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Spain to cast symbolic vote in recognition of Palestinian state

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spain-palestine

by Al-Akhbar

Spanish lawmakers were set to vote on Tuesday in favor of recognizing Palestine as a state, parliamentary sources said, in a symbolic move intended to promote a “two-state solution.”

The non-binding vote was brought forward by the opposition Socialist party but has the support of the ruling People’s Party (PP) and other groups in the lower house of parliament, sources from the two parties said.

“It (the vote) is not binding, it does not set a timeline for the recognition, it gives the government the margin to proceed with the recognition when it feels it will be opportune,” Spanish Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Garcia-Margallo told reporters in Brussels on Monday.

“If we want to be effective this recognition must be done in coordination with the European Union,” he added.

The motion calls on the Spanish government to “recognize Palestine as a state,” according to a draft text presented by the Socialists, and urges Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy “to promote in coordination with the European Union the recognition of the Palestinian state as sovereign, contiguous, democratic and independent which lives in peace and security with the state of Israel.”

It echoes similar moves in other European countries intended to increase pressure for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Britain and Ireland approved similar non-binding motions last month that call on their governments to recognize Palestine. Neither government has heeded that call.

France is also eyeing a similar non-binding resolution for November 28 after Sweden’s center-left government took the lead by officially recognizing the state of Palestine within days of taking office last month.

The EU’s new foreign policy chief, Federica Mogherini, said the bloc’s 28 foreign ministers discussed at a meeting in Brussels on Monday how they could start “a positive process with the Israelis and Palestinians to re-launch a peace process.”

The moves reflect mounting frustration in the European Union at Israel’s illegal settlement plans on land the Palestinians who support a two-state solution want for a state following the collapse of US-sponsored peace talks.

The roots of the Israel-Palestine conflict date back to 1917, when the British government, in the now-famous Balfour Declaration, called for “the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people.”

Israel then occupied East Jerusalem and the West Bank during the 1967 Middle East War. It later annexed the holy city in 1980, claiming it as the capital of the self-proclaimed Zionist state – a move never recognized by the international community.

In November 1988, Palestinian leaders led by Arafat declared the existence of a State of Palestine inside the 1967 borders and the state’s belief “in the settlement of international and regional disputes by peaceful means in accordance with the charter and resolutions of the United Nations.”

Heralded as a “historic compromise,” the move implied that Palestinians would agree to accept only 22 percent of historic Palestine, in exchange for peace with Israel. It is now believed that only 17 percent of historic Palestine is under Palestinian control following the expansion of illegal Israeli settlements.

The Palestinian Authority this year set November 2016 as the deadline for ending the Israeli withdrawal from the territories occupied by Israel during the Six-Day War in 1967 and establishing a two-state solution.

It is worth noting that numerous pro-Palestine activists support a one-state solution, arguing that the creation of a Palestinian state beside Israel would not be sustainable.

They also believe that the two-state solution, which is the only option considered by international actors, won’t solve existing discrimination, nor erase economic and military tensions.

The Palestinian Authority estimates that 134 countries have now recognized Palestine as a state, although the number is disputed and several recognitions by what are now European Union member states date back to the Soviet era.

An AFP count puts the number of states that recognize Palestine at 112.

(AFP, Reuters, Al-Akhbar)

Putin leaves G20 early after harsh reception

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Leaders threaten Russian president with further sanctions over Ukraine

Putin-Obama

by Nadia Prupis, Common Dreams

Russian president Vladimir Putin left the Group of 20 (G20) summit in Brisbane, Australia early, flying back to Moscow on Sunday after world leaders accused him of bullying and warned him to drop his support of separatists in Ukraine.

In meetings with British Prime Minister David Cameron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Putin accused the Ukrainian government of making punitive sanctions against cities in the eastern region of the country that voted for independence last month, while Cameron said Russia was “bullying a smaller state in Europe.”

President Barack Obama said the U.S. was “opposing Russia’s aggression against Ukraine, which is a threat to the world.” He added that Russia had failed to hold up its part of the ceasefire plan agreed upon in Minsk in September.

