Ineptitude meets low altitude at Arab League summit
Few major breakthroughs were reached at this year's Arab League Summit held in Jordan.
Leave it to the Jordanians to put up a good show. Jordan is second to none when it comes to pomp and ceremony, adhering to protocol, exhibiting discipline and providing the perfect stage for the annual ritual. The 28th Arab League Summit on March 29 in the Dead Sea region, attended by heads of state, in addition to prime ministers and special representatives, was almost flawless. But it was also overwhelmingly ceremonial and banal. Seventeen resolutions, none of which was controversial, had already been approved by Arab foreign ministers two days before.
It was no surprise that Arab leaders, representing the 22-strong Arab League, delivered speeches — often punctuated by platitudes and worn-out cliches — and approved the resolutions before they were scurried off to their planes perched on the tarmac of Amman’s international airport. And then they were gone.
Amman hailed the summit as a historic success. King Abdullah II appeared elated by the top-notch organization and the high-level attendance. Jordan had succeeded in imposing the agenda that it wanted: mainly reinstating the Palestinian issue as top and urgent priority, second only to the fight against extremism and terrorism. The final communique urged countries not to move their embassies to Jerusalem and condemned Israel’s unilateral measures in the Holy City and its expropriation of Palestinian lands. Amman was also successful in underlining the need to provide assistance to countries hosting Syrian refugees, Jordan being one of the biggest.
Aside from this, Abdullah was able to facilitate a side meeting between Saudi monarch King Salman bin Abdul-Aziz Al Saud and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, ushering in a thaw in relations between the two countries. A trilateral meeting bringing Abdullah, Sisi and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas prepared the ground for the visits by the three leaders to Washington this month. Sisi met President Donald Trump on April 3 and Abdullah will meet him on April 5. With the Arab Summit reiterating its commitment to the 2002 Arab Peace Initiative and to a comprehensive settlement as a strategic choice, it is hoped that the three leaders will convey a united message to Trump on the need to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in accordance with the two-state solution.
