Too Early to Judge Obama's Middle East Policy

OSTON -- How the new winner of the Nobel Peace Prize has been planning his policy on the Arab-Israeli conflict is starting to become clearer, but remains mostly unclear. It is clearer because of recent moves on such matters as the Richard Goldstone report on the Gaza war and the pressure on Israel to freeze settlements. But it would be a mistake to jump to conclusions and assume that Obama’s Middle East policy is reverting to the traditional American default position of being in Israel’s pocket. It is too early to judge the United States here, and we should not make the mistake of passing judgment on a policy that is still in the making.

Talks with knowledgeable Washington experts who are involved with the administration and follow it closely suggest to me that the Obama team is much more methodical and strategic in its thinking than any other recent American administration, with a strong focus on pushing for a comprehensive Arab-Israeli peace as a high foreign policy priority. This does not seem to be coupled, however, with a detailed work plan on how to get from A to B and finally to a full peace. 

The sharp, swift and sustained American focus on the total freezing of Israeli settlements has been a highly unusual move for the United States in the Middle East -- but also an indicator that Obama is not moving whimsically or aimlessly. Yet it is also not moving with any success, either. The initial articulation of American policy -- engage deeply, freeze Israeli settlements, secure Arab gestures of acceptance of Israel, and go for a comprehensive deal -- has quickly encountered its first bumps in the road. The American responseand next steps remain totally unclear.

There is no consensus among specialists in the United States on what the Obama strategy is and how will he respond to the initial bumps -- Israel’s refusal to freeze all settlements; the Arabs’ refusal to make the gestures of acceptance to Israel before Israel makes substance expressions of its will to coexist peacefully with a Palestinian state. The Obama team has responded with unusual but probably appropriate reticence, neither throwing in the towel and giving up, nor blaming either side for the stalemate and pressuring them to accept ultimatums. 

Obama knew that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his extremist rightwing government would resist the total settlement freeze, so why did he insist soabsolutely? What will he do now? He risks the United States losing face and credibility if he backs off in the face of Israeli stonewalling; he also risks being a one-term president and failing on some of his other major policy initiatives, if he pushes too hard and instigates the pro-Israel lobby groups in the U.S. to fight him on domestic issues as well as in the Middle East.

The most reasoned analysis I have heard from knowledgeable people in Washington who work with the Obama team is that the administration will continue patiently to chart the outlines of what it feels is needed to move towards a negotiated peace, while reacting slowly and patiently to events on the ground -- and all the time pushing Arabs and Israelis towards launching a serious negotiation. That negotiating moment is not now, becauseneither the Palestinian nor Israeli governments is in any shape to negotiate seriously, or to make the substantive concessions required on both sides to seal a deal.

Naïveté has always been part of American policy, as we saw in the juxtaposition of the demand to freeze Israeli settlements with the demand that Arab states make gestures of recognition towards Israel. A better approach would have been to demand that Israel stop an illegal and immoral act -- colonization -- and also ask the Arabs to stop an equally unacceptable act, like, say, terrorism against civilians, incitement against Judaism, or Holocaust denial. 

The Obama administration is focused on a medium-term strategy to push for a comprehensive peace agreement, but at the same time it is also learning about how diplomacy happens in the Middle East. We are still in the phase of Obama’s education on the Middle East, rather than any serious expenditure of American political capital to move from conversations and explorations to actual negotiations. I would expect realistically that by early next year -- with Obama pocketing some domestic and foreign policy successes, the Palestinians getting their house in order and electing a new leadership, the Israelis learning that the United States is serious about comprehensive peace-making, and the Arab states doing something more significant than being idle spectators -- we may see the full contours of an American policy on Arab-Israeli peace-making, rather than the warm-up strides now taking place. Or we may see a new war, much more destructive than any that has come before.