Blues in the White House

A fleeting visit to the American capital reveals a preoccupied nation, worried diplomats and a new Congress which is likely to undermine the assistance to Israel. Salam Fayad is the public’s favorite. And why, actually, are there no negotiations with Syria?

Last week I had the privilege to participate in the Saban Forum as a guest, and to meet and listen to senior administration officials, sympathetic congressmen and influential columnists. The following are my major impressions, very concisely:

1. Foreign aid to Israel is in danger; perhaps not terminally, but there is definitely a clear and present danger. It has nothing to do with the Israeli government, nor with Obama administration, nor even with the catatonic condition of the peace process — but with the black hole of the annual deficit exceeding a trillion of dollars in the American budget. The new 112th Congress, assuming office in the first week of January, will be required to, and will demand extensive cutbacks in the budget; a convenient and clearly unpopular target is foreign aid, out of which Israel and Egypt are biting together for a third of this aid.

The new members of Congress, headed by those elected on behalf of the Republicans’ tea party, might be supportive of Israel, at least, in their way, but they simply abhor foreign aid, especially to third-world and Muslim countries. It’s going to be very difficult from a practical standpoint, and a bad idea from the publicity standpoint: to cut aid to poor countries in Africa and Asia but not to touch aid to Israel, a member of the OECD. Supporters of Israel in Congress are already breaking their heads on how to square the circle.

2. The WikiLeaks scandal is hanging over government officials like a black cloud. The American State Department is busy day and night extinguishing fires in different world capitals and also forced to call back home the smelly diplomats like the ambassador in Libya who did well in portraying Muammar al-Gaddafi’s voluptuous Ukrainian nurse. The Americans are looking at the map of the world — and having no clue to see where it will come from the next time — like in the game where the head is peeking each time out of another hole and should be given a bang with a hammer in order to make it disappear.

3. The damage of the WikiLeaks affair to international prestige adds fuel to the big national debate currently going on in intellectual and political circles apropos the “uniqueness” of America — a concept accompanying the U.S. from its early birth, postulating that America has a special historical role and an exalted status amidst the nations of the world. Very generally, one can say that the American right wing is seeking to restore the crown to its former glory and America to the days of its greatness, while in the left and in the center, they claim that times have changed and brand new content should be poured into the “uniqueness” of America, if at all. This week, an American columnist E. J. Dionne recommended that President Obama catch the bull by its horns and try to rekindle in Americans their pride and self-confidence. Instead of being compared to President Carter who had dipped the Americans in black bile, Obama would be better off resembling Reagan who pulled them out of there.

4. The public’s favorite in Washington is undoubtedly Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, the only one to shed a ray of light in the darkness of the peace process. Fayyad’s success in bringing order to the Palestinian economy and putting the security services in the West Bank on their own feet, has earned unrestrained superlatives from both Americans and Israelis. For the moment, no one pays attention at the dissonance originating from that in the future, Fayyad’s achievements are likely to serve a support base for the unilateral declaration of the Palestinians on the establishment of their state, an intention both the Americans and Israelis are fighting against together.

5. Although Netanyahu has quite a lot of fans among the conservative majority in the Congress, he’s way less popular with administration officials and media observers than Fayyad, and this is speaking modestly. A part of the administration has lost hope for the chance to advance the peace process, and should the issue depend on them, they would let the parties “bleed,” as the then-Secretary of State Henry Kissinger had recommended almost 40 years ago and as commentator Thomas Friedman did in his column last week. The problem is that someone hasn’t lost hope yet, and he is the one whose opinion determines the outcome, President Obama. He still believes in his ability to bring about the awaited change, hasn’t given up on Abu Mazen and Netanyahu — and as long as this is the situation, the peace process will stay alive and kicking as well.

6. In this context, the one to largely enjoy the plaudits for the most part, surprisingly, was the Chairman of the Knesset’s Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, Shaul Mofaz, who presented (inside the discussion hall and outside it) his plan for an interim agreement based on withdrawal from 60 percent of the West Bank’s territory, while providing guarantees to the Palestinians that in the permanent agreement, they will gain a territory equal to the one they had till 1967. “This is the first original idea I have heard in a long time already,”* one of the American participants commented.

7. Nobody has furnished a reasonable explanation yet for the administration’s stubbornness on the settlements freeze, despite there remaining only a few who disagree with the statement that this all is about a strategic mistake which resulted in a whole two years wasted on idle talks leading nowhere. The Washington Post deputy editorial page editor Jackson Diehl holds an interesting theory succinctly expressed in the phrase “all because of a small nail.” In his opinion, it all started because some low-ranking State Department spokesperson having no idea what the Green Line is, who at the briefing for journalists unwittingly applied the demand for the freeze to East Jerusalem as well. Instead of shaking it off or ignoring it, his superiors backed him up; this grew to an ultimate demand; and it is only now that the Americans have found the broken ladder by means of which they could get down from the high tree they climbed onto.

8. The negotiations with Syria, or more correctly, their absence; they are like the weather broadcast: everybody’s talking about it, but no one takes action. There is a wall-to-wall consensus that no step would deteriorate the strategic status of Iran more than the disconnection between it and Syria, that nothing would better the security situation of Israel in Lebanon as reduction of Damascus’ support for Hezbollah, and that no development would instigate a deeper change in the attitude of the Arab countries toward Israel than formation of an agreement between it and Syria. One of the qualified speakers at the Saban Forum hinted that it’s not worthwhile to rule out that behind the political void, there are secret contacts taking place between Jerusalem and Damascus, though his words were received with disbelief. You never know.

9. Here is a wonderful example of the principle of unplanned repercussions, as delivered to an American diplomat by a high-standing Arab source: first, America solved the problems of Iran on its northern border through the victory over the Soviets in the Cold War; then, it removed the threat to Iran from its eastern front in the war against the Taliban in Afghanistan; and in the end, America also neutralized the western front of Tehran when it kicked Saddam Hussein out of Baghdad and established a Shiite regime instead of him. So Iran is now free to threaten all of America’s allies on the southern front: Israel, Saudi Arabia and the oil-rich Emirates.

10. Not even 5,000 new apartments in the territories wouldn’t come close to causing that much of the publicity damage, not to mention the sorrow and pain, than the one engendered by the abominable rabbis’ letter concerning rental of apartments to Arabs.** Especially for all the good Jews in America who, in all honesty, just can’t fathom what’s going on with us.

* Editor’s Note: This quote, while accurately translated, could not be verified.

**Translator’s Note: Referencing the call for the broad public not to rent or sell properties to Arabs and foreign workers; provoked a massive outcry since several weeks ago.