Libyan Aid Ship Extracts Concessions from Israel;
Resumption of House Demolitions in Jerusalem
Posted on July 15, 2010 by Juan
Al-Sharq al-Awsat [The Middle
East] reports in Arabic that the Libyan aid ship, Amaltheal
(“Hope” or Amal in Arabic) docked late Wednesday at al-Arish in Egypt,
bearing 2000 tons of aid supplies for the Palestinians.
The ship’s odyssey from Greece was marked by uncertainty and danger
for the 21 passengers. It developed a mechanical problem that made it
move very slowly on Wednesday. There was a question about whether its
captain might try to take it right into Gaza, which is blockaded by the
Israeli military. At one point the ship was surrounded by 8 Israeli war
vessels.
Intensive diplomatic efforts were launched to convince the Libyan
government and the Qadhafi Foundation to divert the ship to al-Arish.
The USG Open Source Center translated a report of the Voice of Israel Network B
broadcast on Wednesday:
‘ The Jewish-Austrian businessman Martin Schlaff is
mediating between Israel and the Al-Qhadhafi fund in the efforts to
prevent the Libyan ship from reaching the Gaza Strip. This was what our
Arab affairs correspondent Eran Singer was told by Arab diplomatic
sources. Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman’s bureau refused to comment
on the alleged diplomatic contacts regarding the Libyan ship and would
therefore neither confirm nor deny the report. Our correspondent
reports that businessman Martin Schlaff maintains close contacts with
the Libyan authorities and is also known for his ties to Minister
Lieberman.’
Aljazeera English has video, including from a correspondent aboard the
al-Amal:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Ny7dYIOI4o
The Israeli power elite viewed the outcome as a victory. The USG
Open Source Center translates a Hebrew language report from the Voice of Israel
Network B, broadcast on Wednesday, July 14, 2010:
Deputy Foreign Minister Dani Ayalon said that Israel
can chalk up a victory in its dealings with the Libyan ship. He said
that the fact that the United States and EU had urged the ship’s
captain to accede to Israel’s demands granted legitimacy to the
latter’s policy. Ayalon told Network B’s anchor Arye Golan this morning
that the determination shown by Israel toward the previous flotilla had
contributed to its effective policy. As for the possibility of Egypt
inspecting the ship’s cargo and then shipping it to the Gaza Strip,
Ayalon clarified that Egypt and Israel had a shared interest in
preventing HAMAS’s military buildup in the Gaza Strip. ‘
Contrary to what the far rightwing ideologue Ayalon asserted, the incident was
no victory for Israel. al-Quds al-Arabi reports in Arabic
that the Qadhafi Foundation is maintaining that it extracted several
concessions from Israel in return for diverting to the Egyptian port,
including a pledge that travel abroad for treatment of ill Palestinians
in Gaza would be expedited and reconstruction projects would be allowed
to go forward (one in 8 Palestinians in Gaza had their homes destroyed
in the 2008-2009 Israeli assault on the Strip.)
The episode showed the continued determination of NGOs and
governments to break the illegal and inhumane siege of civilians in
Gaza, which, despite Israeli announcements, has not in fact been much
eased. It is illegal in
international law for an Occupying power to blockade the civilian
population for the welfare of which it is responsible. Israeli
politicians’ assertion that their blockade is legal and must be
observed by third parties is incorrect, since blockades that primarily
punish civilian populations are illicit on their face and cooperating
with them is against the law.
The Qadhafi Foundation is very unlikely to be the last NGO to
attempt to get aid to Gaza, and each round of attempted relief will put
Israel in a bad light in the eyes of the world and will risk Israeli
violence against a humanitarian mission. And if each such mission does
extract concessions from Israel, then over time the blockade of Gaza
will collapse. I cannot understand the blockade policy anyway. If the
point is to convince the people of Gaza not to vote for Hamas again,
then wouldn’t you have to schedule elections to discover if the policy
has succeeded? It would be illegal to punish the civilian population
for such a purpose, but at least the policy would have an end-point.
But no elections are scheduled. In that case, the blockade is just
Israelis being unbearably mean to Palestinians for an extended period
of time, with no practical political objective on the horizon. Except
maybe to keep the Palestinians weak and at least slightly malnourished
for as long as possible.
Meanwhile, the Israeli government has gone back to destroying
Palestinian homes in Jerusalem. These actions have repeatedly been
condemned by the European Union as illegal. Richard Falk says that some
Israeli policies in Jerusalem, including a plan to expel some Palestinian
residents, may even constitute war crimes.
The timing of the move was a slap in the face of Egyptian President
Hosni Mubarak, who was about to meet with Israeli Prime Minister
Binyamin Netanyahu. Mubarak hastily cancelled the meeting. The Egyptian
government’s close cooperation with Israel is deeply unpopular with the
Egyptian public. The house demolitions were also further affronts to
President Barack Obama, since they are obstacles to the direct
Israeli-Palestinian talks for which Obama has been pushing. Aljazeera English
has video:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7bCWqALWnu8&feature=player_embedded
http://www.juancole.com/2010/07/libyan-aid-ship-extracts-concessions-from-israel-resumption-of-house-demolitions-in-jerusalem.html
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
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