Paper presented by: Mr. Richard Murphy Senior Fellow for the Middle East Council on Foreign Relations New York

This statement assesses the Fact-Fnding Committee's (Mitchell) Report, American government reaction, the prospects for broader participation in the Israeli-Palestinian talks and whether the odds favor progress towards implementation of the report or continued violence sufficient to block a return to negotiations.

On October 17,2000 President Clinton, speaking on behalf of all the participants at the conclusion of the Middle East Peace Summit at Sham el Sheikh. Egypt, stated that "The United States will develop with the Israelis and Palestinians, as well as in consultation with the United Nations Secretary General, a committee of fact-finding on the events of the past several weeks and how to prevent their recurrence." In addition he cautioned that such a committee should "not become a divisive force or a focal point for blame and recrimination but rather should serve to forestall violence and confrontation and provide lessons for the future."

The Committee was established in early November 2000. less than a month later. Its members were former U.S. Senator George Mitchell (Chair); Suleyman Demirel, former President of the Republic of Turkey; Thorbjoern Jagland, Foreign Minister of Norway; former U.S. Senator Warren
Rudman and Javier Solana, High Representative for the Common Foreign and Security Policy of the European Union.

Thus, the Committee was established under American auspices but was not an official U.S. Government Committee. Its formation represented a compromise between the Palestinian and Israeli positions. The Palestinians had originally sought creation of a committee under the UN. Israel was initially opposed to the creation of any committee but. if there had to be a committee, wanted one composed only of Americans.

No one. least of all the Committee members, foresaw in early-November how far the three week old intifada would further escalate and continue to this day. No one foresaw just how important a life line the Committee's work could become, serving perhaps as the best chance for both parties to extricate themselves from violence.
o
This Committee's report, popularly referred to as the Mitchell Report, was published April 30. It displays considerable sensitivity towards the positions of each of the parties and the authors express themselves in eloquent and strikingly direct language. The Committee has fulfilled its mandate, which as noted above, was to come up with positive recommendations and not to point accusing fingers at either party. The Committee members recognized that their work was a further link in a long chain of diplomatic efforts to achieve peace in the Middle East, which was newly threatened by the eruption of violence in late September.

The Report prefaces its recommendations with a strong statement calling for the parties to reaffirm their commitment to existing agreements and immediately implement an unconditional cessation of violence. At the heart of the Report are recommendations under the headings "End Violence," "Rebuild Confidence" and "Resume Negotiations'* with the section on rebuilding confidence attracting the most comment Both parties are urged to cooperate in establishing a meaningful "cooling off period," to discourage incitement in all its forms, to consider a joint undertaking to preserve and protect holy places sacred to the traditions of Jews, Muslims and Christians and to endorse and support the work of their respective non-governmental organizations involved in cross-community projects.

The three recommendations directed to the Palestine National Authority (PNA) are:

1. Make a 100 percent effort to prevent terrorist operations and to punish perpetrators.
2. Prevent gunmen from using Palestinian populated areas to fire on Israeli populated areas and IDF positions and
3. Renew cooperation with Israeli security agencies to ensure that Palestinian workers employed within Israel are free of connections to organizations and individuals engaged in terrorism.

The three recommendations directed to the Government of Israel (GOD are:

1. Freeze all settlement activity, including the "natural growth" of existing settlements.
2. Ensure that the IDF adopt and enforce policies encouraging non-lethal responses to unarmed demonstrators and
3. Lift closures, transfer all tax revenues owed to the PNA and ensure that security forces and settlers refrain from destruction of homes, roads, trees and other agricultural property in Palestinian areas.

The Committee's mandate was to make recommendations on how to prevent a recurrence of violence. It did so, but, throughout the period of its work, violence persisted. Through late April when the report was published, and afterwards, there have been major incidents of terror against Israeli civilians as well as an escalation in the use of force by the Israeli military and settlers against Palestinians. Both populations have continued to lose faith that a partner for peace exists on the other side.

