by Marsha B. Cohen
Reuven Rivlin has just been elected Israel’s 10th president. A member of Israel’s parliamentary body since 1988, he served as Speaker of the Knesset from 2003-06 and again from 2009-13. Today, Israel’s parliamentarians, by secret ballot, elected him to a 7-year term after two rounds of voting.
A native [...]]]>
by Marsha B. Cohen
Reuven Rivlin has just been elected Israel’s 10th president. A member of Israel’s parliamentary body since 1988, he served as Speaker of the Knesset from 2003-06 and again from 2009-13. Today, Israel’s parliamentarians, by secret ballot, elected him to a 7-year term after two rounds of voting.
A native born Israeli who speaks fluent Arabic, Rivlin (known as “Rubi” or “Ruvi”) comes from a family that claims 50,000 members worldwide, 35,000 of whom live in Israel. Rivlin’s father, Yosef Yoel Rivlin, was a scholar of Semitic languages who translated the Qur’an and One Thousand and One Nights into Hebrew. His cousin, Lilly Rivlin, who spent most of her life in the U.S., is a progressive writer and film maker. Her 2006 film, “Can You Hear Me?: Israeli and Palestinian Women Fight For Peace,” documented the joint activist efforts of Israeli and Palestinian women.
There are many paradoxes in the views of this right-wing Likudnik — hardly known outside of Israel — that explain why some of the most progressive Israelis respect him and believe he will be a suitable nonpartisan representative of the State of Israel in his largely ceremonial role as president.
1. Rivlin believes in democracy, free speech and political pluralism. He has vehemently opposed the witch hunts targeting progressive Israeli organizations, and resisted demands by right-wing politicians that the activities of left-leaning human rights groups in Israel be halted and outlawed. According to Dimi Reider of the progressive Israeli news site, +972:
As Speaker, Rivlin’s commitment to parliamentary democracy (and democracy in general) saw him turn time and again against his own party and its allies, stalling most of the anti-democratic legislation pushed by Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud and Lieberman’s Israel Beitenu, while at the same time trying to instruct his fellow right-wing legislators about the dangers of nationalist populism.
“Woe betide the Jewish democratic state that turns freedom of expression into a civil offense,” Rivlin wrote in an article slamming the Boycott Law passed by the Knesset in 2011. The legislation prohibited advocating any sort of boycott of Israeli products or institutions — economic, cultural, or educational — and made any person or entity proposing an Israel-related boycott subject to prosecution and liable for paying compensation, regardless of any actual loss or damage. Left-wing Haaretz journalist Gideon Levy praised Rivlin’s courageous stance, berating the reputedly “dovish” Shimon Peres who defeated Rivlin’s 2007 presidency bid:
Rivlin has been revealed as Israel’s honorary president; Peres, as its shameful one. The man from the right wing dared do what the man supposedly from the left did not. In the test of courage and honesty, the highest test of any elected official, Rivlin defeated Peres by a resounding knock-out.
(Earlier this year, in mid-February, Israel’s High Court considered a petition seeking to overturn the Boycott Law, but did not issue a ruling.)
2. Rivlin has consistently condemned the anti-Arab racism pervading Israeli society. He was incensed after learning that Arab construction workers on the Knesset grounds had red Xs painted on their protective helmets to distinguish them from foreign workers, and insisted on the immediate removal of the distinguishing marks. “We cannot allow the use of any markings that could be seen as a differentiation between people on the basis of race, ethnicity and religion,” he declared.
Rivlin has castigated the race-baiting and Islamophobia exhibited by supporters of the Beitar soccer team and the team’s discrimination against Muslim players. “Imagine the outcry if groups in England or Germany said that Jews could not play for them,” he said. He has also opposed proposals for the ethnic cleansing of Jerusalem by radical Jewish settlers and condemned “price tag” attacks. In September 2013, Rivlin criticized the election slogan “Judaize Jerusalem” of the far-right United Jerusalem list, calling it a “disgrace” and “incitement,” and called for an investigation over whether the slogan constituted a criminal offense.
3. Rivlin opposes making civic and political rights for Israeli Arabs (or, as many prefer to be known, “Palestinian citizens of Israel”) contingent upon their serving in the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). ”These calls are populist at best and carry a tone of incitement at worst,” he declared. At the same time, Rivlin endorsed civilian service projects that would help alleviate the high unemployment rate among young Arab men and improve the quality of life in their own communities. “I believe that the creation of a civil service layout within the Arab sector is a step that could benefit the Arab sector and the Israeli society at large. The Arab sector needs manpower and young volunteers can support that cause,” he said.
