When all suspect that proximity talks with Israel will end in failure, Dina Ezzat tries to understand why the Arabs have agreed to engage in them "This won't work -- indirect talks, proximity talks will not yield results," Israeli Intelligence Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Dan Meridor said Wednesday. The Israeli official spoke hours before George Mitchell, envoy of US president to the Middle East, was planning to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to finalise the launch of proximity talks that he will supervise between Israel and the Palestinians, slated for the next four months. Meridor's prophecy of failure is not one sided. On Saturday, a limited number of Arab foreign ministers also predicted that proximity talks are unlikely to deliver, due to what they qualified as the "lack of good faith" on the side of the Netanyahu government. The Arab decision to accept the US proposal of indirect talks was adopted despite prior Arab threats of turning down talks if Israel did not halt its aggressive settlement expansion activities in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem that Palestinian Authority (PA) leaders say should be the capital of a future Palestinian state. According to Qatari Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Hamed Ben Jassem, Arab countries decided to give "the American broker a chance so maybe they can do something." "This is a chance we are giving to the Americans," he added, following the five-hour meeting that adopted a communiqué outlining the Arab stance on the parameters of a lasting solution. Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa too said that Arabs are not about to turn their backs on the administration of US President Barack Obama who has been trying, even if not successfully, to be a fair and honest broker. According to Meridor, however, US involvement in indirect talks is exactly the reason why the talks won't work. "Everyone will want to pull America to their own side, and they won't get closer, they will get further," he said Wednesday. On Tuesday, in Cairo, US Ambassador to Egypt Margaret Scobey insisted that the US is not going to force a solution on anyone. "The US cannot impose any solution," she said. Acknowledging the difficulties ahead, Scobey insisted that "there is a way forward" and that there are "reasons to be cautiously optimistic". Arab peace process diplomats, including Palestinians and Egyptians, do not share this assessment. "It will not work for long. Netanyahu is not sending any signals of serious peace talks engagement," said one. According to another, "Netanyahu is going into these talks only to fudge it sooner rather than later, and I would be surprised if the four-month timeframe endures." A senior PA official who spoke on condition of anonymity said that President Mahmoud Abbas was under "considerable pressure from Washington to give proximity talks a chance. And even if not convinced, [Abbas] had to bow," especially that some Arab capitals urged him not to miss this chance and that practically speaking he has no other alternatives. During the past few days Abbas worked on garnering enough high-level Arab support for his otherwise clearly weak political posture. On Wednesday morning he was in Cairo for talks with President Hosni Mubarak., who had earlier discussed with Netanyahu ways of reviving the stalled talks between Israel and the Palestinians. In Cairo, as in Riyadh and Abu Dhabi, the previous two stops of his limited Arab tour, the Palestinian president was reassured that he would not be standing alone in the face of public anger should Netanyahu do the expected: engage in proximity talks while acting provocatively on the ground. And the provocations will surely not only come from Netanyahu. On Tuesday, Palestinians accused Jewish settlers of setting fire to a mosque in the occupied West Bank. The Palestinian complaint included blame for the lack of effective intervention by the Israeli authorities to prevent the attack. The PA, nonetheless, is not willing to make an issue of the incident at this point -- not that it has traditionally done otherwise. The official stance now is that another year should not pass under the Obama administration "without getting something out of the Israelis". Some Arab capitals while sharing the same sentiment disagree with the tactics. They favour going straight to the UN Security Council. However, Palestinian sources suggest that only at a later stage might the US be willing to entertain talk of the UN Security Council, if it feels that the Arabs have done everything possible and that Israel has not been responsive. The Arabs' nod to indirect talks comes as Israel and the US are hurling indirect threats and accusations against Syria and Hizbullah for the latter allegedly acquiring Scud missiles. It also comes as over 1.5 million Palestinians are kept under an impossible and suffocating siege in Gaza. (see pp.8-11)
