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?

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!’

Burkini Ban, Burkina Faso & Israel

Mao Zedong decreed that everybody should dress the same in China. 

I don’t like burqas; just as I did not like the choke-collar suits of Maoist China, the black garb of Charedi Jews or the tophats City bankers wore until not that long ago.

I don’t like them, mostly because I feel that people should not be regimented.  Wearing a uniform is loss of freedom, just like being in the army or in prison.  Plus, people wearing that kind of garb seem to be yearning to go backwards – to 7^thcentury Arabia or to 17^th century Poland – rather than forwards.

In recent weeks, several municipalities in France have decreed a ‘burkini ban’ – meaning that women using public beaches are fined if they wear that ‘Islamised’ type of costume.  Even more recently, a French ‘administrative court’ – whatever that is – has banned the ban.  Yet, apparently, the story is not over yet: some of the mayors involved (and quite a few national politicians who jumped on the bandwagon) have vowed to overturn the suspension that suspended the ban that banned the burkini… you know how it goes!

Even some burqa-inspired garb looks
trendy when Italians design it! 

Well, I may not like burqas (or indeed burkinis); but the idea of a ban is wrong, stupid and – perhaps worst of all – a populist distraction from the real issues.

It’s wrong because, just as people should not be told what clothes to wear, they shouldn’t be told what not to wear.  It is even more wrong because one particular distinctive garb was singled out and banned.  Yes, I know there are ‘reasons’ – there always are; but no: there are no excuses for double standards.  Or, rather, there are only dishonest excuses.

The burkini ban is stupid, because it completely lacks purpose.  What exactly is it supposed to achieve?  Will it prevent the radicalisation of young Muslims?  How exactly?  Which of France’s recent terrorist attacks would have been prevented, had the burkini bans been in place?

Finally – and worst of all – the burkini ban is a populist distraction.  This trifle of an ‘issue’ deflects attention from the very real and grave concerns: the radicalisation of young Muslims, the religious extremism which begets intolerance and terrorism.

The ban is not just a golden opening for political demagogues – of every tinge – to burnish their credentials; it’s also a cop out for everybody: an excellent excuse to duck the real challenges, while furiously debating a marginal issue.  What a superb opportunity for doing nothing – with great determination!

Even worse – the motivations are, let’s face it, obviously racist.  Granted, there was no obligation for the French state to open its borders and its population registry to a wide variety of people – including some who have not exactly been raised up in the spirit of  ‘liberté, egalité, fraternité’.  But once they did let them in, once they recognised them as French citizens, they can’t tell them what they are allowed to wear, now can they?

‘Special laws’ for one category of people?  Haven’t we seen that before, somewhere?  A bylaw is still a law.  And singling out one particular category of French citizens deserves just one name: no, it’s not ‘love of nudity’ – it’s ‘naked racism’!

Nor am I particularly surprised: in the latest elections for the European Parliament, the far-right Front National won a third of the votes.  And those European Elections took place in 2014, before the latest bout of jihadist terrorism that hit France.  (Contrary to popular belief, the fully proportional European Parliament elections are the best indicator of people’s real political opinions, which are masked by plurality election systems based on geographic constituencies.)

So much for the far-right.  There is, of course, quite a bit of far-left racism in France (and elsewhere in Europe).  In the process of crowning them as ‘oppressed’ and hence in perpetual need of their rights being ‘defended’ by Good (Marxist) Samaritans, the far-left denies Muslims their God-given agency; it infantilises them.  When it comes to Muslims, far-rightists demand a higher standard than for anyone else; far-leftists set the standards lower than for anyone else.  Both positions are racist because both deny Muslims their status as equal members of the human race – with the same rights and obligations everyone else has.

Prefers not to wear hijab (but wouldn’t be fined if she did):
Noura Abu-Shanab, an Arab Israeli and captain
of the women football team Hapoel Petah Tikva. 

Sure, France has seen quite a bit of Islamist terrorism; but Israel has seen more.  Circa 7.5% of French citizens are Muslims; the proportion is roughly 3 times larger in Israel.  And yet, in Israel not even the far-right tries to control how Muslims dress.

If you are a Muslim in Israel, you are entitled to have your personal status matters (such as marriage and divorce) adjudicated according to Shari’a – the Islamic law.  The qadis (traditional Islamic judges) receive their salaries from the state budget, as do the dayanim – their Judaic counterparts; and the Jewish State will apply the decision of the Shari’a court just as it does with that of a Beth Din – the traditional Rabbinical court.  French Muslims can only dream of that level of freedom and consideration.

An Israeli beach: the way to heaven is a matter of opinion...

And yet, it is the French government that, every year, is paying a lot of money to far-left Israeli organisations dedicated to inspecting ‘human rights’ in Israel.  That money, it turns out, would be put to much better use, were it invested in France.  There is, it seems obvious, a lot to be done to root out extremism and racism from the French society – both Muslims and non-Muslims.  Perhaps Israel – a good friend of that troubled country – should weigh in to prop up the increasingly shaky French democracy?  Lest it becomes more like – say – Burkina Faso?

Gewalt yidn! Israel’s democracy in danger – again

In a previous series of articles, I described the cohort of 'Israeli Non-Governmental Organisations’ (NGOs) funded – directly and indirectly – by foreign (mostly European) governments.  We are not dealing with pennies or eurocents here, but with massive finance: according to NGO Monitor (an organisation aiming to research and publicise the extent and influence of such funding)

“European governments provide at least $100 million annually to Palestinian, Israeli, and international NGOs that utilize these funds for anti-Israel campaigns and promote BDS under a façade of promoting human rights, peace, and capacity building.”

In fact, such enormous funding is without parallel.  NGO Monitor provides the following example:

“in 2014, civil society in Israel received €3,754,133 from EIDHR, and adding NGOs in the West Bank and Gaza €5,630,323 – the majority of which are related to the conflict. In contrast, Ukraine – a deeply flawed democracy with a population roughly five times the size of Israel’s and at the time (2014) a war zone affected by severe human rights violations – received just €3,400,575.”

EIDHR stands for ‘European Instrument for Democracy and Human Rights’ – this is just one of the many channels through which money is distributed.

How Europe invests in democracy and human rights: bubble size represents EIDHR per capita funding, as per the 2015 Annual Action Programme

This is why I ended a recent article by stating

“As a democracy, Israel should be (and very much is!) open to criticism.  But it should not be a push-over.  The most basic tenet of democracy is, after all, that it is the people that makes the decisions.  ‘The people’ as in ‘those who live, pay taxes and vote in that country’.  To preserve that basic tenet, a democracy has the right (nay, has the duty!) to defend itself – not just against the enemies who want to physically overcome it, but also against the false friends who attempt to undermine it.  It is high time Israel told Europeans, in no uncertain terms, to mind their own business.  And their own (rather heavy!) conscience.”

Well, I don’t know if the powers that be in Israel read my humble articles, but someone decided to do something about it.  The country’s parliament (the Knesset) has just passed an amendment requiring NGOs that rely on foreign governments for more than 50% of their annual budget to disclose that fact on their official reports, adverts and formal communication with elected officials.

The law was proposed by the Justice Minister, supported by the government and lambasted in harsh terms by the opposition.  So far, so good – that’s the role of opposition in a democracy.  The amendment has also been attacked, naturally, by the NGOs in question.  No surprise there, either.

But – here comes the issue – it has also been criticised by foreign powers: the Obama Administration and the European Union.  Both have cried ‘gewald yidn!’ (or the English equivalent), decrying the new law as a threat to Israel’s democracy.

If I had a dollar for each time I heard that Israel’s democracy is in mortal danger – I’d be a millionaire.  Last time I checked, the country was still very much the only democracy in the Middle East – so I guess it has somehow managed to duck those grave dangers.

But hey, one never knows…  So I thought I’d look into the issue, to check whether the Israeli democracy was really on its last legs.

To start with, I read the proposed law in its latest version; I know, I know: I’m such a sad person!  But at least, now I can assure you: the text does not declare any NGO illegal; it does not force them to disband – or else; in fact, it does not impose any restriction whatsoever upon NGOs’ activity.  All it does is require them to state clearly, in their public and official communications, that they are funded by foreign governments – and to list those governments.  But only if that constitutes the majority of their total funding.  If, for instance, just 49.9% of an NGO's budget comes from foreign governments and the balance from non-governmental sources (either Israeli or foreign), then the law places no special requirement on that NGO.

'So what’s the big deal?' you’ll ask.  'How does a mere requirement to disclose information constitute a threat to democracy?'  Well, according to the law’s critics, the new amendment discriminates between left wing and right wing NGOs.  For instance, one such critic – an organisation called Americans for Peace Now (APN), claims that

“The bill requires no transparency from right-wing groups – who are promoting an agenda that lines up comfortably with that of the current government – although they are massively funded by foreign donors.  As such, the clear objective of this bill is to enhance the hegemony of this government’s narrative by silencing dissent.”

Worried, I read the law again.  It says nothing about left, right or centre: it refers to all NGOs, with no regard to their political agenda (or lack thereof).

So I turned again to Americans for Peace Now, for an explanation.  Here it is, from the horse’s mouth: the bill, they say,

“require disclosure […] only with respect to foreign government funding (which goes almost entirely to progressive civil society NGOs and NGOs working on peace and human rights)…”

It does not, on the other hand, require disclosure

“with respect to foreign individuals (who provide massive amounts of funding for right-wing NGOs).”

You got that?  It’s not the Israeli law that discriminates between left-wing and right-wing NGOs.  It’s actually the foreign governments that make that difference: they provide funding only to left-wing NGOs, but not to right-wing NGOs.  Err… why??

As an aside, it seems to me that Americans for Peace Now have committed a bit of a Freudian mistake in their passionate argumentation.  I don’t know about you, but their reference to “left-wing NGOs” and “right-wing NGOs” kinda grates on my ear.  Aren’t charities supposed to be apolitical??  Are these human rights organisations, or political outfits?  If the latter (a conclusion that the left-wing/right wing classification inexorably leads to), then why do foreign governments bankroll political movements – of a particular tinge – in a fellow democracy?

Still, what about APN’s basic argument?  Why does the law refer only to funding by foreign governments and does not apply also to donations by foreign individuals?  Well, individuals are fundamentally different from states and governments.  As an individual, I can give money to whoever I please; it’s my private money.  Not so a government; it operates with public money.  Which is why an individual is entitled (in law and in practice) to privacy; conversely, governments are required (in law and in practice) to exhibit transparency and be open to public scrutiny.  Hence, there is a reasonable argument that a requirement to publish names of individual donors might spook them; it would amount to an infringement of their privacy.  Not so in the case of governments, to which the opposite principle applies: the duty of transparency, rather than the right to privacy.

Ryanair CEO Michael O’Leary (an Irish national, i.e. a foreign individual as far as the UK is concerned) is reputed to have used his own and his company’s money in support of the ‘Remain’ campaign.  ‘Leave’ campaigners must have resented that, but nobody said it’s illegal.  But what if the government of Ireland (a foreign country with interests not necessarily aligned with those of the UK) would have done the same?  What if – say – Israel’s government would have donated tens of millions of pounds to organisations promoting Brexit?

There is another issue, too.  See, I always thought (and most people do, I’d guess) that ‘NGO’ stands for Non-Governmental Organization.  But how ‘non-governmental’ is an organisation if the majority of its funds come from governments?  At the very least, the public is entitled to know that this or that particular Non-Governmental Organization is… rather governmental in terms of its finances.

Americans for Peace Now disagrees, however:

“this bill clearly portrays Israeli civil society organizations – organizations that obey the law and work to advance an agenda that differs from the current government’s worldview – as ‘foreign agents’ which are disloyal to the state, which represent foreign interests, and which act to undermine the state and its institutions. This bill does not only seek to stigmatize these progressive groups but also seeks to humiliate them by demanding that they stigmatize themselves through slapping a ‘warning label’ on their public communications.”

Well, “Israeli civil society organisations” have every right “to advance an agenda that differs from the current government’s worldview”.  Nobody disputes that right – I certainly don’t!  What raises eyebrows, however, is the fact that the majority of their funds are contributed by foreign governments.  One would think that “Israeli civil society organisations” would be able to raise the funds needed for their operation from within that civil society.  Moreover, since the fact of the matter is that they don’t, that they are mainly bankrolled by foreign governments, why should that fact be concealed from the “Israeli civil society” – i.e. from the Israeli public and its elected representatives?

Since Israel is a democracy, “Israeli civil society organisations” can (and should!) question government policies; they have the right to criticise them and claim that they are bad for the country.  But those organisations cannot at the same time demand to be themselves above scrutiny.  Doesn’t the Israeli public have the right to question their wisdom – and, yes, even their loyalty?  After all, foreign governments – even friendly ones – are driven by their own national interests, which are not necessarily aligned with and may even drastically diverge from Israeli interests.  Shouldn’t the Israeli public be given the tools to question and decide for themselves whether a particular organisation claiming to speak for the “Israeli civil society” really does?

Furthermore, if those “Israeli civil society organisations” consist of “progressive groups” of loyal patriots “that obey the law”, then what do they have to hide?  How does disclosing the source of their funding – in a format easy to grasp by the public – “stigmatise” them?  Since when does the truth (nobody disputes that it is the truth) “humiliate”??

The lady doth protest too much, methinks!  It would seem that somewhere, somewhere deep inside, those “Israeli civil society organisations” feel that what they do, while legal, is not exactly… shall we say… cool.  It may be kosher, but it stinks.

If that is how they feel, I think they are right.  In fact, a similar conclusion has recently been reached by a bipartisan US Senate inquiry.  It found that the Obama Administration (through the Department of State) funded an NGO called One Voice.  In turn, that NGO used the funds to campaign (through an “Israeli civil society organisation”, of course) against Benjamin Netanyahu, during the latest parliamentary elections in Israel (2015).  The Senate inquiry found that the transaction had been legal – no US law had been infringed; it just wasn’t ethical, fair or democratic.  In other words – kosher, but stinking to high heaven.  Both the Democrat and the Republican Party co-chairs criticised the Administration, with the latter stating:

“The State Department ignored warning signs and funded a politically active group in a politically sensitive environment with inadequate safeguards.  It is completely unacceptable that US taxpayer dollars were used to build a political campaign infrastructure that was deployed — immediately after the grant ended — against the leader of our closest ally in the Middle East.”

Sorry, “Israeli civil society organisations” – but I don’t see at all how the new law is undemocratic.  That doesn’t mean I have no problem with it – I do.  I suspect it’ll be ineffective.  Money is fungible and it is all too easy to move it around and disguise its sources.  As I’ve explained elsewhere, charities such as Oxfam get a huge chunk of their budgets from the British government and the various purses it controls.  So when Oxfam funds – say – Breaking the Silence (as it did), is that to be counted as government money or not?  How about if Oxfam funds a charity which bankrolls a programme with another charity which pays a third charity to commission a report from “Israeli civil society organisation” Breaking the Silence?  You get my drift…

Legislation is a good thing.  Over-legislation isn’t.  And when it comes to foreign interference, legislation is often toothless and weak.  It is defensive.  And – as Israeli soldiers know and Israeli footballers unfortunately don’t – sometimes offence is the best type of defence.  The way to put an end to foreign – especially European – subversion is not to protest and legislate, but simply to establish, quietly but effectively, that two can play at this game.

Take for instance Spain.  The country is a major donor to “Israeli civil society organisations” – including extreme-left fringe outfits such as ICAHD.  Israel can return the compliment by providing funds to secessionist movements… err… civil society organisations in Catalonia and the Basque Country.  Not directly, of course – but through a charity funding another charity…

Peaceful protest on the streets of Barcelona. Not funded by Israel.

France is another country that seems to care deeply for Israel’s civil society.  Certainly more than it does for its own Roma population, which faces widespread, systematic racism, discrimination and even persecution by the authorities.  Morality will surely oblige Israel to fund French civil society organisations fighting France’s rampant antiziganism.

British police forcibly evict inhabitants of the Dale Farm travelers’ camp.

And so on…  Don’t worry, this won’t cost a lot of money: political activists are cheap – one can buy a dozen for the cost of one honest worker.  And they specialise in generating maximum noise for the buck.  Once a few European countries get a taste of their own medicine, I’m sure that brutal, 'anti-democratic’ legislation will become unnecessary.  A gentlemen’s agreement between fellow democracies is a much better solution.

Because Israel’s democracy is indeed under threat.  Not from Knesset’s legislation, of course; but from the anti-democratic, subversive practices of some ‘friendly foreign governments’.  Well, every stick has two ends; and old Hillel said it well:

“What is hateful to you, do not unto your neighbor.”

Those ‘friendly governments’ could do with a reminder.  After all, what are friends for??

Don’t slam Islam; but don’t tolerate intolerance, either!

Paris is in shock again and with it the entire civilised world.  Although, truth be told, this has not come as a surprise.  Nor have the reactions of Western politicians and journalists.  On one hand, we hear again the predictable but oh-so-idiotic claim that acts perpetrated in the name of Allah and Muhammad ‘have nothing to do with Islam’; on the other hand, we are treated to the bigoted implication that believing in Allah and Muhammad counts as ‘fifth column’ membership.  Both approaches are cowardly populist; both are terribly wrong; worse – both are pathetically unhelpful.

