Author: Helena

Tragic Obama administration cave over Durban review conference

The State Department issued a terse statement yesterday explaining that the US would not be represented at the Durban review Conference being held this week in Geneva.
The statement gives this reason for the failure to attend:

    the text still contains language that reaffirms in toto the Durban Declaration and Programme of Action (DDPA) from 2001, which the United States has long said it is unable to support. Its inclusion in the review conference document has the same effect as inserting that original text into the current document and re-adopting it. The DDPA singles out one particular conflict and prejudges key issues that can only be resolved in negotiations between the Israelis and Palestinians. The United States also has serious concerns with relatively new additions to the text regarding “incitement,” that run counter to the U.S. commitment to unfettered free speech.

This seems completely specious. The DDPA deals with numerous conflicts and issues, including these two points:

    # Concerning the Middle East, the DDPA expresses concern about the plight of the Palestinian people under foreign occupation and recognizes the inalienable right of the Palestinian people to self-determination and the right to an independent state. It also recognizes the right to security for all countries in the region, including Israel, and calls upon all governments to support the peace process and bring it to an early conclusion.
    # The DDPA recalls that the Holocaust must never be forgotten.

Which part of that language, in particular, does the Obama administration not agree with? Or which part does it think “can only be resolved in negotiations between the Israelis and Palestinians”?
I thought the Obama administration supported the establishment of an independent Palestinian state, the right of all states in the region, including Israel, to security, and the non-forgetting of the Holocaust?
What on earth is it that they’re objecting to?

Threats to East Jerusalem Palestinians, Youtubed

Clayton Swisher has two super short pieces on Al-Jazeera English about the threats to the Palestinian communities in the East Jerusalem neighborhoods of Sheikh Jarrah and Silwan. In the first of those, he finds a US diplomat who’s been sent to “fact-find” with one of the threatened Sheikh Jarrah families.
Yes, “fact-finding” is fine. But really, how much more of it needs to be done? The numerous expropriations, home demolitions, and other gross rights abuses the Palestinians of occupied East Jerusalem have faced throughout 42 years of occupation have all been excellently documented.
The US government position still in fact tracks with the international law position that holds that East Jerusalem is indeed occupied territory. (Though for the past 16-plus years, US government officials have always tried to squirm their way out of admitting as much in public.
The fact that this portion of the city is occupied territory means that the implantation of Israeli settlers into colonies/settlements in and around it has been quite illegal under international law, as have all other steps taken to change the status of the this portion of the occupied West Bank. (Yes, of course including its annexation/Anschluss to Israel.)
The 270,000 Palestinians of East Jerusalem and the built environment they hold so dear (and sacred) are under acute threat these days. EJ Palestinians pay high Israeli-style taxes but receive nothing like he kinds of municipal or other kinds of government services that the city’s Jewish-Israeli population receives. They are prohibited from holding any kinds of public political gatherings. Though they live in a city Israelis claim has been “unified”, they are subject to all the sanctions available to the military occupation authorities in the rest of the West Bank, including endlessly renewable terms of detention without trial. (As applied, also, to the legislators they elected back in January 2006.)
In addition, thousands of EJ Palestinians have hanging over their heads either the threat of confiscation of the special blue ID cards (“pass books”) that allow them to continue living in the city of their birth, or the threat of demolition of their family home. Hundreds of demolition orders– maybe more than a thousand?– are outstanding. The East Jerusalemites never know where the municipal demolition crews will be sent to next month, or next week, in their endless forays around the city.
Many East Jerusalemites feel quite abandoned by the Lords of Ramallah, judging that the situation of their city took a marked turn for the worse after Oslo.
So let’s hope Sen. Mitchell and the rest of the “international community” finally do something this time to buttress and restore the protections that international law accords to the East Jerusalemites, as to the Gazans and all other populations under military occupation.
We need only recall that the special protections that the Fourth Geneva Convention accords to residents of territories under military occupation were adopted by the world’s nations in 1949 in the specific light of the gross violations that the vulnerable populations (including of course Jewish and Roma populations) of Eastern Europe had been subjected to during the foreign military occupation they had then so recently suffered.

The IDF’s ‘Dahiyah Doctrine’, applied in Gaza

Kudos to Inter-Press Service’s Daan Bouwens for this piece of reporting in which he reminded readers that Israel’s strategic decisionmakers had integrated a policy of major, intentional destruction of civilian targets into their war-planning for certain contingencies considerably before they launched the assault on Gaza, December 27.
Bouwens quotes Valentina Azarov, a legal expert with the Israeli human-rights group HaMoked as arguing that the IDF’s operations in Gaza, “were part of the military strategy called the ‘Dahiyah policy’, being that of indiscriminate killing and the use of excessive, disproportionate force.”
Azarov and Bouwens were at pains to point out that this was Azarov’s own personal assessment. However, she had adduced considerable evidence to back it up.
‘Dahiyah’ is, in this context, a reference to the the heavily populated southern suburb (dahiyeh) of Beirut, in which Hizbullah maintained its headquarters for many years prior to the Israeli assault of summer 2006– and which it has substantially rebuilt since 2006.
But during Israel’s 33-day war against Lebanon that year, it just about leveled the entire Dahiyeh, which was a neighborhood of densely packed eight- to ten-story buildings, most of them residential, but including numerous schools, mosques, shops, and so on, along with more than a few offices for Hizbullah’s extensive social-service bodies, political bodies, and yes, also their military bodies.
The best online resource about the Dahiyah Doctrine is this contribution that Ben White made to the Guardian‘s ‘Comment is free’ section last October. This Wikipedia page on the ‘Dahiya Strategy’ is also helpful.
The White piece has good hyperlinks, including to the then-recent interview in which the GOC of the IDF’s ‘Northern Command’, Gadi Eisenkot, talked openly about the Dayiha Doctrine in these terms:

    “What happened in the Dahiya quarter of Beirut in 2006 will happen in every village from which Israel is fired on,” said Gadi Eisenkot, head of the army’s northern division.
    “We will apply disproportionate force on it (village) and cause great damage and destruction there. From our standpoint, these are not civilian villages, they are military bases,” Eisenkot told the Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper.
    “This is not a recommendation. This is a plan. And it has been approved,” Eisenkot added.

In terms of “deterrence theory”, this is a pretty standard threat of “massive retaliation.” (Added to, I guess, a specifically Israeli version of Henry Kissinger’s “Madman theory of deterrence”, as indirectly alluded to here.)
But the results– whether in the Dahiyah or in Gaza– have been devastating.
Back in October-November of last year, when Eisenkot was making his pronouncements about the doctrine and Israelis were commenting on it– sometimes with great approval– just about all the discussion seemed still to be solely about Lebanon and Hizbullah, and future prospects in that theater.
But as we know, Israel’s military planners were meanwhile already working hard to plan an upcoming operation against Gaza– one of the key goals of which was to “restore the credibility of Israel’s deterrence” and to wipe away the stale traces of defeat, flat-out operational ineptitude, and flawed leadership decisionmaking that had marked Israel’s previous war of choice, in 2006.
Only a few of the commentaries in Israel– e.g., this one from Gabriel Siboni– noted the applicability of the Dahiyah Doctrine to Gaza.
Siboni wrote:

    With an outbreak of hostilities, the IDF will need to act immediately, decisively, and with force that is disproportionate to the enemy’s actions and the threat it poses. Such a response aims at inflicting damage and meting out punishment to an extent that will demand long and expensive reconstruction processes. The strike must be carried out as quickly as possible, and must prioritize damaging assets over seeking out each and every launcher. Punishment must be aimed at decision makers and the power elite.
    … This approach is applicable to the Gaza Strip as well. There, the IDF will be required to strike hard at Hamas and to refrain from the cat and mouse games of searching for Qassam rocket launchers. The IDF should not be expected to stop the rocket and missile fire against the Israeli home front through attacks on the launchers themselves, but by means of imposing a ceasefire on the enemy…

It was left to one of Siboni’s colleagues at Tel Aviv University’s Institute for National security Studies, Zaki Shalom, to raise some significant questions about the new doctrine.
The last of his questions had particular significance to the situation in Gaza:

    Finally, how will the plan be applied if it becomes evident that village inhabitants are shunning a mass exodus? Would the IDF activate massive fire that results in hundreds or possibly thousands of civilians killed?

