America is the only nation which can put pressure on Israel. But every US president assesses how much he can do without annoying the powerful Jewish lobby in America. President Barack Obama appears to be different but his reaction is lukewarm. He may not prove to be a Bill Clinton who got Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Yasser Arafat to shake hands and come to an understanding which had the makings of a settlement.
Obama has to start all over again and emphasise to Israel that peace or security in the region can be achieved through conciliation, not by force. The Security Council’s resolution was too tepid to be taken seriously.
The attack on the flotilla indicates how power has become the arbiter in the world. Countries in a region have to come together to withstand pressure from outside. This is yet another reminder to South Asia that unless it puts its act together, it may expose itself to outside interference. The manner in which the US is enhancing its presence in Afghanistan and Pakistan is ominous. The region must wake up to the danger.
Israel has reintroduced gunboat diplomacy. Colonisation belongs to an age when there was no UN, no forum to discuss aggression and no lobby to seek peace. What has happened recently cannot be taken lightly.
The entire international community has to sit up and take note. Israel cannot get away with it as it has so far by reducing the people of Palestine to a commodity that Tel Aviv can use in the manner it likes.
Israel is not the face of the Jews who are generally known as a peace-loving community. It should not be allowed to blacken their faces.
