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An Innovative Approach to Middle East Peace Based on Trade and Commerce | RealClearPolitics

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An Innovative Approach to Middle East Peace Based on Trade and Commerce | RealClearPolitics

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Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton have an opportunity to lay out an overarching policy on the Middle East in Monday night's debate. Thus far, that has been missing in the presidential campaign. Amongst the public, there is widespread frustration with repeated policy failures and a perception that the region is beyond repair.

The next president will inherit a daunting to-do list: ending the Syrian war, decisively defeating ISIS, stabilizing Iraq, resurrecting the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, and navigating a troubled relationship with Turkey. Attempting to deal with these problems in isolation as we have for decades will only produce more failures and frustration.

Instead, there is a need for a new approach to the Middle East which offers a vision of inclusion rather than division, where the governments and peoples of the region have equal stakes in their future. Such a vision may appear more aspiration than reality, given the region's bloody conflicts, but there is a model rooted in the region's history that could provide such a path.

For hundreds of years, the peoples of what the West called the "Levant," (encompassing Israel, the Palestinian territories, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria and parts of Iraq and Turkey), shared a common bond and identity that transcended religion and ethnicity. The often loose rule of the Ottoman Empire, while hardly a model of twenty first century good governance, nonetheless facilitated both a "live and let live" approach among the region's diverse communities. It also encouraged the free movement of goods and people, instilling a spirit of commerce and entrepreneurship.

This era came to an end when France and Britain arbitrarily carved up the region in the 1916 Sykes-Picot agreement, paving the way for sectarian and ethnic strife, authoritarian rule, economic stagnation, and ongoing conflicts.

Yet, the traditions of integration, diversity, and tolerance are not lost among the peoples of the Middle East. The excesses of authoritarian rule and the atrocities of ISIS and Al-Qaeda are the exceptions, not the norm. The habits of integration are deeply ingrained in Levantine culture and reside just beneath the surface, waiting to be tapped.

A recent example suggests that this model is more than a historical artifact. Six years ago, Turkey, Syria, Lebanon and Jordan announced a free-trade zone and visa-free travel among the four countries. Economically, the Arab world and Turkey became more integrated than they had been for nearly a century as trade doubled to $30 billion between 2007 and 2011. Arab travel to Turkey rose by nearly 50 percent in 2010 compared to the previous year.

Soon after, Syrian protesters, inspired by popular revolts in Tunisia and Egypt, took to the streets and were met with a vicious response from the Assad regime. By the fall, Turkey and others imposed sanctions on Syria, and the Levantine integration project disintegrated.

This short-lived integration experiment provided a peek at the potential for a new turn in the region's politics. Economic integration, by definition, offers a shared vision of prosperity, and allows insulation against the sectarianism and ethnic hatred which fuels violent extremists, including ISIS and others.

The Levantine model would also offer the best chance for Israel to normalize relations with its Arab neighbors. A territorial settlement based upon the 1967 borders is necessary but not sufficient for a lasting peace. The transformation of Israel into an economic partner of its Arab neighbors would be an endgame of a new Levant, and satisfy a longtime American objective.

The vision of a New Levant will not be realized simply by reflecting on better times of a previous era. ISIS and Al Qaeda must be militarily defeated, but there is no time to waste in working toward an "integration for peace" model. War will not last forever, but the coming post-war period must not simply become an interregnum between conflicts.

The US, in collaboration with international and regional partners, should initiate a combination of bilateral and multilateral diplomatic tracks focusing on the region's interlocking, inseparable crises. These conversations would involve not only regional government officials, but would also engage leading intellectuals and economists to outline a path toward integration in the postwar decade. The endgame is integration of these countries into a single economic zone allowing the free movement of goods, services, labor and capital.

For those who want to dismiss a new Levant as idealistic, I suggest a quick look at European history prior to the formation of the EU. In an era of tight budgets, Integration for Peace also offers an attractive market-based alternative for reconstructing Iraq and Syria, creating jobs and bringing refugees home.

The United States must reassert itself in the Levant-much as it did in postwar Europe. Trump and Clinton would be wise to recognize that a renewed sense of collective identity based on mutual economic interests holds the key to healing a divided region so desperately in need of a shared vision of a more peaceful and prosperous future.
Jamal Daniel is the Chairman of Crest Investment Company and the founder and publisher of Al-Monitor, winner of the 2014 Free Media Pioneer Award. The opinions expressed here are further elaborated in the current issue of The National Interest.