Okay, forget about “village”. (Israelis tend to just assume that all Palestinians live in “villages”. The Dahiyah is not a village, and most of the residents of Gaza don’t live in villages, either.)
But what, more germanely, happens to the plan if there is no place for the civilian residents of the area targeted to safely flee to— as was certainly the case in Gaza?
… Anyway, it seems clear that my longtime acquaintances Richard Falk and Richard Goldstone, both of whom are charged by the UN with investigating Israel’s conduct during the war on Gaza, have an ample paper trail to look to– and hopefully, also to follow up further on– regarding the specific intent of Israel’s political and military leaders to engage from the get-go in avowedly disproportionate operations inside Gaza, including against specifically civilian targets.
Goldstone had a generally good track record in the waning days of his country’s apartheid system, in investigating some of the grosser excesses of the “securocrats”, including the high level securocrats, who ruled the country in those days. Let’s hope he brings that same sensibility, that same doggedness, and that same refusal to be rolled by all the securocrats’ many excuses, special pleadings, and specious arguments, to his current task regarding Israel.

Mitchell revs up mission

It’s been almost three months since, at that January 22 event at the State Department, Sec. Clinton announced the appointment of former Senate Majority leader George Mitchell as “special envoy for Middle East peace”– and Pres. Obama, who was also present, immediately put flesh on that announcement by saying,

    Lasting peace requires more than a long cease-fire, and that’s why I will sustain an active commitment to seek two states living side by side in peace and security.
    Senator Mitchell will carry forward this commitment, as well as the effort to help Israel reach a broader peace with the Arab world that recognizes its rightful place in the community of nations.
    I should add that the Arab peace initiative contains constructive elements that could help advance these efforts…

At the time, I commented that the way Mitchell’s appointment was effected indicated that he would be reporting to both the president and the secretary of state. Yesterday I was able to have a good discussion with a couple of (regrettably anonymous) sources in the administration who were able to confirm conclusively that this was the case. “It is very important that there is no daylight between any of the three of them,” one of these people said.
Mitchell has, of course, been on the road again this week, with a heavy schedule of meetings in (thus far) Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Israel, Palestine, and Egypt.
This is his third visit to the region since his appointment; and he has been more outspoken this time than hitherto in articulating the US’s vision of “two states living side by side in peace and security” both publicly and also, reportedly, in private meetings with leaders in both Israel and Palestine.
Israel new (or recycled) PM Netanyahu and his foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, are notably sticking to their position of refusing to engage at this time in any discussions about sovereignty issues– that is, about the possibility of a independent Palestinian state.
Haaretz reports today,

    In meetings with Israeli leaders on Thursday, Mitchell stressed Obama’s commitment to the goal of a two-state solution to end the decades-old conflict.
    “That is our objective. That is what we will pursue vigorously in the coming months,” Mitchell said.

It thus seems clear that serious confrontation between the two government is getting closer.
In associated news this week, it’s been revealed that Jordan’s King Abdullah II will be the first Middle Eastern head of state to meet Obama in the White House. That’ll happen next Tuesday. And US government sources have said that Obama likely won’t be in DC when Netanyahu comes across in early May for the annual AIPAC conference so won’t be able to receive him then.
This is, of course, an abrupt shift from the extreme lovey-dovey-ness that existed between the US president and successive Israeli PMs right through from January 2003 till January 2009. (In Pres. Clinton’s case he almost hero-worshipped Rabin, in particular.)
Mitchell’s earlier two visits to the region as “peace envoy” were low-key missions, focused on “listening”. During them, he didn’t make any forceful public statement. He didn’t do anything “radical” like visiting Gaza or Syria, or talking to anyone who could even remotely be described as “close to” Hamas. I got pretty worried and impatient, thinking that after the good, activist start Obama and Mitchell got off to in January, the momentum seemed to have fizzled out of their effort.
It also took Mitchell what I thought was an inordinately long time to staff up his peacemaking effort. Friends of mine also started to raise questions as to whether Mitchell, in his mid 70s and recovering from prostate cancer, really still had the physical vigor required to push this peacemaking effort through to conclusion.
Well, now it seems the staffing pieces are starting to fall into place. Mitchell will have, it turns out, four people who will report directly to him. Their exact job titles seem not to be clear– whether they will be “deputies”, or “chief of staff”, or something else…. But the important thing is these four will be expected to coordinate closely with each other and each will report directly to Mitchell.
They are:

    Gen. Keith Dayton, the guy who’s been running the fairly controversial (in Palestinian circles) effort to train up a pro-Abbas Palestinian security force. He will apparently carry on doing what he is doing– and presumably will also be heavily involved in discussions on the security regime in the OPTs in the context of further Israeli withdrawals. But from now on, he’ll be part of the Mitchell operation, and reporting to Mitchell.
    David Hale, until now a deputy assistant secretary of state for Near East affairs, and formerly I think Ambassador to Jordan. Hale has been traveling with Mitchell this week. I think the expectation will be that he’ll be the person who’ll go to Jerusalem to set up the office the Mitchell operation will be opening there. (Let’s hope it is of considerably more use all round than the ridiculously expensive and under-performing office that Tony Blair has been maintaining in the American Colony Hotel for the past couple of years…. Also, does this mean curtains for Tony? I certainly hope so.)
    Fred Hof. Hof is a longtime Middle East expert, whose principal expertise is in the Syrian-Israeli-Lebanese nexus. But he was also chief of staff of the 2000-2001 Mitchell Commission, which reported on the causes of the outbreak of the Second Intifada, and drafted the commission’s April 2001 report. So Hof knows a lot about Palestinian affairs, too. He will be working primarily from Washington, backing up Mitchell’s efforts on both the Palestinian and Syrian tracks.
    Mara Rudman, who worked in the Clinton-era National Security Council and has until now been the executive secretary of the Obama NSC. She has also been traveling with Mitchell this week. Her responsibility on the team will apparently include managing its efforts to coordinate with all the other arms of the federal government. She’s also pretty well connected to various parts of the US Jewish community.

My sources told me they expect Mitchell to run parallel efforts to secure an Israeli-Palestinian peace and to secure peace in the Israel-Syria-Lebanon nexus, but with the latter effort most likely somewhat subordinated to the former. There seems to be a fairly clear understanding that Netanyahu might try to push for a big peacemaking breakthrough on the Syrian track as a way of staving off US pressure to engage seriously on the Palestinian track– and that this needs to be resisted. But, as one of my sources said, “We are firmly convinced a person can walk and chew gum at the same time. Activity on the Syrian track should not preclude activity on the Palestinian track.” Indeed, this person indicated that the “comprehensive” (Palestinian track, plus Syrian track, plus Lebanese track) peacemaking approach, as advocated in the Arab peace initiative, has some non-trivial advantages including from the perspective of Israel’s citizens.
Though Mitchell will reportedly be working on both the principal tracks at once, he has no immediate plans to visit Damascus (or Beirut.) Someone remarked that this seemed unlikely before the holding of elections in Lebanon in early June.
Well, anyway, I am happy that Mitchell’s operation is finally getting up and running. I’ve been reading the slightly theoretical study of his previous peacemaking efforts in both Northern Ireland and Palestine/Israel that Shelley Deane has in the latest (March 2009) issue of something called the Journal of Intervention and Statebuilding. Shelley was also looking at the more recent “Helsinki process” undertaken with reps of many political trends in Iraq, which tried explicitly to use the peace-mediation approach summed up in the “Mitchell principles.”
Mitchell’s 2000-2001 effort in Palestine resulted in a report and a set of recommendation that went absolutely nowhere. In part that was because of the limited mandate of the Mitchell Commission, which was not itself given the task of mediating a final peace agreement, but only of making recommendations as to how the existing peace “process” could be gotten back on track. In part it was because of the lack of commitment and support the Commission received from both Pres. Bush and also– to some extent– from secretary of state Colin Powell.
The Mitchell Commission report was commissioned, remember, by Clinton, in early October 2000, in response to a resolution from the UN Security Council calling for a “speedy and objective inquiry” into the causes of the escalation of violence in Palestine. Clinton “captured” that process from the UNSC; but since he, his veep, and his wife were all heavily focused on the imminent elections, he didn’t too much to activate the Commission with any great speed…. And then, after Bush because president, it was to Bush that the Commission submitted its final report… That, after all kinds of shenanigans involving disruptive Israeli leaks, the Israelis attempting end-runs around Mitchell by getting Scooter Libby to go bat for them, etc.
Anyway, Bush was deeply uninterested in doing anything on the Israel-Palestine front. Thus, the report sank like a stone into a very deep ocean.
This time, we have a different president. And we have a Sen. Mitchell– along with some of his staff members– who have long experience of the kinds of tricks balky Israeli governments can get up to.
I was just now having lunch with an English friend who’s also deeply interested in these issues. He asked whether I thought Obama and Mitchell were wise to the kinds of tricks Netanyahu might get up to. I said yes.
An attempt to activate the pro-Israeli lobby in this country in defense of the Netanyahu government’s positions is completely predictable.
(That is another reason why the Delahunt resolution,a House of Representatives resolution that congratulates Sen. Mitchell on his appointment as peace envoy and applauds the effort to establish a Palestinian state, is so important. This resolution now has 101 sponsors, including five or six republicans. If you go to this web-page, you can find out if your representative has signed on as a sponsor. If so, express your appreciation. If not, lobby her or him to urge her to do so.)

