DUMB IDEA! Blair May Become Special Mideast Envoy

Robert Fisk: How can Blair possibly be given this job?
Robert Fisk: How can Blair possibly be given this job?
Independent UK
Published: 23 June 2007

Here is a politician who has failed in everything he has ever tried to do in the Middle East

I suppose that astonishment is not the word for it. Stupefaction comes to mind. I simply could not believe my ears in Beirut when a phone call told me that Lord Blair of Kut al-Amara was going to create "Palestine". I checked the date - no, it was not 1 April - but I remain overwhelmed that this vain, deceitful man, this proven liar, a trumped-up lawyer who has the blood of thousands of Arab men, women and children on his hands is really contemplating being "our" Middle East envoy.

Can this really be true? I had always assumed that Balfour, Sykes and Picot were the epitome of Middle Eastern hubris. But Blair? That this ex-prime minister, this man who took his country into the sands of Iraq, should actually believe that he has a role in the region - he whose own preposterous envoy, Lord Levy, made so many secret trips there to absolutely no avail - is now going to sully his hands (and, I fear, our lives) in the world's last colonial war is simply overwhelming.

Of course, he'll be in touch with Mahmoud Abbas, will try to marginalise Hamas, will talk endlessly about "moderates"; and we'll have to listen to him pontificating about morality, how he's absolutely and completely confident that he's doing the right thing (and this, remember, is the same man who postponed a ceasefire in Lebanon last year in order to share George Bush's ridiculous hope of an Israeli victory over Hizbollah) in bringing peace to the Middle East...

Not once - ever - has he apologised. Not once has he said he was sorry for what he did in our name. Yet Lord Blair actually believes - in what must be a record act of self-indulgence for a man who cooked up the fake evidence of Iraq's "weapons of mass destruction" - that he can do good in the Middle East.

For here is a man who is totally discredited in the region - a politician who has signally failed in everything he ever tried to do in the Middle East - now believing that he is the right man to lead the Quartet to patch up "Palestine".

In the hunt for quislings to do our bidding - ie accept even less of Mandate Palestine than Arafat would stomach - I suppose Blair has his uses. His unique blend of ruthlessness and dishonesty will no doubt go down quite well with our local Arab dictators.

And I have a suspicion - always assuming this extraordinary story is not untrue - that Blair will be able to tour around Damascus, even Tehran, in his hunt for "peace", thus paving the way for an American exit strategy in Iraq. But "Palestine"?

The Palestinians held elections - real, copper-bottomed ones, the democratic variety - and Hamas won. But Blair will presumably not be able to talk to Hamas. He'll need to talk only to Abbas's flunkies, to negotiate with an administration described so accurately this week by my old colleague Rami Khoury as a "government of the imagination".

The Americans are talking - and here I am quoting the State Department spokesman, Sean McCormack - about an envoy who can work "with the Palestinians in the Palestinian system" to develop institutions for a "well-governed state". Oh yes, I can see how that would appeal to Lord Blair. He likes well-governed states, lots of "terror laws", plenty of security - though I'm still a bit puzzled about what the "Palestinian system" is meant to be.

It was James Wolfensohn who was originally "our" Middle East envoy, a former World Bank president who left in frustration because he could neither reconstruct Gaza nor work with a "peace process" that was being eroded with every new Jewish settlement and every Qassam rocket fired into Israel. Does Blair think he can do better? What honeyed words will we hear?

I bet he doesn't mention the Israeli wall which is taking so much extra land from the Palestinians. It will be a "security barrier" or a "fence" (like the famous Berlin "fence" which was actually called a "security barrier" by those generous East German Vopo cops of the time).

There will be appeals for restraint "on all sides", endless calls for "moderation", none at all for justice (which is all the people of the Middle East have been pleading for over the past 100 years).

And Israel likes Lord Blair. Indeed, Blair's slippery use of language is likely to appeal to Ehud Olmert, whose government continues to take Arab land for Jews and Jews only as he waits to discover a Palestinian with whom he can "negotiate", Mahmoud Abbas now having the prestige of a rabbit after his forces were crushed in Gaza.

