Palestinian Protocol Offense

"It is not common that foreign officials meet Israeli officials in east Jerusalem. The Canadians have been making a name for themselves by speaking out on the international scene in a way which is all too rare ... demonstrating an unusual courage and moral stance."
"There should be nothing unusual about meeting Israel's justice minister in east Jerusalem (where the ministry is based). What is strange is that this is the exception."
Yigal Palmor, Israeli foreign ministry spokesman

Canadian Foreign Minister John Baird

AFP photo

 

Meeting Tuesday with Israeli Justice Minister Tzipi Livni in east Jerusalem, Canada's Minister of Foreign Affairs, John Baird, has come under criticism. He insists he crossed no line by holding that meeting with Ms. Livni in Jerusalem. The Government of Israel considers Jerusalem their capital city. Most foreign emissaries meeting with their Israeli counterparts insist on meeting in Tel Aviv, for to meet in Jerusalem would represent an acknowledgement of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel.

Jerusalem, the ancient Hebrew capital city, is deemed by the international community to be 'occupied territory', in acquiescence to Arab sensibilities. Taken from Jordanian rule during the 1967 war of defence when Israel was once again attacked by her Arab neighbours. East Jerusalem was ruled off-limits to Jews under Jordanian rule. And Jews were unable to approach their most holy site in Judaism. Under Israeli rule, Muslim holy sites are protected, as are Christian sites.

Minister Baird insisted that it is "irrelevant" where he chooses to conduct a discussion of Middle East peace. "I'm just not interested in getting into the semantic argument about whether you have a meeting with one person on one side of the street (and) it's OK, and you have a meeting on the other side of the street, and it's not", he explained.

"We're focused on trying to have an impact on the difficult and serious challenges, that being security for Israelis, an end to the conflict, and the legitimate aspirations for a state from those in the Palestinian side." Logical and explicable. A previous Conservative-led government under then-Prime Minister Joe Clark had declared it was prepared to recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital. That went nowhere. And that was then.

Mr. Baird met as well with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, with Prime Minister Salam Fayyad and his own PA counterpart to discuss security and development, meetings he declared to have been "very productive", though the Canadian position remains far from that of the Palestinians. "We certainly don't agree on every issue. We have some profound differences of opinion on the way forward, but not on the need to go forward."

His businesslike attitude is not reflected by the Palestinian Authority, fuming over what they consider to be an insult. "The visit is a slap in the face to the Palestinian people" wrote former PA foreign minister Nabil Shaath in a commentary. As a Fatah Central Committee member in charge of international relations, Shaath characterized Mr. Baird's visit as an "unprecedented recognition of the illegal Israeli annexation of Palestinians' occupied capital."

The "unprecedented offense", he warned, would result in "severe" damage to Canada's relations with the PA, the Arab world and those who have committed to a two-state solution. Although nowhere is it written in law that east Jerusalem represents the Palestinian capital; it is what they aspire to achieve, nothing more.

The response to that from Mr. Baird's foreign ministry spokesman Rick Roth was that Mr. Baird "wanted to get Livni's view on the Middle East peace process, given her new responsibilities and important role in the new cabinet."

"This doesn't change our longstanding position that all final status issues must be negotiated between the two parties. As guests, we were pleased to meet our hosts where it was most convenient for them."

Decidedly so.