Crisis in Israel and Fate of Palestine

by Dr.Abdul Ruff Colachal

(August 05, New Delhi, Sri Lanka Guardian) As predicted by many, Israel is once again trying now to further prolong the Palestine resolution and delay any durable peace in the region. BY resisting the attempts by USA–led West, UN and Arab nations to secure the promised Palestine state, Tel Aviv is keen to keep the lingering Palestine issue without any proper commitment and implementation. Israel has now created a corruption sandal and regime change crisis to keep the issue at bay by resurrecting, as usual, a domestic tussle to change its recent Mideast position as it almost agreed to let Palestinians set up their own sovereign nation.

Olmert had been under pressure to resign over a police inquiry into money he received from a businessman. With a view to advancing Israel’s “national interests” in the region and USA, Israel's right-wing Likud leader Benjamin Netanyahu called on 31 July for a new parliamentary election after Ehud Olmert pledged to resign following his party's leadership contest in September.

Olmert, will, however, remain caretaker prime minister until a new government is formed. This process could drag on for months, possibly into next year if a parliamentary election is called. Defense Minister and former premier Ehud Barak, head of the left-of-centre Labor party and Olmert's largest coalition partner and a contender for the post said that it was "not yet clear whether there will be election in three or four months from now" if Olmert steps down. Vice Premier Haim Ramon, a Kadima party leader and Olmert confidant told Army Radio that chance of holding new elections is high.

Scandals

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has faced weeks of public pressure to resign over probes into suspicions he took bribes from an American businessman. The corruption inquiry centers on allegations that a US citizen, Morris Talansky, made election donations in cash to Olmert in 2006, which may have subsequently been used to buy luxury items. The prime minister had faced mounting pressure from within his own party to resign.

The scandal is one of six corruption investigations Olmert has faced during his time in office. Although initially was admitting taking bribes, Olmert has also denied any wrongdoing, and vowed to fight for his innocence. Olmert finally bows to pressure and has announced he will stand down within months, saying a corruption case involving him is hurting his family. Vowing to prove his innocence, he said that he would quit as leader of his Kadima party as soon as it elects a new leader on 17 September.

Even earlier, the opposition and the ruling coalition partners created obstruction to Olmert’s decision to support the US plan for Mideast peace. This strategy of denying any opportunity for the ruling party to come to terms with the new reality and help establish a Palestine state has been going on in Israel for quite some time now.

Dogged by corruption scandals, the Israeli prime minister's decision to bow out of the centrist Kadima party's leadership contest on September 17 and then step down plunged the Middle East peace talks and Israeli politics into limbo. Olmert, who could stay on as a caretaker prime minister for months while his Kadima successor struggles to cobble together a new coalition, has vowed not to "ease up" on peacemaking - a challenge that could prove time-consuming and complicated because of bitter divisions within parliament.

Olmert said he felt able to continue carrying out his duties despite the corruption investigation but he asked: "What is more important, my personal justice or the public interest?" Noting that the investigation was turning people against him, he said that "people hurting my family bother me a lot". He complained of "relentless attacks from self-appointed 'fighters for justice' who sought to depose me from my position, when the ends sanctified all the means".

Ehud Olmert

Israeli prime ministers tend to have a pretty short shelf life, but the issues they grapple with seem immutable. Only Ariel Sharon has won successive elections in the modern era, albeit at the head of two different parties; fate has decreed that no-one else would last even four years as PM since the early 1990s.

In 1993 Ehud Olmert began 10-year stint as mayor of Jerusalem. In 2005 he left right-wing Likud party with former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to form Kadima and in 2006 he took over as leader when Ariel Sharon suffers a stroke. In 2007 Olmert helped re-launch Israeli-Palestinian peace talks after seven-year hiatus and recently in July he announced plans to resign.

Ehud Olmert succumbed after less than three, brought down by a mix of corruption allegations and his poor war leadership. But while the Olmert years may have seen a new low in the public perception in Israel of its political leaders, since the 2006 Lebanon war his stewardship of foreign policy tells another story.

Just maybe, some people thought, Olmert would enable Israel to settle accounts with its foes like the Palestinians and Lebanese and head towards a more secure future. The outgoing PM still intends to do a deal with Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas, a man he is said to have developed a warm personal relationship with, before he steps down in two months. But the challenges seem as daunting as ever, and it will be all the more difficult in an expected period of political turmoil with no obvious successor and ambitious contenders vying for power.

Race: Possible successors

As it is already known, four Kadima ministers, including Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and Transport Minister Shaul Mofaz, have launched campaigns to replace Olmert in the September 17 vote. Avi Dichter and Meir Sheetrit are also seen as contenders for the party leadership. Polls have shown Livni, Israel's chief negotiator with the Palestinians, ahead within Kadima. Netanyahu, a former prime minister, could try to build his own coalition to stymie Kadima. Tzipi Livni, one of Israel's most popular politicians, is tipped to replace Olmert in the party contest. A former protégé of Ariel Sharon, she helped broker Israel's withdrawal from the Gaza Strip. She is viewed as one of the few centrists in the government not tainted by corruption, and said to be championing a vision of Israel co-existing with a Palestinian state. However, critics argue that she lacks the military and political experience to lead the country.

Recent opinion polls suggest Netanyahu's Likud party, a critic of Olmert's peace moves with the Palestinians and Syria, would win a snap election. "This government has reached an end and it doesn't matter who heads Kadima. They are all partners in this government's total failure," Netanyahu told Israeli Radio. "National responsibility requires a return to the people and new elections."

But the poll scenario will emerge only when a final decision is taken by the government.

Israel, Syria, Iran

Keen to remain the key player with power to invade and kill Arabs in Mideast and without any threat to its supremacy, Israel quickly has warned on Iran nuclear aims.

