Lessons for Israel from the Failed Peace Talks

Abraham H. Miller   5-12-14

Over the past two weeks, Israeli National Security Adviser Yossi Cohen sent letters to the White House and European leaders outlining the deceptive Palestinian strategy to exploit the peace talks for short-run, tangible benefits with no intention of achieving peace.  

Accompanying the letters is a 65-page internal Palestinian document from Chief Negotiator Saeb Erekat to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas recommending that the Palestinians do an end run and move forward to join fifteen international organizations. The foundation and impetus for the current round of talks ensued from an agreement that the Palestinians would not go ahead on this front. 

Erekat also recommended that the talks not extend beyond Kerry’s deadline, guaranteeing their demise.

While the Palestinians danced before the international media to the tune of peace, once out of the glare of the cameras’ lights, they were telling their own people that the talks were only being engaged in to obtain the release of Palestinian prisoners -- many with innocent blood on their hands.

The strategy worked. Despite anguished outcries from the families of terrorist victims, Israel let dozens of terrorists return to a hero’s welcome in the Palestinian territories. They were showcased as role models for Palestinian children. Undoubtedly some of them will kill again, and some of the children they inspire will become future murderers.  

But the Palestinians’ biggest victory was the American administration’s placing blame for the failure of the talks on Israeli’s reluctance to release another batch of murderers to be lionized as heroes. The Israelis knew the Palestinians were playing charades, and if there was any doubt, the forged unity agreement, during the negotiations, between Fatah and the terrorist group, Hamas, confirmed Israel’s fears. 

Kerry’s capacity for showering blame on the Israelis reached obscene heights after the talks collapsed. His invoking the tired and worn Apartheid canard against Israel was not an error in judgment but a calculated act of mendacity befitting the man who deluded himself into believing that Israel ripped the Nobel Peace Prize from his hands.

Kerry also gave encouragement and legitimacy to the Palestinians whose public narrative is that the Israelis scuttled the talks, even though they themselves had no interest in their success.

Aside from the near impossibility of the talks succeeding, Kerry’s conduct further assured their failure.

He established a public deadline. He permitted the substance of the talks to leak. He openly condemned Israel as the talks were ongoing. He asked Israel to release prisoners with blood on their hands while demanding nothing from the Palestinians. He gave public testimony on the talks while they were in progress, blaming Israel as the world’s media captured and disseminated his remarks.

After the talks collapsed, Kerry had an apoplectic fit furiously denouncing Israel while joyfully contemplating the inevitable creation of yet another Judenrein dictatorship that will be dominated by thugs and kleptomaniacs allied with zealots posing as ambassadors of the Almighty. Not once, did Kerry address the incongruity of negotiating with an entity whose political infrastructure of corruption, authoritarianism, and manufactured hatred made it devoid of legitimacy among its own people and incapable of implementing anything except the division of the next Western aid package among its cronies.

The faux negotiations cost Israel dearly, but they cost America even more because no Middle East government could ignore that the Obama administration jettisoned Israel as easily as it helped topple Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and as quickly as it betrayed the interests of both the Saudis and the Emirates in its pursuit of a nuclear deal with Iran that everyone knows will be ultimately breached.

The strongest lesson for Israel is that  a weak president, dismissed by his adversaries (witness Russian President Vladimir Putin’s imperialistic behavior), no longer trusted by his allies, and a man who has added the word “pink line” to the vocabulary of international relations will ultimately be incapable of enforcing any agreement.   

If the Americans conclude an agreement with Iran, who will enforce it when it is inevitably broken?  Can Israel trust its security to the incompetent, indecisive, puerile Barack Obama, whose true feelings toward the Jewish state were exposed by the conduct of his secretary of state?

The president has more than answered that question.  All the remains is for Israel to listen carefully and act accordingly.

Abraham H. Miller is an emeritus professor of political science, University of Cincinnati.  He has also served on the faculty of the University of California, Davis and the University of Illinois, Urbana.

