MIDDLE EAST: Slow Progress Along Road to Comprehensive Peace

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Analysis - Dilip Hiro

LONDON, Oct 26 1995 (IPS) - The Economic Conference of Arabic States, Israel and the United States, which opens in Amman, Jordan, Sunday, provides an opportune moment to take stock of the Middle East peace process.

The peace process started four years ago when an international conference was convened in Madrid, Spain, but the overall picture remains mixed on the political front, largely because of stalled talks between Israel and Syria. And, businessmen in the region say, political problems play a major role in hindering economic development.

The failure of Warren Christopher, U.S. Secretary of State, and his Syrian counterpart, Farouk al Shaara, to break a deadlock during their meeting at the United Nations on Oct. 24, underlined the continued stalemate.

The Madrid assembly in 1991 decided to pursue the peace path along two tracks: diplomatic and socio-economic. After that conference’s open, international sessions, diplomatic talks were conducted privately on bilateral bases, between Israel and its Arab adversaries.

At the same time, a second stream of multilateral negotiations concerning regional matters was initiated. These included refugees (almost exclusively Palestinian) water resources, economy and ecology.

While, as agreed beforehand, Syria and Lebanon participated in the bilateral diplomatic talks that followed, they stayed away from the multilateral track, and have done so ever since.

Their move is in line with the Arab League’s official policy of maintaining an economic boycott against Israel, and companies trading with or investing in that country.

Ever since the Arab League adopted this stance, in 1950, it has maintained its Economic Boycott Committee in Damascus. Its boycott works on several levels. Three is a primary boycott which covers an updated list of companies worldwide which trade and invest in Israel. A list is also maintained of U.S. and other firms trading with Israel.

A year ago, yielding to U.S. pressure, the six-member Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) decided to opt out of the mild secondary and tertiary forms of boycott of Israel.

This was the latest gain Israel made in its campaign to see the Arab economic boycott ended.

Its first success came when it signed a peace treaty with Egypt in March 1979. But 16 years on, trade between the two states remains insignificant.

Following Israel’s signing of an accord with the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO), in September 1993, Arab hostility towards the Jewish state declined.

The trend continued with the conclusion of a peace treaty between Israel and Jordan, in October 1994. The latter set the scene not only for the GCC’s token relaxation of its economic boycott of Israel, but also the opening of liaison offices by Morocco and Tunisia in Tel Aviv.

These developments alarmed Syrian President Hafez Assad. At his initiative, a mini summit of the Heads of state of Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Syria was held in Alexandria, Egypt, in December 1994.

It concluded that there should be no Arab normalisation of trade with Israel until and unless there was full and comprehensive peace with all Arabic states and the final status of the Palestinian entity had been settled.

It was understood that Saudi Arabia, the unofficial leader of the GCC, would curb the efforts being made by Oman and Qatar to establish economic links with Israel.

Observers believe that part of the reason behind the decisions of Oman and Qatar is to show that they are not meek, camp followers of powerful Saudi Arabia.

In any case, a prospective Qatari gas deal with the Jewish state which Israelis are trumpeting, lies well into the future. The state-owned Qatari oil company has signed a joint venture with Enron, a U.S. energy company, to develop Qatar’s North west Dome, the largest natural gas deposit in the world, an export Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) to India and Israel.

In the latter case, LNG will be shipped to Port Said, Egypt, and then pumped to Israel through a pipeline running through the Palestinian territory. It will be at least another 10 years before this project is implemented.

Oman is a different case altogether. Its ruler, Sultan Qabwos, has been an Arab deviant on the peace process for a long time. Oman was the only Arab state which did not sever links with Egypt after it signed a peace treaty with Israel in 1979.

Last year, Sultan Qabwos received Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in Muscat. Since then Israeli ministers and officials have visited Oman first to attend the Multilateral Peace Committee on Water Resources, and then the set up a centre for water de-salination research to transform, cheaply sea water into drinking water.

Also Israelis have expertise on irrigation and agriculture in arid zones developed in the Negev desert, to offer to Oman. In September, the two countries decided to set up trade offices in Muscat and Tel Aviv.

Against these modest gains, Israel suffered a serious setback last November in Casablanca, Morocco. At a meeting of Arab and Israeli businessmen, half of the Israeli cabinet turned up. There were more than 2,000 Israeli businessmen – several times the number of their Arab counterparts.

“All we did was succeed in frightening them (the Arabs)” said an official of the Israeli trade ministry later. “We want them to go at their own pace.”

Israeli eagerness contrast with Arab reluctance, which is more than political. “I don’t know what Israel can offer us that Japan and the United States are not already providing,” said an Arab businessman.

Analysts say the overall conclusion is that so long as talks between Syria and the Jewish state are stalled, a comprehensive peace in the region, remains elusive, and without peace treaties between Israel and Syria, and Israel and Lebanon, a serious construction of “prosperous peace” – the primary objective of the conference in Amman – can hardly proceed.

MIDDLE EAST: Slow Progress Along Road to Comprehensive Peace

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Analysis - Dilip Hiro

LONDON, Oct 26 1995 (IPS) - The Economic Conference of Arabic States, Israel and the United States, which opens in Amman, Jordan, Sunday, provides an opportune moment to take stock of the Middle East peace process.
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