European Union President Herman von Rompuy told reporters on Saturday that foreign ministers were ready to consider additional actions against Russia. “Russia has still the opportunity to fulfill its Minsk agreements and chose the path of de-escalation, which could allow sanctions to be rolled back,” von Rompuy said. “If it does not do so however, we are ready to consider additional action.”

“We need to avoid a return to a full-scale conflict,” he added.

Obama echoed that sentiment, saying that if Russia engaged in diplomatic efforts to deescalate the fighting in Ukraine, the U.S. would suggest lifting sanctions “that are frankly having a devastating effect on the Russian economy.”

The Guardian writes:

The crisis has been deepened by the creation of the declared Donetsk People’s Republic (DNR) led by Alexander Zakharchenko, an electrician turned battalion commander. Earlier this month the region occupied by separatists for six months organised an unauthorised vote to appoint a prime minister.

The Ukrainian prime minister, Arseniy Yatsenyuk, announced in response that all state funding would be cut off, arguing that the elections violated the Minsk peace accords signed in September.

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper also reportedly told Putin, “I guess I’ll shake your hand but I have only one thing to say to you: you need to get out of Ukraine.”

More than 4,000 people have been killed in that country since April, where separatist fighting has continued to escalate. The Russian government has repeatedly denied involvement in the conflict, including the downing of Malaysian airliner MH17 on July 17, killing 298 people, as it flew over rebel-held territory.

Putin denied that he was leaving over the barrage of criticism, instead saying that he needed to return to work in Moscow.

In an interview with German TV, Putin also said that additional sanctions against Russia could backfire on Western countries.

“Do they want to bankrupt our banks? In that case they will bankrupt Ukraine,” Putin said. “Have they thought about what they are doing at all or not? Or has politics blinded them? As we know eyes constitute a peripheral part of brain. Was something switched off in their brains?”

The Guardian continues:

Nato claims 300 Russian troops remain in Ukraine training the separatist forces ahead of likely fresh offensives. Several of the contested areas are crucial for the republic’s long-term survival, including the port city of Mariupol and a power station north of Luhansk….

Putin has insisted he will not cut funding to Ukraine, or demand early repayment of loans.

“We do not want to aggravate the situation. We want Ukraine to get back on its feet at last,” the president has previously said.

Although the western media has portrayed Putin as an isolated figure at the summit, he has continued to forge close relations with the Brics countries (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) a grouping that is becoming increasingly organised at the G20 and, in terms of economic size, more than matches the size of the G7 economies.

The European Union uses death to deter immigrants

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European Union immigrants

by Martin Kreickenbaum, WSWS

On November 1, the Italian government officially ended the naval operation Mare Nostrum, which has retrieved more than 100,000 refugees from the Mediterranean Sea in the course of the past year. The termination is a deliberate decision of the European Union to permit thousands of refugees to die at sea in order to deter others from trying to set foot on European shores.

The Italian government commenced Operation Mare Nostrum on October 18, 2013 after nearly 500 refugees drowned in one week off the coast of the Italian island of Lampedusa. The operation was aimed at preventing similar catastrophes by an improved system of maritime surveillance.

In practice, sea rescue was always of secondary importance to Mare Nostrum. Deployment of the Italian Navy was intended as an act of deterrence, to detect refugee boats off the coast of Libya and Tunisia at an early stage and escort them back to Africa.

Nevertheless, when those picked up by merchant vessels off the coast of Italy are included, a total of approximately 150,000 refugees were rescued under the Mare Nostrum programme. Thousands more lost their lives attempting the dangerous passage across the sea. In just the first ten months of this year, more than 3,000 refugees drowned in the Mediterranean. Since 2000, the total stands at about 25,000.

Although the other European governments and the European Union claimed they wished to prevent any repeat of Lampedusa, they refused to provide a single euro for rescue operations in the Mediterranean Sea. EU Commissioner Cecilia Malmström castigated Mare Nostrum, “because the probability that refugees will be rescued has increased” and they would therefore be induced to attempt the crossing in even smaller and more unseaworthy boats.