 The ‘peace process’ – failure foretold

(Part I) By MARTIN SHERMAN   5-8-14

EDITED EXCERPT 

Martin Sherman is the founder and executive director of the Israel Institute for Strategic Studies.

Between the River and the Sea there will exist either exclusive Jewish sovereignty or exclusive Arab sovereignty. This is not right-wing extremism or religious fanaticism, merely sound political science.

 Maj.-Gen. (res.) Giora Eiland, former head of the National Security Council,  remarked, half a decade ago: “The maximum any Israeli government can offer is less than the minimum any Palestinian leader can accept. The real gap between the sides is much greater than perceived, and that gap is growing.”

The validity and viability of the paradigm that has dominated the discourse – the two-state land-for-peace approach – is being questioned by mainstream pundits across the political spectrum.

Thus in 2007, Maj.-Gen. Uzi Dayan, formerly deputy chief of staff and head of the National Security Council, observed: “The land for- peace idea has now collapsed.

We have to find another way, and a new concept is urgently needed.”

Echoing  the same sentiments,  left-wing pundit Prof. Carlo Strenger wrote in Haaretz: “It is time to have a clear-headed, hard look at reality: The two state solution is dead.

WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?”

There is no way to arrive at a stable geo-political configuration that involves dividing the sovereignty over this territory between Jews and Arabs And let me stress, I make this determination as a political scientist – not a as religious fundamentalist or radical right-wing ideologue.

 To understand the reasons for, and the nature of, the impasse, we need to recognize that for Israel to survive over time as the nationstate of the Jewish people, it must contend with two vital imperatives: 

The Geographic Imperative :

The Demographic Imperative.

In addressing these two imperatives, Israel faces two mortal dangers:

 The two-state paradigm – which does not address the Geographic Imperative; 

The one-state paradigm – which does not address the Demographic Imperative.

Not ‘right-wing scaremongering’ 

The visuals distributed to the JNF audience prior to my{Martin Sherman} address (“Israel: Through the binoculars of a Palestinian intelligence officer”), clearly illustrate why the two-state proposal would make Israel geographically untenable.

Not only would the width of the country – in its most populous areas – be reduced to a minuscule 15-25 km. (roughly the distance from Beverly Hills to Malibu along Sunset Boulevard), but these would be completely dominated topographically by the limestone hills that comprise the “West Bank” and rise above it from the east. Any forces – regular or irregular – deployed on their western slopes, will command: 

• Virtually all major airfields in the country (civilian and military), including the only international airport; 

• Major sea ports and naval bases; 

• The fresh water system; 

• Main land transportation axes (road and rail); 

• Principal power plants; 

• The nation’s parliament;

• Crucial centers of government and military command; 

• Eighty percent of the civilian population and the commercial activity in the country.

In any two-state scenario, all of the above would be in range of weapons being used today from areas already transferred to Arab control. This can therefore no longer be dismissed as right-wing scaremongering, for it is merely a prudent extrapolation of the empirical precedent.

In Part II 

( next week), I shall deal with the remaining topics raised in my address: 

• The Arab Spring as a threat multiplier 

• The irrelevance of assumed Palestinian “sincerity” 

• The Hamas-Fatah rapprochement 

• The one-state paradigm – A precursor to Muslim tyranny 

• Mirror images of desperation: Proposals for unilateral withdrawal vs unilateral annexation/enfranchisement of Arab residents in Judea-Samaria 

• My assessment of what Netanyahu is liable to do 

• My assessment of what Netanyahu ought to do 

I will end next week’s column with the very same words with which I end this one:

 In the final analysis, between the River and the Sea there will exist either exclusive Jewish sovereignty or exclusive Arab sovereignty.

The side that will prevail, is the side whose national will is the stronger and whose political vision is the sharper.

This is not right-wing extremism or religious fanaticism.

It is merely sound political science.

EXPLAINING THE MIDDLE EAST ARAB -ISRAELI MIDDLE EAST CONFLICT

This presentation is straightforward. However, it's distributor to the military/educational site is a surprise.

