This week was penciled in to be historic. The heads of state of 43 Mediterranean countries—including Israel, the Palestine Authority, Turkey, Egypt, Europe’s 27 members and several Arab nations—were supposed to gather in Barcelona for the first Union for the Mediterranean summit. Instead, the region is on high alert and peace is as distant as ever.
Designed as Europe’s most significant (however incipient) diplomatic foray in years to give the Middle East peace process some traction, the summit was officially postponed until November. And it didn’t even have anything to do with Israel’s deadly attack on a six-ship flotilla that sailed from Turkey.
The decision came late in May amid growing boycott calls of the nascent Union for the Mediterranean, after Europe was forced to admit it failed to narrow even the smallest Arab-Israeli differences. Now, whatever is left stands as a testament of the European Union’s failed regional diplomacy.
While the aftermath of the Israeli naval attack on international waters that killed at least nine people remains uncertain, as does the broader Middle East quagmire, what is certain is that rescheduling the summit will be impossible under the current circumstances. The Union for the Mediterranean itself will in effect be indefinitely shelved, if not all together abandoned.
Europe, naturally, is not responsible for Israeli naval attacks or the impasse in Middle East peace talks. After all, far more cohesive initiatives over the past few decades have fizzled under the weight of reality. In fact, the summit failure is only part of the embarrassment. The fiasco is in Europe’s role.
The plan was promising. The Union for the Mediterranean was conceived as a good neighborly idea, as I said in a March column, to intertwine the destinies of Mediterranean countries plagued by a myriad of rivalries, many rooted in the decades-old Arab-Israeli conflict. Even enemies tend to find common ground over time to build lasting stability out of self-interest. In other words, it is a focus on shared issues, instead of differences.
Even with a botched summit, the Union for the Mediterranean’s secretariat could have pursued regional rapprochement. After all, in order for diplomacy to work, channels need to be built. During its inauguration earlier this year, there was even cautious optimism that France and Spain would succeed in using the UfM to launch a concerted and unique EU diplomatic effort in the region, distinct from US policy, to break the stalemate.
Instead, Europe’s contradictory policies dealt a coup de grace to the organization and rendered it unable to meet its goals. What the Middle East peace process needs badly is a balanced broker, one that condemns Hamas, but doesn’t remain in complicit silence about Israel’s collective punishment of Gaza and disproportionate use of violence.
The US, even if it wanted to, is more constrained by internal politics, and thus biased in favor of Israel. Iran, on the other side, supports the more radical groups that Israel justifies its aggressions with. In the middle, but overshadowed by the two warring sides and allies, are Arab countries, now more united than ever.
Righteousness aside, the bottom line is that the current impasse is dangerously unsustainable. It reinforces the hardliners supporting Hamas, undermines Palestinian reunification talks, emboldens Israel’s hawks, and further pushes the region toward war.
The EU, the biggest single economic block on earth, is needed to wield its influence to support the balanced Arab peace initiative to force a peace process on all sides. And the UfM was the best-suited vehicle for the job. But alas, Europe folded its cards again. Even with the flotilla attack, Europe has failed to openly condemn Israel. What exactly must Israel do for Europe to react? Had any other country done anything remotely similar, world condemnation would have materialized within hours.
Europe—despite Israel’s defiant settlement and Jerusalem policy, or the Mossad’s use of European passports, and the flotilla attack—isn’t ready to revise its botched contradictory policy to act as a balanced Middle East broker. This brings us back to the Union for the Mediterranean. It should get its own tombstone in Barcelona so that Europeans remember what role their leaders played. The group’s failure embodies everything that is wrong about European diplomacy. And the implications are dire.
Arab countries, already frustrated with Europe’s self-defeating policies that give Israel immunity from violating international law, will eventually stop listening. The EU will witness how its already thinning influence will wither into irrelevance, while countries like Russia, China, and even newcomers like Brazil eagerly move in to replace it. But Europe should not forget that a regional war will not be on America’s shore: it will be on the Mediterranean.
Andres Cala – Madrid-based freelance journalist
