IS THEY IS OR IS THEY AIN’T PRO-ISRAEL? THE UK CONSERVATIVE PARTY

Posted By on March 12th, 2010

http://www.robinshepherdonline.com/just-weeks-before-the-election-british-conservative-party-leader-sets-out-pro-israeli-platform-or-does-he/#more-2354
Just weeks before the election, British Conservative Party leader sets out pro-Israeli platform, or does he?
In an exclusive interview with Britain’s Jewish Chronicle, David Cameron — leader of the Conservative Party and a man who could be prime minister in eight weeks time — has set out an agenda which suggests he would take a much more pro-Israeli line than the current government should he come to power.

Cameron described as “feeble” the government’s handling of the universal jurisdiction procedures which have been used against senior Israelis saying, “We will keep pressing the government to make this right – and if they don’t, we will.” Islamist groups such as Hizb-ut-Tahrir — which openly calls for an Islamic state in Britain — would be banned and Islamist leaders would be prevented from coming to the UK. Cameron also said that Britain under his leadership would have voted against the Goldstone Report. The current government voted in favour.

The notion that the Conservatives would put Britain on a more pro-Israeli track is probably reasonable, but the devil lies in the detail. Consider, for example, Cameron’s explanation of his position on the Goldstone Report:

“The detailed allegations of human rights abuses… are serious and they do need to be fully investigated,” the Jewish Chronicle quoted him as saying. The Conservatives would have voted against the report because it “didn’t mention Hamas’s role in starting the conflict”.

But this thinking is muddled. The point about the allegations of human rights abuses is that they are not “serious”. In reality they are propagandistic, dishonest and designed to obscure the real issue, which is that the Goldstone Report is an attempt to criminalise defensive operations mounted by democracies fighting terrorists. That should be reason to oppose it in itself.

But there is also a very particular reason Cameron should be opposing the Goldstone Report. That reason is that it represents a threat to Britain’s own national interests. British soldiers in Afghanistan and Iraq have been fighting terror groups which employ tactics that are all but identical to those employed by Hamas in Gaza. Thousands of innocent Iraqis and Afghans may have been killed by British (and American) forces in those countries, not because Britain is guilty of “war crimes” but because the terrorists use entire civilian population centres as human shields.

If Goldstone passes, it would set a precedent in international law which would inevitably be used against Britain.

It is worrying that Cameron appears unable to see this. For the Goldstone Report is a litmus test issue. If the man who opinion polls suggest could well be prime minister by early May does not get the point about Goldstone it is unlikely he will get the point on many other issues in the Middle East.

So quite apart from the fact that one would inevitably be cautious about the ultimate significance of a senior politician’s comments about Israel made to a captive audience in the Jewish Chronicle, there is also the worry that Cameron doesn’t really get it.

He’s better than Labour, and certainly far better than the Liberal Democrats. But let’s just wait a while before we start dancing in the fountains.

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