Begin forwarded message:

From: "The White House" 

Date: May 6, 2014 

Subject: EXPLAINING THE MIDDLE EAST ARAB -ISRAELI MIDDLE EAST CONFLICT 

Reply-To: "The White House"

EXPLAINING THE MIDDLE EAST ARAB -ISRAELI MIDDLE EAST CONFLICT Is the problem really so complex? Who is willing to live in peace and who wants the other side dead?   Dennis Prager  explores the Middle East conflict and makes it perfectly obvious what lies at the bottom of the hostilities in the region. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8EDW88CBo-8#t=327 The White House • 1600 Pennsylvania Ave NW • Washington, DC 20500 • 202-456-1111

FROM THE ASHES OF THE ETZION BLOC    Nadav Shragai     5-4-14

"Queen has fallen," was the radio transmission from Aliza Feuchtwanger from the burning bunker at Kfar Etzion on May 13, 1948. "Queen" was the code name for the Etzion bloc. For about half a year, its defenders sacrificed their lives to hold their positions against larger and better-armed Arab forces, and on the verge of the war's end and the country's independence they could hold out no longer. "A desperate Masada-like battle is taking place in the village," Feuchtwanger told headquarters in Jerusalem in her final transmission. "The Arabs are everywhere. There are thousands of them." A few minutes later, she climbed onto the roof of the bunker and placed a white, blood-drenched sheet on the bunker's antenna to signal surrender.

The dozens of fighters who were still alive gathered in an empty lot adjacent to the school and old German monastery in order to surrender themselves and their weapons to the enemy, but their captors instead chose to slaughter them. Most were killed in a hail of bullets. A few managed to escape and survive. On that day, 127 fighters, men and women, some of them survivors of the Nazi death camps and ghettos, gave their lives. Only four, among them Feuchtwanger, lived to tell the story.

In total, 240 residents and fighters died in the battles for the Etzion bloc, of which Kfar Etzion was one of four communities at the time. Many of the fighters were taken captive by the Jordanians. The Knesset would subsequently make the fall of the Etzion bloc the date for Memorial Day for Fallen Soldiers. Few remember this fact today. The State of Israel rose amid the flames of the burning Etzion bloc. "Queen" fell, and a state rose.

Even fewer people remember that during the siege on the Etzion bloc, its defenders were not only busy protecting the communities, but also disrupting enemy movements toward Jerusalem. The Etzion fighters attacked enemy forces along the Jerusalem-Hebron road, the main artery connecting the Arab Legion and the armed gangs in Hebron to Jerusalem. Yohanan Ben-Yaakov, a researcher of the Etzion bloc's history, notes that at the beginning of May 1948, an Arab Legion officer fighting in the area said the Arab Legion had concluded that reaching and conquering Jerusalem would be impossible as long as the Etzion bloc remained in the way. The Etzion bloc, therefore, became the de facto forward position for the defense of Jerusalem, and essentially sacrificed itself so that Jerusalem could remain in Jewish hands.

David Ben-Gurion recognized this and would later write: "I can think of no battle in the annals of the Israel Defense Forces which was more magnificent, more tragic or more heroic than the struggle for [the Etzion bloc] …If there exists a Jewish Jerusalem, our foremost thanks go to the defenders of [the Etzion bloc]."

Indeed, despite waging a battle for their very survival, the Etzion fighters also fought for the survival of Jerusalem. They captured outposts at the Russian Monastery and at Hirbet Sawir, laid mines and roadblocks, and ambushed vehicles and Arab Legion convoys.

Moshe ("Mush") Zilberschmidt, the commander of the Etzion bloc who was killed in a battle for the Russian Monastery, coined the phrase that would guide the Etzion fighters throughout their ordeals -- "Netzach Yerushalayim" (Eternal of Jerusalem). One of his subordinates, who was also killed in the fighting, wrote the following last words to his loved ones: "I don't know if we will prevail, regardless our dear children will be free citizens in a free homeland, and for this we are prepared to fight ... this is Jerusalem's forward position. We are defending its walls."

