BEIRUT — Is this a historic opportunity for Arab-Israeli peace-making we are experiencing this week, or just another display of Israeli chicanery and Arab hesitancy? I have a suggestion for the Arab world to pursue to find out.

Last weekend, Arab heads of state at a summit meeting in Saudi Arabia reissued their offer to make permanent, comprehensive peace with Israel. The Israelis rejected the call, but said they liked some of its elements. A week later, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert issued a call for Saudi Arabia to lead a delegation of Arab leaders to Jerusalem to negotiate peace. The Saudis and other Arabs quickly rejected that call, insisting that Israel should withdraw from Arab lands occupied in 1967 before any meetings or talks could take place.

The Americans and Europeans, as usual, offered routine, rather bland, statements encouraging peace talks and compromise, but seemed to do little else in public to capitalize on what looks like a possible historic opportunity to break the Arab-Israeli stalemate.

I suggest a bold Arab move to break this logjam and find out who’s serious and who’s playing games. The Arabs should respond positively to Olmert’s invitation, with an acceptance of his call to sit and talk, but with a twist of their own. The king of Saudi Arabia should announce that his foreign minister is leading a delegation of Arab ministers, including the Palestinian independent Foreign Minister Ziad Abu Amr, to the United Nations offices in Geneva next Monday, April 9, and will be waiting to negotiate a permanent, comprehensive Arab-Israeli peace agreement. The Arabs will go to Geneva to make peace on the basis of their Arab peace plan principles and relevant UN resolutions — all of which are broad enough to win Arab support and enticing enough to attract the Israelis.

Before flying to Geneva Sunday for their Monday gathering, the Arab foreign ministers should issue a statement that makes it clear that they are eager to make peace with Israel, willing to make reasonable and mutual compromises that capture the spirit of UN resolutions, and prepared for permanent coexistence with a predominantly Jewish Israeli state — on the assumption that Israel in turn will withdraw from occupied lands, coexist with a sovereign Palestinian state, and agree to a negotiated resolution of the Palestine refugee problem, which is the core of the conflict from the Arab perspective. The Arabs should do this to show that they are flexible and well-intentioned, but not desperate for peace at any price.

The Arabs and the Israelis have made no progress for peace when each side tried to force the other into unilateral concessions. This is what we witnessed last week with the Arab summit peace offer that Israel rejected, and Olmert’s invitation to meet that the Arabs rejected. We can only find out how serious they both are about negotiating a permanent, comprehensive peace by sitting them down at a negotiating table and hammering out positions, offers and counter-offers.

The Arabs look like naïve amateurs or insincere tricksters if they keep reissuing their 2002 peace plan, but leave it to hang in the air as an abstract declaration of principles. The Israelis are equally non-credible when they expect Arabs to fly to Israeli-occupied Jerusalem at Olmert’s beckoning. This is not how politics, diplomacy or peace-making work in the real world. If the Arabs are serious about their historic offer to talk and make permanent peace on the basis of UN resolutions and a sense of equity and legitimacy for all — and I am convinced they are — they must move beyond passive statements and enter the realm of dynamic political engagement.

The Arab peace plan provides a compelling platform for that, given its emphasis on resolving the key issues of land, sovereignty, Jerusalem and refugees. It is also broad and attractive enough for Israel to embrace it simultaneously as a starting point for serious talks, especially on the critical refugee issue that clearly must be resolved on the basis of UN resolutions — whose implementation would be negotiated for mutual acceptability.

Sitting to talk peace with Israel on the basis of the Arab peace plan and UN resolutions in Geneva is an honorable deed, free of treason, surrender or a priori substantive concessions. It turns the tables on the Israelis, and frees the Arabs of the constant accusation of missing opportunities and refusing to respond to Israeli offers. Arabs and Israelis have sat at many conferences and peace negotiations before, especially since Madrid in 1991. Doing so again would be a courageous and responsible act for all concerned.

It is time for the Arab world to spring free from its own diplomatic incompetence and immobility, to stop being on the defensive, and to go on the offensive. Geneva next Monday is a winner for all Arabs and Israelis who sincerely covet peace and justice.

Rami G. Khouri is an internationally syndicated columnist, the director of the Issam Fares Institute at the American University of Beirut, editor-at-large of the Beirut-based Daily Star, and co-laureate of the 2006 Pax Christi International Peace Award.

Copyright ©2007 Rami G. Khouri / Agence Global

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Released: 04 April 2007
Word Count: 806
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BEIRUT — Two intriguing meetings took place last week in the Arab world. In Egypt, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice met with the intelligence services directors of four Arab states (Jordan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates). Just days later, the Arab heads of state met in Riyadh for their regular Arab summit.

Which of the two meetings was more significant and signaled the tone, content and direction of Arab state policies? Are the three factors at play here — American foreign policy, Arab security systems, and Arab national leaderships — merely coordinating in a logical move among allies and friends, or are they converging into a single political dynamic that blends American foreign policy with Arab security services?

The summit meeting was a routine event that reissued a historic, but five-year-old, peace offer to Israel. The Rice meeting with the intelligence chiefs was a novelty that deserves more scrutiny, for both its current meaning and future implications.

