Tag: Israel/Palestine
Pompeo pontificates
Secretary of State Pompeo took the occasion of his speech in Cairo today to assert what few in the Middle East believe: that the US is a force for good in the region. Offering little evidence for this assertion that would be convincing to anyone but Middle Eastern autocrats, he instead focused on criticizing the Obama Administration.
He criticized it for failing to respond adequately to Sunni extremism, to the Iranian crackdown on the Green Revolution, and to Bashar al Assad. He also praised President Trump for destroying the Islamic State (ignoring completely Obama’s role in that fight) and for bombing Syria when it used chemical weapons (to little effect). The message was clear: American foreign policy is going to be unfailingly partisan. No more non-partisanship at the water’s edge. That’s for sissies.
Iran, Pompeo suggested while vaunting his evangelical credentials, is evil. He reviewed the full array of US efforts to counter Tehran, ignoring US withdrawal from the nuclear deal and its negative implications for relations with Europe and its impact on America’s credibility in future nonproliferation efforts. He ignored the lack of progress in getting Tehran to renegotiate the agreement, which is what he has been pleading for.
While acknowledging President Trump’s decision to withdraw from Syria and underlining that Middle Eastern partners will need to do more, Pompeo reiterated America’s maximal demands without considering the means available. The US won’t provide assistance to Syria until Iran withdraws and a political transition is irreversible. He also challenged Hizbollah and Iranian dominance of Lebanon, promised to work for peace in Yemen, and pledged an agreement on Israel and Palestine.
As Council on Foreign Relations President Richard Haass put it,
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@SecPompeo articulated ambitious goals-to expel every last Iranian boot from Syria, to reduce Hizballah’s missile arsenal, to help build an Iraq free of Iranian influence-while backing reduced US presence in the Middle East. No policy can succeed with ends and means so divorced.
In concluding, Pompeo claimed that the US had never been an oppressor or empire-builder. That betrayed a serious lack of education on American history, especially in the Western Hemisphere, and insensitivity to how Washington is viewed in the Middle East, where US interventions are often viewed as imperial. Pompeo pledged allegiance to all the autocrats of the region except Iran’s and ignored even the murder of Jamal Khashoggi. How should Middle Easterners who want more open societies and freedom of expression feel about that?
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Make Plan A work
I’ve had several requests from Balkan publications for my end-of-year views on the situation in the region. I’ve so far passed them up, but a few words here seem appropriate.
The Balkans are at peace and far more prosperous than they were in the early 1990s, when war ripped apart former Yugoslavia. Now European Union members, Slovenia and Croatia were then fighting for survival as Serbia tried by force to hold the Federation together, or at least hold on to territory it regarded as “Serb.” Bosnia suffered three and a half years of war, ethnic cleansing, and eventually genocide. Kosovo endured less, but only because NATO was prepared to intervene sooner. Macedonia and Montenegro mostly escaped war, but only with difficulty and international help.
Things are much better now. Per capita income is markedly higher. Ethnic nationalism barks a lot but seldom bites. No army in the Balkans is capable of sustained warfare and no public would support it. All the region’s citizens except Kosovo’s can travel visa-free throughout the European Union. All the remaining non-members of the EU have been promised an opportunity to join the EU. All have signed agreements with Brussels that provide many of the trade and financial benefits of membership, along with ample pre-accession funding.
People in the Balkans are nevertheless dissatisfied. Resurgent ethnic nationalism plagues Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia, and Kosovo. Economic growth is slow, corruption is endemic, and the prospect of European Union accession distant. Big issues remain unresolved. Approval of Macedonia’s far-reaching Prespa agreement with Greece is uncertain. Kosovo and Serbia are far from normalization of their relations, despite years of negotiations. Governance in Bosnia and Herzegovina is increasingly dysfunctional, due to a peace settlement that is difficult to change. Complaints rather than satisfaction are dominant 25 years after the Dayton peace agreements began to bring an end to the Balkan wars of the 1990s.
I think it is wrong to be discouraged. The post-war Balkans region is uniquely advantaged. Its proximity to Europe brought it far more attention and assistance than is typical after conflict. Think of Syria, which will get precious little Western help after far more destructive wars than anyone in the Balkans suffered. Each of the Balkan countries emerged from the 1990s with the prospect of democratic, even if illiberal and imperfect, governance. Only one of the Arab Spring countries, Tunisia, comes even close to that. Except for Iraq and Israel–each imperfect and illiberal in its own way–none of the Middle East can come even close to the freedom of expression and association Balkan citizens today enjoy.
So my message, argued at length in From War to Peace in the Balkans, the Middle East, and Ukraine, is that Plan A is far better than any conceivable Plan B.
The path into EU and NATO for those who want it is getting steeper. But neither has closed its doors. I can well understand those in Kosovo who are discouraged because Brussels has delayed giving the country visa-free status, even though it met all the manifold requirements. But 2020, when the EU says it will be ready to proceed, is just around the corner. It would be a colossal error not to stay on track. Montenegro, already in NATO, seems to understand that and is likely to qualify next for EU membership. Serbia needs to clean up its courts and free up its media, in addition to meeting the technical requirements of the acquis communautaire and normalizing its relations with Kosovo. Skopje and Athens need to maintain their agreement, even if it faces a setback in one of their parliaments. Bosnia and Herzegovina will be the last piece of the Balkans puzzle to find its proper place, but it will do so if it focuses on making the Sarajevo government capable of negotiating and implementing the acquis.
There is nothing insoluble in the Balkans. 2019 should be devoted to making Plan A work. There is no better Plan B.
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Risk rises
2019 has a particular significance: it is the year Republicans need to decide whether they will go into the 2020 presidential election with Donald Trump as their candidate, or not.
There is no serious possibility of a primary challenge or an internal party coup. Trump has demonstrated complete command of the party apparatus, including its major funders. He has given them enough of what Republicans traditionally want: judges who can be relied upon to protect property, law enforcement, and fetuses as well as tax cuts for the very wealthy and white nationalism (aka supremacy) for the hoi polloi. It’s a powerful combination because it finds support in less populated states and rural areas that are overweight in the Electoral College.
There are two other possibilities:
Amendment 25* of the constitution, which allows the vice president to lead an effort to remove a president for inability to carry out the functions of the office, provided the effort can win support from half the cabinet and a 2/3 vote in each house of Congress. Trump is dottering: unable to walk the 250 yards from the White House to Blair House across Pennsylvania Avenue, inarticulate to the point of incoherence, and obviously overweight and unhealthy.
But Trump’s cabinet is loyalist, especially with the departure of Secretary of Defense Mattis (and the earlier departure of Secretary of State Tillerson). Ben Carson would join a risky rebellion in the cabinet? Matthew Whitaker, the unqualified acting Attorney General who couldn’t tell the truth about his college academic achievements? Mike Pompeo, who has pledged he’ll keep fighting for conservative social issues until the Rapture?
Impeachment and conviction isn’t much more likely. The new House majority will be Democratic and might easily find the votes to impeach (accuse) Trump of “high crimes and misdemeanors.” But the Senate, where a 2/3 majority would be required to convict, remains solidly in Republican hands. Impeachment without conviction and removal from office is not a winning wicket. The Republicans tried that with Bill Clinton and found themselves with the short end of the stick.
But there is an added factor in 2019: Special Counsel Mueller’s investigation. We don’t know what it will eventually produce, or when, but we do know what it has produced already: five Trump aides, including his first National Security Adviser, have struck plea deals and a couple of dozen Russian operatives have been indicted, in addition to the conviction of Trump’s campaign chair on non-campaign related financial charges. Some will try to deflect attention from the guilty pleas by saying they are “only” for lying to the FBI. That’s silly. We all know it is a crime to lie to the FBI. If someone does, it means he is willing to risk years in jail to avoid telling the truth. Lying to the FBI suggests an underlying felony.
The role of the president in all this is still unclear, and in any event Justice Department guidance does not permit indictment of a president in office. But that does not mean Mueller can’t recommend indictment in the report he is expected to file. The indictment won’t go forward–Whitaker or his replacement is there to stop it–but the recommendation itself would have a dramatic political impact. Even a strong conclusion could do likewise. New York State’s attorney general has already concluded that the Trump Foundation demonstrated “a shocking pattern of illegality.” What if it turns out his campaign was likewise a criminal enterprise, one that allowed or even encouraged a foreign power to subvert the 2016 election?
