The European Press Views the Middle East

Suicide Bombing Which Killed 15 in Jerusalem Leads To Call for International Peacekeepers

By Lucy Jones

The Aug. 9 suicide bomb attack in Jerusalem which killed 15 people and injured many more put the Arab-Israeli crisis firmly back on Europe’s front pages. The event also led many newspapers to call for international peacekeepers to be deployed in the region.

“For a watching Western world, this shocking moment must finally galvanize the concerted action that has been so sadly lacking,” wrote London’s The Guardian on Aug. 10. “It’s time to insist on sending international monitors or observers; it’s time to make good on kthreats of sanctions if Israel balks; it’s time to tell Mr. Arafat that his EU funding ends, today, unless his intifada ends too. And it’s time to inform George Bush that either the U.S. is running Middle East mediation or it is not.”

On the same day the London Times laid some responsibility for the current bloodshed at the feet of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat. The suicide bombing cemented the breakdown of trust that makes it almost impossible for any Israeli politician to reopen talks with the Palestinian Authority, noted the paper. But Arafat’s goal, the Times continued, is to force Israel further and further onto a war footing, which would reinforce his demand for the deployment of an international “protective” force. “European governments should not fall into this trap,” the paper warned.

Moscow’s Izvestia of Aug. 11 said the latest suicide bombing would threaten the Palestinian autonomous areas. “This time the Israelis have taken a more hard-line approach than ever before,” the Russian paper pointed out. “Sharon’s logic is simple: if Arafat cannot meet his commitments, then Israel will be forced to protect its security in its own way.”

The Israeli government holds the key to solving the Middle East crisis, France’s L’ Humanité argued Aug. 10. In order for Israel to change its politics, however, the international community must show determination and the courage to implement an international peacekeeping force, the paper editorialized. The problems won’t simply go away over time, it wrote, adding, “The longer the international community waits, the worse the crisis will be.”

Attack on Palestinian Institutions Called a “Fatal Move”

Following the suicide attack, Israel took over several Palestinian institutions, including East Jerusalem’s Orient House, the seat of Palestinian municipal government. The occupation could be part of a “planned, progressive and systematic destruction of the Palestinian movement,” on the part of the Israeli government, speculated an Aug. 13 editorial in Geneva’s Le Temps. If this is the case, the paper said, “Israel will only meet very little international resistance,” as “none of the major nations with influence in the region seem to want to commit themselves.…In the short term,” according to the paper, “everything is happening as if Ariel Sharon should only expect verbal rebukes and political inaction from Washington…The European Union is equally paralyzed; France and Germany are not in a position to follow the same policy regarding Israel, and Britain remains attached to American strategy in the region.” Meanwhile, continued Le Temps, the U.N. is “worn out” after its operations in the former Yugoslavia and the Arab countries “are all weakened, either by a lack of political legitimacy, or economic poverty, or both…Ariel Sharon has a clear path to charge into the wall,” it concluded.

Berlin’s Die Welt warned on Aug. 13 that the Israeli seizure of Orient House could prove riskier than expected. “This could spell the beginning of a nightmare,” it said, calling it “a fatal move by Israeli Public Security Minister Uzi Landau to try and break Palestinian pride.”

Nation of Islam Leader Allowed Into Britain

The British press gave saturation coverage to a high court judge’s decision to allow Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan into Britain. Successive home secretaries over the last 15 years have barred him from entering the country, considering him a threat to racial harmony and public order. The judge apparently accepted the argument of Farrakhan’s lawyers that excluding him from Britain contravenes the Human Rights Act, a European Union convention incorporated into British law last October. The Times said on Aug. 2 that the judge’s decision “will particularly alarm the government because the judge has taken the rare step of intervening in a matter involving a senior minister’s personal discretion.” The paper called Farrakhan “a symbol of racial hatred” and mocked his beliefs: “[He] claims to have conversed on a flying saucer with Elijah Muhammad, spiritual leader of the Nation of Islam.”

On the same day, however, the liberal Guardian applauded the decision, declaring: “Our anti-racial incitement laws have also been strengthened. If Mr. Farrakhan indulges in his old rhetoric, it would not be difficult to arrest and deport him. If he resists such incitement, he has a right to be heard.”

The Independent of Aug. 2 concurred: “Exclusion merely bestows upon him a heroic status in the eyes of his devoted followers which he does not deserve and would otherwise not be able to receive. There is no reason to exclude anyone from this country, however vile, contentious or unpopular their views, unless there are genuine fears that their presence would lead to violence or abuse,” the paper stated.

India-Pakistan Talks on Kashmir End in Deadlock

In mid-July, a much-trumpeted meeting took place between Pakistan’s Gen. Pervez Musharraf and Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee. It was the first time in two years the leaders had discussed the disputed territory of Kashmir. “At least the ice has been broken,” wrote Germany’s Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung on July 18, after the summit had ended in a deadlock. “The Kashmir problem is hard to resolve because it involves the crux of both countries’ sovereignty,” the paper noted. “New Delhi has long declared ‘its’ Kashmir to be an ‘integral part’ of India, while Islamabad’s armed forces need the conflict to justify the leading role they play in Pakistan.”

