A few days ago, Heiko Maas, Germany’s
Minister for Foreign Affairs, travelled to meet his Israeli counterpart Major
General Ashkenazi, to inform him of Europe’s discomfort with Israeli plans to
annex even more Palestinian land.
Such words are like water off a duck’s back.
Unless, important countries such as Germany read the riot act to Israel, and show
willingness to follow their words with action, Israel will totally disregard
them.
And it gets worse: Israel wanted Maas’ visit
to produce even more mileage and concocted a ploy to humiliate both the
Palestinians and Germany. This was achieved by preventing Maas from visiting
Ramallah. Maas had planned a trip to meet the Palestinian leadership, before
travelling on to Amman to see King Abdullah of Jordan. To prevent this meeting,
Israel – which controls the Palestinian territories – informed Maas, that were
he take the 20km. trip to Ramallah, and then back to the Tel-Aviv airport he
would be quarantined for 14 days on his way back, before being allowed to
leave. Shamefully, Maas gave in.
Israel’s quarantine enforcement seems
flexible: it conveniently forgot that according to its own quarantine regulations,
Maas should have been quarantined upon arrival in Israel, before meeting with
Israeli ministers. Moreover, thousands of Palestinians travel back and forth every
day to work in Israel, without needing to quarantine. Quarantine was just a
ploy.
Two years ago, in his inaugural speech, Maas
explained «I entered politics
because of Auschwitz«. Does Auschwitz
incapacitate him and renders him incapable of handling Israel/Palestine issues?
Maas probably had a bad conscience: He has Germany's representative at the UN vote against Israel more often than any other European country.
ReplyDeleteIt is difficult to find a reason for this, but remorse over Auschwitz does not seem to play any role in his voting behaviour.