No, we can’t start accusing or suspecting everyone who embraces Islam as his/her religion; or even as his/her main identity.  But neither should we stick our heads in the ground, close our eyes to reality and plug our ears with politically-correct cotton wool, denying that a certain strand of Islam has everything to do with terrorism.

There will never be a shortage of imbeciles eager to find excuses and to ‘explain away’ terrorism.  Yes, the West has made war in Iraq and Afghanistan; but then, Russia is making war in Ukraine – and yet Ukrainians don't blow themselves up in Moscow’s stadiums or in Sankt Petersburg’s concert halls.  Yes, Western colonialists have left a lousy legacy in the Middle East; but they did worse, much worse elsewhere.  Indians don’t try to blow up the Wembley Stadium.  Armenians don’t murder patrons in Istanbul’s restaurants and Israeli Jews don’t fly airplanes into Frankfurt’s office buildings.

There’ll also be bigots who will point to passages from the Qur’an and claim that there’s something inherently violent in Islam.  But I can equally quote passages from the Torah and from the New Testament that would seem to incite to violence.  What about the injunction to “blot out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven”?  And didn’t Jesus say “I came not to send peace, but the sword”?  Oh, and I can find for you Qur’anic verses praising peace – just like one finds in every scripture.

No, Islam is not a religion of peace; nor is it a religion of war.  Religions aren’t ‘of’ anything; people are.  There is no denying that acts of terrorism are currently more likely to be committed in the name of Islam than in the name of Christianity, Judaism, Buddhism or Shintoism.  If a suicide bomber detonates himself tomorrow, it is more likely that he’ll be called Muhammad, rather than Paul, Moshe or Jitendra.  That is a fact.  Most Muslims are not radicals; it's just that there are more radicals among Muslims.

But why?  Islam is not fundamentally different from Christianity or Judaism.  It is just younger, much younger.  It appeared on the grand scene of history about 14 centuries ago.  Christianity is considerably older – more than 2000 years; Judaism is ancient.  Age is of consequence: religions (like all human endeavours) have a life of their own.  Just like human beings.  Youngsters are more impetuous; more impulsive; less patient and less tolerant.  Thankfully, they mellow as they grow old.  So do religions.  Want to understand radical Islam?  Violent Jihad?  Think 14th century Christianity, with its crusades and Inquisition.

In 14th century Europe, religion pervaded every aspect of human life; so it does these days in most parts of the Middle East.  14th century Europeans may have called themselves ‘French’, ‘German’ or ‘English’; but their primary identity was ‘Christians’.  Just as these days hundreds of millions of people will tell you that they define themselves first and foremost as ‘Muslims’.

Jihadis are nothing more – and nothing less, and nothing else – than the ‘modern’, Muslim version of medieval Crusaders.  They may be armed with assault rifles and grenades, rather than swords and maces; but they are just as blood-thirsty; just as self-righteous; just as ready to achieve martyrdom and earn their ticket to heaven.  Are you still wondering why they behead people?

OK, you’ll say; that may well be so, but how does this help?  Will we have to endure centuries of Jihad?  Well, not necessarily.  Things have changed somewhat from the real 14th century.

Think about it: why did so many people (not just kings and knights, but simple peasants and tradesmen) leave behind their homesteads, their families, their lives – to make war on the infidels?  To kill, maim, pillage and rape?  No, Popes did not use Twitter to stir up trouble – not in those times.  They used preachers.  That has not changed: it is still the preachers of hate that brainwash people into becoming butchers.

Wanna deal with Jihadi terrorism?  You can try to track all the tens of thousands that have already been radicalised – and the millions that will be; or you can go after a few thousand hate preachers. Those preachers may not practice violence themselves; but they kill, maim, pillage and rape – however indirectly.  Jail them if you can; kill them if you have to; or just prevent their odious message from reaching its target.  That means tighter border controls.  It means closing websites, monitoring social media, controlling school activities, raiding mosques, banning radical madrassahs.  If that implies changing our laws, so they protect the tolerant, rather than tolerating the bigot – then so be it; if it means making law enforcement more intrusive, then that’s a price we’ll have to pay, for our safety and that of our children.  Make no mistake: it’s the price we’ll have to pay to maintain rule of law; to avoid rule of the mob.  There will have to be limits to freedom: your freedom must end where you want to take away mine.

That won’t stop tomorrow’s terrorist attack; it won’t provide an instant solution.  But, in time, it will choke the flow of hatred.

The Torah says “I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. Choose life, so that you and your offspring will live”.  I’m sure the Qur’an won’t disagree.