Seduced?
[Editor’s Note: Two people were wounded when three Kassam rockets hit Israel from Gaza. Islamic Jihad said that although they fired the rockets, Israel was to blame. A Hamas spokesman said the attack “came as result of Israeli provocation…” adding that Hamas was “committed to the calm.”]Seduction is very French. President Sarkozy’s speech before the Knesset was nothing if not seductive and most of his audience was nothing if not willing.
[Editor’s Note: Two people were wounded when three Kassam rockets hit Israel from Gaza. Islamic Jihad said that although they fired the rockets, Israel was to blame. A Hamas spokesman said the attack “came as result of Israeli provocation…” adding that Hamas was “committed to the calm.”]
Seduction is very French. President Sarkozy’s speech before the Knesset was nothing if not seductive and most of his audience was nothing if not willing.
He touched some great notes, quoting the Bible a la President Bush, including the part about God giving the land to Abraham. He referenced Israel as the protector of Jews, present and future, calling Israel the “only place in the world where everyone is sure that Jews will never have to wear a yellow star, where Jews will not be prohibited from riding buses, going to cinema or theater or holding certain jobs, where they will not be forced to live only in Jewish neighborhoods or only go to Jewish restaurants, stores or schools.” He said, “A nuclear Iran is intolerable… Anyone trying to destroy Israel will find France blocking the way…Israel must know it is not alone in the battle against Iran’s nuclear ambitions.” And, “My dear friends, the 21st century has arrived and I say this will be the century of peace for Israel.”
All of this is very good, particularly from the man who assumes the EU presidency in July. But seduction is pressure to give in to an ill-advised desire. No matter how good the feeling engendered by the attachment of Nicolas Sarkozy to Israel’s present and future, Israel and its friends have to be very clear-eyed about the difference between Sarkozy the man and French foreign policy as promoted by the French Foreign Ministry and the eternal French civil service. These have not changed.
All Israel has to do, he said, is remove the checkpoints that allow Israel to stop terrorist activity; stop building houses for Jews in places the Palestinians don’t want Jews; and agree to use the capital city of the Jews as the capital city of someone else. There can be, he said, “no peace without a solution to the problem of the Palestinian refugees,” and “no peace without a halt to settlement activity.” “Peace is not possible if the Palestinians cannot move about freely.” He suggested that Israel “encourage legislation that would entice settlers to leave the West Bank.”
Along with what appeared to be a sincere profession of friendship, and a nod in the direction of Palestinian obligations to “fight terrorism,” Sarkozy made a threat. “We must tell friends the truth, and the truth is that Israel’s security can never be assured unless an independent, modern, democratic and viable Palestinian state is established finally beside it.” So is it Israel’s obligation not only to permit the establishment of a Palestinian state, but also to ensure that it is modern, democratic and viable? And to ensure that it is Judenrein on their behalf?
“I didn’t come here to preach morality,” he said after the speech. Perhaps not, but seduction may turn out to be a problem.