Two fascinating pieces in today’s NYT.
This one by Elisabeth Bumiller chronicles Condi rice’s conversion from being a big Israeli-Arab negotio-skeptic to now being the cheerleader for Bush’s extremely belated venture into peacemaking there.
After describing how derisive both Bush and Rice were back in 2001 of the whole idea of the US having an active role in israeli-Palestinian mediating, Bumiller wrote,
- When Ms. Rice became secretary of state in the second term, she told Mr. Bush in a long conversation at Camp David the weekend after the 2004 election that her priority would have to be progress in the Middle East. It was a turning point in more ways than one; Mr. Arafat died a few days later. Although Ms. Rice said in an interview that she had set no conditions when she took the job, her aides said that she had known that her relationship with the president would give her far greater influence to push an agenda, including peacemaking in the Middle East, than Mr. Powell’s…
Her first two major judgment calls in the Palestinian arena showed mainly her lack of ability to judge it. Those were (1) the active support she gave to Sharon’s unilateral withdrawal from Gaza in 2005, and (2) the active support she gave to the Palestinian elections of January 2006. In the first case, the fact that the Israeli withdrawal was unilateral meant that (a) it did nothing to establish a negotiating-type relationship between Sharon and Abu Mazen, (b) Israel remained quite free from any negotiated-and-agreed commitments to the Palestinians, so it retained a free hand to continue very oppressive and sometimes lethal policies in both the West bank and Gaza, and (c) it weakened Abu Mazen politically by making him look irrelevant to Palestinians.
How many of those outcomes were foreseen or intended by Rice, I wonder?
Regarding the Palestinian elections, I think she made completely the right decision– but she totally misjudged the outcome, which was a rout for Fateh. (In part, because of factor ‘c’ above.) And then, instead of swallowing hard and dealing with the outcome, she backed Olmert in his pursuit of extremely punitive policies against the Palestinians.
And then, in the summer of 2006, she (or her boss?) made decisions regarding Israel’s lethal assault against Lebanon that were both ethically horrendous and very counter-productive from a policy point of view.
So we cannot at this point say that her track record as Bush’s chief manager on Israeli-Arab affairs has been a good one.
Bumiller also has this description of the motivations for Condi’s current activism in the cause of Israeli-Palestinian peace:
- Ms. Rice’s thinking on the Middle East changed for several reasons, her aides said. She has been under increasing pressure to get involved in the peace negotiations from European and Arab leaders whose support she needs for the campaign of diplomatic and economic pressures on Iran. She considers it equally important, her aides said, to shore up the moderate leadership of Mr. Abbas, who is facing a sharp internal challenge from the more militant Hamas faction.
Not least, Ms. Rice’s supporters say, she is determined to fashion a legacy in the Middle East that extends beyond the war in Iraq.
I am really surprised and saddened to see that her aides apparently didn’t say a word there about Condi finally realizing that peace is an extremely necessary and valuable thing for both Israelis and Palestinians to work for… They just seem to be presenting her as this machiavellian manipulator.
(Bumiller also has a really hackneyed quote from previous longtime– and failed– “peace processor” Dennis Ross in which he says, “This administration has too often engaged in stagecraft, not statecraft.” Like Dennis was any good at statecraft during all those years he presided over a string of failed negotiations?? Note that I exempt from that criticism the work Dennis did in helping prepare the Madrid conference of 1991– but at that point, he was acting mainly as a gofer for Jim Baker, rather than running the show himself.)
The second interesting NYT piece is also by Bumiller. It is this short-ish exploration of Rice’s relationship with Bush. Turns out she tries to be his nanny, too, not just the nanny to the whole of the rest of the world… and he sort of jokes about the extent to which she “tells” him what to do. It sounds like a bizarre and very unhealthy way to run a country.
And finally, we have this, from the president himself when he was meeting with Abu Mazen earlier today:
- The United States cannot impose our vision, but we can help facilitate.
That is such nonsense! There is a tremendous amount the US could do, both by working other nations in the security Council and by re-structuring the pattern of the incentives and disincentives it gives to Israelis and Palestinians (i.e. carrots and sticks), in order to push for the US’s own reading of what is a just, legitimate, and sustainable outcome between Israelis and Palestinians. The US is a great power, for goodness’ sake, and seldom holds back from telling any other country in the world how to run its business.
But in the case of Israel and the Palestinians, all Bush aspires to do is to “help facilitate” the negotiations between these two extremely mismatched parties.
If he sticks with this approach, and if the adults in the international community don’t step in and take the process over from him as he falters, then this Annapolis-launched process will be going, very dangerously, nowhere.
Why can’t he simply say, forthrightly and frankly, that the US has its own strong interests in the speedy attainment of a fair and sustainable final peace agreement– all of which is true– and will be working hard with all concerned parties to achieve that?
“How many of those outcomes were foreseen or intended by Rice, I wonder?”
None of them would be my guess. From what I have heard she isn’t even that sharp in her chosen specialty, which is Russia, and it is obvious she knows nothing about the Middle East, and has not managed to learn. I also find her in general not very bright, and quite soulless and without humanity, but that might just be my impression. (I have never heard her famous piano playing. My guess is that she is technically proficient, and perhaps can reproduce the elements of style reasonably well, but I doubt there is much of the quality sometimes called soul that makes for a true artist.)
“I am really surprised and saddened to see that her aides apparently didn’t say a word there about Condi finally realizing that peace is an extremely necessary and valuable thing for both Israelis and Palestinians to work for… They just seem to be presenting her as this machiavellian manipulator.”
