Now that the hastily called peace summit in Cairo has concluded and its top-level participants from 27 countries have gone home, the hard work of quelling terrorism begins.
The difficulty of that work is barely hinted at in the summit's concluding communique, which speaks mostly in broad terms about a joint commitment to enhancing the struggling Middle East peace process, promoting security and combating terrorism.Those bland generalities won't mean much unless the working group to be formed after the summit can agree on such essential specifics as:
- Establishing better lines of exchanging intelligence information about terrorists from country to country.
- Laying the groundwork for more lenient extradition treaties.
- Conducting an international crackdown on the funding sources of various terrorist groups.
- Providing border crossings with computerized data bases that include complete and up to date lists of all known terrorists.
The exchange of intelligence data is of key importance. When it comes to terrorism, no spy service holds all the pieces to the jigsaw puzzle or knows what the picture on the puzzle box looks like. Besides, with the exchange of such data to their mutual advantage, Israelis and Arabs could gradually develop ever greater mutual confidence and trust.
But even if little concrete progress results from the Cairo conference, the summit there still constitutes a major breakthrough toward peace.
For one thing, the conference helps to diplomatically isolate such non-attendants as Iraq, Iran, and Libya - widely considered the outlaw regimes in the Middle East.
For another, the summit demonstrated and furthered the relaxation of tensions between Israel and most of the Arab world.
In all, 14 Arab delegations attended the summit and stood shoulder-to-shoulder with Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres as well as with the presidents of the United States, France, Germany, and Turkey, the prime ministers of Great Britain and Canada, plus senior representatives of the European Union and Japan.
Never before have so many Arab leaders made common cause with Israel, making it harder for terrorists to depict the Israelis as interlopers in the Middle East who deserve to be made outcasts.
Despite such gains, the summit was not without its problems and shortcomings.
By spurning its invitation to attend, Syria alienated Washington and made it harder for Israel to negotiate a withdrawal from the Golan Heights.
Moreover, the summit had a one-sided aspect because it was convened only in response to recent terrorist attacks against Israeli citizens. The world has been less vocal in condemning and mobilizing against depredations that victimize Arabs. Arab cooperation cannot be expected to last long unless the international community responds more vigorously to any future attacks by Israel's army or to killings committed by Israeli extremists against Arabs.
Meanwhile, the Cairo summit accomplished about as much as it could be expected to do in just one day. The challenge now is to match the conference's harmony and ringing words with continuing cooperation and concrete deeds.