The real 'oven-ready' deal

 As I write this, UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson is on his way to Brussels, there to meet EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.  The two ‘principals’ are supposed to do their darndest to undo the plonter in the bilateral negotiations and find a ‘creative’ compromise towards a deal.  This is the latest move in an intricate dance that – everybody knows – will only end when it absolutely needs to.

In the run-up to this ‘crucial meeting’, the two sides did what they do best: jockeyed for positions.  As for us, the public, we are being told (by countless journalists and politicians) that the negotiations now boiled down to resolving three issues:

• - EU fishing quotas in UK waters;
• -; ‘Level playing field’ rules;
• - Who/what will police the deal.

It is the same story: whichever paper you read, whichever channel you tune into, you’ll read or hear journalists and politicians parroting what they heard from others – adding to it only their own ideological slant and their sense of self-importance.  Most of these journalists and politicians don’t know what they’re talking about; the others are just lying to us.  The truth is that these ‘issues’ are either unimportant or very easy to solve.  They are (or can be, given the political will) non-issues.  Here is why.

The fishy issue

As long as UK was a member state (and in the transition period following Brexit) EU fishing rules – the so-called ‘Common Fisheries Policy – applied.  This sets quotas for each member state and per each species of fish.  Currently, it allows both British and EU boats to fish in British waters – up to the set quota.  In practice, this means that EU boats catch much more fish in UK waters than British boats catch in EU waters.  Come 1 January 2021 and in the absence of a deal, the UK could in principle keep all the fish for itself and not allow anyone else access to what is, legally speaking, a national resource.  This would negatively affect EU fishermen, especially those from neighbouring countries: France, Belgium, Netherlands, Denmark…

Nah, those fish cannot be saved.  They'll go into the pan...

That much is true.  But, when the Economist calls the issue “political dynamite,” that’s bollocks; when French President Emmanuel Macron threatens to scupper the deal over the percentage of fish available to the EU – that is posturing.

For both EU and UK, fishing is a minor economic issue.  We are talking truly ridiculous numbers: the total value of fish caught by EU boats in UK waters is somewhere around $0.6 billion.  For comparison, EU’s total economic output is estimated at $18,000 billion.  In other words, we are talking about 0.0033% of EU’s ‘GDP’!  In terms of employment, fishing provides a means of livelihood for just under 100,000 EU ‘nationals’.  This is almost 0.05% of the entire EU workforce, but only a small fraction of those fishermen ply their trade in British waters.  Measured in FTE (Full-Time Equivalents), France boasts an ‘army’ of 6,623 fishermen – some of whom may even vote for Macron, provided he displays enough Gallic belligerency on their behalf...

‘Level playing field’

If fishing is “political dynamite,” this one’s the equivalent of a nuclear bomb.  Currently, British and EU regulation is practically the same, ensuring that British and European countries can compete fairly in both markets.  Come 1 January 2021, the UK would, in principle, be able to change the rules, reducing the costs and/or boosting the profitability of British firms.  The British government may reduce environment protection obligations; it may improve productivity by forcing employees to work longer hours; it may reduce consumer protection standards; it may even decide to subsidise certain industries.

We must ensure a level playing field forever!

Let’s say that British and European firms both make a particular widget, which is currently priced at €100 per widget.  To manufacture it, companies have to buy Raw Material – also manufactured in the EU and costing €50 per widget.  Raw material is also available from Chinese suppliers at €30 per widget, but such Raw Material contravenes EU’s strict environmental policies and is hence verboten in Europe.  Post-Brexit, however, the British government can in principle decide that the environmental issue isn’t that important, or that it can be mitigated.  If it allows them to buy Chinese Raw Material, British firms would be able to undercut EU companies, potentially pushing them out of the market.

It’s not just about China; in fact, the EU more worried about potential supply of cheaper products from the US.  The European powers that be have worked for decades to keep certain US industries out of the common market – not because they are more littering, but because they are more efficient and can therefore supply cheaper products.

EU’s proposed ‘solution’ to this was that the UK pledges to use the same rules as the EU.  But that would make a mockery of Brexit and would constitutes a particularly painful form of political suicide for any Conservative government.

The British concession was the so-called ‘non-regression’: as part of the deal, the UK would pledge not to lower the regulatory requirements below the current levels – which are aligned with those of the EU.  But European politicians were quick to point out that the EU constantly raises its standards.  So accepting merely ‘non-regression’ may, in the future, still result in a competitive advantage for British firms.  In the words of German Chancellor Angela Merkel:

“We need to have a level playing field not only for today, but for tomorrow, and the day after that.  Otherwise the result will be unfair terms of competition, which we cannot impose upon our businesses.”

Mrs. Merkel’s ‘offer’ was that the deal should include provisions allowing the EU, in the event of ‘unfair’ British regulation, an ‘automatic right’ to retaliate – for instance by curtailing access to certain markets for British goods and services.  But, beyond being unpalatable to any ‘sovereign’ British government, such provisions would be exceedingly complex to design and implement.  What constitutes an ‘unfair’ change in regulation?  Who will determine what is or isn’t ‘unfair’ as opposed to just ‘different’?

This seems like an insoluble conundrum.  In fact, an Irish politician called it an attempt to “square the circle”.

But it’s all just smoke and mirrors.  There is a very straightforward solution: rather than attempting to be restrictive or prescriptive in terms of ‘level playing field’, the deal should simply allow either side to unconditionally terminate the agreement (in its totality, not partially), with – say – one year notice.  This means that, if it feels that the agreement does it more harm than good (for instance, that British firms are enjoying an unfair advantage and are therefore undermining the ‘health’ of the single market), the EU would be able to bail out long before that vaunted single market sustains significant damage.  The one year transition period would allow government agencies and companies to adapt to the new reality.  And, if the agreement is terminated, we would all be no better and no worse than with no deal in the first place.  But the risk of termination would be – I dare say – exceedingly small: the two parties would be more likely to negotiate away small hiccups and weigh eventual drawbacks against broader advantages.  What’s more, any issues would be assessed for their real impact – rather than for the imagined future risks.  From afar, the shadow of an anthill can often be mistaken for a steep mountain!

An unconditional right of termination would ensure that this will always be a relationship between two willing partners; it would defuse the suspicion that it may at some point turn into an unhappy catholic marriage.  And this brings me to the next ‘major area of disagreement’…

Who/what would police the deal

What happens if one of the signatories believes that the other has violated the terms of the deal?  Who is going to interpret what’s been agreed – and make a determination as to what constitutes ‘the terms’?

The EU wanted its own ‘Court of Justice’ to make those determinations.  ‘Keep dreaming!’ responded the Brits.

There are, of course, solutions – international treaties often include complex clauses designing bespoke processes of conflict resolution.

But here’s the thing: international treaties are extremely difficult (and often impossible) to enforce.  If you want an example, look no further than the ‘transition deal’ between EU and UK.  The ink has hardly managed to dry on those pieces of paper, before the UK government introduced a bill aimed at ‘clarifying’ its obligations and ‘protecting the UK’ from ‘extreme EU interpretations’ of what’s been agreed.  Government officials have serenely admitted that the draft bill violated international law, albeit only in a “specific and limited way” (rather than in a general and unbounded manner, presumably!)

This may sound unpleasant to certain hypocrites and wishful thinkers; but the reality is that a sovereign state cannot – except in the most extreme circumstances – be forced to comply with ‘international law’, or with treaties it signed.

So the best – nay, the only – guarantee that an agreement will be complied with is making sure that it is and remains in the best interest of its signatories.

Luckily, he is protected by International Law...

An unconditional termination clause would make ‘policing the deal’ and ‘conflict resolution processes’ superfluous.  It is catholic marriages that account for the most acrimonious divorces – just ask Henry VIII!

So why are they fighting?

But, if the ‘major areas of disagreement’ are actually non-issues, why this prolonged, painful ‘process’?  Why the rancour, the recriminations, the bitterness?

To understand this, one has to appreciate that the European Union has long ceased to be about economics.  In the 1975 referendum, the UK voted to enter the Common Market – an economic bloc; in 2016 it voted to leave the European Union – a political project.

