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Baby Step Diplomacy

March 27, 2007 9:06 AM

By BRUNO NOTA

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert agree to meet ever two weeks. This was the highlight of the press conference held by U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice earlier today, press conference which concludes the Secretary’s three day visit in Israel, Jordan and the Palestinian Authority.

It may not sound like much, but for the leaders of the two embattled nations to even agree to stick to a schedule is a step forward.

Whether this agreement will materialize and whether these meetings will become as news item as common as the news about the Israeli Army’s raids in the West Bank or about Kassam rockets fired from Gaza at Israel is yet to be seen.

Both Olmert and Abbas are, at his point in time, quite busy fighting for their own political survival.

Mahmoud Abbas, head of the Fatah, is the President of a people without a state which a year ago voted for the rival Hamas by an overwhelming majority. In Gaza, where the Hamas is the dominant political and military force, the rivalry translated at times over the last few months into fierce exchanges of gun fire which left tens of Palestinians dead.

Two weeks ago Abbas swore in a new cabinet, the direct result of the Mecca agreement, a power share political deal between Fatah and Hamas.

Just over a year ago Ehud Olmert presented his cabinet to the Israeli public. According to a recent public opinion poll, only 3% of the same public would vote for Olmert again. With unfavorable conclusions expected to be published by a committee investigating the performance of the Israeli government and military during the Second Lebanon War of the summer of 2006, Olmert is unlikely to gain any additional public support and sympathy.

The Arab summit scheduled to take place later this week will focus on the Saudi Arabian initiative designed to bring to a peaceful end of the Israeli Palestinian conflict.

It is hard to imagine Olmert and Abbas will be the ones to sign a final treaty which will allow the two nations to co-exist peacefully side by side in two independent states. Neither are core issues of the conflict likely to be solved soon.

But talking to each other is a step, small as it may be, in the right direction.

And only a very few would dispute the fact that talking is better than shooting.

March 27, 2007 | Permalink | User Comments (0)

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