The Bush Administration's Approach to Israeli-Palestinian Peacemaking : หน้า 22/52

But the Bush administration showed little interest in the peace process. Instead, it pursued a set of policies that either downgraded Israeli–Palestinian peacemaking or subordinated it to demands for Palestinian reform. Peacemaking and reform can be linked (perhaps a major flaw of the Oslo period was the complete disconnect between the two), but the realities of the Palestinian situation made the Bush administration’s preferred sequence—reform now, peace later—impracticable. It was impossible to create a democracy in a state that did not exist and in an environment in which an elected parliament could not muster a quorum, because many deputies were in prison. Nor could democracy be promoted by an administration that actively sought to reverse the outcomes of the processes it encouraged—supporting long-delayed parliamentary elections, but then trying to undermine the outcome. And undermining Palestinian institutions could hardly be reconciled with expectations that they make and enforce commitments against violence. Only in the summer of 2007 did the Bush administration begin to engage in sustained, high-level diplomacy to address the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. That effort, resulting in the Annapolis conference, hardly seems likely to lead to a settlement any time soon. It is easy to point out flaws in this approach: the extreme vagueneess on process; the diffident involvement of the U.S. president himself; the slippery shifts in goals, targets, and mechanisms; and the almost inexplicable timing. Yet for all these legitimate criticisms, it is important to note some advances over previous American efforts, especially the willingness to address rather than postpone the core issues of the conflict and the impressive success in pulling in surrounding Arab states to support the process. If the initiative undertaken by the Bush administration in 2007 seems less than promising, it is not only because of the flaws inherent in the attempt itself; it is also because the ground on which American diplomatic efforts are built has shifted. Many of the most troubling shifts occurred while the United States either ignored or abetted them. It was not only the tensions inherent in the policies that have led to the current morass but also the way in which the policies were pursued. Here as well, reality has gotten in the way of the goals. The administration made no sustained effort to create a process to realize any of the bold visions enunciated by the president. Worse, on those occasions when the United States sought to take a more direct and high-level role, the efforts were not only sporadic but also shortsighted and sometimes contradictory. In April 2002, when Colin Powell was sent to the region, he was all but publicly disowned by other parts of the administration. After Bush presented his vision for a democratic Palestinian state in June 2002, his administration provided little support for political reform except efforts to sideline Yasser Arafat. When those efforts helped lead to the appointment of Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazin) as prime minister, the new, supposed champion of Palestinian reform was greeted with a warm American embrace but then abandoned to fend for himself in an extremely perilous domestic and international environment. Bush publicly endorsed the Road Map to peace in a meeting with British Prime Minister Tony Blair, but took no serious action to support it. The Israeli withdrawal from Gaza occasioned the direct intervention of the American secretary of state to secure an agreement on movement and access—but the United States was virtually silent as that agreement remained on paper only. U.S. intervention again in January 2006 allowed the