By IPS Correspondents
WASHINGTON, Mar 26 2008 (IPS)

In a continuing bid to promote Palestinian-Israeli peace, U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney became the latest in a parade of high ranking officials from the administration of President George W. Bush to visit the region and push the peace process set in motion at the Annapolis conference last fall.

Cheney, during his first trip to Israel or Palestine in five years, met with both Israeli and Palestinian leaders. He reiterated Bush’s call for the establishment of a “long overdue” Palestinian state – a first for a U.S. president – and acknowledged that the road there will be rife with bumps.

“Achieving that vision will require tremendous effort at the negotiating table, and painful concessions on both sides,” said Cheney on Sunday in Ramallah at an appearance with Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas.

But with the PA under Abbas’ Fatah faction only controlling the West Bank and the militant Islamic group Hamas controlling the Gaza strip, many critics doubt whether effort and concessions can build a sustainable peace – let alone a Palestinian state.

“The point is that if this has any chance of success, you can’t build this on a divided Palestinian house,” former Israeli negotiator Daniel Levy, now the director of the Middle East Initiative at the New America Foundation, told IPS.

“That’s simply not where the Americans are at, and it’s not where the leadership groups around Abbas in Ramallah are,” he said.

“My conclusion from talking with the Palestinian leadership [Abbas’ PA] is that they have established preconditions which would have to be filled before they would ever agree to reconciliation, including a complete reversal of the Hamas takeover of Gaza,” said Cheney, doubting the effectiveness of the Yemeni tack.

Levy said that though Cheney’s comments were couched as a reflection of the PA leadership’s view, they do as much to dictate the administration’s line to Fatah. He was careful to say, however, that Fatah bears the bulk of responsibility for its own lack of will towards a national Palestinian dialogue.

Cheney commented on the need for “a Palestinian partner for the Israelis that accepts Israel’s right to exist and rejects violence and terror” – two conditions which Hamas does not meet. But while Abbas fits the criteria, he may be too weak to legitimise the process both in Israel and at home in the territories.

Asked about the Yemeni effort, a senior administration official traveling with the vice president anonymously told the Associated Press the U.S. would not deal with Hamas unless there was a “fundamental change” by Hamas, which the U.S. currently classifies as a terrorist organisation.

Likewise, Amos Gilad, an Israeli Defence Ministry official, told Israeli radio that Israel would likely end talks with Abbas if he reunited the PA and included Hamas.

Cheney said that Hamas, with the support of Iran and Syria, was trying to “torpedo” the peace process. But Hamas has participated in ceasefire negotiations with Israel to alleviate a worsening humanitarian situation resulting from the Israeli siege of Gaza. The talks were arranged by Egypt and tepidly backed by the U.S., though Israel has not publicly acknowledged its participation.

Echoing critics of the ceasefire, Cheney said that he worries about the continuation of weapons smuggling into Gaza. Opponents of a ceasefire say that those weapons will allow Hamas to build up its arsenal in what has been called “the Hezbollahisation of Hamas”, referring to the Lebanese Islamic militant group that used lulls in violence to build its military strength.

“Fundamentally, [Cheney’s] trip highlights what to many people is a glaring absence in the American approach to the two parties,” said Scott Lasensky of the Congressionally-funded U.S. Institute of Peace. “The Annapolis initiative and the Bush administration’s latest steps are premised on the notion of the U.S. facilitating.”

Lasensky co-authored “Negotiating Arab-Israeli Peace: American Leadership in the Middle East” with former U.S. ambassador to Israel Daniel Kurtzer. Both a history and a “tool kit” for future negotiations, the book calls for active U.S. leadership to move the peace process forward. Lasensky said the current U.S. position was not enough and it should take on a more active mediation role.

“The role of facilitator was very much emphasised at the Annapolis meeting and reinforced by the vice president’s visit because he didn’t really carry with him any – at least there were not visibly – new ideas, bridging proposals, new inducements or forms of pressure on the sides,” said Lasensky.

The most important changes that Annapolis affected to the “road map for peace” – the Bush plan laid out in his first term – was to run the negotiations on specifics of a Palestinian state in parallel with obligations under the road map.

In the phases of the road map, for example, the PA’s ability to provide security for Israel was to come before the permanent status negotiations. Especially under the split control of the Palestinian territories, Abbas has been unable to control rocket attacks aimed at Israel from within the Gaza Strip.

But even under the parallel plans, any agreement to emerge will be inherently weak due to its limited endorsement by only half of the territories. Such an agreement has been termed a “shelf agreement”, meaning that it would be inoperative until a unified Palestine could match the demands of the road map.

Noting that “the current policy ain’t goin’ anywhere,” Levy said that the U.S. needs to rethink and clarify their Israel-Palestine policy as a whole.

“I think the important thing at the moment is a need for a credible American policy,” said Levy. “And trying to produce a process for an endgame deal on the wreckage of Palestinian internal disarray encouraged by U.S. policy is not a premise that can work. First you’ve got to get your policy right.”

“The question for the Americans is whether they take themselves seriously. On one hand, there’s no agreement for an endgame. On the other hand, there’s no progress on the road map issues. So you’re seeing inability on either front.”

Excerpt: