'Just World News' with Helena Cobban: Mouallem interview, part 3 (final)

'Just World News' with Helena Cobban Info, analysis, discussion-- to build a more just world
« Mouallem interview, part 2: Iraq, Lebanon, peace process \| JWN front page \| Human rights, democracy, the US, and Syria » Mouallem interview, part 3 (final) Posted by Helena Cobban March 3, 2007 12:01 AM EST \| Link Filed in Syria This is the third installment of my write-up of the interview I conducted with Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Mouallem in Damascus on February 28. The first two installments appeared in these two earlier JWN posts: 1, and 2. ~HC. So, I had been asking Mr. Mouallem about the fate of the many settlers whom Israel has implanted into the occupied Palestinian and Syrian territories since 1967, and he had been saying, "To make peace you need a political decision. The issue is not one of settlers, but their presence there is used as an excuse for the lack of political will in Israel"... I asked again about the question of the settlers, and whether the presence, now, of nearly 500,000 of them inside the occupied West Bank (including East Jerusalem) might not make the political question, for any Israeli government, of effecting a total withdrawal from that occupied area much more difficult to resolve? He replied, You talk about the 500,000 settlers-- but what about the four million Palestinian refugees? How can the international community be happy with that dispersal of the Palestinians from their homes but say it cannot easily think about relocating 500,000 settlers? The existence of the settlements there doesn't in any way affect the requirements of international law. Regarding the negotiations over Golan, the issue of the Israeli settlements there was raised during our negotiations with Israel. The Israeli negotiators agreed to remove all those settlers and asked for compensation for the costs of pulling them out and relocating them. Whom did they ask this of? I asked. He replied, "Those who were watching the negotiation"-- a clear reference to the Americans, who were the sole outside mediators/facilitators of all the bilateral peace negotiations that Israel held, in parallel, with the Syrians, Palestinians, and Jordanians in the 1990s. "If the Israelis had asked us," Mouallem added, "we would have countered that request with our own request for compensation for all the many monetary losses our people suffered as a result of the occupation of our land." However, he noted that that principle of compensation from an outside party for the costs of relocating Israeli settlers from occupied territories-- a principle that has earlier been applied with respect both to the settlers Israel withdrew from Sinai in 1982, or from Gaza in late 2005-- could also be applied to settlers being relocated out of the West Bank in the context of a final Palestinian-Israeli peace. If a comprehensive peace process is resumed within the coming period, I asked, did he expect that the Syrians would be able to coordinate more effectively with the Palestinian negotiators than they had in the 1990s, when Yasser Arafat presided over all aspects of the Palestinians' dipliomacy? Mouallem replied, "I can't tell, because the Syrian issue is much easier to resolve than the Palestinian issue. Between 1991 and 2000 we built the structure of the peace agreement on our trac, and we achieved about 85 percent of the final agreement." What about the recent press reports that, between 2004 and summer 2006, a Syrian-American business executive called Ibrahim Soleiman had conducted some "track two" diplomacy with a group of well-connected Israeli private citizens, and had passed a number of significant messages between the governmental authorities in Israel and Syria in an attempt to exoplore the possibility of a resumption of the negotiations? "It was a personal issue," he told me. "Ibrahim Soleiman is an individual who is keen to see peace between Syria and Israel. But I have no knowledge of any contacts between him and the Syrian government." Did he have any fears that, if there is a comprehensive Arab-Israeli peace negotiation, this might make problemns between his government and Iran? He replied, No. We negotiated with Israel from 1991 through 2000, and we continued to have good relations with Iran throughout those years. Of course, it's possible the Iranians were convinced that the Israelis would never complete the negotiation-- that Prime Minister Shamir had been serious when he later revealed that his intention, when he participated in the Madrid conference, was simply to tie the Arab side up in negotiations for a further ten years without arriving at any final settlement. I asked how he saw the position of the present Olmert government in Israel. He had said earlier he saw it as "weak"-- so what did that portend for the chance of successful negotiations? I prefer not to look at individuals but at the movements of public opinion. The Israelis lack any leadership that is dedicated to creating a peace culture inside their society and to preparing public opinion for the era of peace. Now, instead, we see a leadership that plants fear in public opinion, and prepares the public there for another military confrontation. But had the Syrian leadership, for its part, done much to create a culture of peace, I asked? He said, During the peace negotiations, and especially during the summit between President Hafez al-Asad and President Bill Clinton in Geneva in 1994, President Asad said clearly that 'Peace is our strategic option', and spoke about 'the peace of the brave.' Until now, President Bashar al-Asad considers this to be a fact. Addressing another aspect of Arab-Israeli peacemaking, I asked how he saw the more activist role the Saudi monarchy recently started playing regarding several aspects of regional diplomacy including the negotiation of the Mecca Agreement concluded in mid-February between Fateh and Hamas. I asked whether he considered the Saudis had gone significantly further in this diplomacy than Washington might have been happy with. He said merely, We are happy to see the Saudis having a dialogue with the representatives of [Lebanese] Hizbullah, and hosting Hamas and Fateh in Mecca. We're happy to see His Majesty the King supporting the Mecca Agreement, which we are happy with. We're happy, too, to see them hosting an Arab summit in Riyadh in the near future. This is the role we should see Saudi Arabia play, in contributing to increase the stability in the region. We're also happy to see them undertaking a dialogue with Iran. At the beginning of our meeting-- before he told me "So now, you can ask me anything you like!"