Piecework

This past week's two beig Middle East developments drew mixed reviews. They also made the Bush administration look like a marginal player in Middle East affairs and its policies toward Lebanon, Hezbollah, Syria, Hamas, Israel and Iran like miserable failures. The agreement that key Lebanese political players signed in Doha, Qatar was a victory primarily for Hezbollah and secondarily for Arab League diplomacy. The agreement resolves for now the political crisis in Lebanon: It commits the parties to a National Unity government in which Hezbollah will have veto power; it agrees to the election of the compromise presidential candidate Gen. Michel Suleiman and calls for certain revisions of the electoral laws that will increase Shiite representation in the Lebanese parliament. These changes correspond to the probable populations of the respective communities and certainly to their respective military strengths, as Hezbollah's recent armed seizure of West Beirut bluntly demonstrated. Through the agreement the government parties averted a coup d'état or civil war, which would have cost them more. The agreement, however, does not address the wider issue of Hezbollah's future character, viz., political party, movement, army; it does not quiet fears in Lebanon of Hezbollah creating a state within a state.

The agreement generally received regional and international applause. Even the United States, which had called upon Lebanon's government to stand up to Hezbollah expressed some satisfaction. Its spin was that Hezbollah's gains, achieved at gunpoint, had cost it its reputation and so political partners among other Lebanese Some skeptics, however, questioned whether the agreement just delayed the collapse of Lebanon into civil or could really defuse the situation. Yet the Arab patrons of the parties -- primarily the Saudis, on one side, Syria, on the other apparently signed off on the agreement. That suggests they have interests in making the agreement work or, put another way, keeping Lebanon from becoming the battleground of a proxy war between the United States and Iran. If so, the politics of the regional system have trumped those of the global system (not that Iran is really a global player). Since the regional politics are traditionally contentious and solidarity weak, the agreement testifies to the extent of the Arab states' disdain for the United States and suspicions of Iran.

Official Israel and Syrian statements that the two countries are indirectly negotiating peace through the Turkish foreign ministry are no surprise since reports of such negotiations have been leaking for the past month. The statements, however, made the countries' respective patrons, the US and Iran, look ineffective, since each had publicly warned its client against such negotiations. Indeed, a New York Times editorial rather imaginatively argued that George Bush's condemnation of appeasers in his May 14 speech to the Knesset was aimed at both Obama and Israelis who want to negotiate with groups to whom the Administration refuses to speak, viz., Syria, Hamas, Hezbollah. Secretary of State Rice said rather coolly that it was okay for Israel to negotiate with Syria. She then claimed that Israel and the Palestinian Authority were making such progress in their US sponsored negotiations that agreements could be signed by the end of the year. Since neither the parties to these negotiations nor any informed observers believe this, Rice is either terribly out of touch or just plain lying. Given her record, it's hard to tell.

Iranian president Ahmadinejad and his circle were reportedly pissed off by the revelation to the point of branding Syria's negotiations a betrayal of its friendship with Iran. Iran's foreign ministry, however, denied the truth of such reports. So Ahmadinejad is likely to soft pedal his opposition while working behind the scenes to block the negotiations.

There is considerable doubt among Israelis that the negotiations can succeed, though arguably both sides can benefit if Israel gives Syria the entire Golan Heights in return for a peace that includes an end of Syria's alliances with Hezbollah, Hamas and Iran. For one thing, earlier negotiations between Syria and Israel failed because the two sides could not agree on the extent and modality of Syria's control of the Golan. Second, Israel PM Olmet is too weak politically to get the Israel public behind such a deal. Indeed many skeptics believe he chose to disclose the negotiations now to deflect attention from a police investigation of his possibly corrupt practices when he was Minister of Industry and Commerce in a previous government. Third, although Israeli governments have tended to look at negotiations as an alternative to negotiations with the Palestinians, the Israel will need some assurance that some peace can be reached with the Palestinians before it will agree to relinquishing all or most of the Golan.

On the Brink or in the Bazaar

Reuters and al-Jazeera report that talks in Doha, Qatar among Lebanese leaders have fasiled to reach any agreement for ending the political crisis in Lebanon. According to al-Jazeera one major disagreement is over proposals concerning the size of electoral districts, particularly in Beirut, with Christians fearing that large sized districts would dilute their representation in Parliament. According to Reuters, the sticking point is Hezbollah's refusal to a compromise proposed by the Qatari hosts that would give Hezbollah 10 ministers in the government cabinet and some say over the appointment of a n eleventh. This would give it close to, but not guaranteed, veto power in the government.

The compromise proposal evidences Hezbollah's strength and indicates how out of touch with reality is the Bush administration in thinking, as Bush's Security Adviser Stephen Hadley puts it, the talks are an opportunity for the Lebanese government to clip Hezbollah's wings.

A Gathering Storm?

