<http://rubinreports.blogspot.com/> RubinReports
<http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Rubinreports/~3/9ofUmZ4PSYI/palestinian-poli
tics-is-about-to-make.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email>
Palestinian Politics Is About to Make a Transition For the Worse; Bad Time
to Push for Peacemaking
Posted: 23 May 2011 03:08 PM PDT
This article is
<http://pajamasmedia.com/barryrubin/2011/05/23/palestinian-politics-is-about
-to-make-a-transition-for-the-worse-bad-time-to-push-for-peacemaking/>
published in PajamasMedia.
By Barry Rubin
Palestinian Authority "president" Mahmoud Abbas is retiring and has called
on Fatah to choose a replacement. Wonder who they'll pick? Watch this space.
I think I know and he makes Amr Moussa look like Megan McCain.
Meanwhile, Prime Minister Salam Fayyad has suffered a heart attack. The
Fatah leadership wants to get rid of him and is only held back by concern
over the donors giving money. His days, too, are numbered.
President Obama's argument is that Israel should make peace as fast as
possible. But of course since the two "moderate" leaders aren't going to be
around very long, why make concessions to be pocketed by their successors
who won't implement these commitments and will definitely add even more
demands.
Obama's argument is that Israel is becoming delegitimized because there
isn't a peace agreement. But delegitimization by some is better than a very
dangerous strategic situation. Moreover, it isn't clear that more Israeli
concessions and risks will reverse delegitimization. Experience has shown
the opposite.
Obama's second argument is that the strategic situation will get worse if
Israel doesn't make concessions, etc. In fact, precisely because the
situation is getting worse means Israel doesn't want to face a hostile
Egyptian and Lebanese government, a stronger Iran, a less reliable America,
etc., from a worse strategic situation. And that's what will happen if
Israel does what Obama wants.
https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/359330079121990828-46727477991
71900432?l=rubinreports.blogspot.com
<http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Rubinreports/~3/bDALWQE7z7o/in-september-oba
mas-middle-east-policy.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email> In
September, Obama's Middle East Policy Will Collapse
Posted: 23 May 2011 01:58 PM PDT
This article is
<http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/1/64/10342/Egypt/Politics-/Shopping
-for-a-political-party-Ahram-Onlines-idiot.aspx> published on PajamasMedia.
By Barry Rubin
Prediction: In September, President Barack Obama's Middle East policy blows
up in his (and our) face(s). It's totally obvious and yet no one is focusing
on it.
I'm not referring to the Palestinian Authority's bid for unilateral
independence at the UN. I'm referring to the Egyptian parliamentary
election.
It is totally obvious that in that election Egypt will elect a radical,
anti-American, hate-Israel parliament which will then write the country's
new constitution. This is a turning point in Middle East history. And Obama
is unaware of it. Quite the contrary, he declared in his State Department
speech that everything is great with the "Arab spring." Nothing can go
wrong. It is the expression of a yearning for prosperity and freedom.
The Arab spring began when a frustrated man in Tunisia set himself on fire.
It will now move to the new phase: the whole Middle East will be set on
fire.
Is that alarmist? Not at all, except in the sense that when one sees a fire
he sets off the fire alarm.
Don't be distracted by the question of whether Islamists will have a
majority or the even narrower question of whether the Muslim Brotherhood
will have a majority.
There WILL be a radical majority, there MIGHT be an Islamist majority, there
won't be a Muslim Brotherhood majority but it will ALMOST CERTAINLY be the
largest single party.
Why do I say this? Well, Amr Moussa, who isn't an Islamist and is Egypt's
most popular and important Egyptian politician says so.
There is no sign-no sign-that the moderates are organizing serious parties.
Instead of getting to work, they're complaining. Meanwhile four radical,
anti-American, passionately anti-Israel forces are organizing:
--The Muslim Brotherhood, which should get one-third or more of the seats
and is contesting half of them, obviously in the districts where it has the
best chance of winning.
--Smaller and even more radical Islamist parties (referred to as Salafists)
who could form agreements with the Brotherhood so that they won't hurt each
other's chances.
--Left-wing neo-Marxist parties.
--Radical nationalists.
There will probably be a number of independents who will be courted and won
over by one of these blocs.
Imagine the day after that election. What will the mass media say? What will
the American politicians say?
