The lack of substance behind Brazil's and Argentina's recognition of Palestinian independence

By Guy Burton

Brazilian flags have been highly visible on Ramallah streets over the past few days, almost as much as in June and before the country crashed out of the World Cup. Their presence has much to do with public sentiment in the West Bank this week and following Brazil’s decision to recognise a Palestinian state within the 1967 Green Line. Brasilia’s announcement was followed by Argentina’s decision to do the same, a statement which should bring out many similarly mothballed Argentine flags in the de facto Palestinian capital as well.

This Latin American diplomatic charge is expected to continue, with Uruguay, Chile, Paraguay and Peru all making similar statements in the next few months. Palestinian policymakers may feel some degree of satisfaction, especially those around Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, whose government presented a two-year plan to achieve Palestinian independence in August last year. However, they should not be getting too carried away, since the Brazilian and Argentine positions give little away.

At the same time, Brazil and Argentina have been at the brunt of a predictably critical Israeli reaction. Israel claims that the Brazilian and Argentine decisions were taken outside the accepted mode, by being unilaterally announced rather than as a result of negotiations between themselves and the Palestinians. In its official statement, the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs argued that the Oslo Accords require the final status of the West Bank and Gaza to be settled through negotiations while the Road Map laid out a vision of a Palestinian state to be achieved through Israeli and Palestinians negotiations. The appeal to both Oslo and the Road Map are designed to emphasise legitimacy, especially by the latter: the Road Map was endorsed by the Quartet, which includes the UN and is therefore the expression of the international community.

Israel has strong backing for its position. On 7 December, PJ Crowley, a US State Department spokesman, said that “the only way to resolve the core issues within the process is through direct negotiations. That remains our focus. And we do not favor that course of action. As we’ve said many, many times, any unilateral action, we believe, is counterproductive.” Although why exactly the move was counterproductive, he failed to say while also overlooking Americans’ acquiescence of the ‘right’ kind of unilateralism.

While Washington criticizes Brasilia and Buenos Aires for their ‘wrong’ unilateral decisions, American policymakers refuse to say the same of Israel. After nearly three years without direct negotiations between the Israeli and Palestinian leaderships, they restarted in September only to flounder weeks later, when the Israelis’ 10-month settlement freeze – which was partial because it was only limited to new constructions and not those that already had planning permission or which were based in Jerusalem – ran out. For both the Palestinians and Americans, extending the freeze would have been a sign of good faith for talks to continue. But Israel refused and despite American efforts to bribe the Netanyahu government with a $3bn arms package to extend the moratorium for a further three months, Washington appears to have admitted defeat on a future freeze.

This American failure matters far more than any statement by a Latin American government – which will reassure the Israelis while deceiving the Palestinians. Even within the Israeli peace camp, the section of society most inclined to accept international involvement in the process, the Latin Americans’ influence has been largely disregarded. A prominent Israeli activist, Gershon Baskin of the Israel Palestine Centre for Research and Information, effectively overlooked Brazil and Argentina when he said that their decisions highlighted the vacuum in the current stalled negotiations and American absence in bringing the two sides together. For him and others like him, only Washington matters.

At the same time, the Argentine and Brazilian decisions promise more than they deliver by failing to back up support for Palestinian sovereignty. On one hand, their capacity and willingness to construct a Palestinian state within the Green Line is extremely marginal. The amount pledged (as opposed to have been spent) by Brazil to the Palestinians has been $20m since the mid-1990s. By way of comparison, the EU and Washington contribute $600m and $350m respectively per year.

On the other hand, it is not clear what action either country will take to hold Israel to various UN resolutions and legal obligations as an occupying force in the West Bank. It is doubtful that they will apply economic leverage, especially given rising trade across the Atlantic. Israeli-Argentine trade amounts to around $300m per year while Israeli-Brazilian trade was around $1bn in 2009 (down from $1.6bn in 2008). Much of that trade constitutes Israeli exports ($1.2bn), many of them related to the arms industry. Moreover, both Latin American countries’ trade with Israel has been formalized through a free trade agreement between Israel and the regional, trading bloc, Mercosur, which came into effect in April.

