Obama's first call was to President Abbas

The White House revealed that the first world leader Barack Obama called after being sworn in on Tuesday was Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. I'd say it was a good, if small, first step in the right direction.

Obama took a lot of heat for not making any public statements about the Israel/Gaza conflict in the weeks leading up to his swearing in, but I thought his reasoning was sound - it went back to an old tradition that United States politicians speak with one voice in terms of foreign policy (remember Obama's oft-repeated comment that America has only one president at a time). But it was also a stance that has put a lot of pressure on him to offer a policy towards the Israel-Palestine conflict that is markedly different from the one offered by the Bush Administration - after all, if you were just going to do the same thing, then why not say that weeks ago, it certainly would not have gone against the ‘one president at a time’ rule if you were just going to continue what the current president was doing anyway.

Much of Obama’s credibility in the Middle East now is going to depend on approaching the problem in a substantively different way than Bush, so making Pres. Abbas his first call was a nice symbolic touch that now has to be followed up with more concrete steps. And in another sign that a new approach is needed in the Middle East, Saudi Arabia made something of a veiled threat towards Israel the other day. The Saudis were part of a conference of Arab nations meeting in Kuwait to discuss the recent conflict in Gaza. All together, the Arab states have pledged $2 billion to help rebuild Gaza, $1 billion of that amount was promised by Saudis.

The Saudis also urged Israel to reconsider the 2002 peace proposal they offered that would have all the Arab states sign peace treaties with Israel if they fully withdraw from the West Bank and Gaza Strip so that the Palestinians can establish a state of their own. Back in November, Israel's Defense Minister Ehud Barak said that the Saudi proposal deserved a fresh look that, of course, was before Israel's military campaign in Gaza. Now the Saudis are saying that their peace proposal “can't stay on the table forever.” They didn't elaborate on what they would do though if they decided the 2002 proposal was no longer valid.

Finally, Israel has said that they will investigate their military's use of white phosphorous artillery shells during the Gaza campaign, amid international charges that Israel could be guilty of war crimes. By some accounts, Israel is so worried about international war crimes charges being levied against them that they are keeping the names of the commanders of Israeli forces in the Gaza campaign a secret, and Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni briefly considered canceling a trip to abroad Brussels, worried that she could be charged once she landed in Europe.

White phosphorous shells are designed to burst open before hitting the ground, scattering fragments of phosphorous, which burns fiercely when it comes in contact with air, over a wide area. Use of the shells in itself isn't a crime, but international law dictates that they can only be used in open areas for illumination at night and to create smoke screens to hide the movement of troops. Their use against people, even enemy soldiers is strictly forbidden (since phosphorous inflicts horrible burns), as is their use against buildings or other structures. Israel is accused of using them freely though over densely populated areas in the Gaza Strip. The UN contends that their main warehouse for food and medical aid supplies was burned to the ground by Israeli forces using white phosphorous shells.