August 03, 2006

George, Tony and "Root Causes"

...here's a bit of flavor showcasing the kind of criticism Tony Blair is getting from the Whitehall Old Guard, in this case, former UK Ambassador to Moscow Rodric Braithwaite, writing in the FT:

The catastrophe in Lebanon is the latest act of a tragedy rooted in European anti-Semitism and in the expulsion of an Arab people from their ancestral home. Both sides claim the right to self-defence. Neither hesitates to use force to pursue aims it regards as legitimate. No single event is the proximate cause of the current mayhem – neither the Israeli onslaught on Lebanon, nor the Hizbollah rockets, nor the Israeli assassination of Palestinian leaders, nor the suicide bombings. The causes go back in almost infinite regression. In the desperate pursuit of short-term tactical gain, both sides lose sight of their own long-term interests.

The Israelis remember the Holocaust and the repeated calls from within the Muslim world for the elimination of their state, and they react strongly to real or perceived threats to their existence. Whether their government’s methods can achieve their ends is for them to judge. A liberal Israeli columnist has argued that “in Israel and Lebanon, the blood is being spilled, the horror is intensifying, the price is rising and it is all for naught” – a reminder that Israel remains a sophisticated and in many ways an attractive democracy.

But whatever our sympathy for Israel’s dilemma, Mr Blair’s prime responsibility is to defend the interests of his own country. This he has signally failed to do. Stiff in opinions, but often in the wrong, he has manipulated public opinion, sent our soldiers into distant lands for ill-conceived purposes, misused the intelligence agencies to serve his ends and reduced the Foreign Office to a demoralised cipher because it keeps reminding him of inconvenient facts. He keeps the dog, but he barely notices if it barks or not. He prefers to construct his “foreign policy” out of self-righteous soundbites and expensive foreign travel.

Mr Blair has done more damage to British interests in the Middle East than Anthony Eden, who led the UK to disaster in Suez 50 years ago.

Meantime, Andrew is comparing Tony favorably to Churchill, and posts extensive excerpts from a rather impressive speech he gave recently. But here's the thing, just one example of what I think frustrates many Brits. Blair, in this speech, speaks of the critical import of "bend[ing] every sinew of our will to making peace between Israel and Palestine", as if we don't, "we will not win." Well, O.K., so you'd think he'd be pressuring his Buddy-in-Chief to run with the ball on this some, as it's only the Americans that can lead the show on this issue (the Israelis trust no other players, and the Palestinians know only the Americans can deliver the Israelis). But aside from Bush's constructive June 2002 call for "two states, living side by side in peace and security," he's barely made any real effort to put the Israeli-Palestinian issue on the front-burner so as to wrest the necessary concessions from each side. To be sure, this is very tough work, and the devil is in the details obviously, and every Adminstration has basically failed before. But, you know, at least they tried. And it's no great secret what's needed to make a deal, one that will massively improve dynamics in the Middle East and materially reduce the appeal of radical Islam to many, and thus greatly enhance the United States' position in the so-called GWOT. But back to Blair. He can talk about the critical need to "bend every sinew of our will", and so on, but people in London wonder: where's the beef Tony? What is your alliance to George Bush producing, really, on this score, among others?

Meantime, Condi Rice speaks of "root causes", as if eradicating Hezbollah gets to the nub of the issue. But as Brent Scowcroft recently wrote, the real root causes are a bit deeper, alas, than Nasrallah and Co.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has stated that a simple cease-fire in Lebanon is not the solution to the current violence. She says it is necessary to deal with the roots of the problem. She is right on both counts. But Hezbollah is not the source of the problem; it is a derivative of the cause, which is the tragic conflict over Palestine that began in 1948.

The eastern shore of the Mediterranean is in turmoil from end to end, a repetition of continuing conflicts in one part or another since the abortive attempts of the United Nations to create separate Israeli and Palestinian states in 1948. The current conflagration has energized the world. Now, perhaps more than ever, we have an opportunity to harness that concern and energy to achieve a comprehensive resolution of the entire 58-year-old tragedy. Only the United States can lead the effort required to seize this opportunity.