4. An unabashed proponent of the one state solution, Rivlin advocates giving full Israeli civil and political rights to West Bank Palestinians in a single-state scenario. Most Israeli liberals and hardliners alike oppose any one-state solution that would make Palestinians Israeli citizens. They complain that Rivlin’s stance would create a situation in which Israel could not be both Jewish and democratic. That’s because allowed to vote, Arabs would would eventually outnumber Jews and Israel could no longer be a “Jewish state.” To prevent this, most liberals still advocate a two-state solution, while right-wing hardliners want to expel as many Arabs as possible from the West Bank and Gaza while depriving those who remain of Israeli citizenship. Nevertheless, the notion that a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict may no longer be viable is gaining traction on Israel’s progressive left.
5. Rivlin has pledged to Arab citizens of “green line” Israel that they won’t be forced to become part of a Palestinian state in the event of a “land swap” deal that exchanges Israeli Arab cities and towns for Jewish settlement blocs in the West Bank. In 2009, Rivlin infuriated Israeli hardliners when he made his first official visit as Knesset Speaker to the Arab town of Umm al-Fahm, Israel’s second-largest Arab municipality in “green line” Israel. Rivlin assured the town’s residents they would not be subjected to “ethnic cleansing.”
6. Rivlin defended the rights of Arab Knesset members when parliamentarians from his own party and others were determined to take them away. In 2010, he joined prominent civil libertarians in objecting to Knesset Member (MK) Hanin Zouabi being stripped of her parliamentary privileges. As punishment for her involvement in the Gaza flotilla’s attempt to break the Israeli boycott of Gaza, MKs voted to strip her of her right to leave the country, take away her diplomatic passport, and deny her legal fee payments, refusing to allow Zouabi to say anything in her own defense. “Let her speak!” roared Rivlin at the shrieking MKs. Although disagreeing with Zouabi’s stance, Rivlin upheld her right to defend herself, stating, “I believe that everyone should have the right to speak their minds, even if what they say hurts me.” (In 2008, Rivlin had also opposed – and temporarily thwarted — taking away the pension of MK Azmi Bishara of the Arab Balad party, who fled Israel when he was charged with treason. Rivlin argued that until Bishara was convicted of a crime, his pension was untouchable.)
Before today’s election, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, leader of the hawkish, Russian-dominated Yisrael Beiteinu party, stated he would not support Rivlin because of his opposition to creating committees for investigating human rights organizations, and Rivlin’s defense of Arab parliamentarians’ rights.
7. Rivlin disapproves of Netanyahu’s ongoing criticism of the negotiations between world powers and Iran over its nuclear program. “We must not contradict the United States regarding the deal with Iran,” Rivlin wrote in a post to his Facebook page. “A conflict with the United States is against Israel’s vital interests.”
8. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu did everything he could to prevent Rivlin’s election. After preventing the re-election of Rivlin as Knesset Speaker last year, Netanyahu tried to thwart Rivlin’s ascent to the presidency by frantically searching for a viable alternative candidate; proposing the outright abolition of the position of Israel’s president; and trying to postpone the presidential election. In a 2010 interview Rivlin had criticized Netanyahu’s leadership style:
“[Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu’s worldview states that ‘the majority can do anything, that the leader can demand whatever he wishes of those who entered the Knesset because of him and he can force his opinion on them.’ That is something that can greatly harm democracy and lower the Knesset’s standing to rock bottom.”
9. Rivlin has attracted both respect and support from members of Israeli opposition parties. MK Ilan Gilon of the Meretz party declared he would be supporting Rivlin while other Meretz members took an anyone-but-Rivlin stance. Even before the withdrawal of long-time Labor party stalwart Benjamin Eliezer from the presidential race due to financial impropriety investigations, Labor MK Shelley Yachimovich announced she would be crossing party lines to vote for Rivlin because he was “the most appropriate and suitable candidate for the position.” Her words of praise did not stop there:
He is an exemplary democrat, honest and uncorrupted, modest in his personal manner and statesman-like in his conceptions and public conduct. One doesn’t have to speculate on how he will behave as president. Even as someone from the right-wing, whose opinions are often the opposite of mine, he passed the test, standing like a solid rock in defense of democracy.”
Photo Credit: J-Street.
]]>by Robert E. Hunter
President Barack Obama spent three days in the Near East, a whirlwind visit like a genie from the Arabian Nights, kicking up dust and making his presence felt. But what did he achieve?
