by Smadar Perry - Bitterlemons - Feb. 12, 2007
The photos that emerged in the middle of last week from the spacious and elegant al-Safa Palace in Mecca told the story of events taking place behind the scenes of the "historic" summit between delegations from Fateh and Hamas.
In the excitement, Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal briefly forgot that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen) had been plotting, with the blessings of Washington and Jerusalem, to overthrow the Hamas government in Gaza. The two drove in the same car between cities in Saudi Arabia, then proceeded to open the reconciliation talks with an inaugural prayer from the Quran. Waiters produced trays laden with food, the delegations both slept and deliberated in the palace and the hosts made themselves scarce except when needed. A few days later, the Palestinian leaders crowned their agreement with a photo-op visit to the holy site, wrapped in white robes that symbolized the purity of their intentions.
Only rarely does the royal palace, which overlooks the Kaaba, holy to hundreds of millions of Muslims worldwide, allow the TV cameras in--although the conference managers did make sure to distance the media from the many scenes of loud arguments and angry dissent. Saudi Arabia went all out with the "Mecca summit", and from the outset allowed that this was the parties` "last chance". King Abdullah wanted to emerge with a series of diplomatic achievements precisely where his predecessors in Egypt, Jordan, Qatar and even to some extent Damascus had failed.
As far as we know, at least five of the most senior officials in Saudi Arabia were recruited to this enterprise: King Abdullah, his brother Crown Prince Sultan, Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal, the new intelligence chief Prince Mukrin bin Abdul-Aziz, and the rising star of the king`s new open diplomacy, Prince Bandar, the national security adviser. The senior advisers recommended using an American model of crisis negotiating and adapting it to Middle East conditions. They knocked heads together among Abu Mazen, Khaled Meshaal and their large entourages until a unity government agreement was reached--albeit one cobbled together hurriedly, under pressure, padded with generous promises of money and replete with formulations that look fragile and unconvincing. The real test, all the experts agree, will be whether the promised end of the bloodletting can be maintained on the ground in Palestine. Israel was barely mentioned at the Mecca summit.
It now emerges that a week before the Mecca deliberations began, Meshaal made sure to send an unequivocal clarification from Damascus: there was no chance of getting Hamas to commit to recognizing Israel. The movement`s policy, dictated by Meshaal to PM Ismail Haniyeh in Gaza, was not going to be radically revised. Meshaal signaled to the Saudi monarch that he could manage just fine without the king`s millions.
Accordingly, the unity government agreement was preordained to deal with internal Palestinian issues, to generate formulae for cooperation between Abu Mazen and a Hamas-led government and, most importantly, to aggrandize the new role of the hosts as crisis managers and negotiators. If the two Palestinian camps maintain their agreement, the Saudis will channel a billion dollars for economic projects and aid and rebuilding schemes to the Gaza Strip and West Bank.
The money is a marginal issue for the oil kingdom. The Saudi royal house is prepared to spend many more hundreds of millions of dollars in order to achieve its big objective. The administration in Washington divides the Muslim world between "allies" and "bad guys" (Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan, Morocco and Fateh vs. Iran and Syria). But the Saudis partition the exact same map along strictly sectarian lines: Sunni Muslims are the allies of the Wahabi Sunni royal family, as opposed to the Shi`ites of Iran and Hizballah who seek to bring down the Sunni/majority government in Lebanon and establish the empire of "correct Islam". This confrontation, once suppressed, has become increasingly acute since the fall of Saddam Hussein and the rise of Iraq`s Shi`ites.
Saudi Arabia perceives a long-term Iranian nuclear threat and a more acute, pervasive and advanced threat to establish a "Shi`ite crescent" from Tehran via its Shi`ite allies in Iraq all the way to Hizballah in Lebanon. The ultimate Iranian objective is to inflame Egypt, the largest Arab country, and reach the holy of holies, the kingdom where Islam began. Whoever holds the Kaaba controls the Muslim world. This explains why the Saudi security and intelligence establishments are waging total war against fundamentalist cells that were planted with funding and inspiration from Tehran.
For external consumption, Riyadh has considerably enhanced its relations with Tehran: national security advisers Ali Larijani from Iran and the Saudi Prince Bandar exchanged visits in recent weeks. But the Saudi ambassador in Washington, former intelligence chief Turki al-Faisal (the brother of the Saudi foreign minister) was summoned home without ceremony after he called for a dialogue with the ayatollahs. The Saudis are also increasing their quiet involvement in Iraq and reinforcing the Siniora government in Lebanon against Iran`s brutal intervention, executed with Syrian President Bashar Assad`s indulgence.
Despite its drawbacks, the Mecca agreement is now seen in Washington and among the "good guys" camp in the Arab world as paving the way for the next step in Riyadh`s effort to reinforce its inter-Arab position. At the end of next month, the 22 Arab leaders will convene in a summit designed to revitalize King Abdullah`s peace initiative. The diplomatic equation is simple: the Arab world, which already approved the plan in Beirut in 2002, offers Israel full peace and normalization (which will be tested "on the ground" exactly like the Mecca agreement) in return for an Israeli commitment to withdraw to the 1967 lines.
Israeli prime ministers have until now evaded responding directly to the initiative. The Saudi royal house does not intend to let up the pressure. It has the backing of the United States, which is interested in a peace process. And the competition is on against the Iranian bid for the leadership of the Muslim world.- Published 12/2/2007 © bitterlemons.org
Smadar Perry is Middle East editor of the daily Yediot Aharonot.