Whatever the novelty or routine nature of Rice’s meeting with the Arab intelligence directors, it seems like the sort of noteworthy development that Arab governments should explain to their own Arab citizens. As the Iraq situation shows with gruesome daily regularity, security is a core imperative for Arab citizens and their states. Citizens need to know that they can leave their homes in the morning and have a good chance of returning alive at night. States, societies and governments need to know that theirs are orderly, secure, stable communities that can aspire to achieving their full potential and even some prosperity.

Security is not a dirty word, and Arab security systems need not remain a secret and forbidden world of shadows and whispers. Arab security agencies have important, legitimate roles to play. The modern Arab states have all pursued domestic policies that place security and regime survival before any other value. Most Arab citizens that live in safe, stable societies appreciate that fact. A few Arab states that have allowed security agencies to abuse their roles were transformed into grotesque police states, to the discomfort and disdain of most of their citizens, and the world.

A new set of questions arises, though, if some Arab countries now consider giving security agencies a central role in foreign policy as well as in domestic governance. The wider context in which this may be happening is pertinent. Rice’s latest visit to the region includes her quest for “moderate Sunni Arabs” who will join the American-Israeli side and fight the Iranians and their Arab friends, alongside her meeting to foster bonding between the US State Department and Arab security establishments.

Arab citizens in whose name and for whose interests this is happening deserve to be informed about the full implications of whatever is going on. This is especially true if we are witnessing a confluence between the largely Israeli-defined Middle East foreign policy of the United States and some Arab security agencies. Already, security agencies play a central role in Arab public policy, and are moving into foreign policy duties. Egyptian foreign policy to the Palestinians and Saudi links with the United States, for example, are both handled primarily by top security personnel, rather than foreign ministry officials.

Some Arabs fear this trend, and the Rice meeting’s implications, if it heralds a new convergence of American and Arab policies that are anchored in the primacy of Israeli-American concerns, with Arab national rights and security needs being only a derivative corollary. This is not a certainty, but a possibility that many Arabs fear, with justification.

Stability and security for all Arab countries are important and legitimate goals, and must be pursued diligently, within the rule of law, by all available intelligence, police, armed forces and other security agencies. But an important balance also must be struck in two directions, at a time when some Arab security agencies become more directly and openly involved in making or implementing foreign policy. The first is a balance between internal security that is achieved via police and intelligence methods on the one hand, and the kind of organic stability that reflects equitable socio-economic development and political systems that are participatory and accountable, on the other. The second is the balance between Arab security policies that protect against foreign threats, and policies that move dangerously close to becoming a surrogate for the Middle East policies and interests of foreign countries.

If, however, real security threats require Arab intelligence agencies to become foreign policy players, their legitimate security aims would be easier to achieve if they informed their citizens more openly about exactly what is going on. In either case, a more transparent process would only benefit Arab citizens and states, and the security organizations that work hard to protect both.

Rami G. Khouri is an internationally syndicated columnist, the director of the Issam Fares Institute at the American University of Beirut, editor-at-large of the Beirut-based Daily Star, and co-laureate of the 2006 Pax Christi International Peace Award.

Copyright ©2007 Rami G. Khouri / Agence Global

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Released: 31 March 2007
Word Count: 788
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AMMAN, Jordan — I sensed something was slightly unreal about the Jordanian capital Amman when I was there Monday. The distorted reality, I quickly discovered, reflected the presence in town of U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, whose Mideast diplomatic efforts increasingly look like a self-deceiving world of mirrors and make-believe.

As she intensified the elusive search for “moderate Sunni Arabs” to share in her adventure, Rice also launched a process of “parallel talks” with Israeli and Palestinian leaders who have gotten nowhere talking to each other once every few months. To overcome the chronic stalemate of sterile bilateral Palestinian-Israeli diplomacy, she now expands this into a trilateral failure, as the principal Middle Easterners do not talk to each other, but only talk to her. It’s hard to decide if this is a comedy or a horror show.

The most galling thing about Rice’s and Washington’s approach is its fundamental dishonesty. The Bush administration spent its first six years avoiding any serious engagement in the Arab-Israeli conflict, or decisively siding with the Israelis on most key contested points, like refugees, security or settlements. Now, with little time left in her incumbency, President Bush on the ropes, his administration in tatters, America’s army in trouble in Iraq, Washington’s credibility shattered in the region and around the world, and the Middle East slipping into greater strife and dislocation, we are asked to believe that she will dedicate her remaining time in office to securing the establishment of a Palestinian state.

Does she take us in the Arab world for idiots or robots? Or simply another generation of hapless Arabs with no options, and so must go along docilely with every American-Israeli initiative — no matter how insulting, insincere or desperate it can be? This one smacks of all three.

The Rice approach is not serious because she does not prod Arabs and Israelis simultaneously to comply with the rule of law and UN resolutions. Instead, in her hasty and insincere diplomatic fishing expedition she casts her net wide in an attempt to catch enough “moderate Sunni Arabs” to play by her American-Israeli rules. This is a direct consequence of two trends in the region for which the United States must share much blame: the invasion and collapse of Iraq into sectarian strife that has started to spread throughout the region, and the persistence of pro-Israeli American policies for some four decades now, which ultimately contributed to the birth of massive Arab Islamist movements that oppose and fight Israel, side with Iran, and defy the United States.

