25 April - 1 May 2002
Issue No.583
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Al-Ahram Weekly Online 25 April - 1 May 2002 Issue No.583 |
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Racism gains
Iason Athanasiadis on the week the Middle East conflict washed up on Europe's shores
European Union foreign policy supremo Javier Solana provided a surprisingly mild encomium to Secretary of State Powell's visit, last week, saying, "Secretary Powell has done what he was able to do at this point in time. But we have to continue supporting his mission, this mission is not over."
Solana's comments, a far cry from European Commission President Romano Prodi's recent announcement that "It is clear (US) mediation efforts have failed and we need new mediation," reflect Europe's cautious approach to Middle East diplomacy. The EU, while seeking to complement its generous economic role with a political presence, tempers its statements with a hesitancy to contradict the US or call Israel to account.
But the ongoing revelations of the scale of the tragedy in Jenin was a trigger that prompted the international community to make a more concerted push towards sending an international peace-keeping force to the region. UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan made a call for an armed multinational force in the Palestinian territories. However, he was vetoed by the US ambassador to the UN, John Negroponte, who stated that he would veto an Arab-sponsored draft resolution asking Annan to investigate "the full scope of the tragic events that have taken place in the Jenin refugee camp." The draft expressed shock at the "massacre" in Jenin, called on Israel to respect the 1949 Geneva Convention on protecting civilians in wartime and asked for "an international presence that could help provide better conditions on the ground."
Meanwhile, Danish Foreign Minister Per Stig Moeller called on Friday for a United Nations-led investigation of the events in the Jenin camp to clarify whether Israeli forces had violated human rights. Moeller argued that even if Israel had been acting in self-defence its forces were excessive in their reaction to the Palestinian resistance. He added he would discuss the proposal with his 14 European Union colleagues.
As accounts of Israeli atrocities inside the Jenin refugee camp swamped the international media, the EU voiced strong concern about reports that grave human rights violations had occurred.
"(The EU) finds the reports of the events which happened at the Jenin camp very alarming. If they are confirmed, they will have very serious consequences," the EU announced in a terse statement issued in Madrid, which currently holds the presidency of the 15-nation bloc. It did not go into details.
UN Middle East envoy Terje Larsen weighed in with strident criticism of the Jenin operation. Following a visit to the ravaged camp, he described the sight as "horrific beyond belief" and denounced Israel's obstruction of rescue teams and ambulances from entering the camp as "morally repugnant."
"It is totally unacceptable that the government of Israel for 11 days did not allow search and rescue teams to come," Larsen added.
"(The camp) is totally destroyed; it looks like an earthquake has hit it," he said. "I am watching two brothers pull their father from the ruins; the stench of death is horrible. We are seeing a 12-year-old boy being dug out, totally burned," he said. "We have expert people here who have been in war zones and earthquakes and they say they have never seen anything like it."
Larsen's comments caused a political storm in Israel and he came in for harsh criticism at a cabinet meeting. Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres, however, rejected calls for declaring the UN envoy persona non grata and expelling him from Israel.
Sunday's surprise electoral success of Jean- Marie Le Pen, the leader of France's right- wing Front Nationale, came just as the country was recovering from the worst outbreak of anti-Semitism in the recent past. The right-wing politician's electoral win caused the country to reel back in shock and question the multi-cultural identity it has been projecting. Le Pen, a right-wing nationalist who has called for the limiting of immigration into France and is infamous for once describing the Holocaust as a "detail" of history, appears, in his statements, more threatening to France's Arabs than its Jews.
The Israeli Maariv daily said that Le Pen's success could "provoke a chain reaction in other countries and stoke the rise of fascist and anti-immigrant feeling." Another Israeli paper, Haaretz, wrote about a "historic success for the extreme right," and also stressed that Le Pen had benefited from support by France's Jewish community. In an interview with Haaretz Le Pen said he "totally understands the state of Israel which is seeking to defend its citizens in cracking down on the Palestinians." He added that "Fortunately there will never be Islamic unity."
An EU-Mediterranean meeting that took place in Valencia on Monday and Tuesday ended inconclusively, with few advances in economic or political cooperation between the EU member states and associate Arab countries and Israel. The meeting seemed doomed to failure from the start, as Syria and Lebanon announced that they would not be attending, Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres delayed his arrival until Monday evening citing "technical problems" and Arab delegates stormed out of the conference hall when Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Michael Melchior took the stand. A German diplomat commented that Monday's walkout showed "a discussion between Israel and Arab nations now is not possible."
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