Why then have Argentina and Buenos Aires taken the decision to recognize Palestine? With regard to Israel, Israeli policymakers can bluster against the Latin Americans’ diplomatic recognition of Palestine – but its leaders know that politically, when compared to the US, neither Brazil nor Argentina matters. Their involvement in the process to date has been very limited. Moreover, neither country is likely to damage economic ties between themselves and Israel; diplomatic pressure remains disconnected from the business of trade.

As for Palestine, the benefits of offering diplomatic recognition by Argentina and Brazil far outweigh the (verbal) opposition heaped by Israel. Both the Argentine and Brazilian positions present a degree of foreign policy continuity. The two countries – indeed Latin America generally – have become increasingly pro-Arab since 1967. In part this reflected economic pressures from the early 1970s when the then military dictatorships struggled to secure reliable and reasonably priced oil inputs to supply their import substitution industrialization policies at the time. Brazil even signed up to an anti-Zionist resolution at the UN in this period (subsequently reversed at the end of the Cold War).

More recently, links between the Arab world and Latin America have increased. The past decade has coincided with a rise in trade between Latin America and the Middle East on the one hand and greater diplomatic contact on the other. In 2003 Brazil’s President Lula proposed an Arab-South American summit, the first which took place in Brasilia in 2005 and followed by Doha in 2009 (with Peru to follow next year). At both meetings, the issue of Palestinian sovereignty has been given particular airing in the speeches and space in the final declarations. Meanwhile, Brazil has been courting support for it to become a permanent member of the Security Council. To achieve this it has sought to project itself beyond its hemisphere and to present itself as a leader of the developing world.

Consequently, for both Brazil and Argentina, extending diplomatic recognition for an independent Palestine is an easy way of building up credibility in the Arab world and with little risk of any action beyond harsh Israeli words. In other words, that the two countries have taken the course they did demonstrates a decision based on weighing the relative costs and benefits. In this instance, both realized that there was little to lose and much to gain, especially in the Arab world where Palestinian sovereignty remains a primary concern (albeit more rhetorical than acted upon these days) and with little risk of losing valuable Israeli markets.

Guy Burton is a researcher at the Centre for Development Studies at Birzeit University and a research associate for the Latin America International Affairs Programme at the LSE Ideas Centre.

Jordan’s Frustration with the Middle East Peace Process

By Nigel Ashton

In a widely quoted interview with The Times last May King Abdullah of Jordan warned that ‘if we delay our peace negotiations then there is going to be another conflict between Arabs or Muslims and Israel in the next 12-18 months’. 12 of the 18 months are now up and Israeli-Palestinian negotiations seem further away than ever from even beginning, never mind reaching, fruition. If King Abdullah’s frustrations were great a year ago, they have only increased in the course of the past month. The recent collapse of Palestinian-Israeli proximity talks before they had even begun, coupled with the intransigence of the Netanyahu government on the issue of settlement-building, give little reason to believe that the next six months will bring significant progress.

It is no surprise, then, that the tensions in US-Israeli relations which have made headlines in recent weeks have been mirrored in a further worsening of the already bad bilateral relationship between Israel and Jordan. In an interview with the Wall Street Journal given just before his recent trip to the US, King Abdullah was frank about the troubled nature of the relationship.

The background in personal relations between Abdullah and Netanyahu was unpromising from the outset. The first three months of Abdullah’s reign in 1999, after the death of his father Hussein, were a period of strained relations with the outgoing first Netanyahu government. Despite this, when Netanyahu returned to office in 2009, Abdullah claimed to have given him the benefit of the doubt, waiting to judge him on his actions in office second time round. ‘I was extremely optimistic by the vision he had for peace between the Israelis and the Palestinians and the Israelis and the Arabs.’

Albeit that this comment may have significantly exaggerated the true extent of the King’s hopes for the new government, the experience of the past 12 months has been one of unrelieved frustration. ‘Everything I've seen on the ground has made me extremely sceptical, and I'm probably one of the more optimistic people you will meet in this part of the world’ Abdullah told the Wall Street Journal. Abdullah’s judgement was that relations with Israel are now at their lowest ebb since the signature of the peace treaty in 1994.

