Jewish World Review Oct. 5, 2001 / 18 Tishrei, 5762
LONDON DIARIST
Forget the nutcases in Iran and elsewhere in the
region who claimed that the catastrophe was the
work (or at very least the inspiration) of Israel's
intelligence services in their combined quest to
drive a wedge between the United States and
the Islamic world.
Perfectly respectable voices -- particularly in
Europe, especially in Britain -- were quick to
point more highly manicured fingers at Israel.
They do not, of course, accuse Israel of direct
complicity, but they loudly assert that Israel must
bear a substantial share of the blame for the
outrages that struck America.
Was not Arab rage ignited by Israeli intransigence
at the negotiating table? they ask. Were not Islamic
passions inflamed by Israeli brutality toward the
Palestinians? And has not America itself been
blatantly one-sided in the Middle East conflict?
This ludicrous attempt to project blame from
perpetrator to victim -- and thus deflect or at
least dilute the guilt of the terrorists -- has
inspired a macabre media game: Relative Morality.
In London this week, a senior BBC interviewer
felt entirely confident asking the newly elected
leader of Britain's Conservative Party, Iain
Duncan Smith, whether he considered Israel
-- "a country with blood on its hands" -- to
be a terrorist state.
More shocking than the question was the
seeming inability of a major European political
leader to give a simple, straight answer to the
preposterous question. Instead, he was left
equivocating about the need to study "the
complex issues of the Middle East."
Placing Israel on the front-burner appears to
have been actively encouraged by some
elements in the British establishment, whose
Prime Minister Tony Blair has sought to
position himself as America's best and closest
ally.
While Blair is certainly not regarded as an
enemy of Israel and is indeed seen as a most
loyal friend of the United States, an unnamed
"senior Foreign Office source" last week felt
free to describe Israeli Prime Minister Ariel
Sharon as "the cancer at the center of the
Middle East crisis."
While denying that such sentiments -- expressed
in an interview with the Guardian, a respected
London-based daily -- were those of the Foreign
Office, a spokesman would not deny that they
were prevalent in the Foreign Office.
Jerusalem bristled and an Israeli spokesman sadly
declared that this was no way for officials to talk
about the democratically elected leader of a friendly
state. And there the matter seemed to rest.
But simmering resentment turned to full-blown
diplomatic incident the following day when British
Foreign Secretary Jack Straw declared that "one
of the factors which helps breed terrorism is the
anger which many people in this region feel at
events over the years in Palestine."
The comment appeared in an article he
purportedly wrote for an Iranian newspaper on
the eve of his visit to Teheran, no doubt to please
his Iranian hosts and assuage any possible anger
about his next stopover: Israel.
Once again, the Foreign Office spokesman was
wheeled out to insist that his master had intended
neither to justify nor legitimize Palestinian terrorism.
But by this time, Sharon was incandescent and
promptly cancelled his scheduled meeting with
Straw, while Foreign Minister Shimon Peres was
left to call off a dinner and downgrade his
encounter with Straw to a "working meeting."
It was only the personal intervention of Blair,
during the course of an 80-minute conciliatory
call from London, that persuaded Sharon to
reconsider -- and reschedule -- his meeting
with Straw.
Meanwhile, Britain's Jewish community, in the
form of the Board of Deputies, responded with
angry disappointment: "Such a statement by the
British foreign secretary gives credence to anti-
Israeli and anti-Jewish propaganda currently
being circulated by the enemies of Israel,"
thundered board president Jo Wagerman.
"British Jews are increasingly being victimized
as a result of disinformation and propaganda
spread by the pro-Palestinian lobby."
There was little comfort to be drawn from the
fact that Straw's Middle East odyssey appeared
to have backfired rather spectacularly: By the
time he returned to London, Iran had withdrawn
its previously qualified support for the American-
led coalition, while Saudi Arabia had announced
that it would not, after all, permit its bases to be
used by coalition aircraft operating against targets
in Afghanistan.
What is driving Britain's hostility toward Israel,
itself a prime victim of Islamic terrorism?
Ironically, the grotesquely lopsided stance has its
roots in Blair's particularly close affinity with the
US, which is likely to have given Arabists in the
British Foreign Office more elbow room to
"balance the books" and express their natural
anti-Israel leanings.
Another factor is the government's drive to
legitimize the estimated two million British
Moslems -- mostly from Pakistan and
Bangladesh -- who have suffered verbal and
physical abuse and felt themselves to have
been under siege since Sept. 11.
Not least, however, Britain is anxious to protect
its influence and interests in the Arab world. At
a time when it is preparing for war against Islamic
targets, it clearly feels the need to shore up its
credibility in the eyes of its trading partners in the
Arab world and prove that its enthusiastic
commitment to the US-led coalition is not
animated by anti-Islamic sentiment.
And the cheapest, most efficient means of achieving
these goals is to pay in Israeli currency.
That method of payment would certainly suit
Straw's deputy, Foreign Office Minister Peter Hain,
who once advocated Israel's violent destruction
(if it did not agree to voluntarily dismantle itself)
while describing Israelis as "greedy oppressors."
What makes all this relevant is that Britain is one
of the most powerful voices on Middle East affairs
in the 15-member European Union, setting the tone
and policy for many of its European partners.
Over the past 20 years, successive prime ministers
have ensured that Britain has followed a relatively
benign policy toward Israel. Blair, a committed
Christian, is also a known friend of Israel, taking
holidays there with his wife before being elected
leader of the Labor Party. He has since appointed
the Orthodox Lord Michael Levy as his personal
envoy to the Middle East.
To the profound regret of Israeli officials and British
Jews, Blair's influence in foreign affairs -- at least
as far as it impacts on Middle East affairs -- appears
to have waned in direct proportion to his
uncompromising pro-American stance.
It is a phenomenon that leaves British Jews, for
the first time in a long time, wondering what the
future holds for them.
Relative morality
http://www.jewishworldreview.com --
MOSLEMS attack Christians and they
blame the Jews. So lamented former Israeli prime
minister Menachem Begin during the civil war in
Lebanon 20 years ago. The observation could
equally have applied to events that followed
Sept. 11.
Helen Davis is a veteran London journalist. Comment by clicking here.