Now, Israel-America suddenly, magically, expresses interest in the 2002 Arab peace plan, after derisively ignoring it for the past five years, and they claim to seek a coalition of “moderate Sunni Arabs” who would take steps to improve it. The 2002 Arab peace plan, unanimously approved by the Arab world, offered to achieve permanent peace and coexistence with Israel, in return for Israel returning the Arab lands it occupied in 1967 and resolving the Palestine refugee issue through negotiations based on UN resolutions.

Israel-America wants the Arabs to make more concessions, gestures and overtures even before Israel has made any reciprocal moves of equal magnitude. They want all Arab governments, even novel elected ones like the Hamas-led Palestinian government, to pledge recognition of Israel before they can even be engaged as legitimate players in the peace-making game.

The problem with this approach is that it has been tried for 40 years, since the 1967 war, and it has consistently failed, because it did not tackle the legitimate needs of both sides at the same time. Notably, Israel’s peace agreements with Jordan and Egypt succeeded because both sides made gestures and concessions that were reciprocal and simultaneous, always anchored in the spirit and letter of UN resolutions.

Rice will surely find a few “moderate Sunni Arabs,” for ours is a region rich in mercantile traditions, full of people ready for a deal. But those who buy into Rice’s American-Israeli rules will be such isolated and discredited individuals that they will represent few people beyond their guards, business partners and cousins — a large cohort in many Arab lands, but not a credible basis for lasting peace.

Rice should stop futilely searching for “moderate Sunni Arabs”, who will be discredited by their association with her Israeli-centric approach to peace-making. She would do better to look for some law-abiding Israelis who would be prepared to repeat with Palestine, Syria and Lebanon the sort of balanced, negotiated peace Israel signed with Jordan and Egypt. The Arabs in 2002 made a serious peace offer. Israel has not. It’s time for the United States to stop fishing and fantasizing, and instead to work seriously for peace and justice for all in the Middle East, so that it could help to stop the rot that threatens the entire region as well as America’s own plummeting standing in the world.

Rami G. Khouri is an internationally syndicated columnist, the director of the Issam Fares Institute at the American University of Beirut, editor-at-large of the Beirut-based Daily Star, and co-laureate of the 2006 Pax Christi International Peace Award.

Copyright ©2007 Rami G. Khouri / Agence Global

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Released: 28 March 2007
Word Count: 813
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BEIRUT — Every morning I sit in my living room, read the newspapers to track the latest Arab-Israeli developments, and watch my water turtle Jerry exert heroic efforts and make lots of noise in his tank as he burrows beneath the colorful stones, fake coral, and large wooden driftwood stump that dominates his world. As he churns hard with all four arms and legs together, he always ultimately pushes his entire body beneath the driftwood and the stones, with only the tip of his small head, with its alert eyes and long, shapely nose, sticking out into the water, watching for food and predators.

Tired from exerting so much energy, but feeling safe in his camouflaged state, he sleeps, only to repeat the whole ritual the next morning, when I also repeat mine, sitting nearby in my easy chair reading the newspapers to see if there is anything new in the quest for Arab-Israeli peace.

A year ago, when he was smaller and more feisty, Jerry would occasionally muster all his energy, paddle furiously with all four feet, swim across the entire water tank making believe he was a flying fish, and leap out of the water towards the tank rim. Grabbing the rim with his front legs, he would paddle like a maniac with his back legs, and leap out of the tank.

Once out, and finding life in our living room either uninteresting or disorienting, he would scamper to the nearest dark, sheltered corner, pull his head into his shell, and sleep. We would find him eventually, scold him mildly while secretly admiring both his daring spirit and muscular prowess, and put him back into the water, where he would repeat this drama days later. Once he made it out of the living room and into the kitchen, where, perhaps unable to open the refrigerator, he found a dark corner and went into sleep mode.

Jerry has grown larger now, and no longer leaps out of his tank, perhaps because the adventure has lost its allure, or he’s too big to paddle fast enough to leap out of the tank. Maybe he’s just amassing protein and saving his energy for one last try.

I have owned Jerry the turtle for three years now, but have been following Arab-Israeli issues for four decades of adult life. The two seem to have settled into a similar pattern: Regular rituals of much noise, energy and action, tinged with some anticipation of something new, ultimately lead to the same predictable routines and safe, dark corners, where immobility rules.

As I watched Jerry this week I was also thinking of the upcoming Arab summit, the visit of U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s statement on March 22, that Israel was willing to make “painful sacrifices” for peace. Over and over, my daily morning personal counter-quartet of Jerry the turtle, Condoleezza Rice, Ehud Olmert and Mahmoud Abbas repeats the ritualistic rites of the past, only occasionally with new vocabulary or new leaps into the unknown.

Rice and Abbas’ “political horizon” is this year’s equivalent of Jerry adventurously making his way to the kitchen, in a flash of novelty and innovation, even some daring, that generates momentary excitement. Yet ultimately, we seek refuge in familiar dark corners, where the head retreats into the shell, and we are shielded from the realities and challenges of our world.

There is something unimpressive and unrealistic — almost desperately fantastic — about new expectations being generated for this diplomatic season, revolving around the Arab summit’s relaunching of the 2002 Arab peace plan, Olmert’s nice, vague statements, another Rice visit, and the Palestinian Hamas-Fateh coalition government. This is a grotesque ritualistic dance, performed by a sad troupe of actors characterized primarily by a massive collective lack of credibility, profound insincerity, and deep political immobility.

