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| Volume XII, Fall 2005, Number 3 |
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BOOK REVIEW
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Peace Process: American Diplomacy and the Arab-Israeli Conflict since 1967, Third Edition,, by William B. Quandt. Brookings Institution Press and University of California Press, 2005. xi 535 , with notes, selected bibliography and index. $45.00, hardcover.
Thomas R. Mattair
Consultant to government and business
The third edition of William Quandt’s well-known book is a comprehensive review and analysis
of American Arab-Israeli policy from 1967 to 2004. As in the previous editions, Quandt pays
sufficient attention to the importance of international politics, domestic politics and bureaucratic
politics in shaping American foreign policy, but stresses the importance of the thinking of the
president and his top advisers. Quandt has used some new documentary material on the 1967 and
1973 wars. He has rewritten the Clinton chapters based on recent accounts by Clinton, Madeleine
Albright, Dennis Ross and others, including Robert Malley. As in the second edition, the reader is
directed to the web for appendixes. This review concentrates on the Clinton and Bush II years. A
review of the first edition covering the Johnson through Bush I years was published in this journal
in Volume II, 1993, Number 2.
In the chapter on Clinton’s first term, Quandt notes that Dennis Ross and Martin Indyk were
the “intellectual architects” of the administration’s policy, and that both were associated with the
pro-Israeli Washington Institute for Near East Policy and were considered to be admirers of Israel’s
prime minister, Yitzhak Rabin. Thus, as the administration shepherded the Madrid peace process
along, Quandt writes, they “firmly sided with the Israelis, insisting that small practical steps needed
to be taken first (confidence-building measures), to be followed by agreement on a transitional
period, and only later on the final-status issues that were uppermost in the minds of Palestinians.”
Quandt comments that these negotiations “would proceed without an explicit understanding of
where they were headed.”
On the question of the extent of the administration’s involvement in the 1993 Oslo Accord
between Israel and the PLO, Quandt writes that it was “the first Arab-Israeli agreement since 1967
to be negotiated without significant involvement by the United States.” The Americans made only
“modest” contributions to the May 1994 Cairo Accord on implementation of the Oslo agreement,
setting a five-year interim timetable in motion, and to the 1994 Jordanian-Israeli peace agreement.
After unsuccessful Israeli-Syrian talks, Israel then engaged with the PLO to produce the Oslo II
agreement in September 1995, which called for phased withdrawals of Israeli forces from three
zones of the West Bank over several years and for elections of a Palestinian Authority and
president in January 1996.
Quandt’s conclusion regarding the Israeli-Syrian talks is that “one sees little sign of an
American effort to persuade either [Syrian President Hafiz] Asad or Rabin to cast aside their normal
caution and go for broke.” On Israeli-Palestinian talks “it was as if Clinton had no views of his own,
or as if the United States had no independent national interest at stake ....” He writes that
“Clinton’s unwillingness to take any steps that might be seen as undermining Rabin was perhaps
understandable and was certainly consistent with the views of Ross and Indyk,” that it was also a
response to the pro-Israeli Republican-led Congress, and that it might even have worked had Rabin
not been assassinated.
It did not work with the Likud party’s Benjamin Netanyahu, an opponent of the Oslo Accords,
who became Israel’s new prime minister in May 1996. He refused to implement Israel’s agreement to
withdraw from most of Hebron unless it was renegotiated. The Americans helped negotiate a new
agreement, but Netanyahu would not sign an agreement that committed Israel to withdrawal, so
Ross wrote a “Note for the Record” delineating Israel’s obligations under Oslo II, and Secretary of
State Warren Christopher wrote a letter expressing his understanding of Israel’s commitments.
Quandt’s take on how this note and letter would be used by Netanyahu is that “the Palestinian
population would remain in enclaves surrounded by Israeli security forces, Palestinian islands in an
Israeli sea. This was quite different from the image of a Palestinian sea with Israeli islands (the
Israeli settlements under Israeli military protection) that the Labor party had seemingly held out as
the likely outcome in the West Bank ....” The essence of the October 1998 Wye Agreement was this:
“Palestinians committed themselves to further steps on security and revocation of parts of the
National Charter; Israel undertook to make a series of gradual withdrawals as Palestinians carried
out their side of the bargain.... The whole process would take several months, after which the
parties would begin final-status talks.” Israel did withdraw from a small area in the West Bank and
turn it over to Palestinian control, but Netanyahu soon suspended implementation.
When Ehud Barak became Israel’s new prime minister in May 1999, he told Clinton that he
wanted to defer Israeli redeployment agreed upon at Wye and that he was not prepared to re-affirm
Rabin’s commitment to Israeli withdrawal to the June 4, 1967, line on the Syrian front. Quandt
writes, “Clinton, eager to adapt to Barak’s preferences, quickly restated that the United States
sought only to be a facilitator, helping the parties to reach agreement, but not seeking to impose its
views.” In an effort to revive Wye, Albright was “handmaiden” to the September 1999 agreement at
Sharm al-Sheikh. But the emphasis was on Israeli-Syrian talks, which, Quandt shows, failed when
Barak would not agree to the June 4, 1967, lines. Barak did withdraw from south Lebanon in May
2000.
