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| At Annapolis: Palestinian Authority President Abbas (l.), President Bush, and Israeli Prime Minister Olmert (r.). Gerald Herbert/AP |
Mideast peace gets new push
Arabs and Israelis sat down formally together for the second time in history.
from the November 28, 2007 edition
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Still, the president's embrace of the conference idea suggests that he believes the door is now open to try for peace in a way that it wasn't in 2002.
What has changed for Bush? The leadership of the principal parties, in particular that of the Palestinian Authority. Bush repeated Monday that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas is a leader he can work with.
In addition, the president said Tuesday that now is the time for peace because of the crossroads at which the region stands. "A battle is under way for the future of the Middle East," he said.
Another important change is that Bush was pressed to accept holding a peace conference by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, a Bush confidante and key foreign-policy adviser (but who opposed the conference idea when Mr. Powell proposed it).
Hadley suggests that Bush, while not adopting a hands-on approach, will continue to offer the big picture of what an Israeli-Palestinian accord must look like and what it can mean for the region and the world – as he did with his June 2002 speech that set him on record as supporting a two-state solution. "He will make very clear that this [bilateral] effort has his support and is a top priority for the remaining time in his second term," Hadley says.
White House officials continue to hammer at what this is not for the president: It is not Bush suddenly getting President Clinton's religion on presidential Mideast diplomacy, and it is not Bush's dive into shuttle diplomacy.
"The notion that somehow the key to success is simply for the United States to lean on one side or another and jam a settlement through is just not what history has suggested," Hadley says.
But some experts believe that the US, including the president, will at some point have to get into the talks and butt heads – squeezing unpalatable compromises out of each side – if negotiations are to succeed, especially by the end of 2008.
"Saying the two sides have to work it out between themselves isn't a recipe for success and isn't likely to move things very far," says Mr. Zunes of the University of San Francisco. For one thing, he says, the "asymmetry of power" between the two parties doesn't augur well for the two making progress on their own.
Zunes adds that if Bush is "unable to push the Palestinians and unwilling to push the Israelis," it's difficult to see how much has changed from the start of Bush's presidency.
"It's significant that Bush is the first president to use the word 'Palestine' in talking about creation of a Palestinian state," Zunes says, "but at some point this has to be about getting beyond statements."
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