I’m not sure why anyone pays attention any more to Olmert, Abbas, Rice and the Arab summiteers, other than that they control large amounts of money and huge military arsenals. Trying to break the Arab-Israeli stalemate by asking the Arabs to revise and improve their peace plan, while not asking Israel to reciprocate in kind, is the biggest indicator of the depth of the diplomatic and ethical gutter we are in, and why we will not get out of it with this cast of failed characters.

I know that Jerry my water turtle will at least attempt one more heroic leap out of his tank in his life, which is more than we should expect from the Rice-Olmert-Abbas-Arab Summiteers. These characters remain immobilized by their own plummeting credibility, efficacy and legitimacy, because they continue to play by Israeli-American rules, rather than summoning the courage to craft a win-win situation that responds simultaneously to the legitimate rights of Israelis and Arabs alike. My turtle Jerry can teach them all some important lessons about daring to leap, even if they fail once or twice.

Rami G. Khouri is an internationally syndicated columnist, the director of the Issam Fares Institute at the American University of Beirut, editor-at-large of the Beirut-based Daily Star, and co-laureate of the 2006 Pax Christi International Peace Award.

Copyright ©2007 Rami G. Khouri / Agence Global

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Released: 26 March 2007
Word Count: 819
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BEIRUT — The fourth anniversary of the American-led war on Iraq this week has generated considerable analysis of the prospects of this country’s quest for stability, security and well-being. Most of what we read and hear is unsatisfying, because it examines Iraq’s last four years when it should be exploring a much longer time frame, and it sees Iraq mainly through the lens of America’s presence and priorities. A more useful analysis would acknowledge the combined suffocating burden of local tyranny and Western imperial and military adventurism.

When the British and French a century ago configured this region to suit their imperial needs and sensibilities, they left behind an embarrassing mess that continues to erupt into chronic violence in many lands. Arab tyrants took the baton of their own distorted statehoods from their European colonial craftsmen, and from the 1950s to 70s turned their young, often novel, countries into ugly police states. When this disturbed and violent region sent waves of bombers to attack foreign targets, the Americans led the new charge into the Middle East after September 11, 2001, once again pledging to transform these sick societies into healthy democracies.

Like the original Euro-manufactured modern Arab state system, today’s revised American version, in George W. Bush’s vision of an Arab constitutional cornucopia, was flawed by several chronic constraints. It was a Western vision, designed first to respond to Anglo-American needs. It was imposed primarily by Western armies, and comprised a series of dictates from London and Washington about the rules, values and alliances by which we would live in the future. It was almost totally devoid of input by the Arab natives. So, Anglo-American armies today cannot stay and cannot leave Iraq, though their presence is widely resented by most Iraqis, and is now the single biggest instigator and training ground for terror in the world.

Iraq has over four thousand years of history. Four years of Anglo-American militarism and romantic notions of instant democratization seem like an innocently naive time frame within which to analyze the prospects for this ancient but shattered country. This hapless region will never shed the burdens of its own oddball inception and fractious history unless the natives and their recurring visiting Western armies move towards a more complete and honest analysis of what ails them both. Five cumulative problems seem pertinent in Iraq and much of the Middle East.

Iraq’s birth at the hands of British colonial officials was the first problem. It brought together several different ethnicities, nationalisms and religions into a single state, without the principals expressing any clear desire or ability to become co-citizens of a single country. Tribal, national, ethnic and religious identities that had developed over thousands of years in some cases, suddenly found themselves herded into a new world and a novel collective identity, unilaterally and whimsically decreed by fair-skinned men and women from London who were concerned mainly about the interests of London.

That foundational structural flaw could have been overcome over time, had the country slowly developed an equitable governance system that allowed its citizens to feel that they were protected by a system of laws that was applied equally to all. That did not happen, though, because the second problem of modern Iraq was its own autocracy and despotism, starting with the first military moves to take power in the mid-1930s. The same land that gave glorious civilization to the world also gave ugly military rule to the Arabs.

The third flaw in Iraq resulted from years of indigenous tyranny, which saw the predominantly religious Sunni and tribal Takriti ruling elite systematically brutalize many other groups, creating tremendous forces of resentment and revenge. The fourth problem was the Anglo-American invasion four years ago, which instantly shattered and removed the structures of statehood, and triggered a serious resistance movement. This also opened the door for long-simmering anti-Sunni, anti-Takriti, anti-Baathist anger to manifest itself, while also making Iraq’s cities a haven for criminals and political militias who filled the vacuum left behind by the vanished state.

The fifth problem was the deliberate provocation of inter-communal killing and strife by forces linked to Al-Qaeda-type terror groups, who targeted Shiites in particular, unleashing brutal inter-communal warfare anchored solely in indigenous brutality.

It is difficult to separate these five elements from each other or view any of them in historical or political isolation. They include three shameful episodes of Western political brutality (creating often illogical Arab states, supporting Arab tyrants for many decades, and then invading to remove those tyrants and unleash forces of chaos and death); and three home-grown legacies of native barbarism (military-induced police states, elite-based repressive governance, and terror-based inter-communal strife). Stable, satisfying Arab statehood will need to see an end to both of these ugly traditions.

