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Monday, July 24, 2006

Israel and other affected parties in the Israel-Lebanon war

The Carnegie Endowment has a background piece on the current situation in the Middle East that's worth seeing: Crisis in the Middle East. It's dated 07/20/06, so it doesn't touch directly on the last few days' events.

Before getting more into that, though, I want to summarize my own general view of US support for Israel. There are good reasons that the US and Israel are strong (though technically informal) allies. Israel has declined US offers since 1967 for a mutual defense treaty beacuse of concerns about its implications for unsettled territorial issues deriving from the 1967 Six Day War.

One reason I would call historical. How different from today the situation looked in 1947-8 is illustrated by the following account from the
Library of Congress (LOC) Country Study for Israel (1988):

By 1947 Palestine was a major trouble spot in the British Empire, requiring some 100,000 troops and a huge maintenance budget. On February 18, 1947, Bevin informed the House of Commons of the government's decision to present the Palestine problem to the United Nations (UN). On May 15, 1947, a special session of the UN General Assembly established the United Nations Special Committee on Palestine (UNSCOP), consisting of eleven members. The UNSCOP reported on August 31 that a majority of its members supported a geographically complex system of partition into separate Arab and Jewish states, a special international status for Jerusalem, and an economic union linking the three members. Backed by both the United States and the Soviet Union, the plan was adopted after two months of intense deliberations as the UN General Assembly Resolution of November 29, 1947. Although considering the plan defective in terms of their expectations from the League of Nations Mandate twenty-five years earlier, the Zionist General Council stated willingness in principle to accept partition. The League of Arab States (Arab League) Council, meeting in December 1947, said it would take whatever measures were required to prevent implementation of the resolution.

Despite the passage of the UN partition plan, the situation in Palestine in early 1948 did not look auspicious for the Yishuv. When the AHC rejected the plan immediately after its passage and called for a general strike, violence between Arabs and Jews mounted. Many Jewish centers, including Jerusalem, were besieged by the Arabs. In January 1948, President Truman, warned by the United States Department of State that a Jewish state was not viable, reversed himself on the issue of Palestine, agreeing to postpone partition and to transfer the Mandate to a trusteeship council. Moreover, the British forces in Palestine sided with the Arabs and attempted to thwart the Yishuv's attempts to arm itself. (my emphasis)

Palestine was part of the British Empire at this point. After armed resistance from Zionist groups in Palestine, Britain decided they had had enough. (The word "Zionist", to say what's not necessarily obvious to everyone is a descriptive word used by the movement that founded the State of Israel. Though for many Muslims it has become practically a cuss word, it's not an insult word to most everyone else.)

Truman's decision to back the creation of the State of Israel was not generally a popular one in the US at the time. But it was part of cleaning up the mess that Britain and France, especially Britain, left in the wake of its Middle Eastern Empire and its post-First World War arrangement in the region. A large part of US policy in the Middle East, including the Iraq War, can be seen as cleaning up for the British.

The Country Study continues:

In mid-March the Yishuv's military prospects changed dramatically after receiving the first clandestine shipment of heavy arms from Czechoslovakia. The Haganah went on the offensive and, in a series of operations carried out from early April until mid-May, successfully consolidated and created communications links with those Jewish settlements designated by the UN to become the Jewish state. In the meantime, Weizmann convinced Truman to reverse himself and pledge his support for the proposed Jewish state. In April 1948, the Palestinian Arab community panicked after Begin's Irgun killed 250 Arab civilians at the village of Dayr Yasin near Jerusalem. The news of Dayr Yasin precipitated a flight of the Arab population from areas with large Jewish populations.

On May 14, 1948, Ben-Gurion and his associates proclaimed the establishment of the State of Israel. On the following day Britain relinquished the Mandate at 6:00 P.M. and the United States announced de facto recognition of Israel. Soviet recognition was accorded on May 18; by April 1949, fifty-three nations, including Britain, had extended recognition. In May 1949, the UN General Assembly, on recommendation of the Security Council, admitted Israel to the UN. (my emphasis)

I've highlighted here references to the Soviet bloc. Even though the Cold War was well under way at this time, both the US and the Soviet Union wanted to see Israel independent. There was a shared desire to see the liquidation of the British Empire. There was the refugge problem. The Soviets also may have hoped that Israel, led by Social Democrats who had just been through an armed, anti-imperialist conflict with Britain, might be receptive to friendly relations with the USSR.

Although the Arab states that went to war with Israel immediately after those events have long since accepted Israel's existence in practice - but not formally - there are still unresolved issues remaining from those days. Up until the Six Day War of 1967, Israel was rightly regarded as surrounded by powerful enemies that could and possibly would seek its destruction as a country.