Gaza, three months on

On January 18, Israel and Hamas each separately announced its decision to halt the hostilities they had been engaged in since December 27. That un-negotiated, parallel ceasefire remains fragile and has been far from completely observed. Israel, in particular, has maintained its aggressive presence close by 1.5 million people, surveilling them very closely from ground, sea, and air (including from low-flying drones), and launching numerous attacks against Gazans from all those platforms.
The horror and carnage of full-blown war has not returned. But the tight siege that Israel has, quite ilegally, maintained around the Strip has been inflicting– and daily until now continues to inflict– severe harm on Gaza’s war- and siege-battered people.
Today in Jerusalem, 23 high-profile international NGOs issued a joint statement accusing much of the world of “standing by” as “Gazans sift through the rubble.”
Ma’an News reports,

    More than “lip service to the needs of the people of Gaza” is required, the statement said. It had particularly harsh words for the European Union, set to review its trade and economic relations with Israel in the coming weeks.
    “If the EU does not put the brakes on the process to strengthen ties with Israel, it will be sending a dangerous signal to the world that maintaining a destructive policy of closure is acceptable,” said Martha Myers, country director of CARE West Bank and Gaza.

I agree with the criticism of the EU. But the US is just as culpable for the its failure to challenge Israel’s policies towards Gaza. Perhaps even more so, given the clout the US government has, which throughout the past 16 years it has always unfailingly used to protect Israel from any form of accountability or sanction, regardless of the illegality or gross brutality of the Israeli government’s actions against its neighbors.
The Ma’an report continues thus:

    “Gaza’s industry, including the agricultural sector, has almost completely collapsed and reconstruction has proved a near impossible task. Operation Cast Lead destroyed Gaza’s economy which was already severely weakened after months of blockade. It makes no sense to continue depriving ordinary people the opportunity to earn a living and support their families. The crossings must be opened now to allow the normal flow of commerce. If they are not, the people of Gaza simply will not recover,” added Myers.
    Reconstruction in Gaza is severely constrained. Materials such as cement and reinforced steel rods are still being denied entry by Israel, the statement said.
    Highlighting the ramifications of the decision the joint statement said, “This means that the 20,000 families – or at least 140,000 people – whose homes were destroyed or rendered uninhabitable as a result of the conflict are unable to rebuild their lives. Many are living in tents and in makeshift shelters constructed with salvaged bricks and plastic sheeting, with no end in sight.”
    Country Director for Oxfam Great Britain in Jerusalem John Prideaux-Brune said bluntly that “There has been zero progress in allowing construction materials in to help people rebuild their lives. This is unacceptable, full stop.”
    He called on world leaders to “take practical steps to fully open the crossings and exert as much pressure on Israel and all parties to ensure that families can finally see a light at the end of what has been a very long and dark tunnel. A drip-feed of food aid and medicines is simply not enough.”