The outlines of a comprehensive settlement have been apparent since President Bill Clinton's efforts collapsed in 2000. The major elements would include:

· A Palestinian state based on the 1967 borders, with minor rectifications agreed upon between Palestine and Israel.

· Palestinians giving up the right of return and Israel reciprocating by removing its settlements in the West Bank, again with rectifications as mutually agreed. Those displaced on both sides would receive compensation from the international community.

· King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia unambiguously reconfirming his 2002 pledge that the Arab world is prepared to enter into full normal relations with Israel upon its withdrawal from the lands occupied in 1967.

· Egypt and Saudi Arabia working with the Palestinian Authority to put together a government along the lines of the 18-point agreement reached between Hamas and Fatah prisoners in Israeli jails in June. This government would negotiate for the Authority.

· Deployment, as part of a cease-fire, of a robust international force in southern Lebanon.

· Deployment of another international force to facilitate and supervise traffic to and from Gaza and the West Bank.

· Designation of Jerusalem as the shared capital of Israel and Palestine, with appropriate international guarantees of freedom of movement and civic life in the city.

These elements are well-known to people who live in the region and to those outside who have labored over the decades seeking to shape a lasting peace. What seems breathtakingly complicated, however, is how one mobilizes the necessary political will, in the region and beyond, to transform these principles into an agreement on a lasting accord.

Finally, don't miss Robert Pape, who demolishes the grotesque over-simplifications about Hezbollah solely constituting an Iranian agent and enjoying no real support in Lebanon:

ISRAEL has finally conceded that air power alone will not defeat Hezbollah. Over the coming weeks, it will learn that ground power won’t work either. The problem is not that the Israelis have insufficient military might, but that they misunderstand the nature of the enemy.

Contrary to the conventional wisdom, Hezbollah is principally neither a political party nor an Islamist militia. It is a broad movement that evolved in reaction to Israel’s invasion of Lebanon in June 1982. At first it consisted of a small number of Shiites supported by Iran. But as more and more Lebanese came to resent Israel’s occupation, Hezbollah — never tight-knit — expanded into an umbrella organization that tacitly coordinated the resistance operations of a loose collection of groups with a variety of religious and secular aims.

In terms of structure and hierarchy, it is less comparable to, say, a religious cult like the Taliban than to the multidimensional American civil-rights movement of the 1960’s. What made its rise so rapid, and will make it impossible to defeat militarily, was not its international support but the fact that it evolved from a reorientation of pre-existing Lebanese social groups.

Evidence of the broad nature of Hezbollah’s resistance to Israeli occupation can be seen in the identity of its suicide attackers. Hezbollah conducted a broad campaign of suicide bombings against American, French and Israeli targets from 1982 to 1986. Altogether, these attacks — which included the infamous bombing of the Marine barracks in 1983 — involved 41 suicide terrorists.

In writing my book on suicide attackers, I had researchers scour Lebanese sources to collect martyr videos, pictures and testimonials and the biographies of the Hezbollah bombers. Of the 41, we identified the names, birth places and other personal data for 38. Shockingly, only eight were Islamic fundamentalists. Twenty-seven were from leftist political groups like the Lebanese Communist Party and the Arab Socialist Union. Three were Christians, including a female high-school teacher with a college degree. All were born in Lebanon.

What these suicide attackers — and their heirs today — shared was not a religious or political ideology but simply a commitment to resisting a foreign occupation. Nearly two decades of Israeli military presence did not root out Hezbollah. The only thing that has proven to end suicide attacks, in Lebanon and elsewhere, is withdrawal by the occupying force.

Thus the new Israeli land offensive may take ground and destroy weapons, but it has little chance of destroying the Hezbollah movement. In fact, in the wake of the bombings of civilians, the incursion will probably aid Hezbollah’s recruiting.

It sure will....

...anyway, just a hodge-podge of links, for your reading pleasure. More later.