BEIRUT — When the finest American and international minds speak, we should listen carefully. Two important documents came to light this week that nicely capture the extreme poles of the current political condition of the Middle East — we either work hard for comprehensive peace touching on all the key disputes in the region, or we suffer the consequences of the existing conflicts and the spread of terror that they spawn.
The expanding terror problem was revealed in American press reports about a classified 30-page U.S. National Intelligence Estimate that says the Iraq war has become a primary recruitment vehicle for potential terrorists, whose numbers may be increasing faster than the effort to deter and defeat them. The report notes that the Iraq war has probably heightened rather than reduced the threat of terror attacks against the United States or other targets. This is partly because radical terror networks seem to have spread and decentralized, including the use of over 5000 radical Islamist web sites, leaving Al-Qaeda more as an inspiration than a direct manager of terror attacks.
The radicalizing impact of the Anglo-American-led war in Iraq is no surprise. Many people in the Middle East and elsewhere warned the U.S. and UK governments before the war that such a brazen bid to change Middle Eastern political realities through the instrument of Western armies would generate a strong counter-reaction, including a probable spike in terror. Washington and London concluded that the risks were worth taking, given the importance they attached to removing the former Baathist regime in Baghdad as a means of triggering similar changes in other Middle Eastern lands.
The American intelligence agencies’ analysis is important for two particular reasons. First, it is a remarkable example of the sort of self-critical honesty and transparency that are hallmarks of democratic systems. Critical as I am of the American policy in Iraq, I am a great admirer of an American governance system that examines its own policies so bluntly, giving the emperor the bad news when necessary. I know of nothing vaguely similar ever happening in any Arab country, where the prevailing tradition is for yes-men to tell the great leader that all is well in the realm due largely to his endless wisdom and munificence. If reckless and adventuresome militarism in Iraq is a sign of the worst of American political culture, speaking the unpleasant truth about this ongoing rash endeavor is a sign of the best American ways.
The second, more important, point is that many of the same dynamics that pertained to the Anglo-American desire to attack Iraq in early 2003 apply today to the situation with Iran. Serious accusations are made against Iran, and many evil motives and intentions are ascribed to its government, with little solid or indisputable evidence. The consequences of an Anglo-American-Israeli strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities would probably be much worse than what we’ve witnessed in the wake of the Iraq assault. This is because political tensions are so much more intense in the region today than they were in 2003, Iran’s formidable capacity and reach, and the growing linkages between situations like Iran, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, and Palestine-Israel.
This is why the other text released this week, by the International Crisis Group (ICG), is worth pondering and acting upon. ICG launched a new global advocacy initiative designed “to generate new political momentum for a comprehensive settlement of the Arab-Israeli conflict,” with major funding for the initiative announced at the Clinton Global Initiative meeting in New York. Resolving the Arab-Israeli conflict would significantly reduce tensions in the region, and probably gradually weaken or decouple Iranian ties with Palestinian and Lebanese groups and Syria.
The ICG initiative includes:
* mobilizing respected ex-officials from the United States and other countries around a statement of support and concrete actions for a comprehensive settlement, and a new process to achieve it, following the input of several brainstorming sessions;
* convening a high-level group of former U.S. government officials to generate bipartisan support for the U.S. administration to engage fully in efforts to achieve a comprehensive resolution; and,
* producing a series of ICG reports and briefings on the Arab-Israeli conflict and individual countries, to provide information, analysis and guidance to policy-makers.
The last half decade has revealed the consequences of leaving the Middle East to drift in a sea of its own dysfunctional governments, stressed societies, indigenous autocracy and militancy, foreign invasions, and local occupations. We suffer today the heavy legacy of a deadly combination of local and foreign hegemons. The antidote requires a concerted effort to resolve the core, and oldest, dispute in the region — the Arab-Israeli conflict — according to established international legal principles and UN resolutions, which would make it easier to reduce tensions and resolve disputes in other parts of the Middle East.
This week reminds us of three essential elements needed for such a change in direction for the Middle East: ending Anglo-American neo-colonial military adventures, resolving the Arab-Israeli conflict, and promoting more honest, open and accountable governance throughout the Middle East.
Rami G. Khouri is an internationally syndicated columnist, the director of the Issam Fares Institute at the American University of Beirut, and editor-at-large of the Beirut-based Daily Star.
Copyright ©2006 Rami G. Khouri / Agence Global
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Released: 26 September 2006
Word Count: 837
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