In 1967, the descendants of the Etzion bloc defenders returned home. The second generation re-established Kibbutz Kfar Etzion, and later Alon Shvut, Rosh Tzurim and Bat Ayin. Today, the Etzion bloc includes 20 communities that are home to some 20,000 people, alongside Efrat and Beitar Illit with their additional 60,000 residents. "The lone oak," a vestige of the original Etzion bloc, is no longer alone but remains a lasting symbol of its fight for survival to this day.

The residents of the Etzion bloc have done well to navigate themselves to the epicenter of Zionist consensus, which does not even consider relinquishing it again. Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon's holiday gift -- expanding its area by another 1,000 dunams (247 acres) -- is a more than fitting tribute to those who fought, died and rebuilt.

US officials: Even if Israel doesn’t like it, Palestinians will get state

In anonymous briefing to top columnist Nahum Barnea,  members of Kerry’s team slam Netanyahu, empathize with Abbas, warn Palestine will rise ‘whether through violence or via int’l organizations’

BY TIMES OF ISRAEL STAFF

American officials directly involved in the failed Israeli-Palestinian peace process over the last nine months gave a leading Israeli columnist a withering assessment of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s handling of the negotiations, indicated that Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has completely given up on the prospect of a negotiated solution, and warned Israel that the Palestinians will achieve statehood come what may — either via international organizations or through violence.

Speaking on condition of anonymity to Nahum Barnea, a prominent columnist from Israel’s best-selling daily Yedioth Aharonoth, the officials highlighted Netanyahu’s ongoing settlement construction as the issue “largely to blame” for the failure of Secretary of State John Kerry’s July 2013-April 2014 effort to broker a permanent peace accord.

They made plain that US President Barack Obama had been prepared to release spy-for-Israel Jonathan Pollard to salvage the talks. And they warned that “the world will not keep tolerating the Israeli occupation.”

Barnea, who described his conversations with the American officials as “the closest thing to an official American version of what happened” in the talks, said the secretary is now deciding whether to wait a few months and try to renew the negotiating effort or to publicize the US’s suggested principles of an agreement.

Detailing how the US sought to solve disputes over the core issues of a two-state solution, Barnea wrote on Friday that, “Using advanced software, the Americans drew a border outline in the West Bank that gives Israel sovereignty over some 80 percent of the settlers that live there today. The remaining 20 percent were meant to evacuate. In Jerusalem, the proposed border is based on Bill Clinton’s plan — Jewish neighborhoods to Israel, Arab neighborhoods to the Palestinians.”

He quoted the Americans saying that while the Israeli government made no response to the American plan, and also failed to draw its own border outline, Abbas agreed to the US-suggested border outline.

The Americans said they had intended to begin the nine-month negotiating period with an Israeli announcement of a settlement freeze. But this proved impossible, an American official was quoted saying, “because of the current makeup of the Israeli government, so we gave up… We didn’t realize [that] continuing construction allowed ministers in [Netanyahu's] government to very effectively sabotage the success of the talks. There are a lot of reasons for the peace effort’s failure, but people in Israel shouldn’t ignore the bitter truth: the primary sabotage came from the settlements. The Palestinians don’t believe that Israel really intends to let them found a state when, at the same time, it is building settlements on the territory meant for that state. We’re talking about the announcement of 14,000 housing units, no less. Only now, after talks blew up, did we learn that this is also about expropriating land on a large scale. That does not reconcile with the agreement.

“At this point, it’s very hard to see how the negotiations could be renewed, let alone lead to an agreement,” the Americans continued. “Towards the end, Abbas demanded a three-month freeze on settlement construction. His working assumption was that if an accord is reached, Israel could build along the new border as it pleases. But the Israelis said no.”

The Americans told Barnea that, in contrast to the hitherto unclear reports of whether the US was prepared to release American-Israeli spy Pollard to salvage the talks from collapse in recent weeks, Obama was willing “to prepare for Jonathan Pollard’s release. Such a move wouldn’t have helped his popularity in the American security system… There was a massive effort on our part to pull the wagon out of the deep quicksand it was stuck in. But the reality here hit us hard. Neither side had a sense of urgency. Kerry was the only one who felt a sense of urgency, and that was not enough.”

