Saudi Ambassador Calls for U.S. to Step Up: “Implementation Should Be Done Now”

It is time to stop developing plans and start pursuing action, Saudi Ambassador to the U.S. Prince Turki said yesterday.  Everyone knows that two states is the solution, he said, but he warned that goal would never be achieved without U.S. involvement and pressure.

During the question and answer portion of his address to the National Council on U.S.-Arab Relations, Prince Turki recounted all of the peace efforts he had “lived through” that have dissected the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and put forth solutions, which will inevitably be the foundation to any agreement.

He said, “And there is nothing new to add to that equation other than the fact that all of these plans need to be implemented.  The United States, in its Roadmap, has given a way to achieve peace and the establishment of a two-state solution.  Couple that with the Abdullah Peace Plan of 2002 and you will get an end view to that process, which is two states, based on the ’67 borders, with Israel withdrawing from all Arab territories, including Jerusalem, in return for total Arab countries’ recognition of Israel and normalization of relations.  And the only thing lacking in all of these things is that nobody has put their foot forward, and we have to be clear in our views on this issue.

“The United States is the only country that can do the right thing for everybody in the Middle East, not only because of the size and strength of the United States, but because the United States is engaged and enmeshed in our political situation and has been for the last 50 years or so, whether it likes it or not.  And I don’t think it’s a matter of liking or not that should decide this year, but where are the basic interests of the United States?  The basic interests are for peace to reign in our part of the world so that we can turn to more fruitful endeavors and more contributive engagements with each other.”

His full speech may be found here.

Can You Hear Them? Israeli and Palestinian Women Speak Out

Can You Hear Me? Israeli and Palestinian Women Fight For Peace
A Film by CALME Luminary Lilly Rivlin, Producer, Writer and Director

CALME Luminary Lilly Rivlin’s film is the first documentary to explore in depth the role of Israeli and Palestinian women peace activists dealing with one of the world’s oldest conflicts.  Though prospects for peace have ebbed and flowed between Israelis and Palestinians, women peace activists have worked consistently to bring an end to the bloodshed that has brought so much anguish to both sides.  No matter how desperate the political situation seem these women never stop communicating with each other.  They come together in their bereavement over the loss of loved ones and to demand a better future for their children and grandchildren. There is bonding, there is friction, there are differences of opinion.  But most of all it is a story about women who have hope and keep on trying to hear each other and do not give up their work for peace.

UPCOMING NEW YORK CITY SCREENINGS after the jump.

IAEA Chief Stresses Two States for Human Security

Sadat Lecture for Peace
Delivered by Dr. Mohamed ElBaradei

In IAEA Chief Dr. Mohamed ElBaradei’s speech on Tuesday at the Sadat Center at the University of Maryland, he stepped outside of his normal realm of preventing nuclear proliferation to instead speak about the importance of two states to the region writ large:

“In June 2002, President George Bush articulated for the first time the formal support of the United States for a Palestinian State, laying out the principles of what would be called the ‘road map’ to achieve that goal.

For security in the Middle East to be realized will naturally require more than just finding a solution to the Israeli–Palestinian issue. The need to achieve stability in Iraq and Lebanon, to normalize relations with Iran, and to address pressing issues of development, governance and modernity throughout the region are only a few of the substantial challenges that must be dealt with.

But if the Palestinian question were to be resolved, a decades old burden of Arab–Israeli tensions would be lifted that would improve immeasurably our ability to deal with these and other challenges.”

Read the full speech here.

Palestinians Search for the U.S.

The subheading of West Bank correspondent Jamil Hamad’s post on Time online today starkly states, “By vacating its traditional refereeing role, the U.S. may be condemning Israelis and Palestinians to disaster.”

Comparing the situation playing out in the Palestinian territories to the fall of Solomon’s temple, Hamad says, “America has abandoned the role of honest broker between Israel and the Palestinians, leaving Israel with no restraints on its actions, and the Palestinians with no faith that diplomacy can change their situation. The resulting collapse of any kind of peace process will benefit neither Israel nor the Palestinians. If things are allowed to remain as they are now, the hostility between the two peoples will soon pass a point of no return, leaving them ensnared in a grim story of blood and bitterness for the foreseeable future.”

Secretary Rice’s Regional Efforts May Require Unsavory Partners

David Ignatius’ op-ed, “Reach Out to the Red Zone,” implores Secretary Condoleezza Rice and the Bush administration to stretch beyond their diplomatic comfort zone in the Middle East to work with all of the key players in the region.  This includes those terrorist organizations (to include Hamas and Hezbollah) that are more challenging to engage with, but crucial nonetheless to any serious efforts to affect meaningful change in the region.  

His argument could be taken one step further to encourage Secretary Rice to focus her efforts specifically on the greatest regional sore spot, the stalled Israel-Palestinian peace process.  As long as this central conflict remains unresolved, it will continue to foster overarching regional grievances and will impede much needed progress on other tough issues, such as Iran’s nuclear status.  Such issues cannot be addressed in a regional vacuum, or without first addressing the Israeli-Palestinian crisis. 