Two substantive matters stand out: $200 million promised to the King of Jordan to [...]]]>
by Robert E. Hunter
President Barack Obama spent three days in the Near East, a whirlwind visit like a genie from the Arabian Nights, kicking up dust and making his presence felt. But what did he achieve?
Two substantive matters stand out: $200 million promised to the King of Jordan to deal with that country’s horrendous refugee program stemming from the Syrian Civil War and the “trailer talk” between Israeli Prime Minister “Bibi” Netanyahu and Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, with the US president as a facilitator. Related to the Israeli attack on a Turkish vessel carrying supplies to Gaza in 2010, this was one of those classic diplomatic imbroglios in which neither side is prepared to be the first to back down. Obama’s role was thus instrumental, a true honest broker.
What else? Atmospherics, mostly, and mostly on the Israeli side, where Obama has been accused of being insensitive to Israeli feelings, in part because of his poor relations with Netanyahu, and not visiting the Holy Land during his first term as president. This is not just the stuff of a relationship on the rocks; it also impacts Obama’s ability to advance US interests in the Middle East in two ways. First, in US domestic politics, where, like it or not, the supporters of Israel (more particularly, supporters of its government) are a major force to be reckoned with, not just on Arab-Israeli issues, but also on the full range of Middle East issues and the president’s domestic agenda. Second, what the US does with Israel and what it’s able to get Israel to agree to do is the starting point for any progress in its relations with the Palestinians. Israel occupies most of the disputed land, after all. Even more importantly for the United States, Israeli cooperation also provides flexibility for the US President, including in his domestic politics, to deal with other matters in the region — matters far more critical at the moment than the Israel-Palestine issue — especially in regard to Syria and Iran.
Hence, the president was quite right in doing what he should have done a long time ago: demonstrating, to the extent that it can be done through words and the symbolism of his Israeli visit destinations, that his heart is in the right place. Hard-boiled Israeli leaders — and they are paid to be so, especially with Israel’s objective circumstances — clearly believe that Israel’s capacity to rely on US security guarantees depends on Israel being seen by US leaders as strategically important. In the Cold War, where the US and the Soviet Union mostly chose sides, Israel’s strategic connection to the US was obvious. That has been far less clear since the Egypt-Israel Peace Treaty of 1979, which vastly reduced the risk of an Arab war on Israel (and hence the risk of a US-Soviet nuclear confrontation), and then the collapse of the Soviet Union. Israel has sought since then to identify areas in which its strategic interests are at least compatible with those of the United States. This helps to explain why Israel emphasizes the threat from Iran far beyond what objective US analysts see in terms of a potential direct threat to the US, just as Israel and its supporters in the US were instrumental in pressing the United States to invade Iraq a decade ago.
But at heart, the US commitment to Israel’s security and future is not about strategy — after all, the US was committed to Vietnam and then walked away and is doing the same now with Afghanistan. The US commitment is “of the heart”, and has to extend far beyond the US Jewish community, which is a small fraction of the US population. In fact, support for Israel as a democracy, as a haven for survivors of the Holocaust and as a productive Western society with Western values, is both broad and deep in US culture and society. This is the most solid basis for Israeli confidence in America’s commitment. And reinforcing that sense of identification does not come out of a strategy text book but out of demonstrations of the unprovable: repeated reassurances of American love for Israel and what it represents, in hearts and not heads.
Of course, this is deeply frustrating for most Arabs, including virtually all Palestinians. This was underscored on Obama’s trip, when he limited himself largely to “words” and not “music.” He made little effort to connect with this people, who have labored under Israeli occupation for nearly 46 years, in terms that they could relate to emotionally.
Nevertheless, Obama did say many of the right things — Israeli settlements on the West Bank are “counterproductive” (but not “they should be stopped and maybe even rolled back in places”) and a two-state solution is important for everyone including Israel. In making the latter case eloquently to Israeli young people during his Jerusalem speech, Obama also added another point: the founding generation of Israeli leaders is passing from the scene, and a new generation needs to chart Israel’s future. It was not an accidental comment. In fact, this may be Obama’s “long game” — not that he’s expecting to be the one decisive player in resolving the standoff, but that perhaps over time, young Israelis and Palestinians will be able to do it themselves. In fact, as confirmed by public opinion polling in the two communities, the people want to go in that direction; it’s the leaders who haven’t found their way.
