The appointment of Robert Ford as US ambassador to Syria late last week may have been a shrewd move for Washington, but the timing couldn’t have been worse for the Middle East.
Sources tell me that a Netherlands-based, UN-backed court investigating the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri will issue its first indictments as soon as the end of this week.
Remember that 2005 murder?
Shortly after the Hariri killing, with evidence of Syrian complicity abounding, a disgusted President George W. Bush pulled our ambassador from Damascus. But President Obama, filled with hopes of “engagement” with America’s worst enemies, has long wanted to return an American ambassador to Syria.
Yet, even with last year’s sizable Democratic majority, the Senate wouldn’t hear of it. Unable to get the necessary confirmation and knowing that this year’s Senate is bound to be even tougher, Obama decided to overcome objections by using the holiday congressional recess to appoint Ford as his conduit to President Bashar al-Assad.
Back in the region, much of the Arab world didn’t see this as legitimate parliamentary maneuvering — far from it. The Lebanese press and other Arab media were filled with rumors and creative analysis — with Syria mostly emerging a winner.
The Kuwaiti newspaper al-Rai reported over the weekend that Obama’s top Mideast adviser, Dennis Ross, secretly negotiated with Damascus recently to relaunch peace talks with Israel. In this version, sending a new ambassador was just one detail in a larger, strategic Washington turnaround on Syria.
The Saudis reportedly pushed another scheme: America will help exonerate Damascus in the Hariri probe; in return, the Assad regime will deliver several concessions to the West, which wants Syria out of Iran’s regional orbit.
The problem with all these real and imaginary scenarios is that, back here on earth, Assad may appear coy but won’t play ball. Like several other regional leaders, he increasingly believes that we’re unreliable and that his best bet is on the rising regional power: Iran.
Under Bashar’s father, Hafez al Assad, known as “The Lion,” Syria had aspirations of regional leadership. Under the son, however, it has devolved into an Iranian franchise, yet one more satrap in the mullahs’ growing regional sphere that includes Hezbollah, Hamas and America’s worst enemies in Iraq.
But Bashar Assad’s aides aren’t dummies. With American sanctions hurting, they know they can’t completely break ties with the West. So they revert to an old Damascus game, dangling promises of better future relations in front of gullible guests.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu played that game with Assad Sr. during his previous term in office, in the 1990s, sending former Ambassador to Austria Ronald Lauder to conduct secret peace talks with Damascus. Yesterday, the Israeli press reported that an American Jewish leader, Malcolm Hoenlein, visited Damascus recently. But Jerusalem insiders say now that neither the Lauder talks nor others have ever gotten close to finalizing any agreement.
“Bashar Assad always wants an advance payment for any promised concession,” says a veteran diplomat in the region. “But, whether you pay or not, he never delivers on his end of his deal.”
Even Team Obama is disillusioned with Damascus. Nevertheless, the president, set on “engagement,” rarely gives up. So last week he used a recess appointment to get his man to Damascus.
What a difference several years make. In 2005, then-Sen. Obama railed against Bush for using a recess appointment to send John Bolton to the United Nations. Because the Senate hadn’t approved him, Ambassador Bolton would arrive at Turtle Bay as “damaged goods” with less credibility, Obama said.
“It’s certainly gratifying to see that President Obama has matured from the views he held on recess appointments during his Senate days,” Bolton said over the weekend. Then again, he told me, “sending an ambassador to Syria rewards five years of Iranian and Syrian bad behavior. What a signal to send right before the likely indictments by the UN tribunal in the Hariri assassination.”
Regional players are expecting earth-shaking events — including possibly an inter-Lebanese or even a regional war — to follow the indictments. Nothing could be more damaging now than appearing to renew our friendship with the crowd that ordered the Hariri killing. beavni@gmail.com
