Israel Proposes Peace Talks With Lebanon
Offer on Eve of Cease-Fire Gets Cool Reception, but Diplomatic Flurry Is Called 'Extraordinary'

By Griff Witte
Washington Post Foreign Service
Thursday, June 19, 2008

JERUSALEM, June 19 -- Israel on Wednesday publicly pushed to open peace negotiations with Lebanon, seeking to add another initiative to an already burgeoning diplomatic roster that includes talks with some of the Jewish state's foremost adversaries.

While Lebanon immediately indicated it has no desire for a deal with Israel, the overture came just a day after Israel agreed to a truce with the armed Islamist group Hamas that took effect early Thursday in and around the Gaza Strip. Israel is also negotiating a prisoner exchange with Hezbollah, the Lebanese Shiite movement it fought to a standstill in 2006, and last month announced the resumption of long-stalled peace talks with Syria.

The sudden diplomatic activity represents a turnabout from just this spring, when Israel was leading the charge for the world to isolate -- rather than engage -- armed groups and Middle Eastern governments considered hostile to the West. In its policies and pronouncements, Israel favored sanctions over dialogue and threats of force over cease-fires.

The change in approach stems from factors both local and global, including the corruption scandal swirling around Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and the declining influence of the United States in its attempt to bring about an Israeli-Palestinian peace deal by the end of President Bush's term in office. Israel's diplomatic openness could influence the debate in the U.S. presidential campaign over when it makes sense to talk to one's enemies and under what circumstances confrontation should give way to engagement.

"It's quite extraordinary. You'd have to go back to the early 1990s to find a time when there was this level of activity," said Yossi Alpher, a veteran Israeli negotiator and political analyst.

Underlying the most dramatic element of that activity, the Gaza truce, is a recognition that isolating Hamas has not worked, Alpher said.

The policy, formulated after the Islamist group won day-to-day control of the Palestinian Authority in January 2006 elections and deepened following its violent takeover of Gaza a year ago, involved political, military and economic pressure, the keystone of which was a tight siege on the narrow coastal strip. The United States vigorously backed that approach, hoping that worsening conditions in Gaza would lead its people to turn against Hamas rule.

"It was supposed to bring Hamas to its knees. But all it did was bring a lot of human suffering, which is on our conscience," Alpher said.

While Hamas may not be as popular in Gaza today as it was a year ago, its control over the strip's 1.5 million people appears undiminished. The group and its allies have continued to shower rockets across southern Israel on a daily basis.

Israel had considered launching a major military offensive to forcibly remove Hamas, and it still may take that route if the cease-fire fails. But military and civilian leaders alike concede that the cost would be great, with high casualties on both sides and Israeli forces in Gaza lacking an exit plan.

Instead, Israel on Tuesday opted for a truce, following months of Egyptian mediation.

The deal went into effect at 6 a.m. Thursday, with Hamas vowing to halt the rocket fire and Israel pledging to end its military strikes.

The United States had recently come around to supporting the truce. On Wednesday, a State Department spokesman indicated that Israel's efforts to reach out to its foes could help U.S.-backed talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, whose influence is limited to the West Bank. Those negotiations were launched last November in Annapolis, and there has been little public progress since.

"The Israelis want to take steps forward to deal with some of the issues in the region, and that's positive and good," said the spokesman, Tom Casey. "There's a sense out there that we're not supportive of, or aren't saying enough positive things about, Israel reaching out [to its adversaries]. But that's the plan. That's what we tried to do in Annapolis."

Hamas had its own reasons for wanting the truce. The deal has the potential to elevate the movement's status in the Middle East and also gives it time to regroup.

"Israel has managed to kill Hamas operatives quicker than Hamas can replace them," said Jonathan Rynhold, senior research fellow at the BESA Center for Strategic Studies outside Tel Aviv.

Israel is already deep into talks with the armed Lebanese group Hezbollah, mediated by Germany, over a prisoner exchange. Under the expected terms, Israel would set free a notorious Lebanese gunman, Samir Kuntar, and perhaps others, in exchange for the two Israeli soldiers whose capture in the summer of 2006 set off a month-long war between Israel and Hezbollah fighters. The captured soldiers were badly injured at the time, and there has been no indication since then that they are still alive.

That deal could be completed as early as next week, according to those familiar with the talks.

Mark Regev, spokesman for Olmert, cited a "changed constellation" in the Middle East as the reason Israel renewed its offer Wednesday to open talks with Lebanon.

"Israel can negotiate with the Palestinians. It can negotiate with the Syrians. There's no logical reason whatsoever why we shouldn't be negotiating with the Lebanese," Regev said.

But Lebanon responded coolly.

"There's no room for bilateral negotiations between Lebanon and Israel. The Lebanese position is unchanged," Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora said in a statement.

In the past, Siniora has said Lebanon -- a weak state that is heavily influenced by Syria -- would be the last country to make peace with Israel. A broad spectrum of Lebanese politicians on Wednesday also denounced the Israeli call for talks.

Israel has fought two wars in Lebanon, and it occupied a stretch of southern Lebanon for nearly two decades ending in 2000. The two nations remain in dispute over a relatively small patch of land along their border that is controlled by Israel. Regev said that Israel was interested in holding "direct, bilateral" talks with Lebanon and that all issues would be on the table.

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, during a visit to Beirut this week, suggested it was time for Israel and Lebanon to try to resolve their differences over the land, which is known as the Shebaa Farms.

Hezbollah has said it sees in Rice's comment a ploy to neutralize one of Hezbollah's main justifications for its attacks. The group issued a statement saying that "anyone who believes that placing Shebaa Farms under U.N. mandate will mean eliminating the rationale behind our resistance is mistaken."

Negotiations between Israel and Lebanon, if they happen, would probably be intimately linked to the talks between Israel and Syria, which are being mediated by Turkey.

There is widespread skepticism in Israel that the negotiations will amount to much, although there is a possibility that Olmert will meet Syrian President Bashar al-Assad at a conference in France next month, a move that would be likely to further weaken U.S. efforts to isolate Syria.

Many Israeli commentators believe Olmert is launching the diplomatic initiatives only to deflect attention from a corruption probe that threatens to bring down his government. But some note that there could be benefits, even if the motives are complex.

"When you negotiate, you get a bit of quiet," Rynhold said. "And at the moment, everyone has an interest in that."

Staff writer Robin Wright in Washington and special correspondent Alia Ibrahim in Beirut contributed to this report.