Middle East Economic Survey
VOL. XLVII
No 38
The Political Scene (20 September 2004)
The continuing lack of security in Iraq is raising the question of whether it will be possible to hold national elections on schedule. The Americans have admitted that the formation of the Falluja brigade has proved to be a failure. They are also lecturing the Syrians about occupying other countries. In Israel, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has more or less admitted that he is not interested in the international “road map” to peace. The Iraqi National Congress – Ahmad Chalabi’s party –appears to be a good deal less keen on contacts with Israel than in the days when it was the protégé of the neoconservatives in Washington.
Security The Key To Elections
After another week of mayhem in Baghdad and air strikes against insurgents in the Sunni triangle north of the Iraqi capital, it is hardly surprising that even supporters of the American adventure in Iraq are beginning to wonder whether it will be possible to hold national elections on schedule by the end of January. US Secretary of State Colin Powell sought to address these concerns on 12 September when he acknowledged that “there is an insurgency raging,” but insisted that “it will be brought under control,” adding that when it is, “what the people of the world will see are the Iraqis in charge of their own destiny…most of the country would be in a satisfactory position for elections if they were being held next month. So we have time to deal with the challenges we face.” What Mr Powell did not say, however, is that both the Iraqi and American governments are counting on the UN to help them meet the election deadline. According to Iraqi UN charge d’affaires Faisal al-Istrabadi on 14 September, “it is a fact that Iraq needs the technical support of the UN to hold elections. We know that. The UN knows that…the number of UN workers now in Iraq is inadequate.”
On the same day, US ambassador John Danforth also appealed for UN help, saying
that “I strongly urge that member states contribute to the future of Iraq by
providing financial assistance and troops to provide security for the UN in
Iraq.” But apart from the members of the “coalition of the willing,” the
international community has been singularly reluctant to commit either money or
men to Iraq and shows no sign of doing so now. Nor was UN Secretary General Kofi
Annan exactly exuding optimism when he observed on 15 September that it is
unlikely that Iraq would be able to hold “credible elections” in January “if the
security conditions continue as they are now.” Coincidentally or not, Mr Annan –
who is certainly not trying to win any popularity contests in Washington – chose
this moment to declare that the US invasion of Iraq had been “from the charter
point of view…illegal.”
An Unsuccessful Experiment
It is, of course, Mr Powell’s job to be upbeat about the prospects in Iraq, but the escalating terrorist attacks in Baghdad speak for themselves and reports from journalists on the ground strongly suggest that the Sunni insurgency appears to be gaining rather than losing momentum. Indeed that Americans admitted as much indirectly when they announced on 9 September that they had disbanded the Falluja brigade, the 1600-strong unit of former army members and native Fallujans put together at the end of April to take over and pacify the city after the US marines failed to subdue it in three weeks of fighting. However it appears that once in Falluja, the members of the brigade did very little to suppress or even restrict the activities of the insurgents and may, therefore, paradoxically have made Falluja an even safer haven for them. Indeed according to Marine Col Jerry Durrant, “the Falluja brigade is done, over. The whole Falluja brigade thing was a fiasco. Initially it worked out OK, but it wasn’t a good idea for very long.”
Announcing the decision, the brigade’s latest leader, Gen 'Abd Allah Hamid Wa'il, read a Defense Ministry statement saying that “any member of the brigade can, as an individual, join the Iraqi national guard or the Iraqi police.” But the question uppermost in many people’s minds was not how many members of the Falluja brigade would join the government forces but how many may defect forthwith to the insurgents. And another question raised by the disbanding of the Falluja brigade is what the Americans now plan to do about the Sunni insurgency – and to judge from the numerous air strikes against Falluja in the past week, they are at least contemplating a return to plan A.
Burns Berates Bashar
It speaks volumes for the Bush administration’s lack of perspective – let alone any sense of irony – that it sees nothing incongruous in berating the Syrians for keeping 16,000 or so troops in Lebanon while 135,000 or so American troops are occupying Iraq. But that is exactly what US assistant Secretary of State William Burns did during the course of a visit to Damascus on 11 September. “Syria must end its interference in Lebanese internal affairs, withdraw its forces from Lebanon and allow the Lebanese armed forces and government to establish their authority throughout Lebanon,” Mr Burns declared after meeting with President Bashar al-Asad. “It must also…take steps to halt activities of states, individuals, and organizations operating on and from Syrian territory and in Lebanon that facilitate and direct…violence and terror.” Mr Burns described his talks in Damascus as “thorough and candid,” meaning, presumably, that they were lengthy and acrimonious. But they were not apparently entirely negative, since the next day in Cairo the American envoy hinted at the possibility of cooperation in making the Iraqi-Syrian border less porous when he said that “we talked about ways in which we might explore cooperation with regard to Iraq and our concerns about border security as well as the activities of groups operating out of Syrian territory who threaten efforts to ensure stability and security in Iraq,” adding that “we talked about mechanisms through which we can talk about practical ways in which we can help border security, which is in the mutual interest of Iraqis as well as Syrians.”
Sharon Comes Clean About Road Map
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has never made much of a secret of the fact that he does not have a high regard for the “road map” to Middle East peace proposed by the international quartet (the UN, US, EU and Russia), even if he has from time to time pretended to go along with it. (In fact, it would probably be more accurate to say he has occasionally allowed others, mainly the Americans, to pretend that he goes along with it.) But now, with the regional focus on Iraq and a presidential campaign in full swing in the US, he has evidently decided it is safe to dismiss the road map in more robust terms by asserting that Israel has no intention of withdrawing from the West Bank after completing its proposed “disengagement” from Gaza. Speaking to the daily Yediot Ahronot on 16 September, Mr Sharon replied to a question about his long-term vision for the region by saying that as long as there is no change in Palestinian leadership and policy, “Israel will continue its war on terrorism and will stay in the territories that will remain after the implementation of disengagement.” Moreover he went on to make clear that he sees disengagement as an alternative to the road map rather than a first step towards its implementation, saying: “Today, we are also not following the road map. I am not ready for this…The disengagement plan relieves Israel of pressures to adopt one plan or another that would be dangerous for it.”
A Sign Of The Times
As far as can be made out, the initial plans – perhaps fantasies would be a better word – of the pro-Israeli neoconservatives in Washington for post-war Iraq were that Iraqi National Congress (INC) leader Ahmad Chalabi (or somebody very much like him) would somehow be installed in power and that the signature of a peace agreement with Israel would be high on his list of priorities. However, now that Mr Chalabi has fallen out with his former American patrons and is trying to play the anti-American Shi'a card, it appears that accommodating Israel is not quite as important an objective as it once was, as a senior member of the INC, Mithal al-Alusi, has discovered to his surprise. Mr Alusi, who visited Israel last week to attend a conference, told the Israel daily Haaretz on 13 September that “many intellectuals in Iraq know that Israel must be taken into account as an existing fact…It is in Iraq’s interests to have diplomatic relations with everyone, and that is what we want.” He added that while Mr Chalabi did not know about his trip to Israel, he supported contacts with Israel, and “it’s time to end the secrecy. The truth shall win.” In this instance, however, the truth cost Mr Alusi his job. On the same day, according to INC spokesman Haidar al-Musawi, an emergency meeting of the party leadership decided “to fire Mithal al-Alusi.” Moreover the party also issued a statement to the effect that “his statements which were carried in the media do not represent the INC’s point of view.” From this it is probably safe to conclude that, in the present political climate in Iraq, Mr Chalabi is having second thoughts about the wisdom of his stated willingness to do business with Israel.
Charles Snow