-- Mouallem had made a quick introductory statement summing up how he saw his country's present position. "We have passed the period of imposed isolation," he said, with evident relief. "Why it was imposed on us, I still don't know." He continued, The problem we face is that the Israelis always try to resolve issues by force, and this has led to the absence of peace for many decades. We see that the US policy has also, similarly, involved a reliance on force-- in Iraq, in Afghanistan, and in this current mobilization against Iran. We believe that without a political regime in the region [by which I understood him to mean a coordinated political-diplomatic approach to problem solving], you can't resolve issues or find stability. This has been demonstrated clearly-- in Iraq, in Afghanistan, and Palestine. You even need a political regime in the 'War on Terror'. Without a political dialogue with the relevant parties in this region, the Middle East won't ever see stability. Is the current instability seving America's interrests or the region's interests? It is surely not. They tried to tell us about some projects they had, like the Greater Middle East, or the 'New' Middle East, or the alliance among 'moderate' countries in the Middle East. But what is their definition of 'moderate'? Is it a country that supports an ignorant American policy on regional issues? You find many questions along these lines being asked in the streets in the whole of this region. Why has the American reputation reached such an unprecedentedly low level in so many countries in and beyond the Middle East? No-one in the administration has yet answered this. Toward the end of the interview, I returned to the question of the United States' current position in the Middle East, including the status of the campaign it pursued in 2004 and 2005 for democratization throughout the region; and I asked how he saw Washington's position now. He replied, Nobody in this part of the world is against democracy. But still, the people of the region have our own priorities-- and the first priority for us is to liberate the Golan Heights and end the Arab-Israeli conflict. Because this on its own would have profound political, economic, and social consequences on Syrian life. We want to see the Middle East stable and secure. We want to see Iraq, Lebanon, and Palestine all stand up! This, for any Syrian, is a priority. And this will lead to other priorities, like democratization. I asked his reaction to reports I had heard that some officials in the Bush administration, including Deputy National Security Advisor Elliott Abrams, had indicated that they gave such a high priority to democratization and regime change in Syria that they had argued that the present, Baath Party-dominated government in Syria should not be "rewarded" by being engaged in a peace process that would almost certainly lead to the return of Golan to Syrian control. He said, If Mr. Abrams said so, this means that in his lifetime he hates to see peace. When Israel conquered the Golan, did it do so on behalf of peace and democratization-- or on behalf of conquering and expansion? You should ask Mr. Abrams if what's happening in Iraq is democratization. The average number of people killed every day in Iraq is 60 to 70 people. So many Iraqis are now obliged to choose between being killed and leaving their country. And this is democratization? People like Mr. Abrams damaged the cause of democratization more than any others. Because democracy is an important way to govern a country-- but only if you respect each country's priorities and needs. We finished the meeting with some small talk. He and his key media advisor Bushra Kanafani talked a little about the dangers they faced during the trip the two of them-- and one other Foreign Ministry official, Ahmed Arnous-- had made to Baghdad last November. Throughout our whole meeting, Mouallem projected a clear sense of relief that, in his view, the president whom he serves and the government of which he is a part had successfully survived a period of some danger and political uncertainty, and was now prepared to be somewhat gracious and understanding in the way it deals with the United States and other western and pro-western powers in the period ahead. I gathered this same impression of a government and regime that feels a new (if still not yet complete) sense of self-confidence from all the other contacts I had during my three-day visit to Damascus. Those included contacts with a number of members of the country's liberal political opposition. Indeed, I was struck by how similar some of the key the arguments-- and even the language-- I heard from them was to that I heard from Mouallem. But I shall write more about that, later. « Mouallem interview, part 2: Iraq, Lebanon, peace process \| JWN front page \| Human rights, democracy, the US, and Syria » Comments Comment from... Gordon Reed, at March 3, 2007 01:11 PM: Thanks for an insightful interview, I wish our leaders were as articulate. I just read an article in The Future of Freedom Foundation regarding the Syrians torture of Arar. Bush says we do not talk to Syria but obviously somebody in the administration did. The article asks the question of why no one in the media brings up this point. Gordon Reed Comment from... Chris Assad, at March 3, 2007 06:10 PM: I too thank you Helena for the interview with Syria's Minister of Foreign affairs. Mr. Reed in the previous comment wished that "our leaders were as articulate" as Mr. Mouallem. My comment on that is; they are, however. Our leaders prefer deception and outright lies over sincerity and truth. That is what gets us into quagmires in practically every far away corner of the globe. Comment from... kdj, at March 6, 2007 08:55 PM: Greetings, Helena! Have you written about the Sabian Mandean people of Iraq? I am trying to organize a forum about their severe circumstances in Iraq. From the BBC. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/6412453.stm Thanks, as always Helena! 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Mouallem interview, part 3 (final)