One bitter American official told Barnea, “I guess we need another intifada to create the circumstances that would allow progress.”

A third intifada, the Americans made clear, “would be a tragedy. The Jewish people are supposed to be smart; it is true that they’re also considered a stubborn nation. You’re supposed to know how to read the map: In the 21st century, the world will not keep tolerating the Israeli occupation. The occupation threatens Israel’s status in the world and threatens Israel as a Jewish state.”

Pressed by Barnea on perceived international hypocrisy over Israel’s presence in the West Bank, when the world “closes its eyes to China’s takeover of Tibet, it stutters at what Russia’s doing to Ukraine,” the Americans were quoted as responding: ”Israel is not China. It was founded by a UN resolution. Its prosperity depends on the way it is viewed by the international community.”

The American officials described to Barnea what they called Abbas’s loss of trust in the talks and in Netanyahu, and how his skepticism hardened as settlement-building continued, and as Israel demanded complete security control over the territories. From Abbas’s point of view, the Americans told Barnea, the sense was “that nothing was going to change on the security front. Israel was not willing to agree to time frames; its control of the West Bank would continue forever. Abbas reached the conclusion that there was nothing for him in such an agreement. He’s 79 years old. He has reached the last chapter of his life. He’s tired. He was willing to give the process one final chance, but found, according to him, that he has no partner on the Israeli side. His legacy won’t include a peace agreement with Israel.

“In February, Abbas arrived at a Paris hotel for a meeting with Kerry. He had a lingering serious cold. ‘I’m under a lot of pressure,’ he complained. ‘I’m sick of this.’ He rejected all of Kerry’s ideas. A month later, in March, he was invited to the White House. Obama presented the American-formulated principles verbally — not in writing. Abbas refused.”

Abbas, the officials told Barnea, had made concessions — in accepting that “Palestine” would be demilitarized; in agreeing to the US border outline that would see 80% of settlers coming under Israeli sovereignty, and in agreeing for Israel to retain control of sensitive security areas such as the Jordan Valley for five years.

“He also agreed that the Jewish neighborhoods in East Jerusalem would remain under Israeli sovereignty, and agreed that the return of Palestinians to Israel would depend on Israeli willingness,” the Americans said. “‘Israel won’t be flooded with refugees,’ he promised.”

In a rare attribution of some blame to Abbas, the Americans said they “couldn’t understand why it bothered him so much” to recognize Israel as a Jewish state. But here too, ultimately, the Americans were empathetic to Abbas: “The Palestinians came to the conclusion that Israel was pulling a nasty trick on them. They suspected there was an effort to get from them approval of the Zionist narrative.”

The final straw for Abbas was the late March announcement by Uri Ariel’s Housing and Construction Ministry of building tenders for more than 700 housing units in Jerusalem’s Gilo neighborhood. At that point, the Americans told Barnea, Abbas “lost interest. He turned to the reconciliation talks with Hamas and to the question of who would inherit his mantle.”

The Americans warned that, with the talks over, Israel might be facing “quite a problem. As of now, nothing is stopping the Palestinians from turning to the international community. The Palestinians are tired of the status quo. They will get their state in the end — whether through violence or by turning to international organizations.”

They also warned that if, as announced, Israel seeks “to impose economic sanctions on the Palestinians, it could boomerang. The West Bank economy will collapse, and then Abbas will say ‘I don’t want this anymore. Take this from me.’ There’s great potential for deterioration here, which could end with the dismantling of the Palestinian Authority. Israeli soldiers will have to administer the lives of 2.5 million Palestinians, to their mothers’ chagrin. The donating countries will stop paying up, and the bill of $3 billion a year will have to be paid by your Finance Ministry.”

Some of the warnings delivered by the Americans reflected a similar tone to that expressed by Obama in an interview he gave shortly before his last meeting with Netanyahu at the White House in March.

