EGX kicks off week higher on August 17    EGP inches down vs. USD at Sunday's trading close    EGX launches 1st phone app    Egypt achieves record primary budget surplus of EGP 629bn despite sharp fall in Suez Canal revenues    Escalation in Gaza, West Bank as Israeli strikes continue amid mounting international criticism    Egypt recovers collection of ancient artefacts from Netherlands    Resumption of production at El Nasr marks strategic step towards localising automotive industry: El-Shimy    Egypt harvests 315,000 cubic metres of rainwater in Sinai as part of flash flood protection measures    Egypt, UNDP discuss outcomes of joint projects, future environmental cooperation    United Bank achieves EGP 1.51bn net profit in H1 2025, up 26.9% year-on-year    After Putin summit, Trump says peace deal is best way to end Ukraine war    Egypt, Namibia explore closer pharmaceutical cooperation    Jordan condemns Israeli PM remarks on 'Greater Israel'    Renowned Egyptian novelist Sonallah Ibrahim dies at 88    Egypt's FM discusses Gaza, bilateral ties in calls with Saudi, South African counterparts    Egypt prepares to tackle seasonal air pollution in Nile Delta    Al-Sisi says any party thinking Egypt will neglect water rights is 'completely mistaken'    Egyptian, Ugandan Presidents open business forum to boost trade    Egypt's Sisi, Uganda's Museveni discuss boosting ties    Egypt's Sisi warns against unilateral Nile measures, reaffirms Egypt's water security stance    Egypt, Colombia discuss medical support for Palestinians injured in Gaza    Egypt, Huawei explore healthcare digital transformation cooperation    Egypt's Sisi, Sudan's Idris discuss strategic ties, stability    Egypt's govt. issues licensing controls for used cooking oil activities    Egypt to inaugurate Grand Egyptian Museum on 1 November    Egypt's Sisi: Egypt is gateway for aid to Gaza, not displacement    Greco-Roman rock-cut tombs unearthed in Egypt's Aswan    Egypt reveals heritage e-training portal    Sisi launches new support initiative for families of war, terrorism victims    Egypt expands e-ticketing to 110 heritage sites, adds self-service kiosks at Saqqara    Palm Hills Squash Open debuts with 48 international stars, $250,000 prize pool    On Sport to broadcast Pan Arab Golf Championship for Juniors and Ladies in Egypt    Golf Festival in Cairo to mark Arab Golf Federation's 50th anniversary    Germany among EU's priciest labour markets – official data    Paris Olympic gold '24 medals hit record value    A minute of silence for Egyptian sports    Russia says it's in sync with US, China, Pakistan on Taliban    It's a bit frustrating to draw at home: Real Madrid keeper after Villarreal game    Shoukry reviews with Guterres Egypt's efforts to achieve SDGs, promote human rights    Sudan says countries must cooperate on vaccines    Johnson & Johnson: Second shot boosts antibodies and protection against COVID-19    Egypt to tax bloggers, YouTubers    Egypt's FM asserts importance of stability in Libya, holding elections as scheduled    We mustn't lose touch: Muller after Bayern win in Bundesliga    Egypt records 36 new deaths from Covid-19, highest since mid June    Egypt sells $3 bln US-dollar dominated eurobonds    Gamal Hanafy's ceramic exhibition at Gezira Arts Centre is a must go    Italian Institute Director Davide Scalmani presents activities of the Cairo Institute for ITALIANA.IT platform    







Thank you for reporting!
This image will be automatically disabled when it gets reported by several people.



