JERUSALEM — What a difference a year makes.
A little more than 12 months ago, as President Clinton was ending his eight years in the White House, he detailed a Mideast peace plan that included deep concessions and reconciliation between Israelis and Palestinians.
This week, as Clinton visited Israel for the first time since leaving office, the vision of a “New Middle East” that developed under his watch appeared little more than a pipe dream.
Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak has retired from politics while Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat has become, in Israel’s terminology, “irrelevant.”
Clinton refused an invitation to go to Ramallah and meet the beleaguered Arafat, and reportedly, even declined a phone conversation with him.
It was only a little over a year ago Clinton hosted Barak and Arafat at Camp David after meeting with Arafat numerous times in the White House during his presidency.
Lately, Israelis see signs that the U.S. administration that succeeded Clinton’s is concluding that Arafat is indeed “irrelevant.”
If so, it’s unclear what that would mean for a future Palestinian leadership, and for that regime’s relations with America and Israel.
The evidence of a policy shift by Bush is still largely circumstantial. The most that can be said with assurance is that the relationship with Arafat is in flux and has not yet reached a definitive position.
The signals of an American shift include:
*Qatar-based Al Jazeera television reported Tuesday that retired Gen. Anthony Zinni has asked U.S. national security adviser Condoleezza Rice to relieve him of his mission because he does not trust Arafat and does not feel his return to the region can stimulate a cease-fire agreement.
Declining to send Zinni would essentially confirm that the Bush administration “has had it with Arafat,” as Sharon confidants say. The Palestinians have requested that Zinni return to the region as soon as possible. In contrast, Sharon told visiting American Israel Public Affairs Committee leaders last weekend that sending Zinni would show Arafat he can avoid moving forcefully against terrorist groups yet still court the United States as Israel’s putative negotiating partner.
*The United States conspicuously avoided criticizing recent Israeli military moves, including deep incursions into the West Bank cities of Tulkarm on Monday and Nablus on Tuesday. While the Nablus action was based on pinpoint intelligence and aimed at ranking Hamas terrorists — four were shot dead and a bomb factory destroyed — the incursion into Tulkarm seemed as much a demonstration of Israel’s dominance as a specific policing measure.
As such, the Tulkarm raid was bound to further weaken Arafat’s prestige in the Palestinian Authority, possibly hastening his fall from power. There was a spate of reports here over the weekend — vigorously denied on the Palestinian side — that Arafat was considering resigning or voluntarily going into exile in Tunisia.
*When Israel retaliated for last week’s terror attack on a bat mitzvah in Hadera by bombing a Palestinian police station in Tulkarm, Bush did not criticize Israel but restated his support for the Jewish state’s right of self-defense. The Bush administration appears to remain unmoved by the spectacle of Israeli tanks surrounding Arafat’s residence in Ramallah, or by the sight of them storming into Tulkarm and Nablus.
*The Israel Defense Force’s destruction of the Voice of Palestine radio in Ramallah was another step to weaken Arafat by smashing the symbols of his rule. Despite outspoken reservations in Europe, the Bush administration again looked on in silence. For many key figures in the Israeli government and army, this silence is interpreted as a “green light” of approval to chip away at Arafat until he topples.
Clinton this week accused Arafat of “missing a golden opportunity” for peace at the Camp David summit in July 2000, and dismissed the subsequent intifada violence as “a terrible mistake.”
The former president came to Israel to accept an honorary doctorate from Tel Aviv University on Sunday.
Mobbed by well-wishers wherever he went, Clinton urged his Israeli audiences not to give up hope of a miraculous return to the peace process, but he seemed to hold out little hope that, if negotiations did somehow resume, it would be Arafat sitting opposite the Israelis.
If Arafat eventually does succumb to mounting Israeli military pressure and declining American support, what then?
Optimists here and in Washington believe power in the Palestinian Authority could pass relatively smoothly to another member of the present leadership. That could be one of the older generation of Arafat lieutenants such as his deputy Mahmoud Abbas, or one of the younger generation of security officials such as Jibril Rajoub or Mohammad Dahlan.
But many experts call that scenario wishful thinking. More likely, they say, is that power would fragment in the Palestinian territories and strengthen the radical and fundamentalist factions — giving rise to an extremist takeover in leadership.
One can assume that American policymakers contemplating the prospect of Arafat’s departure are applying their minds, too, to what comes next.