Ehud Olmert achieved his goals in Washington -- if not now, then soon, writes Graham Usher On the scale of the feel-good factor Ehud Olmert's maiden trip to Washington as Israeli prime minister could hardly have rated higher. He met with all the administration's major players. He had nearly six hours of talks with President Bush, including 90 minutes in camera. He addressed both houses of Congress (only the third time such a privilege has been accorded an Israeli premier) and was garlanded with 32 ovations and 18 standing ones. "I am very, very, very satisfied," he said, on his return to Israel. He meant it. Olmert had three goals in the US capital -- to achieve US-Israeli harmony on Iran; to maintain a common stance toward the new Palestinian regime; and, above all, to elicit a public US commitment to his convergence plan, now reborn Israel's "realignment concept". In Olmert's ambition, this is Israel's wholly unilateral endeavour to conquer Jerusalem, remove small, isolated settlements in the occupied West Bank and annex the large, major ones so as to "guarantee Israel's security as a Jewish state with the border it desires". Olmert scored two out of three, with the third almost certainly to follow. On Iran there was not even a shadow separating the US and its protégé. Bush insisted it was "a common international goal" to prevent Tehran from acquiring nuclear weapons. He also promised that "the US would come to Israel's aid" in the event of any Iranian attack. Some observers saw Bush's statement as another instance of Washington's "iron-clad" commitment to Israel's defence. Others as a gentle nudge to Tel Aviv not go solo à la Osirak, Iraq, 1981. For now ---- like Ariel Sharon before him -- Olmert has apparently conceded. "There is a total agreement and understanding between the president and myself" on Iran, he said. Nor was there any lessening in Washington's phobic attitude to a Palestinian Authority led by Hamas. "No country can (expect to) make peace with those who deny its right to exist and who use terror to attack its population. Hamas must recognise Israel's right to exist, must abandon terror and must accept all previous agreements between the PA and Israel. I assured the (Israeli) prime minister that our position is steady and strong -- that Hamas must change". Or be changed. And therein lays the seed of difference between Bush and Olmert's future prescriptions for the occupied West Bank. It concerns not so much convergence but rather the PA and President Mahmoud Abbas's role within it. For Olmert convergence is predicated on Abbas's manifest weakness and Hamas's presence in government: both enable and justify its unilateral character. Bush still prefers that convergence be "coordinated" with Abbas and the possibility of Hamas's removal, if only to keep the fiction of a peace process or a roadmap alive. "The Prime Minister ideas (about convergence) could be an important step toward the peace we both support," Bush said at the Washington press conference last week. But "any final status agreement (with the Palestinians) will only be achieved on the basis of mutually-agreed changes and no party should prejudice the outcome of negotiations on a final status agreement." Privately, Bush was less principled. According to Israeli political columnist Nahum Barnea, the US president told Olmert his administration would eventually adopt convergence but "on condition that Israel only move to implement it after a concerted, convincing effort ... to negotiate with Abbas". There are three reasons why Washington wants a re- engagement with Abbas, say sources. Whatever Abbas's political weakness, he remains the last bulwark against a total Hamas takeover of the PA and, in the short term at least, needs to be strengthened not sacrificed on the altar of another round of Israeli unilateralism. Second, Washington has yet to relinquish hope of a Palestinian regime change, with the latest means being Abbas's referendum proposal and the possibility that it open the way to new PA elections and a new Palestinian government. Finally, with confrontation looming with Iran the US does not does not want any unnecessary schism with Europe -- and the Brussels (the Brussels what ?????)has made it clear it can accept an Israeli West Bank redeployment to a "defensible border" but not to a "permanent" one. In Washington, Olmert got the message. He changed the vocabulary, referred to the Palestinian leader as "President Abbas" rather than "Chairman Abu Mazen" and promised a photo-meeting with him "very soon", probably at Sharm El-Sheikh and with President Mubarak and King Abdullah on side. But there is barely an Israeli analyst who believes such gestures are anything other than mirrors to appease the Americans. Rather, Olmert will use the six-nine months he has allowed for a "Palestinian partner" to emerge to complete the West Bank wall, thicken the settlement blocs and torpedo every Palestinian and Arab initiative for a return to negotiations, especially one that may be endorsed by Hamas. For Olmert the only roadmap now is a one-way street called convergence -- which the US will support "when the time comes", says Israeli US Ambassador Danny Ayalon.