Consequently, the conflict between the UK and EU isn’t about the economy, as we are being led to believe; it is about ideology.  Nothing exemplifies this better than a recent Twitter-facilitated ‘conversation’.  On 2 December 2020, UK Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Alok Sharma posted:

“The UK was the first country to sign a deal with Pfizer/BioNTech - now we will be the first to deploy their vaccine

To everyone involved in this breakthrough: thank you

In years to come, we will remember this moment as the day the UK led humanity’s charge against this disease”

I’m no fan of the Rt. Honourable Sharma; one can dispute the taste he displayed in an official tweet that sounded like the boastful cheering of a football fan.  But that’s not what he was criticised for.  No, Mr. Sharma’s tweet was criticised for being nationalistic.  Within 3 hours (which is warp speed in diplomatic terms), a certain Andreas Michaelis, Germany’s Ambassador to the Court of St. James, weighed in – also on Twitter:

“Why is it so difficult to recognize this important step forward as a great international effort and success. I really don't think this is a national story. In spite of the German company BioNTech having made a crucial contribution this is European and transatlantic.”

Listen to the music: the German envoy wasn’t objecting because Mr. Sharma omitted to give credit to the vaccine’s ‘German connection’.  No, he was annoyed by Sharma’s expression of national pride.

And therein lies the difference: born as a sensible economic alliance, the European ‘Union’ is now an ideological movement – one that aims to gradually wipe out the nation states in favour of a new (some would say ‘artificial’) European identity and its political manifestation: a supra-national entity (some would call it an empire).  Hence the relentless push against any trace of ‘nationalism’ – even the mild, benign form that many would call ‘patriotism’; hence the instinctive, knee-jerk reaction against manifestations of such ‘nationalism’ – whether in the UK, in USA, or elsewhere; hence the hostility towards Israel – the embodiment of such ‘nationalist’ aspirations.

The problem the EU has is that this ideological push does not really have much to show in terms of popular support; it is the dream of a political, economic and intellectual elite, which is promoting it without much consultation with those they seek to re-educate and re-mould.  Consequently, as the push towards ‘multilateralism’ and ‘European identity’ advanced, so did the (generally hostile) popular reaction to it.  What’s worse, from the point of view of the promoters of ‘the European project’ is that the initially diffuse popular reaction soon drew the attention of politicians eager to ride that ‘populist wave’.  There is, within the EU itself, a rising ‘Euro-sceptic’ sentiment, a centrifugal tendency that worries the ‘internationalists’.

Brexit was, of course, by far the most powerful manifestation of that tendency – and it has shocked and shaken the ‘Union’ to the core.  The worst nightmare of the ‘Europeans’ is another ‘exit’, a second member state that would decide to contradict the ‘EU line’ ideologically and cross it politically.  That would be, from the point of view of the ‘European project’ a disaster.  The ‘Unionists’ must avoid it at all costs and ‘sell’ Brexit as a complete outlier, a regrettable setback and – most of all – as an unmitigated mistake.

Hence, from EU’s point of view, Brexit must be (or at least must look like it is) very painful for the UK; and if pragmatic interests (economic and political) have to be sacrificed in the pursuit of that ideological imperative – so be it.  On the other hand, they cannot go too far: EU’s economy is already on its knees; and a spurned UK would be a loose cannon aimed at the European prow.

My conclusion is that a EU-UK deal is not just a possibility – it’s the only possibility.  The ‘solutions’ to all the ‘major disagreements’ are simple; a deal could have been signed months ago.  But that’s not to say it will be signed today, tomorrow or by 31 December.  It might indeed; or it might not – if the EU powers that be feel that they can afford to postpone it to 2021.  Paradoxically, Biden’s election makes the latter outcome more likely.  But postponing has a price – and not just an economic one: once the UK absorbs the ‘birth pangs’ of the new situation, the British government’ desire to do the deal will go down a notch, with the result being a stiffening of its position in the ensuing negotiations.  Meanwhile, the EU will have to absorb a few pangs of its own; and, since they will not be equally felt by the various member states (Ireland, for instance, will feel more pain than Austria), the vaunted ‘European unity’ may start to fray at the seamline of opposing interests.

As for us… We the People will continue to be misinformed by lazy and incompetent journalists; deceived by scruple-less politicians; and generally treated with contempt by arrogant fools with a superiority complex and a sense of entitlement.  Until (not unless!) we do something about it.

Epidem-ideology: how political dogma affected the response to Covid-19

According to an opinion poll published on 15 March by NBC/Wall Street Journal

I just looked up the data: worldwide, the number of deaths caused by Covid-19 is fast approaching 100,000.  It will probably run past that heart-breaking milestone, by the time I finish writing this.

Italy is (still) the country most affected: with a population of 60 million, it registered more than 18,000 Coronavirus deaths – that’s 300 per million inhabitants.  Italians have already spent weeks in lockdown.  The Italian economy – not very healthy to start with – is in intensive care and may never completely recover.

South Korea has a somewhat smaller population: 51 million.  But its death toll currently stands at just 208 – 4 deaths per million inhabitants.

Why this huge difference – no less than two orders of magnitude in mortality rates?  I could tell you that there are many reasons, that they are complex, that we are studying them carefully…  But I’m not a politician and – even more so under the current circumstances – am disinclined to muddy the waters.

We find a hint about the reasons for the Italian-Korean disparity in a recent interview with Italy’s Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte.  Asked whether his government’s response had not been ‘too little, too late’, Mr. Conte doubled down:

"We have a completely different system to China. For us to severely limit constitutional freedoms was a critical decision that we had to consider very carefully.  If I had suggested a lockdown or limits on constitutional rights at the start, when there were the first clusters, people would have taken me for a madman."

Mr. Conte is probably right: some people, perhaps many people, would have taken him for a power-grabbing madman, had he imposed “limits on constitutional rights” too early in the process.  But then, isn’t this what a leader is expected to do – make unpopular, but timely and efficacious decisions in an emergency?  Spot the iceberg ahead before it becomes obvious to the naked eye – and veer hard to avoid it, even if it rocks the boat and nauseates the passengers?  Otherwise, Mr. Conte, nobody needs you: let’s have governance by opinion poll!

The cruel, brutal, heart-wrenching irony is that Giuseppe Conte has not protected constitutional rights: his government ended up imposing a tougher, longer and more painful lockdown than the South Koreans ever experienced.  In the process, he trampled the most important constitutional right of all: the right to live.

In South Korea, legislation allows the government – in times of emergency only – to access essential information, such as the telemeter data from mobile phones, the location of credit card transactions, etc.  Some may see it as a ‘Big Brother’ invasion of privacy.  But that information is collected anyway – in the databanks of telecom companies and financial firms.  And access to it is crucial to containing the pandemics, by locating and isolating early people who came in contact with already identified virus carriers.  In Israel, there is even an app for that: one can register on that app and check for him/herself whether they have been in the immediate proximity of a known virus carrier.

Of course, this does not provide full-proof (or even fool-proof) protection; it does not kill the infection – but it prevents it from killing too many people.  Would you suspend for a while – just for a while – your oh-so-dear right to perfect privacy, if you knew it may save one life?  Or 10?  Or thousands?  I know I would!

Of course, I know the dangers: ‘it’s a slippery slope…’, ‘once there’s a precedent…’, ‘ give them one finger…’, etc. etc.  But hey: as Mr. Conte said, we do not live in China.  We are lucky enough to live in countries with a tradition of democracy, with governments that are elected and accountable.  The risks are there, yes, but so are the solutions; we can deal with those risks after we save those old and vulnerable (or just unlucky) among us.  Denying ourselves the means to save people’s lives in an emergency, just because those means may be misused later?  That’s like not calling armed officers during a terrorist attack – to pre-empt the risk of future police brutality against peaceful protesters.

But it’s not just about accessing data – there is more misplaced ideological ballast that should have been thrown overboard, once that iceberg first appeared onto the radar screens.

Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte and
President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen.
No, they do not congratulate each other for their response to Covid-19. 

