Wednesday
Dec092009
The EU and Jerusalem
Issandr El Amrani
For the last few days the EU has been battling over a Swedish proposal (Sweden currently holds the EU presidency) to make it official EU position that Jerusalem should be a shared capital of the two states. Now to most reasonable people this makes sense: after all the international community is backing a two-state solution, the city is divided and that division is recognized by international law, and it's clear that the symbolism of Jerusalem being the capital of both Israel and Palestine is important to the parties. Except of course the Israelis want it all to themselves, and have plenty of allies to counter this move.
Due to various pressures (see below) that laudable proposal has now been reworded:
Al Jazeera's Inside Story has a show on the EU and the Jerusalem question on Sunday:
(Ahmad Moor had thoughts on that exchange at Mondoweiss.)
How was it that the EU decided to water down a clear commitment to East Jerusalem as a Palestinian capital?
Alain Gresh writes that Paris is enabling Israeli policies, with Sarkozy lobbying on behalf of Netanyahu to water down the Swedish proposals. Their ground is that there should be recognition of Bibi's "positive" move on partial freeze of settlements, which is ridiculous — anything less than a total freeze is illegal and against the chief diplomatic initiative launched by Obama several months ago). (The Jerusalem Post also covered the French move.)
The United States also came out on this issue as typically mendacious:
Of course, the Swedish position was exactly what the PA wants to see, so it's not like the EU would be imposing a standard that both parties reject as implied. For the record here was the divide among some of the major EU states on original Swedish proposal:
For: Sweden, Britain, Ireland, Belgium.
Against: Italy, France, Holland, Germany, the Czech Republic, Romania, Poland.
Due to various pressures (see below) that laudable proposal has now been reworded:
The European Union backed away yesterday from demanding that East Jerusalem be the capital of a future Palestinian state after a proposal from the Swedish presidency ran into Israeli objections.
EU foreign ministers, meeting in Brussels, called instead for negotiations to settle Jerusalem's status and said they envisaged the city as the capital of two countries: Israel and any future Palestinian state.
The EU position was a compromise between Sweden and several other countries that wanted the 27nation bloc to make a firm commitment to the Palestinians on East Jerusalem, and other countries, such as the Czech Republic, Ger-many and Italy, that preferred a less overtly antiIsraeli stance.
Israel criticised the statement, saying it would "not contribute to the renewal of negotiations" and failed to acknowledge the Palestinian side was the "primary obstacle" to a peace deal.
Al Jazeera's Inside Story has a show on the EU and the Jerusalem question on Sunday:
(Ahmad Moor had thoughts on that exchange at Mondoweiss.)
How was it that the EU decided to water down a clear commitment to East Jerusalem as a Palestinian capital?
Alain Gresh writes that Paris is enabling Israeli policies, with Sarkozy lobbying on behalf of Netanyahu to water down the Swedish proposals. Their ground is that there should be recognition of Bibi's "positive" move on partial freeze of settlements, which is ridiculous — anything less than a total freeze is illegal and against the chief diplomatic initiative launched by Obama several months ago). (The Jerusalem Post also covered the French move.)
The United States also came out on this issue as typically mendacious:
Shortly after European Union Ministers announced their support for the division of Jerusalem between Israel and a future Palestinian state on Tuesday, the U.S. State Department issued a statement saying that the fate of Jerusalem should only be determined by Israel and the Palestinians in talks.
"Our position on Jerusalem is clear. United States policy remains unaffected and unchanged: As has been stated by every previous administration which addressed this issue, the status of Jerusalem, and all other permanent status issues, must be resolved by the parties through negotiations," the statement read.
Of course, the Swedish position was exactly what the PA wants to see, so it's not like the EU would be imposing a standard that both parties reject as implied. For the record here was the divide among some of the major EU states on original Swedish proposal:
For: Sweden, Britain, Ireland, Belgium.
Against: Italy, France, Holland, Germany, the Czech Republic, Romania, Poland.
Reader Comments (5)
Arabist, you have to understand that the European Union has one of the most obscure and muddled decision making processes due to its large size.
We all saw the total anti-climax that was the night a few weeks ago when the EU heads of state bickered over who was to be EU President. It was something so confusing and a decision so fudged that they should have done the same as the Catholic cardinals at the Vatican and had a conclave burning smoke and all that jazz for extra drama.
When it comes to all things administrative and policy, the power for this will always rest with the EU Council of Ministers which results in 27 Foreign Ministers sitting around a table all day bickering, eating and generally not getting an awful lot done.
As the clock ticks, they need to release something to show that they've all agreed a united stance so they just agree to a fudge.
99% of most European Union business is made of pure organic European chocolate fudge.
Thats why the original Swedish proposal was watered down. It needs to be agreed by everybody and not everybody agreed with it. Simple as that.
Does anyone really think that a two-state solution has a significant chance of actually happening? And if not, shouldn't the EU be declaring it's support for http://www.odsg.org/co/" rel="nofollow">one democratic state instead?
Prestwick, I do understand that the EU works by consensus. The whole point of the post is to highlight which member states did not share Sweden's view and refused to to call for a two-state solution with Jerusalem as its shared capital.
I have a low opinion of the EU as it stands today, with its undemocratic referendum-busting treaties; its bloated, corrupt and overpaid civil service and the insult of sending out a constitution that goes on for hundreds of pages. The EU still lives on its great post-war achievements, from the 1950s to the 1980s. I regret the expansion East, it should have remained a Western European union in my opinion. But anyway, the point of the post is to attract attention that this simple, long-assumed basis of a solution to the problem of Jerusalem is something that the EU can't even agree on.
(I should point out, in the interest of full disclosure, that I am a secret Belgian.)
Arabist, to call it "consensus" is very optimistic but I accept your point none the less*. It is interesting to see how Europe voted in regards to each nation's levels of history and involvement with the ME.
As for how this affects the whole game in Palestine remains to be seen. How would a Labour or Kadima Administration have gotten on in the first year of an Obama Presidency? Much better than the bizarro-world that Netanyahu and Likud have managed to create so far.
My prediction is that Netanyahu's administration will fall within a year or two because he can't reconcile his own far right instincts with a US President who won't back him to the hilt on everything and an Isreali electorate complete dissolusioned with Israeli politics.
Only in two years or so will the EU's fudge on Jerusalem come into play.
(*The expansion east was propelled by the UK mostly as it sought a rampart against further centralisation from the federalists in France & Germany. They are also very keen to have Turkey on board.)
One day due to the crisis of capitalism in the US the Empire will be dismantled and Israel will be the first to hit the skids. On that day look for the one-state solution to be implemented but quick.
Yes, and the EU, the UN, and the US congress SUCK.