Region's brightest and best look for solutions

Dead Sea, Jordan: It is time for this year's World Economic Forum on the Middle East, so the region's brightest and best are off to Dead Sea to find a solution to the many problems that afflict the region. But there will be an odd combination of economic and business hope, despite the worldwide recession; and political despair despite the wider world's more hopeful political scene after Obama's election.

The business communities in the region feel that their governments are doing enough to combat the effects of the recession, and that if they can hang on for long enough their companies will come through relatively quickly, unlike their competitors or suppliers in the United States or Europe where the recession is expected to last for a lot longer.

When talking to any businessman, what they really want is for the large companies to start paying their bills.

However, despite the lack of cash in the system, several WEF polls of Middle East businessmen speak to their confidence that government spending will recharge the economies, and that the recession may have forced two welcome developments on governments. One: A chance to rethink their rush to growth and re-order their strategic planning; Two: a requirement to become more transparent, so that the wider business community and public are able to make their own judgments on the operations of the governments.

So despite the grim economic news from many parts of the world, the Middle East business gathering on the shores of the Dead Sea will have a sense that the desperate October-to-December period of numbing uncertainty is over, and while the grim reality of January-to-May will probably produce more shocks over the next few months, the bottom may be in sight.

But any business confidence is not mirrored in the political arena, where the worst Israeli government for decades has just taken power, with a clear agenda to stop the Two-State solution and refuse to recognise a Palestinian state. A lot of the debate during the World Economic Forum will be about the Israelis and Palestinians, since Benjamin Netanyahu, the new Israeli Prime Minister, will fly to meet Barack Obama for the first time on Monday.

A lot will depend on that meeting, since if the new Democrat administration takes a successful tough line with the Israelis, there will be some hope of finding a way forward during the next few years. But if Obama's people acquiesce with Israeli intransigence, or if the Israelis ignore any American requirements with impunity, then there will be little hope for the peacemakers.

The key test of any change will be to see if Israel will stop building new colonies, and stop stealing more land.

Another area of immediate concern which will come up in the forum will be the planned American withdrawal from Iraq, and the likelihood the fragile peace of the last two years, may not continue.