Forget Paris. The path to Middle East peace goes through Cairo, with a possible stop in Riyadh.
Over the weekend, French President François Hollande summoned foreign ministers from the entire world to Paris to promote the relaunching of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations. (Actually, not the entire world: Palestinians and Israelis weren’t invited.)
Hollande is still under the illusion that “solving” the Israeli-Palestinian impasse will ease Mideast tensions. Never mind the real, unrelated, drama: Syrian carnage, apocalyptic Libyan chaos, Yemen’s collapse, growing Iranian belligerence. Hey, Arabs and Jews grab headlines, and politicians love headlines.
So off they went to Paris. World diplomats watched the Seine rise and issued a communiqué. They’ll continue those efforts, perhaps at the United Nations, later this year.
While in Paris, they likely griped about how Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had just formed, as the State Department put it, reportedly “the most right-wing coalition in Israel’s history.”
It isn’t. One day earlier, in Jerusalem, both Netanyahu and his newly minted “most right-wing” defense minister, Avigdor Liberman, reaffirmed their commitment to a two-state solution. More importantly, they both expressed, for the first time, support for the “Saudi plan” (a vague offer for wide Arab recognition of Israel, conditioned on resolving Palestinian issues) as a basis for regional diplomacy.
Oh, and a week earlier, in Cairo, Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi announced he’s ready to mediate direct Israeli-Palestinian talks, with Bibi’s support.
So who needs Hollande?
The French initiative is “probably going nowhere,” Ilan Goldenberg, until recently President Obama’s close adviser on Palestinian-Israeli issues, told me. Trying to force peace on Israelis and Palestinians through international pressure is “a waste of time,” he said, adding, “[Sisi’s] initiative is more significant.”
After all, Egypt, the Saudis, Sunni Gulf states and others share common interests with Israel these days. The rise of Iran in the aftermath of the disastrous nuclear deal tops their immediate security concerns, followed by the threat of ISIS and other extremists to relatively stable Arab regimes.
The Palestinians? Meh. Few in the region have much faith in the corrupt, failing West Bank-based Palestinian Authority’s ability to negotiate with the bloodthirsty, nihilistic Gaza-based Hamas — let alone the Israelis.
Instead, Israelis like Maj. Gen. (ret.) Gadi Shamni say that Israel must determine its own fate, while betting a new generation of Palestinian leaders will do better. Shamni and other left-leaning ex-generals and diplomats in Israel, alongside veterans of the Obama and Bush administrations, have produced a plan to enhance Israel’s security while ushering in a future Palestinian state.
Former Maj. Gen. Amnon Reshef says one such measure could be announcing a halt to all construction for Jews outside areas that will surely remain in Israel while continuing to build in major Jewish settlement blocs.
Such measures will allow the Saudis, Egyptians and others to force Palestinians to the negotiation table, while enhancing Israel’s own security.
Even if Palestinian obstinacy leads nowhere, direct negotiators will allow for tightening, and more public, cooperation with like-minded Arab states — from the Gulf to North Africa.
For the first time, Netanyahu, Liberman and many of their coalition partners are signaling a public readiness to advance that Saudi-Egyptian route. (Liberman, who famously lives in a West Bank settlement, has long said he’d willingly leave his home for a real peace deal.)
And as Israeli Finance Minister Moshe Kahlon said recently, dramatic regional diplomacy is “much more than mere media rumors.” Kahlon invited center-left parties to join Netanyahu’s ruling coalition to shore up support for it.
Menachem Begin was one of those Israelis once dubbed the “most right-wing prime minister ever.” Yet he signed Israel’s first peace treaty with an Arab state, the Camp David accords with Egypt in 1979. Can Netanyahu preside over a similar breakthrough, widening Israel’s circle of allies and ending Arab hostility toward the Jewish state?
Maybe. Either way, the time’s ripe, so if you’re a betting person put some chips on quiet regional diplomacy. Even more importantly, avoid cliché-ridden, loud, world-encompassing French initiatives. At best, they’re just hot air. At worst, they’ll kill any progress toward a breakthrough.
