The Cable: Levin lifts hold on State Near East official, bureau makes senior appointments

From The Cable at Foreign Policy. If you read this blog regularly, you know I am delighted that Ambassador Feltman has gotten this position and even more delight that the hold up has been removed. (The last time I said I was glad he got the job and how much I thought of him, he thanked me for the kind words. So much for anonymity!). What you don't know is that I also served with his new DAS, Maura Connelly, in Jerusalem when she was the Deputy Principle Officer, and I think she is fabulous as well. I think under their leadership, NEA is in great stead!

UPDATED: Levin lifts hold on State Near East official, bureau makes senior appointments

Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI) lifted his hold today on the confirmation of Jeffrey Feltman to be assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern Affairs, a Levin staffer tells Foreign Policy. The move clears Feltman to be confirmed by the Senate by unanimous consent, perhaps even as early as tonight, a Hill foreign policy aide said, adding he doubted there would be a need for a roll-call vote.

As previously reported, Levin had been exercising the hold on the senior Near East appointment to pressure the administration to make eligible for Libyan relief compensation funds an Italian-born constituent who had been wounded in a 1985 terrorist attack on Rome's airport. Feltman, who has recused himself from the case, has declined to comment.

Meantime, sources say, Assistant Secretary of State for Legislative Affairs Richard Verma has gone to Levin with two offers in the past month trying to resolve the issue. The Michigan Democrat apparently didn't find either offer satisfactory, while word from State after the second go-round was that Levin had "raised the bar."

Levin's office declined to say how the matter was resolved today. Earlier Thursday, it had declined to comment on the matter. Verma has not responded to queries.

Last year, Levin had received a letter from a former top Bush administration State Department official that would have met his requirements, a Washington Middle East hand previously explained on condition of anonymity, but had been unable to get the U.S. government to follow through on whatever that letter promised regarding extending eligibility for Libya relief funds for his constituent.

Feltman, a well-liked career foreign service officer and former ambassador to Lebanon who assumed the role of acting head of the NEA bureau after the retirement of David Welch last December, has had some other unreported good news of late.

He was finally able earlier this month to make senior hires in the bureau. Among the most senior NEA appointments, Ronald L. Schlicher, a former ambassador to Cyprus and consul general in Jerusalem, came on as Feltman's PDAS on July 20. Schlicher oversees all the other DASes in the bureau, and has "executive section" authorities to make decisions on IT, budgets, personnel, human resources, funding and staffing. The State Department's Iran office, directed by Todd Schwartz, also reports to Schlicher.

Bureau DAS appointments that were finalized in the past couple weeks: Janet Sanderson, a former U.S. ambassador to Haiti and deputy chief of mission in Amman, became the DAS for the Maghreb and Arab Peninsula earlier this week. Michael Corbin, a former US charge d'affaires in Damascus and official in Iraq, became the new DAS for Iraq. Maura Connelly came on July 13 as the DAS for Israel, Palestine, Egypt and the Levant. Madeleine Spirnak continues to serve as the acting DAS for public diplomacy and the Middle East Partnership Initiative.

The Cable previously reported that the Brookings Institution's Tamara Cofman Wittes is a candidate to become the DAS for Middle East democracy/Arab reform issues. (Wittes, who previously declined to comment, couldn't be reached Thursday.)

"Every bureau has a set number of DAS slots, some Foreign Service, some Civil Service (in regional bureaus like NEA, most are Foreign Service)," a State Department official explained. "A few are Schedule C (political appointees). Each bureau has the right to fill those jobs as it sees fit, once the candidate is approved by a senior personnel review committee. A Senate hold wouldn't necessarily hold up that process."

One source speaking not for attribution said a new senior NEA official had recently remarked that he did not know how Feltman had managed to run the bureau (which after all counts in its map Iraq, Iran, Lebanon, Syria, Israel, the Palestinian Authority and Libya among a few warm spots) without getting his team in place for this long - almost eight months. Feltman, currently attending a Centcom conference, also recently lost a day sitting through jury selection (he wasn't ultimately picked), a department hand said.

The hold on Feltman's confirmation became an issue at the State Department press briefing yesterday. Asked by a reporter if Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had spoken to her former Senate colleague on the matter, spokesman Ian Kelly said, "Well, of course, we're all looking forward to having Jeff become the confirmed assistant secretary. There's a lot of important diplomatic activity under his purview in North Africa and the Middle East. I know the Secretary is eager to have him come on board as a full-fledged assistant secretary, but I don't think I'm prepared to talk about what exactly she's done with Congress."

Later on, a reporter opined to Kelly, this is "a political holdup by a member of Congress because of an issue that has nothing to do with his nomination," before throwing in a question, "What can you do about it to end the standoff?"

Guess Who's Coming to Dinner?

I've been remiss in telling you anything about the new folks coming in at the State Department, and I thought I would begin to try to remedy that.

You may have heard long ago that Secretary Clinton will have two Deputies (D in State Department shorthand), James B. Steinberg and Jacob Lew.

Steinberg will have the role vacated by Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte (and will be considered the Principal Deputy). Steinberg served as deputy national security adviser in Bill Clinton's administration.

