Walter Ellis: The problem with Bush's Great Israeli Peace Bid

Opinion

Wednesday, May 21, 2008

Everyone these days seems to be issuing wake-up calls. It is as if we are all awake and all asleep at the same time. Perhaps we are dreaming. Perhaps you are dreaming as you read this.

In America, wake-up calls are being issued on a constant basis — like an alarm clock that refuses to be turned off.

We have to wake up to the fact that manufacturing is going down the tubes (with the tubes, needless to say, having been Made in China). We have to wake up to the falling dollar.

We have to wake up to the trade deficit. There can be no more sleeping through the Iraq war or the slow, gradual defeat of Nato forces in Afghanistan.

We need to open our eyes and see Putin's Russia for what it is — a very potent threat to US military supremacy.

Most of all, we need to stop yawning and get on with the business of electing a new president. And, speaking of which, if we don't wake up soon to the dangers of racism in our national psyche, we're all doomed.

The current and most fashionable wake-up call is on behalf of the state of Israel, which, on its 60th birthday, we are urged by everyone — Jews and gentiles alike — not to take for granted.

I used to live in Israel and I have to tell you, they ain't going nowhere. Israelis are tough buggers, and ruthless with it. They're in it for the long haul. If anything, the wake-up call should be in the opposite direction. America needs to wake up and recognise that the US and Israel are not joined at the hip and not destined by God to proceed through what remains of history to the Rapture.

I would go further and say that it is America's unwavering support for Israeli intransigence that has largely prevented any meaningful progress towards reconciliation between Jews and Palestinians. Israelis like to proclaim that they are confident in their own strength.

But a big part of that confidence is predicated on the fact that they have America in their corner. Take away Washington's Big Stick and — to mix metaphors — it's a whole new ballgame.

No one (certainly not me) wants to see Israel defeated by Arab armies and consigned to a new form of slavery.

Yet, at the same time, no one should want to see Israelis constantly dictating the terms of political reform and, just as often, vetoing change.

George W Bush (he's the President of the United States, in case you'd forgotten) and Condoleezza Rice, his increasingly obscure Secretary of State, only woke up to the Israel-Palestine question in their last 12 months in office, at which point they announced that they intended to solve it by the end of 2008.

Given their track record, you might think that they would have been better to try and get some sleep. But no. That's not the way it went.

In my head I have the image of the two of them watching a re-run of the Andy Williams show back in December. During a newsbreak, the President reaches for the nachos, only for the former university administrator, who is playing a little Schumann on the White House piano, to point out to him that things don't look so good in Israel.

The President glances at the screen, on which Israeli gunships can be seen firing rockets into Gaza. "Hey there, Condy," he says. " Darned if you're not right. Maybe it's time you got your black ass over there and sorted things out."

The Secretary of State reluctantly closes the lid of the Steinway. " Sure thing, Mr President," she replies. "It's not like I got anything better to do."

And so the Great Peace Initiative began.

Of course, it may not have been exactly like that. But I doubt I'm far off.

As always, the problem is that America likes to present itself as a honest broker, while being 95% — no, make that 99% — on the side of Israel. The Arabs know this. More to the point, they also know that for the first time in a long while, the US is weak and indecisive and is no longer the sole determining factor in what's going on.

Washington needs to wake up to this fact and get its act together before it's too late. But don't hold your breath. What is much more likely to happen is that the Bush-Rice peace bid will fade away to nothing, like autumn leaves, leaving the next occupant of the Oval Office to deal not only with Iraq and Afghanistan, but a revivalist Arab World and a truculent Israel.

Good luck with that, I say. Oh, and don't forget about the dollar. And the trade gap. And Putin (I mean, Medvedev). And the Chinese navy. And race relations. And the fact that nobody makes anything any more. And the housing crisis. And ...

Thank the Lord for Indiana Jones.