The Mitchell Report recommends steps first to end the violence, then rebuild confidence as the prelude to resuming negotiations which it describes as the "only path to peace, justice and security." Shortly after the report was issued CIA director George Tenet traveled to the region and the two sides convened security negotiations. 'Tenet is a man no one wants to disappoint," one Israeli official has since stated.

American Government reaction to the report

After the election of President George W. Bush. the Committee offered to dissolve itself since it had been conceived by the previous administration. The Bush team encouraged the Commission to persevere. Since its release, the report has been repeatedly praised by the Bush Administration and adopted as a framework for the parties to use as a way to take immediate action and ultimately return to negotiations.

The Mitchell Commission has made a useful contribution to an Administration which initially appeared reluctant to engage itself deeply in the Palestinian Israeli conflict In fact the Administration began its term convinced that engagement along the lines of President Clinton's exceptionally prolonged and detailed intervention would not be effective. Its action in the first days of its term to close the office of the Special Envoy for Middle East Peace had the strategic effect of sending a clear message about a break with the Clinton Administration's approach. As one insider has privately commented, "we wanted to let the parties deal with each other until they demonstrated that they wanted to end the violence and move back to negotiations."

When Secretary of State Powell made his February tour of certain Middle East capitals, the issue of Iraq took precedence. Soon afterwards it was announced that the U.S. Ambassador to Jordan, William Burns, was to become the next Assistant Secretary of State for the Near East and he began contacts with the Israeli and Palestinian leadership. An initial engagement of the CIA to host security talks between the parties aborted when the Palestinian delegation returning to Gaza was shot at by the Israelis. The dispatch of CIA Director Tenet in June was the Administration's first intervention on the ground by a senior Washington official, extending the Administration involvement beyond the telephone calls to area leaders by the President and the Secretary. The Middle East trip in late June by the Secretary appeared originally intended to buy time to solidify the cease fire which had come into effect only on June 11 and also to assure concerned Arab friends that Washington would remain engaged in efforts to restart the negotiations. He did, however, succeed in getting both Israel and the Palestinians to agree to a time line for implementation of the report

Powell's trip followed on the second meeting between Prime Minister Sharon and President Bush in Washington which revealed some differences of opinion on riming regarding the start up of the cooling off period and the beginning of confidence building measures recommended in the Mitchell Report. Both the U.S. and Israel have been at pains to down-play those differences.

Violence.

As of July 1 Israel continued to maintain its position that there must be a total cessation of violence for seven days before beginning a period of cooling off which it foresaw as requiring six weeks before moving on to confidence building measures. The Palestinian position is that 100% cut off of violence is impossible. The American position, as well as that of the Mitchell Report, is that there must be 100% effort to stop the violence if not 100% results. Conservative voices in the U.S. media have strongly supported Prime Minister Sharon's position that only results matter.

The Settlement Issue.

Washington's approval of the Report may indicate a subtle shift away from the position it has taken since the Declaration of Principles in 1993. At Oslo in 1993. Israelis and Palestinians agreed that settlements, along with the status of Jerusalem. Palestinian refugees and borders, was a permanent status issue. The Mitchell report argues that stopping settlement expansion must be a confidence building measure between Palestinians and Israelis. It asserts that a freeze of settlement construction, including that done in the name of "natural growth." is necessary, as it will be a key inducement for the Palestinians to return to the negotiating table. This recommendation seriously disturbs Israeli leaders who have described a freeze as constituting a "reward" to the PNA for ending violence, something which they maintain should be done unconditionally.

