FIXATION is a term used in chemistry to describe the process by which a gas is combined with a solid. In psychology, it denotes a state of arrested mental development. The inveterate American fixation with settling, or trying to settle, the Arab-Israeli conflict endeavors to combine the gas of American good intentions with the implacability of Arab hatred for Israel or, conversely, the solidity of Israel’s determination to survive. Psychologically, it demonstrates an American failure, even after so many years, to understand the Arab mind or to accept the fact that in the Middle East vendettas have a durability that outlasts time.
The conclusion of the Camp David accords would seem at first glance to invalidate this judgment. But the Camp David accords were not simply an acknowledgment by Egypt of Israel’s legal existence in exchange for the recovery of the Sinai peninsula. They were also bought by American money, by a commitment, explicit or implicit, to sustain Egypt economically for years to come. Is the United States now proposing to extend the same financial inducements to Syria, Jordan, Saudi Arabia (the saints preserve us!), or some inchoate Palestinian polity in return for their formal recognition of the state of Israel? Or is territory to be the principal medium of exchange? Whatever the Bush Administration may have in mind, it would do well to remember that in dealing with the Syria of Hafez Assad it is not dealing with the Egypt of Anwar Sadat.
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