For a certain tinge of politicians, political activists and just loud-mouthed scatter-brains, ‘freedom of movement’ has morphed from a desideratum to be considered and adopted where beneficial – into the be-all and end-all of ‘progressiveness’ and political correctness.  To the point where they now see it as an immovable principle – circumstances be damned.

As early as 24 January 2020, France had identified three cases of Covid-19 on its territory – all three imported from China.  A month later, Italy had announced its third Covid-19 death.  Yet on 29 February, as the infection was expanding like fire in a pile of dead wood, the pompously named – but poorly led – World Health Organisation was issuing the following ‘wise’ recommendation:

“WHO continues to advise against the application of travel or trade restrictions to countries experiencing COVID-19 outbreaks.”

Needless to say, the European Union bureaucrats were only too happy to comply with – and reinforce – that mind-boggling advice.  As late as 2 March 2020, as no less than 66 countries were reporting Covid-19 cases, the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control was serenely assessing:

“The risk of acquiring the disease for people from the EU/EEA and the UK travelling/resident in areas with no cases, or multiple imported cases, or limited local transmission, is currently considered low to moderate.”

In blissful accordance with the EU ‘multilateral’ and legalistic approach, ECDC also advised that

“Travel and trade restrictions during a public health event of international concern (PHEIC) are regulated under the International Health Regulations (IHR), part III.”

Well, this is what ‘the experts’ said, but what about the politicians?  The ones elected to keep us all safe?  The captains charged with steering us away from death and misery?

On 22 January 2020, the annual World Economic Forum was taking place, as usual, in the beautiful, tranquil ski resort of Davos.  Defying that tranquility, some experts chose that posh gathering of international figures to ring the alarm bells about a strange pandemic that was already devastating Wuhan.  A former US disease control czar named Dr. Richard Hatchett was among the first to spot the approaching iceberg:

“China was unfortunate in that that’s where the epidemic started, but it is now a global problem.”

Few of the politicians paid attention.  The newly-elected (appointed?) European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen did not even mention the pandemics in her hour-long speech.  The address was, instead, laden with all the formulaic niceties politicians use when they have nothing particularly interesting to say.

Of course, European politicians are not stupid enough to rely on EU Commission’s clairvoyance at the best of times – let alone when flying excrement hits the proverbial fan.  Give it a bit of strain (let alone a global pandemic) and the ‘Union’ dis-unites into national governments driven by the good ol’ ‘each man for himself’ attitude.

So on 31 January, the Italian government banned flights to and from China.  Of course, to describe this as ‘closing the stable door after the horse has bolted’ would be charitable.  In fact, while people could no longer fly directly from Beijing to Milan, they could still fly there via Berlin, Paris or Vienna; they could even drive or train it across the beautiful Alps – and the Schengen Area’s non-borders.  No, this was definitely a case of closing the door of a stable that had no walls.  If you, dear reader, think that this is particularly stupid… well… I can’t really blame you.  But then, you must remember that the Italian prime minister’s main concern was not keeping his people healthy – but keeping them from doubting his own mental health.  He needed to accomplish that difficult task – while also being seen as ‘doing something’.

On 25 February, a gaggle of European health ministers met in… Rome.  Where they sagely decided that imposing a travel ban within the EU would be “disproportionate and ineffective”.

It’s not that the EU Commission was oblivious; no, they were widely awake to the danger posed by Covid-19… to Africa’s weak healthcare facilities.  On 13 February, they attended a presentation by World Health Organisation officials, who warned that the entire African continent had only two laboratories able to test for Coronavirus.  Consequently, on 24 February, EU commissioners announced a donation of €114 million to WHO and €15 million earmarked for African lab facilities.  An ample Commission delegation flew to Addis Ababa on 26 February, for a series of meetings with African Union officials.  (The only thing that the European Union and the African Union have in common is the word ‘Union’; but hey: it’s such a powerful word!)

At the time (and still today) Africa was the least affected continent.  No, not because of the abundance of testing labs and ventilators – far from it; just because… most Africans don’t travel that much, and not that many people travel to Africa.

Why, then, you may ask – the focus on Africa?  Well, it’s just another instance of ideological – rather than logical – decision-making: a large part of the European political class is constantly on the look for ‘weak and oppressed’ to save; even when they don’t particularly need saving.  That admirable attitude comes with quite a pinch of racism: Africans are seen as the eternal victims, the world’s quintessential ‘weak and oppressed’.  It’s the new ‘white man’s burden’; but also a well-tried way for a ‘privileged white person’ to feel good about him/herself.

And it’s not just career politicians – the same frame of mind has infected the layer of professional political activists who like to – rather pompously – refer to themselves as ‘civil society’ or ‘human rights organisations’.  By the beginning of April, the number of Covid-19 deaths in the UK was edging towards 3,000; the country had already spent a week under lockdown.  An even tougher (and earlier) lockdown had been declared in Israel, where there were already dozens of deaths.

Yet two ‘pro-Israel’ outfits decided to convene a (virtual, because of the lockdown) ‘emergency briefing’ on… the dire Coronavirus situation in the Gaza Strip (which, ironically thanks to the Israeli-Egyptian blockade, had 9 already isolated cases and – fortunately – no deaths).  I read their advert twice, to make sure this was no April Fools joke.

It wasn’t – it was dead serious.  Yachad UK and New Israel Fund UK had entrusted the ‘emergency briefing’ to a couple of ‘civil society’ representatives from Israel and Gaza, chaired by Donald Mcintyre – a journalist/political activist with The Independent with a history of very harsh anti-Israel ‘criticism’.  Mr. Mcintyre had also in the past blamed the failures of British foreign policy (revoltingly pro-Israel in his opinion) on “Jewish party donors”.  But hey: why should valiant builders of the ‘New Israel’ disqualify someone for chairing their briefing, merely because he is suspect of harbouring antisemitic prejudice?

Anyway, I was interested to learn from that most absorbing briefing that, according to international law, Israel is responsible for everything that happens (or might happen, or could conceivably happen) in Gaza.  I must admit that my knowledge of international law cannot compete with the expertise of those civil society luminaries.  Still, I was wondering how exactly was Israel supposed to discharge that clear responsibility – given that any Israeli who ventures onto the Strip is imprisoned – if not immediately killed?

By the way, I tend to focus on the failures of European leaders and ‘civil society’ simply because I happen to live in what is – only arguably by now – Europe.

Not that the US administration – which comes from a rather different ideological neck of the woods – did much better.  Trump started by dismissing the whole thing as leftist exaggeration – if not outright fake news designed to hurt the great American economy and his own chances of re-election as President.  After all, no sensible virus would take on the might of the United States – now would it?  

But, by 12 March, with South-Western Europe claiming a rather inglorious leadership in Coronavirus pandemics, the US imposed a 30-day travel ban on the entire European Schengen Area.  With hindsight, this was a modest and very, very belated step in the right direction.  But one that immediately attracted the bitter ire of European freedom-of-movement ideologues.  Indeed, EU officials condemned the new Trumpian heresy in the strongest terms.  A prominent Belgian MEP (from the Green Party) called Trump’s decision “irresponsible”.  A physician by training, she delivered that sage verdict in a TV studio, while sitting face-to-face with her interviewer.  Then she turned her attention to more burning issues: the (harsh, in her opinion) EU asylum policy; and the bloc’s far-from-sufficient cuts in carbon emissions.

But only 5 days later (17 March) the EU chiefs were imposing a ban on travel into the Schengen Area.  By then, however, they were just desperately trying to board a train that was already moving away – as several Schengen countries had already re-instituted border checks…

On 23 March, Italy reported 602 Coronavirus deaths in just 24 hours; the total number had exceeded 6,000.  On the same day, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borell announced that the bloc would send €20 million in humanitarian aid to I… no, not I-taly, but I-ran!  Which had just announced 127 new deaths in 24 hours, bringing the official count to 1,812.

No doubt, the Italian prime minister (whose mental sanity must by now be well-established with his co-nationals) had that little Iran detail in mind when he bitterly declared, in a recent interview, that the “European project” might fail over its response to the pandemic.  But I’m positive Mr. Borell will reassure him that it’s nothing personal: helping Iran, rather than Italy, is just deep-seated EU ideological impulse.

