Birthday Greetings
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Celebrating Israel's
50 th birthday Thursday, the liberal Israeli paper Ha'aretz
lauded the country's enormous achievements but said they have been "darkened by
clouds of failure and hardship." Israel, it said in an editorial, is "at the top of the ladder of inequality among
developed nations" and has limited its citizens' freedom of choice in important
areas because of "a political covenant with the Orthodox and ultra-Orthodox
streams." Ha'aretz also condemned the "skeptical and negligent approach
of all the governments until the late 1970s toward peace agreements with Arab
countries." Israel will need "spiritual strength" if it is to transform itself
"from a national movement to a civilized and developed nation," it added.
"Improving democracy, firmly establishing the rights of the individual,
granting equal expression to minorities, supporting the weak, encouraging
excellence and maintaining a non-patronizing relationship with Diaspora Jews
are the necessary conditions for this to happen."
The
conservative Jerusalem
Post said in an editorial Wednesday that "[s]omehow, even during our
birthday celebration, speaking of achievements is not quite in fashion." Even
so, it added, "The resurrection of an ancient people in its own land, following
the destruction of a third of its number in the Holocaust, is unique in history
and represents ample cause for celebration." Quoting an opinion poll in
Ha'aretz that showed 82 percent of Israelis expect Israel will live to
celebrate its 100 th anniversary, the Post said it wasn't the
"confidence of the overwhelming majority" that was striking but the question
itself: "[W]hat other nation celebrating its jubilee would even ask such a
question?" In a jubilee interview with the newspaper, Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu called Israel "the greatest success story of the 20 th
century, and in many ways the greatest triumph of a people of all the nations
of history."
The Israeli anniversary was the subject of front-page
stories and editorials throughout Europe Thursday, many of them emphasizing
current tensions within Israel at least as much as the reasons for rejoicing.
Le Figaro of Paris
carried an interview with Leah Rabin, widow of assassinated Prime Minister
Yitzhak Rabin, in which she said his killer, Yigal Amir, was "the product of a
climate orchestrated by Likud." She added, "I absolutely blame 'Bibi' for the
hate campaign he carried on against my husband." If "Israeli society is
desperate" today and "the young want to leave the country," it's because of
him, she said: "This government must be overthrown by any means."
The
liberal French daily Libération devoted its whole front page and five inside pages
Thursday to the Israeli jubilee, including a two-page joint interview that
Yasser Arafat and Shimon Peres gave Ha'aretz and three European
newspapers. "We are cousins, we were cousins, we will remain cousins," said
Arafat. "For Israel to remain a Jewish state, we have to have a Palestinian
state," said Peres. Libération 's editorial said that deep rivalries
between Israeli communities of different regional origins explained "the
acceptance of the sinking of a peace process the success of which was the
essential condition for Israel's entry into adulthood."
In Rome, La Repubblica headlined its main Israeli jubilee story
"The fifty joyless years of Israel"; Turin's La Stampa headlined its "Israel, fifty years of joy and
mourning." In Madrid, El
Mundo called on Israel in an editorial
to end its present "stubbornness" and to ensure the peace process resumed, "so
that in 2048, Israel will be carrying on as strongly as now ... and that a
viable and peaceful Palestine will be keeping it company." In London, the
Times said Israel
would remain "a restless, innovative society" and continue to make sacrifices
to support its own. "Israel at 50 is not facing a midlife crisis, but a
succession of second childhoods," the Times said. "It is unlikely that
'normality,' whatever that is, will prove a blessing or burden for Israel in
the near future." The liberal Guardian wished Israel "all the best on its 50 th
birthday, but urge[d] it yet again--people and government--to try harder still
to achieve the just and lasting peace they and their neighbours so badly
need."
In Paris, Le Monde's editorial Thursday was
devoted to the recent advance of the right-wing, racist, anti-Semitic People's
Union Party, which won 13 percent of the vote in regional elections in
Saxony-Anhalt in eastern Germany. It said the result was "very worrying" and
reflected not only specific grievances in the east but also more general German
fears: "Immigration, Europe, and globalisation are nourishing deep identity
anxieties," it observed. Slogans such as "Germany first" are becoming more and
more fashionable, and they are even being used by the Social Democrat Gerhard
Schröder to increase his chances of becoming chancellor in September, Le
Monde said. On another note: A survey in the paper Wednesday revealed
the principal cause of popular discontent in France is noise.
The Italian and Spanish
papers mainly led their front pages with congratulatory remarks on the imminent
launch of the European single currency, which both countries have qualified to
join. Corriere
della Sera of Milan carried a front-page commentary by Ennio Caretto titled
"The American Euro-Fear" on the reportedly growing anxiety in the United States
about the effect the new Euro may have on the dollar.
