Dennis Ross's Mythology

Nobody ever got rich defending the virtues of Yasser Arafat, so indulge me for taking a swipe at Dennis Ross's op-ed in Tuesday's New York Times. During the first Bush and then the Clinton administration, Ross, of course, was America's Mr. Middle East. Or as the bio on his think-tank's website puts it, he was "a highly skilled diplomat" who "for more than 12 years...played a leading role in shaping U.S. involvement in the Middle East peace process." Is it an oxymoron to speak of highly-skilled U.S. Middle East peace negotiators considering the bloody collapse of U.S.-brokered Middle East peace negotiations? Ross has a simple explanation for the failure: it's Arafat's fault. Ross's account of his government service, The Missing Peace, presidential-memoir-length at 840 pages, sums it up in a sentence: "Only one leader was unable or unwilling to confront history and mythology: Yasser Arafat."
Ross takes up his concern with mythology again in his Times Op-Ed. This time he complains about what he sees as an emerging mythology--perpetuated in former President Carter's book Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid--that seeks to defend Arafat's "rejection" of U.S. peace proposals. Ross believes that Arafat's refusal to abandon the mythologies of the Palestinian struggle made it impossible for Arafat to make peace with Israel.
The notion that Arafat alone destroyed the peace process is itself a myth--and nobody has done more to advance it than Ross. The collapse of the peace process was a complex affair lasting from the Oslo accords in 1993 until the end of negotiations in 2001. Arafat contributed his share of mistakes. He was a vain, stubborn, corrupt and autocratic leader. His reliance on violence up to the end did more to hurt than help the Palestinian cause. But as Condi Rice cranks up another attempt to revive the peace process, it's worth debunking some of Ross's myths if American diplomacy is ever going to go anywhere.
--Arafat refused key compromises. Ross downplays the concessions that Palestinians made and suffering they endured since losing the 1948 war to Israel. When Arafat recognized Israel and signed Oslo in 1994, he gave away 78% of historic Palestine. That may seem a simple, over-due recognition of reality to Ross, but to Palestinians, many still holding keys to homes in Jaffa and Haifa, it's a gut-wrenching, existential capitulation. Arafat, a revolutionary nationalist guerrilla leader, made further substantial concessions during Ross's years of mediation. Following President Clinton's and Ross's departure from office, Arafat never renounced negotiations but the incoming Israeli and U.S. governments refused to engage the elected leader of the Palestinians.
--Arafat avoided key decisions. Yes, partly because Ross's skills didn't include the ability to gain Arafat's confidence and assure Palestinians of their future in a viable independent Palestinian state. Throughout the negotiations over the future of that remaining 22%, to cite one example, Israeli governments continued to expand illegal Israeli settlements with scarcely a peep of protest from the U.S. That left the paranoia-inclined Arafat suspicious and resentful. Having failed to oversee full implementation of confidence-building Israeli pullbacks, the U.S. decided to pressure Arafat into quick end-of-settlement talks on the ultra sensitive issues like control of Jerusalem, return of refugees, Jewish settlements and borders for a Palestinian state. Going into those failed Camp David talks, Arafat felt cornered--not the frame of mind a skilled mediator should instill in a negotiating party.
--Arafat missed key opportunities. Arafat never rejected peace at Camp David. His insistence that U.S. and Israeli proposals could be improved upon was validated when they were indeed improved upon in secret negotiations that continued, after the Palestinians launched an intifadeh. Ross scorns Arafat for not later endorsing Clinton's final proposals in December 2000. Arafat's reluctance was a tactical error, but hardly proved he would never make a final peace deal. He knew that Clinton and Israeli Prime Minister Barak were heading out of office within a month and would not be around to keep whatever commitments they made to Arafat in return. Given the terrible killings that ensued, Arafat's death in 2004 and last year's parliamentary victory of the fundamentalist Hamas group over Arafat's Fatah party--Hamas wants the whole 100%--let's duly note that Ross and his boss had eight golden years to negotiate Middle East peace and they too missed an opportunity.

By Scott MacLeod/Cairo