As for myself, I'd like to reassure Mr. Giuseppe Conte that he is not alone: I, too, am most concerned about our “constitutional rights”.  I think we have the right to be led by people endowed with leadership qualities and a sense of civic responsibility.  We have the right to demand that those leaders (politicians, civil servants and ‘experts’) wean themselves from the intoxicating political dogma; that they check their ideological baggage in at the gate – before they start making decisions about our life and death.  Because, if they keep betraying their oaths of office; if they get it wrong by placing ideology before epidemiology – I say we have the right to demand a reckoning.

Football and other forms of ‘progressive’ colonialism

Two European (and global) football powerhouses clashed recently in Sankt Petersburg.  France ultimately beat Belgium 1-0, through a goal scored in the 51^st minute by Samuel Umtiti.  But many would argue that the star of the match was another French player, 20-years-old Kylian Mbappé.  Kylian was born in Paris, but both his parents hail from Africa – and both are talented sportsmen in their own right: his Algerian mother is a former handball player; his father originates from Cameroon and is a football coach.  Cameroon, by the way, is also the birth place of French goal-scorer Umtiti.  The country’s national squad, unfortunately, failed to qualify for this year’s World Cup.

Kylian Mbappé's mother was a talented handball player inconservative
Morocco, where women rarely get a chance to shine.

Most spectators would agree that among the best Belgian players were Marouane Fellaini and Nacer Chadli – both born in Belgium to Moroccan parents.  A third Belgian player – Romelu Lukaku – is often cited as the national squad’s star player.  He was also born in Belgium, but to parents who had migrated from Zaire.  All three hail from ‘sportsy’ families; there’s clearly a strong component of ‘nature’ in the ‘nature + nurture’ mix that produced these outstanding footballers.

They are not the only ones.  Another Belgian player (Carrasco) has a Portuguese father and a Spanish mother; Vincent Kompany’s parents are Congolese; Kevin De Bruyne’s mother was born in Burundi…

On the French side, Lucas Hernández was born to a Spanish father; Antoine Griezmann – to a German father and a Portuguese mother.  Besides Umtiti and Mbappé, at least three other French players are of African descent: N'Golo Kanté’s parents from Mali; Paul Pogba’s from Guinea; and Blaise Matuidi’s from Angola and Congo.

These are interesting observations, especially at a time when migration to ‘the rich world’ (or indeed ‘the free world’ or ‘the safe world’) is becoming a top political issue in Europe and North America.

The footballers mentioned above are living proof that migration can be a success story – and that its effect on the host country can be very positive.  Indeed, without those talented players, it is doubtful that France and Belgium would be as strong as they are.

There is, however, a dark side to this success – one that pro-migration ideologues pretend not to see: France and Belgium’s gain is also the loss of countries like Morocco, Cameroon, Zaire, Congo, Mali, Angola and Burundi – all of them former European colonies.  And all of them able to field much poorer football national teams, compared to their former colonisers.  Only one of the list of African countries above – Morocco – qualified for the World Cup; and even Morocco was forced to pack their bags early, after two defeats and a draw in the groups stage.

No, this is not Samuel Umtiti; they are Cameroon's children -- those that
didn't make it to Europe.

It’s not just football players, of course: it’s doctors, engineers, scientists, artists, entrepreneurs from former European colonies in Africa and Asia.  Having robbed those countries of their natural resources – for decades or even centuries – Europe now drain them of their most precious asset: their best, brightest, most talented people.  And no, not every one of them gets to be a football star or a university professor; most migrants end up eking out a living by doing the jobs Europeans can’t be bothered to do themselves – a ‘modern’ form of exploitation that borders on slavery.  If you don’t believe this – go out there and look who’s cleaning public toilets in Paris and Brussels.  Or indeed in London!

Who is cleaning your street?

It’s not just former colonies: it’s poorer countries, in general.  Romania, for instance, is one of those poor countries – the poorest in the European Union; maybe not quite as pauper as Cameroon and Zaire, but certainly poorer than France and Belgium.

Poverty destroys everything – but arguably nothing as much as healthcare.  There is a huge healthcare gap between France and Romania (let alone France and Cameroon!)  But healthcare is not an easy profession: training a doctor involves many years of study followed by even more years of hard graft leading to – at best – mediocre pay.

That’s in recent times in France, for instance, the medical profession has been attracting few ‘native’ Frenchmen and women.

So the French authorities invited foreign doctors (primarily Romanian) to apply for jobs in the French healthcare system.  And the applicants were so numerous, that the French could afford to be really choosey: they employed the best of the bunch.  Between 2008 and 2013, the number of foreign doctors working in France shot up by 43%.  According to the president of Romania’s College of Physicians, between 13,000 and 14,000 Romanian doctors work abroad, 4,000 of them in France.

Says Prof. Vasile Astarastoae, president of the Romanian College of Physicians:

"There is a major crisis in Romania when it comes to having enough doctors. In 2011 there were 21,400 doctors working in Romanian hospitals. On 1 November 2013 there were only 14,400."

By 2014, France had circa 330 practicing physicians per 100,000 inhabitants.  Romania had just 270; Poland had only 230.  According to an academic study

“The brain drain of Romanian doctors constitutes […] a dramatic loss for the national healthcare provision”

Life expectancy in France is currently 82 years – and significantly longer if you happen to be white.  In Romania, it’s just 75 years…

In Pakistan, there are just 81 physicians per 100,000 inhabitants; in India, just 73.  Yet many Pakistani and Indian doctors work in the British NHS – which takes pride in its enlightened, ‘progressive’ diversity.

This Romanian doctor looks happy: he practices in Northern France.  His
compatriots, however, were left with even poorer health care.

It requires many years and a lot of money to train a doctor.  And if that physician ends up working in oh-so excitingly multicultural London or Paris – rather than in native Bucharest (or Karachi or Mumbai or Kinshasa) – then that celebrated diversity comes at a heavy cost in ‘diverse’ life and limb.

And it’s not just about healthcare or economics.  By uprooting talented people away from their own language, customs, identity – the rich countries perpetrate something akin to cultural genocide.  There is nothing ‘progressive’ in that.

It is ‘progressive’, charitable and simply humane to give to the poor – not take away even the little they have; so why are we taking doctors away from Pakistan and Romania – rather than sending doctors and nurses there??

Whether in Europe or USA, Australia, Canada and Israel, ‘pro-migration’ ideologues feel inherently superior to those ‘populist’ cavemen who object to unrestricted migration.  As I sit writing this, a cohort of self-proclaimed idealists use ships bought with donors’ money to ‘rescue’ migrants.  They pick them up from just outside Libyan waters, lift them from the overcrowded and shabby boats provided by people-smugglers and drop them on the nearest European beach.  There is ‘instant gratification’ in that – at zero risk to the ‘idealists’.  But this free ferry service also causes more and more pauper Africans to take the risk – to pay more and more money to board increasingly overcrowded, ever-shabbier boats.  In so doing, the ‘idealists’ probably end up killing more people than they ever ‘save’ (more than 8,000 would-be migrants drowned in the Mediterranean Sea in just two years!)  The idealists’ enthusiasm would be put to much better use persuading people not to take this route and instead help them improve their lives in-situ.  But that is much more difficult, onerous and risky.

Smuggler boats off the coast of Libya. Unseaworthy, yes; but then the hope
is not to reach Europe in this boat -- just to get a lift on a 'charity ferry'.

If your real purpose is to feel good about yourself for helping a few migrants land on a European beach, at no cost to yourself, then knock yourself out.  But if you truly care about people – rather than pandering to your own narcissism – then you will recognise that the problem of abject poverty isn’t solved by bringing a few people (those more proactive, who had the money to pay a people-smuggler and were lucky enough not to drown) from Zaire to Belgium, or from Romania to France.  That kind of selective ‘assistance’ just makes the rich richer and the poor poorer.

