Another dreadful suicide bombing atrocity in the Israeli city of Haifa yesterday, which killed 15 people and injured 40, brings the Israeli-Palestinian conflict once again to full international attention. It must stay there.
During the last two months some 150 Palestinians have been killed by the Israeli army in the occupied territories, 80 of them in the last five weeks. Israeli spokesmen say their strong policy of demolishing houses and preventive attacks has helped stop many more bombings. But it has been widely criticised - not least by the United States and Britain this week. And yesterday, in a highly significant statement of their concern about this running crisis, France, Russia and Germany insisted it should be tackled alongside the peaceful disarmament of Iraq. They say they will "not let a proposed resolution pass that would authorise the use of force" against Iraq. They go on to say there is "the chance to obtain through peaceful means a comprehensive settlement for the Middle East." That would involve publishing and implementing the roadmap put together by Russia, the United States, the European Union and the United Nations and "putting together a general framework for the Middle East, based on stability and security, a renunciation of force, arms control and trust-building measures."
This statement exposes an important disagreement between the United States and the other members of this so-called "quartet" which has been working on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict for some months. President Bush has refused to have the roadmap published before the recent Israeli elections and now before any attack on Iraq, in the belief that regime change there would make an overall Middle East settlement much more possible. The logic of the Franco-German-Russian position is quite different. It reflects a growing European concern about the new Israeli government sworn in this week. It is the most right-wing one in the country's history, containing several parties supporting extremist attitudes towards the Palestinians and a majority of ministers flatly opposed to a Palestinian state.
This combination of US-led regime change in Iraq without an explicit UN Security Council mandate and an Israeli government so opposed to a Palestinian state is a recipe for deeper turmoil in the Middle East, not a roadmap to an overall settlement there, according to many Europeans. These very different perspectives heighten the sense that grave issues for the security of both neighbouring regions are at stake in coming days and weeks. It is high time this was properly recognised in European policy towards the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.