Rice seeks to mold region in U.S. vision of a "New Middle East"

bigtree

(1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore

Wed Jul-26-06 07:09 AM
Original message

Rice seeks to mold region in U.S. vision of a "New Middle East"

Edited on Wed Jul-26-06 07:11 AM by bigtree

July 26, 2006

'New Middle East' sought by Rice may be too high a goal

By Robert Ruby
Sun Foreign Reporter

JERUSALEM // By broadly calling for "a new Middle East" yesterday rather than a quick cease-fire between Hezbollah and Israel, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice seemed to gamble against the region's conventional wisdom that peace is best achieved in increments.

Here, lofty goals often become the enemy of success, as the United States has learned in Iraq. Small steps sometimes succeed when giant leaps do not, as has been the case in the long, troubled history of peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians. Large ambitions are often wrecked, as Israel painfully learned during an 18-year occupation of southern Lebanon that ended in 2000.

But Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert endorsed Rice's broad principles yesterday, and both maintained that quicker steps to a cease-fire would be less valuable, and less reliable, than a more dramatic shuffle of power and influence in Lebanon.

"It is time for a new Middle East," Rice said, during a day of meetings with Olmert as well as Mahmoud Abbas, the president of the Palestinian Authority. "It is time to say to those that don't want a different kind of Middle East that we will prevail. They will not."

more: http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/nationworld/bal-te.conflict26jul26,1,1351376,print.story?coll=bal-news-nation&ctrack=1&cset=true

How long will this region endure U.S. manipulation of their lives and livelihoods? This call for a "New Middle East" will confirm the fears of those in the region that the goal all along was to weaken Arab influence and expand Israel's. Rather than just focusing on the prosecution of Hizbollah, Rice (and the U.S.) will now be seen as muckraking for regime change with their support of Israel's devastating assault on Lebanese territory and infrastructure. This, I predict will cause more in Lebanon to view the routing of Hizbollah as a pretext to their own domination by Israel, backed by the U.S.

For all of those who maintain that there's no linkage between Israel's actions and the U.S., Rice's proclamation of a "New Middle East" will eliminate any argument they may have used to mollify the other Arab interests in the region who have expressed alarm at the scope and breadth of the military campaign. Clearly, the U.S. will now be seen as an integral part of any action Israel undertakes. That's not going to make them any more amenable to any agreement to dismantle the militarized organization. It will drive the Lebanese and others to favor or tolerate those who would stand up to Israel and the U.S., like these splinter groups are doing; like Syria has the capacity to do.

The call by the Bush regime for a "New Middle East", while, at the same time, encouraging and supporting Israel's invasion of Lebanon, will provoke the 'old' Mideast to new and more pernicious means of defense against U.S. imperialism in the part of the world they call home.