Posted by Helena Cobban
March 3, 2007 12:01 AM EST | Link
Filed in Syria

This is the third installment of my write-up of the interview I conducted with Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Mouallem in Damascus on February 28. The first two installments appeared in these two earlier JWN posts: 1, and 2. ~HC.

So, I had been asking Mr. Mouallem about the fate of the many settlers whom Israel has implanted into the occupied Palestinian and Syrian territories since 1967, and he had been saying, "To make peace you need a political decision. The issue is not one of settlers, but their presence there is used as an excuse for the lack of political will in Israel"...

I asked again about the question of the settlers, and whether the presence, now, of nearly 500,000 of them inside the occupied West Bank (including East Jerusalem) might not make the political question, for any Israeli government, of effecting a total withdrawal from that occupied area much more difficult to resolve?

He replied,

You talk about the 500,000 settlers-- but what about the four million Palestinian refugees? How can the international community be happy with that dispersal of the Palestinians from their homes but say it cannot easily think about relocating 500,000 settlers? The existence of the settlements there doesn't in any way affect the requirements of international law.

Regarding the negotiations over Golan, the issue of the Israeli settlements there was raised during our negotiations with Israel. The Israeli negotiators agreed to remove all those settlers and asked for compensation for the costs of pulling them out and relocating them.

Whom did they ask this of? I asked.

He replied, "Those who were watching the negotiation"-- a clear reference to the Americans, who were the sole outside mediators/facilitators of all the bilateral peace negotiations that Israel held, in parallel, with the Syrians, Palestinians, and Jordanians in the 1990s.

"If the Israelis had asked us," Mouallem added, "we would have countered that request with our own request for compensation for all the many monetary losses our people suffered as a result of the occupation of our land."

