The curious thing about the roadmap for Middle East peace is that, while most observers consider it effectively dead, it is still routinely invoked and endorsed by all the parties. Hence when the Israeli prime minister, Ariel Sharon, first put forward his plan for a unilateral Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, he presented it as a step towards implementing the roadmap. And the Quartet the diplomatic grouping (made up of the US, the UN, Russia and the European Union) which produced the roadmap in the first place welcomed the Sharon plan in similar vein.
In fact, as all the parties are aware, there is good reason to believe that Mr Sharon sees his plan as a substitute for the roadmap, not as a prelude to its implementation. Whereas the roadmap requires him and the Palestinians to move through a series of stages to an eventual two-state solution, the Sharon plan essentially means that Israel would relinquish Gaza but tighten its grip on the West Bank. Its a retrenchment to new borders, rather than a peace plan.
It is accordingly a sign of how little hope there is for a revival of a meaningful peace process that the Sharon plan has been so widely embraced by people who harbour such serious doubts about it. In the current situation, everyone is clutching at straws.
The plan nevertheless continues to have consequences, not least for the Israeli prime minister himself. It has enraged part of his own right-wing Likud Party, including significant figures within his own cabinet. Ariel Sharon is the first prime minister from the Israeli right to accept a two-state solution; as such, he has broken an important taboo. But while he himself has accepted (in principle at least) the need for what he calls painful concessions to the Palestinians, many of his Likud colleagues remain wedded to the idea of Greater Israel and regard Mr Sharon as a traitor to their cause.
The Sharon plan is accordingly shaking up Israeli politics. Deprived of a working majority in parliament, Mr Sharon looks set to create a Labour-Likud coalition -- or call fresh elections.
The plan has also, perhaps more surprisingly, shaken up Palestinian politics. Although Mr Sharon is not proposing to begin the withdrawal until 2005, and even then to proceed in careful stages, the key issue in Palestinian politics has already become: who will fill the vacuum in Gaza when Israel leaves? The Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat does not want to see the militant Islamic group Hamas which enjoys strong support in Gaza -- acquire a dominant position there. Neither do the leaders of Egypt and Jordan, who have pledged to help bring about a handover of power from Israel to Mr Arafats Palestinian Authority.
Mr Arafat finds himself under challenge, however, on several fronts. Israel and the United States continue to shun him, insisting they will only deal with his prime minister, Ahmed Qureia. Palestinians, meanwhile, are increasingly critical of the corruption and incompetence of the Palestinian Authority and its failure to uphold law and order, and maintain basic services, in the areas nominally under its control. These grievances came to the boil in July when gunmen blatantly challenged Mr Arafats authority and it seemed for a moment that Gaza was descending into anarchy.
Some of the gunmen were thought to be loyal to Mohammed Dahlan, the former security chief in Gaza, now seen as a rival for Mr Arafats position. By late August, it appeared Mr Arafat had seen off the challenge. But the anger and chaos left many wondering whether, at 75, Mr Arafat is beginning to lose his grip.
Finally, the Sharon plan has had consequences in Washington. Anxious to show that the prospects for progress on the Arab-Israeli front are not entirely bleak, the Bush administration has embraced the Sharon plan -- and has done what it can to bolster Mr Sharon at a time when hes under fire from within his own party.
Another consideration for Mr Bush is without doubt that, as he seeks re-election, he wants to avoid any hint of confrontation with the Israeli prime minister. Most American Jews vote Democrat, but Mr Bush has done more than most Republican presidents to woo Jewish opinion. His advisers calculate that, in a close race, every vote counts.
But in helping Ariel Sharon, President Bush has alienated the other members of the Quartet, as well as the Arab and Muslim worlds (already indignant over the invasion of Iraq and its aftermath). The charge against Mr Bush is that, in his eagerness to help his Israeli ally, he has moved the goalposts of Middle East peacemaking.
In April, standing beside Mr Sharon at the White House, the US President declared that the Palestinians could not expect to get all of the West Bank under a future two-state peace settlement and that the Palestinian refugees would have to settle in the Palestinian state, not in Israel. That may indeed represent realism, but many questioned the wisdom of the American superpower spelling out its opinion on such sensitive matters in advance of a settlement thereby jeopardising its credibility as an honest broker.
In August, the administration went further, tacitly accepting that Mr Sharon could build more homes in West Bank settlements in clear violation of the roadmap, which calls for a settlement freeze. This has reinforced the view that no serious attempt to revive the peace process can be expected before the US elections in November, and that prospects for progress are bleaker than for many years.
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