To the European parliaments members

international | eu | opinion/analysis Thursday February 26, 2004 20:43 by Silvia Cattori PY Salingue silviacattori at yahoo dot it

Many of you believe that this resolution is crucial in the Palestinian conflict, however you have voted on it without consulting with the Friends of Palestine. It may have been that you were busy in the preparation for Geneva Accords while voting for this resolution. It may be that now you will doubt your vote. The resolution that you have supported violates the basic legitimate Palestinians rights to “terminate the occupation”, and the right of return, which is recognized under international law

To the European parliaments members

who voted for a disgraceful resolution

that squandered the rights of Palestinians

Translated from French



On October 23rd 2003, the European Parliament adopted by a large majority a resolution known as “Peace and Dignity in the Middle East”.

Many of you believe that this resolution is crucial in the Palestinian conflict, however you have voted on it without consulting with the Friends of Palestine. It may have been that you were busy in the preparation for Geneva Accords while voting for this resolution. It may be that now you will doubt your vote. The resolution that you have supported violates the basic legitimate Palestinians rights to “terminate the occupation”, and the right of return, which is recognized under international law.

We will address some aspects of this resolution to show how detrimental this resolution is for the Palestinian victims.

· “Peace and Dignity in the Middle East” condemns and rejects all acts of terrorism committed by any Palestinian organization, against Israeli people, and demands the Palestinian authority to fight without mercy these terrorist acts, until such organizations are destroyed.

· Declares victims of Palestinian terrorism as innocent victims whether they are civil or military and condemns terrorism as impeding the peace process.

· Requests the Palestinian Authority to adopt a reasonable approach concerning the question of the right of return, which affects around 4, 5 million Palestinian people. The solution must be fair and even handed, suitable to all concerned parties. The solution should take into consideration the fact that not all Palestinian refugees can come back to their places of origin. It must also take into account the demographic concern of Israel.

You were of the opinion that you knew how to resolve in the best way the questions and the problems of humanity. You must have been surprised by the reaction of the Palestinian Refugees, who do not seem to appreciate the sacrifices that again are asked from them. You may be surprised that Palestinian Refugees obstinately do not want to understand that the time has come for them to start to think in reasonable and realistic way, which simply means, to give up their right to return.

It may be that your evaluation of the facts on the ground was wrong.

It is obvious that Palestinian people longs for peace, exhausted after years of military occupation. However this peace cannot be achieved by surrendering their rights. The large majority of Palestinians understands that this kind of peace will lead to more suffering, destructions, and violence.

The negotiations that may be based on this resolution ask the Palestinians to abandon all their rights that they have fought for during last 55 years.

You failed to differentiate between the opinion of the Palestinian elite and the opinion of the vast majority of the Palestinian people; those from the refugees camps, from the occupied villages and from the destroyed areas. The vast population did not benefit from the Oslo peaceful process. This process of endless negotiations only benefited to the Palestinian elite.

The second Intifada was a movement, which aimed to overthrow the corrupt elite, which misused the international donor’s money. Unfortunately the Intifada failed to achieve its target.

Today you want to force the Palestinian people, who already have sacrificed a lot and suffered a lot as a result of corruption and betrayal, to accept any outcome of the negotiations. This kind of negotiations is rejected by the majority of the Palestinian people.

When you voted for this resolution, you dealt with the friends of Palestine and the solidarity movements with Palestinians, in the same manner you dealt with the Palestinian people. You failed to consult both the Palestinians and the solidarity movements.

The weird fact is that you think that you can resolve all the problems of Palestinian without consulting them.

A parliamentarian who voted the text may manipulate a simple citizen. If any person criticizes the resolution, it can be easily argue within the framework of the resolution that such criticism is one sided and exaggerated. The response could be in the form of: “We are against occupation. We are against an excessive use of force by the army. We are in solidarity with the pilots, who object to their missions in the Occupied Territories. We are with prisoners` rights, for the removal of settlements…” As such the layman who criticizes, will be told: you are exaggerating…

The problem is that within the resolution you have voted, the word settlements is not used in a way that reflects the reality of it a s a tool of colonialism. The resolution did not request the destruction of the wall of security. The resolution simply asked Israel to stop building the wall or to ensure that while building, it will not affect the final border of the future Palestinian state.

What is obvious is that the result of such a resolution fails to safeguard the rights of Palestinian people but rather just protect the rights of the Palestinian elite; the privileged from Ramallah and Jerusalem. They are in a hurry to negotiate to regain the power and the profitable deals interrupted by the second Intifada.

The Palestinian elite is jubilant about such negotiations, especially that President Bush favors, such negotiations, as it will help in the creation of the future cooperation between all the partners and in the creation of the free market zone in the region. Additionally to this cooperation, all the parties will cooperate in the battle against the illegal immigration, crimes and terrorism.

You must be happy to have amended the resolution in order to support t the Geneva Accords.

But this resolution is a win – lose game, and not a zero sum game.

You permitted yourself to abolish a right to return. The concept of right to return is recognized under the declaration of Human Rights, under the International Convention of Political and Civil Rights, and under the United Nations resolutions 194. But no reference to any of the above was made in your resolution.

Your resolution also failed to differentiate between resistance and terrorism. As such the resolution requests the repression of all kinds of the resistance, and by that denies the right to end the occupation.

Your resolution also recognizes the demographic concerns of Israel, as such you are promoting the demographic preference of one nation and the ideology of Zionist and Jewish state.

The adoption of the resolution had a perfect timing, as it leads toward the Geneva Accords. While the focus on public attention was on the details of the Geneva Accords, no attention was given to the crimes committed by Israel in the Occupied Territories.

Nowadays any aid granted by United States is conditional on fighting terrorism. Both: your resolution and Geneva Accords failed to differentiate between resistance and terrorism. As such, any aid that may be given to the Palestinian non-governmental organizations will be based on the same condition. By that, your resolution and Geneva Accords adopt the ideology of United States. In the same view, any opposition to the resolution, by Palestinian people or the friends of Palestinian people and the solidarity movements, will be considered as an act against peace.

It is a high time to decide whether we speak about terrorism, or resistance, simple implantations or colonies, the security wall or the apartheid wall, demographic concerns of Israel or the legitimate right to return…

Silvia Cattori and Pierre-Yves Salingue

15 Februry 2004