Tony Blair will on Friday attempt to restore British influence in Washington when he warns President George Bush that the Middle East ”road map” remains the only viable option for achieving a lasting political settlement.
Less than 48 hours after Bush spurned his plea for an ”even-handed” approach to the Middle East, the prime minister will make clear in private that Britain cannot sign up to Ariel Sharon’s unilateral plan which was all but endorsed by the president.
As Blairites admitted that the president’s declaration marked a personal setback for the prime minister, foreign secretary Jack Straw last night underlined Britain’s unease. He said: ”President Bush … has to make his own judgements. We make our own.”
The prime minister, who began his two-day visit to the US last night with a meeting in New York with UN secretary general, Kofi Annan, will today put on a brave face when he says that key elements of the Sharon plan, such as the pledge to withdraw from the Gaza Strip, can be reconciled with the road map.
But well placed Blairites made clear on Thursday that Bush’s announcement had been ”uncomfortable” for him. Britain’s unease was underlined on Wednesday night when Downing Street issued a carefully worded statement which welcomed aspects of Sharon’s statement, such as withdrawal from Gaza.
But the statement said nothing about abandonment of central elements of the road map, such as treating Palestinians as partners and calling for the vast majority of Israeli settlements to be removed from the territories occupied since 1967.
Three charities — Christian Aid, Oxfam and Cafod — on Thursday night wrote to the prime minister to seek assurances he was still committed to a ”just solution”. Government sources insisted the charities had been given the wrong impression.
It emerged yesterday Britain was consulted in general terms by the White House before Wednesday’s announcement. Downing Street’s influence appeared to be negligible as attempts to rein in Bush were ignored.
”The Palestinians made a very strong plea to the British before Sharon’s visit – ‘please use your influence with the Bush administration so that they don’t change the fundamental positions’. They made a strong pitch to Tony Blair directly, and to Jack Straw,” said Ed Abington, a former US consul general in Jerusalem and a consultant to the Palestinian Authority. ”Quite clearly, the British have no influence or didn’t even try … I suspect they have no influence.”
Other Palestinian officials said the foreign minister, Nabil Shaath, had expressed fears about the outcome of the negotiations to Straw and Foreign Office officials. According to the Palestinian representative in Washington, Hassan Abdel Rahman, Shaath telephoned Straw again on Monday.
”He explained we had formal information from the US that they were going to issue that kind of guarantee to Israel, and we expressed our opposition,” Rahman said. ”He was told that Britain was in disagreement on this.”
Britain was not the only power shut out of the decision making process that produced a shift in US policy towards the Middle East. During the weeks of diplomacy, it became increasingly clear that national security adviser Condoleezza Rice and her aides were the driving force behind the move to endorse Sharon’s vision of the future.
Their growing influence came at the expense of the secretary of state, Colin Powell, who reportedly was opposed to this break with tradition, as were career diplomats.
”I know that there was opposition from the state department,” said Rahman.
Instead, power shifted toward the leading neo-conservative in Rice’s office, Eliot Abrams, remembered for his role in the Iran-Contra affair.
The final accord between Sharon and Bush were not finalised until Tuesday, following talks with the Israeli leader and Rice.
The declaration dismayed Blairites who believed the road map would undermine Osama bin Laden, who attempted on Thursday to exploit divisions by offering to negotiate with European countries if they withdraw troops from Iraq and Afghanistan. This was rejected out of hand in Europe and the US on Thursday.
Blair’s failure to influence the president over the Middle East is likely to feature prominently at the summit. One Blairite said: ”Tony Blair will feel quite uncomfortable. Ariel Sharon wants to create a semi-Palestinian state and the US is not acting as a restraining force.” – Guardian Unlimited Â