So I’m thinking we don’t really know what 2019 will bring. The government shutdown is already scrambling the political scene. Trump is sending distress signals and looking for a deal, by lowering the definition of a border wall as well as how much money he needs for it. The Democrats aren’t biting, yet. Nor are the Chinese, whose retaliation against Trump’s tariff war is devastating soybean and other farmers who supported Trump in 2016. Faced with pressure from Trump not to raise rates, the Fed has asserted its independence and proceeded. The stock market is “in correction” and highly volatile. The economy looks like it is heading for the end of the slow but steady Obama boom.
January will bring the launch of multiple House investigations into the Administration’s malfeasance as well as the 2016 campaign. A quick pullout of US troops from Syria this winter could lead to a major clash there between Turkey and Syria, with Arab and Kurdish paramilitaries allies respectively. The proposed drawdown of troops from Afghanistan could embolden the Taliban and wreck the prospects for a negotiated end to its 17-year war. Continuation of the trade wars will raise prices to American consumers and lower US exports, slowing an economy already towards the end of the business cycle.
I dare not go past that to the spring. While the US remains safer and more prosperous than ever before, the uncertainties Trump generates are also greater than ever before. 2019 looks to be a year of rising risk.
*I originally said “Article.” Apologies for the error. There’s a reason I’m not a lawyer.
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The disgrace
A presidency that has known few happy days is at a nadir, though it may well go lower. Russia and Iran are celebrating the American withdrawal from Syria, which President Trump decided to please Turkey. Ankara will now attack the Kurds who allied themselves with the US to fight ISIS successfully. The President has consequently lost a universally respected Defense Secretary as well as a capable lead for the diplomatic campaign against ISIS.
The economy is shaky. The stock market is correcting and the Fed is raising rates. Recession before the 2020 election is increasingly likely. The trade wars with China and Europe continue with no end in sight, devastating American agriculture and some American manufacturing. The budget deficit is exploding due to an ill-conceived tax cut for the very wealthy. Trump hasn’t spent already appropriated funds for border security, but he is demanding more for an unnecessary and extraordinarily expensive wall on the Mexican border, partly closing down the government through Christmas.
This is a record of unparalleled chaos and failure, even without mentioning the new North Korean missile sites and the Iranian refusal to discuss either their missiles or Tehran’s regional power projection until Trump reverses his decision to exit the Iran nuclear deal. Pyongyang and Tehran represent serious threats to US interests that Trump has no strategy to counter.
Nor has he been any more effective in changing Russian behavior, which the Congress and his Administration continue to sanction without any admission by the President of Moscow’s wrongdoing. The “deal of the century” Trump promised on Palestine his negotiators have botched completely. America’s diplomacy and international reputation have rarely known worse, more incoherent and less effective, moments.
What can be done?
Little is the serious answer. Even when the Democrats take control of the House little more than a week from now, they will have no ability to fix 90% of what ails the country. Their main role will be oversight: making clear to the public what the real situation is through hearings and reports. Beyond that, they can refuse to sign on to stupidities like the border wall, but no legislation can pass the Senate without a good bit of Republican support, especially if overriding a veto will be necessary. The Democrats cannot force the US back into the Iran nuclear deal, the Paris climate change agreement, or the Trans Pacific Partnership, all of which held substantial advantages for the US.
Meanwhile, Special Counsel Mueller’s investigation has produced indictments, guilty pleas, and convictions of high-ranking Trump campaign and administration officials as well as Russian intelligence operatives. There is no longer even a slight doubt that Moscow campaigned in 2016 in favor of Donald Trump, likely tipping the balance in his favor in key Midwest states and Pennsylvania. Trump is obsessed with legitimacy, as well he should be. He is not a fairly elected president, even if we accept the inequities of the Electoral College. He is the product of blatant, widespread, and illegal foreign assistance. We need barely mention Trump’s own illegal campaign contributions as well as his criminal use of Trump Foundation resources.
I doubt though that we have reached bottom. Still to come are revelations about massive Russian and Saudi financing for Trump real estate, as well as indictments of his co-conspirators in stealing and publishing emails. Trump really hasn’t hidden these things, but a report from Mueller that details them will be more than interesting. It will raise questions about whether a felon should be sleeping and watching TV in the White House, where he does little else except brood. If his former National Security Adviser can go to prison for years, why can’t the President be indicted and tried?
