Elise Labott: Washington puts the onus on Arafat

Arafat

The Bush Administration has been walking a political tightrope as it attempts to keep the Mideast from spiraling further out of control. CNN's Elise Labott explains some of the problems they face.

Q: President Bush has said that Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat could do more to stop terrorism. Did his remark indicate that the United States will be doing more to pressure Arafat?

A: The United States has consistently called on both the Israelis and Palestinians to reduce the cycle of violence. And while the Bush administration does call on Israel to exercise restraint, it has clearly has put the onus on Arafat.

Arafat says that as long as Israel launches military strikes against the Palestinians and continues its economic blockage against the Palestinian people, terrorist attacks are bound to happen. But the administration has taken the point of view that the majority of Israeli military attacks against the Palestinians are in response to terrorist activity on the Palestinian side and to prevent further attacks.

U.S. officials say that if Arafat were to stop the terrorist attacks, Israel would not feel compelled to use military force. So the administration says both publicly and privately that it is putting the pressure on Arafat. In fact, officials say that during a recent phone call with the Palestinian leader, Secretary of State Colin Powell told Arafat that it was imperative that he crack down on the Islamic militant groups Hamas, believed to be responsible for last Friday's bombing of a pizza restaurant in Haifa. Powell told Arafat that if he didn't crack down on Hamas, it could jeopardize his political future.

It is also worth noting that the administration is under a lot of pressure from many members of Congress, as well as the powerful Jewish lobby in the United States, to get tougher on Arafat.

Q: Ambassador Satterfield met with Arafat. Does the United States believe Arafat is capable of arresting the terrorists Israel identified arrested?

A: Deputy Assistant Secretary Satterfield is in the region this week, and has held meetings with both Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Arafat. His message is that both sides need to take steps to end the violence. (As a side note, officials say that Satterfield is expected to travel to Jordan and Egypt to meet with leaders there before returning to Washington.)

Regarding the arrests, the Bush administration says that Arafat needs to more to stop the violence. But Powell and other U.S. officials emphasize the need for Arafat to make a greater "effort," rather than call for specific results. They have stressed the importance of Arafat arresting those known to be responsible for previous terrorist attacks or planning new ones, which they say would be a good first start for him to prove he is serious about stopping the violence.

Arafat also promised to make these arrests as a condition of the cease-fire negotiated in June by CIA Director George Tenet. While the administration has said Arafat could do more than he is doing right now, officials have been careful not to spell out exactly how much they believe Arafat is capable of doing or exactly which arrests he could make.

Q: Israel staged an incursion into Jenin Tuesday, an area that Israel had not been in since 1995. Last week, Israel invaded the symbolic Orient House in Jerusalem. How does the Bush administration view this new Israeli tactic of going after both military and political targets?

A: The Bush administration has voiced concern about both events and felt the Israelis went too far. Last week officials said they were very concerned about the invasion of Orient House and the Palestinian town of Abu Dis. These officials said the action represented a political escalation of the conflict, which increased the risk of further deterioration. U.S. officials felt that the attack on Orient House was not to enhance Israel's security, as the Israeli government claimed, but was a political attack on the Palestinian Authority.

The administration also called this week's incursion by Israel into the Palestinian town of Jenin "provocative." The fear is that such powerful strikes by Israel against the Palestinians threaten to undermine any efforts to restore peace. And by attacking the Palestinians on both political and military fronts, the Israeli actions could be perceived as an effort to destroy Arafat's already fragile credibility with his people. This could seriously thwart any political basis for negotiations between the two sides.

Q: The secretary of state said last week that the Mitchell Plan remains the only way to achieve peace. In light of recent events, does he still hold to that belief? If so, is the administration saying anything about how it hopes to get the two parties back to the peace table?

A: The Bush administration does believe that the Mitchell Committee recommendations are the only "road map" for the parties to move back to negotiations and find a lasting peace, and they consistently say there is "no Plan B." The Mitchell report calls for an end to violence and confidence building measures by both sides to restore faith and trust, which the administration believes would create a climate for negotiations.

On Tuesday, Powell said that he does want to see a resumption of negotiations between the Israelis and Palestinians, but only after the violence has stopped and the Mitchell report is implemented. He has said that the U.S. would only get more involved in facilitating talks between the two sides once the parties took steps to reduce the violence.

An Egyptian delegation led by Osama el-Baz, national security adviser to President Hosni Mubarak, is in town this week to meet with members of the Bush administration, and officials tell us they will be discussing some Egyptian ideas for moving the peace process forward, and we are being told that King Abdullah of Jordan could be traveling to Washington in the next few weeks, so perhaps there could be some new proposals presented to the parties in the near future.

But even if new ideas are introduced, it will still all boil down to whether the parties have the political will to move beyond the violence. One official put it quite bluntly when he said that nobody could wave a "magic wand" or throw "fairy dust" at the conflict and make it go away -- the parties have to make the decision to end the current escalation.