Brussels, 31/03/2009 (Agence Europe) - At the opening of the Arab League Summit in Doha (Qatar) on Monday 30 March, Syrian President Bachar al-Assad, who wants increased international and European support for the peace process, nevertheless criticised the “contradictory” attitude of the EU. It refused to back the Arab peace plan at the Paris summit at which, on 13 July, the Union for the Mediterranean was born, but now makes this plan the cornerstone of its Middle Eastern diplomacy. “We have to count on unity in our ranks,” Bachar al-Assad declared, at a time when some heads of state, in particular, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, did not attend the meeting in Doha, revealing the scale of the inter-Arab differences. Quarrels between Arab leaders - a mixture of differences over strategies towards Israel, the United States and Iran - have grown since the invasion of Gaza in December of last year. The problem does not lie in the existence of the differences, but in how they are resolved, said the Syrian president. He also felt that the situation was tense because “there are no longer any Israelis with whom to discuss peace”. Some Arab countries have drawn the conclusion that the Arab peace initiative will fail if Israel continues to reject it. This danger would become patent if the coalition that Benjamin Netinyahou is trying to form sticks to its election pledges. The Arab peace initiative, actively supported by the EU and by Barack Obama, means the recognition by the Arab states of the existence of Israel. (F.B./transl.rt)