But the deadly assault on the billiards hall in Rishon Le Zion, and the almost certain Israeli retaliation, should not obscure the fact that Bush and Sharon moved at least a half step down the path toward a diplomatic solution. The indications are in what they said and did-and also in what they omitted.
First the omissions. Ariel Sharon arrived with what he called a peace plan, but the only detail leaked in advance was the ambitious and bizarre proposal for a fence to separate Israel from the Palestinians. He also brought dossiers attacking Yasir Arafat and Saudi Arabia for supposedly sponsoring and funding previous suicide bombers. And Sharon has declared repeatedly that he could not deal with Arafat as a partner in peace.
These were not major themes at the White House talk, however. A senior U.S. official said there was no discussion of a 600-mile ditch, fence or wall. Sharon’s repeated demand for a new leader to replace Arafat also was “not a big part” of the meeting, the official said. Indeed, while Sharon is sticking to his views about Arafat, Bush’s perspective, according to his senior aide, is that “we are not going to try to choose leadership for the Palestinian people.”
Also omitted was discussion of the two Israeli documents charging Arafat and the Saudi government of supporting terrorist bombers. Israeli officials distributed two bound publications of more than 80 pages each to reporters on the eve of Sharon’s White House meeting. But much of the content had been published weeks earlier on the Israeli Defense Forces Web site (www.idf.il). Based on a first detailed reading, the case outlined against Arafat and senior Palestinian Authority officials in “terrorism against Israel” was not conclusive nor well documented. What was new was documentation of claims that Saudi Arabia was supporting the Hamas organization and the families of a number of suicide bombers. In both instances, the White House made it clear it preferred to postpone any discussion. “Very little of this [discussion] focused on reports or the like, because the president has not seen those reports,” Bush’s senior aide said.
These omissions fit into a familiar pattern. Two weeks ago, on the eve of Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah’s visit to Bush’s Crawford, Texas, ranch, an unnamed Saudi official was quoted in The New York Times as warning that if the meeting did not go well, Saudi oil shipments might be cut off, and U.S. troops might be expelled from Saudi Arabia. Oil prices rose the day of publication, and denials were issued on all sides. What was missing in the story was a reality check, for Saudi Arabia’s national income derives from oil sales, and its leaders have repeatedly denied publicly that they will use oil as a political weapon. And the idea of expelling the force that provides essential military protection for the regime had an air of unreality to it. The tough talk made sense, however, in the context of domestic and Arab politics. Sharon’s views about a fence and about replacing Arafat may also be aimed mostly at his domestic audience, particularly within the right-wing Israeli political scene.
So where did the talks signal progress? First there were the atmospherics, with both leaders saying they had to take advantage of what may be a fleeting moment of relative calm. “I believe that there is a chance now to start and move forward,” Sharon told reporters at the end of the Oval Office meeting. Said Bush: “I told the prime minister there’s nothing more I want than [there] to be peace in the region and that I look forward to working with him and his government to achieve that peace.” Later he asserted: “It’s very important for us to seize this moment, as the prime minister mentioned, and lead and get on that path.”
Second, instead of focusing on the role of Arafat and the Palestinian security apparatus, they established new goals: the reform of the Palestinian Authority, starting with its police force. Bush announced that CIA Director George Tenet would return to the region soon to help design a “unified security force that will be transparent, held accountable.” The fact is that Palestinian Authority, set up by the Oslo accords, failed to construct an efficient government, and the corruption and manipulation of funds has been widely reported, including in Palestinian media. As Bush pointed out, the security authority had as many as eight regional commands without a single unifying structure.
They also discussed a possible international conference that would attempt to restart the peace negotiations. There seems to be a wide gap in expectations for this conference, with Sharon advocating that a conference agree to delay for five to 10 years the final shape of a Palestinian state, while Arab leaders seek an agreement in, at most, one year. Sharon also has offered a maximum of 42 percent of the West Bank to Palestinians-though Israeli officials say the figure is in fact more flexible than that-while U.S. and Arab officials say the amount of territory should be closer to the 95 percent-plus discussed at the end of the Clinton administration. Finally, they seemed to agree on the unique opportunity offered by the Saudi proposal for a peace process that ends with normal diplomatic ties between Israel and the Arab states. Bush said of Abdullah: “He’s the man who laid out the vision for peace. He’s also a man who understands that by reforming the Palestinians we have a chance to achieve peace.” Sharon, according to a Bush senior aide, told Bush that “he admired the vision that the Saudis had put forward.”
Where the two sides disagreed was in familiar areas-the future of Jewish settlements in the West Bank, the timing of setting up a Palestinian state, and the extent of Israeli withdrawals. Yet here, they seemed to agree on a protocol to set aside the differences until the crunch comes in direct negotiations. For example, Sharon said talk of a Palestinian state was “premature.” Bush, by comparison, said, “I haven’t changed my position” that a Palestinian state should be the stated goal of the peace process. But in fact Sharon has already accepted in principle that there will be a Palestinian state. Bush also reaffirmed the bedrock position of the international community that any settlement has to be based on UN Security Council resolutions 242 and 338, which call for “peace” in exchange for “land” and Israel’s withdrawal from territories occupied in the 1967 Middle East war.
The initial impression left by the meeting was that Bush is putting a concerted effort into the process. His engagement could at this stage be described as “a foot in the water.” Before meeting Sharon, the president spoke with the Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah and with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. Meanwhile, Secretary of State Colin Powell conferred with Jordanian King Abdullah, whom Bush was seeing Wednesday afternoon. While Bush has yet to reveal an overarching strategy for the peace process, the intensive consultations seem aimed at ensuring that every Middle East leader is on board as he proceeds.