But none of this actually moves anything forward in the Middle East. The Secretary of State, John Kerry, will assume the burden of being lead US negotiator, a poor use of his time overall, given that the chances of moving the “peace process” forward are so poor. They come up against the fact that, when push comes to shove, psychologically, Israel is not willing — understandably so — to take risks for peace in view of grave uncertainties about Egypt, Syria, and Iran. And the President of the Palestinian Authority, Mohammed Abbas, can take no risks for peace as long as Israel keeps Gaza isolated and its people, lacking economic hope, dependent on Hamas.
At least with his trip, Obama has taken limited steps that had to be taken in regard to the Middle East as a whole — with the reconciliation between Turkey and Israel, and the reassurances of where his heart lies to Israel. But the administration still lacks an overarching perspective on the region. It has no real strategy (does anyone?) regarding a way forward on the Syrian civil war. There is no visible planning about the aftermath. The administration does not seem to be taking seriously the rising, if slow-rolling, civil war throughout the region between Shi’a and Sunni states and communities, and Washington is unwilling to tell Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the UAE to stop their nationals from funding Islamist fundamentalism in Syria and elsewhere and where the US suffers directly — including in terms of combat casualties – in Afghanistan and Pakistan, from what these three countries tolerate among their rich supporters of religious extremism. The United States also continues to lead a policy of continued isolation of Iran while refusing to engage in negotiations that meet the first test: the consideration of legitimate Iranian security interests, as well as those of the United States and Israel — a sine qua non for success. He argues that “all options are on the table,” but a serious approach to negotiations is not one of them. Obama has thus, like his two predecessors, given a critical hostage to fortune: that keeping the US out of a war with Iran — which the American people do not want, and which would be even more destructive to US interests than the misbegotten invasion of Iraq — depends not on independent US decision-making, but on the good sense of two other countries, Israel and Iran. No great power should ever get itself into such a predicament.
The key issue now is whether the US president will take a step back, engage the best that there is in the US professional community on the Middle East; bring the right people into the government; consult with others outside; and for the first time in his presidency, develop a coherent, viable strategy for the region as a whole that is consonant with the deepest and most critical US interests in the region.
At the very least, in looking at the Middle East and his administration’s approach to it, President Obama needs to fashion a team of hard-nosed thinkers and doers, akin to what Franklin Roosevelt did in World War II and various administrations did during the Cold War. As the Chief of Naval Operations, Admiral Ernest King, said in 1942: “When the going gets tough, that is when they send for us sons of bitches.” Obama needs to view the Middle East and US interests through a similar optic and bring in the first team.
Photo: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US President Barack Obama holding a joint press conference at the Prime minister’s residence in Jerusalem. March 20, 2013. Credit: Kobi Gideon
]]>Ira Glunts
The Israeli attack on Gaza in December 2008/January 2009 and the subsequent investigation [...]]]>
Ira Glunts
The Israeli attack on Gaza in December 2008/January 2009 and the subsequent investigation and unequivocal condemnation by a United Nations team led by Judge Richard Goldstone of Israeli conduct before and during what the Jewish State calls “Operation Cast Lead,” have radically altered the way many view Israel’s brutal occupation and oppression of the Palestinian people. Gaza and Goldstone have also caused many to question the 18 year-old US-sponsored Israeli/Palestinian “peace-process” which never produces any positive results.
Here in Central New York, some local activists in the Syracuse Peace Council started the group Central New York Working For A Just Peace In Palestine & Israel as a direct result of the invasion of Gaza. In February, the Judaic Studies Program at Syracuse University hosted journalist Peter Beinart, a self-identified liberal Zionist, who has recently signed a public letter urging President Obama to support a United Nations resolution condemning the Israeli settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. (The US vetoed the resolution.) Neither Beinart’s willingness to sign this letter, nor an invitation extended by the Judaic Studies Program to someone expressing these views, would have been conceivable before the Gaza invasion. (For a less than positive review of the Beinart lecture, see my blog post, here)
The Goldstone Report: The Legacy Of The Landmark Investigation Of The Gaza Conflict is invaluable in assessing what really happened in Gaza. It presents an abridged version (327 pp.) of the “Report of the United Nations Fact-Finding Mission On the Gaza Conflict (September, 2009),” with 11 insightful essays which explore the Goldstone document from progressive legal, historical, and political, as well as personal perspectives. This version also intersperses witness testimonies which were published by the Mission, but not included in the original report. (Full disclosure: I am a contributor to Mondoweiss.net which is edited by Weiss and Horowitz.)
The stark fact is that the Israeli army killed over 1,400 people during the Gaza invasion. This is as opposed to 13 Israeli fatalities, some of which were Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) soldiers killed by “friendly fire.” Of the 1,400 fatalities, over 80% were civilians. Approximately 5,300 Gazans were injured, including 2,400 women and children; 2,114 houses were destroyed, with an additional 3,400 houses rendered uninhabitable. The three-week Israeli assault resulted in over 51,000 displaced persons. Among the IDF’s targets were mosques, hospitals, private residences, a chicken farm, a sewage treatment plant, and a United Nations Relief and Welfare Agency (UNRWA) field office compound, which was sheltering 600 to 700 civilians. According to Goldstone, there was no military advantage gained by any of these attacks.
The Mission employed testimonies of Gazans, as well as on-site inspections in order to document its findings. Although the Israeli government refused to cooperate, and vehemently tried to prevent their citizens and soldiers from doing so, the Mission did interview Israelis outside of Israel and employed public testimony from the so-called “Soldiers’ Forum” at Israel’s Oranim military academy, as well as reports from the dissident soldiers’ group “Breaking the Silence.” The report contains statements made by Israeli officials, which were widely quoted in the Israeli and foreign press, that Israel’s declared aim was to punish the civilian population. The document also includes justifications made by Israeli officials, reported in the press for specific Israeli military actions. Most of these were shown to be inaccurate, many purposefully so.
A Tzipi Livni quote illustrates the IDF intent to violate international norms of military conduct. Livni, who was the Israeli Foreign Minister during Operation Cast Lead, said, “Israel is not a country upon which you fire missiles and it does not respond. It is a country that when you fire on its citizens it responds by going wild – and this is a good thing.” The Israeli “wildness” violated the laws of war, including: use of human shields, capricious home invasions, illegal detention of civilians including elected officials, massive wanton destruction of personal property and of infrastructure, and killing of unarmed and non-threatening civilians.
The Goldstone Mission concluded that Operation Cast Lead “was a deliberately disproportionate attack designed to punish, humiliate and terrorize a civilian population, radically diminish its local economic capacity both to work and to provide for itself, and to force upon it an ever increasing sense of dependency and vulnerability.” Targeting a civilian population clearly violates international humanitarian law. The Mission also concluded, as did many who read the Israeli press before and during the three-week Israeli assault, that one purpose of the attack was to punish Gazans for voting for Hamas in the free democratic election of 2006.
The Goldstone Report not only addresses the Gaza invasion, but seeks to place it in the context of the ongoing struggle between Israel and the Palestinians, as well as between Israel and its Arab neighbors. In describing this history, the report harshly criticizes the Israelis for, among other things, the 8,000 Palestinian political prisoners in Israel from the occupied territories (a violation of international human rights law), the restriction of movement (between Gaza and the West Bank and within each territory), the suppression of legitimate dissent in the occupied territories, and the blockade of Gaza. It also condemns Israel for its settlements on conquered land, a violation of the Geneva Conventions, the Judaization of East Jerusalem, and construction and maintenance of the separation wall, which has been ruled illegal by the World Court. And all that is not even to mention the illegitimate and disproportionate use of force during the 2006 Lebanon War. This is hardly the portrayal of an enlightened Western democracy. And it is a characterization of Israel which is all the more shocking for many because it came from Richard Goldstone.
Judge Richard Goldstone is a nightmare for the Israeli and US pro-Israel spin doctors. He is an internationally-recognized jurist with extensive experience in redressing the injustices of apartheid in his native South Africa. He is not only Jewish, but is a self-identified Zionist, and was an honorary member of the Board of Governors of Hebrew University for ten years. His daughter immigrated to Israel where she now lives. This made it difficult to dismiss Goldstone as an anti-Semite from a United Nations whose moral and legal authority Israel has always ignored, with the aid of the United States veto. However, this did not stop the Israelis and their US supporters from smearing the judge.
Alan Dershowitz of Harvard Law School called Goldstone “an evil man” and “a traitor to the Jews.” The usual charges of “self-hating Jew” echoed loudly in the Israeli and US media. On November 3, 2009 the US House of Representatives voted 344 to 36 for House Resolution 867, which called the Goldstone Report, “irredeemably biased and unworthy of further consideration or legitimacy.” The Obama administration, not known for great courage in its foreign policy decisions, has danced to the tune of what some euphemistically call “certain political interests.” In so doing, the US has followed the advice of the House resolution and blocked any further consideration of the Goldstone Report at the United Nations.
