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by Peter A. Belmont / 2010-09-30
© 2010 Peter Belmont
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The UN and EU and Arab states (and US’s newly independent southern neighbors, and on and on) have ignored the Israel/Palestine conflict’s intractable refusal to resolve until now, doubtless in large part because of US pressure.
The US and Israel now agree (in practice if not in pronouncements) that the path to peace is closed for the indefinite future. The US ignores the illegality of settlements and cannot even halt the building of new settlement housing.
Will this be enough of a signal (or threat) to other interests to move other nations to action?
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The nations of the world have seen the USA and Israel sabotage efforts toward peace for 43 years. Most of that time there has been at least a semblance of a peace process (that is, stage-craft called a “peace process”). Recent events have shown this semblance to be less even than illusiory (Israel’s wall and its refusal to comply with international law as set forth by the International Court of Justice by removing the wall, the settlements generally—all illegal at international law, Israel’s strangling siege of the prison which is Gaza, the Gaza horror of 2009, the events relating to the blockade-running ship Mavi Marmara, Israel’s straightforward refusal to stop increasing settlement building, and the US’s last and best hope for new political will (Obama’s fine initial statements) seen defeated by the Israel Lobby or a false front from the first).
The EU has long made weak noises calling for an end to settlements (or a freeze on new settlement building) and otherwise expressing an interest in a just and lasting peace. But the EU’s occasional words have never been accompanied by any sort of actions.
Israel has not had to pay any sort of price for its intransigence. The civil-society efforts called the BDS movement (boycotts, sanctions, and divestment) are too new and too small to count for much, although they are the only game in town right now—the enforcement of international law having been fully abandoned by the UN and the international community. “What, me worry?” the nations seem to say. Even the phenomena associated with Al-Qaida seem to have aroused merely a defensive response but not a thoughtful inquiry into causes.
I would like to think that the EU would be likely to step in where the USA has proven powerless to tread, seeking by real pressure to move Israel toward compliance with international law and, eventually, toward ending the occupations (and claimed annexations) of 1967.
As the USA is increasingly shown to be a paper tiger (its wars in Iraq and Afghanistan failing and known to have failed) and its debt to China mushrooming to a point where the USA will come to be seen as a vassal of China’s, the fear to oppose USA policy which has heretofore kept other nations from attempting to coerce Israel will be reduced.
The USA will hardly utter a cry to the EU for help (any more than the Israeli peace camp, now only of blessed memory, ever called upon the USA for the help of tough love which alone could have ended Israel’s imperialism), but the EU and others may begin to feel that the injustices of Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians and the dangers of Arab and Islamic anger at the West for supporting Israel may—when taken together—constitute sufficient motivation to take steps, long suppressed by the USA, to coerce Israel toward compliance with law and peace making.
To be clear, Israeli compliance with law would mean removing all 550,000 settlers from all occupied territories and keeping them out for so long as the occupation continues. It would mean removing the apartheid wall from occupied territory, It would mean lifting the siege on Gaza.
For all the 62 years of its lifetime as a state, Israel has played the game that children play with their doting parents, misbehaving and waiting to see if they will be prevented from doing so (or actually punished for doing so). Until today, they have seen that there is full immunity and impunity. And so on and on they go, acting worse and worse. Is this like car speeding toward a brick wall which will stop it? Or is it a wonderful joyride, time without end? Only history will answer this question.
There is no chance that the Palestinians or even the Arab countries together have the economic or any other clout sufficient to rein Israel in. The EU, Russia, Turkey, Brazil, India, etc., could impose trade sanctions and these, I believe, would be sufficient to bring Israel to heel. Sadly, what with USA pressure to allow Israel all latitude in all matters, these nations have so far elected not to act.
How bad will matters have to get before opposition to the USA-Israeli axis of evil blossoms?
We will have to wait and see.
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