Lew, former Office of Management and Budget director during President Clinton's administration, will focus on budget and resources. His appointment is to what is essentially a new position at the Department. There is usually there is only one deputy, and this may be a sign of Secretary Clinton's interest in expanding resources for the department. I certainly hope so. It is clear from her welcoming remarks and the subsequent visit by President Obama that both Secretary Clinton and the President are committed to revitalizing the role of diplomacy in national security policy, and the Department needs more resources to do that job.

It seems that Under Secretary for Political Affairs Bill Burns (P in State Department shorthand) and Under Secretary for Management Pat Kennedy (M) will both be staying on. I think that will be good both for continuity and for keeping careerists in prominent positions.

A former top State Department official during President Clinton's administration, Wendy R. Sherman, may be to be returning to the Department, possibly in another stint as counselor (C) to the Secretary.

Al Kamen, in today's In the Loop in the Washington Post, had these picks:

Daniel Benjamin, a terrorism expert at the Brookings Institution who had been Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton's terrorism adviser during the presidential campaign, appears to be joining the State Department as assistant secretary for counterterrorism. "The Next Attack," a book he co-authored, opens with: "We are losing . . ."

Jennifer E. Sims, a former deputy assistant secretary of state for intelligence coordination and Senate intelligence committee aide who is now a Georgetown professor, is returning to Foggy Bottom to head the Bureau of Intelligence and Research.

[...]

Rose Gottemoeller is reportedly coming back from the Carnegie Institute's Moscow office to be assistant secretary of state for verification.

[...]

There still appear to be openings at State for top jobs minding South Asia -- but no one seems to want them now, because the odds are you'll never know what's really going on in your region what with special envoy Richard C. Holbrooke in charge. Ditto for the Middle East post, but they might decide to just elevate the highly regarded career deputy, Jeffrey D. Feltman, to take care of things new special envoy George J. Mitchell (and maybe Dennis Ross) don't care about.

I guess this also means that Elizabeth Jones, the former Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs (EUR), who had been mentioned as the new A/S for Near Eastern Affairs (NEA), has bowed out of consideration. I would be happy to see Ambassador Feltman get the top spot at NEA, not just because he is a careerist but because he is an all-around decent guy. As for who would take the A/S position in SCA, I haven't heard. Kurt Campbell, who had been at the Pentagon in the Clinton administration as deputy assistant secretary for Asia-Pacific matters, is still apparently the choice to be assistant secretary of state for East Asia and Pacific affairs (EAP).

Baghdad, Beirut embassy dissenters to be honored

The piece below is an AP report on the folks getting dissent awards from AFSA (American Foreign Service Association), our employee association (the article calls it our "union," which is not exactly accurate).

I know two of the three folks getting the award. Luke I met recently, but I met Ambassador Feltman some time ago when he had dinner with a group of us going to serve in NEA. He had previously served as Consul General in Jerusalem and was more than willing to share his wisdom and advice on the post. As a newly minted Junior Officer, I appreaciated his being willing to take the time to talk with us. I am glad to see him being honored.

Baghdad, Beirut embassy dissenters to be honored
By MATTHEW LEE - Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON --Two American diplomats who successfully challenged policy in Iraq and Lebanon last year are being honored at the State Department Thursday for their courage in speaking out.

Former ambassador to Lebanon Jeffrey Feltman fought plans to build the new embassy in Beirut in an area controlled by Hezbollah militants. Iraq veteran Rachel Schneller called attention to the mental health care needs of diplomats returning from war zones. They are getting awards for constructive dissent from the American Foreign Service Association.

The association is the union for U.S. diplomats. It says Feltman and Schneller showed exemplary courage, integrity and leadership by taking on their superiors in Washington and changing the department's institutional thinking.

In cable after cable, Feltman argued it was unsafe to construct the new embassy on property that was bought for that purpose in 2004 but had later fallen into the hands of Hezbollah. Higher-ups in Washington were insisting on going ahead with the project. Finally, last July, it was put on hold.

"Ambassador Feltman challenged this decision and repeatedly appealed directly to the highest levels of the State Department," his citation reads. "His willingness to take a stand on principle and to question the conventional wisdom in order to protect his embassy personnel exemplifies the best qualities of constructive dissent."

Schneller, who served in Basra, Iraq and returned to the United States with post-traumatic stress disorder, took on the department for its failure to provide adequate mental health care to diplomats who serve in war zones. In internal memos and interviews, Schneller made the case that they deserved similar treatment to members of the military.

Partly as a result, the department created a new mental health care office and adopted new leave guidelines to deal with stress-related disorders that plague up to 17 percent of diplomats serving in danger posts, according to one survey.

"Despite personal sacrifice, Ms. Schneller showed enormous courage in challenging the system on an issue of life and death importance to career diplomats and their families," her citation reads. "(Her) actions exemplify the qualities of constructive dissent by demonstrating the intellectual courage and integrity to challenge the status quo while working within the system."

The awards are given annually by the union, which is also giving a dissent honor to a third diplomat this year, Luke Zahner, who documented serious human right abuses by the military-backed government while working at the U.S. Embassy in Bangladesh. Zahner convinced his superiors to report those abuses, according to his citation.