Judge Goldstone has invited “fair minded people” to read the report and “point out where it failed to be objective or even-handed.” Neither the Congress nor the Obama Administration has done so. The US mainstream media has all but shut the door on criticism of Israeli conduct during the Gaza invasion. But despite the dismissive response to the Goldstone Report and to the critics of the Gaza invasion, both the report and the invasion have resulted in increased public opposition to US policy regarding Israel. The US pro-Israel camp, alarmed by this new reality, has inaccurately labeled it “a campaign of delegitimization of Israel.”
The essays contained in the Goldstone Report do little to legitimize an Israeli perspective. Jerome Slater criticizes Goldstone’s position that Israel’s war in Gaza could be justified by the claim of self-defense. He writes that “when illegitimate and violent repression engenders resistance” then the claim of self-defense is invalid. Brian Baird, an ex-Congressman, details the degree to which his House colleagues passionately spoke in defense of Israel while demonstrating their almost complete lack of knowledge of the facts. All his attempts to educate them met with indifference — caused by the giant shadow of the pro-Israel lobby.
The final word is given to Laila El-Haddad, a Palestinian journalist and blogger. She spent Operation Cast Lead in North Carolina connected via Skype and email to her father, who was under siege in his home in Gaza City. She details his messages of fright, courage, and despair, followed by relief and muted hope. These thoughts given from father to daughter provide the reader with a visceral understanding of the terror and horror visited on Gazans during the invasion, a horror which is impossible to transmit through a United Nations document. Sadly and soberingly, El-Haddad tells us that for now, for the people of Gaza, the Goldstone Report is just “ink on paper,” since it has not led to any improvement in their lives.
The presentation of the Goldstone Report and the accompanying materials contained in the volume are valuable because they make this extraordinary document accessible to those who might normally be reluctant to read it in its entirety on the United Nations web site. The book is especially recommended to those liberals who still check their progressivism at the gate before entering the portal of Palestine. What they read here just may shake some of their deeply-held beliefs.
An earlier version of this book review appeared in the Syracuse Peace Council’s Peace Newsletter (March, 2011, PNL #802).
]]>This would the first time an Israeli Prime Minister has ever agreed to a UN investigation into the actions of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). Israel had refused to cooperate with an investigation conducted by the UN Human Rights Council, headed by Richard Goldstone. Israel accused Goldstone, a renowned South African Jewish jurist, of focusing disproportionately on Israeli actions when the UNHRC report was released. The “Goldstone report” concluded that both Israel and Gaza’s militant Hamas rulers had committed war crimes.
Now, Netanyahu claims that it is “in Israel’s national interest to ensure that the factual truth regarding the flotilla incident would be exposed for the world to see.” When Ban originally proposed the investigative panel on the Gaza flotilla in early June, days after Israeli commandos intercepted the Gaza-bound convoy, Haaretz reported that “Senior government officials said the Foreign Ministry recommends responding favorably to establishing the committee because Turkey will probably oppose it.”
Another opinion about why Israel agreed to be part of the investigative panel: as the Israeli say in Hebrew, Ayn breira–no choice.
“There was no choice but to agree to the international community’s demands, first and foremost those of the US and the UN,” one official source said.
“We could have been considered naysayers, or we could have done what we did, which was to take part in determining the mandate that will be given to the committee and affect its program.”
The source said the committee would have been established in any case, even without Israel’s consent. “Though Israel didn’t want another inquiry, there was no choice,” he said.
The panel will be authorized to review reports submitted by investigators in both Israel and Turkey, but will not have the authority to subpoena any witnesses. One of the concessions Israel won as a condition of its participation is that neither Israeli soldiers nor any Israeli citizens can be questioned by the panel. At most, political leaders may be allowed to give statements.
Turkey, which withdrew its ambassador to Israel and suspended joint military exercises with Israel in protest of the attack, has been demanding an international investigation into the attack on the flotilla all along. Eight Turks and one Turkish-American on the convoy’s flagship were killed by Israeli naval commandos determined to keep the flotilla’s Gaza-bound aid from reaching to shore. Just before Ban announced Israel’s acceptance of the UN panel of inquiry, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan reiterated in a phone conversation with Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu that Turkey insists on its right to an apology and compensation for the victims.
The UN Panel of Inquiry is to be chaired by former Prime Minister of New Zealand Sir Geoffrey Palmer, an international lawyer and an expert on maritime law. Palmer anticipates that chairing the inquiry be a “very challenging and demanding task.”