However, he noted that that principle of compensation from an outside party for the costs of relocating Israeli settlers from occupied territories-- a principle that has earlier been applied with respect both to the settlers Israel withdrew from Sinai in 1982, or from Gaza in late 2005-- could also be applied to settlers being relocated out of the West Bank in the context of a final Palestinian-Israeli peace.

If a comprehensive peace process is resumed within the coming period, I asked, did he expect that the Syrians would be able to coordinate more effectively with the Palestinian negotiators than they had in the 1990s, when Yasser Arafat presided over all aspects of the Palestinians' dipliomacy?

Mouallem replied, "I can't tell, because the Syrian issue is much easier to resolve than the Palestinian issue. Between 1991 and 2000 we built the structure of the peace agreement on our trac, and we achieved about 85 percent of the final agreement."

What about the recent press reports that, between 2004 and summer 2006, a Syrian-American business executive called Ibrahim Soleiman had conducted some "track two" diplomacy with a group of well-connected Israeli private citizens, and had passed a number of significant messages between the governmental authorities in Israel and Syria in an attempt to exoplore the possibility of a resumption of the negotiations?

"It was a personal issue," he told me. "Ibrahim Soleiman is an individual who is keen to see peace between Syria and Israel. But I have no knowledge of any contacts between him and the Syrian government."

Did he have any fears that, if there is a comprehensive Arab-Israeli peace negotiation, this might make problemns between his government and Iran?

He replied,

No. We negotiated with Israel from 1991 through 2000, and we continued to have good relations with Iran throughout those years. Of course, it's possible the Iranians were convinced that the Israelis would never complete the negotiation-- that Prime Minister Shamir had been serious when he later revealed that his intention, when he participated in the Madrid conference, was simply to tie the Arab side up in negotiations for a further ten years without arriving at any final settlement.

I asked how he saw the position of the present Olmert government in Israel. He had said earlier he saw it as "weak"-- so what did that portend for the chance of successful negotiations?

I prefer not to look at individuals but at the movements of public opinion. The Israelis lack any leadership that is dedicated to creating a peace culture inside their society and to preparing public opinion for the era of peace. Now, instead, we see a leadership that plants fear in public opinion, and prepares the public there for another military confrontation.

But had the Syrian leadership, for its part, done much to create a culture of peace, I asked?

He said,

During the peace negotiations, and especially during the summit between President Hafez al-Asad and President Bill Clinton in Geneva in 1994, President Asad said clearly that 'Peace is our strategic option', and spoke about 'the peace of the brave.' Until now, President Bashar al-Asad considers this to be a fact.

Addressing another aspect of Arab-Israeli peacemaking, I asked how he saw the more activist role the Saudi monarchy recently started playing regarding several aspects of regional diplomacy including the negotiation of the Mecca Agreement concluded in mid-February between Fateh and Hamas. I asked whether he considered the Saudis had gone significantly further in this diplomacy than Washington might have been happy with.

He said merely,

We are happy to see the Saudis having a dialogue with the representatives of [Lebanese] Hizbullah, and hosting Hamas and Fateh in Mecca. We're happy to see His Majesty the King supporting the Mecca Agreement, which we are happy with. We're happy, too, to see them hosting an Arab summit in Riyadh in the near future. This is the role we should see Saudi Arabia play, in contributing to increase the stability in the region.

We're also happy to see them undertaking a dialogue with Iran.

At the beginning of our meeting-- before he told me "So now, you can ask me anything you like!"-- Mouallem had made a quick introductory statement summing up how he saw his country's present position. "We have passed the period of imposed isolation," he said, with evident relief. "Why it was imposed on us, I still don't know."

He continued,

The problem we face is that the Israelis always try to resolve issues by force, and this has led to the absence of peace for many decades. We see that the US policy has also, similarly, involved a reliance on force-- in Iraq, in Afghanistan, and in this current mobilization against Iran.

We believe that without a political regime in the region [by which I understood him to mean a coordinated political-diplomatic approach to problem solving], you can't resolve issues or find stability. This has been demonstrated clearly-- in Iraq, in Afghanistan, and Palestine. You even need a political regime in the 'War on Terror'.

