Is there a chance for a peace miracle in Middle East?

January 26, 2009

Palm Beach Gardens, Florida

The Gaza crisis unfolds as America starts a creative presidency in the face of overwhelming economic challenge. Israel is about to elect hard-line leadership and Palestinians have yet to accept the need to unite through civic empowerment, rather than fight an asymmetrical war with the occupier.

The world expects two parallel miracles to take place in the foreseeable future. President Obama is assigned the miracle of reversing a crisis of confidence in the US economy; the newly appointed US envoy, George Mitchell, is assigned the miracle of reversing the crisis of confidence in Middle East peace.

The Middle East is the land of miracles, but not the political type. What would it take to achieve a peace miracle? A new peace process, accommodation from both rival sides and US firm intervention would go a long way to generate hope in a settlement.

The war in Gaza is the last nail in the coffin of what has been a worn-out, discredited and short-sighted peace process. But with a transformed US foreign policy, a fresh initiative for a lasting Arab-Israeli settlement may have a chance to emerge.

The most saddening thing about the tragedy of Gaza may not be the blood spilled, the level of destruction caused or the hatred generated, but rather the missing of yet another historic opportunity to intervene effectively in the Arab Israeli conflict. Effective intervention deals with root causes and the interrelated parts of the conflict.

President Barack Obama is deeply sensitive about the relevance of Gaza to his agenda of change. Obama knows that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict can only end when the occupation is terminated and when Israel’s future is solidly secured. The new president is well aware that the conflict will only end when Palestinians accept Israelis, and Israelis, in turn, trust Palestinians. Any other Arab agreement of peace with Israel is vulnerable as long as national aspirations of Palestinians remain blocked.

The cease-fire agreement will further limit the military capacity of Hamas and ease Israeli restrictions on the people of Gaza. But Hamas will soon regenerate military muscle and cash political credit for its martyrdom. In fighting a superior military power, Palestinians see success in sacrifice, not in body count of the enemy.

The propaganda war never stops. Israelis claim the moral high ground in all their wars and accuse Palestinians of violating the rules of combat. Israelis measure the morality of fighting by the “surgical” accuracy of targeting the enemy. Palestinians measure immorality of war by the intensity of Israeli collective punishment of their civilians. Israel accuses Palestinians of terrorism; Palestinians accuse Israelis of state terror.

Both sides of the conflicts are trapped by a counterproductive political strategy. Israelis are trapped by an occupation which undermines quality of governance and respect of rule of law. Palestinians are trapped by a strategy of risk-prone resistance which slows the pace of their political liberation.

Each side is intent on “teaching” the opponent lessons of justice. Israel “disciplines” the people of Gaza with devastating air strikes. Palestinians intimidate Israelis with feeble rockets which cause damage, fear and occasional loss of life.

Each side considers itself a victim. Palestinians underestimate the existential fear of Israelis, and Israelis underestimate the suffering of Palestinians.

Each side unwittingly delays peace. Extreme Israelis prefer to preserve the status-quo to an active search for peace; a lasting settlement requires painful accommodation. Extreme Palestinians are not in a hurry to negotiate a two-state solution. Some Palestinians dream that one day Israel will have to “expire”.

The two sides have become monotonous in rhetoric, predictable in defending their case and simplistic in analysis. Each has chosen a convenient moment in time to identify who started this last conflict. Israel talks about violation of cease fire in late December and Palestinians talk about Israeli air strikes of early November. This selective perception on each side characterizes narration of subjective history, analysis of conflict, claims to land, the role of God and the expectation of who will ultimately win.

Obama and his team must be aware of the futility of the step-by-step, territory-by- territory, country-by-country, incremental approach to solving a conflict that involves several countries and several interconnected Palestinian communities. How can one separate the issue of Gaza troop evacuation from the problem of expanding Israeli settlement in the West Bank? How can the issue of withdrawal from the West Bank be negotiated separately from the issue of the occupation of the Golan Heights in Syria? How can withdrawal of forces from all Palestinian territories take place without massive international investment in a comprehensive social and economic empowerment of the Palestinian refugees?

To break this self reinforcing cycle of hostility in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, the US administration must suggest the basic elements of a region-based, land-for-peace agreement. But this conflict is not only about land for peace. The solution must include Jewish recognition of responsibility for past Palestinian suffering and Arab recognition of responsibility for future Israeli security.

Obama makes good start on Middle East

President Obama has sent two positive messages to the Arab world in one week, and for that we should be glad.

One is his interview with the Al Arabiya TV network.

This is the first interview he’s granted since becoming president — a fact that hasn’t been lost on Arabs and Muslims.

And his tone during the interview was refreshing. He told the popular network that he had Muslim family members, and that he had lived in the most populous Muslim nation in the world, Indonesia.

