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Former special
envoy Dennis Ross does not have as optimistic vision as the RAND think tank did
about today’s conditions for peace in Israel and Palestine, though he does say
that the clock is ticking for
bold action to secure the ceasefire and produce tangible progress that will
undermine Hamas. A Race Against Time in The Mideast OpEd by Dennis Ross,
Washington Post, Wednesday, May 25, 2005; A27 Palestinian leader
Mahmoud Abbas is in Washington for a meeting this week with President Bush. As
president of the Palestinian Authority, Abbas has pursued a strategy that
depends on his being able to show that his way -- the way of nonviolence --
will deliver for the Palestinian people. Exit polls at the time of his election
in January indicated that Palestinians, weary of daily deprivations and loss of
income, wanted a restoration of calm, freedom of movement and their jobs -- and
expected that Abbas would deliver. To be sure, the public
also wanted an end to corruption and lawlessness in the Palestinian cities and
administration. Here, too, there were expectations that in the aftermath of
Yasser Arafat's deliberate strategy of chaos, Abbas would produce change. Unfortunately, at this
point, Abbas has been able to deliver little of what was expected. While he has
made some moves against corruption -- treading carefully, given the opposition
of the old guard of Fatah -- he has not been able to produce much on employment
or freedom of movement. Palestinians still give him the benefit of the doubt,
but they are increasingly dissatisfied with the absence of real change. One
sign of this is the increasing appeal of Hamas -- an appeal that is growing not
because of its Islamic agenda but because, unlike the Palestinian Authority, it
is perceived as clean and capable of delivering services. Another sign of the increasing
dissatisfaction are polls that indicate that more than 75 percent of
Palestinians believe that there has been no change or change for the worse on
the economy during Abbas's tenure. All this should be an
alarm bell for the Bush administration and the world. Abbas believes in secular governance, the rule
of law, nonviolence and coexistence with Israel. If he cannot make it, if he
cannot demonstrate that his way offers a future for the Palestinian people,
what message does that send? Who do we think will take his place? The
possibility of Hamas's winning elections, tying his hands and eventually
supplanting him is not a fantasy. Photo opportunities
will not provide him much help. And while Abbas must press harder against those
resisting change, including in the security area, he needs more than rhetorical
encouragement -- he needs real help from the outside. Material assistance must
be provided -- not just pledged. Last December, donor nations pledged $1.2
billion to the Palestinians. Six months later, less than 10 percent of the
money has materialized. And the money that has been provided -- as important as
it is -- is not going to meet the urgent needs created by unemployment. Per
capita income in the West Bank and Gaza was $1,800 a year in 2000 and is down
to $1,000. Jobs are urgently needed; labor-intensive projects must be financed
and launched now. The international
community acts as if a business-as-usual approach will suffice in providing the
assistance that has been pledged. That could mean that by the time the money
begins to appear, it will be Hamas, not the Palestinian Authority, making the
calls on how it is spent. It's time for the Bush administration to make a major
push to get donors to deliver. The Abbas visit should provide the catalyst for
such an initiative. While the
administration's assistance request has almost worked its way through Congress,
there is little prospect that money from the United States will flow to
labor-intensive projects before the elections. Nonetheless, our request for $350 million for the Palestinians gives us leverage
to press the Persian Gulf oil states to do their fair share. To date they have
not fulfilled their pledges, let alone pledged the additional funds they should
be providing. The Bush administration needs to call publicly, not
privately, for the creation of a Gulf Cooperation Council fund of $1 billion
for Palestinian development. This money should be available immediately to finance
housing projects that are labor-intensive and for which there are existing
Palestinian blueprints and contractors; provide the $240 million the
Palestinian Authority would like to spend on social programs to compete with
Hamas; and underwrite the cost of the pensions Abbas needs to pay to those he
has retired from the security organizations. Oil revenue for the
Persian Gulf oil states (excluding Iraq) has increased by $58 billion in the
past year. These countries should be more than capable of providing $1 billion
for the Palestinians. It
is time for the U.S. administration to speak bluntly -- something on which it
prides itself -- to the gulf states. Beyond the money, it
is essential to cement
the cease-fire
between Palestinians and Israelis. In the past week there have been rocket and
mortar attacks against Israeli settlements in Gaza and the Israeli city of
Sderot. The Israeli defense minister, Shaul Mofaz, has given instructions to
"use all necessary" means to strike at those responsible. It would
not take much for the current calm -- which has led to a dramatic reduction in
Palestinian attacks and IDF targeted killings -- to unravel. Neither Prime
Minister Ariel Sharon, who is already under enormous pressure because of his
decision to withdraw from Gaza, nor Abbas can afford for the current period of
calm to explode. Nothing will happen by
itself; the cease fire and the security situation will not be shored up on
their own nor will donor assistance for labor-intensive projects just
materialize. The clock is ticking, and President Bush must seize the
opportunity of the Abbas visit to make these things happen before it is too
late. The
writer was director for policy planning in the State Department under President
George H.W. Bush and special Middle East coordinator under President Bill
Clinton. He is counselor of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and
author of "The Missing Peace." http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/05/24/AR2005052401252.html |
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