Is Bush getting serious about Palestine? Patrick Seale writes President George W Bush has spoken. But will he now match words with deeds? This is the simple question everyone concerned with Middle East peace is asking. In his State of the Union address on 2 February Bush declared that his aim was "two democratic states, Israel and Palestine, living side by side in peace". In Brussels on 21 February he introduced a note of urgency when he said, "our greatest opportunity and our immediate goal is peace in the Middle East." He called for "a new Palestinian state [that] is truly viable, with contiguous territory on the West Bank". He then surprised most observers by adding, "a state of scattered territories will not work." Israel, he said, must freeze its settlement activity. Bush had never before been so explicit. So what is he up to? Four tentative conclusions may be drawn from his remarks. First, the president appears at last to understand the Israeli-Palestinian problem, which in turn suggests that he has been well-briefed. This raises the question of who briefed him. Was it Condoleezza Rice, the new secretary of state? Or was it Tony Blair, Britain's prime minister? Blair has been pressing Bush on the Palestine question. Having supported Bush on Iraq, Blair is now claiming a political reward, which he badly needs as he faces a general election, probably on 5 May. Referring to the Arab-Israeli conflict in an interview with The Financial Times on 26 January, Blair predicted an "evolution" in American policy. "You will find in the next few weeks that there will again be a very clear direction set out by America," he declared. Are we now witnessing that "evolution"? Second, Bush appears to recognise that a resolute effort to end the Arab-Israeli conflict is essential for victory in his global "war on terror". This, in itself, is a change from the days when Washington refused to admit any connection between US policies in the Middle East and the terrorist attacks it suffered. Third, from Bush's speech in Brussels one can infer that he has accepted that an improvement in relations with Europe -- which he seems to want -- depends on progress towards Middle East peace. France's Foreign Minister Michel Barnier had earlier declared that the test for improved trans- Atlantic relations was movement towards an Israel- Palestinian settlement. Fourth, Bush's remarks must surely be seen as a challenge to Israel's Prime Minister Ariel Sharon. Most observers agree that Sharon made a monkey of Bush in his first term. After 9/11, Sharon won Bush's ear by equating the Palestinian resistance with international terrorism. He then went ahead with settlement building in spite of Bush's admonitions. The American president may now be seeking to reassert his authority over a small but high- handed ally. If these conclusions are correct, they point to a substantial change in White House thinking, and also to a decline in influence -- at least on this topic -- of the pro-Israeli neo-conservatives, who occupy senior positions in the Pentagon and the vice- president's office and pack Washington's right- wing think tanks. Something like a trade-off appears to be taking place. The US is putting great pressure on Syria and Iran -- to Israel's satisfaction -- but in exchange is demanding Israeli concessions on the Palestinian track. THE PRICE OF PEACE: What Bush seems to be saying to Sharon is that disengagement from Gaza and four small outposts in the northern West Bank will not be enough. The settlers will resist being moved -- and might even resort to violence -- but they must be defeated. Gaza disengagement must in due course be followed by West Bank disengagement. This will be the real test of the "evolution" in American policy, so optimistically predicted by Blair. It will also be the test of Bush's political will. Unless most of the settlements are removed, there will be no viable Palestinian state on contiguous territory in the West Bank -- and therefore no peace. Uri Avneri, the veteran Israeli peace activist, is a shrewd Sharon-watcher. He does not believe the Israeli prime minister has changed. He wrote this week, "if the settlement blocs that have been created are annexed to Israel, the Palestinian territory will be sliced up into a number of enclaves -- perhaps four, perhaps six. The Gaza Strip, an isolated ghetto by itself, will be another enclave. Each enclave will be surrounded by settlements and military installations, and all of them will be cut off from the world outside." This is clearly not Bush's vision but, if he means business, he will have to move fast. Sharon is pressing ahead with the security wall, which will absorb some seven-eight per cent of the West Bank. He is also building massive new settlements between the wall and the 1967 border. Meanwhile, East Jerusalem, which the Palestinians want as their capital, is steadily being cut off from the West Bank. The one-day conference on Palestinian reforms which Tony Blair hosted in London on 15 March will not stop Israel's land grab. But it will serve to remind Sharon that the US, like much of the rest of the world, is committed to a two-state solution of the conflict. Jewish settlements which impede such a solution will one day have to be removed. The presence at the London meeting of Rice, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan and European Union's Foreign Policy Chief Javier Solana, should send a clear signal to the Israeli public that the time for "hard decisions" is fast approaching. Mahmoud Abbas, president of the Palestinian Authority, who was also in London, is determined to prove to the world that, in spite of last Friday's suicide bombing at Tel Aviv, the Palestinians will reform their institutions and will be responsible peace partners. His message is that peace is there to be seized -- but only if Israel, in turn, is ready to pay the price by ending its occupation. SYRIA AND THE PEACE PROCESS: President Bush may have grasped the essential elements of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, but he is still a long way from understanding that Syria, too, needs to be included in the peace process. If it is not, there will be no real peace in the region. One of the reasons Syria has clung to Lebanon for so long -- indeed, the major reason for the present crisis in relations between the two countries -- is because it believes it must at all costs prevent Lebanon from concluding a separate peace with Israel. A separate Lebanese peace would cause Syria's own claim to the Golan to be sidelined and, by opening the door to Israeli influence in Beirut, would expose Syria itself to deadly peril. Fresh in Syrian minds is the US and Israeli attempt, following Israel's 1982 invasion of Lebanon, to force Beirut into Israel's orbit under the so-called 17 May 1983 accord. Syria and its allies in Lebanon managed to abort the accord and wrest Lebanon out of Israel's embrace. Syria is not about to allow any such threat to materialise again. All these problems would be resolved if Washington were to grasp that Middle East peacemaking must be global, not piecemeal. It must involve all the actors and settle all the claims. The glaring flaw in America's Middle East policy is the demonisation of Syria, and also of Iran. These two powers will not bow to US or Israeli dictates. They have interests which need to be addressed. If the US wants an honourable exit from the bloody mess in Iraq and genuinely seeks a resolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict, then it must engage with both Tehran and Damascus, and not seek to browbeat them into submission.
