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| Annapolis: Waiting for a Fiasco |
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| Written by Rabbi Dow Marmur | |
| Monday, 26 November 2007 | |
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It has been announced that Prime Minister Olmert will not be going in handcuffs to the Annapolis summit. The Police decided not to bring charges until after he returns home – unless, of course, he’ll seek asylum in the United States. But Olmert will travel with no less burdensome, though less visible, shackles: the limitations that some of his coalition partners, the opposition and the realities of the conflict have put on him. They’ll make sure that he doesn’t give anything away, especially not land, not the settlements, not (part of) Jerusalem and not the Golan Heights. They’ll cite the failure of Oslo as a prime reason for their stance. As he seems to be more interested in staying as Prime Minister than making peace, it would be overoptimistic on our part to expect that he will free himself from his many constraints. This is no time for euphoria despite the high expectations. But the feared failure of Annapolis shouldn’t be blamed on Olmert. Even the most dovish and astute of Israeli Prime Ministers (if such a person exists) will have failed, because his main partner (Abu Mazen) isn’t in a position to deliver and the hosts (George W. Bush and Condoleezza Rice) don’t have the wherewithal to make it happen. When the recriminations will start flying after the anticipated fiasco of Annapolis, the international community is likely to put most of the blame on Israel, because blaming Israel has become something of a world sport, especially in the media. No amount of PR will be able to change the negative image created by Israel’s Annapolis skeptics. Within Israel itself, Olmert will, of course, carry the lion’s share of the blame, because of his unpopularity in the country and because too many front line players have an interest in his political demise. Three of them come particularly to mind. Tzippi Livni is Olmert’s obvious successor as party leader. But is there much left of Sharon’s (and currently Olmert’s) party, Kadima? As it seems now, it has already gone the way of its founder: not really alive, though not yet buried.Ehud Barak, the other front line player, may have already assumed that Kadima is a spent force. His studied silence on most issues of the day, and the absence of any articulation of the position of the Labor Party that he leads, suggest that he’s preparing himself to take over from Olmert by placing himself so close to the centre of Israeli politics that the electorate will not know the difference between him and his rivals to the right. The impotent rage in the circles of what’s left of Israel’s Left is fierce. Benjamin Netanyahu, the leader of the opposition, is obviously preparing himself to succeed Olmert – and he may very well do so. He will try to present himself to the electorate more centrist than he is - and much more than his backers will want him to be. One of the consequences of Annapolis (in addition to increased terrorist activities by Hamas, Hezbollah and their Iranian backers) may well be an early general election in Israel. None of the above potential successors should give us cause for much hope of better times: Livni hasn’t exactly taken the country by storm, even if she looks better than Olmert, and the other two have already been Prime Ministers – and failed. A fiasco at Annapolis will thus not only have repercussions on the international scene but less than pleasant consequences for internal politics in Israel. I’ll have more to say about it when we get to Israel in mid-December. In the meantime: start worrying. Toronto, November 25, 2007 Trackback(0)
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