CAUX report

Report from Meeting in Caux

I attended: “The Middle East Peace Process: Breaking the Deadlock” in Caux, Switzerland in August, 2009. The Track 2 meeting was hosted by the Next Century Foundation and Caux Initiatives for Change with leading negotiators from the Middle East, Europe and the US. The meeting was arranged with a view to creating of forum for discussion, debate and the sharing of ideas regarding devising a lasting peace in the Middle East, focusing principally on Israel/Palestine; Iraq; and Iran.

The meeting consisted of plenary discussions with different speakers with particular expertise or experience opening the discussion before wider debate was opened to the floor. In addition, there were working groups which split the delegates into three smaller groups. Undoubtedly, these main events provided a neutral meeting place for parties from opposing sides and factions to converge and so allow unofficial breakaway meetings to take ok place in private.

The Prospects of a new US President

One of the motivating factors behind this meeting was the arrival of President Obama in the White House. Obama’s willingness to engage in dialogue with all parties in the Middle East and bring all sides to the negotiating table has served as an inspiration to many in the pursuit of a lasting peace in the region.

An expert in international relations speaking at the conference explained that Obama’s arrival in the White House has brought specific changes to the Middle East Process:

Firstly, with regard to the US Approach:

1. For the first time a peaceful solution in Israel/Palestinian has been named as being of US National Interest, especially as it was included as a key commitment in Obama’s election campaign.

2. Obama has a ‘regional approach’, which is different to the Bush/Cheney era. The logic being that if we can resolve the Israel/Palestinian issue then that will assist in defusing tension with Iran etc.

3. Obama does not pretend that the US can complete the challenge alone. He has stated that he needs the help, assistance and co-operation of other nations in the region.

4. He has stated a willingness to engage (almost) unconditionally – which is a step-change from the term of Bush & Cheney, which always included conditions and/or preconditions. This phase of Obama’s strategy is not an unending engagement however as he is not going to allow Iran to drag on forever – whilst they come closer to developing a functioning nuclear weapon.

5. Concerted Strategic Change – Obama’s special envoy to the Middle East, George Mitchell, declared that the Arab Peace Initiative (API) is now their policy also.

The Challenges in the Middle East that face the Obama administration:

1. Convincing each nation to do its share: - he has opened the challenge to the leaders of the Middle East: the US cannot fix the problem alone. The message is apparently “We are willing to help but you must do your bit”.

2. Getting the parties to listen and be sensitive to the other side’s story – e.g. it is not enough for the Arabs to accept that Israel is a fact of life, they should understand why Israel is there. The Israelis on the other hand have to understand that the Palestinians and the Arabs have real grievances.

3. Getting each side to say in public what they say to Obama in private. It is necessary to hear the truth from the parties’ representatives. Restoring the trust in countries with so much bloodshed and recriminations will be no mean feat.

ISRAEL/PALESTINE

Gaza – The Way Forward

Problems outlined included – The Impact and Isolation of Gaza – 1st in respect of the Isolation of Hamas:

    • Gaza & Hamas is nearly 100% dependant on international aid.
    • This has made Hamas more reliant on and so more linked with Iran, Syria and others.
    • The economy runs through the tunnels to Egypt not over the borders, thereby forcing legitimate business endeavours through illegal channels.
    • Isolation has radicalized the Hamas movement: isolating the more moderate advocates in Gaza and Hamas and strengthening the extremists.

One speaker urged the delegates not to judge Hamas by their rhetoric but by their actions and after living in Gaza for many months highlighted that the Gazans had managed surprisingly well given the restrictions currently placed on them.

Arab Peace Initiative Endorsed

All sides at the meeting were agreed that the Arab Peace Initiative was an important policy that needed to be implemented as a central pillar in the Middle East Peace Process. The problem before is that it had been misinterpreted in the US and Israel, some less open-minded people seeing the words ‘Arab’ and ‘Peace’ as an oxymoron, the perception of many in the US had been coloured by September 11 attacks, others struggled to welcome such an initiative at the time as it was during the height of the violence of the 2nd Intifada.

In addition to the implementation of the Arab Peace Initiative, solutions outlined were:

· Inter-Faith, cross-religion dialogue: encouraging and facilitating religious leaders from Israel and Palestine to share ideas.

· An international financial package (approx. $50 billion for the rehabilitation and compensation of Palestinian refugees and the compensation of Jewish refugees expulsed from Arab countries.

· A territorial Israeli-Palestinian accord along with solid security arrangements, thus providing for the establishment of a Palestinian State in provisional boundaries that continue the permanent status of negotiations on all core issues.

· Impose a clear, rigid and binding process of negotiations on the parties, while simultaneously assuring that all parties and constituencies undertake a process of education towards mindset transformation supportive of peace and reconciliation.

· Mediation between Fatah and Hamas so that there might be some understanding between the leadership of the Palestinian Areas.

· A Ceasefire – with enforcement mechanisms – to report and resolve violations.

IRAQ

The debate focused on the impact of the internal stability in Iraq on the security and stability of the wider Middle East. Regardless of the rights and wrongs of starting the war in Iraq, now the war has begun one impassioned delegate made the case for the US having a moral and legal duty to stay until the Iraqi government is stable enough to maintain security by itself. Fears run high that if the US and allied forces left Iraq without leaving a stable and secure government in power then Iran would take control, given that Iraq’s neighbour is already influencing a lot of what happens on the ground in parts of Iraq and taking over Iraq is apparently a key objective for Iran.

On a positive note, Iraq has been taking some progressive steps, especially in relation to Kuwait. Following Saddam’s invasion in 1990 the Kuwaitis are still owed $24 billion in reparations and billions more are outstanding in debts. It was commented by a prominent Kuwaiti delegate that Iraq has used its best endeavours to return all POWs, stolen goods and archives that were taken. There is work to do however: the Kuwaitis are willing to reduce the reparations should Iraq agree to enter into mutual projects such as Commercial Free Zones. The UN has been helping to negotiate an official border demarcation in exchange for a $15 billion debt write-off by the Kuwaitis (currently the border is being respected but the Iraqis have not yet installed the border markers). There is also talk of some of the monies owed to the Kuwaitis being settled by investing the money in mutual ventures on the Iraq/Kuwait border.

One Israeli former deputy minister stated that progressive steps should be taken by the international community to help link Iraq with the allies the West wishes it to have: e.g. linking Iraq’s oil supplies to the European market via a crude oil pipe through Jordan to the Northern Israeli port of Haifa. This would unite Iraq, Israel and Europe in an economic initiative that would strengthen Iraq economically and provide an incentive to work peacefully together.

IRAN

The meeting was somewhat hindered by not having a representative from the Iranian government, as they pulled out at the last minute.

1. Election Fixed This was an important elections given that it was the first time that there had been mass participation with minority and opposition voting when they had previously boycotted all elections.

It was lamented the extent to which the elections in Iran were apparently fixed. Evidence of this was the speed with which the results were announced before there would have been a chance to count all the votes; inexplicable results occurred such as in the home town of a rival candidate, Karroubi, Ahmadinejad still won by a sizeable margin; the mobile telephone network (an important means of maintaining communications and monitoring elections) was shut down for 5 hours on the day of the elections.

However the public responded with other forms of communication with 200 million texts being sent in a country with a population of 70 million and Twitter.com took on a new significance as being the source of communication to the rest of the World what was happening inside the country.

2. Coup d’Etat – as a result of the new election Ahmadinejad’s government has changed. Many of his friends and family have been brought into key positions in the government, including the person responsible for the Nuclear Programme.

3. Possible Actions –

    • Sanctions were largely seen as counter-productive and would not be unwelcome by the Iranian government. Without managing to actually disrupt the Iranian government they would provide it with a tool to turn the Iranian people against the rest of the World by blaming it for any suffering or inconvenience caused.
    • Military Action would allow the Iranian government to solidify and consolidate their position by cracking down further on opposition leaders and followers in the name of ‘fighting the enemy’.
    • Media could provide effective gateways to empowering and enlightening millions of Iranians. Greater numbers of independent Satellite TV channels would be useful in achieving this goal. Channels such as Al-Jazeera do not want to appear too controversial but the new BBC Farsi channel has proved a useful outlet. New media (i.e. Twitter.com) has already been very successful.

The meeting was considered a success in part as, bar Iran, there were high level representatives from each of the major players in the region discussing the problem. It must be always to difficult to judge any negotiations however until any agreements are put into action. The ringing endorsement of the Arab Peace Initiative however would appear to be a key step forward as it is something that all parties agree upon and provides a blueprint for the peace process to follow.