The Quartet's aims, or American policy by another name
Published in Daily News Egypt on 02 - 05 - 2007


The Palestinians have long sought, and Israel has long resisted, the internationalization of efforts to construct a process that would lead to a durable and comprehensive peace. Independent advocates for a just peace have echoed this call out of the realization that the near monopoly of Washington on stewardship of Israeli-Palestinian diplomacy has hindered - and even obstructed - meaningful progress. Never has this fact been more glaring than during the two administrations of US President George W. Bush. The Bush administration's default position is simply to ignore the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Bush has never sought the resumption of the Oslo process that became moribund at precisely its most promising juncture: the Taba meetings of January 2001. Nor has Bush seized the opportunities presented by successive iterations of the Saudi-drafted peace plan endorsed by the Arab League. Instead, Bush has ridden shotgun while Israeli Prime Ministers Ariel Sharon and Ehud Olmert have driven events, first with refusal even to meet Palestinian leaders and then with unilateral measures like the August 2005 "disengagement from Gaza and four far-flung West Bank settlements. As a result, the two-state solution, identified by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in 2006 as a "personal goal, has faded further and further from view, overshadowed by expanded settlements and the separation wall in East Jerusalem and parts of the West Bank. At the same time, and unlike the Clinton administration, the Bush administration has participated in what appears to be an international body supervising the Israeli-Palestinian file - the Quartet of the United States, the United Nations, the European Union and Russia. Notably, the White House joined the Quartet before "multilateralism and "working with our allies became Democratic and realist talking points in the foreign policy establishment's feeble campaign to stop the invasion of Iraq. So the Quartet cannot be dismissed as a mere sop to domestic critics, but it certainly has been a simulacrum of internationalization. As is obvious to all concerned, the clout in the Quartet resides in Washington. It is often said that the Quartet is a tool for sanding the rough edges off US policy preferences, in particular through the moderating influence of the UN and the EU. In practice, however, the Quartet has mostly served to cloak the Bush administration's unilateral peace-blocking policy in the garb of international legitimacy. Exhibit A is the Quartet's signature achievement, the "road map unfurled on April 30, 2003. Though there had been intense pressure for a peace process to replace Oslo throughout late 2001 and 2002, amid a series of suicide bombings in Israel and Israeli military incursions into the West Bank, the US secured the postponement of the road map's announcement three times. When it finally was released, the text bore clear marks of accommodation to US and Israeli demands. First, Bush's newly discovered passion for Palestinian "reform was made a condition of final-status negotiations, as was Israel's requirement of a full cessation of Palestinian armed attacks. More damaging to the road map's prospects was the phased approach, which left the plan vulnerable to constant derailment by acts of violence and, like Oslo, delayed discussion of the most important issues until the end. Finally, despite EU official Javier Solana's insistence that "the road map is not the property of one country, the Bush administration's fundamental disinterest in the document's implementation has rendered it effectively moot. In 2006, when Hamas won a majority in the Palestinian Legislative Council in internationally vetted elections, the US prevailed upon the Quartet to bless an international financial blockade of the Palestinian Authority - a policy with the clear political goal of impoverishing Palestinians into reversing their democratic choice. The three US-Israeli conditions for talking to the Hamas-led PA became known as the "Quartet conditions. Cognizant of the worsening humanitarian crisis in the Palestinian territories, the EU eventually softened the blow of the aid embargo with the Temporary International Mechanism. But it was Saudi Arabia - not the Quartet - that broke the strategic impasse by convening Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Hamas leaders to hammer out a deal for a "national unity government. Today, with the Bush administration engaged in halfhearted attempts to jump-start Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, one hears fewer mentions in Washington of either the road map or the Quartet. There are signs, meanwhile, that EU member states will not toe Washington's line of maintaining the blockade on the PA despite the Hamas-Fatah deal. But the raison d'etre of the Quartet - a negotiated Israeli-Palestinian peace leading to a two-state solution - is arguably less obtainable now than it was at the time of the foursome's formation. Israel's separation barrier can be torn down; settlements and bypass roads can be dismantled or swapped for land in Israel proper. But it is hard to believe that any of this can or will happen absent a genuinely international peace process - one that is not controlled by Washington and is not subject to the vicissitudes of American domestic politics. In the case of the Quartet, one almost suspects that the simulacrum has been used to discredit the real thing. Chris Toensingis editor of Middle East Report, a publication of the Middle East Research and Information Project. This commentary first appeared at bitterlemons-international.org, an online newsletter publishing views of Arab and Islamic issues.

Clic here to read the story from its source.