Aref Assaf, "2008: The Year that Peace was the Prize

February 10, 2008

The United States shoulders a pivotal role in its hope for peace in the Middle East. As Palestinian, Israeli, and U.S. leaders strive to re-launch the Middle East peace process, there are three distinct but related sets of issues facing the Palestinian polity: the ongoing struggle between the Palestinian Authority (PA) and Hamas, permanent status negotiations with Israel, and the daily on-the-ground reality . Each of these requires a distinct set of responses not only from the Palestinians and Israelis, but also from the United States.

As long as Hamas maintains its militia and its readiness and ability to employ military means–internally or against Israel–to achieve its political objectives, achieving a sustainable, national unity arrangement is impossible. The nature of the struggle between the PA and Hamas is both political and ideological. It is political because at stake is control of the Palestinian body politic, its platform, and institutions–namely the governance structures of the PA, the definition of the political agenda of the PLO (of which Hamas is not a member), and control of the security sector. It is ideological in that it is a competition between two irreconcilable visions of the future: one based on secular values and the other on religious ones.

This struggle, however, will not end with one side annihilating the other. Each represents a sizable enough constituency that neither can be wished away. Instead, victory will be defined by the ability of either side to impose its conditions on the other, and in doing so define the next phase of the Palestinian national movement. Action or inaction by any external player–whether by Israel, the United States, or the Arab states–will be utilized by either party to strengthen its position in this dynamic.

In this struggle, the United States must define its role very carefully.

Ultimately, the Palestinians themselves must determine their future. As a leader who won the Palestinian presidency on a platform promising negotiations and advocating non-violence, President Abbas is best qualified to decide when the moment is right to talk to Hamas, once it has met the conditions he deems necessary. The United States should not try to micromanage his approach but should trust his judgment, especially because the movement he leads has the most to lose by a Hamas win. When and if he decides that the time is right, the United States should not veto him. In the meantime, the United States should continue to support him in the face of any regional pressure to enter into a premature deal with Hamas.

The United States should also be careful in the way it approaches the permanent status negotiations. These are negotiations that deal with fundamentals of the future and identity of both Palestine and Israel, and as such cannot be rushed. Attempts to prematurely push a substantive solution will only cause a backlash from both sides. Instead, the United States should help manage the negotiation process by keeping the two sides focused on the goal of a peace deal, ensuring that extraneous events do not distract from this effort, and providing incentives for progress. Once the sides are at an advanced enough stage of the negotiations, American bridging ideas could be introduced if they will help provide the final push for a deal.

The area that requires the most intensive U.S. involvement relates to developments on the ground. While Phase I of the Road Map presents a long menu of such issues, analytically speaking,  these fall into two definable categories. One category includes measures that are prerequisites for achieving a peace deal: namely security performance by the Palestinians and settlement freeze by the Israelis. These are issues that should be approached firmly, energetically and without compromise. Failure to deliver on these will make reaching a permanent status deal impossible.

The rest of the Road Map Phase I obligations can be loosely described as "confidence building measures." These should not be approached as goals unto themselves but rather as tools to create the political environment in which a peace deal can be successfully negotiated. In the past, Palestinians and Israelis failed to utilize these measures to build confidence. Instead, they became prerequisites for, and as such, obstacles to progress on negotiations. Rather than helping to build support for the process among their respective publics by showing the seriousness of the other side, they became tools for mutual recrimination, with each side pointing out the unfulfilled obligations of the other.

Changing this dynamic is the greatest challenge to–and the biggest potential contribution to be made by–U.S. diplomacy. If it approaches these issues through a mechanical monitoring mechanism, the United States will only feed into the traditional dynamic by providing ammunition to those who are seeking to point fingers. Instead, the United States should strategically look at Phase I obligations and pick and choose those which entail the minimum political cost to a given side and the maximum dividend for the other.

These can include combating incitement, reopening the Palestinian social and economic institutions in Jerusalem, and facilitating freedom of movement. In the meantime, the United States should use its considerable influence with both Israelis and Palestinians to ensure that actions by either side with the potential to damage mutual trust are stopped before they see the light of day. As shown recently by the publication of tenders for settlement expansion in Jerusalem, once the genie of unhelpful actions is out of the bottle, it cannot be put back. Such a role for the United States would entail an ongoing, robust presence to remain fully aware of developments on the ground and be capable of responding in a timely fashion.

Peacemaking anywhere is a complex business, and this is especially true of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. It requires an approach that manages the competing elements of aspirations, domestic politics, and concrete realities in a way that can ensure a virtuous dynamic of mutual support between these elements, lest they end up undermining one another.

 

Such a complex nuanced approach cannot be left to the parties themselves as they continue to be held hostage to their own immediate political and even emotional constraints and reactions. Instead, the United States–not as a favor to either Palestinians or Israelis but rather out of pure U.S. national interest–should take the lead in creating an encompassing diplomatic structure that manages these various strands towards ending the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.