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Welcome to USAGOLD's "Gilded
Opinion" pages.
We invite you to browse our index
of outstanding gold-based commentary.
(Back to Holger Jensen Index)
While we find Mr. Jensen's columns particularly informative with respect to foreign affairs, his opinions do not necessarily represent those of Centennial Precious Metals, USAGOLD, its management and clientele.
INSIDE FOREIGN AFFAIRS
Arab summit remarkable in
its scope
by Holger Jensen, International Editor
Against a backdrop of escalating hostilities between Israel and the Palestinians, three important things happened at the Arab League summit in Beirut this week.
It did not, as did 25 past summits, engage in much Israel-bashing. It unanimously endorsed a Saudi plan that offers Israel peace within secure borders. And it reconciled Iraq with two Gulf War foes that once felt most threatened by Saddam Hussein: Kuwait and Saudi Arabia.
The sight of Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah embracing Saddam's personal envoy, Izzat Ibrahim, and the head of the Kuwaiti delegation shaking hands with a former invader was as remarkable as the first ever collective Arab offer to recognize the legitimacy of the Jewish state.
In a landmark agreement mediated by Oman and Qatar, Iraq gave up its claim to what it had previously regarded as its 19th province and promised to "respect the independence, sovereignty and security of the state of Kuwait and guarantee its safety and unity to avoid anything that might cause a repetition of what happened in 1990."
That in turn led to a unified Beirut Declaration demanding the lifting of U.N. sanctions imposed on Iraq for its 1990 invasion of Kuwait and stressing "our total rejection of any attack on Iraq."
The latter was a pointed and public reminder to President Bush of what Vice President Dick Cheney had already been told privately on his recent Middle East tour: that no Arab government, even victims of Saddam's prior aggressions, would support U.S. military action against Iraq.
As Syrian President Bashar Assad pointed out in a separate interview with journalists, getting arms inspectors back into Iraq is an issue to be decided upon by the United Nations, not the United States, and "should not be used as a pretext or cover" for unilateral U.S. action.
Assad was the only Arab leader to engage in Israel-bashing, accusing Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon of launching a "new Holocaust" against the Palestinians and predicting that Israel would never accept the Saudi peace plan as long as Sharon was in power. But even he signed on to it, and agreed to language changes to make it more palatable to Israel.
Instead of a right of return for Palestinian refugees, which no Israeli government would ever accept, the Arab offer now calls for a "just solution," in line with a 1948 U.N. resolution that suggests refugees be financially compensated in lieu of repatriation.
Instead of simply offering Israel "normal relations," as voiced in Abdullah's original proposal, the Arab states pledge to "consider the Arab-Israeli conflict ended in the context of a comprehensive peace" if Israel gives up the occupied territories for a Palestinian state.
But they still demand complete withdrawal -- meaning not only the Palestinian-inhabited West Bank and Gaza Strip but also Syria's Golan Heights -- and East Jerusalem for a Palestinian capital. Sharon has said such conditions are unacceptable, and no Israeli leader before him has ever contemplated giving up all the Jewish settlements Israel has built since 1967.
There is also the problem of what to do with up to 4 million Palestinian refugees, even if they are compensated. Lebanon's constitution, for example, specifically rejects a permanent settlement of Palestinians on its soil and the Arab League agreed to reject "any solution which conflicts with the special interests of the Arab host countries."
Yet the offer of a comprehensive Middle East peace is tempting. Even Sharon's spokesman, Raanan Gissin, found it "interesting."
As Saudi Arabia's foreign minister, Prince Saud al-Faisal, pointed out in an interview with CNN, this is the first time Israel has been offered a chance where "all the neighborhood would recognize its right to exist. If that doesn't provide security for Israel, I assure you that the muzzle of a gun is not going to provide that security."
But it will take U.S. pressure to force the necessary Israeli concessions.
"The United States supports Israel militarily, economically and politically," said Saud. "It is the only country that can wield influence on Israel. This is the time where sense must be talked into Sharon. War and conflict are now in his head. This has to be removed from his mind and only the United States can do it."
Let's hope someone in Washington was listening.
March 30, 2002
Send your questions to international editor Holger Jensen, who will answer one each day. E-mail: hjens@aol.com
Copyright © 2002 The E.W. Scripps Co. All Rights Reserved.
Reprinted by USAGOLD with permission of Mr. Jensen. No further reproduction without permission.
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