Threatened by whom?

By Khaled Dawoud
Arab leaders meeting with US Secretary of State Colin Powell in his first regional tour since US President George Bush took office in January, were keen to send two messages to the new administration. The first is that the Palestinian-Israeli conflict cannot be shelved in order to give priority to Washington's desire to further contain Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's regime. The second, and linked message, is that the decade-old sanctions against Iraq must be gradually lifted and an end brought to the horrifying suffering of the Iraqi people.
Powell's own statements following meetings with Palestinian and Israeli officials on Sunday, though, suggested that any progress on the Palestinian-Israeli track is unlikely to happen soon.
"There are some things that have to happen [before negotiations can resume]," he said. Chief among these "things" is a reduction in the level of violence. Washington also wants to revive security cooperation between Israel and Palestinians and to convince Israel to ease its "siege" of the West Bank and Gaza. Yet in a joint news conference with Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, the US Secretary of State remained silent as Sharon insisted repeatedly he would not resume talks with Palestinians, or release millions of dollars of Palestinian taxes held by Israel, until the six-month-old Al-Aqsa Intifada ends.
Powell's whirlwind tour included stops in Egypt, Palestine, Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Syria. "We are taking this heat that somehow we are affecting the people of Iraq, that somehow we are losing the support of Arabs in the street, as they are often called," Powell had told reporters accompanying him on his plane before arriving in Cairo on Saturday. Yet his attempts to sell the argument that Iraq remained a regional threat were shrugged off in practically every capital he visited.
"The problem that we have is in Baghdad. It is Saddam Hussein who refuses to abandon his pursuit of weapons of mass destruction. He threatens not the US, but he threatens the region... the children of Egypt, the children of Saudi Arabia and the children of Kuwait," Powell intoned following a meeting with his Russian counterpart, Igor Ivanov, in Cairo. He was flatly contradicted by Foreign Minister Amr Moussa. "For us, I don't see that threat," Moussa told reporters. "Though if you ask countries in the Gulf region, they do feel it and they say it publicly."
Moussa went on to underline the importance of progress on the Palestinian-Israeli track: "The Palestinian-Israeli peace track is basic to us all... No developments in other places should distract us from giving attention to the Palestinian-Israeli track. The question of Iraq has its own dimension and importance. Derailing the peace process, though, is guaranteed to impact on the whole region, and the stability of the Middle East."
Most analysts believe that, despite the rhetoric issuing from Washington, sanctions are likely to be eased, and restrictions limited to the import of so-called "dual use" goods. According to UN figures, the Sanctions Committee responsible for monitoring Iraq's imports, has blocked $3 billion in goods following objections from US and British representatives on the committee. These have included pencils, ambulance cars, refrigerated trucks, oil industry spare parts, water pumps and even eggs, which US officials in the past insisted could be used to develop biological weapons.
Even Kuwait, which held huge celebrations this week to mark the 10th anniversary of the end of Iraq's occupation of the oil-rich state, backed the idea of "modifying" the sanctions. Kuwait's Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, Sheikh Mohamed Al-Sabah, said that his country backed "altering the sanctions imposed on Iraq in a way that would maintain a ban on military materials that would directly threaten Kuwait's security," a position echoed by the Saudi Foreign Minister, Saud Al-Faisal.
Even American domestic coverage of Powell's trip was hard-pressed to come up with any diplomatic victories, though US reports played up Syrian President Bashar Assad's agreeing to place Syrian imports of Iraqi oil under UN control. Washington claims that Syrian imports of Iraqi oil amount to 180,000 barrels a day and provide Baghdad with revenues that it could use to rebuild its army. Syrian officials have neither confirmed nor denied the American reports that come at a time when Damascus has been openly calling for the lifting of sanctions against Iraq following months of steadily thawing relations between Damascus and Baghdad.
US officials accompanying Powell said they hoped to present a plan on modified sanctions to Arab leaders before they meet in Amman on 27 March. Meanwhile, Arab leaders began their own consultations immediately following Powell's departure from the region. President Hosni Mubarak visited Amman on Tuesday to hold talks with King Abdullah. Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat also met with the Jordanian leader on Tuesday before heading to Cairo to meet with President Mubarak yesterday. Arafat is scheduled to leave today for Tripoli and talks with Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi.
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