Saying Sorry
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The approach of the
50 th anniversary of the foundation of Israel failed to generate
harmony in the Israeli press, which continued in traditional abrasive form. The
liberal Ha'aretz led Monday with the humiliation inflicted on Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu by George Tenet, director of the CIA. Under the
headline "PM's attempt to sidestep Albright fails," the newspaper reported
Tenet had returned a message from Netanyahu to him because it appeared the
prime minister was trying to bypass U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine
Albright.
"This was
Netanyahu's second attempt to get a message to President Bill Clinton without
bringing Albright into the picture," Ha'aretz reported. On the first
occasion, the CIA had ignored the inference in the message that it should be
passed on to the president and had sent it to Albright instead, reported
Ha'aretz 's military correspondent, Ze'ev Schiff. But when the second
message was received, Tenet decided to return it to Netanyahu with an
explanation. In another report, Ha'aretz said the United States
will decide whether to table its latest Middle East peace initiative only after
U.S. envoy Dennis Ross talks with Netanyahu in London next Monday.
In an editorial
titled "A needless, harmful annexation," Ha'aretz attacked Jerusalem
Mayor Ehud Olmert for wanting to expand the city's municipal boundaries to the
west. This is another example of Jerusalem's urban planning being influenced by
political considerations, the paper said. "As in the past, a political concept
is totally overriding sensible urban considerations," it added. The
conservative Jerusalem
Post led Monday with the news that, according to Israeli Finance
Minister Yaakov Neeman, the United States and Israel will reach an agreement
within 12 days to abolish U.S. civilian aid in exchange for an increase in
military aid.
In an
op-ed
article, Bernard Wasserstein wrote in the Jerusalem
Post that
the British should not "confess to their crimes as rulers of Palestine between
1917 and 1948." "Great historical apologies are much in fashion," Wasserstein
wrote. "President Clinton has apologized for slavery. The Queen of England has
expressed regret for the Amritsar massacre. The Japanese, the Austrians, even
the Swiss, have been induced to express remorse for sins of commission and
omission." But the "disinterested historian, reviewing the history of the
mandate, must conclude that the diplomatic framework for Zionist state-building
from Balfour to Bevin was, in large measure, a British construct. ... But in
the case of the British mandatory government and Zionism the record should be
clear to all and the verdict unambiguous: No apology is required."
In an editorial titled "The Debt of Slavery,"
Le Monde of Paris said
Monday that Europe and the United States should do more than just apologize to
Africans for the terrible damage done to them over a period of 250 years. The
offenders must "recognize their debt and pay it off," the paper said. "First,
by giving the rightful place in their policies to development aid for Africa;
and second, by ceasing to offer blacks in their own countries no choice at all
apart from assimilation or exclusion." Also in Paris, Libération led its front page
with the news that fierce Roman Catholic opposition is causing the French
government to prevaricate over its plans to recognize unions between
homosexuals.
The surprise success of the
far-right German People's Union in Sunday's election in the east German state
of Saxony-Anhalt made most European front pages Monday but received less
prominence in the German press. In a front-page comment Monday by Bernardo
Valli, Rome's La
Repubblica said the result diminished the chances that Helmut Kohl will
return as chancellor after next September's parliamentary elections. Other
popular subjects in the European press included the first anniversary of Tony
Blair's landslide victory in Britain and the dispute between France and Germany
over who should be appointed first president of the European central bank to
supervise the single European currency--a Frenchman or a Dutchman.
The London Observer reported Sunday that
Malaysia had "carried out a mass poisoning of defenceless refugees and migrant
workers in detention camps" to "subdue them before repatriation." The poisoned
water made the mainly Indonesian detainees vomit blood and "triggered riots
which were brutally suppressed," the Observer said. " 'Ringleaders' were
shot dead, and others tortured, beaten and robbed before being deported." In an
editorial, the newspaper described these events as "the human cost of financial
carnage" and demanded "a new international financial architecture" under which
"developing countries can insulate themselves from vicious reversals of
investment flows." Criticizing the United States, the paper concluded, "the
desolation of East Asia is too high a price to pay for the freedom of
international finance."