Yesterday's commemorations of Israel's independence and the Palestinians' nakba (catastrophe) are already overshadowed by crises in Israel and Lebanon. Israel PM Olmert is under another police investigation, his third in recent years, concerning new charges of bribe taking (in incidents uncovered during the course of an earlier investigation). He is liable to be indicted, in which case, he says, he will resign. That possibility raises the question of his succession by Foreign Minister Livni and her ability to keep a governing coalition, on one hand, or early elections, on another. Olmert and his supporters claim the charges are trumped up by opponents to peace talks the Palestinians or Syria, that, he says, are making progress. So far Olmert has not given any evidence for this claim. Moreover, to judge by the government's record and the current state of the talks, the opponents would need no help from the police to derail they. They can just leave that to Olmert, his coalition partners and the Israel army, all of whom appear quite capable and willing to do that themselves.

In Lebanon, Chairman Nasrallah declared war on the Lebanese government after, he says, the Lebanese government declared war on Hezbollah, by trying to shut down the private communications network that Hezbollah had set up throughout Lebanon, with Iranian help. Hezballah gunmen have blocked the road from Beirut's international airport to the city and also wrested control of West Beirut from Sunnis. These moves come after months of a political stalemate over choosing a Lebanese president, that has pitted Sunni, Druse and most Christian communities in Lebanon against Lebanese Shiites, dominated by Hezbollah. The political situation is aggravated by economic deterioration in Lebanon, due to several factors: a) the devastation from the war with Israel two years ago; b) the political stalemate itself scaring off foreign investment; and c) rising costs of food and other necessities which has provoked violent demonstrations.

In addition, Hezbollah military leaders want to show their muscles, because the party has failed to strongarm its candidate into the presidency of Lebanon, while the Sunni, Druse and Christians grouped in the anti-Syria, anti-Shia coalition would rather have a showdown now rather than later when Hezballah is even stronger. So the parties are likely to spiral into a civil war. In that case, Israel leaders, with or without Olmert at their helm, will decide to "help" the Lebanese government either overtly or clandestinely. The Bush administration would undoubtedly green light any such Israeli move, since it regards conflicts involving Iranian clients -- Sadrists in Iraq, Hamas, Hezballah -- as proxy wars with Iran. Iranian leaders have a corresponding view of conflict directed at US clients, viz., Israel, the Lebanese government, the Arab gulf states. Lebanon today is an opportunity for them to demonstrate Lebanon's disruptive power and consequently its being a necessary player in achieving some stabilities in the Middle East, regardless of Western efforts to isolate it over the nuclear program issue.

International relations in the Middle East are like the old joke about in New England. If you don't like what is happening now, just wait a bit.

Judgements of Histories

On the eve of the US invasion of Iraq, I remembered Thucydides's account of Athens's catastrophic expedition to Syracuse. Daniel Mendelsohn's brilliant New Yorker review of an annotated edition of Herodotus's Histories suggests to me that other Greek historian (and Thucydides's predecessor) had a better template for the Iraq expedition. In Mendelsohn's reading, Herodotus's point was not to gossip or celebrate Greek courage, but to recount the rise and fall of the great Persian empire. The empire fell because of a rash ruler's effort to expand it beyond its natural limits. That puts a nice socio-biological twist on hubris, the motor of Greek tragedy, and echoes Dirty Harry's line that "a man should know his limitations." In concluding his review, Mendelsohn lays the template thickly over the present case:

Then, there is the story itself. A great power sets its sights on a smaller, strange, and faraway land—an easy target, or so it would seem. Led first by a father and then, a decade later, by his son, this great power invades the lesser country twice. The father, so people say, is a bland and bureaucratic man [Darius], far more temperate than the son; and, indeed, it is the second invasion that will seize the imagination of history for many years to come. For although it is far larger and more aggressive than the first, it leads to unexpected disaster. Many commentators ascribe this disaster to the flawed decisions of the son[Xerxes]: a man whose bluster competes with, or perhaps covers for, a certain hollowness at the center; a leader who is at once hobbled by personal demons (among which, it seems, is an Oedipal conflict) and given to grandiose gestures, who at best seems incapable of comprehending, and at worst is simply incurious about, how different or foreign his enemy really is. Although he himself is unscathed by the disaster he has wreaked, the fortunes and the reputation of the country he rules are seriously damaged. A great power has stumbled badly, against all expectations.

Max Rodenbeck, the Economist's Middle East correspondent, also uses a book review to deliver a similar judgement of the Iraq expedition's effect on the American empire. He finds much wrong with Robin Wright's Dreams and Shadows: The Future of the Middle East, especially her assuming that Middle East societies can easily adopt civic culture and democratic values. However, he agrees with her that the invasion of Iraq and its aftermath helped put an end to such efforts earlier in this decade.

As numerous interlocutors in the region tell her, not only did the debacle promote extremism and further isolate pro-Western liberals, it alerted people to the terrible risks of toppling tyrants. The Iraq adventure, in Wright's view, may have been the biggest American policy failure of all time. It could yet prove to mark the end of an imperial America's influence in the region, much as France and Britain's catastrophic invasion of Egypt in 1956 demolished the colonial powers' standing and dangerously boosted the fortunes of Egypt's reckless leader, Gamal Abdel Nasser. That is surely a sound judgment.

Digging Up the Past - 2

The arrest of Ben-Ami Kadish on charges of spying for Israel from 1979 to 1985 is a matter of the FBI settling old scores. The charges might also diminish Israel credibility in US eyes for several reasons. First, when Pollard was arrested in 1985, Israel claimed Pollard was its only spy in the US. Second, Israel's commitment at that time to no more spying in the US seemingly included no further contact with other spies there -- if such existed. Yet according to the allegation of obstruction of justice included among the charge, an Israel government official recently helped Kadish concoct the story he told FBI investigators Third, Rafi Eitan, who headed the agency that "ran" Pollard and Kadish, happens, for entirely unrelated reasons, to be a minister in PM Olmert's cabinet. That might be too great an irony for American officials at a time they are increasingly aware of the discrepancy between what the Israel government says it is doing to improve conditions for West Bank Palestinians and what the Israel army, housing ministry and other agencies are actually doing.

Of course, one wonders why the FBI saw fit to bring charges against an 84 old, stemming from activities that ended 23 years ago. Israel journalist Yoel Markus believes it both part of a long time FBI campaign against Jews in sensitive US security positions and a move that assures George Bush does not release Pollard next month as a gift to Israel on its 60th anniversary. He does acknowledge, however, that Kadish, who worked for free, even more than Pollard, who was paid, provides evidence for FBI suspicions of American Jews' having dual loyalties. Given the post 9/11 paranoia, Kadish's exposure is likely to discomfort American Jews even more than Pollard's.

Syria - ous Discussions

Per the Los Angeles Times, CIA tomorrow officials will brief tomorrow several congressional committees on the Syrian installation which Israel bombed last September. They will confirm what has been suspected since the bombing -- that Syria with North Korean aid was building a nuclear reactor that could produce plutonium for nuclear weapons. This disclosure will also confirm the extremely close cooperation and convergence of interests between the United States and Israel in planning and conducting the raid.

The closed briefings are sure to raise lawmakers' and pundits' questions about the Bush administration's current willingness to ease sanctions against North Korea in return for further accounting by the latter of its nuclear program and evidence of its dismantling. There will also be more questions about the effectiveness of current efforts to stop Iran's nuclear development program, especially since many observers saw the raid on Syria as a rehearsal for raids of suspected Iranian nuclearinstallations. On that issue, Iranian President Ahmadinejad reiterated today that Iran would continue its nuclear program, while the International Atomic Economic Agency (IAEA) announced it had received a note from Iran promising cooperation in clarifying whether the nuclear program was involved in the development of weapons. Iran has maintained the program is for only peaceful purposes and the US National Intelligence Estimate on Iran, issued earlier this year, partly supported that assertion.

Another question about the CIA briefing: Why is it coming now, after months of intense secrecy and stonewalling. One answer would link the timing to possibly serious developments in the Syria-Israel relationship. A Syrian official disclosed on Monday that President Bashir al-Asad and Israel PM Ehud Olmert have been discussing through Turkish intermediaries the resumption of peace negotiations. A semi-official Syrian source yesterday said that Olmert had stated Israel's willingness to withdraw from the Golan Heights in return for a full-peace with Syria, including security measure like demilitarization. Al-Asad has said he wants open negotiations with Israel, but since his and the ruling Baath Party's prime interest is the return of the Golan Heights to Syria, there are not huge obstacles on the Syrian side in getting to "Yes." Except, maybe, reluctance in selling out its Hezbollah and Hamas clients and breaking with its ally Iran.

The disclosure now of Syria's febrile nuclear efforts might prod Syria to make nice in public by seeking peace negotiations with Israel. Lacking Iran's energy resources and vast population, Syria is more vulnerable to international pressure and more likely to get it. However tying the CIA briefings tomorrow to a shift in US policy, currently that of shunning Syria, probably attributes too much agility to the Bush administration.

Indeed if the administration and its neo-con coteries are still intent on attacking Iranian nuclear installations before W. leaves office, it would not want to be distracted by peace negotiations between Syria and Israel or have such confuse its Manichean vision of the Middle East. The probability that the administration will push for such an attack increased today, with the appointment of Gen. David Petraeus to head the US Middle East Command. In contrast to his predecessor, who was fired for considering Iran an essential player in the Middle East and urging diplomatic engagement with it, Petraeus has a one dimensional view of Iran. In his recent testimony to Congress, he assigned it major responsibility for the instability in Iraq and appeared to favor confrontation in dealing with its clients and operatives there. He is unlikely to be less hawkish when dealing with Iran in a wider context, especially knowing what moderation cost his predecessor.

