Israel Has Made the U.S., Its “Best Friend in the Middle East,” Irrelevant

By Delinda C. Hanley

Five months after the Annapolis peace summit, construction of Israel’s illegal Ma’ale Hazeitim settlement in East Jerusalem’s Ras al-Amoud neighborhood continued, April 28, 2008 (AFP Photo/Ahmad Gharabli).

THROUGHOUT its history Israel has regarded all U.N. resolutions critical of the Jewish state as irrelevant. Prime Minister Ariel Sharon frequently called Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat irrelevant. Israel ignored the Saudi peace initiative originally floated in 2002 and unanimously approved by Arab states on March 28, 2007. This Arab generous offer of normalization and peace also was deemed irrelevant—as was Hamas’ smashing election victory on Jan. 25, 2006. Israel has closed all crossings into and out of Gaza for a year, because the suffering of Gazan civilians is irrelevant.

It is now increasingly clear that Israel also sees the United States—its benefactor to the tune of $3 billion a year, its steadfast friend—as irrelevant.

Condoleezza Rice has so far visited the Middle East 21 times as secretary of state and Israel has consistently pulled the red carpet out from under her and made her government look foolish. On the eve of Rice’s June 14 arrival, the Interior Ministry announced plans to build 1,300 new housing units in Ramat Shlomo, an occupied area of the West Bank that Israel considers part of Jerusalem.

Since the renewal of peace talks in Annapolis Israel has given the green light to build more than 3,000 housing units in the portion of the Holy City which Palestinians claim as their future capital. The Jerusalem Municipality also approved a city plan to build tens of thousands of new apartments over the next 12 years.

Israel has disregarded U.S. pressure to dismantle roadblocks and outposts in the West Bank, and has flouted U.S. requests to approve travel papers for Gazan students who have won Fulbright scholarships to study in the U.S. To put it bluntly, Israel has ignored every U.S. attempt, however feeble, to make peace before President George W. Bush leaves office.

That being the case, Israel bewildered American supporters when, just days after President Bush returned from celebrating Israel’s birthday, it launched a whirlwind of peace talks with Syria, Lebanon, and Hamas. These talks bypassed the White House, which has consistently refused to engage Syria, Hezbollah or Hamas. After Israel’s repeated protestations that it would never negotiate with what it describes as terrorists, what happened? It’s hard not to be skeptical of Israel’s motives.

On June 18, the eve of the Gaza cease-fire painstakingly brokered by Egypt, including Israel’s promise to gradually ease the crippling siege on Gaza, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert proclaimed the truce was likely to be short-lived, declaring, “Hamas and the other terrorist organizations have not changed and have not become patrons of peace. These are contemptible and bloodthirsty terrorists.”

Hamas announced on the first day of the truce, June 19, that any Israeli infraction would meet with an immediate response. Within minutes an Israeli warship fired shells into the waters off Gaza City, but the action provoked no response from Hamas or Islamic Jihad fighters. Israeli helicopters and tanks conducted highly visible provocative patrols along the Gaza borders. No response. It was Israel’s June 24 assassination of Islamic Jihad commander Tarek Juma and a bystander in the West Bank town of Nablus that prompted Islamic Jihad to launch three rockets into southern Israel. Hamas said it remained committed to a cease-fire, but Israel obviously never was.

Meanwhile Israel apparently is engaged in a Turkish initiative to make peace with Syria, and to resolve the issue of who owns the Golan Heights, which Israel seized in the 1967 war. On yet another track, Germans are helping Israel negotiate a prisoner swap, to facilitate the return of two Israeli soldiers held by Hezbollah. Israel also is aiming for an agreement with Hezbollah that it refrain from shelling Israel from Lebanon and strike a deal with Lebanon over the Shebaa Farms.

Skeptical observers in Tel Aviv and elsewhere believe this flurry of negotiations represents Israeli efforts to isolate Iran from its traditional allies before a possible military strike on Iran’s alleged nuclear program. If Israel can neutralize Hamas to the south and Hezbollah to the north, the theory goes, its northern and southern flanks would be protected against retaliation in the event of an attack on Iran.

The June 20 New York Times reported that Israel had carried out a major military exercise over the Mediterranean Sea in the first week of June that appeared to be a rehearsal for a possible attack on Iran.

Other Israeli analysts suspect that Olmert’s uncharacteristic diplomatic moves are simply an attempt to divert attention from a corruption investigation that could force him from power.

Whatever the real motivation behind Israel’s game plan, the United States (Israel’s favorite “even-handed” peace broker) is conspicuously absent from the field. In fact, thanks to Israel’s efforts to prod Washington to wage war on Iraq, Iran and ”terrorism” at home and abroad, the United States is quickly becoming irrelevant around the world. It was Qatar, after all, not the United States, which brokered a deal in Lebanon to prevent a new Lebanese civil war.

Delinda C. Hanley is news editor of the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs.