Bound for Israel

This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.

The New York Sun

President Bush has picked quite a moment for his first trip as president to Israel, coming as it does in the wake of both the Annapolis peace parley and the challenge to his hard line on Iran issued by his own intelligence agency and promptly disputed by Jerusalem. The visit will have the potential to convey to Iran and its allies that there is no daylight between the American and Israeli positions on the crucial question of it acquiring nuclear weapons, even while tempting the president to get deeper involved in the so-called peace process.

So far Mr. Bush’s presidency has been marked by a conscious stepping back from the Mideast diplomacy that characterized the Clinton presidency. Mr. Clinton entered office at a time when there were great expectations by many — though not all — that the Palestinian Arab war against the Jewish state could be resolved. The same could not be said for Mr. Bush, who took office on January 20, 2001, just as Ehud Barak was about to lose an election to the Likud party led by Mr. Bush’s friend Ariel Sharon.

Part of the reason for Mr. Sharon’s impending victory was that the rejection by the Palestinian Arab terrorist, Yasser Arafat, of the plan proffered by President Clinton at Camp David and the unleashing by the Palestinian Arabs of new, ever-more-savage attacks on Israel from the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Upon entering office, the Clinton administration had taken over half a year before sending State Secretary Christopher to tour the Middle East. By the time a similar period had elapsed in the Bush administration, America had suffered 9/11.

Within months, and under pressure from Congress, Mr. Bush’s declared ambition to strike back at “terrorists with a global reach” was redefined to include Hamas and Hezbollah. By the following June, Mr. Bush broke all ties with Arafat, announcing a new American policy that favored the establishment of a Palestinian state but with a new leadership which had broken with the movement’s terrorist tradition. This was the statement in the Rose Garden, and it fit with Mr. Bush’s strategic doctrine, based on the principle that American security rested on the expansion of democracy.

Following the death of Arafat, the Palestinians held an election that was won by Hamas. It was not a real election; there is no free press; there was physical intimidation; there was interference from an Islamist state. That the victory of Hamas came under a rising Iranian shadow, which also darkened Lebanon’s political landscape, put the event in a dangerous light. In the summer of 2006, Hamas and Hezbollah ignited a war and fought Israel to a standstill, adding to the mounting gloom among Israelis and Arabs fearful of Tehran’s messianic intentions and regional ambitions.

To the degree that Annapolis represents an attempt to regain diplomatic momentum it is a dangerous demarche, setting up, as it did, an attempt to conclude an agreement with the Palestinian Arabs by the end of 2008 — in other words, setting the stage for the kind of late-term scramble that Mr. Clinton undertook to such disastrous results. Our David Twersky reminds us that Mr. Bush kept silent during the fiasco of Camp David II, refusing to criticize President Clinton’s efforts, though admonishing the White House not to press Israel because of a timetable imposed by the approaching end of Mr. Clinton’s tenure.

Mr. Bush had already — in 1998 — made his only visit Israel. He was the Texas governor, while Mr. Clinton was in the White House fuming at Prime Minister Netanyahu, who was caught between hawks in his cabinet and doves in the White House. Mr. Netanyahu erred by agreeing, in October 1998 at the Wye River Plantation, to an Israeli pullback from 13% of the West Bank in exchange for Palestinian measures to prevent terrorist actions. Sound familiar? Within a year, Labor’s Ehud Barak drove him from office.

So Mr. Bush will have a lot to think about as he flies into the Middle East. His hard earned credentials and his political scars will not in and of themselves immunize him from the temptation of exiting as a peace maker. The prospects of peace with the Palestinian Arabs being what they are, however, the opportunity for Mr. Bush lies in gaining an appreciation for the dangers from the twin terrors unleashed by Sunni jihadism and Shi’ite Iran. It is hard to imagine he will be received in Israel as anything other than one of the greatest friends the Jewish state has ever had, an honor worth collecting even at a dangerous time.


The New York Sun

© 2024 The New York Sun Company, LLC. All rights reserved.

Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. The material on this site is protected by copyright law and may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, cached or otherwise used.

The New York Sun

Sign in or  Create a free account

or
By continuing you agree to our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use