The outgoing President of Colombia, Alvaro Uribe, will be the panel’s Vice-Chair. Representatives of Israel and Turkey will also serve on the panel, which is to begin its work on August 10 and give Ban a progress report by mid-September.
The choice of Uribe for a prominent role on the investigative panel might seem curious. Tensions have been rising between Colombia and its neighbor Venezuela. Last week, Venezuela’s Ambassador Valero met with Ban, and presented him with a letter accusing Colombia of warlike acts. On July 23, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez severed diplomatic ties with Colombia.
The pro-American Uribe is viewed favorably by Israelis because of his criticism of Chavez, whom Uribe accuses of aiding FARC rebels. Chavez has taunted Colombia for being “the Israel of Latin America” and the US as the “evil empire.” Colombia, the largest recipient of US military and foreign aid in Latin America, granted the Pentagon the use of seven military bases last year after Ecuador refused to renew a 10 year lease on the US’s regional military base in Manta.
Colombia is one of Israel’s biggest customers in Latin America for military equipment. During a visit to Israel in at the end of April to promote expanded ties, Colombia’s Foreign Minister Jaime Bermudez told the Jerusalem Post:
Colombia and Israel have had a very long relationship and a very strong partnership, too. Both countries and our peoples have suffered and have endured, in a way, similar difficulties. At the same time, I would say that we both are resilient and determined, that we share somehow a lot in common. I would say that for us, it’s very important to make a partnership with Israel in several aspects.
Colombia employs former Israeli intelligence experts as mercenaries to fight against left wing guerillas. The UN Working Group holds mercenaries responsible for many of the human rights violations of which Colombia has been accused. Furthermore the use of mercenaries violates the United Nations International Convention against the Recruitment, Use, Financing and Training of Mercenaries, which entered into force in 2001.
In 2007, the American Jewish Committee presented Uribe with its “Light unto the Nations” Award:
“President Uribe is a staunch ally of the United States, a good friend of Israel and the Jewish people, and is a firm believer in human dignity and human development in Colombia and the Americas,” said AJC President E. Robert Goodkind, who presented the award at AJC’s Annual Dinner, held at the National Building Museum in Washington.
Under President Uribe’s tenure, Colombia has fought rebel guerillas and drug traffickers and has made a serious attempt at demobilizing the paramilitary. Colombia is the third-largest recipient of U.S. foreign aid.
“Despite many odds, President Uribe has remained committed to the pursuit of security, peace and broad-based economic growth for all Colombians,” Goodkind said. Indeed, while President Uribe and his family have personally suffered due to the violence that has long plagued Colombia, he remains committed first and foremost to curbing violence and restoring peace and security.
Goodkind noted the shared experiences of Colombia and Israel. “Both Colombia and Israel have been forced for decades to face challenges regarding their survival and their citizens have suffered the threat of terror on a daily basis,” he said. “Nevertheless, Colombians like Israelis continue tirelessly to build democratic and prosperous societies, and remain passionate about achieving peace.”
[nb: In 2009, the AJC conferred its National Human Relations Award to media magnate Rupert Murdoch.]
It’s quite obvious why Israelis would want Uribe on the UN panel. What’s in it for the Turks?
Turkey has been seeking closer diplomatic ties with Latin America and the Caribbean since the late 1980s. An “Action Plan for Latin America and the Caribbean” was prepared and put into effect in 1998. The year 2006 was declared to be the “Year of Latin America and the Caribbean.” Trade between Turkey and Latin America has more than quadrupled in the past decade. Turkey has resident embassies in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Cuba, Mexico and Venezuela, but not in Colombia–as yet.
What Turkey does have going in Colombia (besides an Inter-Parliamentary Friendship Group) is its participation in the advanced and cost-effective M60A1 battle tank, for which Colombia may be the first customer. A new joint venture announced this spring between Turkey’s procurement agency, the Undersecretariat for Defense Industries, or Savunma Sanayi Mustesarligi (SSM), and state-owned Israel Military Industries (IMI), who are teaming up to ward off at least four competitors and to sell Columbia’s military an order of tanks worth about $250 million,
The defense ministries of the two countries approved the joint venture and requisite licensing issues at the height of tensions between the Islamist government of Turkish Prime Minister Recip Erdogan and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s rightist coalition government over Israel’s early 2009 war in Gaza and disputes over Gaza, Iran and Syria.
The joint venture between IMI and Turkey’s Aselsan aims for a 50-50 work share based on Israeli electronics, subsystems and weaponry, with the bulk of production and assembly work to take place in Turkey and later under licensed production in customer countries.
