Condoleezza Rice is back. The US secretary of state is touring the region to "encourage" the resumption of the peace process, according to her aides. But according to what she has been saying all last week in interviews with American newspapers, she is here to pit Arabs against each other.
She said an "alliance of moderates" has emerged in the region, under her sponsorship, to confront "the alliance of extremists" namely the Palestinian ruling party Hamas and Lebanon's Hezbollah resistance group.
Her favourite alliance, the moderates, will have to come up with plans to defeat the extremists, she said. The US will support those moderates, like Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, to enable him to overthrow the democratically elected government of Hamas and plunge the occupied territories into chaos that would allow Israel to hold on to the land indefinitely.
Another moderate, Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora, would get all the American help he needs to disarm Hezbollah. The move, Rice knows, would spark more civil strife in the war-ravaged country.
The most dangerous element of Rice's alliance of moderates scheme is that it would be under the direct supervision of Israel. The Jewish state would be able to set the rules and policies in our region.
It is pity that Rice comes to the region only a few days after the release of the Iraq report without getting the message. According to the report, prepared by a number of US terrorism experts, the threat of terror increased significantly after the US intervention in Iraq.
We expected the US administration would reconsider its policies in the region. The natural thing would be a serious attempt to address the Palestinian cause to achieve a comprehensive, lasting and just settlement, instead of trying to build a wall of "the moderates" to protect the Israeli occupation.
