Europeans encouraging and financing 'Palestinian' intransigence
Blogger E-Man (whose blog I had never seen before) points out a Haaretz article from Sunday that discusses a body known as the Negotiations Support Unit (NSU). The NSU was founded and is supported and funded by various European countries, and it is encouraging the 'Palestinians' to dig in their heels on the 'right of return,' an issue whose compromise by Israel could spell the end of Israel as a Jewish state.The NSU was founded in 1998 following a Palestinian request to the U.K. for assistance in the final-status talks with the Israelis. Britain, Sweden, Norway, Demark and Holland agreed to contribute to the new body, appointing the London-based Adam Smith Institute to head the project. Since 1998, the NSU has received tens of millions of euros from European countries.And why would the Europeans be interested in encouraging positions that will lead to dead ends in the 'peace process'? A lot of reasons. Look at the countries involved. Britain has a real problem with Islamists and a history as an occupying power in Israel. Sweden is vehemently anti-Israel. Norway is happy to support a government that includes Hamas and is in regular contact with Hamas. Denmark, home of the famous Muhammed cartoons, is probably the least anti-Israel of the countries in question, but even they have their moments. And then there's Holland, which compares Israel's 'occupation' of Judea and Samaria to the Nazi occupation in their own country.
The offices of the NSU are located not far from the Palestinian Authority's government center, the Muqata, in Ramallah. Some 20 legal experts are at work there on the issues of the final-status agreement - Jerusalem, the settlements, water, the refugees, borders and security.
The NSU also deals with other issues involving Israel in the realms of economics, agriculture, transportation, communications and archaeology. A good many of the NSU staff are not Palestinians born and raised in the West Bank or Gaza, but rather in the U.S. or Europe, and others are Israeli Arabs. The head of the NSU is a British citizen.
...
Sources in Israel say the NSU has taken an extreme position over the years about the right of return for the Palestinians, saying the Palestine Liberation Organization and the PA do not have a mandate to make concessions on this issue. "We talk about compromise and they speak of justice," a senior official said. [The Hebrew version of this paragraph also calls NSU members "one-staters in a two-state environment" - see here].
"We can see how the papers they write are leading to more extreme positions. Their problem is that they hold the opinions of Palestinians from outside the territories, and they care much more about ideology and justice than finding a solution that will meet the needs of the Palestinian population," he said.
The NSU attitude completely ignores the Hamas takeover of the Gaza Strip and the weakness of the PA in the West Bank and has raised more than a few eyebrows in Israel. "They talk about establishment of a Palestinian state within six months as if there is no reality on the ground," a diplomatic official said, refering to the NSU document published in Haaretz last Thursday. "Instead of trying to reach a common denominator and agreements, they turn the talks all along the way into a debating society, waving their rights around, and that doesn't lead anywhere."
Why are these countries financing 'Palestinian' intransigence on the 'right of return'? Because it's not a 'Palestinian' state they seek. They seek to destroy the Jewish state.
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 7:18 PM
2 Comments:
I can think of a few other Euro motivations for getting this deeply involved --- all of them as nefarious for the Jewish State as the one you attribute to them.
(1) Eurocrats understand other bureaucrats (in this case, the UNRWA) and the need for perpetuate the existence of bureaucracies whether they have outlived their useful purpose or not.
(2) Extension of the Euro empire to the Middle East --- with two entities that will be called Israel and Palestine, but that will be satrapies of the EU rather than sovereign states, and with porose borders between them (and the rest of the EU). In discussions with Euros who ought to know better, I was scared by the willingness to accept the idea that something that in practice does work for, say, Flanders vs. Holland, and doesn't even really work for Flanders vs. Wallony, would somehow work for two peoples that have pretty much zilch in common other than origins in the Middle East.
For that matter, Eurocrats may well have deluded themselves into thinking the 'Palestinians' will give up Jihad if only they have access to the much-vaunted Euro social system...
I can add more motivations which are not exactly the same as wanting Israel destroyed although it might lead to this end:
Europe sees itself as an aspiring world power and in competition with the US. Since Israel is seen as a US vassal they pander to the Palestinians in order to have their own pawns.
I would also think that the pandering to the Palestinians are perceived as paying protection money to the Islamists...
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