After Israel's successful war in 1967, Israel acquired nuclear weapons within a few years with the connivance of the Nixon administration. Israel faced a more serious challenge than it expected in the Yom Kippur War of 1973. Israel famously bombed Iraq's Osirik nuclear reactor in 1981 and shot Syria's Soviet-supplied air force out of the sky in their 1982 war. Since that time, Israel cannot be said to seriously be in danger for their existence any longer, though both Israeli diplomacy and much of American public opinion proceeds as if that's so.

There is a pragmatic element in the US-Israeli partnership. Israel provides an important source of clout and intelligence for the US in the Middle East, though I certainly wouldn't say that benefit for the US has always been optimal.

Politically, Israel is the most successful democracy in the Middle East. Israeli foreign policy is debated much more widely in Israel itself than in the United States. Israel's democracy has distinct problems. As a parliamentary system, the electoral rules allow splinter parties with a small vote to get seats in the Knesset. This multiplication of parties means that motley coalitions have to be formed to build a government. And the resulting governments find it difficult to negotiate lasting peace arrangements, because the pullout of even a small party can bring the government down. But that common democractic system is an important source of connection between the US and Israel.

Finally, there are a number of sentimental ties that are subjective but important. Jews feel as special tie to the Jewish State, not least because of the horror of the Holocaust. American Christians feel a tie to the "Holy Land" of the Bible. Many Americans came to admire Israel as a tough country who could stand up to hostile neighbors, some of which (like Egypt under Nasser) were also anti-American. There is a dark side to the latter, though: some people admire them for people tough white people who can beat up on Arabs (though many of Israel's American fans of this type would probably be surprised at the non-European heritage of so many Israelis).

Here are some quick excerpts from the Carnegie paper. From the Introduction:

This is a dangerous moment for the Middle East, because the conflicts in Gaza and Lebanon could easily escalate to involve the broader region. Indeed, there are voices in the United States and Israel calling for a deliberate broadening of the conflict to Syria and Iran in an attempt to solve all the contentious issues of the region at once.

We believe that this is an illusion. Any strategy to address the present crisis must deal with the realities of the Middle East as they are now, not try to leapfrog over them by seeking to impose a grand new vision. Such a vision would be bound to fail as it did in the case of Iraq. (my emphasis)

Paul Salem on Lebanon:

The likely outcome of the current situation, then, will be a festering crisis in which much of the South is emptied of its inhabitants, hundreds of thousands of Shiite refugees are stranded in Beirut and other parts of the country, and the government remains paralyzed vis-à-vis Resolution 1559 and real security measures in southern Beirut or the South. This will be an unsustainable situation that might lead either to a collapse of the Siniora government or to civil strife within Lebanon, or both, with an accompanying expansion of power for Hizbollah, Syria, and Iran at the expense of the March 14 coalition and their western and Saudi backers. After all, Hizbollah is much better equipped for internal war than any other group in the country.

One of the few possible factors that might lead Hizbollah to accept a change of status and strategy in Lebanon is pressure from Iran, its main funder, backer, and guide. However, itis hard to imagine that, given the current international climate and the defiance of the Ahmedinejad government, striking a deal with Iran would lead to the reining in ofHizbollah and a change of its role and status in Lebanon. But in such difficult diplomacy lies the only real hope of a semi-positive outcome to the current crisis; otherwise, Lebanon is set to enter into another long period of unrest.

Michele Dunne on US policy:

The Bush administration policy of focusing on an overall transformation of the Middle East and avoiding direct diplomacy to address the Arab-Israeli conflict has run up against its limitations. The current conflagration shows that it is time for the United States to address the ongoing conflicts between Israel and its Arab neighbors. This does not mean that the administration’s strategic goals in the Middle East - which include promoting democracy and eliminating regional troublemaking by Iran and Syria - should be abandoned. Rather, they should be complemented by direct efforts to address the ongoing conflicts. ...

Surely the Middle East needs democracy and responsible behavior by states, but it is not reasonable to expect such developments alone - even should they be achieved - to settle conflicts between Israel and the Arab parties. Reducing the power of Hamas and Hizbollah and compelling them to act responsibly or be excluded from political participation will require far more than stopping assistance from Syria and Iran. The cutoff of assistance to Palestinian extremists from Saddam Hussein since 2003, for example, did nothing to reduce Palestinian resistance against Israel. The Lebanese state and Palestinian Authority can only be strengthened and become able to enforce limits on Hizbollah and Hamas within the context of negotiated solutions to the conflicts that justify the two groups’ militancy.

