Toward a New American Policy. By Daniel C. Kurtzer. The Cairo Review of Global Affairs, February 10, 2013.
Kurtzer:
The
United States has invested heavily in Middle East peacemaking for decades.
While the strategic goal has been to achieve a peace settlement, the United
States has tended to focus on the essentially tactical objective of bringing
about face-to-face negotiations between the parties. With some exceptions—for
example, the Clinton Parameters in 2000 and the George W. Bush letter to Ariel
Sharon in 2004—administrations have eschewed articulating positions on the
substantive outcome the United States seeks. Because of the serious problems
confronting the region and the peace process today, it is time for the United
States to adopt a new policy, a new strategy, and new tactics.
Why Tilt at Middle East Windmills?
This
essay argues for the development of a new, comprehensive American policy and a
sustained strategy for advancing the Israeli-Palestinian peace process. It
advocates for American creativity, flexibility, and initiative in crafting the
tactics required to engage the parties and help them approach the required
mutual concessions. This argument does not rest on either the inevitability or
even the likelihood of early success, nor on the readiness of the parties to
overcome legitimate concerns and powerful internal opposition to confront the
tough decisions required to make peace. Indeed, there are strong reasons to
avoid working on the peace process at all.
However,
doing nothing or continuing down the same path that the United States has
traveled before—simply trying to get to negotiations—not only will not succeed,
it will deepen the challenges the United States faces in the Middle East and it
will exacerbate the very conflict that the United States has tried to resolve
over many decades. There are hard realities in the Middle East and the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict that some try to ignore or argue away. It is time
to confront those realities and develop a reasonable but also bold policy and
diplomatic strategy worthy of American values and interests. Developing a sound
policy, a sophisticated strategy, and appropriate tactics to advance the peace
process is not tilting at windmills. It is doing what the United States has
shown itself capable of doing in the past to advance prospects for peace.
The
idea of a two-state solution—the cornerstone of American policy in the
region—is now on life support, and its chances of surviving cannot improve
without active diplomacy. Not only are governments losing interest, but more
importantly, public opinion is losing confidence that such an outcome is
achievable. The issues in the peace process are complex, and American policy
needs to address this complexity, whether or not there is a promise of
immediate success.
Current
upheavals in the region argue for investing in Israeli-Palestinian conflict
resolution. Hunkering down or managing the status quo is not a policy when it
assures the United States less leverage and less support for our policies
elsewhere in the region. With growing skepticism about and opposition to American
policy in the Middle East, a serious effort to advance peace can have a
transformative effect on our standing and credibility.
There
is no magic formula for success, whether it involves intense American diplomacy
or conflict management. Periods of engagement have often ended in frustration,
violence, and war. Trying to manage the conflict—for example, by focusing
solely on improving the situation on the ground—is not only a recipe for
inaction; it is actually far more dangerous than it appears.
Status
quos are not static. They either improve or they worsen. The status quo in the
West Bank appears to be improving, evidenced by economic activity in
Palestinian cities, the relative absence of terrorism, and several important
signs of Israeli-Palestinian cooperation, for example, in security and in
economic affairs. This is, however, a misleading picture. Israeli settlement
activity has accelerated in recent years, and the Israeli government’s active
support and funding of settlement infrastructure have skyrocketed. As more
settlers move into the occupied territories, the area of the prospective
Palestinian state is shrinking, becoming less contiguous and less viable. To
believe that Palestinians will accept a state limited to their main population
centers—so-called Areas A and B in the West Bank—is delusionary. Calm on the
surface masks growing frustration and anger below. Any spark can ignite a
conflagration that will consume the status quo.
More
fundamentally, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict drains energy from the parties
and from the United States to deal with more pressing issues in the region, in
particular, Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Yitzhak Rabin recognized this in 1992,
when he reportedly told then-President George H. W. Bush that Israel required
comprehensive peace with all its neighbors in order to free its energies to
prepare for the emerging threat from Iran, which Rabin assessed would be
evident within ten years. In 2002, Saudi King Abdullah and other Arab leaders
also recognized this reality when they adopted the Arab Peace Initiative, a
cosmic change in the position of Arabs toward Israel and the conflict. Arabs no
longer insisted on dealing with the “problem” of 1948, that is, the very
existence of the State of Israel, but rather promised Israel peace, security,
and recognition if the 1967 occupation of Arab territories and the persistence
of the Palestinian issue could be resolved. Iran was as much on the minds of
Abdullah and other Arab leaders in 2002 as it was on Rabin’s in 1992.
So,
while some argue that it is a waste of time for the United States to invest in
the peace process, the opposite is really true. Such an investment will pay
dividends if it moves the conflict toward resolution and allows the region to
act in concert to deny Iran its power ambitions. Doing nothing, or doing too
little, is a prescription for trouble.