Without a political dialogue with the relevant parties in this region, the Middle East won't ever see stability.

Is the current instability seving America's interrests or the region's interests? It is surely not.

They tried to tell us about some projects they had, like the Greater Middle East, or the 'New' Middle East, or the alliance among 'moderate' countries in the Middle East. But what is their definition of 'moderate'? Is it a country that supports an ignorant American policy on regional issues?

You find many questions along these lines being asked in the streets in the whole of this region. Why has the American reputation reached such an unprecedentedly low level in so many countries in and beyond the Middle East?

No-one in the administration has yet answered this.

Toward the end of the interview, I returned to the question of the United States' current position in the Middle East, including the status of the campaign it pursued in 2004 and 2005 for democratization throughout the region; and I asked how he saw Washington's position now.

He replied,

Nobody in this part of the world is against democracy. But still, the people of the region have our own priorities-- and the first priority for us is to liberate the Golan Heights and end the Arab-Israeli conflict. Because this on its own would have profound political, economic, and social consequences on Syrian life.

We want to see the Middle East stable and secure. We want to see Iraq, Lebanon, and Palestine all stand up! This, for any Syrian, is a priority. And this will lead to other priorities, like democratization.

I asked his reaction to reports I had heard that some officials in the Bush administration, including Deputy National Security Advisor Elliott Abrams, had indicated that they gave such a high priority to democratization and regime change in Syria that they had argued that the present, Baath Party-dominated government in Syria should not be "rewarded" by being engaged in a peace process that would almost certainly lead to the return of Golan to Syrian control.

He said,

If Mr. Abrams said so, this means that in his lifetime he hates to see peace.

When Israel conquered the Golan, did it do so on behalf of peace and democratization-- or on behalf of conquering and expansion?

You should ask Mr. Abrams if what's happening in Iraq is democratization. The average number of people killed every day in Iraq is 60 to 70 people. So many Iraqis are now obliged to choose between being killed and leaving their country. And this is democratization?

People like Mr. Abrams damaged the cause of democratization more than any others. Because democracy is an important way to govern a country-- but only if you respect each country's priorities and needs.

We finished the meeting with some small talk. He and his key media advisor Bushra Kanafani talked a little about the dangers they faced during the trip the two of them-- and one other Foreign Ministry official, Ahmed Arnous-- had made to Baghdad last November.

Throughout our whole meeting, Mouallem projected a clear sense of relief that, in his view, the president whom he serves and the government of which he is a part had successfully survived a period of some danger and political uncertainty, and was now prepared to be somewhat gracious and understanding in the way it deals with the United States and other western and pro-western powers in the period ahead.

I gathered this same impression of a government and regime that feels a new (if still not yet complete) sense of self-confidence from all the other contacts I had during my three-day visit to Damascus. Those included contacts with a number of members of the country's liberal political opposition. Indeed, I was struck by how similar some of the key the arguments-- and even the language-- I heard from them was to that I heard from Mouallem. But I shall write more about that, later.

Comments

Comment from... Gordon Reed, at March 3, 2007 01:11 PM:

Thanks for an insightful interview, I wish our leaders were as articulate. I just read an article in The Future of Freedom Foundation regarding the Syrians torture of Arar. Bush says we do not talk to Syria but obviously somebody in the administration did. The article asks the question of why no one in the media brings up this point.

Gordon Reed

Comment from... Chris Assad, at March 3, 2007 06:10 PM:

I too thank you Helena for the interview with Syria's Minister of Foreign affairs. Mr. Reed in the previous comment wished that "our leaders were as articulate" as Mr. Mouallem. My comment on that is; they are, however.

Our leaders prefer deception and outright lies over sincerity and truth. That is what gets us into quagmires in practically every far away corner of the globe.

Comment from... kdj, at March 6, 2007 08:55 PM:

Greetings, Helena!
Have you written about the Sabian Mandean people of Iraq? I am trying to organize a forum about their severe circumstances in Iraq. From the BBC.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/6412453.stm

Thanks, as always Helena!
KDJ