Gary Grappo, a distinguished fellow at the Center for Middle East Studies at Denver University’s Korbel School of International Studies, retired as a Senior Foreign Service Officer, including service as US Ambassador to the Sultanate of Oman, in 2011 — yet many still defer to him as “Ambassador.”
Grappo was Head of Mission for the Quartet’s Special Representative Tony Blair, 2010-2011, in Jerusalem and held posts in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Baghdad, Iraq and Amman, Jordan as well as in Muscat, Oman during his four-decade-long public service career.
“Things never stay the same,” he says of the fluctuating rhythm of global politics, particularly in the Middle East. “Things always change.”
Grappo might be describing his own career trajectory.
He earned his BS in mathematics from the US Air Force Academy, an MS in geodesy and survey engineering at Purdue, and an MBA from the Stanford University Graduate School of Business.
As a lieutenant in the Air Force, Grappo worked as a survey engineer. “I led survey teams to remote parts of the world, which gave me the opportunity to travel extensively — and not in the typical way that members of the Armed Forces do.
“It was probably the best job you could ever have in the military,” he says. “I loved every minute of it. I was fascinated by every place I ever went and every experience I ever had. And it really piqued my interest in foreign affairs, history and US policy.”
After a few years in the private sector following business school, Grappo realized he missed public service and applied to the US State Department. “I took the foreign service exam and was among those rare folks who never studied political science and was accepted in the foreign service program.”
During the transition between the Bush 41 and Clinton administration, Grappo requested an assignment in the Middle East.
Intent on learning a difficult language, he heard of an upcoming position as an economic counselor in the Middle East. Already gifted in economics, he threw himself into a two-year Arabic language program and arrived in Amman in 1994, just before Israel and Jordan signed their peace agreement in October of that year.
Grappo’s wife Becky, an international affairs major, “was supportive, understanding and gifted in foreign languages, much more so than I. She adapted pretty quickly to the lifestyle.”
In 1995, Grappo led the first Middle East Economic Summit in Amman.
“It was a tremendous success,” he says. “Arafat was there, the Israeli prime minister, Jordan’s King Hussein.
“Not long after that, Prime Minister Rabin was assassinated. It was shocking. King Hussein was especially upset. He had forged a very strong relationship with Rabin, as well as President Clinton.
“My personal view was that this was going to change the dynamic considerably — which it did.”
Grappo has tackled multiple Middle East flash points during his 26-year diplomatic career: the Israeli-Palestinian peace process; counterterrorism and terrorism financing in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf; the US occupation of Iraq.
From 2001 to 2003, he led the planning and organization for the Middle East Partnership Initiative, a multi-million dollar foreign investment program involving unlikely Middle East neighbors.
Grappo speaks candidly with the IJN about the successes and failures of the Quartet, Saudi Arabia, the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, Iran and their implications for Israel on her 70th birthday. The following is an edited transcript of our discussion.
IJN: You were Special Envoy Tony Blair’s Head of Mission for the Quartet, established in 2002 to implement the peace process and explore economic endeavors between Israel and the Palestinians, from 2010 to 2011. Was it a success?
Grappo: (He laughs.) Well, you need to go back to the reason behind the formation of the Quartet, which was done at the initiative of the US to bring other countries into the peace process.
The US and the EU were the major players; the UN, which played a facilitating role when it could; and Russia. Sergei Lavrov, the primary Russian representative, rarely participated, usually only when the principals met. A Russian diplomat assigned to the Jerusalem Quartet office was thought to be a spy and he was sent him packing before I arrived.
The purpose of the Quartet was to promote economic relations between the two sides and economic development in the West Bank — which is why the first Quartet representative was James Wolfensohn, who came out of the World Bank. Tony Blair came to the Quartet when he finished his stint as prime minister in 2007.
I spent a great deal of my time going back and forth between the Israelis and Palestinians looking for opportunities to promote economic development.
The Quartet Mission was comprised of about 40 specialists in justice administration, trade, economic development, in addition to staff and drivers.
I was based in Jerusalem and met with other Quartet “envoys” — senior diplomats from the US, the EU, the UN and Russia (although the Russians often didn’t come) — from time to time. The envoys met more frequently than the Quartet principals.
It was frustrating, which is why I only stayed a year-and-a-half. It was difficult to make any kind of progress.
The Palestinians saw the Quartet as an instrument of Israel, which it clearly was not. But if we were going to make any headway with the Palestinians, we had to get Israeli buy-in.
I was finally able to establish a pretty good working relationship with PA Prime Minister Salam Fayyad. Since he was also the finance minister, he would share the kinds of strategies that would help promote development for the Palestinians.
