Israel at loggerheads with allies on boycott of Palestinian coalition

Israel is at loggerheads with most of Europe over the new Palestinian unity government which was sworn in yesterday. The US, as usual and totally predictably, is reserving judgement; meaning we'll have a couple of days of dancing before she agrees to the Israeli position.

However, Britain has been urging other country's to open contacts with the non-Hamas members of the government and the Russians have said, "It is inarguably an important event in terms of consolidation of the Palestinian ranks," and insisted that the new government's programme had "taken into account" the Quartet's three conditions.

What is undeniable here is that the Quartet is now seriously split over how to approach the new Palestinian unity government with Israel and the US both in a tizzy over a statement by Mr Haniyeh in which he insisted "that resistance in all its means" against occupation was a legitimate Palestinian right.

Both the US and the Israelis have swooped on this as a declaration of the legitimacy of terrorism, ignoring the fact that the Palestinian unity government yesterday made historic compromises.

Mr Haniyeh said yesterday the aim of the new government was to establish a Palestinian state alongside Israel on the borders before the Six Day War in 1967. Hamas has offered a long-term truce in return for such a state and said it will not prevent Mr Abbas from negotiating one with Israel.

But Miri Eisin, spokeswoman to Ehud Olmert, Israeli Prime Minister, leaped on Haniyeh's comments, declaring, "Resistance is terror. Nobody should get that one wrong."

Now I know exactly what she is trying to say, but the construct of the sentence is fascinating. "Resistance is terror." That could also read as, "All resistance is futile."

You see, this is the fault line between the EU and Russia and the US and the Israelis. To the US and the Israelis the use of the word "terror" tells you who the good guys are and who the bad guys are. Once one side is designated "terrorist" the argument is essentially over. The "terrorist" can't be dealt with until they reject "terrorism."

However, the Europeans - because they for many years ran colonial empires and carry all the guilt associated with such past activities - are much more concerned with the concept of self-determination, as this was the way European empires devolved power away from themselves and told themselves and the world that they had repented and were still the good guys.

So the European sentiment is with the people being denied self determination and Europeans find it hard to see any qualitative difference between the Palestinian resistance to Israeli occupation and the American Revolution against the British yolk.

Oh, of course, we can all agree that suicide bombings are an abomination, but those are tactics. A tactic that we all abhor. However, the principle remains that an occupied people have a right to resist their occupation.

The Geneva Declaration on Terrorism states: “As repeatedly recognised by the United Nations General Assembly, peoples who are fighting against colonial domination and alien occupation and against racist regimes in the exercise of their right of self-determination have the right to use force to accomplish their objectives within the framework of international humanitarian law. Such lawful uses of force must not be confused with acts of international terrorism.”

Indeed, it makes very clear how it views events in this particular conflict:

Thus, it would be legally impermissible to treat members of national liberation movements in the Caribbean Basin, Central America, Namibia, Northern Ireland, the Pacific Islands, Palestine, and South Africa, among others, as if they were common criminals. Rather, national liberation fighters should be treated as combatants subject to the laws and customs of warfare and to the international laws of humanitarian armed conflict as evidenced, for example, by the 1907 Hague Regulations, the Four Geneva Conventions of 1949, and their Additional Protocol I of 1977. Hence, national liberation fighters would be held to the same standards of belligerent conduct that are applicable to soldiers fighting in an international armed conflict.

So one can instantly see the chasm that's opening between how the US and the Israelis view this conflict and how Europe and Russia view it. Miri Eisin, from an Israeli and American viewpoint has ended all discussion by declaring, "Resistance is terror. Nobody should get that one wrong."

However, both the Israelis and the Americans are making assumptions about how Europeans and Russians view what's taking place here. And their assumption is wrong. Whereas we find it very easy to condemn terrorist acts like suicide bombings, we do not come to the same conclusion as Eisen and conclude that all "resistance is terror".

Resistance is legitimate, and an oppressed people have a right under law to resist their occupiers.

This is why when Europeans and Americans discuss this subject they rarely understand each other. Former colonial powers see the occupied people attempting to obtain self determination, a nation like the US which was formed by settling a continent, sees another settler community in danger of being "driven into the sea".

It is for this reason that the Quartet are about to split on how they deal with the new Palestinian unity government. Our pasts mean that we both look at the same situation and see very different things.

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Tags: Israel, Palestine, US, EU, the Quartet, terrorism, resistance, Geneva, Palestinian unity government