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The Much Too Promised Land: America’s Elusive Search for Arab-Israeli Peace, by Aaron David Miller. New York: Bantam, 2008. 398 pp. $26.00.
For those of us teaching courses on U.S. policy in the Middle East, and on the Arab-Israeli conflict, The Much Too Promised Land by Aaron Miller is a very welcome addition to the literature. Miller, who served in a number of U.S. Government positions dealing with the Middle East, including as deputy to U.S. Middle East envoy Dennis Ross, presents an “insider’s view” of what works—and what doesn’t—in U.S. policy toward the Arab-Israeli conflict. Spicing up his narrative, Miller frequently cites the rather earthy language used by both U.S. officials and foreign leaders, as they discuss Middle Eastern personalities, such as the comments of the late King Hussein of Jordan who characterized Yasser Arafat in the following way: “That little shit. He hasn’t a clue what he is doing” (p. 55). Similarly, Miller’s portrayal of the eating habits of Israeli negotiators is absolutely hilarious (p. 50). Miller gives the reader a real feel for how Middle Eastern diplomacy actually works, including how divisions among U.S. policy-makers hampers U.S. policy in the region.
The book is divided into three sections. The first is an introduction to the dynamics of Middle East peacemaking and the challenges which even a superpower like the United States faces in trying to enforce its will. This section also includes an entire chapter devoted to the impact of U.S. domestic politics and the strengths and weaknesses of the so-called “Israel Lobby.” The second part of the book presents case studies of successful U.S. policymakers: Henry Kissinger in negotiating the Sinai I (1974) and Sinai II (1975) agreements between Israel and Egypt, and the Golan Heights Agreement (1974) between Israel and Syria; Jimmy Carter, who worked out a peace treaty between Israel and Egypt (1979); and James Baker who successfully convened the Madrid Peace Conference in 1991 after the First Gulf War. The final section of the book deals with U.S. President Bill Clinton, who failed in his efforts to achieve peace between Israel and both Syria and the Palestinians, and President George W. Bush who, according to Miller, did not try very hard to achieve an Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement.
In the first section of the book, Miller presents a number of lessons for U.S. policy-makers as they deal with the nations of the Middle East. Perhaps the most pithy are as follows:
In negotiations, to be effective, you need to believe that things can change but have extraordinary patience if they don’t. (p. 26)
You need to be tough but empathetic, firm but practical. And above all, you need to be ready to endure the endless maneuvering and machinations of Arabs and Israelis for whom the conflict has sadly become a way of life. (pp. 26–27)
Smaller nations will do just about anything to survive, and are not inclined to listen or even trust advice offered by a distant power whose political and physical survival is not at stake. The ghosts of the past, made real by history’s fears and traumas, speak louder than the untested promise of a brighter future offered up by American diplomats. (p. 37)
Americans who recognize the galactic gap between a secure and confident America and the insecure world of Israelis and Arabs fare best of all. (p. 41)
This conviction (of Yitzhak Rabin), that however well intentioned, the Americans were naive and didn’t understand the Arabs, was shared by almost every Israeli with whom we worked. (p. 42)
In his chapter on the Israel Lobby, Miller shows how a combination of common values and common enemies has forged a close U.S.-Israeli alliance. He also cites the influence of pro-Israeli Jews in the Democratic Party, and pro-Israeli Evangelical Christians in the Republican Party to show the broad bipartisan support for Israel in the U.S. To those who deplore the power of lobbies, be it the NRA, the Drug Lobby or the Israel Lobby, Miller gives a strong rejoinder—the U.S. system is based on lobbying, and in effect, lobbying is as American as apple pie (p. 119). Miller also cites the comments of career U.S. Ambassador Thomas Pickering, who asserted (p. 86), “As the state child of the Holocaust, and a democratic state in a non-democratic region, Israel creates a strong affinity for Americans.”
In his description of the U.S. leaders who were successful in their Arab-Israeli diplomacy—Henry Kissinger, Jimmy Carter, and James Baker—Miller cites the five “T’s” every such leader must have: (1) making the Arab-Israeli Conflict a top priority; (2) toughness—the ability to push back when Arabs and Israelis try to push you around; (3) tenacity; (4) the ability to gain the trust of Arab and Israeli leaders, and (5) a proper sense of timing (p. 127). In addition, when he discusses the successes of Henry Kissinger, Miller introduces a theme that pervades the rest of his book—the need for a Secretary of State to have the strong backing of his or her President. Kissinger (Richard Nixon) and James Baker (George H.W. Bush) had such backing, but Colin Powell (George W. Bush) did not, and this at least partially explains why Kissinger and Baker were successful in their Middle East diplomacy while Powell was not. Miller sums up Kissinger’s legacy in these words: “He became the first Secretary of State to create an Arab Policy for the United States, the first to prove that America’s close ties with Israel could yield workable agreements with the Arabs; and the first to create conditions in which the Israelis felt confident and secure enough to cede territory” (p. 156).
As far as Jimmy Carter is concerned, Miller is highly critical of his Geneva Conference initiative of 1977 that proved to be a total failure, but then praises Carter for persevering to work out the Egyptian-Israeli Peace Treaty of 1979. In summing up Carter, Miller states: “[Carter’s] moral rectitude, unaccompanied by any sense of doubt, made him determined but tone deaf, eager to talk but not necessarily to listen to those who saw domestic politics as an inescapable reality” (p. 187).
As for James Baker, who succeeded in bringing about the Madrid Peace Conference of 1991, Miller is strong in his praise, but also notes that both Baker’s and George H. W. Bush’s unnecessary alienation of the U.S. Jewish community was a factor in causing Bush’s defeat in the 1992 U.S. Presidential election.
Miller is considerably more critical of Bill Clinton, and of Miller’s own negotiating team, for not listening more to State Department Middle East specialists like Dan Kurtzer, and he cites this as one of the reasons for Clinton’s ultimate failure in negotiating either a Syrian-Israeli or a Palestinian-Israeli peace agreement. Prior to the assassination of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in November 1995, Miller attributes the failure of the United States to take a more active peacemaking role to a combination of the “do it themselves” Oslo process, Rabin’s reflexive opposition to a strong U.S. role, and Clinton’s “reverence for Rabin,” as Dennis Ross described it (p. 249). Miller also deplores the fact that U.S. officials never had a tough or honest conversation with the Israelis on settlement activity, that the U.S. never placed any costs on Arafat for indulging the Palestinian terrorist groups, Hamas and Islamic Jihad, and never imposed penalties on Syria for its failure to practice public diplomacy with Israel.
While I am in agreement with Miller’s treatment of Kissinger, Carter, Baker, and Clinton, I disagree somewhat with his analysis of the George W. Bush years (2001–2009). Miller argues that the Bush Administration not only did not care very much about the Arab-Israeli conflict, but also didn’t try very hard to settle it, even after 9/11. The Zinni mission, in my view, was more serious than Miller indicates, coming as it did after Bush’s post 9/11 speech at the UN and Powell’s major Middle East policy address of November 19, 2001. Zinni’s mission failed not because of a lack of U.S. support but because of a series of Palestinian terrorist attacks which sabotaged it. This minor quibble aside, I consider The Much Too Promised Land an excellent book that should be read not only by professors and students, but also by U.S. diplomatic practitioners who work on Middle East issues.
Robert O. Freedman
Johns Hopkins University
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