Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2009-02-18-Speech-3-040"
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"en.20090218.14.3-040"2
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"Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, it is certainly not Europe, still less its High Representative for Foreign Policy, Javier Solana, the former Secretary-General of NATO, who can play the role of mediator between Israel and Palestine. At the most, they will be called on to finance the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip, as they are doing today for Kosovo, Lebanon and Afghanistan.
The US and Israel do the bombing while Europe finances reconstruction. That is how tasks are allocated amongst the allies. It should, however, be up to those who do the damage to pay. Egypt is at the centre of the peace talks that are discussing an extended ceasefire with Hamas. However, the challenge is formidable as the new Israeli Government, under pressure from the third man, Mr Liebermann, the far-right leader who is democratically accepted over there, risks seeing its task singularly complicated in this negotiation. In fact, Mr Netanyahu, who is presented as the future prime minister, has always been opposed to a truce with Hamas.
A further difficulty is that the Palestinian Authority of Mahmoud Abbas has become, in the West Bank, a sort of international protectorate whose legitimacy has greatly diminished amongst the population.
The final factor we have to take into account is that the expansion of the Israeli colonies, which has not stopped since 1967, makes the creation of a Palestinian State on the West Bank particularly tricky. Today, the ball is in the Israeli court, but will the hawks in each camp accept this truce of God that the two sides demand without providing themselves with the resources?
Allow me to add a thought on France’s return to NATO’s integrated military structure, which will be debated within the framework of the Vatanen report. This return will result in France taking on heavy obligations. In fact, we are rejoining NATO even though the Cold War has been over since 1990. Mr Sarkozy seems to have forgotten the fall of the Berlin Wall and Russia’s return to the ranks of free nations. Is there a need to reinforce the bloc line of thinking at a time when we see multipolarity and the rising power of emerging countries, including on the military level?
Moreover, France’s membership of the integrated structure will oblige it to reinforce its contingent in Afghanistan, even though it already has 3 300 men on the ground. Which funds will it use to finance this operation when its defence budget is about to fall below 2% of GDP and over 30 regiments are to be cut?
Paradoxically, we are going to increase our financial participation to rejoin NATO and, at the same time, reduce our military presence in Africa. European defence, so beloved of President Sarkozy, will therefore be a pillar of the Atlantic Alliance. You only have to read the Treaty of Lisbon and its additional protocols to convince yourselves of this.
Whether it be in terms of foreign policy or common security, the European road is a dead end that can only lead to an alignment with the US and its allies. It is this logic of retraction that we reject in the name of national sovereignty and independence, which rest in particular on our independent nuclear deterrent."@en1
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