In this context, U.S. presidential peace envoy to the region, George Mitchell, who unfortunately was already in the region trying, unsuccessfully yet, to overcome the adverse reaction of these same allies to other Israeli blunders, should have lamented his Israeli bad luck and regretted his mission. General Secretary of the Arab League, Amr Mousa, said that "everything" is now left "hanging in the air,", including mainly the Palestinian Israeli "proximity talks," the focus of Mitchell's mission.
In the wider context, the emergency meeting of the Arab foreign ministers in Cairo on June 2 was in direct opposition to the U.S. stance vis-Ã -vis the Israeli attack, in terminology, perspective and demands, but specially as regards the U.S. Israeli justifications for continuing the blockade of Gaza. To make their message for lifting the siege clear, Mousa was scheduled to visit Gaza next week. Without naming the U.S., they stressed that the continued support to Israel "by some states" and giving "immunity" to its disrespect of international law "in a precedent that threatens the whole international system .. is a big political mistake." They reiterated that the Arab Peace Initiative "will not remain on the table for long." 60 percent of Arabs now believe Obama is too weak to deliver a peace agreement, according to a recent poll conducted by YouGov and quoted by The Christian Science monitor on June 4.
The Arab hard core of the U.S. assets of moderates is the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC); in a statement, they condemned the attack as an act of "state terrorism." Kuwait, a member, stands among them as an instructive example of how Israel is fueling anti Americanism. This country which hosts some twenty thousand U.S. troops on reportedly one third of its territory in support of the U.S. led "Operation Iraqi freedom" had sixteen of its citizens on board of the Israeli - attacked Mavi Marmara. In response, in a vote by consensus the Kuwaiti parliament in which the cabinet ministers are members recommended withdrawal from the Arab Peace Initiative. With Iran across the Gulf and the explosive situation across its northern borders with Iraq, the echo of General Petraeus' warning reverberates louder here.
Thirdly, the Israeli attack has split the Turkish and U.S. NATO allies into opposite sides of the international ensuing divide. Ankara found itself in a head to head diplomatic clash not with Israel, but with the U.S. in the United Nations Security Council, the Geneva based UN Human Rights Council and the emergency meeting of NATO, where Washington acted as Israel's mouthpiece and attorney. Turkey is now for the first time experiencing the U.S. double standards and pro Israel biased policy, which the Arabs have been victims for decades. It might be interesting to note here that both Turkey and Greece, two U.S. and NATO allies, have set aside their historical hostility to each other to publicly disagree with the U.S. in their defense of breaking the Israeli siege of Gaza. "The US response to Israel's disproportionate use of violence against innocent civilians constitutes a test case for US credibility in the Middle East," wrote Suat Kiniklioglu, the Turkish ruling party's deputy chairman.
In the same Carnegie Endowment's report, director of the Middle East Program Marina Ottaway expected potential adverse repercussions beyond the Middle East. "In addition to the predictable Arab reaction, " there has been a harsher than normal response from European countries. This could potentially reopen U.S. tensions with Europe that developed during the Iraq war and have slowly begun to heal under the Obama administration," she wrote.
How could any sensible observer interpret this adverse fallout on U.S. foreign relations and on Arab and Turkish U.S. relations in particular as only the result of bad luck or an unintentional Israeli tactical mistake? The only other interpretation to justify Israel's resort to bloody force is that Israel could no more tolerate a regional united Turkish, Arab and U.S. peace front, supported by the world community.
By aborting an international peace mission sponsored by moderate Arab and regional states, Israel sends a clear message that it wants them out of the game and prefers instead to deal only with pro - violence players, which vindicates a popular Arab belief, established over decades of the conflict, that Israel understands only the language of force.
Israel knows very well that its belligerency has been all along the main source of regional anti Americanism. The U.S. knows it too. Repercussions of the Israeli attack seem to hit at the heart of what President Obama in mid April declared as a "vital national security interest of the United States," i.e. solving the Arab Israeli conflict. By escalating militarily and responding disproportionately, the extremist right wing government of Israel is premeditatedly acting with open eyes to preempt the evolution of a united regional and international front in consensus on a two state solution for the conflict; the best way to split the already burgeoning consensus is to fuel regional anti Americanism as a tested ploy to disintegrate whatever Arab, Turkish and U.S. front might develop to pressure it into yielding to the dictates of peace.
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