11 - 17 April 2002
Issue No.581
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Al-Ahram Weekly Online 11 - 17 April 2002 Issue No.581 |
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More than words
Editorials from around the world are brimming with sympathy for the Palestinians, but what is really needed is action, writes Gamal Nkrumah
Worse than the news of Israeli atrocities against the Palestinians is the failure of the world to stop the Israelis. "The whole world is demanding that Israel withdraws," said United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan as he urged Israel to implement recent UN resolutions calling for both an immediate cease-fire and the withdrawal of Israeli troops. Russian Ambassador to the UN Sergei Lavrov, the current head of the Security Council, condemned Israeli incursions into Palestinian territories.
Yes, compassion for the Palestinians suffuses editorials from around the world as do statements by international leaders. But reading between the lines, there is more than a hint that little can be done without superpower intervention.
Clear signs have emerged, in the past few weeks, of a consensus in world opinion against the escalation of Israeli aggression in the West Bank. The strongest public condemnation of Israel's Operation Protective Wall has come from the government statements, press editorials and commentaries in Africa and Asia. While, in the United States in particular and to some extent Europe, government and mainstream media condemnation of Israel has been somewhat limp. Sharp criticism of Israel's clampdown was voiced from unexpected quarters, as well as from China and the Non-Aligned Movement bigwigs like India, Pakistan, Indonesia and South Africa, traditional sympathisers of the Palestinian cause.
South Africa spoke out strongly against Israeli atrocities. In January, the South African President Thabo Mbeki hosted a peace conference to which leading Palestinian and Israeli political personalities and intellectuals were invited. During a meeting on Friday, South African Deputy Foreign Minister Aziz Pahad stressed to the Israeli ambassador, Tova Herzl, that Israel must implement UN Security Council Resolution 1402, which commands Israel and the Palestinians to agree an immediate cease-fire.
Pahad also condemned Israel's refusal to permit diplomats and their representatives to enter Ramallah, where Arafat is currently besieged in his makeshift headquarters, and he demanded that Israel lift the ban. "The South African government believes that Israel has no right or jurisdiction to refuse our diplomatic representative to Palestine access to our Mission in Ramallah," Pahad told Al-Ahram Weekly. "Israel's attempts to isolate and humiliate President Arafat are a grave error," he said, stressing that Arafat remains central to a political solution to the Middle East crisis. "The unprecedented adoption of two UN Security Council resolutions within a week demonstrates that the international community will not condone the continuation of massive Israeli military aggression against Palestinian towns and cities," Pahad continued.
South Africa's Minister of Foreign Affairs Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, who attended the recent Arab League summit in Beirut as the representative of the Non- Aligned Movement (NAM), warned against the "flagrant violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention" by Israel. She demanded that "urgent, firm and effective steps be taken in order to secure the rights of the Palestinian people to sovereign statehood." Dlamini-Zuma especially regretted Israel's "obstruction of medical assistance" to wounded Palestinians.
Dlamini-Zuma paid special tribute to Yasser Arafat and expressed NAM's unqualified and wholehearted support for the Palestinian leader. As the Palestinian death toll mounts, she stated that, "NAM condemns the use of disproportionate force against the civilian population by the Israeli occupation force."
Another NAM giant, India, concurred. Indian Foreign Minister Jaswant Singh phoned Arafat to express "India's deep distress" at the "unacceptable" situation. He assured Arafat that, "India stood by the people of Palestine in their hour of need." Singh also spoke to Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres and stressed that the incarceration of Arafat was "compounding difficulties."
Not to be outdone, China joined the chorus of condemnation. Chinese Foreign Minister Tang Jiaxuan welcomed US Secretary of State Colin Powell's Middle East tour and hoped that it will reverse the dangerous situation. Tang, who also held telephone talks with Yasser Arafat and the Secretary-General of the Arab League Amr Moussa, expressed his deep concern and worry "about the escalation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict." Tang urged Israel to "implement UN Security Council resolutions, withdraw all troops from Palestine and lift the siege of President Arafat."
Even the staunchest US allies in Asia, such as Japan, beseeched Washington to intervene and stop Israel's ruthless reoccupation of Palestinian autonomous territories. Japan believes that the Middle East crisis can only be resolved through a political settlement that ends the Israeli reoccupation of the territories.
Japanese Foreign Minister Yoriko Kawagushi dispatched Hiroshi Shigeta, Japan's ambassador to Israel and her special envoy to the Middle East, last month to try and persuade Israelis and Palestinians to stop the violence. Kawagushi also held telephone talks with Powell and called on the US to stop Israel and the Palestinians fighting. She asked Powell "not to be tolerant of Israeli military action."
The Japanese media were even more critical of the Israelis than the Japanese government. "What is most troubling is that there appears to be no strategy involved in this madness. Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has spoken only of beating the Palestinians into submission," wrote the Japan Times. It blamed Israel for the escalation of violence. "[The Israelis] built settlements despite promises to desist and with the knowledge that those projects rendered a viable Palestinian state untenable, " the paper explained. But the Palestinians were not entirely exonerated. "Palestinian suicide bombers have introduced an element of savagery and fear that Israelis have never known before," noted the Japan Times editorial.
Boldly, the influential Japanese paper wrote of the "failure of the US to play the role that the world expects of it." Like the Japanese government, the media has egged Washington on to restrain Israel. "Does [Sharon] really think he can solve the conflict with tanks and missiles? Doesn't he understand that military force, the most expedient means to the end at hand, is also the most dangerous?" asked an Asahi Shimbun commentator. "I wish for the revival of the power of words in Israel to replace its ready recourse to military force," he concluded.
However, more than indignation and sympathy, action is now needed. As Dlamini-Zuma so aptly put it, "this is a defining moment in world affairs."
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