We managed to accomplish a few things — and by the way we included Gaza in this. There were some things the Israelis simply could not do due to security concerns. We tried to find ways to address those concerns and brought them to the Palestinians.
One of my biggest frustrations was that apart from Salam Fayyad, who was exceptional, a lot of the PA establishment wasn’t interested in talking. They saw any collaboration with the Quartet as tantamount to accepting Israeli authority, or even sovereignty.
The few I tried to dissuade of this attitude just wouldn’t agree. Here they had an opportunity to do good for the Palestinians by letting us talk to the Israelis about shared opportunities, but this warped stubbornness was really frustrating.
It was pretty clear, and evident to Tony as well, that this process of deterioration, which is at a low water mark right now but could go even lower, was beginning back then.
IJN: Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is on a charm offensive, dispensing with his thawb and donning suits. What does he want regarding Israel and Saudi Arabia? Can he be trusted?
Grappo: I served for two years in Saudi Arabia. This was early 2004. As the Chargé d’Affaires and later Deputy Chief of Mission, one of the things I wanted to do was reach out to Saudi women who were considered leaders. On one occasion I organized a dinner and hosted a group of them. They all accepted — and I was sweating bullets because I was the only male in the room.
Most of those who attended had participated in that first movement when they drove through the streets of Riyadh and were arrested. They were the most impressive women I had met anywhere in the Middle East. Lawyers, business executives, doctors, professionals.
I had already been supporting equality for these women in an official capacity. But you know what they told me? “Let us handle this. We know our culture. We know what we can do in our culture. And we know exactly what our priorities are. We can do this. When we need your help, we’ll let you know.”
Regarding bin Salman, I’m optimistic in many areas and very concerned in others.
The optimism comes from the kind of transformation he’d like to see in his country, which is badly needed. He wants to move Saudi Arabia off its dependency on oil and gas. He wants to diversify his economy, create a tech sector, stimulate tourism — although tourism in Saudi Arabia sounds like a bad joke. But in fact, if they did it right, there are some amazing historical sites in Saudi Arabia, which many Saudis don’t even acknowledge, that are significant for Christian and Jewish populations.
He also wants to see cultural change. He wants to have more women in the work force. Judging from the women I met in Saudi Arabia, you should hand over many CEO positions to these women. He wants to take the extremist element out of religion in Saudi Arabia, which is very important.
What worries me? Bin Salman is a very young man. He’s not all that experienced. He’s clearly a very bright guy. Extremely ambitious, and has certain notions about security in his part of the Middle East.
The two actions he’s taken that have taken a wrong turn are Yemen and this needless falling out with Qatar.
IJN: Bin Salman recently said that Israel has the right to exist, but stopped short of saying that it should be recognized as a Jewish state. Your take?
Grappo: It’s not meaningless. When the Crown Prince, who will one day become the king of Saudi Arabia, makes that statement, it’s worth noting. It’s indicative of a change in attitude that’s taking place among a new generation of Arabs.
In terms of the Jewish state, that will happen, just not now. A number of Arab governments would be more than willing to have even a formal relationship with Israel but are prevented from doing so due to popular attitudes in their respective countries.
The Palestinian issue still resonates in the hearts of most Arabs. Any effort to sweep it under the carpet or diminish it is to ignore something too important to them.
None of these governments is a democracy. For some of these countries that might seem to be warming up somewhat to Israel, there’s only so far they can go. To make a statement promoting a Jewish state is just a bridge too far at this point. As I tell my students, you don’t get the circumstances you want. You get the circumstances that are.
IJN: Iran is uniformly viewed as the major threat to Israel’s existence and the region’s stability.
Grappo: It is. My concern is that the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), the nuclear agreement with Iran, has many flaws. It’s not the agreement I would have negotiated, but it’s the one we got. I do not advocate revoking this agreement or withdrawing from it.
We can work with our European partners to improve this, especially when you see what’s happening in Iran today. The economic fallout the Iranians anticipated has not occurred. Over the last several months, the Iranian rial has fallen by about a third. Their economy is not doing well; their banking system is very weak. All the contracts they thought would result from this agreement have not materialized — so we’ve got something to bargain with.
We can tackle some key weak points of the agreement itself. In my view, these are the time horizons, 10 to 15 year points and so on; the ability to inspect military sites, at least in the way they should be inspected; and ballistic missiles.
We’re talking about nuclear weapons here. Other issues are very, very important, whether it’s terrorism or human rights, but we can’t let Iran have nuclear weapons.
