Days away from the Annapolis peace parley, the glaring weaknesses of the Israeli and Palestinian leaders are raising disturbing questions about the viability of the peace process altogether.
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, who may have wanted to use the conference as a dramatic breakthrough in peacemaking with the Palestinians, finds his hands tied by hawks in his coalition government.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, constrained by Arab and Palestinian hardliners, is finding it difficult to make even minimal compromises that could advance the process.
The upshot is that after months of pre-conference negotiation, the two sides could arrive in Annapolis without prior agreement on even a minimalist joint declaration spelling out a format and timetable for future peace talks.
Also worrisome, in the months following they may find themselves unable to make progress, discrediting the peace process and possibly setting off a new round of Palestinian violence.
Given the limited progress achieved by the Israelis and Palestinians so far, other players are making last-minute efforts to give the conference some meaning. Some U.S. officials are suggesting President Bush may use the conference to deliver a major policy speech outlining U.S. positions on key issues the parties have yet to address.
Israeli critics wary of Olmert capitulating to the hawks in his administration have been focusing on the long-term consequences of failure. One of the worst possible outcomes, they say, would be the collapse of the idea of a two-state solution.
“I don’t want to speak in apocalyptic terms, but if there is no option of two states for two peoples, then there is no option for a Jewish and democratic Israel,” said Ami Ayalon, a Labor Party minister in Olmert’s security Cabinet and a former head of Israel’s internal security service.
The timeline leading up to the conference shows the deterioration: In September, Olmert spoke of a “historic opportunity” and in October he boldly promised to tackle all the most difficult issues. But by November, the Annapolis conference had been reduced to a meeting that would last no more than a day and merely serve as a launching pad for further negotiations.
Nevertheless, Ayalon believes that in the final analysis Olmert is intent on making peace with the Palestinians. With immense effort, he says, a deal can be reached in 2008, before the end of the Bush presidency.
The post-Annapolis process is set to follow a format wherein negotiations over a permanent peace deal will take place while phase one of the “road map” peace process is carried out. For the Palestinians, this means ending terror and dismantling terrorist militias.
On this, skeptics argue, the process is bound to fail, precisely because of Abbas’ inherent weaknesses. Since he does not control Gaza, where his radical Hamas rivals hold sway, and is weak in the West Bank, he will not be able to deliver security in either place.
If the post-Annapolis peace process fails, says Gidi Grinstein, president of the Tel Aviv-based Reut Institute and a member of ex-Prime Minister Ehud Barak’s negotiating team with Palestinians between 1999 and 2001, radical forces in the Middle East will gain strength.
The relatively moderate Abbas leadership will go into decline along with Abbas’ Fatah faction, and Hamas, which already controls Gaza, will gain in the West Bank. The subsequent collapse of the Palestinian Authority, Grinstein warns, “may drag Israel into resuming full military, administrative and political responsibility for the Palestinian population in the West Bank, which would be a major setback for Israeli national security.”