What happened in between was a chronology of diplomatic feints and compromises fit to fill a foreign-service textbook. But key to the process were the one-on-one relations Bush has built with other players in this savage confrontation, especially the Saudis. As the Bush administration now tries to move the process toward a preliminary peace conference in early summer (so preliminary, in fact, it doesn’t know what to call itself), the president’s personal take on the major players will be crucial to his own credibility, and to theirs.
The president’s affection for the burly prime minister of Israel, Ariel Sharon, is well known. Sharon may have many qualities, but only Bush would call the brusque old warrior “a man of peace.” And it was after a personal phone call from Bush that Sharon told his cabinet he was ready to accept a complex deal to lift the siege on Arafat: “The president has asked us to do this,” said Sharon. “He is a friend of Israel. We’re going to do it.” Bush and Sharon will meet this week, with Sharon offering what are described as detailed ideas for a Middle East settlement. (Sharon’s vision is well known: a Palestinian state in Gaza and less than half the occupied West Bank, with provisions to effectively imprison the entire population during an “interim” period.)
If new breakthroughs in the process are to be had, then Bush’s personal rapport with Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah will be vital. After taking the measure of Abdullah eyeball-to-eyeball at the ranch in Crawford, Texas, last month, Bush declared that the two men had “established a strong personal bond.” For his part, Abdullah talked about “a dialogue between hearts.” And without that up-close encounter, liberating Arafat would have been almost impossible.
Still, nothing moves in the Middle East without serious bargaining, and the release of Arafat required enough imaginative deals, discounts and incentives to do any bazaari proud. Even after Powell paid his visit last month, Sharon declared that Arafat wouldn’t be released until he turned over six Palestinians, including four accused of murdering Israeli Tourism Minister Rehavam Zeevi. NEWSWEEK has learned that early last week Sharon asked the Israeli Army’s elite unit, Sayeret Matkal, if it could enter Arafat’s headquarters and pluck the six from the compound. The Matkal commander said it couldn’t be done without serious bloodshed.
At the same time, in Bush’s meetings with Abdullah he was getting assurances that the Saudis would help keep Arafat on the peace track if he were let go. National-security adviser Condoleezza Rice and Sharon adviser Danny Ayalon conferred about how precisely to end the standoff. The British were offering wardens to watch over Zeevi’s killers in a Palestinian jail so Arafat wouldn’t let them out the infamous “revolving door” of his justice system. The Israelis asked the Americans to send wardens as well. In a crucial 12-minute call to Sharon two days later, Bush told him it was time to move forward. “We hope it gets resolved in the shortest time possible,” said Bush.
Now it’s the Saudis’ turn to deliver, and they’re likely to discover what they already knew: vouching for Arafat is no easy job. Arafat’s usual tactic is to play one Arab leader against another, thus wriggling free of his commitments to any of them. So the Saudis have invited Arafat to a miniconference of foreign ministers in Cairo this week, his first trip out of the occupied territories since Sharon laid on the siege. “Arafat must really play the game right now,” says veteran Saudi envoy Hassan Yassin. “It’s no longer a Palestinian game or a Saudi game. We are all exposed now. We have to be careful. We have to be disciplined.” The path toward peace remains a dangerous one for all concerned.
