Finally, NATO wants Israel on board
Haaretz ^ | 12/16/04 | Amos Harel
 

It's been a long time since Israel has received such a firm embrace. When it comes to NATO, Israel is a desirable and sought-after partner. Apparently there is no talk as yet regarding membership in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, which in recent years has opened its gates to Eastern European countries, but this year Israel has been flooded with proposals for intensifying its cooperation with the most important (and strongest) security organization in the world.

In November, NATO invited the Israel Defense Forces, for the first time, to participate in multinational exercises that will be taking place in the coming years, and even to participate in operational activity - maritime patrols against terror in the Mediterranean Basin. The Mossad intelligence agency, the security establishment, the academic world and the media in Israel are being flooded with invitations to participate in various NATO conferences and field trips. As far as NATO is concerned, Israel is finally on the map.

Israel is not alone. The wooing of Israel is part of a broader move, designed to increase NATO's relevance in the post-Cold War world. With the collapse of the Soviet bloc, NATO has to find challenges (in effect, justifications for its existence) other than those that motivated it in the days when hundreds of Warsaw Pact nuclear warheads threatened major Western cities. The alliance, as one of its employees says, is "like an insurance policy. You don't toss your umbrella into the garbage just because it's not raining at the moment."

But the huge expenditures involved in maintaining the bureaucratic and military apparatus of NATO (which are funded from the pockets of the member states) now have to be channeled into a direction other than the frequent training exercises for self-defense in case of an atomic attack, which were common in the past. The previous decade provided the alliance with an opportunity to demonstrate its capability, mainly in the Balkans, which suffered terribly in the wake of the disintegration of the Soviet Union. NATO soldiers were deployed in Bosnia, in order to guarantee the safety of refugees of the ethnic war there. Later on, NATO joined the aerial attack initiated by the United States in Kosovo.

Back to the world arena

NATO's area of operations expanded significantly in the wake of another event: the 9/11 terror attack. Finally an international issue was found for NATO, a threat that does not pale in comparison to the former Soviet challenge. However, as in the Cold War, NATO is treading, cautiously, a few steps behind the United States.

In many parts of the world, NATO is seen as an American organization, whose European members submissively accept the dictates of the great power, but NATO is making a great effort to explain that this is not the case. The U.S., they claim, is in effect "only one out of 26" (the present number of members). Nevertheless, the new worldwide battle against terror has brought European soldiers to places where they haven't set foot since the colonialist era.

"If you had told me in 2000 that we would be involved militarily in central Asia, I would have said that that's an insane idea - but the world has changed," says an official at NATO headquarters in Brussels, explaining the deployment of NATO forces in Afghanistan after the overthrow of the Taliban regime by the United States in 2002. NATO's presence in Iraq is more low key: A small task force (dozens of experts, which will soon grow to several hundred) is now involved in training senior members of Baghdad's new security apparatus. However, due to the strong reservations of most of the leading members, the alliance refrained from active participation in the military attack initiated by U.S. President George W. Bush on Saddam Hussein's regime.

The main context of NATO's wooing of Israel, as well as some of its Arab neighbors, is the fight against international terror. "We have switched from a situation of regional defense to a new approach, which maintains that it is preferable to go to the crisis before it reaches us. This is even more true after 9/11," they explain in NATO.

This policy is reflected in two summit conferences that took place in Brussels in the past month. On November 17, there was a military conference of chiefs of staff from all the NATO countries, along with countries that maintain contact with the organization. On December 9, NATO marked a decade of the "Mediterranean dialogue" it carries out with seven countries - Israel, Egypt, Jordan, Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco and Mauritania - at a conference attended by dozens of foreign ministers.

Israel, not uncharacteristically, didn't send representatives of the senior echelon to the summit conferences: Instead of Chief of Staff Lieutenant General Moshe Ya'alon, the head of the Operations Directorate in the General Staff, Major General Yisrael Ziv, was sent. Instead of Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom, Minister Natan Sharansky was sent (Sharansky's title, minister for Jerusalem affairs, embarrassed NATO; in talks with Arab representatives, NATO representatives preferred to introduce him with his second title, minister of Diaspora affairs).

In addition to the summit conferences, NATO is presenting an entire package of proposals. The alliance wants to upgrade the Mediterranean dialogue. At the same time, it has created a new network of ties with the Persian Gulf states. The seven NATO Dialogue countries are meanwhile being offered more capability in various areas, which can be exploited when the time comes. They will participate in major military exercises (seven such exercises will take place in the coming year), some of which deal with handling mass disasters. On the more practical side, they are being offered security cooperation, which will be reflected in an exchange of intelligence concerning international terror, improved border security, and a NATO maritime operation called Active Endeavor, to monitor Mediterranean Sea shipping lanes in order to ensure that there are no terrorists, combat materiel or weapons of mass destruction on ships.