Baroness Joyce Anelay, minister of state in the British foreign ministry, went so far as to claim that the rescue measures: “create an unintended ‘pull factor’ thereby leading to more tragic and unnecessary deaths.”

When the Italian government then declared it was no longer able to finance the monthly €9 million for military vessels engaged in the operation, its European partners refused to share the costs. The operation was terminated.

By comparison, in just the first 43 days of the 2003 Iraq war the US expended ammunition worth $2.7 billion. This sum would be sufficient to finance Mare Nostrum for 20 years. The US and its European allies spent similar sums in the succession of wars in Afghanistan, Libya, Gaza (in military aid to Israel) and now Syria— the regions where most of the refugees crossing the Mediterranean come from.

Since 2007, the European Union has provided €4 billion for a fund bearing the name “Solidarity and Management of Migration Flows.” Most of this money, however, has been allocated to the military enhancement of border protection, i.e., construction of fences and border guard posts, deployment of infrared and thermal imaging cameras, and drone and satellite-based surveillance of external borders.

Mare Nostrum will be succeeded by Operation Triton under the overall control of the European border agency Frontex. However, Triton’s mandate is not the rescuing of refugees, but the securing of borders against “illegal” immigration and the entry of refugees. “Frontex is responsible for the surveillance of borders and has not been tasked to rescue refugees,” said the agency’s director Gil Arias Fernandez in a recent interview with the Tagesspiegel daily, adding: “Unlike crews of the Mare Nostrum ships, we will not deliberately go out to search for refugee boats.”

Frontex’s draft paper on Operation Triton, which differs from Mare Nostrum in only covering the Mediterranean within 30 nautical miles of the Italian coast, makes no secret of the fact “that the withdrawal of naval forces from the sea area near the Libyan coast … will probably lead to a higher number of deaths.”

The paper actually asserts that this result is preferable, since “significantly fewer migrants will attempt to cross the Mediterranean in bad weather and prices for the crossings will rise.” The number of refugees would thus decline to “the level of previous years.”

Francois Crepeau, UN special rapporteur on the human rights of migrants, fiercely condemned the EU’s approach to refugee policy, declaring: “It is appalling to claim that an increase in the number of fatalities will have the effect of deterring future migrants and asylum seekers. It is as though one were to say: Let them die, because that is a good deterrent for others.”

The deliberate decision to stop the rescue measures in the Mediterranean and allow refugees to drown as a deterrent, shows the real face of the European Union. It does not embody the “unity of Europe,” but rather the dictatorship of the most ruthless capitalist interests over Europe.

The EU is employing the same ruthlessness against the continent’s working population and its international rivals as it does against refugees at its borders. Following the financial crisis of 2008 the EU has dictated one austerity package after another in order to recoup the trillions handed over to bailout the banks, all at the expense of working people again. In Ukraine it has provoked a confrontation with Russia and it is preparing a new war in the Middle East that will have even more disastrous consequences than the current military interventions in Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya.

The working class can only effectively oppose the EU and European governments by joining forces internationally and fighting for a socialist Europe, for the United Socialist States of Europe. The unconditional defense of refugees is a precondition for the defense of the democratic and social rights of all working people.

Revealed: Europe’s "discreet" cooperation with Israel’s nuclear industry

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José Manuel Barroso (left), the European Commission president, has a “discreet” chat with Benjamin Netanyahu. (European External Action Service)

José Manuel Barroso (left), the European Commission president, has a “discreet” chat with Benjamin Netanyahu. (European External Action Service)

– by David Cronin, Electronic Intifada

The European Union has been cooperating furtively with Israel’s nuclear industry for at least six years.

An internal document that I recently obtained states that an accord on “joint and cooperative initiatives relevant for the peaceful use of nuclear energy” was signed between the EU and Israel in 2008. “This is a discreet agreement that has not been given publicity,” the paper adds.

The document (published below) was drawn up ahead of an October 2013 visit to Israel by Antonio Tajani, then Italy’s member of the European Commission.