Which of "Palestine"'s two prime ministers will Blair talk to? Why, the one with a collar and tie, of course, who works for Mr Abbas, who will demand more "security", tougher laws, less democracy.

I have never been able to figure out why the Middle East draws the Balfours and the Sykeses and the Blairs into its maw. Once, our favourite trouble-shooter was James Baker - who worked for George W's father until the Israelis got tired of him - and before that we had a whole list of UN Secretary Generals who visited the region, frowned and warned of serious consequences if peace did not soon come.

I recall another man with Blair's pomposity, a certain Kurt Waldheim, who - no longer the UN's boss - actually believed he could be an "envoy" for peace in the Middle East, despite his little wartime career as an intelligence officer for the Wehrmacht's Army Group "E".

His visits - especially to the late King Hussein - came to nothing, of course. But Waldheim's ability to draw a curtain over his wartime past does have one thing in common with Blair. For Waldheim steadfastly, pointedly, repeatedly, refused to acknowledge - ever - that he had ever done anything wrong. Now who does that remind you of?

Aha! Bush has screwed Tony Blair again.
Aha! Bush has screwed Tony Blair again. He gave Blair a job but with no authority. Blair should have learned better when he hooked up with Bush's war in Iraq. ---BBB

Blair won't have power to mediate on peace
By David Blair in New York
30/06/2007
Telegraph UK

Tony Blair's ambitions for his new role as a Middle East envoy were brought down to earth yesterday after America made it clear that he will have no power to mediate peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians.

Instead, the State Department said that Mr Blair will be confined to improving the institutions of the Palestinian Authority.

One former US adviser predicted swift "frustration" for Mr Blair and likened his role to carrying a "tin cup" around the world, raising funds for the Palestinians.

Mr Blair has been named an envoy of the "Quartet" - a group charged with bringing about peace in the Middle East - comprising America, Russia, the United Nations and the European Union.

On the day of his appointment, he told Parliament his "absolute priority" would be to "give effect" to a "two-state solution, which means a state of Israel that is secure and confident of its security and a Palestinian state that is viable, not merely in terms of its territory, but in terms of its institutions".

Then he told the Northern Echo newspaper that his "huge challenge" was to "prepare the ground for a negotiated settlement".

The Bush administration quickly contradicted Mr Blair's sweeping definition of his role. Tom Casey, the State Department's deputy spokesman, made it clear that negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians will be handled by Condoleezza Rice, the US Secretary of State.

"We'd like to be able to have an envoy to focus very specifically on helping with some of these institution-building tasks for the Palestinian Authority," said Mr Casey.

"But my understanding is there's certainly no envisioning that this individual would be a negotiator on behalf of the Quartet between the Israelis and Palestinians."

In her statement welcoming Mr Blair's appointment, Dr Rice described his task as creating "viable and lasting Palestinian government institutions", strengthening "the Palestinian economy" and establishing "law and order for the Palestinian people". She made no mention of mediating peace talks.

Aaron David Miller, an expert on the Arab-Israeli conflict who advised six secretaries of state, said: "If he [Mr Blair] thinks he's going to be the lead negotiator to set the stage for a political process leading to a two-state solution, it's hard for me to believe that he really believes that.

"I know that's not the role that either the President or the Secretary of State wants for him."

Mr Miller added: "There is no US secretary of state worth his salt - and I worked for six of them - who would ever allow anyone else to have that kind of responsibility."

Instead, Mr Blair's task will be confined to reviving the economies of Gaza and the West Bank and sorting out the Palestinian Authority's shambolic ministries.

James Wolfensohn, the former head of the World Bank, held this job until he resigned in disgust last year.

Israel routinely strangles any economic activity by sealing off the occupied territories and halting the movement of goods and people by using checkpoints and security barriers.

Unless Mr Blair can persuade Israel to lift these restrictions, economic recovery in the occupied territories will be impossible.

"The odds on his getting frustrated quickly are high," said Mr Miller.

"If he lacks the capacity to be tough with the Israelis on the whole host of issues relating to movement - checkpoints, crossing points and all the rest - then his role is essentially Operation Tin Cup. He will carry a tin cup around the world and raise money and not much else."