malina
27.04.02, 16:35
Policy Divide Thwarts Powell in Mideast Effort
Defense Dept.'s Influence Frustrates State Dept
By Alan Sipress
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, April 26, 2002; Page A01
State Department officials say Secretary of State Colin L. Powell has been
repeatedly undercut by other senior policymakers in his effort to break the
Middle East deadlock, warning this has left U.S. diplomacy paralyzed at an
especially volatile moment.
These officials say that Powell's return from the Middle East a week ago with
few concrete results has left them more discouraged than at any time since the
Bush administration took office.
They partly fault what they said was the administration's unwillingness to
stand behind Powell, especially in pressuring Israeli Prime Minister Ariel
Sharon to withdraw his forces from West Bank cities and hold accelerated talks
with the Palestinians. Department officials said they continue to face
objections as they seek to fashion a diplomatic initiative aimed at creating a
Palestinian state.
Powell has displayed little public frustration. But his employees' complaints,
reflecting their own exasperation and deep loyalty to him, reveal the depth of
divisions inside the administration, especially between the State Department
and the Pentagon.
Many in the State Department cite resistance to their diplomatic efforts coming
from Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, who has more of a voice in shaping
Middle East policy than his predecessors.
The opinions of Rumsfeld and his key lieutenants, notably Deputy Defense
Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz and Undersecretary of Defense Douglas J. Feith,
figure prominently because the Pentagon has been given a seat at interagency
discussions over the Middle East conflict. In recent years, the peace process
was largely the purview of the State Department and the White House.
Rumsfeld and his advisers have advocated giving Sharon wide latitude to press
his military operations, viewing the Israeli campaign as a legitimate war on
terrorism. At the same time, they see little value in trying to engage
Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat in renewed negotiations.
Powell and his team have a different view. They sympathize with Israel's need
to defend itself but worry that the unprecedented Israeli offensive is
fostering greater Palestinian hatred and destroying the Palestinians' ability
to govern themselves. While the Powell camp shares the disdain for Arafat, it
believes he remains central to any settlement.
The rift in President Bush's inner circle, some State Department officials
said, has left the administration's policy "dead in the water." These officials
use words like "despondent" and "disheartened" to describe the mood in Foggy
Bottom, saying they cannot remember a time in recent years when they have felt
so badly beaten up.
"I can't think of an awful lot of allies," a State Department official said. He
said the demoralization within the department was "the most acute" in at least
five years.
Another department official, noting with satisfaction how quickly U.S. relief
aid had been dispatched to the devasted Jenin refugee camp in the West Bank,
expressed dismay over the administration's broader approach to the Middle
East. "Now, if only we could fix our policy . . . with the same speed," the
official said.
With Powell back from the region, Bush has yet to resolve what a former State
Department official called the "battle royal" between Defense and State,
delaying the adoption of a plan on how to proceed.
Since the start of the administration, senior State and Defense Department
officials have disagreed over a range of issues, including Iraq, peacekeepers
in Afghanistan and arms agreements with Russia. But a senior administration
official said the tension has become especially pronounced over the Middle East.
"Is it as intense as it's been in the 15 months since [Powell] has been
secretary? Sure," the official said.
Larry DiRita, Rumsfeld's special assistant, said senior policymakers from the
Pentagon and State Department are working together intensively to promote
Bush's Middle East policy. "It's a collaborative effort. No one has a monopoly
on answers here. They're working through this in a way that serves the
president very well," he said.
State Department officials said the only strong support for a more vigorous
policy seeking to address both Israeli and Palestinian concerns is coming from
the CIA, which has developed a working relationship with the two sides in
fostering security cooperation.
Vice President Cheney and his staff largely share the Pentagon's perspective,
though Cheney has increasingly expressed concern about how the conflict is
affecting other administration priorities in the Middle East.
The role of national security adviser Condoleezza Rice is primarily to broker
discussions among senior officials and promote Bush's views. Although her own
opinions on the Middle East remain unclear, she played an important part in the
decision to step up the administration's engagement and dispatch Powell to the
region.
Rice's senior director assigned to the Middle East, Zalmay Khalilzad, is
relatively new to the Arab-Israeli issue and remains preoccupied with
Afghanistan. His new deputy, Flynt Leverett, is relatively junior and is
considered suspect by more hawkish policymakers because of his pedigree as a
CIA employee who also worked at the State Department, officials said.
Some of the harshest criticism has come from Capitol Hill. Many members of
Congress, Republican and Democrat alike, endorse the policies of Sharon's
government and fault efforts either to constrain his military operations or
engage Arafat.
Absent a decision how to move forward, the White House is continually
recalibrating its approach. After Bush demanded three weeks ago that Israel end
its West Bank invasion, Powell went to the region and pressed Sharon with
little immediate success. The White House, facing intense lobbying by Jewish,
evangelical Christian and neoconservative groups, backed off, and Bush's
spokesman, Ari Fleischer, told reporters Sharon was a "man of peace."
Hours before Powell left Jerusalem, however, he told reporters that a cease-
fire and political negotiations could not proceed until Israel ended its
military offensive, which Sharon was continuing despite Bush's demands. This
was a shift in the U.S. position, which had been that there could not be
progress until Arafat cracked down on militant groups.
But a day later, as Powell sat beside him in the White House, Bush praised
Sharon, again calling him a "man of peace," and credited him with taking
satisfactory steps to end the three-week-old invasion. These comments landed
like a body blow on the State Department.
"We're getting hammered for that quote throughout the Arab world," a State
Department official said.
Given the chance to call Sharon a man of peace on the Sunday morning talk shows
last weekend, Powell demurred.
State Department officials said they fear Sharon will seek to exploit the split
in the administration and end the standoff at Arafat's compound in Ramallah by
raiding the building