IJN: Israel possesses nuclear weapons. Does this compromise the goal of a non-nuclear Middle East?
Grappo: You don’t hear many Arab leaders talking about that. You know why? I don’t think any Arab government — in fact I’d be willing to categorically state this — fears Israel’s nuclear weapons or believes that Israel would use them. It’s pretty clear why Israel has nuclear weapons, which is why they don’t have to publicly acknowledge it.
When that great day somewhere in the distant future happens and Israel doesn’t face the line up of enemies surrounding it today — which involves fewer and fewer Arab countries, by the way — they might even decide to eliminate all of their nuclear weapons.
Iran is a different case. We’ve heard everyone from the supreme leader down to military commanders publicly threaten the state of Israel. Recently, a military commander spoke about defeating Israel in 25 years, if not sooner. A country that speaks that way can’t be permitted to have nuclear weapons.
Moreover, those weapons are a threat to the neighboring countries, and to the US. If Iran were to push forward and actually develop nuclear weapons, we would see a number of Arab states go in the same direction.
The Middle East is the last place in the world we want a nuclear war. For all of those reasons, I support maintaining the JCPOA, working within it, working closely with our European allies to address these obvious weak points and returning to the Iranians with the considerable leverage we have.
IJN: How do you gauge the attitudes of average Iranians? Do they all support this extremist regime?
Grappo: If it were up to the Iranian people, we would not be having this conversation. The Iranians want to a part of the West. It’s one of the most developed and progressive countries in the Middle East. If you were to take away the supreme leader component of Iran’s government, it could be a democracy.
We saw last year and the beginning of this year with some pretty impressive demonstrations that were widespread. But there’s no organization or leadership behind this, which is a problem. But it’s understandable. If there were, the government would round them up, and anyone suspected of being a ringleader.
Nevertheless, I think it reflects the thinking of many Iranian people. They are not happy with their government, the lives they’re living or the lack of opportunities afforded to them.
I want to believe that if there’s a change in leadership — I’m not talking about regime change; I don’t think that’s in the cards at all — but a change in the supreme leader, that things could potentially change.
What I’m worried about is the institutionalization of the IRGC [Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps] and the security apparatus.
When it becomes clear that the mass population can’t support the government, I’m hopeful we may see that day in Iran. It can’t come from the outside. The Iranians are going to have to do it themselves.
IJN: The Palestinians refuse to recognize existence of Jewish state. Is this intransigence symptomatic of the Arab world as a whole?
Grappo: Arabs are just like Europeans. Comparing how the Lebanese think to how the Yemenis think is like comparing the Greeks to the Norwegians.
The question of accepting a Jewish state was not an issue when I worked on the Middle East Partnership Initiative.
By the time I left the Quartet mission, it had emerged as a major point of contention between the Israelis and Palestinians. It remains the core problem today.
If you move away from the Palestinians, you’ll find Arabs of all different flavors regarding this issue. The majority, yes, maybe they’ll feel uncomfortable. To be quite honest, Arabs’ interest in this whole Israel-Palestinian issue has begun to wane. They’ve got many other challenges they have to wrestle with.
IJN: Is it true that Palestinians are still in camps in Arab countries and not well integrated into society?
Grappo: They live in major camps in the West Bank and Gaza; also in major camps in Jordan and Lebanon. There are camps in Syria.
What I initially heard was that many of those (Syria-based) camps were evacuated. The Palestinians were moved either to Lebanon or Jordan. But to say that those camps are completely empty is probably incorrect.
The great fear was that the Palestinians in [the Syrian] camps would be prime targets for radicalization by extremists — groups like ISIS or al-Qaida. They thought the Palestinians already had this grudge against the West, particularly Israel and the US. But most of them wanted no part in joining the extremists, so they left for camps in either Jordan or Lebanon.
This whole issue of accepting Israel as a Jewish state is without question the core issue.
IJN: How do we get around it? Is it possible?
Grappo: We can’t even begin today because the two sides are too far apart. You’re dealing with multiple layers of complexity here.
The simplest layer is Israel. My experience was that the Second Intifada really transformed the Israelis. The US and the international community really couldn’t proceed in the same way we had before. The average Israeli was raising the bar.
The political dial in Israel moved further to the right on this issue. I don’t think that’s something Americans appreciated until rather recently. We believed we could continue pushing the peace process, as we used to call it, with the idea that not much had changed, that we had tamped down the Second Intifada and were moving forward.
No, things had changed. This is when Israelis, and especially the leadership under Bibi Netanyahu, really zeroed in on accepting Israel as a Jewish state. If you look at the agreement with Egypt and the agreement with Jordan, there’s no mention of this.
