The Arab League will be at Union for the Mediterranean meetings. But is this confronting Israel or part of a process of normalisation, asks Dina Ezzat European Union foreign ministers and their counterparts from the members of the 43-member Barcelona Process Union for the Mediterranean concluded their two-day meeting in Marseille, France, on Tuesday with a decision to allow the participation of the Arab League in all meetings of the new union. This overrode an Israeli veto that wanted to restrict the Arab organisation to a more ceremonial, less influential role. As such, Arab countries that are not member of the Union for the Mediterranean will now be indirectly represented through the Arab League. "The Arab League will be present in all meetings of the Union for the Mediterranean. This is final," said Hisham Youssef, chief of the cabinet of the Arab League secretary-general. Youssef accredited the decision to "the firm Arab stance" that declined to succumb to pressures exercised by Israel on the European partners to exclude the Arab League from meetings of senior officials where all projects and decision-making is orchestrated. He also praised "high-level intervention on the part of President Hosni Mubarak, the co-chair of the Union for the Mediterranean," during a meeting last week with French President Nicolas Sarkozy, the other co-chair, and "much support from within the European Union" including the support of Italian President Giorgio Napolitano. For Youssef, the decision to include the Arab League representation in all meetings of the Union for the Mediterranean is a victory, a clear indication that Arabs can get things done when they put their collective foot down. But for critics, the Arab League presence alongside Israel in a forum that discusses political, security and economic cooperation is tantamount to a pursue of normalisation with Israel. Critics list other such dangerous precedents, starting with the presence of Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa and Saudi Foreign Minister Soud Al-Faisal last year in the Annapolis meeting with Israeli officials, as well as participation by Youssef in a meeting held in Oxford last month along with Israeli intellectuals to discuss the future of the Arab-Israeli peace process. Moussa himself has often been present in regional and international meetings, away from the UN context, side by side with Israeli officials, and he has not refrained from talking to them during the meetings. He recently supported a call by the Bahraini foreign minister to consider a future set up for regional security cooperation that includes Israel, Turkey and Iran. He is also going to be present in Sharm El-Sheikh next week, at the invitation of Egypt, the host state, to take part in a ministerial level meeting with the Quartet (US, Russia, EU and the UN) that would be followed by a meeting of the Quartet with Palestinian and Israeli delegations. Critics add that Arab League officials from Moussa down are simply ignoring the boycott rules of the secretariat of the Arab organisation in force pending the settlement of the Arab-Israeli conflict. Moussa, they say, keeps talking about no "free normalisation" with Israel, when in fact he is pursuing just that by extending his olive branch with nothing to show for it. They add that he acts as if he was still the foreign minister of Egypt, which has diplomatic ties with Israel, rather than secretary-general of the Arab organisation. "The Arab position on this matter calls for a more careful deliberation," argued political analyst Mohamed El-Sayed Selim in an article printed by the Egyptian daily Al-Ahram yesterday. According to Selim, an expert on European-Mediterranean affairs, "the participation of the Arab League in the current format of the Union for the Mediterranean is about a process of free normalisation which Arabs do not stand to gain from." Youssef counters that the secretariat of the Arab organisation "is not at all involved in any form of normalisation." The Arab League, he said, has always been present in the meetings of the Barcelona process and other regional and international meetings that focus on the future of the cooperation in the region. "The Arab League cannot be excluded from discussing the plans for the future of the region. This is precisely what Israel would like to see happening and this is why Israel fought so hard to exclude the Arab League from attending some of the meetings of the Union for the Mediterranean," Youssef said. The Arab League official added that the presence of the secretary-general of the Arab organisation or his envoys in meetings where Israeli officials or intellectuals are present is "designed to counter an often fierce Israeli attack on Arab rights. We cannot leave the stage free for Israel and allow it to monopolise world public opinion with its narrative on the Arab-Israeli struggle or that of regional developments." As for the announcement of Moussa in support of calls to consider a new mechanism for regional security cooperation that would include Israel, the secretary-general of the Arab League argues that his remarks were based on the deliberations of the Arab foreign ministers last September, which approached the issue as a long-standing Turkish proposal that is worth looking into. This proposal, Moussa added, was picked up again in October during the Arab-Turkish Forum in the presence of several Arab foreign ministers. "But to discuss an idea does not at all mean that we are adopting it or that we are going ahead with normalisation," he said. Moussa insisted that no such mechanism could be seriously contemplated before a set of Arab pre-conditions are met top amongst which is the fair and comprehensive settlement of the Arab-Israeli struggle and an Israeli commitment to work seriously to free the Middle East of all weapons of mass destruction, especially nuclear weapons. "So what the Arabs are doing here is demonstrating an interest in cooperation but are making it conditional. We could also suggest that the project be pursued without the Israeli participation," Moussa added.
