the political debate. Join the Center for Middle East Policy at Brookings on June 18 to engage with three of these dynamic Israeli figures, as we launch a new agenda of research and events examining important changes in Israel’s politics and society. Speakers include: Adina Bar Shalom, President and Chairwoman, Haredi College of Jerusalem; Merav Michaeli, Member of Knesset; Rachel Azaria, Member of Knesset, Former Deputy Mayor of Jerusalem.
8. Fighting Terrorism in the Age of ISIS | Thursday, June 18th | 5:00-6:30 | Center for Strategic and International Studies | REGISTER TO ATTEND | Please join the Smart Women, Smart Power initiative for a discussion of ‘Fighting Terrorism in the Age of ISIS’ with Fran Townsend, Former Homeland Security and Counterterrorism Adviser to President George W. Bush. Speakers include: Fran Townsend, Former Homeland Security and Counterterrorism Adviser to President George W. Bush. Moderated by Nina Easton, Senior Associate, CSIS, Editor and Columnist, Fortune, Chair, Most Powerful Women International.
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Yemen: bleak outlook
Last Thursday, the Wilson Center hosted Youth and Civil Society: The Missing Powers in Yemen with Mohammad Al-Shami, a Yemeni youth activist and advocacy trainer. Haleh Esfandiari, the director of the Middle East Program at the Wilson Center, gave opening remarks and moderated a question and answer session.
Al-Shami presented a bleak picture of Yemen’s predicament. For years prior to the current conflict, Yemen suffered from poverty, water shortages, youth unemployment, inadequate healthcare, divisions along many lines, repeated conflict, and the absence of rule of law. The government was highly centralized, weak and corrupt. Citizens needed to come to Sana’a for basic administrative needs and officials there often required bribes.
The military was seen as only representative of a portion of Northern Yemen. The National Dialogue process that occurred prior to the most recent conflict called for restructuring the military. Soldiers from the North were angered that they could lose their jobs to Southerners as a result.
The current conflict reflects the complex divisions of Yemeni society. The rebels are comprised of disparate elements, some of which are not allied with each other. Al Qaeda has filled the power vacuum in some areas, including the major city of Al Mukalla. Al Qaeda is able to provide stability and services, making those who do not necessarily agree with jihadi ideology turn to them for safety. When the war ends, reconstruction will be long and complicated. The underlying factors that led to the conflict will still be present.
According to Al-Shami, civil society in Yemen is plagued by a lack of expertise and cooperation. International donors provided some training to Yemeni civil society organizations but not crucial capacity building. Civil society organizations did not collaborate on initiatives, and multiple organizations were often inefficiently working on similar projects simultaneously.
These organizations are nevertheless the primary providers of life-saving assistance on the ground. The conflict has forced them to focus on humanitarian rather than development work. They lack supplies and largely depend on Yemen’s weak private sector for materials. Despite these challenges, Yemeni civil society organizations are distributing food and water, finding people shelter, and setting up clinics. They are able to access villages controlled by different forces and serve as the best source of information regarding events on the ground.
In Al-Shami’s view, GCC airstrikes were not the only available solution to the upheaval in Yemen. The GCC does not value civil society and has neglected civil society in its initiatives. The National Dialogue provided an opportunity for a political solution and civil society could have played a role in a peaceful settlement. As the violence drags on, it makes reaching a solution increasingly complicated. The peace talks in Geneva will be more complicated than finding a political solution from the outset would have been.
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Future Serbia
I’ve run into some flak for hosting Serbian Prime Minister Vučić at SAIS last week. Some people think providing an opportunity for someone to speak at a university represents a political endorsement of his views, past and present.
Certainly Vučić has said things in the past that I find odious, most notably this from July 1995:
one hundred Muslims would be killed for every dead Serb
I haven’t forgotten. But it is a mistake to harp too hard and too long on the past. My interest in hearing Prime Minister Vučić, and providing him a forum in which he could be heard by others, stemmed from the need to understand his vision of Serbia’s future. I’m not interested in settling scores but in bending the arc of history in a good direction.