I haven’t seen the full NGO statement yet. But the Ma’an report lists the signatories, who are indeed a high-profile and international group.
Among them is, not surprisingly, CARE West Bank and Gaza. I note that when Pres. Obama recently made his financial disclosure forms public, they included a record that last year, from his family’s income of over $2 million, he and Michelle made a $25,000 donation to CARE. So I’m assuming he supports the goals of that excellent, US-based relief and development organization.
(A few quick side-notes here: Late last night I finished writing my own short piece of analysis for IPS on the situation three months after the Gaza ceasefire. The NGOs’ report had not been released at that point, darn it! I was, however, able to include some material from the excellent interview I conducted in Jerusalem last month with John Prideaux-Brune. You’ll see the published piece later today… Ma’an News, which is probably the best OPTs news source, now has a really useful Twitter feed, that you might want to bookmark… Also, as you may have noticed: I’m now back, after a short break with my family in England. Big thanks to Don and Scott for posting extra in my absence.)

IPS analysis on re-emergence of one-state idea

… It came out yesterday here. Also archived here.
My own main position on one state vs. two states is one of agnosticism. Not least because I’m not a direct stakeholder. Direct stakeholders are around six million Jewish Israelis and more than 10 million ethnic Palestinians– 1.2 million in Israel, four million in the occupied territories, and more than five million in the ghurba (exile/diaspora.)
No democrat can sustain the position that the “vote” of a Jewish Israeli in this central matter ought to count more than that of a Palestinian.
The next political challenge for Palestinians, as I see it, is really to get the diaspora Palestinians (re-) organized and mobilized politically in pursuit of their rights. Starting with, fundamentally, their right to have a say on their nation’s future, after many years of success in the project to disenfranchise them completely. (As I’ve argued for some years now.)
Oslo was a deep stab in the back for them.

Laila el-Haddad’s Palestinian Passover story

The talented Gaza-born journo Laila el-Haddad has been trying to go home to visit her parents, taking her two adorable– and fwiw US-born– children with her. Yousuf must be about four now, and Noor about 15 months old.
However the Egyptian Interior Security service won’t let them transit through their country, which is the only way a Gaza Palestinian can even dream of getting to her or his homeland these days.
Laila and the kids have been stuck in a holding-room in Cairo airport for the past 28 hours. (HT: The Arabist.)
She blogs:

    No one knows where my file is or what is going to happen. I have an off again on again wifi signal, and trying my best to keep updates on twitter @gazamom.

Go and follow her tweets there.
So today is Passover. Tomorrow is the commemoration of 61 years since the Deir Yassin massacre. Tomorrow is also the commemoration of the start of the 1994 Rwanda genocide.
… And Laila is stuck with her kids in Cairo airport, facing deportation. Apparently they don’t where to deport her to since her US visa has run out.
Just let her go home!!!!

Obama’s rockin’ first world tour– and call for action

He’s been doing so well, and it’s churlish of me not to have mentioned it before. (I’ve been busy.)
But oh man, it really feels great no longer to have a president who makes you cringe every time he opens his mouth!
There are still several areas of Obama’s policy that cause me great concern:

    1. He is being ways too slow in doing anything concrete to lay out clear and principled markers for Israel’s behavior toward the Palestinians. (Repeating the mantra about the strength of the US’s support for a two-state solution is completely not enough! Let’s have some consequences out there!)
    2. He’s terrifyingly– and actually, quite unrealistically– warlike in his policies in Afghanistan.
    3. On the whole economic crisis he has surrounded himself far too much with the bankerist types who got us into this whole darn mess in the first place. Larry Summers??? Send him and the rest of the bankerists packing!
    4. Why is he so supportive of the provocative “missile defense shield” in Central Europe?

… But despite those caveats, which are not trivial, I think that over all he’s doing an excellent job.
I just read the speeches he gave in Prague yesterday, and in Ankara today.
In Prague he spelled out his unequivocal support for the goal of a nuclear-weapons free world, set out some generally good first steps toward that goal, and promised to take them. So now, we can hold him to those steps.
In Ankara, first of all it is good he went there, to the giant, majority-Muslim nation at the eastern end of NATO. Second, it’s excellent that the Turkish government had invited him, even after knowing the comments he’d made earlier about the Armenian genocide.
I thought he dealt with the Armenian question and just about all the other issues he spoke about in his speech very deftly, honestly, and compassionately.
On Arab-Israeli issues he said this:

    In the Middle East, we share the goal of a lasting peace between Israel and its neighbors. Let me be clear: The United States strongly supports the goal of two states, Israel and Palestine, living side by side in peace and security. That is a goal shared by Palestinians, Israelis and people of goodwill around the world. That is a goal that the parties agreed to in the road map and at Annapolis. That is a goal that I will actively pursue as president of the United States.
    We know the road ahead will be difficult. Both Israelis and Palestinians must take steps that are necessary to build confidence and trust. Both Israelis and Palestinians, both must live up to the commitments they have made. Both must overcome long-standing passions and the politics of the moment to make progress towards a secure and lasting peace.
    The United States and Turkey can help the Palestinians and Israelis make this journey. Like the United States, Turkey has been a friend and partner in Israel’s quest for security. And like the United States, you seek a future of opportunity and statehood for the Palestinians. So now, working together, we must not give into pessimism and mistrust. We must pursue every opportunity for progress, as you’ve done by supporting negotiations between Syria and Israel. We must extend a hand to those Palestinians who are in need, while helping them strengthen their own institutions. We must reject the use of terror, and recognize that Israel’s security concerns are legitimate.

So okay, now let’s have some actual accountability for the Israeli government– as well as, as usual, for the Palestinians– regarding their actions in the occupied territories.
We need to flood the White House and the offices of our congressional representatives with urgent requests that the US do these things:

    1. Require Israel to open the crossings into Gaza for the passage of construction materials, humanitarian goods, and all goods needed to rebuild a normally functioning economy. This is Israel’s responsibility as occupying power under the Fourth Geneva Convention, which requires a lot more than “just” humanitarian aid for Gaza, as for the West Bank. It requires a normally functioning economy. The US should push for no less than that.
    2. Cease all construction work in the settlements in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, forthwith, and all work on infrastructure projects that support the settlement: “Not one brick.”
    3. Push for the immediate release of from Israeli jails of all the elected Palestinian legislators.
    4. Fully support all international efforts to investigate alleged grave rights abuses committed during the recent war in Gaza.

T. Strouse report from Damascus

    I am happy to publish here a report that Thomas Strouse penned from Damascus on March 31. I thought it gave some useful background flavor to recent developments in the Syrian capital, and at the Arab summit.
    Strouse is working on his Masters degree in Middle East Studies at George Washington University and took the current semester off to study Arabic in Damascus for five months. He also works at Foreign Reports, an oil consulting firm in Washington that primarily reports on political developments in the Middle East relevant to oil markets. He has been writing weekly reports from Damascus. If you’d like to receive them, please drop him a line directly.

Report From Damascus (March 31, 2009)
The flurry of regional diplomatic movement over the past month finally culminated in the Arab Summit which opened in Doha, Qatar on Monday. Key Arab states have all been preparing and maneuvering for the summit for much of the past month. There were several tracks to this pre-summit diplomacy, but Syria was certainly at the center of one of them.
Syria has been receiving special attention from the U.S., as well as from some Arab states that it has not had the best of ties with over recent years. As many have put it, Syria is “coming in from the cold.”
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad made landmark visits to both Saudi Arabia and Jordan in March. In Riyadh, he met with Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, and Kuwaiti Emir Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmad al-Sabah. This meeting was dubbed an Arab “mini-summit.”

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