Turning Islamists Into Lounge Lizards

How can Obama stop the radicalization of the Middle East? By beginning talks on all levels.

Sorrow and success, destruction and a new beginning, disillusionment and confidence – all these followed one upon the other last week. In the Middle East, the three-week war between Israel and Hamas finally gave way to a ceasefire. In Washington, Obama moved into the Oval Office with a historically moving ceremony.

The new President, surprisingly, didn’t mention the war in Gaza at all in his inaugural speech. But the next day, one of the first foreign leaders he telephoned was Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. Obama seems to regard the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as a dangerous confrontation and gives it a high priority, unlike his predecessor George Bush. That’s well and good, but is it enough to defuse the situation?

Hardly. Barack Obama will only be successful in the Middle East if he recognizes Bush’s monumental failures and moves quickly to correct them. He first has to come to terms with the new balance of power Bush created there: the fanatics and the zealots are in charge. How can Obama stop the radicalization of the region?

Israel and the United States have waged three wars in the Arab world. The first was Iraq in 2003 that removed Iraq as a regional power and enabled Iran to take its place. The second war, Lebanon in 2006, made Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah into a celebrated hero of the resistance against Israel. For the first time in Middle East history, a radical Shi’ite leader has become a shining idol in the Sunni Arab world.

The third war, Gaza 2009, probably resulted in making the Islam-nationalist party Hamas into the most powerful party among Palestinians. Mahmoud Abbas, whose term of office is already over, stands as a discredited ally of Israel who tried to gain personal political advantage as bombs fell on Gaza. Hamas leaders, on the other hand, used the opportunity to gain support from Arabs by wildly firing rockets into Israeli cities.

Hamas’ dwindling popularity, its blind brutality, its persecution of dissidents, its inability to govern – huge issues before the war – have now been largely forgotten by the Palestinians. Just holding out against Israel has given Hamas hero status across the entire region. Once again, America’s and Israel’s opponents have won not a military but a political victory. Hamas can already look forward to the next elections with joy.

What can be learned from that? The first insight, to paraphrase Clausewitz, is that war is the sequel to political helplessness by military means. The western democracies have used up all military options since 2001 in Afghanistan and Iraq. Israel exhausted their options since 2006 in Lebanon and Gaza. The enemies of the West are morally armed, but their weapons are dull and rusty, even as a threat.

The second insight is that the movers and shakers in the region, the Mullahs in Tehran, Hezbollah in Beirut, Hamas in Gaza and Damascus, won’t disappear just because the United States and Israel refuse to negotiate with them. Unfortunately, the European Union has embraced this self-imposed speechlessness as well. It should be fervently hoped that the exceptionally gifted communicator Barack Obama will be able to loosen western and Israeli tongues. Negotiating with all the important players in the Middle East isn’t a reward for good behavior; it’s a political necessity.

A third insight belongs here as well: the intellectually hare-brained and politically foolish equation of terrorist al-Qaeda jihadists with regionally rooted Islamists like Hezbollah and Hamas should properly be relegated to Bush’s disastrous history. Unlike al-Qaeda, Hezbollah and Hamas represent a continuation of the old Arab nationalism, except with a religious basis. That’s how Hezbollah came to be regarded by all parties in Lebanon as an accepted political player pursuing attainable goals and making necessary compromises. The chaotically militant but unfortunately popular Hamas will eventually have to be included in that as well.

Finally, a fourth insight: it would be wrong to rely on authoritative Arab regimes in the Middle East. The wars have brought new, stronger powers to the top in the region, powers not allied with Hamas and Hezbollah, but who maintain a continuous dialog with them. We’re talking here about gas-rich Qatar and an ascendant Turkey. Largely unnoticed by the West, Turkey’s devout, pragmatic Prime Minister Erdogan has become a celebrated figure in the Arab world. Much of this popularity derives from his emotional criticism of Israeli actions in the attack on Gaza. If the West is willing to regard him unemotionally, he could be extremely helpful with his connections to Washington and Tehran and to Hamas and Israel.

The change from Bush to Obama is the great opportunity to begin negotiations on a thousand and one different levels. Democratic think tanks in Washington and the Bertelsmann Foundation in Germany have already made many suggestions in this regard. Nobody should expect immediate solutions from them, but the drawn out palaver that ensues will, as proven by the Cold War, make lounge lizards out of a lot of radicals.