Gaza blockade “was plainly counterproductive”, says Yossi Alpher at the Daily Star. But it reflects, he says, the difficulty Israel has in finding a strategy to deal with Hamas:
The stated objectives of the blockade – which varied from time to time – were to oblige Hamas to moderate its policies or otherwise to weaken or depose that Islamist movement, and to force a prisoner exchange for Gilad Shalit on terms acceptable to Israel. Had the blockade achieved any of these objectives, it might have been defensible to impose collective punishment on 1.5 million Gazans. Instead, Hamas grew stronger, while the more moderate Gazan business and agrarian sectors that depend on trade with and via Israel grew weaker. Shalit is still a prisoner of Hamas. The failure of the blockade was obvious at least a year ago. Even Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has reportedly allowed that he recognized the counterproductive nature of the economic warfare waged against Gaza soon after taking office.
The Netanyahu government did not invent this strategy, but rather inherited it from the Olmert government which in turn inherited a partial and occasional blockade from the Sharon government. Sharon’s initial reliance on economic warfare against Gaza is instructive: upon carrying out Israel’s unilateral withdrawal from the territory in the summer of 2005, Sharon threatened far-reaching military measures if, following withdrawal, Qassam rocket attacks against Israeli civilian targets continued. When, within weeks of the withdrawal, the attacks were renewed, Sharon, followed soon by Olmert, responded not with massive military force but with economic warfare, including the dismantling of the entire economic incentive structure put in place by the international community to take advantage of the withdrawal.
But Sharon’s economic punishment did not stop the Qassams. Consequently, Israel’s deterrent image was badly damaged. Hamas escalated its attacks until Israel finally did respond with overwhelming force in late 2008 and early 2009. In this sense, the past five years of dealing with Hamas in Gaza have been illustrative of the difficulty Israel has in finding strategies to deal with a militant Islamist non-state neighbor that rejects Israel’s existence, would welcome an Israeli invasion and is prepared for its population to be martyred.
Israel did not embark alone on the blockade. Three years ago, when Hamas took over Gaza in a violent coup against Fatah, the decision to punish the territory until Hamas agreed to renounce violence, recognize Israel and accept the Oslo framework was made collectively by the Olmert government together with the Quartet, Egypt and the Palestinian Liberation Organization. With the passage of time, and as the counterproductive nature of the blockade became increasingly obvious, Israel’s partners publicly took their distance, though privately some continued to encourage Israel to continue.
In his New York Times column, Roger Cohen writes about Israels strategic problems. He hears, he says, “more hostility to Israel around the world than at any time I can recall.” At Project Syndicate, Ian Buruma finds good and bad reasons for double standards towards Israel. And the Economist has talked to Hamas leader Meshal in Damascus.
EU-Turkey strategic meeting on Iran, Mideast next week. The European Voice has the story (subscribers only):
Senior officials from Turkey and the European Union will meet in Istanbul on Tuesday (13 July) to co-ordinate their approach to Iran’s nuclear programme, the Middle East peace process and the western Balkans. The EU delegation will be led by Catherine Ashton, the foreign policy chief, and will also include Štefan Füle, the European commissioner for enlargement and neighbourhood policy. They will meet Ahmet Davutoglu, Turkey’s foreign minister, and Egemen Bagis, the country’s minister for Europe. An official said: “We believe that there is scope to go beyond accession talks [between Turkey and the EU] in matters to do with regional co-operation and geostrategic issues.” (…)
Ahead of Tuesday’s talks, Gilles de Kerchove, the EU’s counter-terrorism co-ordinator, will meet senior Turkish officials in Ankara tomorrow (9 July) to discuss increasing co-operation. Turkey has seen a resumption of terrorist attacks by suspected Kurdish rebels in recent months.
Spain to take in Cuban dissidents, calls on EU to soften position. The EU Observer reports:
Spain could take in 52 Cuban political prisoners after their release by the Communist island’s government in a move pregnant with implications for EU relations. Spanish foreign minister Miguel Moratinos made the announcement on Wednesday (7 July) following a six-hour meeting with Cuban leader Raul Castro in Havana. “The Spanish government has accepted the proposal that all those who are released travel to Spain, if they so wish,” he told journalists.
