Sunday Times 2

Let me first express my sincere gratitude to the organizers of this unique gathering for bestowing me this opportunity to express my observations on the greatest tragedy of our times: deprivation of a nation state for the Palestinian people.

Let me right at the very outset expound the maxim that guides my political thinking, aspirations and practice. My thinking is succinctly propounded and amply exemplified by President Abraham Lincoln’s letter to Horace Greeley in August 1862: it is as follows….

“I shall try to correct errors when shown to be errors; and I shall adopt new views so fast as they shall appear to be true views…I intend no modification of my oft-expressed personal wish that all men, everywhere, could be free…”

The Non Aligned Movement, of which Sri Lanka was a founding member in Belgrade in 1961, had a number of aims and causes that it fought for. Most of those aims have been fulfilled. Colonialism is dead. The Cold war is over. However, there is one issue that was listed in Belgrade in 1961, and I might add, even earlier, at the historic Bandung Conference in 1955, that remains unresolved and has assumed larger proportions than before. That is the question of Palestine. That issue has spilled over into the 21st century and remains to be resolved.

Sri Lanka has always adopted a bipartisan view on the issue of Palestine. I may even say that there is a broad multi-party consensus in support of the Palestinian people and their national rights.

Sri Lanka under President Jayewardene was one of the first to recognise the Palestinian government in exile headed by the PLO.

Sri Lanka’s stand in solidarity with Palestine was even more strongly declared during the Presidency of Ranasinghe Premadasa, my late beloved father.

In 1991, the President of the US addressed the UN General Assembly and personally spearheaded the successful effort to repeal the 1975 UNGA resolution on Zionism which defined Zionism as a form of racism. The first Gulf war had been won, and the USSR was heading for collapse, so the repeal effort had huge momentum. Only 25 countries voted against the repeal.

Of the 25, most belonged to the OIC (Organisation of Islamic Countries) and the others were led by Communist parties. Sri Lanka was the only non-Islamic and non-Communist-led country to vote against the repeal. We did not pick the easy way out, of abstention or absence!

President Premadasa’s contention was that ‘Zionism is a form of Racism’ resolution should be revisited and repealed only after Israel had respected the repeated resolutions of the UN urging withdrawal from all the territories it had occupied. He said the continued aggressive behaviour of Israel would prove that Sri Lanka’s principled position was validated in the eyes of history.

What is the situation today? We must be pleased that there is a ceasefire in Gaza and we must applaud the role played by Egypt’s democratic government and it’s popularly elected President Mohamed Morsi. His role, supported by Turkey, is a welcome new factor in the Middle East.

The Gaza crisis took place against the backdrop of a siege, a blockade of Gaza, by Israel. This is despite the fact that since 2006 a popularly elected government holds power in Gaza. Indeed it was that democratic vote which triggered the blockade of Gaza by Israel.

We Sri Lankans are struck by the multiple ironies of the situation. Certain powerful countries which preach to us and move resolutions against us on the grounds of human rights and humanitarian law, have done no such thing in relation to the conduct of Israel and have indeed blocked or opposed moves to seek justice for Palestine. We Sri Lankans had to fight for thirty years against a well-equipped terrorist armed force, deploying more suicide bombers and having conducted more assassinations than any purportedly Islamist movement. We had to fight against those who sought to carve out a part of our country, not a movement which sought to liberate itself from external invasion, annexation and occupation.

We fought within our legitimate, internationally recognised boundaries, not outside them. We have never invaded, annexed nor occupied the territory of any other state. In the Gaza war of 2008, the exits were closed to the civilians by the occupier and aggressor, while in our final war, it is our soldiers who gave their lives to open up escape routes for the civilians who were held as a collective human shield by a terrorist militia! Yet it is Sri Lanka and its valiant armed forces and our just, legitimate war of reunification that are the subject of resolutions and reports by the powerful and the hypocritical.

In Gaza, the elected parliamentarians of Hamas have been abducted and incarcerated in the jails of the occupying power for years! The recent crisis was triggered by the assassination of the de-facto number 2 of Hamas, who had in fact been the key negotiator for many ceasefire agreements.

Richard Falk, Emeritus Professor of International Law at Princeton and until recently UN special Rapporteur on Human Rights in the Occupied Palestinian territories wrote the following on the Gaza conflict, on his regular blog. I might add that he is American and Jewish.

He writes that, and I quote:

“The latest Gaza crisis involved attacking a densely urbanised population with advanced weaponry from air and sea, targeting media outlets, striking residential structures, and killing and wounding many civilians, including numerous children. The reliance by Hamas and the various Gaza militias on indiscriminate, even if wildly inaccurate and generally harmless, rockets is a criminal violation of international humanitarian law, but we must also note the low number of casualties caused and the minor damage caused.

