UK -Politics & World Current Affairs

15 January 2008
 Seen in Israel as its staunchest ally, President George ‘Dubya’ Bush waited seven years before his first official visit to the Jewish in his ‘ mission impossible’.

 Adel Darwish, on President Bush’s Middle East Tour.
 

Analysts, as well as parties involved, agree on one thing: It is less clear what the President would  bring his hosts apart from gridlock. Analysts point out that every party in the troubled region had different aims and expectation from the American leader’s grand Middle East Tour.

Pessimists, a majority, expected nothing more from Mr. Bush than just nudging the Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, which he re-started in Annapolis in November to move a few steps ahead ; and  to reassure himself that America’s allies can still be rallied against Iran.

After his joint project with a Mr. Tony Blair, failed to materialise his Wilsonian vision of bringing democracy to the Arabs in a domino effect starting in Iraq, Mr. Bush saw Palestine as the door left open to walk into history books. But he has little time to leave a mark comparable to his predecessors’. President Jimmy Carter’s failure to rescue American hostages from Iran, was offset by associating him self with the Egyptian Israeli 1979 historic peace treaty.

Ronald Reagan set the scene for winning the cold war without firing a shot; while George Bush Snr is admired for liberating Kuwait from Saddam Hussein and remembered fondly by less grateful Arabs for starting the peace talks and for giving ‘ naughty’ Israel a financial smack on the wrist by freezing $10bn loan facilities.

Dubya Bush took office only days after his predecessor Bill Clinton let an Israeli Palestinian peace deal slip through his fingers, in an attempt to offset his pathetic response to al-Qaeda attack on American embassies in East Africa. Instead of  uprooting the terror organisation from Afghanistan, his critics say, he comically fired a dozen or so cruise missile costing a million dollar a piece tt some Afghan terror tents worth 10 bucks.

Mr. Bush jnr, on dad’s advice, had no intention in getting his feet stuck in the ever-shifting sands of the Middle East, focusing instead on economy. But Messers Bin Laden and Zawahiri had a different idea in September 2001 forcing him into a bigger quagmire, that only a Carter like peace deal can wash its mud .
 
Nicked-named by the Economist as ‘Mr. Palestine’ , Mr. Bush was the first American President to commit  himself to establishing a ‘ viable’ Palestinian state, within his ‘two democratic states’ vision.
He Put Israel’s Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on the spot by saying he expected the two sides to sign a peace treaty before the end of the year following his January 10  talks with the Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah.

At the Annapolis summit  Mr. Abbas, and Israel Prime Minister Ehud promised to talk fearlessly to one another about “final status” issues such as borders, Jerusalem and refugees.  Mr. Bush, a man who in the words of an Arab diplomat ,  ‘get on and do what he has set his mind on doing, regardless of being right or wrong’; wanted to be remembered as a leader who planted the seeds of  peace in the holy land;  yet many seasoned Middle East observers say his plan was too ambitious to square the Palestinian Israeli circle in the time frame he set.

The president heard, from both sides their familiar complaints. While expressing gratitude for a big boost in foreign aid inspired by Annapolis and coordinate by Mr. Blair, Mr. Abbas told the President that Israel’s recent announcement of new tenders for housing in West Bank settlements, many seen as illegal in international law, jeopardises the fledgling talks. US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice described an expansion of Har-Homa, a settlement near Jerusalem as ‘ unhelpful’.  
Mr. Olmert too made the familiar complaint about The Palestinians inability to deliver on security, which pushes Israel to take harsh measures that, in turn, makes ordinary Palestinians lives difficult, festering more hatred for Israel.

Theoretically, and in the eyes of International law, President Abbas is the lawfully elected head of what looks like a Palestinian state representing the entire nation. In reality, he only controls the West Bank while Gaza is controlled by the Islamists Hamas, who, Arabs, Israelis and Americans alike agree, backed, financed and armed by Iran and  Syria to stop the very peace settlement President Bush’s tour was trying to secure.

Hamas’s refused neither to stick to agreement signed by the Palestinian Authority with Israel, nor to a deal signed with the rival Fateh for a coalition government under Saudi auspices last year, and staged a bloody coup that drove all of Mr. Abbas’s officials out of Gaza last summer.
Rockets, fired by militants from Gaza, on almost daily bases, at Israeli towns  are seen by many as Hamas inspired. President Bush’s arrival was greeted by salvos of rockets fired from Gaza and a few fired by some previously unknown Islamic Organisation from Southern Lebanon, believed to be an arm of Hezbollah.
 Mr.  Olmert’s  rating in the polls is the lowest in Israel’s 60 years history, and musters little support from the  public for any move on settlements as demanded by the Palestinians and the Americans.