Iraq's Rehabilitation

When members of the Arab League gathered for an emergency summit in Cairo on October 21 to discuss "the grave situation in the Palestinian Territories and its impact on the peace process," hopes were high among ordinary Arabs that their leaders would reflect popular opinion and at least call on the states having ties with Israel to cut them forthwith. They were to be disappointed. When Libya's Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, reflecting that feeling, saw the draft communiqué prepared by the league's foreign ministers, which merely said that member states that had diplomatic relations with Israel might consider severing them, he was so angered that he leaked the document to the press and left the conference.

No other leader followed his example, though--not even Izzat Ibrahim, the representative of Iraq, which is technically at war with Israel. Having been excluded from Arab League summits for ten years because of its invasion of Kuwait, Iraq could hardly afford the luxury of a walkout. As it was, taking into account the threat posed by Israel's hawkish actions, the conference's Egyptian host, President Hosni Mubarak--working closely with Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah--had decided to close the chapter on Arab divisions caused by Iraq's occupation of Kuwait and invite President Saddam Hussein to the summit. Ibrahim, vice chairman of Iraq's Revolutionary Command Council, the country's supreme authority, served as Saddam's stand-in.

Iraq's re-emergence as a player in the Arab world came at a time when many countries were already moving to restore normal relations with Baghdad. In recent months, dozens of flights from several Arab capitals, as well as Paris, Moscow and New Delhi have landed at the newly reopened Saddam International Airport near Baghdad. None of them were cleared in advance with the United Nations 661 Sanctions Committee, which is charged with overseeing the embargo on Iraq. The defiance of the UN came after President Clinton's softening toward Iraq because of the tight market in oil and its rising price. Clinton's behavior had been forecast earlier by James Akins, former US ambassador to Saudi Arabia. "When the oil price rises above $30 a barrel," he said, "Saddam Hussein will be treated like Mother Teresa."

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