What Vučić offered was a glimpse of a possible future Serbia, one that makes a strategic choice for Europe and gives up on the non-aligned balancing act it has performed since the end of World War II. In my book, that would be a welcome development.
Non-alignment lost its real meaning 25 years ago. All the other countries of the Balkans have already opted for Brussels, leaving Serbia surrounded by EU and NATO members and aspirants. Many maintain good bilateral relations with Russia, even while joining in Ukraine-related sanctions. Serbia hasn’t done that, despite its candidacy for EU membership.
The question is what would encourage and enable Serbia to take the necessary steps away from its traditional “non-aligned” stance. Here are some ideas worth consideration.
Internal reform
Serbia has progressed in many respects since the Milosevic era and is now in a position to claim that it is on the road towards democracy and to attracting foreign investment on a commercial basis. But it remains laggard in two key areas: media freedom and rule of law. It needs to up its game in both.
The media issue is not formal censorship but rather informal pressures and even self-censorship, often exercised through politically-appointed editors and fear of losing contracts for valuable government advertizing. In addition, politicians in Serbia frequently attack the medium, not only the message. This cows many outlets into submission–memories of what happened to media moguls who resisted Milosevic’s dominance are still fresh. The media need to be far freer to criticize without fear of retaliation.
Rule of law in Serbia suffers two ailments: slowness and lack of independence. Commercial disputes can drag on for decades. Tycoons and war criminals are too often protected from prosecution. One of the prime suspects in the murder of the Bytyqi brothers, American Kosovars killed in 1999 by Serb security forces, is a member of the prime minister’s political party and serves on its executive board. The courts need to be liberated and encouraged to pursue malfeasance wherever it occurs, provided they follow proper procedures. Read more
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No easy answers
Lots of people were asking yesterday about President Obama’s decision to send more trainers and equipment to Iraq, mainly for Sunni fighters. Here is more or less what I’ve been saying:
Q. Why is the US sending troops to Iraq at this time?
A. They are sending more troops because the current effort is not succeeding. The Islamic State has lost some territory in the past year, but it has also gained territory and appears no closer to defeat than it was a year ago. Beefing up the training and equipment, in particular for Sunnis, is a move in the right direction, even if it is not likely the last one.
Q. What does this represents in terms of strategy?
A. In terms of strategy, not much. The objective is the same—to defeat ISIS—and this is a marginal addition of resources with which to try to do it. I don’t see any big shift in strategy with this decision.
Q. How is that going to help, if any, the fight against ISIS?
A. The key here is to try to get more Sunni tribal members into the fight. If and when the Sunni population wants to be rid of ISIS in a serious way, it will happen.
But that also depends on what the Sunni population can expect if they join the fight. Will they gain political and economic weight in Baghdad or in their own provinces? Will they be treated properly by the Iraqi authorities and adequate provision made for stabilizing and reconstructing their communities? There are no clear answers to these questions yet. The military dimension is not the only one that counts.
Q. Do you think the US is doing enough to help the Iraqis in their fight? If not, what more should the US does?
A. Most military experts think an important missing link is people on the ground to “spot,” that is target, the air strikes, which have been relatively few due in part to fear of collateral damage. But putting Americans into that role risks their lives and would raise questions about whether the effort is sustainable. Training Iraqis to perform that function risks its use to settle scores.
Like many other issues in the Middle East these days, there are no easy answers.
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Bush, not Obama, decided Iraq withdrawal
As Republican candidates for President continue to raise the question of withdrawal from Iraq, “blaming” the supposed mistake on Barack Obama, I am reprinting from a previous post (published on May 2, 2014) the true story:
The notion that it was President Obama who decided to withdraw troops from Iraq is simply wrong. Here is a first-person account from Bob Loftis, who led the failed negotiations on the Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA):
[The decision to withdraw US troops] happened in mid-2008 [during the Bush Administration]. My team and I were instructed to work on an agreement that would allow a long term US military presence. At no time did the issue of withdrawal arise, even when the term “SOFA” became politically toxic in Baghdad. SOFA talks were suspended in May 2008, with the focus placed on negotiating the Strategic Framework Agreement (which would have some vague references to “pre-existing arrangements” (i.e. certain parts of CPA17). I then heard in September 2008 that…there were new SOFA talks which were about withdrawal. The “Agreement Between the United States of America and the Republic of Iraq On the Withdrawal of United States Forces from Iraq and the Organization of Their Activities during Their Temporary Presence in Iraq” was signed on 17 November 2008 by Ryan Crocker: Article 24 (1) states “All the United States Forces shall withdraw from all Iraqi territory no later than December 31, 2011.”
People will tell you that President Bush thought the agreement would be revised in the succeeding administration to allow the Americans to stay in some limited number. But that doesn’t change the fact that it was Bush, not Obama, who decided on US withdrawal.
Once in office, Obama did try to negotiate permission for the Americans to stay. Prime Minister Maliki didn’t want to give up jurisdiction over crimes committed by US troops. Hard for me to fault the President for not yielding on that point, especially in light of the arbitrary arrests and detentions Maliki has indulged in since. Nor do I think US troops in the mess that is today’s Iraq would be either safe or useful.
Note added in 2015:
The circumstances that today are giving President Obama reason to send more troops back to Iraq are dramatically different from any that could have been anticipated in 2008 or 2009. But at least now they are going back to an Iraq whose government welcomes them. Withdrawal was not a mistake. It was a reaction to the political realities both in Washington and Baghdad. Second guessing is a fool’s game, especially when conducted by Donald Trump and Rudi Giuliani.
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Defeating ISIS in Iraq
Monday the United States Institute of Peace hosted Saleem Al-Jubouri, speaker of Iraq’s parliament, on the causes of violence and instability in Iraq and what he believes Iraq needs to do going forward to fight ISIS. USIP President Nancy Lindborg delivered the opening remarks. Acting executive vice president William Taylor moderated. Here is a link to a video of the entire event.
Al-Jubouri, a Sunni, blamed ISIS’s rapid rise to power on the government’s sectarian policies, corruption, and marginalization of Sunnis. The government did not heed his warnings. Iraq is now a country of displaced persons who represent a recruitment opportunity for ISIS.
The role of the Iraqi state in what lies ahead is critical. For Al-Jubouri, a stable state is the guarantor of the well being of minorities and the marginalized. In the struggle between state and non-state institutions, institutions based on elections must be maintained.
In order to defeat ISIS, the Iraqi government must foster reconciliation between Iraq’s different ethnic groups by moving away from confessionalism and regional polarization and towards greater efficiency. Al-Jubouri regards Prime Minister Abadi as a partner in the reconciliation process, which faces many challenges. No single group is to blame.
According to Al-Jubouri, Sunni tribes will only take the risk necessary to fight ISIS if they believe that they will end up better off after ISIS is defeated. They will not risk of fighting ISIS if they believe new extremists will fill the vacuum. When the tribes previously took up arms against Al Qaeda in Iraq, some of those who successfully defeated AQI were subsequently arrested by the government for carrying weapons. If the tribes defeat ISIS, they must be protected under the law once the dust settles.
Al-Jubouri said the proposed law to create a National Guard is intended to ensure that all sectors of society are partners in Iraq’s security. It was supposed to be organized by governorate. But in practice, the National Guard may be just another armed group and could provide legal cover for the Shi’a Popular Mobilization Units (PMUs).
Al-Jubouri does not view the influence of the PMUs as wholly negative. Southern Iraqis are giving their lives to repel ISIS from areas far from their homes. However, the PMUs are not disciplined and suffer in some cases from bad leadership. They have been involved in burning and looting of some captured areas.
The ideal is to strengthen official government forces and forbid all other parties from carrying weapons. But current circumstances are exceptional. The Shi’a have the PMUs, the Kurds have the Peshmerga, but the Sunnis lack a means to confront terror. The Sunni tribes must be armed, with guarantees that the weapons will reach the local population.
The Speaker’s message regarding foreign intervention in Iraq was dichotomous. Iraq needs the help of its closest friend, the US, and the international community, which should increase military assistance and push Iraq towards a more inclusive political process. However, neighboring countries’ (especially Iran’s) attempts to influence Iraqi affairs for their own gain is a problem. No country should intervene in Iraq’s internal affairs.
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