He also said, “All too often the United States starts by dictating — in the past on some of these issues — and we don’t always know all the factors that are involved.” His approach, he said, was going to be, “Let’s listen.” And he added, “The language we use has to be a language of respect.”

This approach couldn’t be more different than the bullying one that President Bush too often used.

Second, Obama’s choice of George Mitchell as U.S. envoy to the Middle East also demonstrates seriousness.

Mitchell’s stature, Lebanese roots, role in resolving the Irish conflict and magical touch with hard-liners make him the promised man for the Promised Land.

For too long, America has equated closeness to Israel with distance from Palestinians. This zero-sum paradigm is faulty because Israel needs a secure and viable Palestinian state as an immediate neighbor and a future partner. Similarly, a viable Palestinian state needs Israel to thrive.

Foreign policy expert Walter Russell Mead argues for this new approach in the latest issue of Foreign Affairs magazine. Palestinians who live under Israeli rule have assimilated various elements of Jewish culture, including the Hebrew language. When peace comes, Palestinians may be natural mediators for Israelis with Arabs of other nations.

Obama and Mitchell need to apply evenhandedness to broker a lasting peace. For too long, Washington has not been an honest broker. It has repeatedly sided with Israel, whether during the Palestinian Intifadas or the raid on Yasser Arafat’s compound in Ramallah in 2002 or the Lebanese war in 2006 or most recently Israel’s brutal operation in Gaza. And while Obama displayed some compassion toward the people of Gaza, his portrayal of Hamas as the only villain fit this old pattern.

Obama and Mitchell must also hold Israel accountable: for its disproportionate assault on Gaza, for its expansion of illegal settlements and for continuing to hold on to the West Bank.

The following five elements, then, would make turn America into an honest broker: U.S. reconciliation with Islam, a win-win approach to Israel and Palestine, a consistent commitment to peace, a sensitive approach to Arab perspectives and firmness with Israel.

With his Al Arabiya interview and his Mitchell appointment, Obama has started down the right path.

Ghassan Michel Rubeiz, a social scientist and political commentator on the Middle East, is the former secretary of the Middle East for the Geneva-based World Council of Churches. He can be reached at pmproj@progressive.org.

Copyright Ghassan Michel Rubeiz

Has Israel won the war in Gaza ?

Palm Beach Gardens, Florida

Israel has won the military battle in Gaza but not the peace it desperately needs.

Today, the confidence of Palestinians and Israelis in a land-for-peace settlement is at a historic low. The worst product of fighting in Gaza may not be the human suffering or material damage, but rather the loss of hope in achieving peace.

Time is not on Israel’s side. Israel is drifting toward a risky one-state “solution”. The two-state solution is rapidly disappearing from expectations, as Thomas Friedman argues in his January 25 NY Times column.

Friedman argues that Hamas, on one side, and the extreme right-wing Israelis on the other, have marginalized moderates and nearly killed the only option for peace: two-states, living side by side, with a shared Jerusalem, 1967 borders, internationally supervised security, and compensated or resettled refugees.

In what way has Israel won, or failed in Gaza?

Israel won the war diplomatically but not strategically.

Israel won in public relations. The Gaza war causation was oversimplified and reduced to a parable of self defense: “unprovoked Hamas shells Israeli neighborhoods; to which Israel retaliates in self defense”. In war, people seem to focus on the precipitating events of hostilities: Hamas shelling provokes Israeli air strikes. As a predisposing cause for the Gaza war, the expanding Israeli occupation was regrettably forgotten. Strategically, the Gaza war distanced Israel from its long term security. Hamas has emerged politically stronger.

Israel won the war domestically but not morally.

The majority of Israelis rallied behind the war. Hamas angered Israelis by its indiscriminate and uncalled for shelling of civilians. The world lost some sympathy for Palestinians who delegated Hamas to defend their cause. But as the war dust settled and the Palestinian shocking body count was compared with Israeli victims, the allegation of a just war theory was not totally convincing. Many observers ask if Israel could have resorted to more diplomacy in Gaza before launching such a disproportional war.

Israel won the war militarily but not politically.

Gaza war has indeed weakened Hamas militarily for the moment. The leadership of Hamas was punished and Gaza’s infrastructure was severely damaged. But at what political cost has this military gain been achieved?

After the coming February elections Israel will most likely be governed by a hard-line right-wing cabinet which will run into conflict with a US Administration that plans to demand serious concessions from both sides. Hamas has won political power among Palestinians as a result of perceived “heroism” in its resilience to Israeli attack. It is expected that international policing of borders in Gaza will replace Israeli control. Neither Hamas nor Gaza will remain for too long under Israeli control.

Israel must look for long term solutions; Gaza war was a short term one.

Israelis protest rockets and Palestinians protest occupation

Newsweek.WashingtonPost.Com, On Faith

Post script for readers of 1.8.09 article: posted 1.13.09

Palm Beach Gardens, FL.