Israel can expect to face international isolation and possible sanctions from countries and companies across the world if Netanyahu fails to endorse a framework agreement with the Palestinians, Obama cautioned in an interview with Bloomberg at the time. If Netanyahu “does not believe that a peace deal with the Palestinians is the right thing to do for Israel, then he needs to articulate an alternative approach,” Obama said then. “There comes a point where you can’t manage this anymore, and then you start having to make very difficult choices,” he said

The president went on to condemn Israel’s settlement activities in the West Bank, and said that though his allegiance to the Jewish state was permanent, building settlements across the Green Line was counterproductive and would make it extremely difficult for the US to defend Israel from painful repercussions in the international community. “If you see no peace deal and continued aggressive settlement construction — and we have seen more aggressive settlement construction over the last couple years than we’ve seen in a very long time — if Palestinians come to believe that the possibility of a contiguous sovereign Palestinian state is no longer within reach, then our ability to manage the international fallout is going to be limited,” Obama warned.

MiG-35s for Egypt: A Veritable Change of Direction? 

Yiftah Shapir, Zvi Magen, Gal Perel      May 1, 2014 

  According to a number of media reports published in late April 2014, Egypt is soon to sign a large arms deal with Russia for the purchase of 24 MiG-35 fighter jets. If the arms deal is completed, it will represent a significant event in the Middle East strategic picture, another sign of reduced United States involvement in the region. For Russia, this would be a meaningful strategic achievement in its global struggle against the West. For Israel, one or two squadrons of aircraft such as the MiG-29 would not have much tactical significance. At the same time, the strategic significance could be decisive if the conflict between Russia and the West escalates and Russia gains an additional foothold in Egypt. However, the deal has not yet been signed, and there are many obstacles to its conclusion - technical, operational, economic, and most of all, political and strategic.

According to a number of media reports published in late April 2014, Egypt is soon to sign a large arms deal with Russia for the purchase of 24 MiG-35 fighter jets. Reports of contacts between Egypt and Russia have surfaced in recent months, particularly in November 2013 following the visit to Cairo by Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Defense Minister Sergey Shoygu, and in February 2014, when then-Egyptian Defense Minister Abdul Fattah al-Sisi visited Moscow. 

These earlier reports spoke of a much larger arms deal that would include air and coastal defense systems, Mi-35 attack helicopters, and fighter jets (actually the MiG-29). In addition, it was reported that the deals would be financed by Saudi Arabia and the UAE.

The MiG-35 was presented for the first time at an air show in India in 2007. It emerged from the older MiG-29 series, and its developers define it as a 4++ generation jet fighter. The advances in this model over its predecessor (MiG-29M/M2) include a modern information system, compatibility with Russian and Westernweapon systems, and a variety of integrated self-defense systems. The MiG-35 is intended as a multi-role aircraft with good capabilities in both air-to-air missions and precision attacks on ground targets in all types of weather. It will be equipped with Zhuk-AE radar, which is an active electronically scanned array (AESA) radar that is more advanced than the radar used in the MiG-29M/M2. Its engines will also be more advanced. The aircraft has not yet entered production, and the signing of the first contract for supply of the aircraft to the Russian air force has been postponed to 2016.

Egypt receives $1.3 billion a year in US aid, and since 1979, the Egyptian military has purchased primarily American equipment. At the same time, Cairo has in fact bought some weaponry or other defense equipment from other countries, including Russia (from which it purchased upgrades to its outdated air-defense systems). Moreover, relations with the United States have cooled since the start of the Arab Spring in Egypt. In August 2011, the United States canceled its participation in the bi-annual Bright Star military exercise because of the political situation in Egypt after President Mubarak’s ouster. And while in 2012, it continued to transfer in full the annual aid to Egypt, this situation changed after President Morsi was deposed in early July 2013. Although the United States supplied Egypt with four F-16s that month (from a deal signed in 2010 that included forty aircraft), the administration later announced that it was delaying shipment of four other F-16s. In October 2013, the US government announced its decision to “recalibrate” defense aid to Egypt and suspend part of it because of the US law prohibiting provision of weapons to regimes that came to power through a military coup. Inter alia, it was decided to stop delivery of the F-16, Apache helicopters, air defense systems, and the Abrams tank; once again the US canceled its participation in Bright Star. However, in April 2014, Washington gave permission for the Apaches to be delivered to Egypt – which followed the delivery of the first the first of four Ambassador fast missile craft to the Egyptian navy in November 2013. as planned.