War of Words

Today's editorial in the usually dovish Haaretz evidences the deep fear in Israel regarding Iran. In effect, the editorial implores George Bush to order US air and missile strikes -- "shock and awe" redux -- on Iranian sites where Israel believes nuclear weapons are being developed. The occasion for the editorial was the Iranian deputy chief of staff's response yesterday to last week's warning by Israel cabinet minister Ben Eliezer. Mr. Ben Eliezer said Israel would destroy Iranian society, if Iran attacked Israel. The Iranian said that if Israel tried, it would be destroyed. The editorial writers at Ha'aretz point to the many Iranian activities that undermine Israel's security to argue that these words should be taken seriously, whereas Ben Eliezer's can be ignored as empty rhetoric.

The editorial fears that nations in Europe and elsewhere, for their own reasons, will avoid sanctions on Iran for failing to open its nuclear program to inspection. They will excuse their inaction by citing the US National Intelligence Estimate that judged Iran stopped its weapons program in 2002 -- a conclusion that Israel vehemently rejected. In Israeli eyes, George Bush, while not a perfect policeman, is apparently the only one willing and able to stop Iran. True, the American army in running on fumes, but the US air force with its abundance of planes and missiles is enough to get the job done.

The editorial reflects the fears of Washington neo-cons, as well as many Israelis, that time is running out to remake the Middle East in Israel's and the US's favor. Hawkish Shmuel Rosner, the paper's Washington correspondent and a willing trumpet for the neo-cons, may have had a heavy hand in its writing. In any case. its proposal is insane, according to the popular definition that insanity is repeating an action with the expectation that the outcome will be different. The neo-cons failed to learn from Israel's experiences in the territories and Lebanon that invading a country is much easier than bringing it under control. Now Israelis, as represented by Haaretz, seem unable to learn from the US failures in Iraq that "shock and awe" bombing would not make Iran comply with US or Israeli wishes. It will just increase instability in the region. To be sure, most Israelis do not especially care about stability in the future. They have lived with instability and prefer their current anxieties be relieved by the destruction of the the suspected nuclear installations.

The editorial also signals the widening gulf between Israel's interests and US interests, at least as the American public perceives the latter. That public has no desire to extend the Bush crusade in the Middle East to Iran. It knows such action would be costly, bloody and fail. If Bush ordered an attack on Iran, Congress would likely start impeachment proceedings against him. Haaretz's ignorance and indifference to these conditions amount to a miserable failure on its part.

Nation Building

Iraq is a great place to practice nation-building, especially for an administration whose head wanted no part of it and whose skill set is consistent with that desire. That was clear from the testimonies today by David Petraeus and Ryan Crocker to the Senate Armed Forces and Foreign Relations Committee. Despite their efforts to simplify and talk up a complex, dismal situation, the complexities and fluidities in the Iraqi political landscape were evident from their words. So was their inability to see beyond a very narrow scope and the utter lack of visibility of what happens next. This is not surprising: there are numerous layers of regional, ethnic, linguistic, religious, tribal, economic and political faults in Iraq and very little shared tradition of living in a unified state. Ambassador Ryan's citing as a major accomplishment the creation of a new Iraqi flag and its being flown in all parts of Iraq --next to the Kurdish flag in the north -- was pathetic, but maybe that is all that can be expected. Crocker nearly referenced arguably the best model for understanding the politics and violence of current Iraq, when he projected the Lebanonization of Iraq in the event of US withdrawal. But not the Lebanon of today, to which Crocker indeed referred, casting the Mehdi Army in role of Hezbollah and Iran in the role of Iran and Syria. Rather the Lebanon of nearly 35 years ago, at the beginning of the civil war. Some features are different, to be sure, but there are similar fragmentations of power, corruption as standard government practice and militias doubling as political agents and extortionist gangs.

Lebanon's civil war lasted fifteen years, 1975 - 1990, and involved occupations of Lebanese territory by two neighboring powers, Syria and Israel, thirty and eighteen years, respectively, which outlasted the war itself. The US occupation was much shorter but costly. Recall the Marine Barracks bombing in Beirut. The civil war and the interventions killed at least 100,000 Lebanese residents, permanently injured another 100,000 and caused over 250,000 to emigrate, out of population of about 5 million, including the Palestinians. The civil war was not continuous fighting but broken into phases, separated by attempts at political reconciliation and the suppression of some violence by the occupying troops in league with one or more of the political factions. If Lebanon is the model, even if Iraq has already had five years of civil unrest or war, the end is still far off. To measure progress over months rather than years is foolhardy, to predict victory -- whatever that means and for whom -- is insane.