Rami G. Khouri is an internationally syndicated columnist, the director of the Issam Fares Institute at the American University of Beirut, editor-at-large of the Beirut-based Daily Star, and co-laureate of the 2006 Pax Christi International Peace Award.

Copyright ©2007 Rami G. Khouri / Agence Global

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Released: 20 March 2007
Word Count: 790
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BEIRUT — Mark this third week of March 2007 as potentially a historic moment of clarity on one of the most important political questions in the contemporary Arab world: How will this troubled, turbulent region make the transition from dictatorships and autocracies to more democratic, accountable systems of government, while the Islamist parties are the most popular forces around?

The answer seems to be: through coalition governments and transitional governments of national unity in which Islamists have a major but not the totally defining role.

In recent months, Islamists and Arab governments in several lands have confronted one another politically and occasionally fought it out in the streets. Now, having fought to a standstill and shown themselves to enjoy roughly equal power in society and among foreign supporters, they are trying the different approach of national unity or coalition governments. Lebanon and Palestine are the most interesting examples, and should be watched closely.

This may be the most important political test that Islamist movements have experienced in the Arab world in their modern history: trial by the fire of incumbency and accountability. We have had very few examples of Islamist groups winning power democratically, and being given the chance to exercise power by freely governing. A few cases of Islamists at local or municipal level can be studied from recent years, and they show mixed results; other examples include Islamist party cabinet ministers in governments in Jordan, Lebanon, Yemen and other countries, and their experience is also mixed.

Nowhere in the Arab world have we had a comparable experience to the ongoing incumbency of the Justice and Development Party that heads the Turkish government. There, the party’s Islamist credentials and rallying cry have been put to the test of actually governing, and responding to national needs. The party continues to adjust to the reality of incumbency and national accountability, seems likely to win another election, and will probably see its leader become president soon.

Arab Islamists will now be subjected to the same test and reality check. Hizbullah in Lebanon is on the verge of agreeing with its political foes on a national unity government that gives it and its allies (including some Christians) around one-third of all seats. In return for its ability to shape or block decisions on major, strategic issues, it will also find itself pressured to deliver practical answers to daily life issues that are high on the priority of ordinary citizens. Hamas in Palestine has just announced its national unity government with Fateh. It hopes to unblock the foreign financial boycott, and thus have more money with which to govern normally.

Both these major Islamist parties had gained power and respect over the years essentially by catering to their constituencies, which form minorities of their countries’ populations — and by resisting Israeli occupation and aggression. Hamas and Hizbullah both have some experience in local politics and service delivery, but not in national office beyond one or two narrow ministries that were always constrained by the majority will. They now must make two crucial transitions that they had toyed with in recent years: from dabbling in politics to full national governance, and from externally directed military resistance to internally directed social, political and economic services.

They have both met fierce opposition in making this change, from their three principal foes: domestic opponents among their fellow citizens, the Israeli government and people, and the United States with other leading Western governments. These are formidable odds to work against, but Hamas and Hizbullah have made headway and are now moving into coalition governments. They continue to succeed because they are credible at home, their domestic opponents are often corrupt and incompetent, and their foreign foes are grossly unfair and inconsistent.

Two aspects of the Islamist transition to mainstream democratic governance are important to watch: First, it is much more important to assess the local verdict on the Islamists in government than to ask what Israel, the United States or Europe feel about all this. Second, at the domestic level, the Islamists will be judged primarily by their record in formulating and implementing sensible policies and responding to their constituents’ needs, rather than in merely expressing popular grievances and repeating the ills of imperialism and the injustices of Zionism.

The weakness of Hamas, Hizbullah and other mainstream Islamists is their lack of coherent, detailed policy programs and practical answers to the pressing national challenges of Lebanon, Palestine and other Arab societies. These include quality and relevant education, job creation, investment promotion, equitable and sustainable economic growth, environmental protection, human rights enforcement, and regional peace and stability, among other issues.

Rockets, rifles, resistance, and communal self-assertion brought Hamas and Hizbullah to the point where they are now entrusted with a major share of governance. They must quickly show that they have answers and policies for the socio-economic and political issues that will improve the well-being of all their citizens.

Rami G. Khouri is an internationally syndicated columnist, the director of the Issam Fares Institute at the American University of Beirut, editor-at-large of the Beirut-based Daily Star, and co-laureate of the 2006 Pax Christi International Peace Award.

Copyright ©2007 Rami G. Khouri / Agence Global

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Released: 19 March 2007
Word Count: 817
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BEIRUT — It is not a coincidence that serious political talks are taking place simultaneously these days: top Lebanese political foes with each other, Saudi Arabia with Iran, the United States with Syria and Iran, Israelis with Palestinians, the Europeans with Syria, and, directly or indirectly, Israel with Saudi Arabia.

For the past three years, the situations in Iraq, Iran, Syria, Lebanon and Palestine-Israel have all conflated into a consortium of conflicts, and there has been frequent talk that one way out of the region’s stressed condition is to strike a Grand Bargain that resolves all these disputes simultaneously. That has always been an unlikely long shot. It is also obvious that these simmering conflicts and active battles are all linked to one another to some extent — since Syria, Iran, the United States and Israel all have their fingers in all of these disputes. Therefore, progress on any of these disputes could trigger movement on the others.

