Our role is to keep
the shark moving
Commentary
by ADAM TANOUS
As long as
I can remember, and then some, the Middle East has been quagmire of
misery. The dominant imagery since the ’60s has been of unremitting
violence, rubble-strewn streets, dust-covered wives and mothers wailing in
anger or woe after someone’s pointless death.
It has now
reached a point so beyond the pale that my instinct sitting safely here in
the Wood River Valley is to say let them have each other—just go to war,
finish this absurdity once and all. What can we do, really? We have
problems of our own. Why should we expend energy, money, time on an
insoluble problem?
But then
the reality of the situation trickles in. It is easy to assume the
political players over time—Rabin, Netanyahu, Sadat, Sharon, Mubarak,
Arafat—are the only ones involved in this blood feud. In a way, they all
deserve one other. But, of course, the situation involves others less
culpable for the political, economic and social disaster unfolding.
There are
millions of people stuck in the middle: Palestinians and Israelis just
trying to send their kids to school, contribute something to their
communities, have a few laughs, live a little. And they are the ones being
killed by bombings and incursions. Their actual homes are what
constitute all that rubble in the streets we see on the news.
So, as much
as we’d like to, it is not really morally defensible to throw up our
hands,.
Who’s to
blame for the situation spinning so wildly out of control?
Perhaps a
better question is who’s not to blame. Like any true disaster, there has
been a conjoining of ill-conceived policies, poor decisions and failures
in leadership.
Say we
begin with Arafat, though there is no beginning point—the Middle East
problem is circular in nature.
Arafat is a
tireless defender of his people, but there is no doubt he has lost
credibility on the international scene and even with various Palestinian
factions. Months ago he had control of militant groups like Hamas and
Hizbollah, groups that have admitted to having killed civilians, and he
did nothing about it. He has refused to condemn suicide bombings. There is
the charge, though still not proven, that he has directed the bombings. A
document allegedly signed by Arafat and directing payment to families of
bombers was found during an Israeli raid.
Statements
of condemnation by politicians sometimes seem to us like little more than
sound and fury, but in the Middle East the subtleties of language have
profound importance. Every statement is loaded with inferences. Signals
can be sent with something as simple as word choice.
That, of
course, was then. Arafat has, subsequently, lost significant control of
the Palestinians. Given that he is under siege in a building surrounded by
Israeli tanks, it is hard to imagine what power he has left.
Sharon is
no less at fault for the debacle. Both he and Arafat are acting out of
enmity for one another, rather than with rational, political strategy for
attaining their goals. Sharon has isolated Arafat in his compound, has
offered him a one-way ticket into exile. He has succeeded in turning a
relatively unlikeable guy into a quasi-martyr. All Sharon has done by
isolating Arafat in his dark, cement compound is inspire thousands of
Palestinians to the cause.
And if
Arafat should die of hunger or mortar shell, something his age-old enemy
Sharon would relish, things would get much worse. The full anger and
concomitant violence of Palestinian and other Arab factions will surely
explode.
What’s
more, Sharon’s policy of rounding up Palestinians, destroying homes,
detaining journalists and preventing rescue workers from helping injured
people is alienating much of the world. While such actions are not quite
the moral equivalent of suicide bombing, it is nonetheless, misguided and
wrong.
The United
States has contributed to the problem by maintaining a hands off approach
to the whole issue. Not until last week did Bush decide to send Secretary
of State Powell to the region. It comes much too late in the game. The
U.S. is the only country in the world that has significant influence over
Israel. We are also deeply involved with Arab countries on the other front
of terrorism. Our entire war on terrorism is linked to this issue, whether
we like it or not.
We are the
most powerful nation in the world. With that comes some added
responsibility. We have a responsibility to help prevent an entire region
from igniting in violence.
The other
aspect of this that tends to get overlooked is Israel’s approach to the
Palestinians seems to depend to a certain extent on the extent of our
involvement in the region. When we are involved they feel a sense of
security that might not otherwise be there. Their sense of security surely
determines not only their aggressiveness but their willingness to
compromise.
What can we
possibly do?
We can
engage both sides. We won’t solve the Middle East problem, but we can
keep both sides talking. Talking is movement and movement reduces
violence. When I was a kid there was always this fact or myth—I still
don’t know which—floating around about sharks: If they stop moving
they die. I feel the same way about the Middle East. In a place where
death and revenge goes back centuries, inertia breeds violence.
Ultimately,
I think there are some hard realities that may not sit well with people.
Talks will have to begin with or without a cease-fire. It seems absurd,
but it is hard to imagine waiting for a cease-fire. There are too many
people willing to derail the process, if only out of spite for the other
side. Perhaps Sharon has control of his military, but I doubt now that
Arafat has control of the more radical Palestinian factions. He may have
at one time, but that time is past. Waiting for a seven day cease-fire
would be foolish.
Another
hard reality is that some sort of international peace-keeping force will
eventually have to go to the area. And U.S. forces will have to be
involved. It would be naïve to think otherwise.
A
Palestinian state will have to come into existence. There are 3 million
Palestinians out there. They can’t be ignored. They need to have a
recognized home, and until they do this conflict will never be resolved.
Most of the
international community considers an Israeli pullout from the West Bank
and Gaza strip—territories occupied by Palestinians—to be a
prerequisite to peace.
By the same
token, Israel needs to have its security guaranteed, whether by the U.S.
or the U.N. Until they feel secure, they will continue to wreck havoc on
the Palestinians. And as they do, many more Palestinians will strap
explosives to their waists and hope to kill as many people in their wake
as possible.
And what
Israel surely must know is they will not stop the violence hog-tying
Arafat. He has made monumental mistakes, has lied through the years, has
overstepped the bounds of what we would consider a civilized leader. But
to hold out for a more principled leader is to wait for many more innocent
people to be killed.