Israelis and Palestinians see in each other the negative magnified. Palestinians view Israelis to be “colonizing occupiers”; correspondingly, Israelis consider Palestinians to be living a “culture of violence”.

Neither side sufficiently appreciates the source of suffering of the other. One key element in the conflict is that Israelis do not consider Gaza to be under occupation. They argue that Israel evacuated the strip in 2005. But in desperation, Palestinians passionately argue that Gaza in fact remains occupied: its borders controlled tightly, air space not free; seashore blocked; export/import controlled externally, tax revenues flow to Israel; economy depressed by the blockade, and the Shekel remains Gaza’s currency.

But there is also another side to the problem. Palestinians unfairly trivialize or justify their rocket shelling on civilian communities in southern Israel as they compare its impact with the carnage they suffer and the suffering of the wider occupation. But Israel’s disproportional punitive action should not dull the Palestinian conscience. This disadvantage in power should also not dull their partial responsibility for exposing their own civilians to war slaughter, regardless of the circumstances.

On the other hand, Israelis conveniently ignore the burden of a growing and worsening occupation, beyond Gaza. Western powers have shied away from putting serious pressure on Israel to end the occupation. In focusing on the excesses of Hamas, Hezbollah, Iran and other extreme players in the region, the US has left Israel free to build illegal settlements and tighten its occupation.

Then again Palestinians shoot themselves in the foot. Their leaders are painfully divided on the character of their liberation. Palestinians have to review their strategy of reckless use of force, especially against enemy civilians, regardless of how unsymmetrical that force is. When Palestinian shell rockets indiscriminately they convey to the world the false impression that they do not value life; this negligence weakens their voice.

This senseless war requires firmer international mediation than is displayed today. The incoming American president is aware that his administration must try a new and bold approach in dealing with the Arab-Israeli conflict.

When Israelis and Palestinians start appreciating the source of suffering of the adversary they are more than half way on the road to peace. The people on either side of this conflict should realize the futility of one-sided advocacy.

International community must stop Gaza war

By Ghassan Michel Rubeiz

Palm Beach Gardens, FL: The international community should immediately intervene in Gaza and end this war. It is imposing an intolerable price on civilians, killing more than 500, many of them innocent children, injuring 2,700 people and making daily life, which was already dire, all but impossible.

The images of this immense suffering gravely alarm the Arab and Muslim world, inciting hatred against Israel — and by extension, against its defender, the United States.

Hamas’s rocket shelling of Israeli citizens is also morally indefensible, useless and provocative. There are much better ways to resist the oppressive Israeli siege of Gaza and the wider occupation.

For Israel, going after Hamas militarily is counterproductive, even in the short to medium term. Being a grassroots movement, Hamas is extremely resilient. It has the potential to regenerate its political muscle, no matter the damage it suffers. Regardless of how regressively Hamas — formally known as the Islamic Religious Movement — governs or how unrealistic its rejection of Israel is, Palestinians are rallying around it because of Israel’s aggression.

Hamas won a democratic Palestinian election in January 2006. After achieving the electoral right to govern all Palestinian territories, Hamas was unfairly ostracized and undermined by Israel, the United States and the European Union. When Hamas was denied access to political power, more Palestinians identified with it, in defiance of external intervention.

When the United States and the EU imposed an embargo on Gaza, more Palestinians rallied to the side of Hamas. In its autocratic rule over Gaza, Hamas has nevertheless shown discipline and offered social services and provided local security. Hamas’s rival party, Fatah, and its leaders in the Palestinian Authority, rule the West Bank as a separate entity from Gaza with dubious legitimacy bestowed by Israel.

The international community must allow Palestinians to shape the character of their governance. For too long political Islam has been considered a threat to the West and its allied Arab regimes. Trying to protect Arab regimes from political Islam has consistently failed in Lebanon, Algeria, Egypt, Syria, Iraq and elsewhere.

Muslims will have to discover, through trial and error, without colonial meddling, how to apply their faith in governance.

Reconciliation of Hamas with Fatah is a crucial precondition for negotiating lasting peace with Israel. Will Barack Obama facilitate the reconciliation among Palestinians in a creative way, or will he — like George Bush — try to divide the two? And will Obama restrain Israel from more aggression, or will he reflexively side with Israel, regardless of its cruel policies?

Obama must recognize that war is futile. He must recognize that the siege of Gaza is a form of collective punishment, which violates the Geneva Conventions. He must reconcile the competing Palestinian factions. And he must make Israel safe.

Countenancing this war will not accomplish any of these goals.

Ghassan Michel Rubeiz is an Arab-American political commentator based in Florida. He can be reached at pmproj@progressive.org

Copyright Ghassan Michel Rubeiz.