Israeli intransigence, in the face of international law and public opinion, dashes hopes for a settlement, of the intractable Israeli-Palestinian conflict, writes Khaled Amayreh in the West Bank Visiting US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has once again failed to make any substantive progress toward achieving peace between Israel and the Palestinians. Rice, who arrived in the region Saturday, held several meetings with Israeli and Arab leaders for the purpose of getting "both sides" to agree to specific political horizons. However, after three days of meetings in Aswan, Amman, Ramallah and West Jerusalem, Rice found herself at "square one" as Israel refused, once again, to pay the price of peace with the Palestinians, namely giving up the spoils of the 1967 War and agreeing to a fair and just settlement of the Palestinian refugee issue pursuant UN resolutions. Rice had hoped to get Israel to accept the core components of the Arab peace initiative that is likely to be re-launched at the Arab summit conference in Riyadh this week. The Arab peace initiative promises peace and normalisation between the Arab world and Israel in return for a full Israeli withdrawal from the occupied territories and a just settlement of the Palestinian refugee problem. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told Rice, however, that while Israel was willing to discuss the Arab initiative and "deal positively" with some of its aspects, especially the issue of normalisation between Israel and the Arab world, it would never agree to a full withdrawal from the occupied Palestinian territories. Indeed, Israeli leaders, including Olmert and Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, and even the purportedly dovish Shimon Peres, have been reiterating their rejection of "giving up" Arab-East Jerusalem, allowing refugees uprooted from their homes to return, and dismantling Jewish-only colonies in the West Bank. Instead, Israeli leaders have been pressing Rice to demand that the Arab world, and the Palestinian Authority (PA), drop clauses in the initiative pertaining to the right of return and withdrawal to 1967 borders. Olmert also told Rice that Israel was sticking to the effectively moribund roadmap as the main reference point in the peace process. Yet Israel never fully accepted the roadmap either, the Israeli government attaching 14 reservations to the plan that eviscerated it of substance. Prior to her meetings in Israel, the US secretary of state had ostensibly sought to get Arab and Palestinian leaders to "moderate" the Arab initiative to make it more "palatable" to Israel. Rice also suggested to the Gulf states that they should initiate contacts with Israel without waiting for progress on the Palestinian-Israeli front. This, she reportedly argued, would assure the Israeli government that the Arabs were sincere about peace, as if the real issue impeding peace was Arab insincerity, not Israeli rejections. More specifically, Rice asked Arab foreign ministers to drop from the Arab initiative -- or at least not prominently feature -- the "right of return" and scrap the phrase "total withdrawal". Rice seems to have received a polite rebuff by the foreign ministers of Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates, whom she met in Aswan in Upper Egypt. Arab officials reportedly argued that any substantive amendment to the Arab initiative would be rejected by the Palestinians and would create serious divisions among Arab states that could be used by Iran to assert and deepen its involvement in the Arab region. Rice sought to compensate her failure by obtaining a commitment from Olmert to maintain contact with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. Abbas and Olmert met three times in recent weeks, but failed to make any progress on any core issues. Rice's vision is focused on "confidence-building measures," such as easing up Israeli restrictions on Palestinian movement and releasing prisoners, rather than discussing ending the Israeli occupation that began 40 years ago. Future Olmert-Abbas meetings will be augmented by periodic visits by Rice to the region. Following her deliberations in West Jerusalem, during which Olmert sought to divert the conversation from the occupation of Palestine to the "Iranian danger," Rice shied away from "dramatic statements," instead resorting to platitudes and generalities, saying she would continue to explore the prospects of Palestinian statehood. The Israeli press reported that Olmert asked Rice not to refrain from alluding to final status issues in her public statements, which prompted her to cancel a press conference she was to hold jointly with Olmert. Reluctant to challenge Israeli intransigence, Rice told Olmert that she was only trying to substantiate the concept of "a political horizon". There are three main reasons why Olmert and his right-wing allies seem not to have taken Rice seriously. First, Olmert is politically weak; his popularity in Israel is at an all time low. To compensate, he is trying to project the image of a strong leader able to stand up to American pressure. Second, the Israeli government, likely in concert with the powerful American Jewish lobby, seems now to be viewing the Bush administration as "steadily becoming a lame-duck administration," with the implication that Israel should resort to stall tactics until a US administration arrives that would set conditions on a peaceful resolution to Palestinian-Israeli strife more favourable to Israel. Third, it is no secret that Israel simply has no intention whatsoever of making peace with the Palestinians based on UN Resolution 242 and the land-for-peace formula since this would oblige Israel to withdraw from the occupied territories. To cover up this intransigence, Israel will -- as it has always done -- resort to equivocation, prevarication and overt deception as well as diversionary tactics, such as flagging the Iranian nuclear issue. This week, Tzahi Hanegbi, a Kadima leader and key Olmert ally, said Israel was likely to publicly "accept" the Arab initiative to give the impression that the Israeli government was not a "rejectionist government". "But we would say no to the right of return, and the return to 1967 borders, and withdrawal from Jerusalem," Hanegbi added. In the absence of even a modicum of goodwill on Israel's part, and with the US unwilling or even unable to exert meaningful pressure on Israel to return to Palestinians their usurped homeland, one can conclude that no real progress in peacemaking efforts should be expected for the coming two years, at least until a new American administration replaces the current one. Given Israel's calculations -- that such a new administration would be in a stronger position to defend Israeli demands -- nothing miraculous will likely be in the offing then either.
