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AS THE COUNTRY was still celebrating the victory of repeal Simon Coveney was on a plane heading to the EU Foreign Affairs Council. After the meeting he tweeted about frustration at lack of any political progress.
To date most of the attempts to broker peace have been led by America, however, the recent events show us that the US is no longer fit to be a peace broker in the Middle East.
That role must now be taken up by the European Union, with Ireland as a leading negotiator.
Never an honest broker
While it has been argued America was never the honest broker it claimed (just look at its arms deals), it’s clear that the Trump administration has no interest in peace, only profiting from public office.
Trump named David Friedman as the Ambassador to Israel, his former bankruptcy lawyer, a conservative supporter of Israel’s illegal settlements and someone with no foreign policy experience. Trump has also assigned son-in-law Jared Kushner to lead the administration’s efforts in the region – Jared similarly has no foreign policy experience and is also a strong supporter of Israel settlements that are recognised internationally as illegal.
These appointments finally drop any remaining pretence of America as unbiased mediator. Beyond the Israeli and Palestinian conflict, America has acted unilaterally in exiting the Iran Agreement and moving its embassy to Jerusalem. Sanctions against US on the international stage for this action are unlikely to be effective.
Filling this vacuum
It is up to the EU now to fill this vacuum. The European Union prides itself on democracy, peace-making and freedom of the press inside its borders but it must now put the action into the External Action Service and take on the role of peacemaker to counterbalance the US as an economic bloc.
As stated by my European Greens colleagues, this must be “a fresh EU approach that genuinely serves the interests of peace and security of the Palestinian and Israeli people alike”.
For this to happen we need real leadership – while the EU has long condemned the actions of Israel, it has left that criticism empty of action as they hid behind the promise of a US-led peace process. The EU has even failed to even seek compensation for EU funded schools and solar panels destroyed and confiscated by Israel to pave the way for settlers – it was left to individual EU countries like Belgium to take a stand.
Peace, not war
The Green Party is an international party built on the belief that peace, not war, is the correct way to solve the our collective problems on this one, fragile earth.
In an move to push for the EU to take on this responsibility the Green Party of Ireland recently put forward a motion at the European Greens conference to condemn the treatment of Palestinians in Gaza and demanding action from the EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and her External Action Service.
To lay the groundwork for this process, the Irish government must themselves show leadership, leadership that so far been absent, taking the following starting steps to show leadership in any oncoming process:
Ireland has had its own history with war, independence and benefitting from EU-US peace-brokering with an occupying force. It is time to step up to the international stage and use that knowledge to bring about an end to the needless slaughter and destruction of Palestinian homes, lives and livelihoods.
Patrick Costello is Green Party councillor in Rathgar-Rathmines and has served as a human rights observer in occupied Palestine.
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