From Madrid to Geneva: The Rise and Fall of the Syrian-Israeli Peace Process, 1991-2000

 

The United States emerged as the world's sole superpower in the aftermath of the Gulf War in March 1991 with unprecedented prestige in the Middle East.  The first Bush administration, eager to proceed with its 'new world order' seized the proverbial 'window of opportunity' to forge a comprehensive Arab-Israeli peace.  This presented Syria, Israel, and the United States with a series of both challenges and opportunities.

 

This work examines the peace process between Syria and Israel facilitated and mediated by the United States from Madrid in 1991 to Geneva in 2000.  In so doing, it will examine the negotiations, offers, and commitments made or imagined in detail.  This work seeks to analyze the motives and moves made by the three protagonists, answer what went wrong, and explain why a decade of efforts failed to produce a peace agreement.

 

Syria joined the peace process under American pressure in 1991 because of their poor regional standing, the dissolution of the Soviet Union, and a fear of external threats to the stability of the regime.  It was necessary to join the peace process because the price of admission was less than the price of abstention.  President Hafiz al-Asad would not make peace with Israel if it required any difficult concession.  He sought to maintain the status quo because he feared change and its potential affect on Syria's stability.  Asad engaged in the process without engaging in peace and during the Clinton administration he discovered that the rewards and punishments attached to the peace process were neither impressive nor threatening enough to require a dramatic change in policy and thinking.  While the U.S. saw Syria as the key to Middle East stability, their role in the 1990s was defined more by their ability to prevent rather than make peace.

 

Syria was determined to lead the Arab world in a comprehensive settlement.  By 1994, Egypt, Jordan, and the Palestinians decided to pursue their own interests and abandon the pan-Arab umbrella.  Asad was unwilling to change his decades-old rhetoric about the Arab nation and Arab interests.  He truly believed that either a secular pan-Arab nation existed or he thought the cost involved in revising or adapting his version of Ba'th ideology would prove too costly.  Talking about peace with Israel was revolutionary by Syrian standards, yet if he could not part with pan-Arab ideology when speaking domestically, there was little hope he would make peace with Israel.  A change in thinking was a threat to the stability Asad successfully created and maintained for three decades.  He was either unable or unwilling to change directions.

 

Israel failed to understand that for Asad, the Golan was not merely a question of territory but of national honor, Arab rights, and regime legitimacy.  Adjusting the 4 June 1967 line, which existed on no map, was unthinkable in Damascus and it was to be defined by Syria alone.  Throughout the 1990s, Asad's public demands increased.  He began with a demand for a "full withdrawal," later added "to the 4 June 1967 line" (as opposed to the 1923 international boundary), then added "with access to Lake Tiberias," and then finally, "with shared sovereignty over the lake."  With each escalating public demand, Asad planted his flag further away from the center and fastened his red lines with permanent ink in a way that made compromise exceedingly more difficult - if compromise was something he sought.  By 1999 and 2000, Asad priced himself out of the market.

 

The Syrian and Western view of negotiations were polar opposites and helped to create a barrier to progress.  Two quotes best represent this disparity.  According to a Western view, "Every negotiation is about manipulation, with each side trying to convince the other that its redlines are truly red while the other's are simply pink."^[1]  This version requires a delicate game of give-and-take based on prioritized interests and trade-offs designed to gain the best deal possible without compromising beyond one's red line.  Conversely, according to a Syrian view, "President Asad does not like ambiguities.  Before entering a negotiation, he likes to know where he is going and what the end result will be."^[2]  This version seeks to gain all objectives before negotiating.  In a Western view, ambiguity is implied by the need to negotiate; otherwise, it is not negotiating but offering a dictate.  While it is certainly reasonable and expected that parties who negotiate know where they want to go, knowing its outcome before beginning obviates the need to negotiate.

 

The Western notion of give-and-take (masa umatan in Hebrew) and the concept that concessions will be involved in order to reach an agreement is implied by the very word 'negotiation.'  To say in English: "This is negotiable" implies flexibility.  In Hebrew, pshara means 'compromise,' 'agreement,' and 'arbitral award.'  The notion of compromise in negotiations is seen as something positive and necessary to make sense of a situation and find agreement.  There is no Arabic term for the concept of political compromise so hal wasat (middle solution) was coined.

 

There are two different forms of negotiations in Arabic.  The first is mufawadat, which implies a political negotiation.  The idea of give-and-take is absent while 'honor' and 'face-saving' are paramount.  The second form is musawama, implying a bargain over the price of goods as one does in the suq.  The concept has no relation to a political negotiation, as it suggests petty-minded haggling.  In Arabic, 'adil (justice) and haqq (right or truth) are virtues, while 'compromise' is not.  In Asad's political negotiation (mufawadat), there was no sense, desire, or need to compromise on what he perceived as justice and Arab rights because one does not compromise on his or her principles.  This was the opposite point of departure from Israel and the United States and it was reflected throughout the decade.^[3]

 

In 1994, Asad explained, "As long as the matter did not deal with substance [i.e. land], we used to give and take and make initiatives.  But on substance there is no possibility for compromise or placation."^[4]  Asad conducted an entire interview with CNN in 1996 without using any word that could be construed as 'negotiation.'^[5]  Murhaf Jouejati, a Syrian foreign policy analyst elaborated further in 2000:  "Syrians are highly sensitive and concerned about maintaining their national dignity.  Syrians, and most Arabs, would see any solution that does not include a total Israeli withdrawal, as undignified...This leads me to conclude that it is perhaps when Israel understands the depth of Syrian and Arab pride [that peace can be reached]."^[6]

 

Given the Western and Syrian view of negotiations, the decade was largely spent contending with Syria's sense of entitlement to 4 June 1967 as a precondition to negotiate and Israel's refusal to directly offer what they saw as a possible result of negotiations.  This central problem goes beyond process and semantics; it represents diametrically opposed thinking, points of departure, and frames of reference.  For each procedural move Asad made in the process - agreeing to an Ambassador's channel, establishing a chief of staff channel, sending Foreign Minister Faruq al-Shar' to meet Prime Minister Barak in 1999 and 2000 - he felt entitled to a return on substance from Israel.

 

Syrian policy was the natural outgrowth and extension of the regime's character and in particular, President Hafiz al-Asad.  It was designed to provide the maximum amount of decision-making operating room and guided by an overall resistance to change.  Syria's objectives in the 1990s were to ensure the stability of the regime by preventing the development of internal and external threats; to increase their regional influence and lead the Arab world; and to regain the Golan Heights from Israel through a political process if possible, by courting the West and the United States specifically, who alone could be counted upon to successfully pressure Israel into making the necessary concessions.

 

During the decade, Asad's foreign policy was driven by the peace process with Israel and unfolded in four phases: