Human Rights

A Strategy for U.S. Policy Toward Afghanistan

“Now is a very unique opportunity for resolving the conflict in Afghanistan,” began Dr. Elie Krakowski, senior fellow at the American Foreign Policy Council, during a July 17 talk at the Middle East Institute in Washington, DC. Dr. Krakowski served in the Pentagon from 1982 to 1988, and dealt extensively with the shaping of U.S. policy toward the country. He recently returned from eight months of privately funded field research in Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, China, and several Central Asian countries, where he held discussions with a number of high-level officials, including the Afghani Northern Alliance’s Commander Ahmed Shah Masoud.

“The countries around Afghanistan are critical,” said Krakowski. “To construct a coherent American strategy, we must review the degree of commitment of surrounding states to an Afghan policy, and their receptiveness to change.”

He particularly emphasized the role of Pakistan in shaping a successful policy. “Pakistanis don’t admit publicly that they are floundering [on an Afghan policy], but,” he pointed out, “key elements of the policymaking elite realize that support for the Taliban is a dead end street.”

Krakowski said he was surprised by the candor with which policymakers expressed their strong concern and uncertainty. He cautioned against Islamabad’s involvement with the Taliban regime, fearing that “the more immediate threat is to Pakistan itself.” The extremist parties in Pakistan, though still a minority, are now more vocal, he said, and have officially called for a Taliban-like government. “There is a risk of takeover by radical parties,” he warned.

Krakowski attempted to dispel certain media-created myths about the Taliban. The media gives the impression that 95 percent of Afghanistan is held by the Taliban, he said, whereas instead the extremist group now holds close to 25 percent. “This map has never appeared in the press,” he noted.

In addition, Krakowski said, popular support for the Taliban is at its lowest in the short history of the regime. “The Taliban miserably failed to deliver beyond the initial provision of security,” he explained. “[Even security] is not as it was.”

He did, however, warn against foreign elements in the Taliban regime, especially extremists from the U.A.E. and Saudi Arabia who, he said, number some 5,000 to10,000. Interestingly, Krakowski revealed that the much-criticized destruction of the Bamian statues in Afghanistan was due in large part to the insistence of these volunteers rather than of the Afghani Taliban themselves. The same men also pushed for the destruction of Afghani Muslim shrines, which they considered a similar affront to their extremist brand of religion. Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Umar forbade this move, however, fearing a revolt by the Afghani Taliban.

Krakowski also disagreed with the characterization of the Afghan situation as an “ethnic conflict.” “Ethnic differences are quite controllable,” he stated. “When you try to suggest dividing the country between a north and a south, the Afghans get furious, whether they be Tajiks, Pushtuns, or Uzbeks.”

“Why is now the time for a solution?” Krakowski asked his audience. There is a growing thirst for peace in the south of Afghanistan, he noted. However, he added, “Let no one think that I am an advocate of the Northern Alliance. That has its own grave problems, and an unsavory leader.”

According to Krakowski, however, Commander Masoud does not desire to rule Afghanistan. Masoud’s demands include a transition government, the drafting of a constitution, and a role in the ensuing government.

A solution to the present crisis, Krakowski argued, requires a change in the American mindset and should differ from the usual three-step academic approach of firstly, the cessation of hostilities; secondly, the creation of a government; and finally, legitimacy from the people. “All these need to be done together,” he stressed.

Additionally, he said, although Afghanistan will require a central government, the provinces should be allowed to retain a high level of autonomy. Afghani traditions need to be respected, he continued, not changed. “The West should hold their ‘good intentions’ in check,” said Krakowski, “[Most Afghani customs] do not contradict our standard of human rights, general morality, and ethics.”

Krakowski roughly outlined what he considered an ideal U.S. approach: the creation of a three-phase concert of states, to which Pakistan would not originally belong but would eventually join; the appointment of a special coordinator for Afghanistan in Washington; guaranteeing a settlement and ensuring that reconstruction takes place as planned; and supporting Commander Masoud by strengthening the Northern Alliance, while bringing less desirable political elements in line.