You cannot air-lift all Zaire’s population to Belgium; but you can (although not easily and immediately, but eventually and with great difficulty) hand-lift, heart-lift and soul-lift Zairians out of their poverty in Zaire.  If you’re French and thirsty for justice – then draining Cameroon of talent really isn’t the way to go; shouldn’t you instead pit your own talents to help fix their country – the one your ancestors broke?

European Dis-Union: good Ideas, bad Ideologues

Exhibit A: the Europound

Almost two decades ago (wow!) I was with a small group of colleagues from my MBA class.  We were dissecting UK Government’s refusal to adopt the Euro.  There were plenty of economic arguments and counter-arguments, before the only Brit in the group opined: “Well, we might have adopted it.  All they had to do was allow us to call it ‘the British pound’ and have the Queen on it…”

Because I am such a miserable nitpicker, I had to say that it also needed to be called ‘the Scottish pound’ in Scotland…  He shrugged, as in “ok, so what?”

Exhibit B: Limburg

I had once been offered a job in Dutch Limburg.  I had never been there and knew very little about that small finger of Dutch territory wedged between Belgium and Germany.  So I went over to have a look.  And how does one get acquainted with people inhabiting sleepy villages and small provincial towns?  I stepped into a pub and ordered a glass of the frothy local beer.

As soon as they realised I was a foreigner, everybody talked English to me: the Dutch are proud of their heritage as worldwide traders – speaking ‘international English’ is almost part of the national character.  So I had a bit of light conversation over my glass of beer, before asking, in a more serious tone: “Will I have to learn Dutch?”.  “Nah,” said the tall, blond youngster at the nearby table.  “Everybody speaks English around here…”  “Yes, it’s true,” opined the older barman, “we all speak English.  But if you want to integrate socially…  At home, with friends we don’t speak English, you know.”  “Oh,” I said, “then I will have to learn Dutch.”  The barman scratched his head a bit, as if weighing his reply: “I didn’t say that.  You see, we all speak perfect Dutch and decent English.  But at home, with family and friends, we speak the local language, we call it Limburgisch.  Dutch people north from here don’t understand it.”  “Oh,” I said.  “Then I’d have to learn Limburgisch.  Is it hard?”  “Not hard,” reassured the barman, but then scratched his head again.  “Not our Limburgisch.  See, it depends where you want to live.  The thing is… on this side of the river we speak one kind of Limburgisch, but the villages on the other side use a different kind.  That one’s I think more difficult.  We don’t really understand their Limburgisch, we mostly use Dutch to talk to them…”

Exhibit C: Veneto

Accompanied by our Italian agent, I was visiting customers in Italy and came upon a factory on the outskirts of a small town, not far from Venice.  The manager received us with that special warmth (mixed with quite a bit of relief) reserved in provincial Italy for foreigners who speak Italian.  We soon plunged into pre-business small talk: where Italian males are involved, that always focuses on football, race cars and – once the ice breaks (and it breaks quite easily) – women.  But after a few minutes, we were interrupted by a cheerful ringtone.  “I’ve got to take this” said our host with a disarming smile and proceeded to have three minutes of phone conversation in a foreign language.  So foreign, in fact, that I couldn’t even identify it or assign it to a recognisable linguistic group.  “It was my mum,” the guy said by way of apology, while carelessly placing the mobile phone back on the desk.  “She obviously isn’t Italian,” I ventured, out of sheer curiosity.  “Of course she is” he said, surprised by my remark.  Claudio, our Milanese agent, intervened: “Lots of people in Italy don’t speak ‘standard Italian’ at home.  Around here, they speak ‘Veneto’, the local dialect.”  “Dialect?” I said, “I couldn’t understand a word of it.”  “I know,” replied Claudio, “neither can I.  It’s not Italian, it’s really a different language...”

Exhibit D: Wales

My parents came to visit me on my first stint in England.  I used a short University break to drive them around and happened upon a historic town in North Wales.  My guidebook suggested visiting an ancient church, quaintly incorporated into the town’s defensive wall.  We stepped in, but had to wait for the service to end, before we could visit the place.  As soon as the service was over, the priest came to bid us welcome.  When he learned we were foreigners – my English was heavily accented and my parents had none – he made a point of explaining: “I speak English, as you can hear; but we are not English, we are Welsh.  Among ourselves we speak Welsh, which is my mother tongue and so it is for most people here.  We are an ancient people, with an ancient language of our own…”

Exhibit E: the Idiot

I have gradually learned that these were not exceptions, but rather constituted the rule.  Where I went skiing (quaint little towns and villages in Val di Fassa), everybody spoke to me in ‘standard Italian’; but among themselves they spoke Ladino, a language I could not understand.  A few miles away, on a different Italian valley, they speak a particular German dialect, hard to understand even for Germans.  In Switzerland, even neighbouring villages speak different dialects of Sweitzerdeutsch, French or Romansh.  In Barcelona, locals speak Catalan and various dialects of that language are spoken in parts of France and Italy.  And I could go on and on…  It fascinates me!

This is Europe: a patchwork of cultures, sub-cultures, mini- and micro-cultures, which took centuries to adhere – some still very loosely – to larger ethnic or national groups.  Yes, this is Europe: an eclectic, colourful mosaic, much like the tinted windows that adorn its churches.  Travel just a few miles and hear a different tongue; admire a different architecture; taste a different food; slacken your thirst with a different beverage.

And this is why I love Europe – despite the awful history, despite the genocide, despite the seemingly incurable antisemitism.  Europe is interesting, it’s exciting, it’s beautiful – because it’s so diverse.  Because ‘Europe’ as a concept belongs to physical geography and to foreigners like myself.  Europeans do not feel European – they feel Italian, French, German…  Who would want a grey, uniform, boring ‘Europe’?  Who would want a world resembling Mao’s China?

Mao thought that 'equality' means 'uniformity'
(a common mistake among Ideologues).
Hence, he forced the Chinese to dress in some
sort of uniform. 'Forced', because most people
don't want to.

Some would, it seems.  A few years ago, I heard a talk delivered by a young guy from the Israel Democracy Institute – a self-described ‘progressive’ outfit.  At some point, the speaker referred rather disparagingly to the concept of ‘Jewish state’, or ‘State of the Jews’.  After the talk, I asked him why he thought ‘Jewish state’ was worse than ‘Finnish state’ or, for that matter, ‘Palestinian state’.  He gave me a thin, superior smile.  “I could focus narrowly on your question”, he said, before intoning sententiously, preacher-like, down his nose.  “But the truth is that, for us liberals, this whole notion of ‘nation state’ is wrong.  It belongs to the past.  We need to strive for a world without borders, without states, without identity politics, a world where people are just that – people and nothing else.”

But why, I inquired, why do “us liberals” “need to strive” for such a world?  I got the clear impression that my question both unsettled and annoyed him – in the way adults are unsettled and annoyed when children demand explanations for something very obvious; like ‘why is there a sun?’, or ‘why do people have to die?’

He took a good minute to formulate an answer and finally said (or, rather, proclaimed): “For starters, there would be no wars.”  I pointed out that historically wars preceded by far the formation of nation states.  “Yeah, yeah,” he said, this time visibly annoyed, “but all the recent wars were the result of nationalism.”  Not so, I pointed out.  Word War I was a war of empires – the very opposite of nation states.  War World II erupted because of a racialist, not nationalist world view; one that divided people by animal-like biological characteristics, rather than cultural identity and a sense of belonging.  The Cold War – arguably the most serious threat to mankind’s very survival – had been motivated by ideological, not national differences.

I could have added that some of the bloodiest, most horrific wars had been ‘civil wars’, pursued across no borders and not by nation states.  But by then the Idiot had had enough of my childish questioning and argumentation.  He did not know why his ideology was the ‘correct’ one; he just ‘knew it was’.

The Ideologues

Once, there lived an Idea.  Then came the Ideologues.

There’s nothing wrong with the idea of a European bloc.  The continent had emerged from yet another horrible ‘hot’ war, straight into the throes of a ‘cold’ one.  There’s nothing more conducive of peace and understanding than common interests (other than a common enemy, that is).