Successive American Administrations have been active in varying degrees on the issue but have never been able to effect a prolonged pause in settlement construction. History has shown that the settler movement can be constrained only by domestic forces within Israel, which are most effective when there is a clear prospect of advancing towards peace. From a domestic Israeli political perspective, settlers irritate the majority of Israeli voters, particularly as more reservists in the IDF arc called for duty in the territories. However, driven by its ideology that all of the territory west of the Jordan River is the Land of Israel, the settler movement has been deaf to arguments that the creation and enlargement of settlements is either unpatriotic or detrimental to Israel's future security. Sharon himself has never wavered from his conviction that the settlements are a strategic defense asset for hi country.

The authors make clear their conviction that an end to violence cannot be sustained in the absence of certain political incentives of which freezing of settlements is a principal one. Given the enthusiasm expressed by Washington for the Report, its view on settlements could, repeat could. become part of the framework for future U.S. diplomacy. Since publication of the Committee's report, Israel has allocated substantial sums for further settlement construction in the name of "natural growth." Differences of opinion have resurfaced within the GOI with the Prime Minister denouncing his Defense Minister for saying that the 16 new rogue settlements in the West Bank would be dismantled.

Other players.

Over the past generation of Middle East diplomacy Washington has seen itself as being in charge of the peace process. True. the Soviet Union was a cosponsor of the Geneva Conference in December 1973 but then and later, particularly as the USSR started to disintegrate, it did not challenge the American leadership role. Israel has long preferred that negotiations be left to the parties in the region, with the exception of Syrian-Israeli relations where it saw the American role as essential.

Today Washington seems more open to a greater measure of internationalization of peace process diplomacy than has been the case under previous administrations. It is fair to say that the tone of the Bush Administration's reception of the report and the comments of the President and the Secretary of State show a greater warmth towards involvement of the person of the UN Secretary General and the European Union in the peace process than was the case in the 80's and 90's. In those days the peace process was all but labeled "No Trespassing-American Property." Thai said. the main driving force for future progress will probably continue to result from the interaction of the parties themselves, assisted principally by the United States. Egypt and Jordan.

Progress or Escalation of Violence?

The major tradeoffs in the peace process remain what they have been ever since the initial Oslo understandings were reached: a viable independent state for the Palestinians and security for Israel. The immediate challenge for Washington, Cairo, Amman and other players external to the region is to persuade both Israelis and Palestinians that each has something to lose from the continuance of violence and that it is essential to move ahead with implementing confidence building measures.

Israelis and Palestinians remain prisoners of their present stand off. Attainment of a viable independent state for the Palestinians will be delayed and complicated by continued violence and continued settlement construction. Israelis underestimate how much this construction contributes to Palestinian distrust of Israel's long run intentions towards them. In turn Palestinians underestimate how much the violence of the past nine months has shaken Israeli views of Palestinian intentions towards Israel's future. The state of Israel today is militarily secure but the sense of individual vulnerability colors the state's overall approach to dealing with Palestinian demands. The PNA has reiterated its support for a two state solution based on a return to the 1967 lines but Palestinian armed violence has disillusioned the Israeli public and fed a mistaken view that security for individual Israeli citizens can best be attained through military force.

The Mitchell report provides a useful framework for progress towards restarting Palestinian-Israel negotiations, but it is not self-implementing and the final result remains to be seen. Washington's endorsement of the report was a positive step as was the agreement reached with the Secretary on a time line for implementation. The international community can assist by continuing to endorse and support the report, but only the parties themselves can act on it Continued accusations of bad faith are predictable and both parties will play up the charge of incitement Israel argues that incitement is verbal and largely media based. Palestinians argue that behavior and actions, like establishing new settlements equally constitute incitement

Until specific measures are agreed upon to move from the recommendations to implementation, violence and disillusionment will continue because of other issues such as settlement growth, terrorists still at large and weapons collection. The future will reveal whether the necessary conviction, strength and political will exist to keep these issues from derailing a return to negotiations. Powell's own words of caution about the long road ahead are emblematic of the Administration's overall sense that there can be progress towards a restoration of a necessary minimum of Palestinian-Israeli mutual confidence but there will be no quick solutions.