The short answer is that the toadies he picks as Attorney General won’t allow it, claiming that Justice Department regulations they could change prohibit it. Trump can no longer, with a Democratic majority in the House, avoid impeachment, if the Mueller report suggests it. But in the Senate he still has not only a majority, but one that hesitates to criticize, never mind convict. Trump has humiliated Mitch McConnell and his cohort repeatedly, but the Senate Republicans remain steadfastly loyal. It is hard to picture how conviction would gain a 2/3 majority it needs in the upper chamber.
The only remedy for this shambolic and bozotic presidency is likely at the polls, less than two years hence. There are no guarantees, but Trump’s path to re-election is narrowing, especially if recession happens. The disgrace is in the White House, not in the country.
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Lost, but not paradise
The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace hosted a discussion Wednesday with Daniel Seidemann, founder and director of Terrestrial Jerusalem. He was joined by Zaha Hassan, a human rights lawyer and visiting fellow at the Carnegie Middle East program. They reviewed recent events in Israel and Jerusalem and discussed the implications for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the near future.
Seidemann’s portrayal of the political future in Israel was bleak. The move by the Trump administration to relocate the American embassy to Jerusalem was the death knell for American leadership in the crisis. Worse, there is no other state willing and able to fill America’s role as neutral arbiter in the conflict. Seidemann warned that hopelessness, which he called “the great destabilizer”, now reigned in East Jerusalem. He expressed no confidence in the ability of the current administration to approach Jerusalem with the seriousness that it deserves, or even recognize what he characterized as the basic fact of occupation in East Jerusalem, Gaza, and the West Bank. Instead he characterized the American policy as “buy them and break them” hoping to stifle dissent with budgetary crumbs, combined with a bleak situation intended to break Palestinian political will.
Seidemann also warned that Israel, along with most of the West, is in danger of sliding into authoritarianism. Institutions are under attack all across Israel. Netanyahu will be attending the inauguration of Jair Bolsonaro, Brazil’s new President-elect who more than toyed with fascism while on the campaign trail. Netanyahu’s move towards authoritarianism is largely due to the noose around his neck: he faces the specter of imminent indictment on corruption charges, which he hopes to ride out and remain in office.
Domestic pressure may play a part in pushing Netanyahu towards construction of two “doomsday” settlements: the E1 settlement in East Jerusalem which would create a bottleneck in the West Bank, and another settlement which would sit between East Jerusalem and Bethlehem. Both settlements would create a serious barrier to the realization of a continuous Palestinian state, as well as displace Palestinians from their homes in numbers unseen since 1997. Though this plan has been paused in the past due to international pressure, it is conceivable given the vacuum of American leadership that Netanyahu may move to strengthen his base in Israel.
Zaha offered an overview of Palestinian strategy in the wake of American withdrawal as an effective mediator. Palestinians have engaged in a flurry of international engagement, hoping to advocate for themselves on the world stage. They filed a complaint to the UN Committee on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, the first ever state-to-state complaint handled by the UN. The committee, consisting of experts on racial discrimination, will tackle among other issues the accusation of apartheid in Israel.
Another complaint has been lodged with the International Criminal Court, and deals with human rights violations committed on Palestinian territory. Since many of the allegations have taken place in East Jerusalem the case will necessarily involve a ruling on whether East Jerusalem is part of the territory of the Palestinian State.
A case in the International Court of Justice questions whether the US can legally relocate its embassy to Jerusalem given the city’s special status. While the US under Trump will likely ignore an unfavorable ruling, the decision will have repercussions for states who are considering an embassy move but seek to abide by international law.
The situation in Israel underlines the need for a renewed American policy in the Middle East. Seidemann urged that it is not too soon to begin considering what American policy in Israel should be after Trump, but he warned against viewing previous American policy as paradise lost, saying “it is lost, but it’s not paradise.” Instead America needs a new plan for thoughtful leadership in the Middle East, free of gimmicks and mindful that the world is no longer unipolar. The silver lining to America’s withdrawal under Trump is an opportunity to reconstitute US foreign policy.
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