{"id":5354,"date":"2009-03-03T20:41:24","date_gmt":"2009-03-04T04:41:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/?p=5354"},"modified":"2009-03-03T20:42:21","modified_gmt":"2009-03-04T04:42:21","slug":"ross-is-clearly-a-major-player","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/2009\/03\/03\/ross-is-clearly-a-major-player\/","title":{"rendered":"Ross Is Clearly a Major Player"},"content":{"rendered":"

Since Secretary of State Clinton set out for the Middle East over the weekend, it has seemed increasingly clear to me that Dennis Ross<\/a>, contrary to my earlier speculation<\/a>, pretty much got the job that he and WINEP were hoping for. Not only has he claimed an office on the coveted seventh floor, but Obama\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s conspicuous placement of Ross\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 name between those of Mitchell and Holbrooke in his speech on Iraq at Camp Lejeune<\/a> last week strongly suggested that he considers Ross to be of the same rank and importance as the other two.<\/p>\n

More to the point is what Clinton and those around her have been saying during the trip, including, most remarkably, the report<\/a> by an unnamed \u00e2\u20ac\u0153senior State Department official\u00e2\u20ac\u009d that she told the foreign minister of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) that she was \u00e2\u20ac\u0153very doubtful\u00e2\u20ac\u009d that diplomacy would persuade Iran to abandon its alleged quest for nuclear weapons. This, of course, very much reflects Ross\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 own view (as well that of neo-conservatives) and will no doubt bolster hard-liners in Tehran who believe that Obama\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s talk of engagement is simply designed to marshal more international support for eventual military action, be it a bombing campaign or a blockade to cut gasoline imports. That Obama essentially confirmed today\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s New York Times<\/em> report<\/a> about a proposed deal with Moscow whereby it would go along with increasing sanctions against Iran in exchange for Washington\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s non-deployment of anti-missile defenses in Poland and the Czech Republic only adds to the impression that some version of the Bipartisan Policy Center\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s September \u00e2\u20ac\u02dc08 report<\/a> on Iran strategy (drafted by hard-line neo-cons Michael Rubin and Michael Makovsky and signed by Ross), which I wrote about here, is in the process of being implemented. (I was going to write about this later this week, but the Moon of Alabama<\/a> beat me to the punch. See also Stephen Walt\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s analysis of Clinton\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s scepticism on his Foreign Policy<\/em> blog)<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Adding to my growing sense that Ross occupies a critical role in policy-making, at least in the State Department, are what Clinton has had to say so far on her trip about Gaza, Hamas, and the Palestinian Authority. As Marc Lynch reports in his truly excellent blog<\/a>, also on the Foreign Policy<\/em> website, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153her remarks suggest that rather than seize on the possibility of Palestinian reconciliation, Clinton prefers to double-down on the shopworn \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcWest Bank first, Fatah only\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 policy\u00e2\u20ac\u009d strongly advocated by Ross. In that respect, you should definitely read Tuesday\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s extended colloquy between Lynch, Brookings\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 Tamara Wittes (who is more optimistic), and Carnegie\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Nathan Brown, who shares Lynch\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s \u00e2\u20ac\u0153disappointment\u00e2\u20ac\u009d about Clinton\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s performance. As Lynch notes, it seems that Clinton is stuck \u00e2\u20ac\u0153in a bit of time-warp\u00e2\u20ac\u009d regarding Hamas\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 power in Gaza, the Palestinian Authority\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s abject failure to enhance its legitimacy, and the Arab League\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s renewed efforts to both unify itself and to reconstruct a Palestinian government of national unity. This insensitivity to Palestinian and Arab public opinion bears all the hallmarks of Ross\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 failed Mideast diplomacy during the 1990\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s.<\/p>\n

I also have the impression that Ross and the so-called \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Israel Lobby\u00e2\u20ac\u009d whose interests he represents believe that enhancing conditions on the West Bank, combined with diplomatic engagement with Syria<\/a>, will somehow be sufficient for Washington to regain its credibility in the region and rally the Sunni Arab states \u00e2\u20ac\u201d along with the European Union, Russia, China, etc. \u00e2\u20ac\u201d behind a policy of confrontation with Iran.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Since Secretary of State Clinton set out for the Middle East over the weekend, it has seemed increasingly clear to me that Dennis Ross, contrary to my earlier speculation, pretty much got the job that he and WINEP were hoping for. Not only has he claimed an office on the coveted seventh floor, but Obama\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":49,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-5354","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"meta_box":{"disable_donate_message":"","custom_donate_message":"","subtitle":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5354","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/49"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5354"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5354\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5356,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5354\/revisions\/5356"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5354"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5354"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5354"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=5354"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}