For those who are interested - and this is an offer that is relevant mainly for some of the Arab countries - NATO offers advice for carrying out reforms in their security forces. The alliance has already implemented similar activities in some of the new Eastern European members. The reform includes activities for streamlining their military apparatus, introducing mechanisms for transparency and monitoring, and preparation for operating Western technological equipment more sophisticated than that which the new members have.

Two terrors

When NATO presents its programs, one hears the expression: "It's a suggestion, not a dictate. There is a menu here from which every country can choose." When it comes to Israel, at least, it's clear that NATO, and not Israel, determines the limitations. The difficulty stems from the contacts taking place simultaneously (usually in the same forum) with Arab countries, whose hostility toward Israel has increased sharply because of the war in the territories.

NATO is careful to emphasize that any cooperation against terror is directed against "international terror, not terror related to a local or national conflict." To this they add an example that is meant to bring evidence from distant regions - "just as we didn't interfere in the past in Italy's problems with the Red Brigades" - but it's clear to all that the real obstacle is the Palestinian conflict.

This evasiveness is an echo of the old and problematic European claim in favor of a distinction between "illegitimate" international terror and terror related to a struggle for national liberation. The second type of terror is not exactly illegitimate, even if it is never said what it is. The Europeans ignore the ramified network of ties between the worldwide Jihad organizations and the local branches, such as Hamas or the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, which ostensibly are involved only in a national conflict.

Israel, in any case, seems very enthusiastic at the moment about any expansion of security cooperation, as long as it doesn't impose restrictions on its activity in the territories. There are Israeli experts, such as Dr. Uzi Arad, the architect of the Herzliya Conference that took place this week, who consider membership in NATO as a possible answer to the Iranian threat, on the assumption that the world will have difficulty stopping Tehran's nuclearization.

When it comes to NATO ties with the Arabs, things are much more complex. At a conference organized by NATO and a British institute for security research in London two weeks ago, with a large number of experts and official representatives from Arab countries participating, the tremendous sensitivity of the speakers to the question of the relations between the (Middle) East and the West was very apparent. Any mention of the (very broad) Islamic connection to international terror caused affront, almost tears. And there were, of course, many complaints about a "double standard" in the attitude of the United States - and therefore, it was claimed, of NATO as well - to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The speakers claimed that whereas the Americans are forgiving toward Israeli cruelty, they seize upon every small deviation in the Arab world.

The official Arab spokesmen showed almost no willingness to admit to a mistake, or to take any responsibility for the growth of worldwide terror in the backyards of Saudi Arabia and Egypt. The main policy reflected in their statements was agreement to accept professional assistance from NATO, on condition that it doesn't include an attempt to intervene in the regime, and certainly there was no response to the dangerous initiative of the Bush administration - democratization.

Arab intellectuals who spoke at the conference (most of them, by the way, live in Europe or in the United States) did not spare criticism of the United States on the Palestinian issue, and even more so regarding its clumsy behavior in Iraq. However, they presented a demand the opposite of that presented by the establishment. Put pressure on them, they said to senior NATO officials, to progress toward democracy. The replies of the NATO representatives were very cautious and noncommittal. NATO clearly does not want to trip over those same obstacles that have already tripped up the United States.

Two `ifs'

The main question preoccupying Israel is somewhat different: Will NATO agree to send supervisory and separation forces to the Gaza Strip after the implementation of the disengagement plan? NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, intimated last month in an interview with the British newspaper The Financial Times, that there is such a possibility, and that the members of the alliance will discuss it - if there is an agreement between Israel and the Palestinians, and if the parties submit a request on this issue.

In a meeting with journalists from the seven NATO Dialogue countries in Brussels last week, Scheffer added a few details about his stance: "Any role played by NATO in the region can be a result of two big `ifs': if there is a peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians, and if the sides ask NATO to participate. A possible NATO role should not be ruled out, but we definitely will not come to the region without the agreement of both sides."

As far as upgrading relations with the dialogue countries, Scheffer said he hopes for a peaceful solution, by means of which "the deathly embrace between the Israelis and the Palestinians" will loosen. However, he added, failure to achieve this does not have to mean a cessation of the dialogue.

IDF officers who have participated in NATO conferences in recent years had the impression that their colleagues in the operational ranks are hoping for a challenge such as that presented by post-disengagement Gaza. But at this stage, such intervention would seem to be a distant scenario: It is hard to understand why Paris, London or Brussels should agree to see young Europeans dying in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.