Secretary of State John Kerry is in the Middle East this week, trying to re-friend America’s jilted allies there. But Egyptians, Saudis and Israelis are increasingly asking: Where’s Waldo?
Like the character in the children’s book, our top diplomat seems to keep vanishing from the scene — as does the world’s former top power, which he represents.
This spells trouble not only for the sorts of goals that President Obama’s critics want him to pursue. It’s also disastrous for Kerry’s (and presumably the president’s) pet project: the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.
Yet Kerry, who arrived in Jerusalem Wednesday, is reportedly planning to dramatically up the stakes. A dovish Knesset member, Zehava Galon, claims the United States is planning to present Palestinians and Israelis by January with a take-it-or-leave-it proposal to “bridge” their differences.
This would follow Kerry’s last big idea, this summer, to time-limit negotiations to nine months, with a pact to be signed at the end of that period, ending once and for all one of the world’s most intractable diplomatic entanglement.
Oops: As the first trimester of that “pregnancy” ends, talks seem to be exactly where pessimists said they would be: in trouble.
Yes, Israeli and Palestinian negotiators meet regularly, often with Kerry’s envoy, Martin Indyk, playing chaperon. But progress?
Last week, as a gesture to Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, Israel released 26 Palestinian lifers from its prisons. But Abbas gave these prisoners — all convicted in gory murder cases involving Israeli civilians — a hero’s welcome.
The right-wing members of Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu’s coalition exploded in fury. To calm them, Netanyahu gave a go-ahead for some new housing construction in the West Bank and Jerusalem — which prompted Palestinian chief negotiator Saeb Erekat to announce he was quitting.
OK, Erekat has pulled the same stunt countless times in his decades as the top Palestinian peace negotiator. Still, a Tuesday meeting of teams from both sides reportedly ended in a shouting match. In other words, both sides were operating true to form as Kerry arrived.
Hence the plan to break the routine. If nothing changes by January, Kerry would pull a move that the Israeli Left has long advocated: Present America’s own peace plan and try to force all parties to comply by it.
This is where the “Waldo” problem comes in. Once, rumors of such a move would drive Israelis and Palestinians crazy with anticipation or anger. Yet now Kerry’s arrival in Jerusalem and Ramallah is generating mostly yawns — as he did in Cairo and Riyadh earlier in the week.
Why? To be fair, some of it is just bad timing.
Sunday, Kerry landed in Cairo just as much-awaited court proceedings started against Egypt’s deposed Muslim Brotherhood president, Mohammed Morsi. Egyptians could be forgiven for caring more about the titanic battle between Morsi and the general who ousted him, Abdel Fatah al-Sisi.
Next, Kerry pow-wowed with Netanyahu on Wednesday — about the time a Jerusalem court ruled on corruption charges against Avigdor Lieberman, a top national power broker. He was cleared, and Israelis naturally obsessed on the political implications. (Lieberman, expected to rejoin Netanyahu’s government as foreign minister, is a strong opponent of these peace talks.) Kerry? Shove that story near the funny pages, where Waldo resides.
But it’s not just timing. Kerry’s obsession with the Palestinian-Israeli process serves only to emphasize America’s absence on every other issue in the region, which (newsflash!) is going through tectonic shifts.
Saudis and Turks clamor for US leadership on Syria. All sides in Egypt quietly crave America’s support in their internal battles. And everyone fears that negotiations with Iran (which resume Thursday in Geneva) will wind up with the mullahs as a nuclear-armed regional superpower, threatening all neighbors.
On all those fronts, no one can find Waldo.
Yes, Arabs always publicly talk about the peace process and Israel’s evils, but as Riyadh-watcher Ali al-Ahmed, president of the Washington-based Institute for Gulf Affairs, tells me, “The Saudis don’t care about the Palestinians, they care about Iran.”
Nonetheless, Kerry and Obama have pushed a signed Palestinian-Israeli pact to the top of their regional to-do list, and Kerry seems eager to drown himself in it.
Back when Uncle Sam was the dominant regional power broker, it might have worked. With Waldo, such projects are doomed to get lost in the crowd.