Source: Voice of Russia
The leadership of the Palestine Liberation Organization said the UN report on inquiry into last year's Freedom Flotilla incident violated international laws. Discussing this issue with us today will be Pyotr Topychkanov, Program coordinator at the Carnegie Moscow centre.
Palestinians say that the UN report was a dangerous political and legal setback because it stated that the Israeli naval blockade on Gaza was legal. Furthermore Palestinians added that attacking a ship in international waters and killing people on board is an act of piracy punishable by international law, especially since Israel is an occupying state. So what do you think of this incident?
First of all I think that it is difficult to give this act the name of piracy, because Israel didn’t occupy a ship, just after taking the cargo it transferred shipments to the Palestinian territory with some exceptions. But nevertheless from the point of international law it is a very difficult issue, maybe it is not piracy, but maybe there are some violations of international law, because the question is – did Israel have the right to use all violent measures of special forces against people and Freedom Flotilla or not. At the same time another difficult question is – does Israel have the right to secure naval blockade of the Gaza territory or not. And from another point Israel can pose other questions, for example, why Turkey and other Middle East countries don’t use the UN system for humanitarian aid for the territory blockaded by Israel. So it is clear that Israel and Turkey and Syria and other countries involved in this problem should use the UN structures as main instruments of providing aid and providing security to the Gaza territory. But frankly I think that Israel is not very interested in using these structures and now of course it is grateful for this UN report, but as usual Israel refers to secure the Gaza territory and provide its own security independently, so for Israel relations between Tel-Aviv and Palestine territories are bilateral relations, it is not interested in involving other countries, other partners, in the negotiation process, humanitarian aid.
The UN report says that the naval blockade was imposed as a legitimate security measure in order to prevent weapons from entering Gaza by sea. Can you comment on that?
It seems to me that Israel can stop arms transfer to the territory of Gaza but it cannot stop transfer of humanitarian aid, of food, water and other necessary cargos, but sometimes Israel stops shipment with goods very important for the people of this territory, so as a blockade of arms transfer it is legal, but as a blockade of necessary goods for Palestinian people, it is illegal.
The executive committee of the Palestine liberation organization said in a statement that it would continue diplomatic efforts to prove that the Israeli blockade on the Gaza strip contradicts international laws. So what results can we expect?
This conflict has a long history, and unfortunately in the international community there isn’t consensus about this conflict. For example, European countries have different opinions and different relations with Israeli and Palestine territories. In Russia you can find a wide range of opinions about this problem. In order to resolve it we should find a consensus in the community, and first of all, in the UN. Unfortunately this report doesn’t reflect a consensus in the UN organization, just report and a very ambiguous report, because it is just a report of the Inquiry commission, which is not a representative of the UN itself. If it is a solution of the Security Council or if it is a solution of the General Assembly of the UN, it will be another story, but it is just the Inquiry Commission.
As we know, Israel said that it would not send an official apology to Turkey over the deadly Gaza flotilla rate, and Turkey responded by saying that it would minimize diplomatic relations with Israel and freeze cooperation in the military sphere. So do you see the possibility of improving the relations between Israel and Turkey in the near future?
In the near future I don’t expect improvement of relations between these two countries, because in both countries there are very conservative governments, very nationalistic, and their political program is based on the idea of national identity, religious identity of these two countries, and in this case without external influence it would be difficult for Israel and Turkey to improve relations between them, because this very difficult problem of Palestine, of the Gaza territory, shouldn’t be dependent on the relations between Israel and Turkey, between Israel and Iran, between Israel and other Middle East countries.
The Defense Minister of Greece and his Israeli counterpart signed a memorandum on military cooperation in Jerusalem on Sunday. So how do you see further development of this cooperation?
Of course we can expect that in this way Israel is trying to build coalition which will be in opposition to the Middle East countries, but it seems to me that Greece is not a very important player in neosecurity and in security in this region. Israel is able to provide its own security itself, without help from Greece or from other European countries. Only one very important partner does matter for Israel – the United States of America. So maybe this is a step to divide European countries about Palestine and Gaza problem, maybe it is an act which should cause concern in Istanbul.
This interview originally appeared on the Voice of Russia site.