The difficulty in receiving weapons from the United States could explain why Egypt approached Russia. Furthermore, it clearly shows that the Egyptian leadership is dissatisfied with US Middle East policy. At the same time, the reports on the latest deal raise a number of questions. 

First, on the technical side, beyond the fact that the MiG-35 is a model that has not yet entered production, the Russian technology culture is totally different from that of the United States. The Egyptian military, and the air force in particular, has undergone a complex, lengthy, and expensive transition since the 1980s from Soviet technology and a Soviet combat doctrine to American technology and doctrine. While Egypt continues to use a number of Russian-manufactured systems (in particular, air defense systems), the purchase of modern Russian aircraft will require a new logistical system that is separate from the system used for aircraft of American manufacture. This involves not only procurement of the planes, but also of new, unfamiliar weapon systems (including air-to-air missiles, air-to-ground missiles, and the like), and each such weapon system requires its own maintenance and training system. This is a long and expensive process, and the logic of embarking on it is questionable.

Second, since the start of the events of 2011, Egypt’s economy has declined, and it is doubtful whether Egypt has the ability to enter into expensive weapons deals. While it has been reported that the deals will be financed by Saudi Arabia or the UAE, there is room for doubt. Both of these countries have serious grievances against the United States and its policy in the region, and Saudi provision of aid to Egypt when the United States is threatening to stop its aid could well be perceived as defiance of the United States. Nonetheless, this is a far cry from Saudi willingness to fund a deal between Egypt and Russia, which is also a source of contention for Riyadh (especially because of Russia’s support for the Bashar Assad regime).

Third, although there is anger at the United States (and at President Obama in particular) and a desire to defy it, it is doubtful that Egypt would actually be prepared to cut off ties and give up US defense aid and weapons purchases from the United States. And finally, as of this time, reports of the arms deal (first published in Israel) have not been confirmed by Russian or Egyptian sources, nor have the prominent media outlets in Europe and the United States covered the story.

The Russian Dimension

Although the arms deal under discussion has much economic value in its own right, the clear Russian interest is in the political-strategic realm. This deal is a component of Russia’s overall effort to rehabilitate its status in the Middle East, which was greatly undermined during the Arab Spring -in Russia’s view, with active Western assistance, as part of the ongoing global conflict. Thus, Russia has increased efforts in the past year at rapprochement with Middle East countries, both those with which it had cooperative relations in the past and others as well. In the meantime, it is clear that Moscow has returned to “arms supply diplomacy.” There have been negotiations with Iraq for some time on comprehensive defense procurement; in talks with Lebanon and Jordan, Russia has even discussed the possibility of supplying Jordan with a nuclear reactor; a large arms deal was discussed between Russia and Saudi Arabia, despite basic disagreements between the two countries; and there has been talk of Saudi funding of possible purchases from Russia by other countries in the region.

Russia’s conduct in the Middle East has recently displayed certain changes because of the Ukrainian crisis, which is at the center of the international agenda and the main arena for the superpower conflict. At the same time, Russia has designated the Middle East as another front in its global struggle against the West, partly to balance pressures on it in Eastern Europe. In this context, increased Russian activity in Syria and possibly also in Iran is especially notable. In addition, Russia is expanding its operations elsewhere in the region and thus demonstrating its challenge of the West. Russia thus has a definite interest in the arms deal with Egypt, as it could significantly upgrade its international standing and serve as a worthy example for the other countries in the region for expanding cooperation.