The U.S. Must Return to Resolving Conflicts – Not Just Managing Them

In the November/December issue of Foreign Affairs magazine, Ambassador Edward P. Djerejian, former Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs, as well as Ambassador to both Syria and Egypt, eloquently lays out a number of points that several of CALME’s luminaries have proffered in previous posts.  The crux of his argument is that the United States has led Israel and its neighbors out of conflict before by acting as the third-party peacemaker, and it is possible – and time – for the U.S. to play that role again.  He also reminds readers that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict does not operate in a vacuum; solving it is integral to bringing stability throughout the region.

Ambassador Djerejian’s article concludes, “President George W. Bush should [therefore] reiterate the vision of a comprehensive Arab-Israeli peace settlement that he presented in June 2002, including his explicit call for a two-state solution involving a Palestinian state living in peace and security next to the state of Israel, and make it clear that he will work toward that end with the international community for the remainder of his presidency.  This could give the parties in the region the political space they need to make the tough decisions and compromises for a negotiated peace.  This thorough approach to peace, which would bring all the Arab and Israeli parties together to address the issues on the Palestinian, Lebanese, and Syrian fronts in a parallel manner, could be modeled after the Madrid peace conference of 1991.

Peace and Education

By CALME Luminary Lynne Wasserman
Vice President, Wasserman Foundation

An estimated 500,000 Palestinian children are currently out of school due to an ongoing strike in the West Bank that has closed most public schools.  In response, the UN is now working separate from the Palestinian government to provide activities, literacy and computer training, and safe recreation areas to local children.  24%of West Bank schools are already run by the UN.  While I applaud these efforts, this is not a permanent solution to an educational crisis occurring in a year that has already proved itself to be particularly challenging to Palestinian children.  According to UNICEF, in the past four months alone, over 180 children in Gaza have been killed or injured in the ongoing violence.

This is not an acceptable state of affairs.  Although attention was rightfully focused on Secretary Rice’s diplomatic outreach during her recent trip, high-level diplomatic efforts alone will not succeed.  They should not be considered completely separate from the everyday social issues such as healthcare and education that affects the apolitical man and child on the ground.  While I continue to wholeheartedly support the President’s vision of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, I also applaud those working at myriad NGOs concurrent to the peace process to better the lives of Israeli and Palestinian children.  They are laying the groundwork for the lasting changes in attitudes, education, and tolerance among any Palestinian government’s constituency that will ultimately make possible the long-term success of any diplomatic solution.

Working Toward Peace By Healing Those on the Ground

This post, by Namrata Mehta Maguire, provides a unique view of a peace effort occuring outside of the diplomatic circles.  Namrata Mehta Maguire is the Director of Finance and Administration for The Center for Mind-Body Medicine

The Center for Mind-Body Medicine (CMBM) has been working in Israel and Gaza implementing its Healing the Wounds of War (HWW) program to treat post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), extreme anxiety and ongoing depression in populations experiencing war and violence.    CMBM has pioneered the use of self-care, mind-body skills and group support to encourage and guide populations who feel helpless in the midst of war to experience and regain their power to help themselves.  Our model not only relieves psychological trauma but it also promotes permanent changes in attitude and behavior, decreasing anger.  It has been our experience that these permanent changes in individuals begins to open the process of building sustainable peace in the region.

Lots of Talk in the Campaigns, but Not About the Middle East

Published by CALME luminary James J. Zogby in today’s Jordan Times

In not a single House or Senate race being contested this year will the candidates engage in a serious debate about the failed US policy in the Middle East.

There is a number of races where the Iraq war is an issue, but in these instances, the debate has more to do with how we got into the war, the mistakes we’ve made and how we should leave.

There are, to be sure, supporters of the president’s vision (or fantasy) of the Iraq war; i.e., that we are producing a democracy that will transform the region. But in no case is there a serious discussion about Iraq, itself, or the consequences of our broader Middle East policy.

Why Now May be the Right Time for a Peace Effort

The following excerpts come from the recent International Crisis Group report published under the auspices of CALME American leader Robert Malley.

[And yet] This desultory state of affairs is an important reason why an urgent, ambitious international effort is required. Years of culpable neglect have crippled forces of pragmatism throughout the region and made the achievement of peace immeasurably more difficult. Another several years of waiting would only make it harder still. Some promising ingredients exist: the possibility of a Palestinian national unity government, Syria’s repeated call for a resumption of negotiations, increased eagerness on the part of Arab regimes for a renewed peace process and even Israel’s search for an alternative way forward after the collapse of its unilateralist experiment.

Moreover, the absence of initiative is itself a policy choice that inevitably will have a significant negative effect. Perpetuation of the Arab-Israeli conflict, with all the anger it generates, fuels extremist, jihadi movements in the Muslim world; intensifies animosity toward the West and the U.S. in particular; radicalises Muslim populations in Western Europe; discredits pro-Western governments; deepens the damaging divide between the Islamic and Western worlds; and, as both Syrian and Israeli officials have warned, sows the seeds of the next Arab-Israeli war. Resolving the conflict clearly would not be a sufficient condition to tackle such deep-seated problems; but it is, on all available evidence, a necessary one…

The Middle East is immersed in its worst crisis in years with no stable resolution in sight. Observers and analysts are quick to point out that circumstances are far from ideal for an Arab-Israeli initiative. They are right. But time for a negotiated settlement is quickly running out.

To read the full report, click here.