It must have cut Malcolm Turnbull to the quick: he goes to all the effort of welcoming the Prime Minister of a country engaged in a brutal occupation and guilty of massive human rights violations, goes to the trouble of isolating Australia from the international mainstream and even close allies like New Zealand and the United Kingdom to endorse the policies of his visitor — and his guest humiliates him.
Turnbull yesterday made clear Australia’s support for a two-state solution to Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory. “We support an outcome which has two states where Israelis, the Israeli people, the Palestinian people live side by side as a result of direct negotiations between them — that is the fundamental point — and live together in peace and the security that they are entitled to expect,” he said.
[Facts on the ground: the open-air misery of Israeli occupation]
But Benjamin Netanyahu — or “Bibi” as Turnbull insists on calling him — was having none of it. He rejected a two-state solution. He preferred “not to deal with labels but with substance … if Israel is not there to ensure security, then that state very quickly will become another bastion of radical Islam … we have to ensure that Israel has the overriding security control of all the territories, all the territories. Other than that, I want the Palestinians to be able to govern themselves and to have all the freedoms to do so.”
This is not a two-state solution, but a formalised status quo, in which Israel controls most of the West Bank (currently called Area C), Palestinian control is limited to a minority of the West Bank composed of non-contiguous, Bantustan-like cites and townships, and Israel doesn’t have to deal with the problem that would arise if it annexed the West Bank, of having to allow Palestinians to vote or, to prevent that frightening outcome, confirm de jure what is the de facto situation now, that this is an apartheid state. That is, Israel gets all the privileges of annexation — in particular, control of Palestinian land and resources — without any of the “negatives” such as having to allow Palestinians political rights.
[Netanyahu’s visit intensifies pressure on Shorten to back Palestine]
Meantime, the steady drip of settlements continues, occupying Palestinian land, appropriating Palestinian resources, strategically placed to surround Palestinian towns and isolate them.
To Netanyahu’s credit, unlike Turnbull, he was indeed dealing not in labels but in substance. “Two-state solution” is a mantra for Western countries that enables them to avoid addressing what Israel is doing on the ground via its settlement policy and military control of most of the West Bank. Netanyahu at least was prepared to be up front — no two-state solution, just the formalisation of Israel’s current occupation and settlement policies. Both Israelis and Palestinians understand this — that’s why, increasingly, so many say that the possibility of a genuine two-state solution is now zero. It remains the formal policy of the (corrupt, authoritarian) Palestinian Authority and Israeli peace activists insist it must be a call for Palestinians themselves to make, but the two-state solution is dead. Netanyahu is prepared to acknowledge it, while Turnbull prefers to cling to the mantra.
Notice also that when asked about the issue, Netanyahu immediately played the radical Islam card and did so again shortly afterward. This is a longstanding Israeli tactic — to try to distract from what is at its core a dispute about military occupation, colonisation and theft of another people’s resources by insisting it’s really about a clash of religions — indeed, of civilisations: Westernised, civilised Jews versus the radical Islamic militants. It’s a convenient fiction that ignores how tens of thousands of Palestinian Christians suffer every bit as much under Israeli occupation as Palestinian Muslims, in cities like Bethlehem.
The plight of Palestinian Christians of course don’t fit the clash-of-religions narrative — and makes a mockery of evangelical Christians’ reflexive support for Israel. It’s of a piece with a broader lack of curiosity in the West about ordinary Palestinians and what they endure at the hands of “the only democracy in the Middle East” (a democracy, that is, if you don’t count its attempts to force properly elected Arab MPs out of parliament or prevent their election or shoot them).
Yesterday was a low point in recent Australian public life. Not merely was a leader overseeing a brutal occupation and de facto apartheid welcomed as a dear friend, not merely did the Turnbull government confirm its isolation from the diplomatic mainstream, but our guest didn’t even have the decency to adhere to the comforting fiction of a “two-state solution” that is now dead.
* Bernard Keane travelled to Israel and Palestine in 2016 as a guest of the Australia Palestine Advocacy Network
Turdball got all that he deserved for being so appallingly obsequious to the thug who is Netanyahu. I hope the world, looking on, does not think this failure of an Australian statesman, is representative of the majority of Australians.
I cringed when I heard him sucking Bibi’s balls.
Turnbull insulted New Zealand when he wrote in the Australian he would never have voted for the UN resolution condemning Israel’s occupation of Palestinian land. NZ pro-sponsored the resolution passed by all Security Council members. (the US abstained so it could be passed).
What is it about the Zionist lobby that they have such influence in Australia and the US? Only Trump’s US and Turnbull’s Oz would welcome Bibi the way he’s been flattered in Canberra. Why does Turnbull want to isolate Australia from the international community by being a mate of Bibi? Thanks again, Bernard Keane. Great, honest journalism.
Sorry Vincent, the colour of your politics is plainly evident. The UN acts as a lobby group for the Palestinian cause and has no genuine validity. And this rubbish about the Zionist lobby – you sound like a Bob Carr clone. The Muslim lobby is far more significant and politically dangerous to Australia’s security and well-being.
Turnbull likes what Israel has to offer us technologically and appreciates Israel’s common democratic values. Sucking up to the decrepit Palestinian cause won’t do anything but win us brownie points with other regimes that are willing to sell out Israel to the intimidation and harrassment from the Left that has lost its credibility, willing to sacrifice our Western way of life and entertain Islamists.
Bernard at his best here. The two-state solution is dead. The one-and-a-half-state status quo is cruel and unjust, and permanently inflames the Middle East.
The only viable path forward – one which Bernard notes duly frightens the Israeli right – is for the Palestinians to change direction and demand a one-state solution.
As a US-guaranteed, nuclear armed, high-tech economy regional superpower, Israel is not going to disappear. Instead the utterly nonviable remnants of Palestine must disappear, by dissolving into Israel, willingly and completely. It’s the only thing that can save the Palestinians as a people now, and it would fundamentally change the dynamics of the Middle East for the better.
The very existence of Israel would no longer be a source of fury for hundreds of millions of people in the region. The Palestinians would have finally set out on a road (long, difficult, but navigable) to civil and political rights. And the US and its allies (Australia included) would finally be able quit the repeated intervening in the Middle East that we know is the fuel for radical Islamism.
Thanks again Bernard for having the courage to report something that isn’t the standard Israeli condoned line. Very few journalist are willing to call a blockade a blockade.
I’ll give this for the Israeli Ministry of Propaganda, they are good. Whenever a line of reasoning is promulgated it is repeated in letters to the Editor, comments sections on blogs, other journalists work, government pronouncements and usually in exactly the same words. The ‘….will become another bastion of radical Islam” line has been repeated dutifully everywhere.
Racist Israel is a blot on the face of the earth as was its Boer predecessor in South Africa and an ongoing danger to world peace. If it won’t negotiate a non-racist solution such as returning to the status quo ante the Nakba in which Jews and Arabs lived together in peace for centuries, then the world (even its ally America) will end up jerking the rug from under it and it will end up with imposed Sharia tyranny. Couldn’t happen to a nicer crowd.