The BBC reports that Spanish foreign minister Moratinos has called on the EU to soften its its Common Position on Cuba in light of Havana’s agreement to release the dissidents:
Speaking in Havana following Wednesday’s announcement, Mr Moratinos said the largest release of Cuban dissidents since 1998 “opens a new era” in European ties with Cuba. “I think there is no reason to maintain a Common Position any longer,” he said. “I expect my European colleagues to now respond.”
Spain has in the past called for an end to the Common Position, but other EU member states have been unwilling to change the policy.
EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton says in a statement:
I welcome the announcement that 52 Cuban political prisoners will be released and look forward to the rapid implementation of this decision. The EU has been following with great interest the dialogue between the Catholic Church in Cuba and the Cuban Government and hopes that this dialogue will lead to the release of all political prisoners. I also want to recognise the efforts of Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos in this respect. The EU stands ready to work closely with the Cuban authorities and the Catholic Church to support this process.
See also a Washington Post report on the prisoners release.
Parliament calls on Member States to recognize Kosovo. From the press statement:
MEPs say Parliament “would welcome the recognition by all Member States of the independence of Kosovo”. Taking note of Kosovo’s declaration of independence of 18 February 2008, which has been recognised by 66 countries, the resolution states that “22 EU Member States have recognised Kosovo as an independent country and 5 have not”.
To make EU policies more effective for everyone in Kosovo, EU Member States should “step up their common approach towards Kosovo”, says the resolution, drafted by Ulrike Lunacek (Greens/EFA, AT). The possibility of partitioning Kosovo is rejected by the MEPs.
Despite differences among Member States regarding Kosovo’s status, it is important for the EU to engage with Kosovo, this commitment being vital for preserving stability and security in the EU’s immediate neighbourhood, believes the EP.
Parliament approves blueprint for EAS. The Guardian reports:
After months of often bitter wrangling between national governments and the European parliament, MEPS today approved the blueprint for a European diplomatic service. In what the EU’s foreign policy chief, Catherine Ashton, called a “historic step” for Europe, the Strasbourg chamber endorsed an agreement to start the creation of the European external action service (EEAS). (…)
The new body will be more closely tied to the European commission than originally desired by Ashton and the member states. Britain and other big EU governments had been concerned that the parliament and the European commission could slow down foreign policy decisions.
MEPs, meanwhile, had hoped the EEAS would become a department within the commission, over which they have more influence. Although the parliamentarians have no formal powers over the service, by using the one trump card they had – their sign-off on budgets and staffing – the chamber managed to achieve some significant compromises, particularly guarantees of budgetary oversight.
The EU’s multi-billion-euro foreign policy budget will remain largely the responsibility of the commission rather than the new service itself.
However, the battle between the parliament and the member states is likely to have been a curtain raiser for further wrangling between the member states about the top jobs in the new outfit. “There’ll be some early manoeuvring over the summer, and in September we’re expecting the knives to come out,” said one EU diplomat.
The smaller member states already feel put out after rumours suggesting a German, French national and Pole had already unofficially nabbed the top three positions under Ashton. A diplomat said: “It was basically a stitchup two weeks ago. We have nothing against any one of them. They’re all highly competent but it’s obvious and blatant that all the big ones have taken over. Effectiveness is important, and we will accept leadership of the big states, – but only so long as they take us along with them, so there is legitimacy as well as effectiveness.”
“Substantial changes” have been negotiated by MEP’s, Parliament says in a press statement:
Two weeks after the Madrid deal on setting up the European External Action Service (EEAS), a package of recommendations on its organisation and working methods was approved by the European Parliament on Thursday. (…)
Although Parliament was only formally consulted on the organisation and functioning of the EEAS, MEPs negotiated substantial changes to EU High Representative Catherine Ashton’s original plans put forward in March. The service’s “Community identity” will be strengthened and its political and budgetary accountability to Parliament is ensured, according to Parliament’s negotiators, Elmar Brok (EPP, DE), Guy Verhofstadt (ALDE, BE) and Roberto Gualtieri (S&D, IT). (…)
The resolution was adopted by 549 votes to 78 with 17 abstentions.
The Parliament has statements from MEP’s Elmar Brok and Franziska Brantner:
Reacting to the vote, German EPP member Elmar Brok said, “The EAS will be fully subject to parliament’s budgetary and budgetary control rights, for both operational as well as administrative funds.”
In addition, 60 per cent of staff must be European officials. Brok said, “This reflects the community method”, he underlined. Parliament can also exert political control over the EU’s foreign and security policy.