On the subject of a special coordinator, Krakowski noted that “Afghanistan is not a ‘level one’ [high priority] in U.S. foreign policy. In order to carry out a policy that requires careful coordination and orchestration, [there must be] someone in the U.S. government to make sure Afghanistan doesn’t fall through the cracks.”

Krakowski plans to fine tune his strategy with the data he has gathered during his fieldwork, and eventually advise the U.S. government on Afghanistan policy.

External involvement is crucial, stressed Krakowski, as long as it is “channeled in constructive directions.” He urged the media to publicize the Afghanistan crisis, noting that often “it is hard to get Washington involved before a major catastrophe happens.”

Pakistan, as a neighboring state and one of the few countries that recognize the Taliban, is another crucial player, but it has its own internal pressures to contend with. “The Pakistan policymaking elite,” Krakowski noted, “has many strands and elements.” The extremist parties have traditionally had very little representation, he said, but the recent corruption clampdown on established political parties has led people to search for alternatives. The precarious economic situation contributes to the general dissatisfaction, Krakowski added, and inadequate schooling forces the poor to enroll in religious schools which espouse a radical agenda. Withdrawing political support from the Taliban may result in a domestic backlash from extremist parties. “Now is not the time to ask Pakistan to clamp down,” concluded Krakowski, implying that the country needed time to sort out its internal issues.

—Homayra Ziad

American Journalist Shares Findings of Trip to Palestine

Journalist Alison Weir, recently returned from a month-long trip to the West Bank and Gaza, spoke July 24 in Washington, DC at the Center for Policy Analysis on Palestine. Prior to her visit, she said, she had noticed the odd absence of the Palestinian perspective and the consistent portrayal of Palestinians as “inherently violent” in the American media—not to mention the absence of history and statistics in news stories. The notion that Palestinian children were threatening Israelis by wielding nothing more than stones against Israeli tanks was simply “out of sync” for this free-lance writer. Weir began to see she was reading the “most censored story” she had ever encountered, and decided to embark on a fact-finding trip of her own to the occupied territories.

Weir began her trip with no sponsoring organization, no knowledge of the language, and no prior arrangements with anyone in the occupied territories. She told the audience of her anxiety at visiting a region portrayed as “generally hostile to Americans, and particularly to women,” but, she said, her fears were soon allayed by the overwhelming warmth and hospitality she received in her encounters with Palestinians. People invited her to their bullet-riddled homes and treated her with respect, she said: “I felt completely safe, except when I came too near the Israeli military.”

From the conflict’s epicenter, Weir was shocked by American media coverage, which was in direct contrast to what she was witnessing on the ground. Positive portrayals of the Palestinians were entirely absent from the U.S. press, she said, while article after article protrayed Israelis as victims. While she was in the occupied territories, the San Francisco Chronicle, for example, published articles about the 10 Israelis who had died that month, and referred to only nine Palestinians killed during the same period. In fact, however, 29 Palestinians had been killed, Weir said.

While there were consistent attempts to humanize the Israeli dead, Palestinian deaths were presented as mere statistics, she noted.

Weir was surprised that there was no mention of Israel’s daily bombardment and shelling of Palestinian civilians. In fact, American newspapers claimed that the Israeli public was under siege by Palestinians! It was, Weir said, the other way around. Palestinians, she explained, were virtual prisoners in their own towns, villages, or refugee camps—surrounded by checkpoints where Israeli soldiers in combat gear manned tanks and pointed machine guns at Palestinian civilians attempting to leave town to visit relatives, attend school, or go to their places of work or worship.

When Weir later visited Israel, she saw people sitting in cafŽs in Tel Aviv, or walking around shopping malls with a complete sense of normalcy, apparently oblivious or simply indifferent to the full-fledged war being waged against Palestinians just across the Green Line.

During her visit, Weir said, the Israel Defense Forces demolished hundreds of Palestinian olive trees and flattened groves of palm trees. This “deliberately created poverty,” Weir contended, and afflicted every family in Palestine’s largely agricultural economy. Unemployment, in fact, reached an historic peak of 49 percent, she said.

