U.S. tries broader approach to Iraq conflict
Source: Reuters
By Sue Pleming and Caren Bohan WASHINGTON, Nov 24 (Reuters) - With Iraq near all-out civil war, the Bush administration is renewing efforts to break the cycle of violence there by enlisting the help of moderate Arab nations while also seeking to tackle the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Ahead of a meeting next week between President George W. Bush and Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, Vice President Dick Cheney was leaving on Friday for Saudi Arabia to discuss Iraq and other regional issues. The United States would like Saudi Arabia to use its influence with Iraq's Sunni minority to help stabilize the country. On Thursday, multiple car bombs killed more than 200 people in a Shi'ite stronghold in Baghdad in the worst single attack since U.S.-led forces toppled Saddam Hussein's government in April 2003. Bush and Maliki will discuss security in Iraq at their meeting, in what is shaping up to be a crisis summit. The surge in violence in Iraq has come as American public discontent with the Iraq war was hammered home in Nov. 7 elections in which Bush's Republican Party lost control of the next U.S. Congress. As one way to reverse the dire situation in Iraq, British Prime Minister Tony Blair and other European leaders would like Bush to take a more active role in reviving the Middle East peace process. Bush has so far avoided taking the kind of hands-on approach to Middle East peacemaking of his predecessors. Some analysts said that may change as Bush turns increasingly for advice to figures from his father's administration, such as former Secretary of State James Baker who is leading a review on Iraq policy, and Robert Gates, Bush's pick for Defense Secretary to replace outgoing Donald Rumsfeld. REGIONAL APPROACH David Rothkopf, a scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said Bush's trip signaled a recognition that stability in Iraq depended on a regional approach. "By going to Jordan to meet with Maliki, Bush is investing himself in a multilateral dialogue on the Middle East," Rothkopf said. In recent months, the Bush administration has stepped up efforts to seek help from Arab allies Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan and others in breaking a deadlock in Israeli-Palestinian peace talks. "All of these issues of the Middle East are interrelated and you can't solve any of them without looking at others," said one Arab diplomat. There is growing pressure for the United States to meet with Iran and Syria over Iraq. U.S. officials have been cool to the idea, though they have not ruled it out. A Western diplomat said the United States wanted to counter the threat it sees from Iran and Syria by co-opting moderate Arab nations on both Iraq and the Palestinian-Israeli issue. "They also want to allay regional fears that the United States is going to leave Iraq too soon. The big concern is about stability in the region," said the diplomat. At the United Nations in September, Bush made clear that resolving the Arab-Israeli conflict was a priority of his final two years in office and he charged his Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice, with tackling it. After joining Bush in Amman, Rice will also attend an annual Middle East conference in the Dead Sea, Jordan where key Arab players may meet on the sidelines to discuss Arab-Israeli issues. The administration's point people on Israeli-Palestinian issues -- David Welch and Elliott Abrams -- have been shuttling between Arab states and Israel in recent weeks to move the process along. However, a senior U.S. official said any movement depended on what happened with negotiations to form a new unity government in the Palestinian territories to replace the Hamas-led administration boycotted by the West. Election losses for Bush's Republicans, the fact that he only has two years remaining in office and chaos in Iraq have robbed the U.S. president of the clout he needed to tackle such a tough issue as comprehensive Middle East peace, said James Lindsay, a former Clinton administration official who is now at the University of Texas, Austin. "The best time to take on major diplomatic initiatives is when you're riding the crest of a wave, not when you're being pummeled by the wave," he said.
| AlertNet news is provided by |  |