First there was a trade agreement.  And the People saw it’s good and liked that.

Then there was a common market.  And the People saw it’s good and liked that, too.

Then there was a political alliance.  And the People saw it’s also good and liked that.

Then the Ideologues decided it’s got to be more, much more; and called it a Union.  The People didn’t like that, but kept quiet.  World was created by words; but not all words will create new worlds.

But the Ideologues set out to actually create a Union.  And not any-old ‘Union’, but an ‘ever closer union’.  Like America, only much better.  But Europe is not America.  It’s different.  Not better or worse, mind you, only different.  Americans descend from those who left in order to be different.  Europeans – from the ones that stayed and found ways to be different.  An ‘ever closer union’?  The People did not think it’s good; and they certainly did not like that.

But the Ideologues wanted to do it anyway, behind People's back.  They knew they were right, they just had trouble ‘persuading the masses’.  But, deep inside, what Ideologue really cares about the backward, unenlightened, non-elite ‘masses’?  Don't adults know better what’s good for the children?  Pursuit of The One & Only Correct Ideology cannot be left to ‘the masses’; it’s the job of "us liberals", of the progressive vanguard.

But the People were angry because Their Will was disregarded.  And there was Brexit.

Epilogue

Nobody really likes the European ‘Union’.  Nobody says it’s good.  Its defenders portray it, at best, as the lesser evil.  Even its staunchest supporters – the ultimate Ideologues – admit that it’s in need of radical change.

Whether Brexit (as opposed to change from within) was the best way to go – I don't know.  It's by now a moot point.  The United Kingdom (or at least an England-dominated federation called ‘United Kingdom’) will survive Brexit.  The European-Union-as-we-know-it will not.  It’s not that other countries will decide to follow the example and exit – not necessarily.  It’s that the tensions caused by negotiating Brexit will further reveal and much accentuate the different (and often diverging) interests of the remaining 27 nations.  They will increasingly remember that they are, in fact, nations.

Contrary to what Ideologues dream, one can write a book about Life; but one cannot force life to follow the Book.  Whether that's the Bible, the Torah, the Qur'an or the Little Red Book.

Contrary to what Ideologues believe, people don't want to be equal – they want to be special and exceptional.  We want equality of opportunities, not equality of outcomes.  That's what drives human progress – the real one, not that of self-proclaimed 'progressives'.
Contrary to what Ideologues think, being an ‘internationalist’ can be much worse than being a nationalist.

Contrary to what Ideologues say, "us liberals" do not "need" to do away with borders, or with nation states, or with our treasured identity.  And We The People certainly do not want to.

Contrary to what Ideologues claim, ‘union’ does not preserve diversity – it destroys it.  Most people like a crusty pizza, or a juicy coq-au-vin, because they enjoy the colour, flavour and texture of the various ingredients.  But put the same stuff in a liquefier and turn it into a grey mush – who would want to eat that?

Contrary to what Ideologues preach, identity does not prevent us from being 'just human beings' – it makes us human beings.  Identity is an anchor; cutting oneself loose does not make one a better person.  It makes one a rudderless ship, drifting in search of ‘a cause’.  Or – truth be told – in search of some meaningful interaction with other human beings.  That is, in search of a new anchor, in search of (some other) identity.

Nobody really wants a European ‘Union’.  The European bloc may survive, but only if rolled back to what it should be – a common market and a political alliance.  Time to save the European Idea from the Ideologues.

Non-final ‘solutions’

It’s been already quite a few years since I last sat in a university study room, trying to get my head around complex case studies.  But I remember well a conversation I had with a French colleague.  We had done some work together and, in-lieu of a relaxing break (oh, the irony!) we started to debate the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.  My colleague was very critical of Israel – everything was the Jewish state’s fault.  Most of all, he opined, Israel was ‘stealing land’ and undermining the ‘two-state solution’.  Negotiations, he said, were just a ruse, a stalling device.  “Why not just give the Palestinians their state and be done with it?” he demanded; “we should force you to do it!”  “Well, it’s not that simple…” I attempted to explain.  “It’s very simple”, he interrupted, with more than a hint of impatience in his voice.  He pulled a block of paper, grabbed a pencil and, with a few quick and decisive lines, sketched the map of Mandatory Palestine ‘from the River to the Sea’.  “That’s the map”, he pronounced, stabbing the roughly sketched elongated pentagon.  Then, with another assertive motion, he drew a horizontal line across the pentagon’s narrow waist, from west to east.  It originated somewhere in the Mediterranean and, I figured, ran through both Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, before crossing the Jordan River.  “That’s it”, he declared, satisfied – and stabbed each half of the now divided pentagon, first the top half, then the bottom one.  “Now you guys take this bit and the Palestinians take the other bit.  I don’t give a s**t if you like it or not, you people have got to learn to get along with each other.  That’s it, problem solved!”  He was not joking – he was dead serious.  He spoke with the hauteur of a Louis XIV: he was ‘the state’ (or the ‘international community’); he must have felt like a new Charles de Gaulle, annoyed at having to deal with those pesky Algerians.

The 'Middle East Quartet' met in New York to promote a 'roadmap' for Israel and Palestine.
(photo from a previous meeting in Munich, Germany)

I was reminded of that discussion recently, when French politicians hosted a ‘summit’ aimed at re-starting ‘the Middle East Peace Process’ (which, despite the name, does not deal at all with the Middle East – as in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Yemen, Egypt or Libya – but only with Israel and the Palestinians).  According to The Guardian,

“The participants [which did not include any Israelis or Palestinians] called on the two sides to genuinely commit to the two-state solution.”

More recently, the Middle East Quartet (which, likewise, isn’t really about the Middle East, but only about Israel and the Palestinians) has met in New York and issued a statement.  Among other things, they say that

“The Quartet principals [i.e. United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, United States Secretary of State John Kerry and European Union High Representative for Common Foreign and Security Policy Federica Mogherini] were joined by the Foreign Ministers of Egypt and France during the second part of the meeting to brief on their work to support Middle East peace.  All agreed on the importance of close and continuing coordination of all efforts to achieve the common goal of the two-State solution.”

As usual, the bulk of the opprobrium was directed at the Jewish state:

“The Quartet emphasized its strong opposition to ongoing settlement activity, which is an obstacle to peace, and expressed its grave concern that the acceleration of settlement construction and expansion in Area C and East Jerusalem, including the retroactive ‘legalization’ of existing units, and the continued high rate of demolitions of Palestinian structures, are steadily eroding the viability of the two-State solution.”

I was still ruminating on the French (from Louis VII to Napoleon, from George-Picot to President Hollande) meddling 3,000 miles away from Paris, when a friend e-mailed me.  She is a kind-hearted Jewish lady, who cares deeply for both Israelis and Palestinians and would like nothing better than to see those two populations living in peace, on either side of a secure border.  Yet all that talk about the ‘two-state solution’ was clearly getting on her nerves:

“I have always felt uncomfortable with the trope ‘two state solution’ in relation to Israel and the Palestinians.  It isn’t the two state bit which bothers me – it is this idea of a ‘solution’.  To start with, the word has a stark finality about it and this comes with dreadful connotations for Jews, with Hitler combining it with the word ‘final’.  He wanted to obliterate Jews – how did we come to rehabilitate this word when working towards peace with those who have also wanted to obliterate us? 

But there are other reasons to reject the word.  It is such an ahistorical concept.  When in history has there ever been ‘a solution’ to anything?  The moving hand of history weaves complex and varying stories; they change and evolve continuously – each ‘solution’ is but the beginning of a new ‘problem’.  Try putting History and Solution into Google and the fourth, fifth and sixth entries are about exterminating the Jews.  And the first three?  One is about therapy, the second about showing how one solves a mathematical problem and the third refers to an alternative history novel, in which the Axis wins the Second World War.”

My friend’s words got me thinking.  And, as always, I wanted to understand: why is it that the word ‘solution’ is so used and abused in the West?  How come that it is most frequently employed when discussing the Middle East?  And how come that, when discussing the Middle East, Westerners appear not just to desire ‘a solution’, but often to know what the solution should be – only to be suddenly possessed of a desire to impose it upon the people in question?

