Israel’s Love-Hate Relationship with the UN Peacekeepers
by Some in the Israeli cabinet are floating an idea of asking UN peacekeeping troops to come in and and be a barrier between Israel and the West Bank towns. Is this really such a good idea, and does the Israeli leadership have the stomach to surrender any level of power for peace?
“Chutzpah” is the word that comes to mind when I read certain stories out of Haaretz . Today it seems all the “you’ve GOT to be kidding!” news is coming out of Israel – it’s a feast or famine situation at times, and so please don’t view my choice of topics as being anything but that.
Haaretz ran a neat little editorial today that I originally ignored. I didn’t make the connection with another story until several hours later when I went back to read some of the stories I had collected and put aside. I paid for that decision later; it disappeared from the front page and I had a hard time locating it again through various links and searches. The reason I ignored it to begin with was the initial teaser blurb on the front page ticked me off.
The story that made me stop in my tracks and run back to Haaretz was about French Defense Minister Michelle Alliot-Marie, who didn’t look too happy the IAF had performed “mock attacks” on the French UN peacekeepers and came perilously close to being shot down . I also saw another story on Arutz Sheva; they reported the Foreign Ministry is trying to put pressure on the IAF to cease all surveilance flights over Lebanon .
Now if this were an isolated incident, perhaps it might be easier to dismiss, but it wasn’t. It’s the second set of UN peacekeepers Israel has tangoed with, which makes this more than just an oddity, but a real kunundrum. The Israeli Air Force engaged in some level of an altercation with a German Navy ship; reports initially stated there were two shots fired by the IAF, but Defense Minister Amir Peretz denies the allegations . This may be a “he said – she said” style argument, but Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was left the embarrassing task of having to ring up German Chancellor Angela Merkel and apologize , no matter who was at fault.
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