Conclusion

If the arms deal between Egypt and Russia is completed, it will represent a significant event in the Middle East strategic picture, another sign of reduced United States involvement in the region. For Russia, this would be a meaningful strategic achievement in its global struggle against the West. For Israel, one or two squadrons of aircraft such as the MiG-29 would not have much tactical significance. At the same time, the strategic significance could be decisive if the conflict between Russia and the West escalates and Russia gains an additional foothold in Egypt.

However, the deal has not yet been signed, and there are many obstacles to its conclusion -technical, operational, economic, and most of all, political and strategic. The United States still has numerous tools to put pressure on Egypt and prevent the deal from taking place. Therefore, reports should be seen more as an alarm for decision makers in Washington than as the herald of a substantive strategic change.

Secret US-Hizballah Talks with Hassan Nasrallah? 04-29-2014

Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas' initiation of a unity pact with the Hamas extremists last week  was prompted by the direct contacts the Obama administration has secretly established with the Lebanese Hizballah. 

 Sources report that the Obama administration has carried over to Lebanon the doctrine set out by the late Richard Holbrooke for Afghanistan, whereby dialogue with Taliban should be made the centerpiece of Washington's strategy for US troop withdrawal. Holbrooke's influence on Secretary of State John Kerry dated back to his run for the presidency in 2004.

In Lebanese terms, Hizballah's Hassan Nasrallah has become the equivalent of Taliban's Mullah Mohammad. 

Hizballah has scored high in the Syrian war. Its military intervention on the side of Bashar Assad in the last year is credited with turning the Syrian army's fortunes around from near defeat in 2013 to partial triumph in key areas of Syria this year. Nasrallah is able to boast that his movement's commitment to the Syrian conflict is its central mission and will remain so until rebel and al Qaeda forces are finally vanquished.

What the Hizballah leader is trying to put across, in terms of the Holbrooke doctrine, is that like Mullah Omar in Afghanistan, he, Nasrallah, holds the key to resolving the Syrian civil war.

The Obama administration bought this premise and decided to apply it to broadening the rapidly progressing dialogue with Tehran to related areas. The plan developed in Washington was to seize the momentum of the nuclear track and ride it to a broad US-Iranian understanding that embraces a comprehensive nuclear accord with Tehran as well as understandings for resolving the Syrian and Lebanese questions.

Administration officials figure that Nasrallah heeds no one but the ayatollahs in Tehran. He may talk big but he knows that his fate is in the hands of his Iranian masters. If Iran decides it is time for him to go, it will be curtains for him. His involvement in the Syrian war is considered to be contingent on the strategic decisions of Iran's leaders. (He was a lot less confident in the winter of 2013 when Hizballah's home bases were being smashed in lethal suicide bombings.)

Iran also determines which weapons are supplied to the Hizballah units fighting in Syria, in which sectors they fight and how to respond to his pleas for reinforcements.

In Washington's view, Hizballah's involvement in the Syrian war has increased its leader's dependence on Tehran. He accordingly has little room for maneuver in contacts with US representatives and if he turns difficult, they are sure they can turn to Tehran to force him in line.

It is also believed in administration circles that the secret Saudi exchanges with Tehran  will eventually produce Riyadh's acceptance of Hizballah as a dominant factor in Syria and Lebanon.

However, many Middle East experts find the US take on Hizballah to be naive and simplistic and strongly doubt that the path it has chosen will bring Nasrallah - or Tehran - around to serving America's will or purposes. They draw a parallel with the underlying US assumptions which ultimately led the Palestinians-Israeli talks off track.

But expectations of the Hizballah track are high and strongly guide the actions of President Obama, John Kerry, National Security Advisor Susan Rice and CIA Director John Brennan. And so, in early March, the first secret rendezvous took place in Cyprus between CI

A officers and Hizballah intelligence and security operatives.

According to a number of Mid East intelligence sources, two such meetings have since been conducted and initial US-Hizballah understandings reached relating to the volatile situations in Syria and Lebanon.

 US Ambassador to Beirut David Hale has been in charge of preparing these meetings and implementing the understandings reached.