There’s nothing new in all this, I’m afraid.  The very term ‘Middle East’ is a quintessentially Euro-centric concept: it’s only ‘East’, of course, when seen from Europe, from ‘the West’.  The Middle East is very much ‘Middle West’ when seen from Japan, India or China.  As for America… well, it depends which way one’s looking; but under President Obama, America is looking Europe’s way.

What’s in a name?  There’s nothing new in the West’s desire to – ahem! – civilise the East (i.e., provide ‘solutions’ for the poor hapless ‘natives’).  And – interestingly – it has always been entwined with another, just-as-keen aspiration: that of relieving those same natives of various natural resources that they couldn’t possibly have a use for, themselves.  In past centuries, it was gold and spices.  Nowadays it is oil and gas.  Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose!

In 1920, the Western ‘solution’ was to divide the Middle Eastern spoils of war among the victors – the French and British colonial Empires.  The Arab, predominantly Muslim inhabitants of those former Ottoman lands did not think of themselves as residents of separate countries.  True: influenced by contemporary Western ideas, a small minority of intellectuals among them (including, for obvious reasons, a high proportion of Christians) wanted an Arab nation state; as for the vast majority, they showed no signs of wanting to be anything but loyal citizens of the Ottoman Empire-cum-Caliphate.

But the wishes of brown-skinned, primitive natives were of little concern to the new imperial masters.  They had their own economic and political interests – which demanded that the Middle East be partitioned in chunks, along arbitrary borders.

A list of those artificial ‘countries’ reads conspicuously similar to the ‘menu’ of perennial Middle Eastern conflicts.

The League of Nations awarded Mandates for 'Mesopotamia' and 'Palestine' to Britain
 and for 'Syria' and 'Lebanon' to France. 

There was Mesopotamia, a descriptive name invented by ancient Greeks and meaning ‘Land between the rivers’.  That was all Greek to the local inhabitants, who reverted – as soon as they possibly could – to the 7^th century Arabic name ‘Iraq’, cousin of the Biblical ‘Erekh’ and grandson of the Sumerian ‘Land of the City of Uk’ (Ur Uk).

Map of Bilad Al-Sham (the Land of the Semites, translated these days as Greater Syria) was a province of the early Islamic Caliphate, before being incorporated in the Ottoman Empire. The province was subdivided into military districts called 'ajnad' (singular 'jund'), of which Jund Filastin (Palestine) was one. Jund Dimashq (the district of Damascus) was the largest and included most of present day Lebanon, Jordan and the southern half of present-day Syria. The Ottomans later changed the organisation repeatedly, redrawing and renaming the provinces. And so did the Western powers after World War I. 

There was, then, Syria – another name that the West inherited from the ancient Greeks, who simply mispronounced the old name Aššūrāyu (Assyria).  After the 7^th century Arab Conquest, the province became known in Arabic as Bilad Al-Sham – the Land of the Semites; an apt name, given that its inhabitants spoke Semitic languages, Aramaic and Hebrew.  ‘Sham’, by the way (and not ‘Syria’) is the origin of the second ‘S’ in ‘ISIS’.  Bilad Al-Sham included not just what is currently known (in theory, at least) as the Syrian Arab Republic, but also present-day Lebanon and ‘Palestine’ (another Greek name derived from the Philistines, Hellenic colonists who – sometime in the 12^th century BCE – had established a handful of cities on the Mediterranean shore).

Around the 12th century BCE, proto-Hellenic 'Sea People' settled on the shores
 of the Mediterranean (see the red patch on the map). They were called Philistines.
Which is why the ancient Greeks called the area Palestine.
The name stuck especially in the West, which inherited the classic Graeco-Roman culture.

Although earmarked for revival as the old-new Jewish homeland, ‘Palestine’ was partitioned by its British rulers, with the Jordan River becoming a border and its Eastern bank (the lion’s share of the land) fashioned into a ‘royal’ fief for Britain’s local collaborators – the Hashimite clan, which was in the process of being ousted from its native Mecca by a rival clan, the Saudites.  The newly established kingdom was ‘christened’ (ahem!) ‘Transjordan’ – literally ‘Beyond the Jordan [River]’.  Needless to say, that had nothing to do with the will (or lack thereof) of local inhabitants: the land was only ‘Beyond the Jordan [River]’ when viewed from London!

Although part of the League of Nations Mandate of Palestine,
the area east of the Jordan River was detached, prohibited for Jewish habitation
 and made into the Emirate (later Kingdom) of Transjordan.

To complete the ‘menu’, let me add Egypt (at the time a British ‘Protectorate’), Yemen (another British ‘Protectorate’), Somalia and Libya (Italian colonies)…

Not everything is the West’s fault, of course – there’s plenty of guilt to go around.  What the previous (Ottoman) rulers bequeathed the new ones was fairly rotten eggs; the Western colonial powers did a good job at cracking them; and the local ‘kings’ and ‘lifetime presidents’ proceeded to vigorously scramble those ‘eggs’ – hence the rather appalling mess we see today.

Drawn by Western colonial powers, the Middle Eastern borders are being erased.
(Caricature by Dan Nott)

But we live in the 21^st century.  And much too little has changed in the approach of some Western politicians – in the almost 100 years that passed since those initial ‘solutions’.

They still bring to the Middle East their quintessentially Euro-centric conceptions of ‘peoples’ or ‘nations’.  In 1920, those were predicated on ‘race’ or ethnicity; these politically-correct, ‘multi-cultural’ days, they centre on the legal concept of ‘citizenship’ or ‘nationality’.  But Middle Easterners have never been divided in ‘races’; and why would anyone care about citizenship of states which – on top of having been invented by foreigners – afford little protection and much oppression?

Clan and tribe are strong elements of identity in the Middle East.  Beyond those, many define that identity along religious and linguistic lines.  The word that best translates the Western concept of people/nation in Arabic is أمة (pronounced ‘umma’).  It derives from the word ‘umm’ (meaning ‘mother’) and is often used in its Qur’anic sense: the ‘Nation’ or ‘Community’ of Islam.  Apart from religion, it is easy to feel a sense of common affiliation with people who speak the same language – or at least who are able to communicate intelligibly using a common idiom, such as literary Arabic.

‘Multicultural’, ‘enlightened’ Westerners may have a hard time coming to terms with this reality.  But unless they do, unless they shed the arrogance of ‘civilising’ the Middle East to their one-and-only understanding of humanity, they have only more blood and tears to contribute.

Take, for instance, the ‘Palestine problem’.  Leaving aside the Western name and the fact that ‘Palestine from the River to the Sea’ is a Western invention, some Westerners have now decided that there are two peoples/nations in that country – and hence there should be a two-state solution; other Westerners want to turn the country into a multicultural heaven in which everyone lives with equal rights ever after – hence a one-state solution.  Note how both ‘solutions’ juggle Euro-centric notions (in italics) and are predicated on the concept of people/nation with its changeable but always Euro-centric meanings: indeed, the ‘two-state solution’ uses the traditional understanding of the term ‘nation’, while the ‘one-state solution’ adopts a more recent meaning, one which a certain Western audience has come to regard as ‘progressive’, ‘modern’ or politically-correct.

As usual, the last thing those Westerners care about is the opinion of the ‘two peoples/nations’ in question.  In fact, they have convinced themselves that both sides in the conflict think and behave like Westerners; that their aspirations are Western aspirations.

Western concepts (whether 1920-style or ‘progressive’) may indeed sound familiar and reasonable to Israeli ears.  After all, the ancient Israelites may have originated as a super-tribal faith community, but centuries of dwelling as isolated islands of otherness have forged for the Jews an identity more similar to Western-style nationhood.

As for the ‘Palestinians’, however, who is to say?  Westerners have decided that Palestinian Arabs are ‘a people’ – mostly because Westerners are familiar and comfortable with that concept.  Make no mistake: I have no problem with Palestinian Arabs declaring themselves a people – if that’s how they feel and that’s what they wish.  But it is a ‘Palestinian’ decision – not an Israeli or Western one.  And the ‘Palestinians’ have yet to speak their collective mind on the matter.