--That they were wrong about the Egyptian revolution and the Muslim
Brotherhood?
--That by helping to bring down the old regime, U.S. policy foisted a
disaster on the region and on its own interests?
--That by celebrating how great the "Arab Spring" is and refusing to
acknowledge the real threats and problems, Obama made catastrophic errors.
--That his policy has led to many advances for America's enemies?
--That Israel is in a far worse strategic situation and certainly can't and
shouldn't make any more concessions?
--That the Islamists are emboldened and thus both Hamas and the radicals who
run Fatah are taking an even harder line?
--That the loss of faith in America by its Arab allies is now undeniably
clear and they are scrambling to make their own deals with Iran and other
extremists?
--That there is a real possibility of a war in which Egypt either joins
directly or backs Hamas? Imagine, Egypt stays "neutral" but nobody stops
thousands of Egyptian volunteers from crossing into Gaza to fight or even
across the Egypt-Israel border to launch terror attacks?
--What will the Obama Administration do if in practice Egypt tears up the
Israel-Egypt peace treaty even if it pretends that it isn't doing so?
--People are insisting that if Hamas in practice becomes part of the
Palestinian Authority that the United States, and certainly Congress, will
cut off aid. But what will happen when the Obama Administration does
everything possible to prevent an aid cut-off and nothing possible to
pressure the PA into changing its policy or behavior?
These are not speculations. These things WILL happen. Nobody in the United
States or Europe is seriously discussing these scenarios and what should be
done about them.
And I didn't even mention the Egyptian presidential elections or, for that
matter:
--An emboldened Turkish Islamist government if it wins the June 11 elections
the:re,
--A Lebanese government controlled by Syria and its clients, especially
Hizballah, if it ever gets a new prime minister and cabinet installed in
that country.
--The survival of an anti-American Syrian government that has murdered
hundreds of its citizens and will be arresting and torturing thousands, in
part due to the Obama Administration's failure to try to overthrow it?
--The sight of Iran ever closer to nuclear weapons and admissions that the
sanctions had only a limited effect?
These are not far-out scenarios. All of them have a 90 percent or more
likelihood of happening.
I don't want to take your time here for a history lesson but consider
precedents:
--1952. Radical regime takes power in Egypt. U.S. realizes the threat by
April 1955 but then saves the regime from being overthrown by Britain,
France, and Israel in 1956. Result: Violence, disruption, and anti-American
problems in the region for decades.
--1979. Radical regime takes power in Iran. U.S. policy makes a mess in
dealing with the revolutionary crisis. Americans taken hostage,
revolutionary Islamism flourishes, thirty plus years of violence, September
11, Islamist movement still growing. By the way, why does not one of the
hundreds of "experts" on television and in the mass media remember that the
Iranian revolution began after President Jimmy Carter urged reform on the
shah and ended with the United States calling on the shah to go away? Remind
you of anything?
September 2011 will be another of those moments. Mark that on your calendar.
On the tenth anniversary of the September 11 attacks, the United States will
be watching the triumph of the ideology and movement--not Usama bin Ladin,
of course, but his smarter counterparts--in much of the Middle East.
PS: Here's an
<http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/1/64/10342/Egypt/Politics-/Shopping
-for-a-political-party-Ahram-Onlines-idiot.aspx> excellent guide to Egypt's
political parties so far which proves my point . Note that there isn't a
single serious moderate party. Amr Mousa isn't forming a party while
Muhammad ElBaradei, Obama's favorite, isn't doing anything but complain.
There is a "Facebook party." So far it has 1000 "likes." Egypt has about 85
million people.
Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs
(GLORIA) Center, editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs
(MERIA) Journal, and a featured columnist at PajamasMedia
<http://pajamasmedia.com/barryrubin/> http://pajamasmedia.com/barryrubin/
His latest books are The Israel-Arab Reader (seventh edition), The Long War
for Freedom: The Arab Struggle for Democracy in the Middle East (Wiley), and
The Truth About Syria (Palgrave-Macmillan). The website of the GLORIA Center
is <http://www.gloria-center.org/> http://www.gloria-center.org. His
PajamaMedia columns are mirrored and other articles available at
<http://www.rubinreports.blogspot.com/>
http://www.rubinreports.blogspot.com/.
https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/359330079121990828-81203971103
24913813?l=rubinreports.blogspot.com
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