If a comprehensive Grand Bargain remains elusive, March 2007 may prove to be the month when all the principal antagonists entered into the Great Talk Fest, to conclude from the many meetings and discussions taking place these days in the region. On the premise that it is always preferable to talk than to shoot, and to share a meal rather than a cemetery, the diplomatic engagements that now define the Middle East do offer a ray of hope. Talking is not a guarantee of success, but it is an essential first step in that direction, and a crucial sign that even the most virulent warriors will explore reasonable alternatives to their senseless death marches.

The gallery of gab is impressive by any standard. Iraq, the United States, and all concerned parties and neighbors met in Baghdad last weekend, establishing follow-up committees, and planning further, higher-level talks. The United States engaged Syria and Iran at that meeting, and a senior American diplomat also held talks in Damascus this weekend, prompting the Syrian government to call for a “serious dialogue” with the United States on all regional issues. An unofficial Syrian envoy (American-based and US citizen) plans to speak before an Israeli parliamentary committee this month. The European Union’s top foreign policy official, Javier Solana, is in Damascus this week to revive stalled relations. The Israelis and Saudi Arabians have launched behind-the-scenes probes to explore the feasibility of the Arab summit in Riyadh later this month, re-launching the 2002 Arab peace plan, about which Israeli officials have made semi-positive noises recently. Palestinian and Israeli leaders continue to meet bilaterally, even if largely fruitlessly. Iran and Saudi Arabia hold high-level talks every few weeks, in part a proxy process for US-Iranian discussions. Pro-government MP Saad Hariri and pro-opposition MP and Speaker of the House Nebih Berri have held three meetings in Beirut in the past week, to resolve the internal Lebanese political crisis. This is talk taken to the level of epic.

If talking is a small but important sign of possible progress, more significant is the simultaneity of all these discussions, for several reasons. It forces all concerned to clarify their positions and thus construct a possible negotiating framework, especially by identifying one’s minimum needs and most important demands from the other side. It generates new possibilities for optimism in public opinion across the region, potentially opening the door for mass movements to push for reasonable negotiated agreements rather than savage battlefield legacies. It increases the possibility that reasonable trade-offs and compromises can be made on more than one front (i.e., Iran and Syria might ease off in Lebanon if their regimes were no longer threatened with removal by force, and Israel would concede more to Syria and the Palestinians if it were confident about Iranian, Hizbullah and Hamas willingness to coexist with it).

We have now seen the two bookends of contemporary Middle Eastern politics. On the one hand, the common lesson of the Israel-Hizbullah war last summer, strife within Palestine, and fighting in Iraq is that local and foreign forces are prepared to fight each other to the death, and to destroy their respective societies if need be. On the other hand, antagonists who discern the potential dangers of their macho attitudes and militarism are also capable of more humble and reasonable acts, by exploring possible peaceful resolutions of their conflicts.

We shall soon discover if our decision-makers are the irresponsible killers they often seem to be, or still have enough sense and humanity left in them to pull pack from the brink of their own extremism. For the first time in many years, they have the opportunity to choose from both options that are on the table before them.

Rami G. Khouri is an internationally syndicated columnist, the director of the Issam Fares Institute at the American University of Beirut, editor-at-large of the Beirut-based Daily Star, and co-laureate of the 2006 Pax Christi International Peace Award.

Copyright ©2007 Rami G. Khouri / Agence Global

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Released: 14 March 2007
Word Count: 778
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BEIRUT — Lebanon and Sudan are two Arab countries that have suffered tumultuous modern histories, and continue to bear the burdens of a combination of their post-colonial structural weaknesses as well as the crime and incompetence of many of their own leaders. Yet today Lebanon and Sudan also stand out as two potentially historic Arab societies where the suffering and waste of the last half century may finally start to shift towards a more decent future, because the killers and tyrants who have terrorized these lands may finally be brought to justice.

These two countries are on the way to experiencing a historic process that many of us have dreamed of for decades: a legitimate, credible court of justice that holds accountable those who are accused — credibly and with evidence — of grievous crimes. In Sudan, the Hague-based International Criminal Court (ICC) has accused two people, a Sudanese government minister and a militia leader in Darfur, of organizing and implementing much of the killing and mass displacement of civilians in Darfur — the first time that the ICC has indicted an incumbent government minister for war crimes and crimes against humanity. In Lebanon, the UN Security Council has voted unanimously to establish a Lebanese-international court to try those who will be accused of killing former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri and dozens of other people since February 2005 — the first time the UN investigates a crime by probing into the workings of sovereign states and their security agencies.

These historic developments are also very controversial. They reflect the will of the international community to penetrate the inner workings of Arab societies and regimes, to identify, try and punish people who are accused of systematically carrying out murder and mayhem. They raise two important questions: How much right does the international community have to interfere in domestic issues such as the killings and mass crimes committed in Sudan and Lebanon? Is it reasonable that the world go after the killers and criminals in these two countries, but not do the same in other countries and to officials who have been responsible for crimes of equal or even greater magnitude?

We must diligently discuss these issues, but not confuse them or hold them hostage to one another. Lebanon and Sudan on their own have been unable to stop the killings that plague them, and it is perfectly reasonable to request the assistance of the international community in this respect. Yet such international intervention ideally must be based on two vital factors: legitimacy and universality. Lacking these elements, it will be fiercely opposed.

