Freeze relations with Israel if Netanyahu refuses to apologize

The Israeli government has agreed only to set the people in the flotilla free, return the ships and partially ease the land blockade of Gaza. The commission set up by the Israeli government to investigate the raid is simply a farce ridiculed even by the Israeli media. And Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu has made it clear that Israel has no intention of apologizing to Turkey, even after the secret meeting held in Brussels between Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu and Israeli Industry, Trade and Labor Minister Binyamin Eliezer, apparently encouraged by Washington to reverse the trend towards worsening relations between two of its important allies.

Turkey, on the other hand, has so far only recalled its ambassador to Tel Aviv and banned Israeli military flights in its airspace. It can be expected that relations between the two countries will further deteriorate if Israel refuses to respond to Turkey’s demands. The overwhelming majority of Turkey’s population would certainly like to see official relations with Israel frozen until Israel is freed of governments that “belie Jewish intelligence,” in the words of the Turkish-Jewish businessman İshak Alaton.

Israel must meet Ankara’s demands to improve relations with Turkey. But more importantly Israel must come to its senses and understand that it cannot assure its security by continuing the occupation and oppression of the Palestinian people and by relying on military power alone, regarding as enemies all that disapprove of its militaristic policies. The world is changing. Even the attitude of the United States, which has over the decades almost unconditionally supported Israel’s policies, is not what it used to be. The Israeli ambassador to Washington, Michael Oren, was recently reported as having described the current situation between the US and Israel as a “tectonic rift” in which the two countries are like continents drifting apart. He noted that, unlike his predecessors George W. Bush and Bill Clinton, President Barack Obama “is not motivated by historical-ideological sentiments toward Israel but by cold interests and considerations.” (Haaretz, June 27)

Meir Dagan, the chief of the Israeli intelligence agency Mossad, told the Knesset last month that “Israel is gradually turning from an asset to the United States to a burden.” (The New York Times, June 3) The liberal-minded American Jewry no longer supports Israel like it used to and is calling on it to make peace with the Palestinians. Surveys show that younger Jewish Americans are no longer as committed to supporting Israel’s policies as older generations. The voices of those in the US who argue that the Israeli lobby in the US is serving the interests of Israel rather than the US are getting increasingly louder.

John J. Mearsheimer, co-author of the book “The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy” (2007), which perhaps more than anything else signaled the changing attitude towards Israel in the US, in a piece titled “Sinking Ship” wrote that “Once it is widely recognized that the two-state solution is dead and Israel has become like white-ruled South Africa -- and that day is not far off -- support for Israel inside the American Jewish community is likely to diminish significantly. The main reason is that apartheid is a despicable political system that is fundamentally at odds with basic American values as well as core Jewish values.” (The American Conservative, June 30)

The days when Israel could discredit and silence its critics by labeling them anti-Semites seem to be over. The European Parliament with overwhelming majority condemned Israel for the attack on the Mavi Marmara and strongly called on an end to the Gaza blockade. In Germany, which for obvious reasons has been the country most reluctant to criticize Israel, five big political parties adopted a parliamentary motion that demanded an immediate end to the Gaza blockade. German social democrats are calling on Israel to begin to talk to Hamas for a peaceful solution to the conflict with Palestinians. (Haaretz, July 1)