Weir attended the funeral of a nine-year-old Palestinian boy who was fatally shot in the chest while playing in his bedroom by Israeli soldiers who opened fire on the boy’s residential neighborhood for 15 minutes. Another day, she attended the funeral of a Palestinian mother of three shot while walking through the streets of Ramallah. There is no mistaking, Weir asserted, that the bullets always came from the direction of Israeli soldiers. At hospitals, Weir said, she saw “boys with holes through their stomachs and in their heads.”

Weir brought home some bullets and mortar shells presented to her by Palestinian children who always asked her, “Why is Israel doing this to us?” Despite her findings, Weir remains hopeful that the situation will change as soon as people in the United States and the rest of the world become more aware of the conflict and its effects.

—Asma Yousef

Dennis Ross Remarks Reveal U.S. Bias

Former U.S. ambassador and Middle East coordinator Dennis Ross demonstrated why most nations scoff at Washington’s claim to be an “honest peacebroker” between Israelis and Palestinians. During a July 19 lecture to Washington, DC interns sponsored by Middle East Insight magazine, Ross gave a brief assessment of the current situation in Israel and the occupied territories and a list of “lessons learned” from last summer’s failed Camp David talks.

He described the current cease-fire as one reached “in name, not fact,” and asserted that the root of the problem in the Middle East lies in the fact that neither side is ever held accountable for actions or decisions made. He then proceeded to charge that Chairman Yasser Arafat refused to agree to a cease-fire until the June 1 Tel Aviv bombing. Israel’s Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, on the other hand, showed restraint and “didn’t react” to the bombing, according to Ross.

One of the lessons Ross said he learned from his involvement with the peace process was that any agreement imposed by the U.S. or any other outside force will not survive. Nor is internal imposition by Israel in the form of a military solution realistic, he added, because “Palestinian aspirations will not disappear.”

He asserted, however, that because Palestinians are continually “inciting violence and hostilities,” they are “very removed from achieving anything.”

But Israelis must not provoke Palestinian anger, he continued, by carrying out house demolitions and land confiscations. Both sides, Ross said, must “avoid bad behavior and promote positive behavior.”

However, he continued, while former Prime Minister Ehud Barak made efforts to condition his people to think positively about prospects for peace before and during Camp David, Arafat didn’t.

According to Ross, Arafat also did not accept a plan presented to him by former President Bill Clinton on Dec. 23, in which Palestinians were granted an independent state, which included almost all of the West Bank and Gaza, and which would have been one-third bigger than it is now. The plan would have guaranteed an international military presence in the Jordan Valley and an unlimited right of return of Palestinian refugees to the new Palestinian state, which would have had Arab East Jerusalem as its capital. While Barak agreed to Clinton’s “balanced approach,” Arafat did not, Ross said.

Ross urged the audience to focus on the “real problem” at hand, which he said was the “loss of faith” of Palestinians and Israelis in peace for the region.

Israelis came to this juncture when Arafat rejected Clinton’s plan and violence erupted. They see no “partner for peace” in the Palestinians, Ross claimed. On their part, Palestinians were tired of requesting Israeli approval for every important decision in their lives, and saw the peace process as a sham, he continued, and so they saw violence as the answer. “Neither side’s anger exceeds the other,” Ross said—essentially equating the occupier and the occupied. He reverted to his tendency to make excuses for the Israeli leadership, however, describing Barak’s decision to continuously expand illegal Israeli settlements in Palestinian territory a “tactical mistake.”

When asked whether or not he thinks the issue of Palestinian refugees’ right of return is inconsistent with a two-state solution, Ross answered vaguely, calling the right of return merely a principle because “53 years later, [Palestinians’] homes aren’t there anymore.”

—Laila Al-Arian

U.S. Policy Options Toward Iraq

At a June 27 press breakfast held at the Nixon Center in Washington, DC, Morton H. Halperin and Geoffrey Kemp released a report outlining U.S. policy options toward Iraq. Halperin and Kemp, who served as co-chairmen of an independent roundtable on Iraq sponsored by the Council on Foreign Relations Middle East Forum, each discussed the proposed options, as well as the driving factors behind the policy choices recommended by the independent roundtable. Although their views did not represent the institutions with which they are affiliated, they were representative of fellow roundtable participants.