Saddened, I can understand, but why would that surprise you – other than the fact that they should be more politically astute than that (on the other hand, why would they, since she cleaerly is not). My impression is that this is exactly what she is, and a not particularly bright one at that. I don’t think she cares at all about what is valuable for Israelis, and even less about what is valuable for Palestinians.
Condi gave me a very, very creepy feeling right from the beginning before I really knew anything about her. I could not put my finger on it, and I wanted to give her the benefit of the doubt, but every time I saw her or listened to her something about her just did not seem right. After seeing her in action for a few years, my first impression makes sense.
Bush: “The United States cannot impose our vision, but we can help facilitate.”
Helena: “There is a tremendous amount the US could do…in order to push for the US’s own reading of what is a just, legitimate, and sustainable outcome between Israelis and Palestinians.”
Helena, after all these years of watching various United States governments – even that of Jimmy Carter – acting as brokers mainly for Israel’s benefit, and in particular after watching the Bush regime in action do you honestly believe that the Bushite “vision” has anything whatsoever to do with a just, or legitimate, or sustainable outcome?
“Why can’t he simply say, forthrightly and frankly, that the US has its own strong interests in the speedy attainment of a fair and sustainable final peace agreement and will be working hard to achieve that?”
I would suggest that he cannot say that because it is a lie, but lying has never been a problem for him or anyone else in his regime, so there must be some other reason.
I find this passage in one of those articles to be particularly revelatory on several levels.
“Ms. Rice, who had heralded the election as a symbol of the new stirrings of democracy in the Middle East, was so blindsided by the victory that she was startled when she saw a crawl of words on her television screen while exercising on her elliptical trainer the morning after the election: ‘In wake of Hamas victory, Palestinian cabinet resigns.’
“’I thought, ‘Well, that’s not right,’’ Ms. Rice recalled. When the crawl continued, she got off the elliptical trainer and called the State Department.
“’I said, ‘What happened in the Palestinian elections?’ Ms. Rice recalled. “And they said, ‘Oh, Hamas won.’ And I thought, ‘Oh my goodness, Hamas won?’”
As if that was not entirely predictable by anyone who was paying attention.
And there is this rather telling article from Haaretz.
“They discovered that her intellectual world was narrow, and that her management style was characterized by authoritarianism and arrogance.”
“Rice showed herself in all her intellectual frailty and character weakness…She had no cohesive worldview about international relations or the modes of action required by the state.”
“Rice raised no questions; for example, about the lack of a connection between the struggle against terrorism and the old-new perception of Saddam Hussein as an enemy….Lacking an intellectual compass, Rice drifted with the prevailing winds and became, effectively, the minister of information for the war in Iraq.”
“In time, Rice realized that Iraq was a bleeding quagmire that would not cover her in glory. She desperately needed an achievement, and so turned to the never-ending Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
“This is the real story of Annapolis: a story of fierce personal emotions, disappointment, affront and desperation.
“But what action did Rice set in motion, and to what end?…In Annapolis we will see no more than an extravagant media gimmick; an orchestrated performance whose Middle Eastern actors are taking part in it halfheartedly because /the president expects it.'”
“Rice, the proprietor, is pushing, because less than a year remains until the elections…”
It is quite apparent that Condoleeza Rice is in way over her head as Secretary of State and was as National Security Advisor. Her only real qualification seems to be that George Bush likes her personally because, in part, of their common religous views, and he is so totally unaware in foreign affairs that he does not see her shortcomings.I imagine that she was an excellent student and could write a hell of an academic term paper, but in real life she has turned out to be one of the worst Secretaries of State we have had, although even Colin Powell couldn’t help failing in a Bush regime.
Jack:
1. I am not sure George Bush CARES about Condi’s shortcomings, or those of anyone else in his regime.
2. Colin Powell sold himself for a cheap price. He may or may not have been intelligent and capable, but if he ever had any moral compass it was overcome by less lofty motives. Do recall his part in the My Lai massacre coverup.
But then what can you expect from someone who chose a career in killing, destruction, and domination of other countries by violent force.
Interesting analysis on Annapolis:
Exposing the Architecture of Power that’s Changing Our World
http://rightweb.irc-online.org/
Introducing the latest Right Web Analysis from International Relations
Center
Attacking Annapolis
By Jim Lobe
In the run-up to this week’s Israeli-Palestinian peace talks in
Annapolis, the regular suspects at outfits like AEI and Freedom’s Watch
have criticized U.S. and Israeli leaders for supporting the talks.
Jim Lobe is the Washington bureau chief of the Inter Press Service and
a contributor to IRC’s Right Web (http://rightweb.irc-online.org/).
See new Right Web article online at:
http://rightweb.irc-online.org/rw/4761
No deal is expected when the Bush administration convenes Israeli and Palestinian negotiators at Annapolis, Maryland on November 27. Still, the atmosphere surrounding the meeting has lightened of late, as commentators have realized that the final status issues in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict — borders, settlements, water, Jerusalem, refugees — will at least be on the table for the first time in well over six years. On the one hand, this development ought not to be dismissed. But, on the other hand, what seems to be a victory of sorts should be recognized for the failure that it is.
Robert Blecher and Mouin Rabbani explain in their essay, “In Annapolis, Conflict by Other Means,” now available in Middle East Report Online:
http://www.merip.org/mero/mero112607.html
.