“Islamabad and Delhi have rediscovered the value of dialogue,” said Neue ZŸrcher Zeitung the same day. “But they do not yet speak the same language.”

Commented the July 18 Oslo Aftenposten, “Since their independence from Britain India and Pakistan have damaged themselves as nations through their complete inability to resolve the Kashmir problem.”

The Economist, however, in a July 21 editorial, wrote that two good consequences may have emerged from the summit. “The first is that, before things got tricky, Mr. Vajpayee and General Musharraf had agreed on a return meeting,” the magazine said. “The second is that India was apparently ready to take at least a step towards acknowledging what is obvious to any non-Indian: that Kashmir is a serious obstacle standing in the way of normal relations between the subcontinent’s largest countries and that, without progress on it, there cannot be much progress on anything else.”

Assad’s Berlin Trip Causes Stir in Germany

Syrian President Bashar Assad’s July visit to Berlin caused heated debate in the German press. Chancellor Gerhard Schröder is facing a difficult balancing act, wrote the German daily LŸbecker Nachrichten on July 11. “Schröder must ensure that talks do not fall apart. This is the only way to improve economic relations with Syria. On the other hand,” the paper continued, “the government owes it to the Jewish lobby to reprimand Assad for his anti-Semitic statements.”

Hanover’s Neue Presse pointed out on the same day, however, that if Schröder took too tough a stance with Assad, Germany’s attempts to participate in mediating the Middle East conflict may be jeopardized. “Those who want peace and democracy must be willing to especially talk to war lords and authoritarian regimes,” the paper said.

In its July 11 edition the east German Mitteldeutsche Zeitung said that Damascus should be more actively included in the Middle East peace process and that the German government should use the Berlin meeting to advance this.

North African Labor Important to Europe

The Financial Times of Aug. 2 ran a piece on motorized caravans of North Africans leaving France and Spain and heading home for the summer vacation period, their cars sagging “under the weight of a year’s earnings turned into gifts or tradable goods: chairs, fridges, television sets and mountain bikes.” Two million Moroccans and Algerians will cross the Strait of Gibraltar during the first two weeks of August, the paper noted, a testament to “the growing importance of North African labor to Europe’s legal and black economies.” Spain’s Civil Guard erects Arabic-language signs indicating rest spots along the route from the French border to Algeciras, the most common embarkation point for Africa.

Spain’s El Pa’s reported on Aug. 1 that more than 500,000 foreigners had applied for “regularization” of their immigration status in the past 12 months, but that fewer than half the applicants were successful.

Megawati Seen as “More Predictable and Less Liberal”

The European press unanimously endorsed the July dismissal of Indonesian President Abdurrahman Wahid and the investiture of Megawati Sukarnoputri, daughter of modern Indonesia’s founding leader Sukarno, as head of state. Abdurrahman was Indonesia’s first freely elected president. During his 21-month tenure, however, the supreme parliament tired of his erratic and ineffectual ways, unanimously declaring him incompetent. Spain’s El Pa’s of July 26 said, “Wahid stirred hopes, but he soon appeared to lose his head.”

But, asked Britain’s Daily Telegraph on July 25th, will Megawati succeed where Abdurrahman failed? “The fact that she is closer to the military than Mr. Wahid could stoke rebellion in the outlying provinces, and cause trouble for East Timor, whose independence she opposed,” the paper noted. “The prospect is for governance both more predictable and less liberal than that of her predecessor.”

Russian Troops Kill Chechen Leader Barayev

At the end of June, the European press reported that Russian troops had killed Chechen separatist leader Arbi Barayev. Barayev allegedly was behind scores of kidnappings and murders—including the decapitation of four Western telecom engineers in 1998. The Russian newspaper Rossiyskaya Gazeta reacted on June 28 with a one-word headline: “Retribution.” It dismissed Barayev as “a simple bandit who thought only of money and personal gain. The idea of holy war was always just a screen for him.”

That day’s The Moscow Times, however, warned that removing one commander would change little, because the Chechen resistance consists of small, independent groups. In an editorial the newspaper expressed regret that Barayev took his secrets to the grave: “We won’t hear what he might have said about who profited from the kidnapping industry in the region over the last decade. We won’t hear his response to claims that rebel fighters have been able to purchase weapons and supplies from Russian officers and soldiers.…No matter how the Chechen campaign evolves, the Russian government has much to answer for regarding its actions over the last decade,” the paper said. “We can’t help but fear that the new enthusiasm for “mopping up” the rebel leaders is really intended to cover up the past rather than to bring peace to Chechnya.”

Azerbaijanis Choose Latin over Arabic for New Script

As of August, the Azerbaijani language will be written in the Latin, rather than the Cyrillic, alphabet—a change supporters hope will move the country in the direction of Europe and modernization and away from Russian influence. According to the July 30 Financial Times, Azeri was written in Arabic script until the Communist revolution of the 1920s, when it went Latinate until Joseph Stalin imposed the Cyrillic alphabet during the Soviet era. Since most Azerbaijanis over 30 can only read their native language in Cyrillic, the country’s newspaper editors fear the change will lead to plummeting circulation. “The move could also weaken the position of Azerbaijan’s political opposition,” the Financial Times noted, “which relies on newspapers to put its views across to the public.”

Lucy Jones is a free-lance journalist based in London.