“Beneath the horrific violence, which exposes the utter vulnerability, of all those living as captives in Gaza, which is one of the most crowded and impoverished communities on the planet, is a frightful structure of human abuse that the international community continues to turn its back upon, while preaching elsewhere adherence to the norm of ‘responsibility to protect’ whenever it suits NATO. More than half of the 1.6 million Gazans are refugees living in a total area of just over twice the size of the city of Washington, D.C… The population has endured a punitive blockade since mid-2007 that makes daily life intolerable, and Gaza has been harshly occupied ever since 1967.

“Israel has tried to fool the world by setting forth its narrative of a good faith withdrawal from Gaza in 2005, which was exploited by Palestinian militants at the time as an opportunity to launch deadly rocket attacks. The counter-narrative, accepted by most independent observers, is that the Israeli removal of troops and settlements was little more than a mere redeployment to the borders of Gaza, with absolute control over what goes in and what leaves, maintaining an open season of a licence to kill at will, with no accountability and no adverse consequences, backed without question by the U.S. Government.

From an international law point of view, Israel’s purported ‘disengagement’ from Gaza didn’t end its responsibility as an Occupying Power under the Geneva Conventions, and thus its master plan of subjecting the entire population of Gaza to severe forms of collective punishment amounts to a continuing crime against humanity, as well as a flagrant violation of Article 33 of Geneva IV. It is not surprising that so many who have observed the plight of Gaza at close range have described it as the largest open air prison in the world.”

“This spectacle of one-sided war in which Israel decides how much violence to unleash, and Gaza waits to be struck, firing off militarily meaningless salvos of rockets as a gesture of resistance, represents a shameful breakdown of civilisation values. These rockets do spread fear and cause trauma among Israeli civilians even when no targets are struck, and represent an unacceptable tactic. Yet such unacceptability must be weighed against the unacceptable tactics of Israel that holds all the cards in the conflict.

It is truly alarming that now even the holiest of cities, Jerusalem, is threatened with attacks, but the continuation of oppressive conditions for the people of Gaza, inevitably leads to increasing levels of frustration, in effect, cries of help that world has ignored at its peril for decades. These are survival screams! To realize this is not to exaggerate! To gain perspective, it is only necessary to read a recent UN Report that concludes that the deterioration of services and conditions will make Gaza uninhabitable by 2020.” I end quote.

Prof Falk also strikes a warning note, that the Israeli ambassador to the UN in New York has described the strike on Gaza as part of Israel’s larger confrontation with Iran and that it has been hinted at by some Israeli officials that the attack on Gaza is a trial run for a much larger attack on Iran. I must add that Iran is a staunch friend of Sri Lanka. It is a little known fact that during President Premadasa’s tenure, and as a result of an agreement negotiated in Tehran by then Deputy Minister of Defence Ranjan Wijeratne, Iran flew a giant Lockheed C 5A planeload monthly, filled with ordnance and ammunition, which was crucial in the success of the operation led by Gen (then Brigadier) Denzil Kobbekaduwe, to break the siege of the Jaffna Fort by the Tigers.

Iran has no nuclear weapons, while those who are threatening to attack it have a nuclear stockpile and are the sole nuclear power in the Middle East. Those who have imposed sanctions against Iran, sanctions which also affect Sri Lanka and its citizens, have monstrous stockpiles of nuclear weapons and do not even whisper a single criticism of their regional ally’s nuclear weapons.

These hypocrites preach to us about the rights of minorities and call for the demilitarisation of our own integral territory, but ignore the occupation of Palestine, the blockade of Gaza, and the moral imperative of the liberation of the people and nation of Palestine. These hypocrites call for autonomy in parts of other states but never strive for the unconditional independence of Palestine.

We in Sri Lanka must, however, draw some hope and inspiration from two factors; the massive democratic upsurge known as the Arab Spring and the re-election of President Barack Obama. This combination may have a salutary effect on the Israel/Palestine equation, as already evidenced in the Gaza ceasefire. As Prof. Ishtiaq Ahmed, Professor Emeritus of Political Science of the university of stockholm writing on November 25th in the Daily Times, Pakistan, observes: “The Arab Spring still holds out a promise of positive change and the Muslim Brotherhood government seems pragmatic. A willingness to recognise Israel exists among the Arabs, provided the Palestinians could exercise their right to a separate, independent, viable state, more or less corresponding to the 1967 borders.

In conclusion I draw your attention and that of our distinguished audience, to a crucial fact. Tomorrow, on November 29th, the Palestinian Authority is now poised to seek recognition by the UN General Assembly of its status as ‘a non-member state’. Sri Lanka was in the forefront of the successful effort for the recognition of Palestine by UNESCO last year in Paris. On November 29th at the UNGA in New York, Sri Lanka must similarly take a strong stand in support and vote in favour of Palestine.

Lastly, let me remind you of the words of wisdom uttered by president JFK in February 1961 when faced with the menace of communism, totalitarianism and dictatorship: We shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and success of liberty.
Friends, let me reiterate these same sentiments in the context of the Palestinian issue:

We in Sri Lanka are prepared to pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the establishment of a free, sovereign, democratic Palestinian nation state in the near future.

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