Mideast: Don't go there

President Bush campaigned for his present job on a platform that
promised to end inappropriate overseas deployments of U.S. personnel. He
expressed concern that such endeavors represented unwarranted drains on
national resources and unjustifiably put Americans in harm's way, especially
since it was not clear their presence was actually contributing to a real
peace in the region.

At the time, of course, he was talking about the Balkans. During
his recent visit to Kosovo, though, he declared that the United States "went
in together [with our allies] and will come out together." As a result,
Americans are likely to be in Kosovo, Bosnia and perhaps Macedonia for the
duration of this presidency – and probably much longer.

Unfortunately, the Balkan tar baby the United States has squarely
embraced will appear the ultimate no-stick Teflon operation compared to a
new assignment President Bush is contemplating in the Middle East.
According to last Friday's Washington Post, "the Bush Administration plans
to dispatch about 10 monitors drawn largely from the State Department to
assess the adherence of Israelis and Palestinians to steps proposed to
restrain Middle East violence and advance peace talks."

To be sure, as this article indicates, the "monitors" would not be
armed U.S. military personnel. Instead, they will be Foggy Bottom types,
apparently augmented by CIA agents. And who can object to so small a number
as 10 of these observers?

TRENDING: Caught red-handed

The trouble is that this is a bad idea, period. That underlying
reality is not mitigated by either the fact that the monitors are
defenseless (at least initially) or the fact that they are too few to have
any chance of effectively monitoring the Palestinian-Israeli conflicts now
routinely erupting in many parts of the West Bank, Gaza Strip and even in
Israel, itself.

If the Bush administration goes forward with what the Post calls a
"highly circumscribed observer team," it will find itself like the unwed
woman who announced she was "a little bit pregnant." The description is
technically accurate, but only temporarily so. It is predictable that more
people will be needed if we are serious about monitoring all the flashpoints
and reporting on all the violence between Arabs and Jews. And how long will
it be after one of these unarmed observers is physically threatened or
harmed before U.S. military personnel are dispatched to protect them?

Heretofore, the brake on dispatching even a modest U.S. team has
been the adamant opposition of the government of Israel. This position was
born of hard experience with international monitors in Lebanon, where the
latter's presence did nothing to impede attacks by Hezbollah and other
Syrian-backed forces on the Jewish State and its personnel. The U.N.
observer force did, however, greatly complicate Israel's options and ability
to deal with the threats posed by such enemies.

The inherent problem posed by inserting foreign observers into this
conflict was recently underscored when the international peacekeeping forces
confessed – after repeated denials – that they had indeed filmed Hezbollah
operatives kidnapping three Israeli soldiers near the Lebanese border.
When, at last, the U.N. turned the film over to the Israelis, the images of
the kidnappers' faces were obscured, ostensibly in order to protect the
monitors from Arab terrorist "reprisals."

Tragically, the Israeli government – presumably under intense
pressure from Secretary of State Colin Powell and other American officials
who have embraced a call for international monitors included in a set of
recommendations served up in recent weeks by a commission led by former
Sen. George Mitchell – has fatally shifted its stance on admitting
observers. Last week, Foreign Minister Shimon Peres declared, "We were
never against the idea that the CIA [agents in Israel to facilitate security
talks between the Palestinians and Israelis] bring other monitors to help
their work, but we are against an international force. If it is a question
of American monitors, we don't have a problem with that."

Naturally, Israel's willingness to accept American monitors will
make it hard – if not, as a practical matter, impossible – for members of
the Bush administration and legislators who understand that no good can come
of this initiative to oppose it. In the same way, official Israeli support
for the serial concessions entailed in the so-called Oslo "peace process"
undercut more sensible friends of Israel, both in the United States and
elsewhere, and led to the present debacle of an armed Palestinian
proto-nation intent on emerging not only as a state in its own right, but
eliminating the Jewish one next door.

Unlike the folly of an open-ended U.S. deployment unjustified by any
direct American interests, the insertion of our personnel into the midst of
the Israeli-Palestinian conflict can only serve to jeopardize this country's
real and abiding interest in the Middle East: ensuring the continued
survival and flourishing of its only reliable and democratic ally, Israel.
At the very least, the mere presence of our people on the ground will be a
tangible expression of moral equivalence between Arabs initiating the
majority of the attacks and Israelis at the receiving end. When (not if)
Americans get hurt, even if it is by Palestinians, popular opinion in this
country will likely find fault with Israel for needing such monitors in the
first place.

It can only be hoped that Prime Minister Ariel Sharon will recognize
the danger inherent in taking the first step on this classic slippery slope.
He should revert to Israel's traditional and validated attitude by telling
his friend, George W. Bush, "Thanks, but no thanks" with respect to putting
any foreign monitors, including Americans, into the combustible
Israeli-Palestinian mix. Even if he doesn't, Mr. Bush should come to his
senses before the Arabists in his State Department and the "international
community" embroil him in another, far more problematic mission in the
Middle East than that he inherited in the Balkans.