Bush Working to Ensure Sharon's Re-Election

by Stephen Zunes

Some Israelis, for religious or nationalist reasons, oppose the necessary compromises for peace. Other Israelis, for moral or pragmatic reasons, support the necessary compromises for peace. The majority of Israelis, however, are in the middle. Historically, Israeli voters have tended to lean towards the peace camp if they feared IsraelÕs close relationship with the United States and the resulting largesse of aid was threatened by a particular policy and lean towards the right if they felt Israel could get away with it. A blank check from the United States for the Israeli government to do whatever it pleases, therefore, significantly hurts the peace forces within Israel. By contrast, pressure from the United States has traditionally enhanced the position of Israeli moderates, since it enables them to convince the Israeli public that failure to compromise would jeopardize their countryÕs close relationship with the United States.

In many respects, this upcoming election parallels the 1992 election between the incumbent Likud Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir Š who, like Sharon, opposed talks with the Palestinians or territorial compromise Š and the Labor Party challenger Yitzhak Rabin, who supported the principle of territorial compromise in return for security guarantees.

Seeing that peace was impossible as long as the Likud was in power, the senior Bush administration undertook a series of measures designed to encourage Israeli voters to support the more moderate Labor Party against the hard line Likud incumbents. Such efforts were successful, leading to RabinÕs election and the direct negotiations with the Palestinians that Shamir had opposed. As a result of the Oslo Accords, there were some major, if uneven, advances in the peace process until Sharon cut off negotiations in early 2001 and re-occupied Palestinian cities in 2002.

By contrast, the current Bush administration appears to be doing just the opposite, undertaking a series of measures designed to encourage Israeli voters to support the hard line Likud Bloc against its more moderate Labor Party challengers.

For example, the senior Bush administration Š led by then-Secretary of State James Baker Š publicly put forward a series of broad peace proposals, supported by much of the international community, prior to the Israeli elections. These proposals were responded to generally favorably by the Palestinians and other Arab parties as well as by the Israeli Labor Party, while being rejected by the incumbent Likud government. This helped make clear to Israeli voters that the peace process would move forward only by voting for Labor, resulting in ShamirÕs ouster.

This time around, however, the Bush Administration has blocked release of a similar roadmap for peace put together by the "quartet" of the United States, the European Union, Russia and the United Nations. Rejecting requests by the other members that such an outline for a peace plan be made public to help Israeli voters choose, the United States insists that it will not be released until after the vote. This has been widely interpreted in Israel as an endorsement of SharonÕs re-election.

As another example, just prior to the 1992 Israeli election, the senior Bush administration withheld approval of an Israeli request for a $10 billion loan guarantee until Israel put a freeze on their illegal settlements in the occupied territories. This threatened withholding of aid was a clear signal to the Israeli electorate that the Likud was taking positions so far to the right that it was losing WashingtonÕs favor, thereby becoming a major factor in the defeat of the Likud. (Due to pressure from Democratic challenger Bill Clinton, Bush went ahead with the loan guarantees without the requisite freeze on settlement activity, but only after RabinÕs election.)

This time, the current Bush administration has indicated its willingness to approve a $12 billion loan guarantee requested by IsraelÕs rightist government along with substantial increases in military aid for Israeli occupation forces, thereby giving a clear pre-election signal of U.S. support for the current Likud governmentÕs policies.

The pro-Sharon orientation of the Bush Administration has been apparent in the appointment of outspoken Likudniks to influential foreign policy positions. In naming Donald Rumsfeld as Secretary of Defense, Paul Wolfowitz as Deputy Secretary of Defense, Douglas Feith as Undersecretary of Defense, Richard Perle as Defense Policy Board chairman and convicted Iran-Contra felon Elliot Abrams as director for Near East and North African affairs for the National Security Council, the Bush administration has given a clear signal that moderates like Mitzna will not get their support. These Bush appointees, who serve as the Bush AdministrationÕs core team on Israeli-Palestinian issues, have supported the expansion of Israeli settlements in the occupied territories and have opposed the Israeli-Palestinian peace process from the beginning. For example, Perle wrote a 1996 paper for the Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies that advised the Israeli government to make "a clean break from the peace process." Similarly, Feith wrote a widely-read 1997 article for Commentary that called on Israel to re-occupy "the areas under Palestinian Authority control" even though "the price in blood would be high."

The Bush AdministrationÕs support for the LikudÕs right-wing stance and opposition to LaborÕs more moderate stance has been quite clear since it first came to office.