So while Israeli and Turkish diplomats foreign ministry officials may be snarling at each other, it’s those guys at their respective Ministries of Defense who understand how important getting along is to the business of war.
Seen in this dim if somewhat perverse light, Uribe becomes a very suitable, if surprising, investigator and arbitrator, if not a particularly neutral one. While Uribe’s bias toward Israel is unquestionable, the participation of Colombia and Turkey on the panel may quietly yield improved ties between them, whatever the panel concludes about the Gaza flotilla.
Sir Geoffrey Palmer, however, may be the most interesting panel participant and the one who most bears watching. Palmer , who served as New Zealand’s Prime Minister for about a year (1989-90) and was appointed to the International Whaling Commission in 2002, says he was asked to take the job because he is seen as “detached and evenhanded” and New Zealand as “impartial.” (Surely any investigative panel should have at least one of those, at least on principle.) Although the panel will be based in NY, Sir Geoffrey doesn’t plan on spending very much time there, although he will travel there soon to meet with Ban and define his mission.
Nonetheless, NZ Foreign Minister Murray McCully, welcoming Palmer’s appointment, took the trouble to point out:
“He will be acting entirely as an independent expert, and in no way as a representative of the New Zealand government. Sir Geoffrey is taking on a challenging and demanding task, and I wish him well in his work – the long-term goal for this government, and for others, is an enduring peace for all in the Middle East.”
As the old saying goes, still waters run deep. Palmer has stated that “”This is a very sensitive matter. It’s a quasi-judicial inquiry, so it is really very important to maintain a sense of detachment.” Is it possible that that the understated and aloof Sir Geoffrey might actually be the one person on the panel who will make some waves if he opines, even on the narrowest technical grounds, that according to the Law of the Sea, Israel’s interception of the Gaza flotilla in international waters, was a violation of international law for which it owes Turkey a mea culpa, however half-hearted, and some cash, however nominal? This has been the Turkish demand along.
Uribe’s job, on the other hand, may be to bring Turkey back on board with the US, Israel and Colombia, if not as a partner for peace, then at least a partner in war. Zvi Bar’el of Haaretz identifies Turkey as one of two contenders (the other is Bulgaria) to host a high powered American x-band radar system to counter the threat of Iranian-launched missiles, described in this past Sunday’s Washington Post. Furthermore, Bar’el writes, “Turkey could also receive Patriot anti-missile systems from the U.S., while Turkish press reports suggest plans in the country to acquire long-range offensive missiles from its American ally.”
There’s much more truth than humor in the old joke that advises a young lawyer starting out: “When the facts are on your side, pound the facts. When the law is on your side, pound the law. And when neither the facts or the law are on your side, pound the table.”
Israel has agreed to join the panel because it’s sure that the facts are on its side: not necessarily concerning what did or didn’t happen in the assault on the Mavi Marmara, but rather the fact that Israeli technology is inextricably embedded in almost every weapons system and piece of military technology the US produces and sells to its allies. Through Israel, Turkey has the opportunity to actively participate in that military technology network.
Turks are invoking the Law of the Sea in defense of the Turkish-led Gaza flotilla at the very point in the twenty-first century when maritime law is ripe for reinterpretation. The resurgence of piracy off the African coast; the sanctions against Iran that call for inspection of ships in the Persian Gulf that might be providing Iran with dual use good and other articles forbidden by western fiat; the damage done by oil companies to bodies of water and ecosystems far from their home offices; and the massive aircraft carriers, nuclear submarines and giant oil tanker platforms that have been silently redefining the notion of territorial waters may give even the most modest interpretation about the actions of Gaza flotilla–and Israel’s handling of it–long-term and long-distance significance. The Washington Post reports that the US Navy has been deploying Aegis-class destroyers and cruisers equipped with ballistic missile defense systems in the Mediterranean Sea for the past year.
The ships, featuring octagonal Spy-1 radars and arsenals of Standard Missile-3 interceptors, will form the backbone of Obama’s shield in Europe.
Unlike fixed ground-based interceptors, which were the mainstay of the Bush missile defense plan for Europe, Aegis ships are mobile and can easily move to areas considered most at risk of attack.
Another advantage is that Aegis ships can still be used for other missions, such as hunting pirates or submarines, instead of waiting for a missile attack that may never materialize.
These are the facts that will underlie and shape the findings of the UN Panel.
Don’t like them? Pound the table.
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