What reply would Obama give to an Arab message of peace? Dina Ezzat investigates Towards the end of this month Arab foreign ministers, upon the request of the Palestinian Authority, are set to meet at the Arab League headquarters in Cairo for an extraordinary meeting that will examine the fate of Arab-Israeli peacemaking under the right- wing government of Binyamin Netanyahu. According to statements made this week by Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa, a fixed date for the meeting has yet to be set but preparations for the assembly of Arab ministers is in the works. The meeting should be taking place in the wake of a scheduled summit between Jordanian King Abdullah and US President Barack Obama in Washington on 21 April. The Abdullah-Obama meeting will offer an opportunity for the Jordanian monarch to convey a collective Arab message to the US president on "Arabs' commitment to peace" and their expectations of Obama to help pursue this objective. The message Abdullah is going to take to Washington was subject to thorough discussion in Amman Saturday. During a meeting with Moussa and the foreign ministers of Egypt, Palestine, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia and Qatar's state minister for foreign affairs, the Jordanian monarch finalised the details of a message to Obama. The message was subject to wider Arab consultation that included Syria. In their message to Obama Arab countries appeal for the direct and systematic engagement of the US administration, and of the US president himself, to encourage the Israeli government of Netanyahu to demonstrate serious and sustainable commitment to peace negotiations, especially with the Palestinians. "We are basically saying that we want an active and ongoing peace process to take place," said Nasser Jouda, Jordan's minister for foreign affairs, in Amman following the meeting. By the account of Arab diplomats who shared the details of the message with Al-Ahram Weekly, the Arab foreign ministers are making a clear offer to the Obama administration that they would put aside their reservations on the positions expressed by the Netanyahu government and that they would stick to the offer included in the Arab peace initiative should Obama commit himself to personally promote the cause of Arab-Israeli peace. This commitment, one Arab diplomat told the Weekly from Amman, is essentially about getting Netanyahu to suspend the construction of illegal settlements in Palestinian territories. "We really want settlement construction to stop. Israel is eating up the land and we don't know why we should negotiate for the establishment of a Palestinian state when there would be no land left for this state to be established on," said one diplomat. He added, "So in their message to Obama, Arabs are making a clear requirement -- of ending all illegal settlement activities." Arabs are also making other demands, including easing the siege imposed by Israel on the Palestinian territories, especially Gaza, removing roadblocks, and refraining from any military operations against Gaza or other parts of the Palestinian territories. Furthermore, Arabs ask that any future peace negotiations be pursued with clear terms of reference and within workable timeframes. The Arabs are not sure what to expect as a reply. In the assessment of Arab (including Palestinian) diplomats who spoke to the Weekly, the US president himself has a clear awareness of the need -- many say the benefits -- of seriously pursuing Arab-Israeli peace. What Arab diplomats are still sceptical about is whether he has the necessary commitment to get Netanyahu to reciprocate. "It is not about Obama. We think Obama knows that peace in the Middle East is in the interest of everyone and we are quite satisfied with the choice of [George] Mitchell as the envoy of the US president to the Middle East," commented an advisor to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. He added that what counts is that Netanyahu wants to evade making any commitments to Obama on making a final peace, especially with the Palestinians. Palestinian officials, in particular, display a great deal of pessimism. They suspect that at the end of the day Netanyahu will manage to use Israel's influence in Washington to restrain Obama administration objectives to securing a stable situation whereby no military operations would be launched against Palestinian territories and no major humanitarian crisis would be reported either. By the account of Palestinian diplomats that spoke to Netanyahu's aides, it is naïve to expect a final peace deal under this Israeli government. In statements made in Cairo Thursday, following a meeting with President Hosni Mubarak, Palestinian President Abbas himself voiced scepticism over the peace orientation of the Netanyahu government. "What we heard from [Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor] Lieberman shows no commitment to the peace process," Abbas told reporters. Nonetheless, Abbas did call Netanyahu on Saturday to wish him happy Day of Atonement. That was the first contact between the two men since the election of Netanyahu. It is a contact that indicates that Palestinian officials are taking up Cairo's advice to show goodwill towards the Israeli government in order to encourage Obama to get more directly involved in administering the Arab-Israeli peace process. There is hardly anyone in Arab diplomatic quarters that has faith that peace will be realised under Netanyahu, but there are many who believe that if Obama is willing to try, the Arabs should support him. On Friday, Abbas will receive Mitchell who was expected in Israel Wednesday for talks with Netanyahu. In statements he made in North Africa before flying to Israel, Mitchell insisted that his mission is to deliver something that the Netanyahu government is reluctant to even acknowledge as a potential objective: "the two-state solution". According to French Ambassador to Egypt Jean Felix-Paganon, the role of the international community now is to insist on the two-state solution. Speaking to reporters Tuesday the French diplomat declined to qualify the Netanyahu government as a non-peace partner. "We will judge this government by its actions," he said. Arab diplomats in New York suggested to the Weekly that they expect less international tolerance towards certain "actions", including military attacks on Gaza, from the Netanyahu government than the previous Israeli government of Ehud Olmert. In the words of one diplomat, "I think there is an awareness that this [Israeli] government cannot have its way. This was not the case with the Olmert government that always managed to position itself as a peace-making government, for some reason."
