Hapless French Foreign Minister unwittingly provides portrait of European weakness as he patronises and condemns Israel (I translate here his interview today with a French newspaper)
In an interview with the French newspaper Journal du Dimanche on Saturday, French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner outlines his views on the Dubai assassination of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh. He also talks about the desirability of Europe and the international community recognising a Palestinian state regardless of whether Israel gives its consent and even before agreement has been reached on the state’s borders.
I offer my translation from the original French of those parts of the interview which deal with Israel and make some comments of my own below it. I submit that both the questions and the answers provide stark illustration of many of the guiding assumptions of French policy in the Middle East.
Here is my translation with the headline and the questions in bold:
Kouchner: “A Palestinian state, quickly”
Is Israel a rogue state that uses the passports of friendly countries to execute its enemies?
We condemn targeted assassinations and the use of forgeries. The agents [who killed al-Mabhouh] did not, contrary to the situation with the Brits, steal the identities of our nationals but they did use a false French passport and a false name. We condemn this unreservedly.
Where could this crisis between Europe and Israel lead?
What needs to happen to get beyond this crisis is to affirm the political role of Europe in quickly laying down the conditions for the peace process and the creation of a Palestinian state. To receive Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, with whom I will be dining on Sunday, is to support a man who
holds the keys to the two state solution. The question of the moment is the construction of a new reality: France is training Palestinian police officers, enterprises are investing in the West Bank…Further, one could envisage the speedy proclamation of a Palestinian state and its immediate recognition by the international community even before negotiations on its borders. I would be glad to see this happen. However, I am not confident that other European countries would follow me on this, and I’m not even confident I’d be right. [NB: This last bit does not appear to make much sense in French either.]
Does this affair [the assassination in Dubai] tell us something about the kind of country Israel is becoming?
It tells us of the immediate necessity for peace and a Palestinian state. An Israel living in peace will fully rediscover the values on which it was founded and for the sake of which we support its security and its existence — for which we support Israel itself.
————-
The interview then trails off into other subjects. So, here are some thoughts on what Kouchner said:
1) In the first and particularly the last answer, we have a clear illustration of France’s belief in its moral superiority over Israel. As I say in my book (link below), west European opinion formers and senior politicians operate on the seemingly unshakeable assumption that they hold the moral high ground. They are doing the judging. Note also the assumptions loaded into the questions: Israel as a potential “rogue state” in the first question; the tut-tutting, when-will-they-ever-learn tone of the last question. The response to that last question also reveals a world view which regards robust self-defence as something contrary to respectable values. In asserting French superiority Kouchner unwittingly provides a quotable example of the pathological weakness of French and west European civilisation.
2) This entire interview pegs off the assassination in Dubai of a Hamas operative seeking to purchase arms from Iran. It does not occur to Kouchner that vast amounts of European aid money have been pouring into Hamas ruled Gaza in recent years, thus freeing up resources for Hamas to purchase weapons to use against Israel. This European aid could thus be construed as an indirect cross subsidy to Hamas. Now, this does not mean that Europe is definitely wrong to provide aid to the Palestinians in Gaza. The issue is complex. But an intelligent and constructive observer should be able to see that Israel is in an immensely difficult situation when it comes to everything to do with Gaza — from economic sanctions, through operations such as Cast Lead, to its approach to terrorists such as Mahmoud al-Mabhouh. Kouchner merely berates Israel for assassinating al-Mabhouh while offering literally nothing to indicate he understands the nature of the problem.
3) Which brings us to the centre-piece of his remarks: his preference for a unilateral declaration of statehood by the Palestinians regardless of what Israel thinks. This, of course, is the plan advocated by Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad. But it has multiple problems: First, Fayyad is even more marginal (if that is in fact humanly possible) in Palestinian society than Mahmoud Abbas. Any plan associated with either or both of them would stand little chance of being accepted by the main Palestinian factions including those within Fatah. Second, and following from this, there is even a risk that a unilateral declaration of statehood could provoke civil war between the Palestinians. The risk is real because a unilateral declaration of statehood would imply a level of de facto recognition of Israel that would go well beyond the insincere paper declarations of the Oslo era. Hamas (to name just one group) is unlikely to be impressed. This brings us to the third problem. In the face of that risk, it is vital that any move to a two state solution has the full support of the Israelis. If Israel is not involved, let alone if Israel decides to take an active role against such a development, failure is guaranteed. Kouchner and all those supporting moves to exclude Israel from the equation have not thought the arguments through. They thus risk making a difficult situation worse.
So, to summarise all this in a single word: clueless.
Have a good weekend.
To read the article in the French original, click here:
http://www.lejdd.fr/International/Actualite/Kouchner-Vite-un-Etat-palestinien-173756/
To go to my book on Amazon UK, click here:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/State-Beyond-Pale-Europes-Problem/dp/0297856642/ref=pd_sim_b_1
To go to my book on Amazon US, click here:
Tags: Israel
February 21st, 2010 at 11:08 am
Western leaders live in a world of delusion. Haven’t they heard the recent Shabaneh revelations ? They’re in danger of delivering the West Bank to Hamas on a plate.
Fatah is corrupt to the core and deeply unpopular, while Hamas are a bunch of bearded Islamo-fascist loonies. Are there any decent people on the Palestinian side ? Why is the West so blind ?
February 21st, 2010 at 3:04 pm
In your second set of thoughts you wrote:
“It does not occur to Kouchner that vast amounts of European aid money have been pouring into Hamas ruled Gaza in recent years, thus freeing up resources for Hamas to purchase weapons to use against Israel.”
Well, looking back on European behaviour, every time the Arabs and/or the Palestinians got themselves into a fix vis a vis Israel the Europeans and America immediately rushed to comfort the spoiled child swamping it in funds.
After so many times it appears that they do this on purpose, revitalising the aggression to continue the pressure on the Israelis/Jews.
February 21st, 2010 at 8:13 pm
The name Fatah mean “Conquest”. That doesn’t sound moderate to me .
February 22nd, 2010 at 2:08 am
Khalid Abu Toameh, who is in a far better position to talk about the feasability of a two state solution (ie: Israel and Palestine each with secure borders) than Kouchner says the conditions absolutely aren’t present at this time, and that western support for Fatah is terribly misplaced as it continues to be rotten to the core. KAT says what the west should be doing is fostering the development of a new, secular political movement in Palestine that would provide Palestinians with a choice other than either/or of rottenly corrupt Fatah / murderous theocratic fascist Hamas.
February 23rd, 2010 at 2:41 pm
Well, on my part I tend to think that Kouchner is a terribly naive, mis-, or underinformed, sorry, idiot. Right in the league of Miliband. (Perhaps Miliband is more outright hostile to Israel than Kouchner, “thanks” to this former’s “lover of Zion” family background.)
But curious how France and Sarko, of all states, talk about “extrajudicial” killing now. Actually this is rather amusing. What was it they tempered with in New Zealand’s port a decade ago against Greenpeace activists? Greenpeace activists, Hello! The French secret services muredered at least one innocent! Not an arms-dealer terrorist with a past of several killings! You must love the hypocrisy! In fact this is even beyond he “usual” realm of hypocrisy.
Read the writer/journalist Jonathan Fenby’s “France on the brink” (subtitle: The problem with France - I have the book) about the orbital hatred Chirac’s campaign of nuclear tests in the middle of the Pacific Ocean at Muroroa triggered all around the world in 1995…