Legitimacy demands that any intervention in the internal affairs of a country, especially detaining and trying individuals accused of crimes, be based on an international consensus anchored in credible institutions, primarily the UN Security Council. That mandate has been fulfilled in the cases of Lebanon and Sudan. Some parties complain of unfair interference or hidden political agendas, including the Sudanese and Syrian governments and elements of the Lebanese opposition; yet the overwhelming international and local consensus correctly supports these courts.

Universality demands that ending the impunity of killers and tyrants be implemented without partiality or bias, i.e., some Arab regimes or groups should not be singled out for judicial and political accountability while others, who savage entire societies, are left alone to commit their crimes with abandon.

Many in the Arab world in recent years have rejected international interference in our domestic affairs on the grounds that the same standards of intervention were not applied to other purveyors of death and destruction, such as the Israeli government in Palestine and Lebanon, the Americans and British in Iraq, or the Russians in Afghanistan years ago. Those powerful arguments are also a recipe for stalemate, and thus license for our own Arab murderers and Anglo-American-Israeli killers to carry on with their criminality.

We must break out of this stultifying stalemate. The imminent judicial trials to end the impunity of assassins in Lebanon and Sudan provide just the opportunity, which is why we must all protect and promote these courts, ensure their impartiality, and see them through to fruition. We must also simultaneously — not conditionally — demand and work for application of such accountability mechanisms in a wider arena, regardless of the nationality of the accused.

The emperors will resist, as they always do. Anglo-American-Israeli neocolonial impulses will try to block the application of accountability standards to their own governments, leaders and armies. The most powerful tool available to a world that rejects such blatant imperial arrogance is the combination of legitimacy and universality that we in the Arab world must vigorously champion by bringing to justice the killers who have long terrorized Lebanon and Sudan. Justice, like charity, is most effective and credible when it starts at home, for it then become infectious.

Rami G. Khouri is an internationally syndicated columnist, the director of the Issam Fares Institute at the American University of Beirut, editor-at-large of the Beirut-based Daily Star, and co-laureate of the 2006 Pax Christi International Peace Award.

Copyright ©2007 Rami G. Khouri / Agence Global

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Released: 12 March 2007
Word Count: 796
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CAIRO — I was traveling from Beirut to Cairo, and reading Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni’s statement that it is impossible for Israel to accept the 2002 Arab Summit peace initiative in its current version. I was thinking what a shame it was that she could not make the same trip I just made — between the Arab capital in Lebanon, where the 2002 Arab peace initiative was formally launched, and the Egyptian capital, which made peace with Israel a quarter of a century ago.

Beirut to Cairo is a significant journey in a symbolic way: Lebanon is where some Arabs actively defy and fight Israel, and last summer fought it to a draw (at a very high cost to all Lebanese, to be sure). Cairo made its peace with Israel a generation ago, but it has proven to be a peace of Egyptian government bureaucrats and American mediators, more than a genuine resolution of a historic conflict.

For the past generation, the simple lesson of visiting Egypt and talking to senior officials and ordinary people alike has been that Israel can prompt some Arab countries to make peace, but it will not enjoy true acceptance and lasting peace with the Arab people until it comes to grips with the full extent of its core dispute with the Palestinians. Tzipi Livni ruled out accepting the current Arab peace offer because, she said, of its problematic references to the right of return of the Palestinian refugees.

Jordan and Egypt were able to sign full peace agreements with Israel because their accords were not complicated by the Palestine refugees issue. This issue cannot be addressed with traditional clichés on both sides. Rather, it requires harder work by all concerned parties to find a resolution to the Palestinian refugee issue that adheres to the principles of international law and UN resolutions, but is also politically acceptable to all concerned. This seems to be the last major issue that Palestinians and Israelis cannot resolve, and it is significant that Tzipi Livni singled it out as the reason why Israel could not accept the Arab peace plan.

The Arab summit planned for the end of this month in Saudi Arabia will grapple with this matter once again. A breakthrough seems impossible to achieve today, given the fixed positions on both sides: Arabs demand that Israel unilaterally and a priori accept the Palestinian refugees’ right of return to their original homes and lands, and Israel refuses outright to discuss the issue. Some sort of middle ground must be identified and accepted by both sides.

The Arab summit would do well to clarify its position on options that the Palestinians could accept in the context of a comprehensive peace agreement, leaving it to backroom diplomacy and the formal negotiations to hammer out the details. The Arab summit should not do this unilaterally, though, but rather in a conditional manner that demands of Israel reciprocal steps or statements.

Unilaterally giving Israel what it wants is not a solution. It would be wrong for the Arab summit unilaterally to change the 2002 peace plan to meet the Israeli objections that Livni expressed last weekend. It would be appropriate, however, for the summit to offer Israel a broad package that includes steps that Israelis and Arabs would take together. Reciprocity and simultaneity are powerful partners that could unblock the now stalled peace process. Israel should be offered a comprehensive, permanent peace by the Arabs, but it should also be required to make gestures of its own on the refugee issue that could make such a peace pact possible.

The openings here are not many, but they must be identified more rigorously than has been the case to date. A critical element for Palestinians and Arabs is Israeli acknowledgement of how the birth of the state of Israel was based on the expulsion, exile and disenfranchisement of the Palestinians. Israel’s acceptance of pertinent UN resolutions on this count would be an important step, which would unlock the door for a negotiated agreement that would affirm the refugees’ right of return, compensate them for their losses, and give them full rights in a Palestinian state, while maintaining the majority Jewish nature of the state of Israel and its formal acceptance by its neighbors.

