Details

Assessing the current crisis:

In order to examine potential solutions for the present crisis in the Middle East and to keep one of the few remaining threads of conversation between the Israeli and the Palestinian side alive, the office of KAF (Konrad-Adenauer-Foundation) in Jerusalem has conducted, in cooperation with its local partner organization IPCRI (Israel Palestine Centre for Research and Information) a workshop about the general strategic and geopolitical situation in the Middle East on the 18th of July 2006. 20 Israeli and Palestinian academic experts, diplomats, journalists and intelligence veterans from both sides participated at the meeting at the Konrad-Adenauer-Conference-Centre which had taken place repeatedly before in a similar setting.

The crises in the Gaza Strip and in Lebanon could lead to a dramatic change in the geostrategic situation in the entire Middle East region. They hold considerable risks, but also opportunities.

One central statement made very clear that the Israeli side is becoming more and more receptive, besides its traditional bilateral approach in the regional conflict, to finding an overall solution to the Middle East conflict as a whole. The participants considered the interconnections between the Israeli and the US-policy in the region to be so tight, that a “mutual right of veto” existed between the two states as far as Middle East policies are concerned, so that the American interests in the region also had to be taken into account in any final solution to the Israeli-Arab conflict. A growing readiness of the Israeli leadership and public to accept a stronger commitment of the international community, even to the extent of sending international peace troops to southern Lebanon, maybe even as a model for the Palestinian territories, which creates a lot of new options and opportunities for a peaceful solution in the region, was stated almost unanimously among the members of the forum. Some participants even considered the deployment of an Arab peace force from relatively stable and moderate states (especially from Egypt, Jordan and Saudi-Arabia) as an option.

KAF intends to continue its work on this issue by conducting similar workshops on the subject which shall lead to the elaboration of concrete policy recommendations.