Of course, there is the PLO, whose leaders must have ‘affirmed’ their peoplehood a zillion times.  But who do those ‘leaders’ represent?  Leaving aside the fact that they lost the only Palestinian elections that could (even superficially) be characterised as ‘free’; leaving aside the fact that they would lose the next ones, if they allowed them to happen; leaving aside all that, the half a million salaried PLO ‘apparatchiks’ and stipended ‘supporters’ are little more than mercenaries; their ‘political opinion’ is based on the bank account, not inner sense of identity.  As for Hamas (which won those ‘free’ elections), they are much more concerned with faith and much less with ‘nationhood’ in the Western sense of the word.

So what do ‘the Palestinians’ really want?  With no freedoms, no plebiscite and an oppressive, taboo-enforcing society, it is really hard to say.  The best we can do, perhaps, is to look at opinion polls.  Granted, those too are often politicised and are generally problematic in the absence of freedom; still, I believe it is useful to look at the latest (June-August 2016) ‘Joint Palestinian-Israeli Opinion Poll’.  It contains some (however mild) criticism of both the PLO/Palestinian Authority and of Hamas – which makes it perhaps a bit more credible in my eyes.

The poll was conducted in Israel by the (strongly left-leaning) Israel Democracy Institute and by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research (PSR) in the West Bank and Gaza.  The European Union supplied the funding, while the German outfit Konrad-Adenauer Stiftung provided ‘partnership and support’.

Predictably, one of the questions was:

“Do you support or oppose the solution based on the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside Israel, known as the two-state solution?”

Circa 51% of the 1,270-strong Palestinian sample and circa 59% of the similarly sized Israeli sample expressed support for ‘the two-state solution’.  This is ‘the result’ that the poll authors and the Western funders promoted: a majority of Palestinians and Israelis still support the two-state solution.  But, of course, some would say, the two sides have divergent understanding of the term: Israeli politicians usually say ‘two states for two peoples’, meaning a Jewish-majority state and a Palestinian Arab-majority state; Palestinian leaders, on the other hand, never say ‘for two peoples’ – their ‘two states’ are an 100% Arab ‘Palestine’ and an ‘Israel’ populated by Jews and Palestinian Arabs endowed with equal rights – including the ‘right of return’ for the PLO-estimated 7 million Palestinian refugees.

This time, however, the pollsters asked the question again, using a more precise wording:

“Mutual recognition of Palestine and Israel as the homelands of their respective peoples.  The agreement will mark the end of conflict, the Palestinian state will fight terror against Israelis, and no further claims will be made by either side.  Support or oppose?”

When presented with this version of the question, support among Palestinians dropped to just 40%; 57% declared their opposition to the idea.  Among Israelis, support grew to 68%, with just 24% opposed.

In other words, only a minority of Palestinian Arabs support the ‘two-state solution’ – as understood by Westerners.  Interestingly, that minority dropped to just 20%, when an additional condition was added: that the Palestinian state be devoid of “major/heavy weapons”.  Even the putative deployment in Palestine of “a multinational force” only succeeded in raising the support among Palestinians to 36%.

But then the pollsters did something really interesting: this time they addressed only those who answered ‘opposed’ to the ‘Mutual recognition, etc.’ question and offered them additional incentives to change their mind to ‘support’.

A ‘bribe’ of $30 to $50 billion “to help in settling those refugees wishing to live in the Palestinian state and compensating them” persuaded 31% of the ‘opposed’ Palestinians to change their mind and ‘support’.  Perhaps surprisingly to some (but certainly not to me), the biggest change of mind occurred in Gaza (41%, compared to just 25% in the West Bank).  Gaza, of course, is home to considerably more ‘refugees’, who are likely to benefit personally from the financial windfall.  By the way, that same windfall to the Palestinians (combined no doubt with the idea of settling the refugees in Palestine, not in Israel) persuaded 37% of ‘opposed’ Israelis to swing to ‘support’.

But financial incentives are tricky.  No doubt, they would be welcome; but what happens after they have been paid?  Even more pertinently, what happens when much of the expected windfall is siphoned off by the PLO kleptocracy, while a lot is wasted through the corruption and incompetence of a ‘civil service’ populated by cronies?  What happens when the windfall fails to fulfill those great expectations?

Non-financial (or not-directly-financial) incentives are more interesting.

When offered membership of the European Union for ‘Palestine’, 32% of the Palestinian nay-sayers changed their tune to ‘support’ the proposed two-state deal.

The offer of a confederation with Jordan persuaded 29% of those ‘opposed’ to change their mind to ‘support’.

Now, that’s interesting.  Both joining the European Union and establishing a confederation with Jordan would involve a certain limitation of sovereignty, in comparison to an utterly independent, self-standing state.  With that in mind, perhaps, only 12% of Israelis opposed to the deal changed their mind when offered EU membership.  Yet rather than being put off, the yearning-for-independence Palestinians interpreted those offers as strong incentives.  In fact, within the constraints of the poll’s statistical significance, they reacted much in the same way to the direct financial incentive, to the offer of EU membership and to the idea of a confederation with Jordan.  Now, I can understand that EU membership may hold the attraction of freedom, good governance, rule of law and an indirect, but perhaps more tangible financial windfall.  But none of the above applies to a confederation with the Hashimite Kingdom of Jordan!

This may be surprising to those Westerners who only listen to themselves.  But it is hardly new.  West Bank ‘Palestinians’ have been ‘united’ with East Bank ‘Jordanians’ between 1948 and 1967 – and no ‘intifada’ took place.  They had representatives in the ‘Jordanian’ Parliament, ministers in the ‘Jordanian’ government and carried ‘Jordanian’ passports; in fact they carried them until 1988, when their ‘Jordanian’ nationality was unilaterally (and illegally) rescinded by the Hashimite king.  According to another opinion poll (run by An-Najah University and published in May 2016), 42.3% of Palestinians support the confederation project while 39.3% oppose it.

We do not know what ‘Jordanians’ think of such idea; opinion polls in that country are viewed as ‘a bridge too far’.  But, for whatever that’s worth, former Jordanian Prime Minister Abdelsalam al-Majali, announced (speaking in the West bank city of Nablus) that he personally supported a confederation.  That’s hardly evidence of popular support, of course; but in Jordan’s tightly controlled political environment, such ‘personal’ statements are inconceivable without the monarch’s blessing.

What, then, does all this mean in terms of that beloved Western ‘solution’?  Not much, perhaps.  There are no ‘solutions’ in the Middle East, only processes.  Processes that most Westerners do not understand.  Including the self-described ‘experts’, none of whom managed to predict – or even correctly interpret – a ‘Spring’ that (so far) killed 500,000 people and displaced ten million.

Let us not mince words: the Middle East is still the playground of Western politicians with neo-colonialist instincts.  As ever – they lack any deep understanding of ‘Eastern’ (especially Middle Eastern) issues.  As ever – they try to advance their own interests, with no regard for the unimportant desires and aspirations of ‘the natives’.  As ever – they envisage 'solutions' that involve drawing lines on a map.  As ever – they attempt to allay their own conscience (and dupe their constituencies), by wrapping a mantle of noble intentions around their rather base mindset.  Deep in their hearts, these white neo-colonialists despise what they see as uncivilised, swarthy natives, forever incapable of getting along with each other.  Like adults witnessing a fight among children, they patronisingly command those 'natives' to 'just shake hands and be friends'.

US Secretary of State John Kerry and
EU High Representative Federica Mogherini congratulate each other
in New York. They have finally set the Middle East right! 

In truth, neo-colonialist Westerners have little empathy with Israeli Jews or with Palestinian Arabs – and even less interest in understanding the conflict between them; what they’re really after is a 'solution' to their own worries – one that would provide: a) uninterrupted flow of oil and b) good-old docile 'Gastarbeiter,' rather than vindictive Islamists.

There’s only one short sentence that the Middle East owes these Westerners – and that’s ‘Mind your own business!’