“Parliament obtained the right to hear EU ambassadors after they are appointed and before they take up their post. In addition, should Ashton be unable to attend a plenary session herself, she will be replaced by a commissioner or national foreign minister.”
Before the EAS will be able to function fully, parliament will have to vote on its budget as well as change the staff and financial regulations. “In exerting these co-decision powers parliament has the last word over the EAS”, Brok said.
Greens MEP Franziska Brantner said, “Parliament’s approval paves the way for a more coherent and effective European foreign policy that better meets citizen’s expectations. “A better service could have been possible, though. We regret that Ashton, the commission and a number of national governments didn’t have the guts to embrace a more ambitious solution.”
“We support the compromise because parliament managed to considerable improve Ashton’s original proposal.” “A strong human rights structure, safeguards for development policy and against renationalisation of EU policies, strengthened democratic scrutiny, a more transparent foreign affairs budget and gender balance in recruitment are cases in point.”
“The deal is not flawless, however. Its weak points include the unclearly defined crisis management structures, the lack of permanent deputies for Ashton and the limited scope of the EAS’s consular services to citizens.”
The EU Observer reports that France and Spain have voiced reservations toward the EAS:
Mr Fillon reportedly said it is a “red line” for Paris that member states will take foreign policy decisions and Ms Ashton will simply “implement” them. Mr Moratinos said that in some cases, such as human rights in Cuba, bilateral diplomacy is more effective than EU-level action.
The Commission has issued an overview of the blueprint: EEAS decision – main elements.
Parliament gives green light for SWIFT, a transatlantic agreement on bank data-sharing. From the press statement:
The new version of the SWIFT anti-terrorist agreement on bank data transfers to the USA was approved by the European Parliament on Thursday. MEPs rejected the agreement in its previous form four months ago but since then have negotiated certain safeguards for Europe’s citizens and won an undertaking that the EU will start work in the second half of this year on a European data processing system that precludes the need to transfer data in bulk to the USA.
The EU Observer has background.
Parliament on human rights: Resolutions on Zimbabwe, Venezuela, North Korea. From the press statement:
In three resolutions adopted in Strasbourg on Thursday, the European Parliament calls for the release of Zimbabwean human rights campaigner Farai Maguwu, urges North Korea to stop its systematic violations of human rights and asks the authorities of Venezuela to free Maria Lourdes Afiuni, a judge in Caracas who was arrested in December 2009.
EU staring into the abyss. The Economist thinks that the EU is in bad shape, but that it is “too soon to write off the EU”:
Will the European Union make it? The question would have sounded outlandish not long ago. Now even the project’s greatest cheerleaders talk of a continent facing a “Bermuda triangle” of debt, demographic decline and lower growth.
As well as those chronic problems, the EU faces an acute crisis in its economic core, the 16 countries that use the single currency. Markets have lost faith that the euro zone’s economies, weaker or stronger, will one day converge thanks to the discipline of sharing a single currency, which denies uncompetitive stragglers the quick fix of devaluation.
Yet the debate about how to save Europe’s single currency from disintegration is stuck. It is stuck because the euro zone’s dominant powers, France and Germany, agree on the need for greater harmonisation within the euro zone, but disagree about what to harmonise.
The article’s bottom line:
How, then, will Europe try to save its single currency? By muddling through, is the best guess. There will be bail-outs that are not called bail-outs, “temporary” rescue funds for weak euro-zone members that prove very hard to cancel, and semi-formal discussions among member governments about their budgetary plans.
Will that be enough? That mostly depends on economic growth, and whether Europe draws the right lessons from this crisis. An open, flexible, competitive EU offers Europeans the best chance of confronting globalisation. But that is not the only EU on offer: a corporatist, cosy, populist union sounds very plausible to Europe’s ageing, anxious voters. Big choices loom.
A leader in the Economist is, however, upbeat about the chances for a European recovery — if leaders become finally “equal to the threat”:
Over the past 18 months they have mostly taken refuge in denial and bluster, punctuated by bickering and by heaping blame on financial markets. Despite a recent bout of austerity and the 11th-hour launch of a vast bail-out fund for its most fragile economies, Europe seems a diminished force in the world.