Julia Choucair on Hizbollah:

First, while certainly Israel can inflict severe damage on Hizbollah’s military capabilities in the short term, it cannot eliminate Hizbollah through military force or prevent it from rearming because Hizbollah is deeply rooted in the Lebanese political arena. ...

Second, the current attack on Lebanon will not put the Lebanese government in a position to disarm Hizbollah. ...

In addition, Washington’s belief that military pressure on Damascus and Tehran would deal a decisive blow to Hizbollah misunderstands the relationship between Hizbollah and Iran and Syria. ...

Ultimately, a long-term solution to the challenge of Hizbollah will only come as part of a regional peace settlement that addresses the overall conflict between Israel and its neighbors (Lebanon and Syria) and finds a resolution to the Palestinian problem.

Nathan Brown on Hamas:

A policy based on recognition of the full set of regional realities must give up on the idea of a quick fix to the challenge posed by Hamas. An effective approach must be based on the lesson the United States has learned so painfully in Iraq: insurgencies cannot be defeated exclusively by military means. It is imperative to combat terrorism and extremism coming from Hamas. But a policy that goes no further - and aims solely to destroy Hamas and anything associated with it - will only bequeath the all too familiar problems to future leaders in more virulent form.

Marina Ottaway on Syria:

Political or even military intervention against Syria at this time would nevertheless do little to bring Hizbollah and Hamas under control and could easily open a new crisis point in a region that already has too many.

Hizbollah and Hamas are not simply puppets of Syria. They exist independently of Syria and have independent leaderships. Syria cannot simply order them to desist from attacking Israel. If Syrian support ceased, Hizbollah’s arsenal would quickly become less sophisticated. However, the two intifadas in Palestine and present actions by Hamas have shown that movements with fairly rudimentary weapons can keep Israel in a permanent state of insecurity.

... There is no democratic happy ending to regime change in Syria. (my emphasis)

George Perkovich on Iran:

Backing Hizbollah in the present conflict in Lebanon is a risky strategy that could have significant negative repercussions for Iran. Iranian leaders, however, are gambling that when the dust settles in Lebanon, the international community will be forced to recognize Iran’s dominant position in the Middle East and will be no less willing than it is today to accommodate Iran’s production of material that could be used in nuclear weapons. ...

Iran’s nuclear program is the immediate focus of conflict, the trip-wire that could put Iran under meaningful international sanctions or even military attack. But Iran’s broader strategic objective is to be recognized as the dominant indigenous power in the Middle East. ...

Iranian leaders risk over-reaching. If Hizbollah is perceived to lose badly (a big if), and Iran cannot come to its rescue, then Iran’s power would be diminished and the wisdom of confronting it, including on the nuclear issue, would be more apparent. And if Sunnis broadly conclude that Hizbollah and its Shiite Iranian patrons, despite the excitement generated by their anti-Israel words and deeds, actually harm Sunni interests, then resistance to Iran’s regional ambitions may become mobilized.

Amr Hamzawy on Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Jordan:

In a surprising move, the governments of Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Jordan have accused Hizbollah, and implicitly Syria, of recklessness and adventurism contrary to Arab interests for its role in provoking the latest conflict with Israel. This is a significant departure in Arab politics. ...

The anti-Hizbollah position taken by Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Jordan also reflects the real fears among some Arab governments of the growing Iranian influence in the region. The rise to power of pro-Iranian Shiite groups in Iraq has led King Abdullah of Jordan to denounce the emergence of a “Shiite Crescent” in the Middle East.

But since last week, both Saudi Arabia and Egypt have backed away from their positions to which Hamzawy referred. See Blair: Situation in Lebanon a catastrophe Yedioth Ahronoth 07/24/06:

Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak on Monday also called for an immediate ceasefire in Israel's military campaign against Hizbullah in Lebanon, saying a longer term solution could be worked out later.

In a statement carried by the nation's Middle East News Agency, Mubarak also warned that the onslaught could cause "a humanitarian catastrophe."

"The situation is very grave and needs an urgent action to reach a cease-fire and put an end to hostilities," Mubarak said. "After the cease fire we can deal with all issues causing the current problem."

Also, Saudi Arabia seeks Lebanon ceasefire in meeting with Bush, Rice CBC/Yahoo! News 07/23/06

Top Saudi Arabian officials met with their U.S. counterparts on Sunday in an effort to end the carnage in Lebanon.

"We are requesting a ceasefire to allow for a cessation of hostilities," Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal said after meeting U.S. President George W. Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in Washington, D.C.

"I found the president very conscious of the destruction and bloodshed the Lebanese are suffering," he said.

Saud gave Bush a letter from Saudi King Abdullah asking for a ceasefire.

posted at 4:17:00 PM by Bruce Miller

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