The Americans claim to want to nurture reform in the Arab world, yet they ban the tiny Gulf state of Qatar from a meeting on the region because it hosts al-Jazeera

President Bush is right: "Sixty years of western nations excusing and accommodating the lack of freedom in the Middle East did nothing to make us safe - because in the long run, stability cannot be purchased at the expense of liberty."

That speech last November was the seed of the Greater Middle East Initiative, launched this month at the G8 summit in Sea Island, Georgia. The plan is to foster democracy, political reform and economic progress across the Middle East and northern Africa through a series of US-backed projects and initiatives.

No question that the problem is urgent, as the upsurge in violence in Saudi Arabia shows. Young Saudis opt for extreme Islam because there is no other counter to the autocratic, corrupt rule of the House of Saud. A Lebanese friend despairs about the future of the region, predicting that ossified regimes will be swept aside by unemployed, radicalised youth for whom religion is the only guide. Think back to the Iranian revolution, and imagine it multiplied across the Arab world.

European liberals have a lot of thinking to do. We can mock Bush as much as we like, but don't we also support women's rights and democracy? To hold back the tide of radical Islam, should we back corrupt, secular governments that have locked up political activists and impoverished their people?

In Gaza in May, Palestinians ridiculed the declaration of the Arab League, which had met in Tunis, for being less use than toilet paper. The League leaders could not even agree on the word "reform", so they watered it down to "development and modernisation".

The problem is that the currency of the reform that America says it wants to nurture is being devalued by America itself. On al-Jazeera news programmes, Arabs see Israeli bulldozers demolishing Palestinian houses, and American soldiers firing the missiles that hit civilians in Fallujah. Instead of reviewing the policies that lead to such coverage, the Americans declined to invite the tiny Gulf state of Qatar to Sea Island along with other Arab nations, because it hosts al-Jazeera. As one diplomat said to the New York Times, "It's strange having a summit declaration on democratic reforms and not inviting a country because it has a free press."

According to the International Crisis Group, the first draft of the initiative drew on a series of United Nations reports that analysed the political and social failures of the Arab world*. However, the main author of the UN reports, Nader Fergany, points out that the American paper ignored his criticism of US and Israeli policies in the region. It relied on his report, he said, "like a drunk leans against a lamp-post: so he does not fall over, not for illumination".

When the Middle East initiative was floated last winter, European diplomats said that unless it addressed Israel's continued occupation of Arab territory, it would have no chance at all. But the Americans don't get it. This administration will not see that its unfettered support of Israel is at the root of its failure in the Arab world. Eventually, the Sea Island initiative did include a declaration on the need to resolve the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, but no one has any illusion that this heralds a change in US policy.

The Americans now want to capitalise on the Europeans' greater credibility in the Arab world, by sucking Europe into the Greater Middle East Initiative. Tony Blair wants to tie Europe into America - but Europe could be throwing away its last chance to influence the Middle East. The European Union already spends considerable sums in the region as part of what is called the Barcelona Process. Like most EU initiatives, it is slow and bureaucratic, but it does fund meaningful projects such as university exchanges and programmes to combat organised crime and terrorism. More importantly, it gives Europe independent leverage in the Arab world.

Two years ago, America's Big Idea was that war in Iraq would somehow miraculously bring in its wake a solution to the Israel/Palestine problem, and create democracy around the region. In fact, Iraq may now be one of the biggest obstacles to reform, providing as it does a rallying cause for al-Qaeda sympathisers. Instead of Europe signing up to the American initiative, it should boost its independent programmes to support reform in the Arab world, tempering democratic evangelism with a historical understanding that change has to come from within.

President Bush seems to think that, by warlike or peaceful means, America can impose democracy on the Middle East. On that, he is definitely wrong.

* The Broader Middle East and North Africa Initiative: imperilled at birth (ICG, June 2004)

Lindsey Hilsum is international editor of Channel 4 News

Post your comment

Please note: you will need to login or register before you can comment on the website