Europe’s role in the Middle East

By Fiamma Nirenstein

All at once, the story of how Yoschka Fischer, German Minister of Foreign Affairs and a just man in his generation – who spent his teenage years speculating on the responsibilities of his fathers (German, European, Christian) – has given importance to Europe’s role in the Middle East. It is a significant episode in a number of ways.

Briefly, the story is as follows: Fischer watched the terrorist massacre in Tel Aviv from the seaside hotel where he was staying. The next morning, he visited the site where a Palestinian terrorist killed 20 youngsters and wounded a hundred. He brought a bouquet of white flowers. An agitated Fischer visited Arafat twice that day. The story goes that, when asked whether he wasn’t deeply distressed by the slaughter of so many young people, Arafat told the startled minister, “Don’t tell me that in the depths of your hearts, you Germans really regret the Shoah.”

During these meetings, Fischer forced Arafat to do what no one had ever forced him to do before during this Intifada, not even the Americans. The head of the Palestinians condemned the attack and declared a cease-fire. In Arabic.

Was Arafat acting sincerely? He was certainly acting under a prime constraint: He suddenly lacked the decisive moral support, his main strength, a pledge he had never been forced to redeem. Without Chirac, without the Italians, the Germans and the Spanish, he would probably never have successfully carried through the Al Aqsa Intifada. Not after refusing Barak’s magnificent offers at Camp David and Clinton’s imprudent guarantees.

He would never have been able to turn the problem of the colonies (though in itself important) into a crucial one in this existential and religious confrontation (where is the problem of territory after Arafat’s refusal of 97 percent of the land returned?). He would never have been able to market the destructive issue of the return of the refugees, which has no way out. He would never have been able to propagate the insane idea that Jerusalem is primarily a Moslem city whose “judaization,” as Hana Ashrawi calls it, is a political invention.

At this point, the whole world is of the opinion that the Palestinians must make their nationalist dream come true. Well, no problem if it is conducted rationally and in a spirit of compromise. No blame if Europe wants a Palestinian state. But Europe has also been much too vehement and critically supportive and, as a result, has lost its role.

As the conflict became increasingly incomprehensible and more and more of a pretense, permeated with calls to kill the Jews (“Wherever they are!” as mufti, politicians and commentators in Palestine and the entire Arab world have been repeating in mosques, newspapers and on television since October), Europe backed the false conception of bilateral aggressiveness. It backed the image of David against Goliath, while the Palestinian Authority can now count on 85,000 armed men and terrorist organizations scourging an entire country.

What happened to make Fischer suddenly understand that there had to be a clear about-face to recover some meaning and a role? Citing Sharon’s appropriate decision to adopt a cease-fire and to not retaliate is not enough. The blood of innocent youngsters and the reference to the Shoah had a crucial effect on Fischer. The former young radical German suddenly saw that, in this conflict, the blood of Jews was being spilt for reasons of hate and not only for nationalism.

He saw that the country of Israel is essential for the survival of the Jews, that even though one might fight against it for political reasons, it cannot be hated or denied per se. Fischer saw what Europe had long ago lost sight of: That Israel is the only way out of Auschwitz, even for Europe. That this is the home of the children of those very Jews that Europe slaughtered.

He must have suddenly been horrified at the Jew hatred, at the Holocaust denial, at the anti-Semitic caricatures with hooked noses and fistfuls of dollars, a specific and overwhelming condition of this Intifada. Suddenly, he must have had a real understanding of the remnants of anti-Jewish Christian and communist-European prejudice, French colonial philo-Arab grandeur and the astute Italian prudence towards the Moslems. As he understood that, Europe reclaimed a role of peacemaker in the Middle East. Because, after too long a time, it remembered its past.

Fiamma Nirenstein

Fiamma Nirenstein was born in Florence and lives in Jerusalem as a foreign correspondent and a columnist for Il Giornale and Panorama in Italy. Holding a doctorate in modern history, she is the author of several books about the Middle East and other subjects. Read more of Fiamma Nirenstein's articles here.