Sceptics might question why this should matter to Israel. After all, despite the frustrations expressed by the Jordanian monarch, there is no prospect of Jordan reneging on its peace treaty with Israel. Nor does Jordan have the power to harm Israel either economically or politically. But, there are two reasons why the dire state of bilateral relations should matter to Israel.

Firstly, if a peace process is to be initiated before the window of opportunity closes for a two state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, it will likely need a constructive role on the part of Jordan. Although Jordanian officials from the King down never tire of underlining that there is no Jordanian solution to the Palestinian question, any Palestinian state created through negotiations with Israel would also depend on close relations with Jordan. Precisely what political structure might govern this relationship could be a matter for future discussion.

King Abdullah implied as much in an interview which he gave to Fareed Zakaria at the end of January during the Davos economic summit. Although he denied for the umpteenth time that there was any ‘Jordanian option’ which might substitute for a peace deal negotiated directly between Israel and the Palestinians, Abdullah implicitly left open in his remarks what might happen after the creation of a Palestinian state. He did not explicitly rule out some form of future association with Jordan if a Palestinian state were created.

Secondly, as Abdullah suggested in his interview with The Times last May, Jordan can play a constructive role in helping to marshal broader support for an Israeli-Palestinian solution. This role might be particularly important given the centrality of the question of the future status of Jerusalem to these negotiations. As Abdullah put it, what could be on offer would be not just a two-state solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, but a ‘57 state solution’ whereby the entire Muslim world would recognise the Jewish state as part of the peace deal.

These considerations might seem distant and utopian to an Israeli government overwhelmingly preoccupied with the present. But, with the projected shifts in the demographic balance between Arab and Jew in Israel and the occupied territories, together with the likely spread of weapons of mass destruction in the region, the status quo is inherently unstable.

The clock is still ticking down towards Abdullah’s deadline.

Next Week: Iran: Who has the power?

Shifting Sands is the blog of the Middle East International Affairs Programme at LSE IDEAS, analysing current events in the Middle East and contributing to the ongoing deliberations over policy prescriptions.

Amber Holewinski, Editor

Israel and Palestine: Can peace talks resume?

Welcome to the Middle East International Affairs (MEIA) blog at LSE IDEAS. We invite PhD students and academics from throughout the UK and abroad to analyse current events in the Middle East and add to the ongoing deliberations over policy prescriptions. Our next contributor, Anne de Jong, examines an option for moving out of a stalemate in Middle East peace negotiations.

We look forward to exploring both regional and topical issues relating to current events.
Amber Holewinski, Editor, LSE IDEAS Middle East International Affairs Programme Blog

Peace or Justice

By Anne de Jong

It all started so promisingly—the famous Cairo speech on the 4th of July by President Obama, the appointment of Northern Ireland peace broker George J. Mitchell as his special envoy to the Middle East and an unprecedented commitment from Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

Yet barely one year in, preconditions kept the negotiation table untouched, the situation in Gaza in a state of ‘permanent humanitarian crisis’ and prominent commentators already declared this new initiative dead. With even the ever optimistic Mitchell acknowledging ‘unforeseen complexities and difficulties,’ one should ask: Are peace talks possible in Israel/Palestine?

Negotiating Negotiations

One would assume that negotiations start at the negotiating table, but the first obstacle to resuming peace talks is preconditions made by both the Palestinian Authority and the Israeli State. The Palestinian Authority demands a full settlement freeze because, as Palestinian lawyer Michael Tarasi put it, ‘we are negotiating about dividing a pizza and in the meantime, Israel is eating it.’

A settlement freeze was fully supported by the U.S. administration with a strong statement by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton: “The president wants to see a stop to settlements-not some settlements, not outposts, not ‘natural growth’ exceptions. That is our position.”

When Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rejected this position, however, no sanctions or pressures were put in place. Rather than placing conditions on loan guarantees or limiting military aid, Clinton applauded Netanyahu’s offer of ten months settlement restraint and labeled it ‘an important step forward.’