But if we are ever going to address this issue today, it’s going to have to be there. I see no way of avoiding it. For Israelis, along with security, it’s a sine qua non.
Could it be done? Not today. It’s not even a remote possibility, which is unfortunate. But it’s a statement of reality.
In my view, the Israeli side is mutable — owing in large part to the fact that Israel is a democratic country. Leadership changes. Positions of leaders change — all that.
IJN: And the Palestinian side?
Grappo: This is actually worse and far more complicated. According to a recent poll, I believe 65% of the Palestinians said they would favor the dissolution of the Palestinian Authority. They have zero confidence in their leadership.
I met and spoke with many moderate Palestinians. They’re not only afraid, they are almost hopeless, in the sense that they can’t change the system.
The PA has devolved into a state similar to a lot of other Arab governments. The people do not believe that their leaders are accountable or are looking out for their best interests.
They also believe that their leaders are very often thieves.
In the case of the Palestinians, you have these two political parties, Fatah and Hamas — which ideologically are not that far apart. It’s just that one has eschewed violence and has accepted Israel, not as a Jewish state but its right to exist; and the other cannot and will not, and is still pursuing a very adversarial approach to the point of armed conflict.
I know for a fact that there have been very able, competent and well meaning Palestinians who might be interested in serving in government, but they are afraid to take on either of the two established political parties.
These two parties are a throwback to the revolutionary parties of the 1960s and ‘70s. They communicate to their followers and would-be followers that they are all victims.
It almost condemns those Palestinians who fall into this rhetoric to the current state they’re in. They have surrendered everything to the government or the parties, which are both equally corrupt and ineffectual. This keeps the Palestinians in their current state of poor development.
When I was with the Quartet, I was the only American diplomat who could travel around the West Bank without a security entourage. I could go wherever I wanted without notifying anyone.
I spoke Arabic, but my drivers spoke Hebrew. I’d meet people in the West Bank; talk to them in coffee shops. If I went with Blair, we had bodyguards, so it was easier going by myself.
You get a pretty honest answer when you sit down and start talking to people. Most of the time, yes, they had their axe to grind with the Israelis. But you could get past that fairly quickly when you started asking them about their own leaders. Then they would really get spun up. It was an edifying experience.
This is the complexity of the Palestinians. Even if Abu Mazen [Mahmoud Abbas] said today, “I’m willing to negotiate with Israel,” it would almost be meaningless because he doesn’t have the support of the people.
In 2016, a study showed that the favorability rating of Netanyahu in the West Bank was better than Abu Mazen’s. I don’t know if it’s still true today or just might have been an idiosyncrasy in the poll that time. But Abu Mazen gets consistently low favorability ratings.
IJN: Israel is celebrating 70 years of independence. What is required for Israel to survive another 70 years?
Grappo: Continue what you’re doing now. What a remarkable success the state of Israel has been! Most of their development has occurred as a result of Israelis.
You know this great book Start-Up Nation? It really exemplifies the kind of entrepreneurship, creativity and work ethic of Israelis, which dates back to Israel’s founding in 1948.
I used to tell the Arabs — not all of them wanted to hear it, but most would probably agree — if you want to be successful, look what your Israeli friends have accomplished with far less than you’ve got.
Israel should also maintain its relationship with the US — and the US should maintain its relationship with Israel, too. This is not a one-sided relationship. The US benefits immensely from having a strong ally and friend in the Middle East.
Also, Israel would probably need to devote a significant portion of its resources to defense. That’s not the most productive way to spend your national wealth, but in Israel’s case there really is no option.
Especially now. It’s one bad neighborhood, arguably worse now than 10 or 15 years ago. I mentioned Iran, but Syria is also very problematic.
And I’m very concerned about what’s happening in the Sinai. Israel almost took the Sinai as a given [in terms of regional stability]. It can’t anymore.
Of course Hezbollah is on the northern border — stretched, but still a potent and very real threat to Israel, far more now than when they last confronted each other in 2006.
Finally, Israel has to be positioned when it is time to take risks for peace [with the Palestinians]. Rabin said it, Clinton said it, others have said it. While the moment is not at all propitious now, there will come a time. Things never remain the same. Things will change.
When the opportunity presents itself, I truly hope the Israeli people and their leadership will take the risk and do what they need to do.
Of course, the other side will have to do the same — and they might have to take even greater risks.
But risk will be inherent in any solution to this situation, and the kind of peace we all want to see in the Middle East.
Andrea Jacobs may be reached at andrea@ijn.com.
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