It is no better than a murderer offering to investigate his own crime. It does not matter that the work of the three-man inquiry will monitored by two foreign observers. This is a whitewash in the making.
Israel continues to reject UN demands that a proper, impartial investigation be carried out by the international community. It is clear that this flawed proposal from the Netanyahu government is part of a wider campaign to try and restore something of Israel’s credibility. Coming close on the heels of the inquiry announcement, Middle East Quartet envoy Tony Blair, the former UK prime minister, bounced back into London from a meeting with the Israeli leader and announced he expected the imminent partial lifting of the Gaza blockade.
Typically Blair continued to ignore the fact that the Gaza blockade is not only a tragedy for the Palestinians trapped within the territory but is illegal under international law, just as joining with his friend George W. Bush in invading Iraq flew in the face of international legislation. The fact that the Israelis may have promised him a partial lifting of the blockade does not make it any less unlawful.
Blair’s bumptious enthusiasm for what he would no doubt like the world to believe is his shining negotiating achievement with Netanyahu is oddly reminiscent of another British premier’s apparent talks breakthrough. In 1938 Neville Chamberlain returned from a meeting with Hitler waving a piece of paper the German dictator had signed which, said Chamberlain, guaranteed “Peace in Our Time”. A year later, despite the sacrifice of Czechoslovakia’s sovereignty, which that agreement encompassed, the world was at war.
The reality is, of course, that Blair himself has experience of covering the truth with a thick layer of misinformation. He no doubt still believes, despite his proven misleading of British legislators over Saddam’s WMD capacity, that if a half-truth is repeated often enough and with sufficient conviction and sincerity, it will come to be believed. Thus he will hail this partial ending of the illegal blockade as a triumph, when in fact it represents yet another failure for his far from impartial diplomacy. It is long past the time when Blair should have been fired from his role with the Quartet.
It would be pleasingly ironic if the Netanyahu government found in the behavior of some in Gaza an excuse to welch on the “deal” Blair thinks he did with them and continued the blockade. That at least would show up the former British prime minister for what he is.
Meanwhile, the international community should make it crystal clear from the outset that it is not prepared to recognize the validity of the Israeli inquiry into the slaying of nine Turks when the Flotilla was attacked by commandos. Having a retired Canadian general and a former Northern Irish politician as observers in no way makes this the international investigation that is required.
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