This settlement restraint does not concern expansion in occupied East Jerusalem where the construction of almost 700 new apartments has just been approved. Nor does it cover infrastructure development to and from settlements in the West Bank. Welcoming Netanyahu’s settlement restraint, and thus renouncing their own demand for a full settlement stop, not only labels the U.S administration as inconsistent, but more seriously it endangers the credibility of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

He has already finished his term in office without elections and made little progress toward overcoming the internal rivalry between Fatah and Hamas. He cannot come to the negotiation table without losing the already fragile support of the Palestinian people as long as settlement construction is ongoing.

In addition, Israel put forward a precondition for negotiations which it knows that no Palestinian leader can accept: the recognition of Israel as the ‘nation-state of the Jewish people.’ The PLO already recognized the right of Israel to exist as a state in 1993 in a series of official and public letters leading up to the Oslo Accords. The difference this time lies in the acceptance of the national character of Israel as Jewish. This would predetermine negotiations on the “right of return” of Palestinian refugees and further relegate the status of Palestinian-Israelis to non-nationals.

Knowing quite well that the Palestinian Authority cannot afford to disregard 1.5 million Palestinians living in Israel and approximately 5 million refugees and their descendants living in the diaspora, it appears that Netanyahu is stalling if not sabotaging any final status negotiations. And where the Obama administration proved to be flexible on the precondition of a settlement freeze, they blindly accept this far-reaching Israeli demand.

What kind of Peace?

It is possible, though unlikely, that the U.S. might use their economic muscle to force both parties to the table. Once there, however, the ‘endgame’ looms large. With an apparent worldwide consensus for a two-state solution, it will be Mitchell’s job to transform this consensus into a pragmatic peace process.

The Palestinian demands are clear: a sovereign Palestinian state on the West Bank and Gaza with East Jerusalem as its capital. A full withdrawal from the Occupied Territories would not only halt Palestinian hostilities towards Israel, but would also guarantee full normalized relations with the 22 surrounding Arab countries, in line with the 2002 Arab Initiative.

Israel’s demands are less straightforward. While Netanyahu expressed the wish for an independent Palestinian state to be created alongside Israel, his Four No’s would prevent any pragmatic steps towards that end.

According to Palestinian chief negotiator Saeb Erekat, Netanyahu’s Four No’s—No to a settlement freeze, No to dividing Jerusalem, No to 1967 borders and No to refugees—would render impossible ‘a viable, independent, and sovereign Palestinian state.’ Netanyahu’s vision of a demilitarized Palestinian state without control over its own borders, riddled with Israeli settlements and with a continued Israeli military presence in the Jordan Valley would create a ‘Palestinian state’ without sovereignty or independence at all.

Peace or Justice

That brings us to the disturbing contemporary reality: a stalemate in negotiations with an eerie resemblance to the 2000 Camp David breakdown. Without Jerusalem, without sovereign borders, and without at least compensation for the refugees, Palestinians are left with Netanyahu’s vision of an ‘economic peace’ under complete Israeli military control.

Gaza would remain isolated and the West Bank divided into pockets of Palestinian reserves. East Jerusalem, whose annexation by Israel is unrecognized by the international community, would see a continuation of house demolitions and evictions. The status of 1.5 million non-Jewish Israelis as second class citizens would not be addressed, and continued institutional and social discrimination against them would be justified under the banner of the Jewish State.

Are peace talks possible? Sure. But without Jerusalem or viable final borders on the table—without talks that are rooted in international law—they will be empty at best. At worse, they will be a fig leaf for ongoing settlement expansion in the West Bank, ethnic cleansing in East Jerusalem, collective punishment in Gaza and continuing military oppression based on ethnic segregation.

Perhaps a more apt question would be: Would peace talks under current conditions be part of a genuine peace process or merely a continuation of the rapidly-deteriorating status quo?

Anne de Jong is a Dutch PhD student at the School of Oriental and African Studies at the department of Anthropology with a specialization in the Middle East. By combining academia and journalism she aims to contribute to a more nuanced understanding of the contemporary Middle East with a special interest in the Israel/Palestine conflict.

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