Nothing Personal / Europa-bound
By Thomas O'Dwyer
When faced with an incompetent, corrupt, mendacious, war-mongering government of timeservers and self-servers, it's hard to think of any policy it might come up with that might merit a nod of approval. But lo, on Tuesday up speaks Silvan Shalom - the foreign minister without the portfolio who lives in the Prime Minister's Office - and announces that Israel might apply to join the European Union.
It was neither big news nor even new news - in our newspaper it merited only an item in the unread wasteland beside page two ads - and was hedged in with possible maybes. "Shalom said he is not excluding that this government will ask for full membership in the EU," said Marco Pannella, an Italian member of the European Parliament.
Shalom's minions confirmed the quote: "In principle, the minister thinks a possibility exists for Israel to join the EU since Israel and Europe share similar economies and democratic values." But the official added, "It doesn't mean he is preparing the dossier for applying tomorrow." Well, of course not, dear - did any ministry here ever prepare anything for tomorrow?
It may still be an eccentric view, but I have always written that Israel belongs in Europe, culturally, economically and practically. One can go further and suggest membership in Europe offers the state the best long-term guarantee of continued existence, and a non-militaristic way to confound its remaining enemies. Who would dare to attack a European Union country?
It offers huge economic benefits that would more than compensate for American handouts, and a whole stack of essential EU legislation would stabilize and underpin the increasingly shaky pillars of democracy here.
Israelis who are miffed at the EU's support for Palestinian independence, are always sniffing that they want nothing to do with the EU, yet enthusiastically leap into anything that is prefixed with "euro," whether it be a cheesy song contest or out-of-its-league sporting events. And in 1996, Israel became the first ever non-European country to join a lucrative five-year EU program for technical research and development under a scientific cooperation agreement that was signed with great ceremony in Brussels.
It was interesting to note that Silvan's comment was greeted everywhere with the same reaction as almost anything he says - yawn! It's about the same level of interest as you can find in the media about next week's Euro-Med ministerial meeting that will take place in Crete. The Euro-Mediterranean Partnership was launched at the 1995 Barcelona Conference between the EU and its 12 Mediterranean partners - also called the Barcelona Process by anyone who remembers.
However, of all people, the Iranians pounced on Shalom's statement. IRNA, the national news agency, citing both Silvan and Haaretz, quickly reassured its readers that Israeli EU membership was "highly unlikely in the foreseeable future." Quoting some obscure EU observer, IRNA said: "The EU requires would-be members to have good relations with their neighbors. This would mean that Israel must dramatically improve its relations with [its neighbors], most crucially Palestine. Other criteria demand candidates respect minorities and human rights that would include rejecting state- sponsored extra-judicial killings."
A visitor from another planet could be forgiven for thinking the United States must be Israel's next-door neighbor and that Europe must be far, far away across the Atlantic, a place of which we know little and care less. Yet Paris and London are the number one destinations for Israeli tourists and the EU is the country's biggest trading partner by far. The euro has been catching up with the dollar as Israelis' favorite foreign investment currency.
Israel is closer to Europe and naturally belongs in the European bloc. All those nations are diverse in culture, languages and economies - and Israel would fit right in alongside the new candidates. U.S. Senator Jesse Helms once said, "The European Union couldn't organize its way out of a wet paper bag." Not so - it's really President George Bush's vision of a Middle East common market, including Israel, that is the wet paper bag no economist will ever try to organize.
The Arab states may have a common language, religion and culture from Morocco to Iraq, but as one economic analyst said: "They don't trade with one another - mostly they scarcely speak to one another. Israel is not a natural belonger in the Middle East. Politics aside, few Arab imports would suit us, few of our exports are suitable for them. It is actually through membership in the EU that Israel would truly find its place as a trading partner with the Arab world."
On a former visit to the EU Commission headquarters in Brussels, a commission official told me that the union's involvement with Israel "is a dense network of long-standing and outstanding relations between the two sides." That jibes ill with the negative slurs Israelis cast at Brussels when they hear some opinion they don't like - one journalist even called the EU a "source of political infection" that Israel should avoid.
South of the Mediterranean median line there are only two democracies, Cyprus and Israel, so a European could be forgiven for wondering why bother with the fractious and uncooperative Mediterranean Middle East at all - squabbling Greeks and Turks, snarling Israelis and Palestinians, Arab dictators, medieval economies and primitive social mores.
However, Israel's divided neighbor Cyprus is well on the way to full EU membership, and this movement alone has already seen the 30-year-old border between Greeks and Turks thrown open in recent weeks. Even without a political settlement, there is no way both sides of a divided nation can fail to benefit politically and economically from membership of the union - just as divided Ireland did when it joined more than 40 years ago, despite the interim violence in the north.
European self-interest is as good a motive as any for bothering with Euro-Med - it has the merit of being honest. "The EU partnership aims toward a Euro-Med charter for peace and stability and on a range of other practical measures," an official said at the last Euro-Med conference.
There is agreement to establish a disaster-management network across the Mediterranean ... Experts discuss issues such as drugs, terrorism, organized crime, social affairs, cultural heritage, and many youth exchange programs. But in Crete, no doubt, neurotic Arabs will again complain about Israel, paranoid Israelis will complain about Israel-bashing - maybe not much of a Euro vision thing, but better than war, war.
Emma Bonino, the EU parliamentarian and leader of the Italian Radical Party, has for long campaigned for Israel to join the EU. "I think it's important that we not see Europe anymore as a geographic, Christian club," she said in a recent interview. "The turning point was when the EU, even theoretically, was open to Turkey. Europe is a political project. The criterion to join the EU was set by the European Council in Copenhagen, and includes parliamentary democracy, a certain standard in human rights and so forth." For now, in her view, Copenhagen excludes any Arab countries.
"But unfortunately and not by chance," she said, "the Israeli leadership does not want to even hear about this issue, because one way or another they know that Europe is also a discipline, and that if Israel joined the EU, it would be Europe negotiating with the Arab world." Over to you, Silvan.
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