Quandt’s account of the administration’s efforts on final-status issues during its last year in
office is of special interest. Barak wanted a summit with the Palestinians, but “Arafat was skeptical,
arguing that the parties needed a few more weeks of preparatory talks.” When Camp David II did
convene in July, Ross proposed an American draft, but Barak rejected it and Clinton sided with
Barak. Arafat offered a concession on territory, and Clinton elicited a constructive counterproposal
from Barak, but when the Palestinians asked questions, “the Americans did little to engage them.”
Arafat then said no.
Quandt’s analysis is that it was “not so much that Clinton mishandled the negotiations..., but
that so little time in the preceeding seven years had been used to lay the basis for the substantive
discussion of the issues that finally came into focus at the summit.”
The Clinton team then thought of presenting its own ideas but held back when the second
intifada broke out, “lest it appear that they were acting in response to the violence.” But they
convened a summit in Sharm al-Sheikh in October and announced that Barak and Arafat would try
to end the violence. When Clinton subsequently presented American proposals on final-status
issues, prospects looked good. Arafat wrote a letter asking for clarifications. In a footnote, Quandt
writes that “Ross makes no mention of this letter in his book. Albright ... mischaracterizes its
content and describes it as totally negative.” Arafat then raised some objections, particularly
regarding refugees, in a meeting with Clinton, and Clinton responded negatively.
In analyzing why Clinton did not succeed, Quandt examines his character, domestic politics,
the assumptions underpinning his policy, and the responsibility of the regional parties. Regarding
Clinton’s character, Quandt notes “his inability to take a firm stand with either party, especially the
politically potent Israelis.” When Quandt considers domestic politics, he writes that “Congress and
domestic politics were no doubt an impediment to Clinton’s Middle East policy, but he came
nowhere close to testing the limits of the possible or engaging in an effort to ease the constraints
under which any president must operate in dealing with Congress.” As for the assumptions,
Quandt writes that these “seemed to assume that the United States had only a modest stake of its
own; that time was on the side of peace; and that the United States could do little to accelerate the
ripening process by adding to the calculus of gain and loss for the parties to the conflict.” Regarding
the regional parties: “It is always easy to blame the lack of progress in the Arab-Israeli peace
process on the intransigence of the parties themselves: but there have been breakthroughs in the
face of this when presidents and their teams have been better mediators.” These are serious
criticisms of Clinton, Ross and Indyk, and this last point in particular seems a comment on Ross’s
consistent argument that Arafat was to blame.
Quandt’s chapter on Bush II is relatively brief. Quandt notes the neoconservatives’ agenda of
U.S. dominance, promoting regime change and backing Israel. He also notes that Vice-President
Dick Cheney said that Clinton advised them that Arafat was to blame for the failure of the peace
talks. Quandt quotes excerpts from an NSC meeting that indicate that Bush accepted the
neoconservative view and Clinton’s assessment, despite warnings from moderate Secretary of
State Colin Powell. The Bush team offered mild endorsements of the April 2001 Mitchell Report and
of the Tenet plan, but the escalation of Palestinian violence motivated Bush, perhaps on Powell’s
urging, to call in June for an “all out effort” for peace.
In the aftermath of September 11, however, the administration’s priority was the war against
terrorism, with al-Qaeda and the Taliban the first targets. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld
and his neoconservative undersecretary, Paul Wolfowitz, and other neoconservatives disagreed
with Powell’s argument that Israeli-Palestinian progress was also an important part of the war on
terror and would help the United States build a coalition including Arabs and other Muslims.
Neoconservatives even made the argument “that Islamic extremism was not fed by differences with
the United States over policy,” an argument that Quandt rightly dismisses. Instead, they also
wanted to target Iraq. Bush agreed with Rumsfeld, Cheney and the neoconservatives, but did work
with Powell to outline a vision of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, helping
build some Arab and Muslim support for the war on terror. This culminated in Bush’s UN speech,
but it waned after the United States seemed to win a victory in Afghanistan.
Bush’s State of the Union speech in January 2002 did not even mention Israeli-Palestinian
diplomacy, focusing instead on threats from the “Axis of Evil.” After the Karine-A episode [interdiction
of a ship allegedly running guns to the Palestinians], Bush consented to Israeli Prime
Minister Ariel Sharon’s reoccupying most of the West Bank, crushing the second intifada and
isolating Arafat, despite Powell’s misgivings and despite Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah’s initiative
for peace. In June, Bush called for a new and different Palestinian leadership and for it to repress
terror before Washington would support the establishment of a Palestinian state. He concentrated
instead on making the arguments for confronting Saddam. But he did accede to Powell’s efforts to
develop UN and coalition support, through renewed weapons inspections in Iraq and through
developing a “Roadmap” for a two-state solution involving Palestinian reform and supported by
the Quartet (the United States, Russia, the EU and the United Nations).
Obviously, in a book about American Arab-Israeli policy, any connection between Israel and
the war in Iraq should be addressed. Quandt’s analysis is that, “although Israel’s security was
certainly one of the reasons for going to war with Iraq, particularly for staunch Zionists like [Elliott]
Abrams [of the NSC] and [Douglas] Feith [of the Defense Department], it was never mentioned
publicly by Bush or his inner circle. And it did no good to support in Europe or the Arab and
Muslim world for the coming attack on Iraq to look like a gift to Israel.” Some did argue publicly,
however, that “the road to Jerusalem runs through Baghdad,” i.e. that the demise of Saddam’s
regime would make it easier to achieve Arab-Israeli peace. And on the eve of the war, the Palestinian
Authority did institute some reform by creating the position of prime minister and appointing
Mahmud Abbas/Abu Mazin to it. Thus, after quickly toppling Saddam’s regime, Bush attended a
summit with Abu Mazin and Sharon. But Quandt argues that the Roadmap’s delineation of phases
was “totally unrealistic,” and notes that a cease-fire was the “prerequisite” for the rest of the
Roadmap.
When a cease-fire could not be achieved, Bush supported Sharon’s unilateral disengagement
plan, involving Israeli construction of a separation barrier that in some areas protrudes deeply into
West Bank territory; Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, with Gaza preferably remaining surrounded
for Israel’s security; and the consolidation of Israeli settlements in the West Bank for the
sake of possible Israeli retention of about half of the West Bank. Bush’s support was provided to
Sharon in an April 2004 letter saying that Israel would not have to return to the 1967 lines and
would not have to accept the return of refugees. Quandt notes that this was the first time these
were actually stated as U.S. policy. Moreover, Bush soon “let it be known that the freeze on
settlement activity called for in the Roadmap (and earlier, in the Mitchell Report) was not meant to
be taken literally. The American position was now defined as tolerance for some continued building
— especially in those large settlement blocks that Israel could expect to keep in the West Bank —
provided that the outward expansion of the settlements was limited.” This meant that Bush was
signaling his acceptance of Israeli retention of substantial areas of the West Bank. He also continued
to promote neoconservative ideas of regime change and democratization, with the particular
intention of pushing Palestinian political reform.
“It is hard to avoid the conclusion,” Quandt writes, “that Bush was in part motivated by
domestic political considerations and the lack of any breakthrough in Iraq” during the 2004 reelection
year. After his re-election and after Arafat’s death, Bush said he would spend some
“political capital” on a two-state solution, but that he wanted a demonstration of Palestinian
commitment to democracy first.
In his conclusion about the Bush administration, Quandt writes that “American policy, except
for some rhetorical flourishes in favor of a Palestinian state, had shifted to an unprecedented
degree of support for a Likud-led government.... Rarely had any president gone so far in subcontracting
American policy to an Israeli leader.” Quandt argues that this has a bearing on Muslim
perceptions of America. Notwithstanding neoconservative claims, he notes that “there is considerable
evidence from public-opinion polls to show that Arabs and Muslims are deeply hostile to
American policies — more than to American values — and that heading the list of those policies is
the perceived bias toward Israel.”
And, Quandt writes, this has a bearing on the issue of terrorism. “No doubt bin Laden’s
motives for attacking the United States go well beyond a concern for the Palestinians,” he writes.
“But certainly some of the passive support for Muslim extremism and some of the recruits who
flock to al-Qaeda must be understood to be a result of the Israeli-Palestinian crisis and the United
States’ image as biased and hypocritical.” Thus, he argues, “a serious effort to establish peace in
the eastern Mediterranean should be one strand of a comprehensive strategy to combat Islamic
extremism....”
In his concluding section on the prospects for peace, Quandt writes that the Roadmap is not
enough and that “the time has come to spell out the destination.” He then offers his ideas, arguing
that Israelis, Palestinians and neighboring Arab states would be likely to accept them, and arguing
that Israeli-Syrian agreement must also be pursued. Moreover, “Countries like Egypt, Jordan, and
Saudi Arabia, perhaps even Syria, might be more willing to cooperate with the United States in Iraq
if they saw a credible American initiative for peace in the Arab-Israeli arena. Even the goal of
democratization might be helped....” Without such a U.S. effort, he fears, the chances for a two-
state solution and for stability and democracy in the region will be bleak.
Quandt’s work on this subject, including this third edition, is probably the most readable,
comprehensive, thoroughly researched, dispassionate, honest, fair, and yet critical, account we have.
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