The Free Gaza Flotilla

Eamonn McDonagh
Z Word Blog
29 May '10

1.

Writing in Haaretz, Amos Harel and Avi Issacharoff point to an aspect of the Free Gaza Flotilla that hasn’t received the attention it should,

In the approaching clash, the complex system of alliances and counter-alliances of the Middle East is beginning to emerge. It does not appear to be coincidental that the Islamist governing party in Turkey is involved, behind the scenes, in dispatching the flotilla, in coordination with Hamas in the Gaza Strip. At the same time it is doubtful that it is coincidental that the Israel Air Force held this week exercises with Greece, the traditional rival of Turkey, of the sort that two years ago were carried out mostly in Turkey.

2.

The editorial writer of the same paper shows no interest in the strategy of other actors in the conflict and goes for a simpler approach,

… the Israeli government knows exactly the price it must pay to free Shalit. It has already conducted indirect negotiations with Hamas and even announced that it was willing to release a large number of prisoners who are members of the Islamic group. The deal has been held up due to a number of prisoners who committed extremely serious crimes whom Israel refuses to release. Israel’s firm refusal to free those prisoners is becoming its most costly move so far.

There seems to me to be a basic misunderstanding about the meaning of the term “negotiation” here. While most people understand it to refer to a process with an uncertain outcome in which both parties attempt to make the fewest concessions possible while extracting the most from their rival, Haaretz seems to understand it as one in which Israel receives its enemy’s wish list and immediately concedes to it in full. Any other approach is seen as a sign of intransigence and bad faith on Israel’s part.

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