It is not hard to understand why the Union wishes to keep this cooperation “discreet.” The agreement was reached with Israel’s Atomic Energy Commission — the body that runs the Dimona reactor, where Israel’s nuclear weapons were developed.

Israel introduced nuclear weapons to the Middle East and has refused to sign the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). It has refused to permit international inspection of all its nuclear activities.

In 2006, Ehud Olmert, then Israel’s prime minister, acknowledged that Israel possessed nuclear weapons. The US Defense Intelligence Agency estimated in 1999 that Israel had between 60 and 80 nuclear warheads.

Hypocrisy

These facts put Israel in a very different category to Iran, supposedly a major threat to world peace.

Unlike Israel, Iran has no nuclear weapons. The National Intelligence Council — a group advising the US president — expressed “high confidence” in 2007 that Iran had halted its weapons development program a few years earlier.

Despite that explicit statement, both the EU and the US have slapped punitive sanctions on Iran (after some sanctions had been relaxed, America imposed new restrictions on business with Iran last week). The official narrative behind these sanctions is that everything must be done to stop Iran acquiring the bomb.

Yet the European Union is happy to cooperate with Israel, a nation that actually has the bomb. Is it any wonder that Brussels officials don’t want attention drawn to this hypocrisy?

Military links

I asked the EU’s Joint Research Centre (JRC) — which is tasked with implementing the “discreet” agreement — why it is cooperating with Israel, a known threat to world peace. A JRC spokesperson tried to present the “scientific collaboration” involved here as benign.

The research with Israel concerns the “medical application of radionuclides, radiation protection, as well as nuclear security related to the detection and identification of nuclear and radioactive materials,” according to the spokesperson. “It does not cover any activities related to reprocessing and enrichment.”

I asked the spokesperson if any guarantees have been provided that Israel will not use the fruits of its research with the Union for military purposes. Not surprisingly, I didn’t receive a reply to that question.

When I asked how much had been spent on nuclear cooperation with Israel, the JRC would only say that the research in question is “not jointly funded as each institution covers its related activities.”

As well as overseeing the development of nuclear weapons, Israel’s Atomic Energy Commission has strong links to the conventional arms industry.

Apart from Dimona, the commission also runs the Soreq research center. Soreq’s own website says that it develops equipment with “homeland security” applications — a euphemism for surveillance technology and weaponry. When journalists have been given guided tours of that center, its scientists have bragged of inventing lasers to assist snipers.

The JRC — the European Commission’s in-house science service — has been cooperating more directly with Israel’s weapons industry, too.

In December 2010, it teamed up with Elbit, the Israeli arms company, for what it called a “small boat detection campaign” in Haifa. The purpose of this exercise was to see how drones can be used for maritime surveillance, principally to stop asylum-seekers from entering Europe.

Elbit is one of the leading suppliers of warplanes to the Israeli military. This means that it is providing some of the key tools that Israel used to inflict death and destruction on Gaza this summer (and in previous attacks). By hosting the “boat detection” exercise, the EU indicated its eagerness to deploy Israel’s tools of mass murder against refugees.

Greenwashing

Although the EU has tried to keep the nuclear research “discreet,” it has openly celebrated more palatable forms of engagement with Israel.

José Manuel Barroso, the outgoing European Commission chief, posed for photos with Benjamin Netanyahu, when the two men approved an energy and water cooperation agreement in 2012. The JRC tried to sell that accord as ecologically sound by stressing that it concerned renewable energy and resource conservation.

Environmental campaigners have a name for tactics designed to rebrand a villain as a tree-hugger: “greenwashing.”

Cooperation on “clean” energy provides scant comfort to Gaza’s people, whose only power plant was bombed by Israel this summer. Nor should it be forgotten that Israel attacked a center for autistic children that had solar panels on its roof. So much for Israel’s commitment to renewable energy.

Israel is a nuclear-armed rogue state. I’m sure that many decent people would be horrified to learn that the EU is liaising with the very agencies that developed Israel’s nuclear weapons — even if this cooperation is “discreet.”

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