What could Arabs get out of the proposed conference on the Middle East? Dina Ezzat looks for an answer Arab capitals await, with bated breath, the announcement of what US policy in the Middle East is to be. Arab leaders hope that the statement, expected to be made by US President George W Bush within the next two weeks, will have been positively affected by successive visits to Washington by several key Arab leaders, such as President Hosni Mubarak and Saudi Crown Prince Abdallah. While it is expected that the new American proposal will offer an exit strategy out of the current violence, nobody is holding their breath that the proposal will offer a miraculous solution to the troubled region. However, Arab capitals remain hopeful that the US administration -- which has so far shown solid support for Israel -- will show some sympathy to the Arab point of view. Concerned Arab politicians are hoping that the new US statement will not simply reiterate the hollow vision for peace that the US President expressed last September and followed up with no real action. "Let us hope it is a plan of action. We do not know. The American president was not very specific about what he is going to offer and for all we know he could be tabling a new vision for peace that does not really entail any action-oriented moves," commented one senior Arab diplomat. Last week, in the wake of President Mubarak's visit to Washington, President Bush said he would be addressing the American people within a week or two to clarify the extent to which Washington intended to get involved in the Middle East. The American offer should, among other things, clarify US intentions regarding the proposed international conference on the Middle East. This offer should also provide some details about the nature and objectives of the proposed conference even if it does not specify what its agenda will be. Once the statement is out, it will be up to the Arab countries to decide on a course of action. "We will see what the Americans have to say. If they say the Palestinians should do this and that without committing Israel to anything, then this will not be a good start," commented one Arab official. So far little is clear about the proposed conference. Apart from European Union Foreign Policy Chief Javier Solana's repeated statement that the proposed conference is to convene in the second half of July, nobody -- not even the Americans -- seems clear about the conference's details. Just this week, George Bush stated that the ground was yet to be paved for the conference. Arabs and Israelis have conflicting objectives and expectations. The Arabs claim that they will only attend the meeting should Israel withdraw its troops to the 28 September 2000 line, terminate its military operations against the Palestinians and show a willingness to start talks aiming at a final agreement. While Arab leaders are willing to hold talks regarding some sort of temporary arrangement, they are adamant that the conference conclude with at least some credible guidelines for a final agreement having been reached, even if its implementation be phased over a period of a few years. "But it could not simply be another temporary arrangement that is based for the most part on responding to Israel's security concerns and demands," commented one Arab diplomat. Moreover, Arabs prefer that the conference deal with the entire Arab-Israeli conflict, taking into account the Syrian and Lebanese track in addition to the Palestinian dimension. While they are not calling for the tracks to be integrated, they feel that, given that the conference will be setting the rules for future negotiations, it should be attended by all Arab parties concerned. Israel, on the other hand, seems unwilling even to contemplate such an approach. As far as the Israeli government is concerned, Sharon will go to the conference to talk to a potential successor to Palestinian President Yasser Arafat. The Israelis expect to agree with the Palestinian on joint security cooperation and a 10-year limited self-rule arrangement for the Palestinians on a little under 40 per cent of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Sharon has stated that he is not going to the conference to talk about a Palestinian state -- a proposition that his right-wing Likud party has vetoed, the right of return for Palestinian refugees or what Jerusalem's final status will be. Moreover, Israel's prime minister has made it clear that he does not want to see Syrian or Lebanese representatives attending the conference. Earlier this week in Washington he even went as far as to say that he was not interested in talking peace with the Palestinians until they halted "violence". Washington has not objected to this line. Meanwhile, even the European Union, which has timidly said that the Syrians and Lebanese are entitled to be present at the conference, has not raised objections to Sharon's line. Therefore, Arab countries do not seem certain about their plan of action. Arab diplomats speaking to Al-Ahram Weekly expressed their concern about attending the conference only to go back to their countries empty-handed. However, they are equally worried that, in rejecting the conference, they would miss a seminal opportunity. According to one Arab diplomat, the big question is whether or not it is possible for Arab countries to turn down Washington if it calls on them to take part in a conference that does not take into consideration the most basic of Arab demands. Arab diplomats are not only concerned about the political cost of saying no to the US. They are also concerned that such a stance could lead to total US disengagement from the peace process and the prospect of a political limbo whereby Israeli aggression continues to go unchecked. Indeed, during Mubarak's visit to Washington last week, Palestinian President Arafat -- until now snubbed by both Bush and Sharon -- called on Egypt and the US to step up their efforts to hold the international conference soon. While Palestinian Minister for International Cooperation Nabil Shaath has stated that the Palestinians will not go to a conference without Syria and Lebanon, informed Palestinian sources are saying that their line might change should "the conference focus unilaterally on the current situation in the Palestinian territories". Palestinians are not making a secret of how frustrated the "unimpressive" Arab financial and political support during the invasion days made them. But even if the conference was to convene strictly to cater for the situation in the Palestinian territories there still remain more questions than answers over what it might offer. Sharon insists that he will head his country's delegation to the conference even if it is held at the ministerial level. He also insists that Arafat will not be allowed to attend the conference. Moreover, Israel's prime minister insists that the conference will not mean that Israel will shoulder any new political obligations or agree on a timetable. Furthermore, Sharon is not even prepared to suspend his government's plans to start the immediate construction of the security fence that is to separate the Palestinian territories from Israel and its settlements. Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa, one of the most apprehensive Arab voices about the proposed conference, said this week that Arabs would not be participating in a conference with no clear terms of reference or clear objectives. "We are not at all interested in theatrics. We are not prepared to go for a new round of hand-shakes that could only lead to deceiving international public opinion about what is really happening in the Middle East. There is enough misinformation being spread by Israel about its intentions to make peace." Similar statements have been coming from Damascus, Beirut and even Cairo and Riyadh. As far as the Arab League is concerned, too many questions remain unanswered about the proposed conference's form and content for Arab leaders to acquiesce to the idea and make any kind of commitment. "The situation is very serious; for Arab countries to go to an international conference or meeting under the current conditions could lead to very negative consequences," Moussa said. The negative consequences, some fear, will not just be about the establishment of new Israeli parameters for settling the Arab-Israeli conflict. It is feared that the conference could even offer the opportunity that the US administration has been looking for to launch a military strike against Iraq. When US Vice-President Dick Cheney toured the Middle East a few weeks ago he was told, in practically every Arab capital that he visited, that the Middle East could not sustain two wars at the same time. Therefore, as one Arab diplomat warns, the US could simply be opting for this conference to secure that "one war is over so that it could start the next". US Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld is currently in the Middle East on a tour of Gulf countries that began in Kuwait, where he declared that the US was still determined to get rid of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's regime. Hours before leaving on his tour, Rumsfeld spoke of the need to stop Iraq from threatening the US with weapons of mass destruction. Rumsfeld's remarks came a few days after the US President spoke of taking "pre-emptive action" against potential enemies and repudiated the old cold war policy of deterrence and containment. Rumsfeld's statements coincided with an article that former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak printed in the Washington Post, urging the US administration to get rid of Saddam Hussein before initiating any final settlement of the Middle East conflict. According to Barak's article, once the Iraqi president was removed the stance of Arab countries on peace negotiations wiould become more realistic.