The report’s premise is that Saddam Hussain and his regime are posing a growing threat to the Middle East and the United States, so that regime replacement must remain a fundamental principle of U.S. policy. Because it remains unlikely that Iraqi opposition groups will manage to overthrow Hussain’s regime, and support for U.S. military intervention remains low, the “practical” focus of current U.S. policy has become the continued control of Iraqi oil revenue—“while improving the conditions of Iraq’s citizens”—and the sustaining of a military deterrent to the perceived Iraqi threat.

While the sanctions regime tries to maintain control of Iraqi oil revenue, the report acknowledges that it is unraveling, and that regional support for Saddam Hussain has grown. The report asserts its support for the Bush administration’s revised sanctions policy: the continuation of the embargo on all conventional weapons transfers to Iraq, the preservation of the U.N. “escrow account” meant to prevent Hussain from obtaining revenues from commerce with the outside world, a refinement of the list of prescribed dual technologies, and more freedom for Iraqis to purchase civilian goods.

The report also affirms its support for U.N. Resolution 1284, which calls for the “streamlining of economic sanctions and their suspension once a new inspections regime, United Nations Monitoring, Verification, and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC), has reported that Iraq is cooperating with U.N. resolutions on weapons development.”

Although the resolution is controversial due to the danger that the “inspection regime could play into the hands of the Iraqi regime,” the report states that the U.S. must continue to support U.N. 1284, since it provides the legal basis for continuing to control Iraqi assets.

Concern exists that the breakdown of the Arab-Israeli peace process has weakened the U.S. position in the region, and that U.S. allies do not fully comprehend American red lines, an important part of U.S. policy. It is important to assess the degree of support for Washington’s red lines, which include Iraqi military threats or attacks on allied forces and neighboring states, and Iraqi acquisition and deployment, or use, of weapons of mass destruction. Halperin and Kemp both stressed that if there were to be a breakdown in the Palestinian-Israeli cease-fire agreement and the U.S. continued to take a position in the Middle East that appeared to be choosing sides, implementation of its Iraq policy would become even more difficult.

Further policy options outlined in the report include the continuation of U.S. and U.K. air operations in the “no-fly” zone, which are impossible without the support of allies such as Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Kuwait. Kemp admitted, however, that “air strikes for a few days, no matter how devastating they appear on television, have not been effective.”

The roundtable co-chairmen also disclosed that there is little expectation that Iraqi opposition forces will soon provide a substantial military challenge to Saddam Hussain. Such a challenge, moreover, would require a major American political investment for which there remains no effective consensus within the U.S. administration. It is understood that to effectively back Iraqi opposition groups the support of a country sharing a common border with Iraq is necessary—and, the co-chairmen joked, the U.S. “does not share a common border with Iraq.”

Although the report contends that a regime change in Baghdad can be regarded as the only long-term solution to the “Iraq crisis,” it also maintains that the goal should not be a central feature of a new Iraq policy. Such a policy should include preparing the U.S. for sudden change in Iraq, including the death of Saddam Hussain by assassination or natural causes. The report also called for a more assertive and aggressive effort in the arena of U.S. public diplomacy. The “U.S. has been losing the propaganda war,” the report asserted, “and it should be a priority to retain the high ground on the matter of who is responsible for the suffering of the Iraqi people.”

The report recommends that the U.S. stress its hopes for the Iraqi people and state that “they will be well treated and respected once the Saddam Hussain regime has gone.”

Declaring that it seems absolutely clear that the condition of the Iraqi people is a result of Saddam Hussain’s actions and that the U.S. should not be blamed for the present situation, Kemp and Halperin reiterated the absurd theme of U.S. innocence by claiming, respectively, that “I can’t understand why we get such bad press over this,” and that the condition of the Iraqi people “has nothing to do with the American embargo.”

—Shereen Abdel-Nabi