Getting through? Jordan Times

Getting through?

Jordan Times, Wednesday, May 5, 2004

It's still a good idea," says the US State Department about Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's unilateral "disengagement" plan, after members of Sharon's own Likud Party overwhelmingly rejected it. "But it's not necessarily the only option," Richard Boucher, the State Department's spokesman, added in remarks published in the Washington Post yesterday.

It's hard, however, to see what other options the American administration has left itself after President George W. Bush's wholehearted endorsement of Sharon's plan over the heads of every other country in the Middle East, friendly or not.

What Sharon will do is not yet clear, though the indications are that he will carry on regardless. It would not be much of a departure for a man who spent the bulk of his military career defying his superiors to now start ignoring his supporters.

What the White House wants, however, is a lot clearer. According to reports in a number of newspapers on May 4, including the above-mentioned Post article, Washington has decided not to provide His Majesty King Abdullah with a letter to counterbalance the assurances Bush offered Sharon at their meeting in April.

With only two days left before a scheduled meeting between the King and Bush, this refusal indicates that the president is focused only on his reelection. To appear to be flip-flopping on stated policy — the oft-wielded weapon used by the Republican campaign against Democratic presidential hopeful John Kerry — would not look good at this time.

The problem is elections are far away, and in the meantime America's disastrous Middle East policy, on all fronts, is dragging the region ever closer to all-out chaos. It is obvious and evident to almost the entire world, and especially to those of us who live here. It is therefore incumbent upon the US to listen to all voices in the region.

One of the voices that the US has traditionally respected the most has been that of His Majesty and that of Jordan. A measure of how important Jordan is in the US could be seen in the reaction to the cancelled meeting between King Abdullah and Bush — something widely interpreted as a sign of the discontent in the region vis-?-vis the Bush-Sharon letters.

Nothing in the intervening weeks has dispelled this discontent, and the White House should be concerned not to alienate its few remaining Arab friends in the region.

Earth, a planet hungry for peace

The Israeli apartheid (security) wall around Palestinian population centers (Ran Cohen, pmc, 5/24/03).

The Israeli apartheid (security) wall around Palestinian population centers in the West Bank, like a Python. (Alquds,10/25/03).

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