Hamas control of Gaza, Palestinian refugees and Israel’s "demographic time-bomb" - the eventuality that Jews will become a minority within the Jewish state - and, frankly, the mind boggles. Finally there is Iran, feared to be developing a nuclear weapons capability - something Israel is already thought to possess - and frequently uttering blistering denunciations and threats against Israel.

However, under Barak and Olmert peace hopes have been raised through an assortment of negotiations, initiatives, prisoner swaps and ceasefires with neighbors, but not necessarily quite sincerely. Calm reigns on the northern front with Lebanon and even the situation in Gaza and southern Israeli has some what quietened. Perhaps the most significant initiative has been the indirect talks with Syria over the fate of the Golan Heights.

Indeed the president of Syria - a country with considerably longer-lasting leaders - said Damascus would wait for a new US administration before engaging in direct talks. Secretive, Turkish-mediated contacts were always likely to be part of a long process that could easily fall prey to ructions in Israeli politics.

However, as the colonial powers so in order to divert the world attention from its weaknesses and hidden agendas, Israel has shifted its attack on Iran. Israeli Deputy Prime Minister Shaul Mofaz has warned that Iran is near a breakthrough in its nuclear program. Mofaz accused Iran of pursuing a strategy of buying time in talks aimed at limiting its nuclear ambitions.

Mofaz is the one to watch, having promised in June that "if Iran continues its nuclear weapons program, we will attack it". However, any Israeli leader's position may be bound by events to the West rather than to the East. Mofaz, known for his hard-line stance on Iran, is a candidate to become Israel’s next prime minister. Current Israeli PM Ehud Olmert has announced he will step down in September. Speaking on a visit to Washington, Mofaz said it was "unacceptable" for Iran to become a nuclear power. "Our estimation is that already by 2009 Iran will reach enrichment capability and as soon as 2010 will have option to reach uranium production at military levels," he said.

An Observation

The Israeli prime minister also seemed to direct veiled criticisms against the justice system, saying "the prime minister is not above the law but he is in no way below it". He said he is proud to be the prime minister of a country that investigates its prime ministers and he seems to have point there. Prime ministers of “innocent” India have been left scot-free for their genocide and destructive policies in Kashmir since it tactfully annexed it in 1947. Even after the discovery of secret grave-yards in Kashmir nothing has happened to Indian leaders dealing with militarized Kashmir. Neither the UNSC nor any power in the world, inclusive USA and EU, has taken any steps to bring the terror Indian leaders to bring to book.

The fact that while Israel-US combine has at least publicized road maps to return sovereignty back to Palestine, India is still panicky about doing the same. The big question, nonetheless, is whether Israel can really let Palestinians live peacefully in their own country and also face giving up the Golan, valued as a strategic asset --and cherished as a fantastic leisure amenity by Israelis --since its forces captured the territory in the 1967 war. Israeli demands Damascus it breaks ties with Israel’s main foes, Palestinian and Lebanese militant groups like Hamas and Hezbollah, and Iran.

There is no way of knowing about Israeli intentions and if Tel-Aviv is serious about realigning itself - rewards could be great, but so could possible repercussions. However, it seems the Kadima party frontrunner to replace Olmert, Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, is most likely to keep the talks with Palestinians and Syria running. By contrast her closest rival, hawkish transport minister and former army chief Shaul Mofaz, is not known as a land-for-peace advocate, so the momentum may be lost.

The White House said its goal of getting Olmert and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to reach a peace deal this year was unchanged. Having declared his intention to resign, Olmert would lack the political strength to make commitments, either in final-status talks with Abbas or indirect negotiations with Syria. The US said that peace negotiations would continue and that it looked forward to "working with all responsible Israeli leaders in the government". Syria’s UN ambassador said the resignation might affect indirect peace talks with Israel, which are being brokered by Turkey.

But, again, with the Palestinians it is much less clear for Israeli strategists as to how problems can be solved, over Jerusalem, Jewish settlements, the borders of a Palestinian state. The biggest challenge for Israel is to return for peace the Arab lands annexed forcefully by it on the strength of support from USA and UK and a few Islamic nations.

Israeli leaders, like their Indian counterparts, are too cunning, to state the least. Some analysts saw Olmert's plan as a ploy to remain in power despite controversy over the police probes. "Looking at Olmert's history, this is a strategic move," said a critic. If the new head of Kadima fails to set up a coalition, "then he will be called back or he will become ... the acting prime minister until there are elections."

All said and done, the present political scenario, where real or created, it is claimed that Olmert's weak political position has severely impaired chances for a peace deal with the Palestinians by the end of the year. (Fatah) Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, a staunch supporter of US-Israel leadership, said the latest crisis and the announcement was "an internal Israeli matter" and that Palestinian negotiators still hoped to reach a peace settlement before the end of this year.

The EU and the US have offered Tehran a series of incentives in a bid to halt its uranium enrichment. Iran has not yet responded to the offer. But Israel is still keen to exploit the Iran issue to its own advantage in Mideast crisis, denying any real progress in Palestine settlement. On its part, Washington also installs a new leader in the next six months, and the outcome of US elections, as much as anything that happens in Israel, could have great bearing on its policy toward nations in the region, including Palestine, Syria and Iran.

It has become a sheer habit of the so-called “democracies” like USA, Israel and India to play dirty criminal politics under the garb of democracy and secularism. These rogue states are interested only in advancing their illegitimate national interests by provocatively pomoting, and then exploiting the global terror situation, and sharing the resources of every region, especially of Islamic nations according to some scheme.

Will the Islamic nations stop their infighting over petty issues and now concentrate on the emerging anti-Islamic coalitions across the world that would in due course try to destory Islamic nations eventually?

(The Writer is a Research Scholar, School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi )
- Sri Lanka Guardian