Arab Foreign Ministers attend the opening session of an emergency meeting at the Arab League headquarters in Cairo.

Just days before the UN Security Council unanimously adopted Resolution 1701 in a rare public outburst, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, castrated the UN for it’s "foot-dragging and impotence” in failing to enforce a ceasefire in Lebanon. He was largely reflecting the regional anger and displeasure at the American reluctance to secure an UN mandate for an immediate suspension of hostilities so that diplomacy could be given a chance.

But more serious challenge for Mubarak and his ilk, ironically come not from New York but from within the region. As with numerous occasions in the past, the Arab League had once again failed to rise to occasion and seek and secure a non-military resolution of a conflict. While seeking an unconditional ceasefire, it has been unable to secure the concurrence of key players to such a course.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is not the one only who is different towards Mubarak’s pleas. Neither Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah not Syrian President Basher al-Assad is in a mood to heed to his calls for restraint.

Indeed, the failure of his intense mediation to secure the release of an Israeli solder kidnapped by Hamas led to renewed Israel’s strikes against the Palestinians. When the same tactics was followed by Hezbollah, which captured two soldiers from northern Israel, violence became inevitable.

Egypt and Saudi Arabia, which initially criticized the Hezbollah for its ‘adventurism’ gradually, backtracked partly because of growing domestic opposition to massive Israeli strike against Lebanon. When Israel was pounding fellow Arabs, these countries could not be seen to be focusing their condemnation on the original ‘misadventure’ that precipitated the avoidable crisis.

At the same time, the potential ‘victory’ of Hezbollah against Israel is unnerving to most of the conservative regimes in the Middle East. Hezbollah’s victory would unleash militant groups in the region that are kept under tight leash. Much of the threats to conservative regimes come not from liberal democratic forces but from hardened and often militant Islamic forces.

With the result, the traditional anti-Israeli platform is no longer sufficient for these countries to rally around. With the conflict and bloodshed entering its third week, there is no consensus in the Arab League for a summit meeting. The request from Yemen for an urgent summit to discuss the ongoing violence in the Middle East was quietly buried.

The maximum that the articulate Secretary-General of the Arab League Amr Moussa was prepared do on the Lebanese crisis was to proclaim the death of the peace process.

Is the League inefficiency an aberration? Since it founding in 1945, the League has been found wanting when its role was vital and critical. The issue is not its inability to resolve problems between its member states but its colossal failure to come to the rescue of smaller member states who were threatened by their bigger neighbors.

When Jordan annexed the West Bank following the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, the League meekly described that the Palestinian territories would be held in ‘trust’ by the Hashemite King.

The failure of the League to reign in Saddam Hussein who treated Kuwait as the 17^th province of Iraq in 1990, eventually led to the US-led military campaign in the Gulf. Likewise, its inability to convince Syria to recognize the sovereignty of Lebanon forced the UN Security Council to adopt Resolution 1680 that explicitly called on Damascus to “establish full diplomatic relations and representation” with Beirut.

As an organization that seeks to defend the rights of the Arabs, the League never came to the defense of Lebanon and its independence against the periodic interference and occupation by Israel as well as Syria.

At the same time, the League did not hesitate to suspend Egypt, a founding member, when President Anwar Sadat signed a peace deal with Israel!

So, making peace is a punishable crime and swallowing up neighbors is not!

Over the years, beyond adopting high-sounding but ineffective anti-Israeli resolutions, the League has no role to play in most of the critical developments that shape the Middle East. War and peace take place independent of the League or because of its inefficiency. Either it has failed to prevent a crisis blowing into a full-fledged war or its failure to resolve differences among its member states led to violent confrontation.

Indeed, League is the only regional organization in the world where the leadership permanently rests with a single country. Except when it was suspended during the 1980s, Egypt always held the post of Secretary-General and hence, seen by many as an extension of the Egyptian Foreign Ministry.

Far from taking a diplomatic initiative, since the start of the current crisis, the Arab League has been looking to the outside world for answers. First, it was the G-8 summit in St Petersburg, then the Rome meeting of major powers, UN Security Council and now the White House.

In short, for weeks the Arab League was just waiting for the manna from heaven. At this rate, it would not be long before the League becomes irrelevant in the Middle East!

The writer teaches at Jawaharlal Nehru University.