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An Innovative Approach to Middle East Peace Based on Trade and Commerce | RealClearPolitics

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Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton have an opportunity to lay out an overarching policy on the Middle East in Monday night's debate. Thus far, that has been missing in the presidential campaign. Amongst the public, there is widespread frustration with repeated policy failures and a perception that the region is beyond repair.

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The National Interest | Reinventing the Levant

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The National Interest | Reinventing the Levant

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AMERICAN POLICY toward the Middle East has been a dismal failure for the past thirty-five years, if not longer. Officials have approached policymaking in the Middle East without a clear sense of the region's history, poverty, predominance of authoritarian rule or intraregional relationships. The failure begins with the concept of "separate peace"-the basis of the 1978-79 U.S.-sponsored negotiations between Egypt and Israel-which never led to a broader settlement. It has continued with Washington's haphazard response to the tumult of the past five years since the Arab Spring, the rise of Daesh (ISIS) and the continuing stream of dislocations flowing from the invasion of Iraq. Each failure has only deepened the sense that the region is beyond repair. Hence, the American public and many elites are tempted by simplistic solutions-draw back from the region even further; deepen support for authoritarian regimes; take extreme measures to end refugee flows; provide Syrian rebels advanced arms; "carpet-bomb." The sense of frustration is understandable, but doubling down on failed policies will not work.

There is a yearning for a more organic solution, one in which the governments and the people of the region have equal stakes. And, indeed, there is a model rooted in the region's history that could be a solution. It enabled nearly four hundred years of peace and prosperity in the Levant. At its core is economic integration, with the free movement of goods and people across a broad swath of territory. Such an approach contrasts sharply with the present-day reality, to put it mildly. But the region is approaching a point of exhaustion, and the United States will have a new opportunity, as it did after the first Gulf War, to advance this model. It will find a receptive region. The habits of integration are deeply ingrained in Levantine culture and reside just beneath the surface, waiting to be tapped. A recent experiment suggests that this model is more than a historical artifact and can be successfully adapted to the modern context.

Six years ago, without American assistance, a movement seemed to be emerging that provided a new framework for economic and political cooperation in the eastern Mediterranean-including Turkey, Lebanon, Jordan, Syria and possibly even Israel-and offered a different vision of regional stability, one essentially integrationist. Though American media and officialdom paid it little attention, it represented the most significant development in the politics of the peace process in some years, and deserves close and careful examination. Now is the time for the United States to reflect on an honest historical accounting of the Mashriq 's (the Arab world east of Egypt) recent history, and then take action. Now is the time to advance "Integration for Peace."

IN JUNE 2010, Turkey, Syria, Lebanon and Jordan a "free-trade zone" and visa-free travel among the four countries. This development built on the rapid expansion of trade relations between Turkey and its Arab neighbors. Trade among the countries of the Arab League and Turkey doubled between 2007 and 2011, to a value of approximately $30 billion annually. Cities like Gaziantep, which had long languished economically, were booming as a consequence of the rapid and dramatic expansion of trade with Syria and Iraq. One source estimated that half the region's goods were bound for the Middle East, compared with just a quarter going to Europe. The language of the agreement struck a tone of inclusivity, noting that the "quadripartite mechanism . . . will be open to the participation of all the other brotherly and friendly countries in the region."

Economically, the region became more integrated than it had been for nearly a century. Turkey rapidly overcame the difficulties of being a relatively resource-poor country by increasing its oil and gas holdings in Iraqi Kurdistan-a remarkable development that allowed Ankara to take a major regional role and lifted many of the limitations on its economic growth. The increased participation of Turkish companies in the region's economic development, including production-sharing agreements in the energy sector with the Kurdistan Regional Government of Iraq, suggests not only Ankara's increased economic weight in the region but also a new willingness to prioritize economics over political tensions. These deepened economic ties persist, offering a political buffer even as Turkey's military operations against the Kurdistan Worker's Party (PKK) and Syrian Kurds fray Turkish-Kurdish relations.

Cultural indicators of increasing sympathy and cooperation between Turkey and its Arab neighbors were just as strong as economic incentives. The BBC reported an upsurge of interest in studying Turkish in Gaza and throughout the wider Mashriq. Turkish soap operas and other television productions became hugely popular throughout the Arab world. Tourism between the Arab world and Turkey also increased, especially after the implementation of the visa-free travel zone; Arab travel to Turkey rose by nearly 50 percent in 2010 compared to the previous year.

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AMERICAN POLICY toward the Middle East has been a dismal failure for the past thirty-five years, if not longer. Officials have approached policymaking in the Middle East without a clear sense of the region's history, poverty, predominance of authoritarian rule or intraregional relationships.