Israel/Palestine
Related: About this forumNetanyahu phones Erdogan to apologize for deaths of Turkish citizens on Gaza flotilla
The two leaders spoke for first time since 2009, agreeing to normalize relations, and return their ambassadors to Tel Aviv and Ankara; Turkey agreed to cancel all legal proceedings initiated against IDF officers and soldiers over Mavi Marmara incident.
By Barak Ravid | Mar.22, 2013 | 4:21 PM
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu phoned Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Friday and apologized over the deaths of nine Turkish citizens during the 2010 Israel Navy raid on the Gaza flotilla.
Erdogan accepted the apology during his conversation with Netanyahu. Erdogan's office later released a statement saying Turkey valued its "friendship" with Israel.
Ties between Israel and Turkey deteriorated due to the May 2010 raid on the Mavi Marmara vessel, which was on its way from Turkey to the Gaza Strip. The ship was part of a flotilla aimed at breaking through a blockade Israel had placed on the coastal territory.
During Friday's phone call, Netanyahu told Erdogan that an Israeli investigation into the incident revealed several operational errors made by IDF forces. Netanyahu "expressed his apologies to the Turkish people for any error that could have led to loss of life and agreed to complete an agreement to provide compensation to the families of the victims," according to a statement by the Prime Minister's Office.
http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/netanyahu-phones-erdogan-to-apologize-for-deaths-of-turkish-citizens-on-gaza-flotilla.premium-1.511394
oberliner
(58,724 posts)AMMAN, Jordan Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel on Friday apologized in a personal phone call to Turkeys prime minister for a deadly commando raid on a Turkish ship in 2010, in a sudden reconciliation between the two countries that was partly brokered by President Obama during his visit to Israel this week, according to Israeli, Turkish and American officials.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/23/world/middleeast/president-obama-israel.html?_r=0
Jefferson23
(30,099 posts)oberliner
(58,724 posts)Netanyahu bows to his American masters.
Jefferson23
(30,099 posts)If Israel's interests interfere with ours the occupation will be over sooner than
you can say, illegal settlement.
Keep in mind if Israel desires to isolate itself even further, they certainly are free
to do so now...just without the US backing. The US is and should be concerned
about their own relevance in the world too, hence the brokered apology to Turkey.
oberliner
(58,724 posts)Do you think that Israel is more isolated now than, say, in the 1980s?
Jefferson23
(30,099 posts)oberliner
(58,724 posts)Look at the UN votes from that era.
Jefferson23
(30,099 posts)low Israel is perceived and the changing players of world leaders, one example, Egypt's
dictator is gone..Israel's former buddy.
oberliner
(58,724 posts)Israel has become much more integrated in terms of its relationship with the EU, and it also has a much higher number of allies in Africa, Asia, and across Eastern Europe than it did in the 1980s.
Jefferson23
(30,099 posts)You're certainly free to believe what you wish about Israel.
oberliner
(58,724 posts)I had been trying to be polite about it, but, please try to be informed about the history of the conflict.
Just because you think Israel is isolated does not make it so. Take a moment to step away from your lens and look at the facts objectively.
Jefferson23
(30,099 posts)permanently.
Your brand of objectivity is pretty sad.
How is your petition to ban 972 Magazine going, oberliner?
delrem
(9,688 posts)The 9 nations opposing the Palestinian request for a non-member state status in the UN:
Israel, US, Canada, Czech Republic, Panama, and four small islands in the Pacific Ocean (Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Nauru, and Palau).
Canada is only part of that short list because we're still suffering under the leadership of the one term wonder Harper. You betcha the US knows how slim even that margin is.
I would call that "isolated", by any definition of the word.
Israel, in the '80s, still benefited from the nearness of several foundation myths.
From my own experience as a student in a Catholic school, the most prevalent myth was that promoting donations of $$ to, and emotional support for, Israel's kabbutz' "making deserts bloom, making an uninhabited and uninhabitable land fertile". The one and only context for this myth was a description of Jewish Israelis as holocaust survivors and victims of thousands of years of persecution. Like all myths, there's a strong element of truth to it, but also exaggeration, selection and abstraction. I know that I, as a student fed this myth, was bedazzled by it. My emotional support was 100%.
Of course, as a Catholic I was also fed some pretty hefty myths associating the Jewish people and the land of Israel with God, and not just any God but the one true God, the God of Jesus, of the Prophets and the God of the Jewish people (now that, children, is what you call a trump card). In the '80s the plight of Palestinians had almost zero air time and Palestinians were hardly if at all imagined to exist. To be sure there're still an extraordinary number of people living 100% in that mythic, religious bubble which negates Palestinians while glorifying Jews. But it's a very different world, today, in so many ways, and IMO that bubble which once enclosed a majority now encloses only a minority. Today more and more people set religious inequalities aside and seek for peaceful resolutions to conflicts which recognize the equality of persons.
Jefferson23
(30,099 posts)Netanyahu phoned Turkish PM Erdogan to apologize over the deaths of nine Turkish citizens aboard the Gaza flotilla in May 2012 after an Israel Navy raid; the two agreed to normalize relations.
By Barak Ravid, Jonathan Lis and Gili Cohen | Mar.22, 2013 | 7:24 PM
Former Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman said on Friday that Israel's apology to Turkey over the 2010 Israel Navy raid on the Gaza flotilla was a "serious mistake."
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu telephoned Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Friday, and apologized for the deaths of nine Turkish activists during the raid on the Mavi Marmara vessel. The two leaders agreed to normalize relations between the two countries.
Lieberman, who currently chairs the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, stated in response: "An apology by the State of Israel on an Israel Defense Forces operation against a terror organization is a serious mistake."
"The apology hurts the motivation of IDF soldiers, strengthens extremists in the area and hurts Israel's struggle along the righteous path," he said.
http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/lieberman-says-apology-to-turkey-a-serious-mistake.premium-1.511420
oberliner
(58,724 posts)Or is his trial still ongoing?
Jefferson23
(30,099 posts)Said he would block any settlement construction freeze.
He seems fine to me, as if nothing unusual is going on in his life.
oberliner
(58,724 posts)The trial of former Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman began in the Jerusalem Magistrates Court on Sunday afternoon.
Lieberman, who is charged with fraud and breach of trust in the appointment of Zeev Ben Aryeh as Israels ambassador to Latvia, entered a plea of innocence.
Initial proceedings were scheduled for late April.
During his trial Lieberman is barred from sitting in the cabinet, but he can continue his parliamentary activities as a Knesset member. If he is convicted of offenses carrying moral turpitude, he will have to resign immediately.
http://www.haaretz.com/news/national/lieberman-pleads-not-guilty-as-trial-gets-underway-first-hearings-set-for-late-april.premium-1.503895
Jefferson23
(30,099 posts)I don't think he is worried.
oberliner
(58,724 posts)Hopefully it will result in, at the very least, a resignation.
azurnoir
(45,850 posts)for him
oberliner
(58,724 posts)Let's see how it plays out in court.
Jefferson23
(30,099 posts)Purveyor
(29,876 posts)that is why Obama insisted on this apology or it was a 'no-go' on Iran.
Jefferson23
(30,099 posts)Iran, I will be shocked...makes no sense. Needless to say, horrifying too.
oberliner
(58,724 posts)Those military strikes have been "imminent" for going on three years now.