IN a week that saw much huffing and puffing in Washington about the so-called admissions of guilt from the Royal Navy personnel taken prisoner by the Iranians, it was perhaps inevitable that the US neoconservatives would also take umbrage at House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's jaunt to the Middle East. A spokesman for President George W Bush's National Security Council complained that, by visiting Syria, she was consorting with terrorists. Bizarrely, a commentator on Fox News compared her to a dermatologist doing the work of a neurosurgeon.
What seems to have upset Pelosi's critics is not so much the fact that she ended up talking to people in a country which forms a part of Bush's "axis of evil", but that she is in the Middle East in the first place. Never mind that she is doing exactly what former Secretary of State James Baker's Iraq Study Group recommended - it said there could be no lasting peace in the Middle East until Syria and Iran were invited into the caravan, but as things currently stand, Team Bush wants no truck with either Damascus or Tehran.
These are tough times for the US and Britain in the Middle East. Escalating violence makes Iraq increasingly ungovernable; Iran is refusing to be daunted by UN sanctions and is hell-bent on continuing the development of its nuclear programme; and the Israelis will not deal with the Palestinian unity government because Hamas is represented in it. It's becoming increasingly difficult to see what the endgame in Iraq might be; the Iranians have demonstrated that they will offer nothing but defiance should the West stand in the way of their nuclear ambitions, and Israel's political leadership is at ground zero. All in all, the prospect hardly pleases.
So, what is the US response? In Baghdad, the military surge ebbs and flows without much discernible effect; in their dealings with Iran's wily president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, it's a question of who blinks first; and the Israeli peace process is an oxymoron because no-one wants to talk to Hamas while they refuse to acknowledge Israel's existence. All the while there is an increased threat of violence - more Shi'ite terrorist attacks in Iraq; the possibility that Iran might develop a nuclear bomb and then use it; and the ever-present danger of a fresh intifada with a wave of suicide bomb attacks on innocent Israelis.
That is why Pelosi's visit to the area is so important. She's not doing it to break ranks, or to undermine Bush's authority, or to give some kind of legitimacy to leaders such as Ahmadinejad or Syria's president, Bashar Assad. She went to the region to try to rekindle some dialogue, to encourage the moderates and to attempt to get a bi-partisan approach back on track again.
With US and British stock at an all-time low in the region, there is a need for a fresh approach. Iran isn't going to suspend its nuclear programme as a precondition for talks as Bush has demanded, and the Palestinian unity government is unlikely to undo its deal with Hamas - after all, it did receive the democratic support of the Palestinian people at the last elections.
It's not enough for the West to make veiled threats and to use overwhelming force without gauging the consequences - look where it got us in 2003. The Middle East is crying out for the introduction of some constructive thinking. Pelosi's visit is a much-needed initiative - it's not about talking to the enemy, as her enemies in Washington have suggested; it's about talking to potential partners for peace.
