So we heard nothing from Tehran for most of last week as Turkey stole their thunder in the rhetorical war against Zionism. And what's more, Turkey commanded the world's sympathy in a way Iran somehow never has.
Now they're attempting to catch up, realising that being caught on the wrong side of this spat makes them look ridiculous. Unfortunately, it puts the Gaza protestors in a tricky diplomatic position. Ahmadinejad and his completely counterproductive sabre-rattling is the object of scorn among many Palestinians I've spoken to, whose memories of being a pawn in an regional scramble for a piece of the pie have not faded. "They're Zionists too", as one friend put it, referring to the region's powers.
The Free Gaza Movement will surely never accept the cover of the Iranians, but such an offer may create a damaging fault-line between those who believe that such a military defence is an overdue and legitimate assertion of Palestinian sovereignty, and those whose desire is for continued nonviolent civil disobedience in the hope that, as with South Africa, the truth will out. If even one skipper decides he wants to take the Iranians up on their offer, an exchange in the Eastern Med between Israel and Iran seems dangerously likely.
Iran's intervention could therefore be the Macguffin that advances the plot of Israeli victimhood in the international community, and consigns this moment of momentum and opportunity to history. But we shall see.
Posts
A Poem For Saturday
-
"Litany" by Billy Collins: You are the bread and the knife, The crystal
goblet and the wine… -Jacques Crickillon You are the bread and the knife,
the cryst...
3 minutes ago
2 comments:
The Iranian plan to send boats was a mistake which won't come to anything. But as for your friend's view that the Iranians are "zionists too" - this strikes me as idiotic, and perhaps motivated by anti-shia sectarianism. The Palestinians I know don't tend to say such stupid things. Ahmedinejad certainly has his moments of buffoonery, but Iran is very much a part of the regional solution - the second most democratic state in the region after Turkey, a thriving intellectual society, and some regional weight against the american-zionist set-up. Without Iran, no Hizbullah. Without Iran, a Syria much more at risk.
Sorry if I wasn't clear - my friend was referring in general to the region's powers, in the context of a conversation about their use of the Palestinian cause to maintain domestic legitimacy and domestic repression. He was referring as much to secular and sunni regimes as to Iran.
Post a Comment