Listening and Learning in the Middle East
Submitted by Chris Dodd on April 19, 2006 - 4:23pm.

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Hi, I’m heading out to the airport here, just coming out of Jerusalem on the way to Tel Aviv, flying to Cairo, meeting with the foreign minister over there, and some folks from think tanks here, some of the opposition in Egypt, to get a good feel for how Egypt looks at the region and at some of their own internal issues.

It’s been a very quick trip. I’ve been traveling with two of my Republican colleagues, Thad Cochran of Mississippi, who’s the Chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, and Judd Gregg of New Hampshire, who’s the Chairman of the Senate Budget Committee. We’ve been in five different countries over the last several days. We flew on Tuesday morning into Amman, Jordan, and on Wednesday, I spent the day in Lebanon, while the other part of the delegation went to Baghdad. I had been to Baghdad a few months ago, and they hadn’t been, so we split up on that day. Then we met in Jordan, and spent the last day and a half here in Israel, and we’re now on our way to Egypt.

So we’re covering the region here, as many of these critical areas as possible, meeting with all sides of the various debates here in Lebanon, here in Israel with the Prime Minister, the Defense and Foreign Ministers, and meeting with Palestinian leaders (non-Hamas), to talk about the current events here: the election of Hamas; and the new team that will be announced here. (Next week a new Israeli government will be formed, according to the new Prime Minister.)

There’s a lot of change occurring in the region. The departure of the Syrian military from Lebanon has created some new opportunities for sovereignty, independence and freedom, but they have a lot of work to do on those issues. Obviously Iran comes up quite a bit as you talk to here, and clearly people here are very much aware of the energy pricing implications.

I have a couple of important messages. One, these are all very complex issues, and it’s going to be critically important that we be far more engaged than I think we have been, quite frankly, over the last five years, for a lot of reasons, none of which are all excusable, but we need to be back and fully participating in these issues, (and not just Iraq), if we’re going to have the results we’d like: not only to secure the independence and freedom of our friends who seek democracy, but also for ourselves, given the important questions which also implicate our future as well.

So it’s been tremendously worthwhile, but also rushed in many ways, but it’s an opportunity to see some key people here who play critical roles in these countries.

Obviously it’s important that we try and work with our friends in Israel, and Palestinian leaders (who are not part of Hamas), who are interested in a two-state solution and who are willing to sit down and talk about securing borders as well as providing for the proper needs of people in both communities. My hope is we can play a role in all of that as well.

We’ve been getting a lot of calls, my office tells me, about energy pricing. The announcements that prices are going up, and costs of gas at the pump are causing a lot of concern. I could just say that the issues over here are going to be a very important factor in determining whether or not we’re going to have some effect.

Just to touch on the local angle, I get back to the U.S. next week. We’ll be reviving two bills, one which I’ve offered already on the floor of the Senate and which did not pass, and that was of course the excess profits tax that goes to consumers in the form of a rebate when prices exceeded $40 per barrel, unless the industry was willing to invest more in additional production and in alternative sources of energy (none of which they are willing to do). Given the salaries and compensation of some of these key executives, you can just begin to feel sense of anger that consumers have when they see these price go up and they see the amount of revenues that are being kept by the companies and not being transferred back to consumers who are feeling the real pinch in all of this.

So we’ve got that bill, plus another bill that would make it easier for the government to go after those who engage in price gauging. I’m a strong supporter these bills, (I’m a co-author of the first bill, and a co-sponsor of the second bill), and my hope is that we can get votes on both of those matters, possible during the consideration of the supplemental budget bill which will be coming up on Tuesday when the Senate re-convenes.

Again, I think it’s very important to meet with people in these regions during times like these, given the importance of these issues, and how directly they impact us. The outcome of the issues between the Israelis and Palestinians; what happens in Lebanon; what happens in Iraq; what happens in Iran; what happens in Egypt—all of these issues have huge implications for us. So I think it’s worthwhile for members who are on key committees to have the responsibility of trying to help formulate policies, to spend some time to listen to people directly. It’s one way to really get first-hand information.