US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice concluded on Thursday her
four-day visit to Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon and the United Arab
Emirates. It was thought to be an important trip. However, the top
US diplomat's efforts to ask Arab leaders to press for recognition
of Israel by the Palestinian military group Hamas, to constrain
Iran's ambition of nuclear desire, and to speed up political reform
have hardly made any headway.
Isolation impossible
Of the four Arab countries Rice visited, Egypt and Saudi
Arabiaare, in term of political influence in the region, the most
important ones. As part of preparation for the Middle East journey,
US President George W. Bush and his top aide Rice have been
stressing that Hamas, which won the Jan. 25 elections, can not be
partner of peace and will get no aid from the United States unless
the military group recognizes Israel's right to exist and abandon
its armed struggle to destroy the Jewish state.
Washington's threat to cut financial aid to the Hamas-led
Palestinian government was echoed by its European allies. But
Rice's latest visit to the Middle East has demonstrated that
American push to isolate Hamas is confronting unanimous objection
from US allies in the Middle East.
Reading major US newspapers this week, people may have found
many stories with glaring titles like "Rice, on tour, finds Egypt
unreceptive to Hamas aid cutoff", "Egypt rejects appeal by Rice"
and "Saudi Arabia will keep up aid flow to Palestinians".
Commenting Egypt's stand on Hamas, the Washington Post said
"Egypt does not provide much aid to the Palestinians but has broad
influence in the Arab world on Israel-Palestinian issues, so the
rebuff could hamper Rice's efforts to build a united front against
the rise of Hamas."
Referring to Saudi Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal's remarks -
"We wish not to link the international aid to the Palestinian
people to considerations other than their dire humanitarian
needs,"- the Washington Post pointed out that "Saudi's statement
put the kingdom at odds with the US push to isolate the
Palestinians, except for the provision of humanitarian aid."
It was reported that Saudi Arabia currently provides about US$15
million in monthly aid through the Arab League for the Palestinian
Authority budget.
It was observed that while she was trying hard to persuade Arab
allies to cut aid to the Hamas-led government, Rice was unavoidably
involving in contradictions of the Bush administration's Middle
East policy.
"On trips to the region in the past year, she repeatedly pushed
Arab governments to step up monetary support for the Palestinians
while arguing that they must open up their political systems.
"This week, in her first trip since Hamas's unexpected victory
Jan. 25, she has urged caution in supporting a Palestinian
legislature that came to power in a democratic election," the
Washington Post said.
Complete nuclear free
In addition to curb Hamas, Rice also tried in her journey to
seek support from Arab countries to take stand against Iran over
its nuclear program. However, judging from her talks with leaders
of Arab countries, people will find that the Bush administration's
call for settlement of Iran's nuclear issue is quite different from
what Arab countries advocate.
Although Rice has time and again accused Iran of developing
secretly nuclear weapons, the Arab countries she visited always
turned a deaf ear to her platitude. "There is no proof yet that
they (Iranians) are producing atomic weapons. They deny this. They
have denied it many times to us," Saudi Foreign Minister Saud
al-Faisal told reporters after talks with Rice in Riyadh, Saudi
Arabia.
Political analysts here believe that the great difference over
Iran's nuclear issue lies in Washington's prolonged practice of
double standards over the nuclear issue, namely while the United
States is sparing no effort to curb Iran's nuclear development, It
closes its eyes to the fact that Israel has made nuclear
weapons.
Egyptian president's spokesman Soleiman Awad said on Wednesday
the discussion about Iran's nuclear issue can never steer clear of
the realization of nuclear free in the whole region of the Middle
East, let alone Israel's nuclear issue. The Egyptian statement
might be the voice of the aspiration of the Middle East countries
over the settlement of nuclear issues in the region.
(Xinhua News Agency February 25, 2006)