In Asia and America it has become fashionable to look upon these failings with disdain. Europe’s time is past, it is said. Its ageing, inward-looking citizens no longer have the resolve to overcome adversity. And yet an ailing Europe benefits nobody. Even now the European Union is the world’s biggest economy. Were it healthy, the worst of the global economic crisis would be over. Politically, everyone has a stake in the fate of Europe’s Big Idea, that rival nation states can do better by pooling some sovereignty instead of going to war. And socially, all democracies eventually have to grapple with Europe’s Big Problem, that governments and social protection tend to grow until they choke the economies that pay for them.
So rather than sneer at Europe’s impotence, the world should be asking whether Europe can rediscover its vigour—and if so how. This newspaper offers an unfashionably optimistic answer. There is nothing ordained about Europe’s failure. Indeed, if EU leaders show a little courage this crisis offers the best chance at revival since the 1980s. (…)
Tidy minds contemplating the contradictions between the euro’s two most important members foresee either integration or collapse. They argue that without a clear political mechanism to cope with wayward countries, the euro is doomed to repeat the sort of crisis it has suffered this year. One day this view may be proved right. But tidy minds underestimate the European art of compromise. And they overlook the determination in Europe to make the euro stick—because to pull it apart would be ruinously costly and threaten the EU’s very existence. For the moment, therefore, the most likely outcome is neither collapse nor a dash towards integration, but for the euro zone to muddle through.
Muddle avoids problems, it does not solve them. Instead of miring itself in internal mechanics, the EU should embrace the lesson from the other, more radical, half of Mr Delors’s programme—the bit that focused on freeing its economy and setting up the single market. By boosting economic growth the EU could ease its political difficulties and help its citizens. At the moment EU leaders are putting their effort into cutting spending: if only they were to add a dose of 1992-style reform. (…)
In the past couple of decades Europe’s privileged “insiders” have blocked change. Mr Delors managed to take them on by building a coalition of the free-market liberals and believers in European integration. Today the crisis has given Europe’s leaders the chance to create their own coalition for reform, focused again on the single market. They should seize it.
French-German dissonances. The (new) Economist’s Charlemagne columnist writes about a seismic shift in the EU:
One account of how President Nicolas Sarkozy and Chancellor Angela Merkel are getting on holds that the pair are bound like squabbling neighbours, condemned to live together despite their differences. They are linked by post-war history and a mesh of institutional bonds between ministers, officials, soldiers and students. Despite finding each other “mutually unbearable”, as one European ex-foreign minister puts it, the two have found a way to get along. They smile for the cameras together, issue joint statements and hold joint cabinet meetings. They agree on taxing banks, more financial regulation and an “economic government” for Europe. They declare, as Mr Sarkozy did after talks with Ms Merkel in Berlin last month, that “more than ever, Germany and France are determined to speak with one voice.”
A rival perception, however, suggests that they are more like a couple on the verge of divorce: they agree on little, and trust each other even less. Consider the row over economic government. The French want to concoct a euro-zone block, with a direct line to the European Central Bank and fiscal harmonisation. The Germans reject this. They insist on a wider grouping, backed by strict budgetary discipline, and harsh sanctions for bad behaviour. (…)
The balance of power between the two countries has shifted. Germany and France are no longer shoulder-to-shoulder equals. This is particularly hard for France. Put simply, its Europe policy has long consisted of coming up with the ideas, and getting the eager-to-please Germans to pay for them. More Europe, in other words, has meant more France. But this equation may no longer hold.
The shift is partly economic. In 1999-2009 France’s share of EU exports shrank while Germany’s grew; last year the Dutch exported more than the French. The Germans have put up with meagre pay rises and tight budgets to keep their cutting-edge industry competitive and public finances in order, whereas the French have put off serious reform and built up huge public debt, while working shorter weeks and taking more holidays. Germany sees no reason why it should be told what to do by a country that has not made much effort itself.
Another factor is a political change in Germany. As Wolfgang Proissl argues in a forthcoming paper for Bruegel, a think-tank, the euro-zone crisis has exposed the cold reality that Germany is the power in Europe that counts the most. Top brass in Brussels, or Paris, can talk as much as they like. But until Ms Merkel agrees, nothing happens. Fully 20 years after reunification, Germany is asserting its interests as the union’s chief paymaster, and no longer feels the need to please. “You can’t call it the Franco-German couple any more”, laments a French former foreign minister, “because Germany has found its place as Europe’s number one.”
Add to this combustible mix two leaders who do not understand each other, nor each other’s culture, nor even each other’s language.
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