For example, the Bush Administration has consistently supported SharonÕs refusal to resume peace negotiations with the Palestinians until all Palestinian violence is halted. By contrast, Mitzna recognizes that preconditioning peace negotiations with the end of the violence is self-defeating, in that extremist Palestinian factions that oppose the peace process (over which the Palestinian Authority have little or no control) will continue their acts of terrorism deliberately to sabotage the resumption of peace talks. He has instead called for an unconditional resumption of peace talks.

Mitzna has challenged SharonÕs commitment to the peace process, noting how the current prime minister has refused to support every single peace treaty and disengagement agreement Israel ever made with an Arab neighbor. However, President Bush has lauded Sharon as "a man of peace," adding, "IÕm confident he wants Israel to be able to exist at peace with its neighbor."

Mitzna has made a series of proposals that could lead to the establishment of a viable Palestinian state alongside Israel and has offered such initiatives as a unilateral withdrawal of the Israeli military and Israeli colonists from the occupied Gaza Strip, which Israel has occupied since its 1967 invasion. The United States has refused to support such a withdrawal.

Mitzna has called for immediate talks with Palestinian President Yasir Arafat and has argued that SharonÕs intransigence makes it difficult for the peace process to move forward. By contrast, President Bush has repeatedly insisted that it is the Palestinians, not the Israelis, who need to have new leadership in order for there to be peace.

Republican leaders have gone as far as denying there is even an occupation to discuss, with Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld referring to the "so-called" occupied territories. Tom DeLay, the incoming majority leader in the House of Representatives, declared that in his visits to the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights, "I didnÕt see any occupied territory. I saw Israel." Outgoing House majority leader Dick Armey also claims that the occupied Palestinian territories are actually part of Israel and has even advocated the removal of Palestinians from this expanded Jewish state. In defending his call for ethnic cleansing, Armey noted "there are many Arab nations that have many hundreds of thousands of acres of land, soil, and property and opportunity to create a Palestinian state." In order to facilitate such a forced population transfer, says Armey, "weÕre perfectly content to work with the Palestinians in doing that."

One reason for Congressional RepublicansÕ lack of concern about international law is the widespread belief within their ranks that the solution was spelled out by a higher authority thousands of years ago. For example, Senator James Inhofe, in a floor speech in the U.S. Senate in December 2001, insisted that the West Bank belongs to Israel because God promised it to Abraham. Israel, according to the Oklahoma Republican, "has a right to the land . . . because God said so . . . This is not a political battle at all. It is a contest over whether or not the word of God is true."

It is not just the Republicans who have swung to a pro-Likud position, however. So have the Democrats.

Mitzna and other moderate Israelis Š while supporting pre-emptive strikes against specific terrorist targets Š have urged restraint from indiscriminate attacks against civilians and the total reoccupation ordered by Sharon. However, both houses of Congress passed bipartisan resolutions last year by overwhelming margins in support for the Israeli offensives, blaming the Palestinians exclusively for the violence and insisting that the Israeli attacks Š condemned by Amnesty International and other reputable human rights groups for deliberately targeting civilians Š were only in self-defense. The vast majority of Democrats joined Republicans in support of these resolutions, which also commended President BushÕs "leadership" in his support for SharonÕs policies. In fact, there were only two "no" votes in the Senate and only twenty-one "no" votes in the House.

At the peak of IsraelÕs spring offensive, Democratic Congressional leaders Š such as House Minority Leader Dick Gephardt, Assistant House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle and Assistant Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid Š all spoke at a series of rallies and forums supporting SharonÕs policies.

In addition, all of the announced and likely Democratic candidates for president in 2004 have also indicated their strong support for SharonÕs policies. Even Vermont governor Howard Dean, who has been attracting liberal support due to his opposition to a unilateral U.S. invasion of Iraq, has openly declared that his position on Israel and Palestine is closer to that of AIPAC Š the American-Israel Public Affairs Committee, which supports Sharon Š than to Americans for Peace Now, which supports Mitzna.

As a result, unless the Green Party Š which is aligned with the Israeli peace movement Š becomes more prominent, there is little incentive for the Bush Administration to change its pro-Sharon stance.

As long time Israeli peace and human rights activist Gila Svirsky observed,

"For decades, we in the Israeli peace movement have been struggling to get Israelis to compromise on the issue that feeds the conflict with the Palestinians. And then our work for peace gets doused twice: once by a prime minister who believes brutality will convince the Palestinians to give up, and then by a U.S. president who supports him on this. Bush has become a big part of the problem. He has to make up his mind: either heÕs for peace, or heÕs for Sharon. He canÕt be both."

Similarly, Israeli commentator Gideon Samet, writing in Haaretz, has noted that the United States has become "more Israeli than the IsraelisÉ. Continuing to rage, raining abuse on Ōthe other,Õ and demonizing the Palestinians." He adds, "With favors like that from our friends, we donÕt need enemies."