Galway Free Palestine Campaign : The schizophrenic "morality" of the EU towards Palestine
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Monday June 23, 2008 18:46
by TD - Free Palestine Campaign
"The morality of the issue or the suffering of the Palestinians would not move ... Obama (Ilan Pappe)
Commendably, Minister of State for Overseas Development, Peter Power on 19th June announced a funding package of €241,000 for the NGO, Medical Aid for Palestinians, the funds to be used for a maternal and child health outreach programme in the Nahr El Bared Palestinian refugee camp in Lebanon with Mr Power promising to further support the Palestinian refugee population.
Commendably, to encourage "democratic" reforms in beleaguered Cuba, on the same date, the EU agreed to scrap sanctions with EU External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner opining to reporters that: "Of course there is clear language on human rights, on the detention of prisoners." Reprehensibly ...
when it comes to Palestine, the "clear language" and actions of the EU towards Israel is corrupted in a fog of hypocrisy and tokenism and if the Commissioner is exercised with the "detention of prisoners," then Israel's detention of some 11,000 Palestinians should be the stimulant to her conscience, for her not to stand hypocritically by and do something effective.?
It's the schizophrenic "morality" of the EU and Irish government that the Free Palestine Campaign addresses with our petition calling on the EU to suspend or terminate the Euro Med Agreement - which economically privileges Israel - until such time as Israel mends its criminality of which Ilan Pappe, in a recent Electronic Intifada interview is not hopeful: "I still think the worst moment was 1948 and the ethnic cleansing; but it is very bad indeed. It is the final stages of the Israeli unilateral attempt to divide the West Bank into two parts, one annexed to Israel and the other maintained as a big prison camp, or a Bantustan at best. The situation in the Gaza Strip is worse, there the "prison" is already in place, and because of the resistance by the Palestinians to the imprisonment, Israel launches an escalating policy of massive killings. The world seems indifferent, and the Arab world uninterested." http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article9634.shtml
Besides the question of Palestine being the "moral issue of our age" (Nelson Mandela) it is also the beam in the blind eye of the EU which instead of terminating the Agreement and initiating immediate effective sanctions is actively in the process of cosseting that country further under the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) , true to hypocritical form "Ireland is one of several countries which, while supportive of an enhanced EU relationship with Israel, believes this must be linked to progress in the peace process." says the Irish government fresh after its refusal to press for the suspension of the Euro-Med Agreement when Dermot Ahern was at the helm of the Ministry for Foreign Affairs.
Besides buying feel-good hypocrisy with the €241,000 for Medical Aid for Palestinians the Irish government and EU should reflect on the murderous racist obscenity that is Zionism, from the opinion of South African Minister, Ronnie Kasrils: "Can Israeli oppression of the Palestinians from 1948 onwards, and the dreadful occupation, now be compared to apartheid? Actually it's far, far worse." to maybe to just one racist salient fact that the Israeli High Court has sanctioned the use of live ammunition on peaceful Palestinian protestors, only barring its use when foreign nationals and Israeli Activists are present but which hasn't inhibited the Israeli Occupying Forces, however, as evidenced in Bil'in when Ibrahim Burnat, was shot three times in the thigh when internationals were present at last weeks protest. See Youtube Video
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A pretty one sided posting ignoring such material facts as the very high level of EU aid to the PA and for the the Palestinians people generally. The EU engages with both sides - you want it to engage with one only and ignore the Israelis and you excoriate it if it does not do what you want. As regards the prisoners the Cuban prisoners are prisoners of conscience. They are in jail for what they think. That is not the case with the Palestinians detainees.
Not the case, "Sceptic," of what I want, more the case of the EU adhering to the Essential Element Clause of its Euro-Mediterranean Agreement with Israel: "Relations between the Parties, as well as all the provisions of the Agreement itself, shall be based on respect for human rights and democratic principles, which guides their internal and international policy and constitutes an essential element of this Agreement." and Israel's “waves of arbitrary arrests, incommunicado detention, torture and unfair trials" (Amnesty International), I put it to you, don't constitute "respect for human rights and democratic principles," and to paraphrase Ronnie Kasrils are much, much worse than Cuba's errancy on these matters, ?
With its "very high level of EU aid to the PA and for the the Palestinians people generally," the EU is hypocritically running with the hare, with its refusal to kybosh the Euro-Med Agreement and institute comprehensive sanctions against Israel it is running with the Zionist hounds.?
Barack Obama speaking to the expatriate Cuban community in Miami on 23 May promised to continue the 47-year crippling embargo on Cuba that has been declared illegal by the UN year after year,
Obama also promised to support an “undivided Jerusalem” as Israel’s capital - as John Pilger points out in his excellent New Statesman article; "Not a single government on earth supports the Israeli annexation of all of Jerusalem, including the Bush regime, which recognises the UN resolution designating Jerusalem an international city".
In a speech to the Israeli lobby AIPAC, Obama moved to the right of Israel’s government by ruling out negotiations with Hamas. A day earlier, he told Cuban exile groups that he would only sit down with Raul Castro if the exiles had a seat at the table, a precondition that Cuba will never agree to.
Obama also refused to criticize Israel's recent practise bombing run in the Mediterranean and accompanying threats to launch massive air attacks on Iran failing to even urge restraint.
I hate to have to break this to you, but "democracy" is not about making wise, just, good, etc. etc. decisions.
It is about making the decisions that "the people" want, for good OR ill --- for however self interested they are deciding, etc. etc.
Obama is running for election, seeking the votes of the people. The reality is .............
1) There are people who will be more likely to vote for him if he is very pro Israel. His opponent will face the same problem. There are very few people in the US who will vote AGAINST a candidate because "too pro Israel" (that might be a minor consideration among any, not the deciding factor).
2) There are people (namely the Cuban exiles, they VOTE remember) who will vote for or against a candidate based solely on this issue. There very few to no people who get to vote here on the other side of this issue (it's a "don't give a damn" for everybody else). Of course there are a fvery ew socialists and/or communists here and they vote but that's irrelevant for any Democrat or Republican as for a candiate from these parties, regardless of position on Cuba, won't be getting votes from socialists or communists.
REMEBER -- our system over here isn't based upon getting the max for some majority coalition. It's designed around ensuring that minority interests can perhaps negotiate SOME of what they want -- in exchange for supporting a lot of what the coalition wants. Our coalitions are very loose/undisciplined cpompared to those of parliamentary form of democracy.
You see this most clearly with the "Cuba" issue. There is no majority SUPPORT for the policy (of the last many decades) but our system doesn't depend upon that. The key thing is that there is very little support for something different while at the same time there is support from a determined small minority FOR the policy. In this country, a minority can get what it wants if:
a) It doesn't want very many things and is willing to accept almost anything on other issues.
b) Isn't actively opposed by a counterbalancing interest group.
Most Americans don't WANT the current (and longstanding) policy on Cuba but it's not an issue they give much of a damn about, not one on which to get their way they would be willing to expend a drop of their politcal clout. The Cuban exile community may be small, but this is about all they care about, and while small nationally they are concentrated in one state (go against them and you will NOT get elected as Senator from Florida)
The conflicts in the Middle East emanate from the "perverse and hateful ideologies of radical Islam." ?
See Related Link
Obama addressing the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) forum on Foreign Policy in Chicago, March 2007.
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