The Arab summit is right to make peace offers to Israel, but it should do so in a manner that realistically entices Israel to engage in serious negotiations while affirming and respecting the refugees’ rights as enshrined in UN resolutions. You only have to travel from Beirut to Cairo, or Beirut to Amman, to appreciate the difference between formal peace agreements that have thin popular support, and a lasting peace based on truly resolving the conflict between Arabs and Israelis.

Rami G. Khouri is an internationally syndicated columnist, the director of the Issam Fares Institute at the American University of Beirut, editor-at-large of the Beirut-based Daily Star, and co-laureate of the 2006 Pax Christi International Peace Award.

Copyright ©2007 Rami G. Khouri / Agence Global

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Released: 06 March 2007
Word Count: 789
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BEIRUT — Suddenly, the diplomatic meetings season seems to have broken out all over the Middle East, perhaps because the main players saw the looming catastrophe that hovers over this region, and decided to pull back from the brink.

The most important meeting is the one March 3, between Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the Saudi leadership, including King Abdullah. Other significant gatherings include the March 10 meeting in Baghdad of regional states and world powers who will explore how to restore security and sovereignty in Iraq, the trip of an American assistant secretary of state to Syria to discuss humanitarian issues related to Iraqi refugee flows, last month’s meetings of the Palestinian and Israeli leaders with US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, and the Hamas-Fateh leaders’ meeting and agreement in Mecca under the auspices of Saudi Arabia.

I suspect that all this movement reflects a growing realization that everybody will lose if things continue on their present trajectory in the Middle East. The danger signs are symbolized by two violent and continuing trends that plague this region: the steady expansion and popularity of militias, resistance organizations and other powerful armed political groups, and some terrorists, that are beyond the control of governments and often challenge governments; and, the steady build-up of American-led armed forces in the region, combined with diplomatic pressure, aimed at Iran, Syria, Hizbullah, Hamas and others who oppose the American-British-Israeli-led alignment that includes several Arab governments.

This trend culminated in last summer’s Israel-Hizbullah war, a worsening security situation in Iraq, and the continuing pressures against Iran and Syria. Both sides in this regional face-off continue to prove their strength in public opinion and in their determination to face down and, if necessary, militarily fight the other side. The big losers are incumbent Arab regimes — uncomfortably caught in an untenable squeeze between the indigenous militancy of their own people and the aggressive militarism of their foreign allies — and the ordinary citizens throughout the Arab world and Iran, who do not wish to see themselves hurled into the incoherence and suffering of open war that are the natural consequence of intemperate policies.

The leaders of both the American-British-Israeli-led alignment and their opponents have shown a stubborn streak that has turned this region into a large armed camp, of ongoing and potential battlefields, and militia proving grounds. The brinksmanship that all sides have engaged in has finally brought us all to the brink — and what we see is not pretty at all. The frightening potential immediate future is exemplified by the common talk of the catastrophic regional and global consequences of what would happen if the United States invaded Iran, and of what is already happening as Iraq’s troubles spill over into the region in the form of refugees, radicalism, political tensions, and a new generation of militias, resistance groups and terrorists.

So, now we decide to meet, and talk, driven often by Saudi Arabian mediation, but also by two other important forces that remain slightly imprecise today: increasing concern by ordinary Arabs, who do not want their world to be destroyed simply to affirm the political hormones of leaders in Damascus and Tehran (and their friends in Hizbullah and Hamas); and, global public opinion that is increasingly worried about the negative consequences of aggressive American-Israeli-led policies in the Middle East.

None of the meetings taking place these days is crucial in itself. All of them collectively, however, reflect a common perception that brinksmanship and bravado are useful short-term tactics, but not good long-term strategy. The meetings in Saudi Arabia will be important if they lead to other sessions with the real powers in Tehran linked to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. Ahmadinejad is the advance party, not the real negotiator.

Similarly, the Baghdad meeting next weekend will prove fruitful if it paves the way for the four critical elements that Iraq needs: a more emphatic Anglo-American commitment to leave Iraq and allow it to regain sovereignty via a legitimate government; a political accord among Iraqis on constitutional power-sharing; collective efforts by all concerned neighbors to help as they can to end the insurgency, resistance, and sectarian strife inside Iraq; and, resolving tensions with Iran, Syria and others thorough diplomacy anchored in the international rule of law, rather than in Israeli-American-inspired regime change.

The American-Israeli-Palestinian meetings of recent months have achieved little or nothing, much like several American-Syrian meetings in 2002-04. So the mere act of meeting and engaging one’s foes is not a guarantor of success. Let’s hope the main players have the courage and humility to enter into genuine negotiations that require giving and taking in order to achieve a win-win situation, rather than merely transferring their gladiator games from one arena to another.

Rami G. Khouri is an internationally syndicated columnist, the director of the Issam Fares Institute at the American University of Beirut, editor-at-large of the Beirut-based Daily Star, and co-laureate of the 2006 Pax Christi International Peace Award.

Copyright ©2007 Rami G. Khouri / Agence Global

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Released: 02 March 2007
Word Count: 784
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