[Note: After a month-long meeting in New York, on 28 May 2010 the 189 signatories of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) unanimously issued a 28-page final declaration. Inter alia, it called on Israel to the sign the NPT and pledged to work towards a nuclear-weapons-free zone in the Middle East. The declaration also called for a conference in 2012 to be attended by all the Middle Eastern states to establish such a zone. Editor, MEI Media Watch.]
Haaretz
Tel Aviv, Editorial, 31 May 2010, Monday
The way out of isolation
Israel suffered a searing diplomatic defeat at the five-year review conference of the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty that ended last weekend. The treaty's 189 member states, including the United States, urged Israel to sign the NPT, which would mean ending its policy of ambiguity and dismantling its alleged nuclear capability. The conference also decided to promote the establishment of a nuclear-weapons-free zone in the Middle East, and to convene a regional conference on this issue in 2012.
The U.S. administration tried to mitigate the damage to Israel, and President Barack Obama restated his commitment to its security. This issue will be discussed tomorrow at his White House meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Israel will not hasten to alter its nuclear policy, and one should not expect foreign inspectors to visit the Dimona nuclear reactor anytime in the foreseeable future.
But the lameness of the review conference's decision in practice, and even the consoling messages from Washington, do nothing to obscure the main problem: Israel has once again found itself isolated against the entire international community. The prime minister's response - to declare that Israel will not help implement the decision - only painted it as rejectionist in the face of a global consensus. Even if Israel has no formal obligation to honour the decisions of a group to which it does not belong, its diplomatic isolation is only worsened by saying no to international decisions.
We must not ignore Obama's message: While expressing reservations about isolating Israel, the White House also made clear that it is adhering to long-standing American policy on the peace process. Or in less diplomatic language, Israel's stubbornness on the Palestinian issue is liable to carry a price in other areas of strategic importance. Those who want to control the territories for all eternity and expand the settlements are liable to undermine Dimona. Indeed, Israel itself is the one that created the link between nuclear capability and peace when it declared years ago that nuclear disarmament in the Middle East would be possible only once a comprehensive peace had been achieved.
At his meeting with Obama tomorrow, Netanyahu will have an opportunity to repair Israel's relationship with its most important, and indeed only, ally. He must not waste it in yet another attempt to buy time and stymie the justified demand for an end to the occupation. For Israel to break out of its growing international isolation, Netanyahu must say yes, without reservations, to the peace process that Obama seeks to advance.
Source: http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/opinion/the-way-out-of-isolation-1.293132
The Jerusalem Post
Editorial, 31 May 2010, Monday
Obama’s NPT deviation
Countries with deep-rooted democratic traditions should make the necessary moral distinction between Iran and Israel.
Washington decided on Friday to join 188 other nations in singling out Israel’s purported nuclear capability for special censure.
At the end of a month-long review conference of the four-decade-old Non-Proliferation Treaty, which takes place every five years, the signatories to the treaty agreed to put pressure on Israel. A conference would be convened in 2012 to discuss ridding the Middle East of weapons of mass destruction. The planned conference would essentially be about Israel, since it is the only country in the region that is said to have nuclear capabilities. Treaty members announced an “action plan” stressing the “importance” of forcing Israel to abandon its policy of ambiguity regarding its nuclear capabilities and to sign the non-proliferation treaty.
Meanwhile, Iran, a signatory of the treaty that has repeatedly and brazenly flouted attempts by the international community to monitor its nuclear enrichment activities, was not even mentioned.
After the vote, several senior US officials attempted to play down its impact on Israel – some more than others. President Barack Obama, while welcoming the new 28-page non-proliferation final document as “balanced,” said that making the Middle East free of nuclear weapons depended on a “comprehensive and durable peace in the region.”
More outspoken was National Security Adviser Gen. James Jones, who said the US has “serious reservations” about the proposed 2012 conference and called Iran’s conspicuous absence from the document “deplorable,” since the country “poses the greatest threat of nuclear proliferation in the region and to the integrity of the NPT.”
Essentially, Jones was rightfully lamenting his own country’s acquiescence to the hijacking of the conference by enemies of Israel – and of America – and the shifting of focus from the radical Shiite Iran to democratic Israel, which has a proven track record of responsible behaviour with its supposed nuclear capabilities even in wartime.
The vast majority supporting the discriminatory resolutions against Israel was no surprise. Like in the UN system, the makeup of the NPT review conference lends wholly disproportionate weight to the dozens of developing, quasi-democratic nations of Africa, Asia and South and Central America – including almost 50 Muslim states – that make up the 118-strong Non-Aligned Movement, led on the nuclear-free Middle East issue by Egypt.
More baffling was the support lent to the initiatives against Israel by the US and other Western countries with deep-rooted democratic traditions that should have made the necessary moral distinction between Iran and Israel.
The Obama administration’s stance marks a worrying deviation from the Bush and the Clinton administrations’ policy of vetoing similar motions. And this change in policy comes at a critical time, not so much because it complicates Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s visit to Washington this week, but because it further weakens the case against Iran’s nuclear pretensions as Teheran comes closer than ever to obtaining the bomb. By allowing Israel to be singled out for special, extraordinary condemnation, the US is achieving a consensus on NPT policy, but it is undermining in the process the very purpose of this policy, which is to prevent the abuse of nuclear weapons, especially by radical Islamic elements, such as those with ties to Iran.
Focusing on Israel distorts reality. It equates Israel, a country surrounded by enemies that is desperately in need of the deterrence offered by the possibility that it might have nuclear capability, with Iran, a country led by religious extremists and a president despot who consistently threatens to “wipe Israel off the map,” denies the Holocaust and views America as a Satan-like entity that spreads immorality.
What’s more, America’s resolve to stop Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s nuclear aspirations cannot be taken seriously if Washington is willing to lend a vote to a resolution on nuclear proliferation that does not even mention Iran, and to do so after an entire month of discussions.
National Security Adviser Jones was right about his diagnosis that Iran “poses the greatest threat of nuclear proliferation in the region.” And it truly is “deplorable” that the US went along with the 188 nations that have lost their moral bearings and failed to single out Iran for condemnation. Too bad the US did not put its vote where Jones’s mouth is.
Source: http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Editorials/Article.aspx?id=176914
Arab News
Jeddah, Editorial, 29 May 2010, Saturday
Nuke-free Mideast
Russia and China should now demand US pressure Israel into signing the NPT
The call by the United Nations for a Mideast free of nuclear weapons offers yet again a new opportunity to bring Israel into the non-proliferation treaty process while also stopping Iran or any other regional power from acquiring a nuclear arsenal.
The Israelis of course have denounced the decision by some 200 member signatories of the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT), saying it is discriminatory because it singles them out. Such an absurd protest ignores the reality that at present Israel is the only Mideast state possessing this fearsome weapons. The Netanyahu government instead yesterday trotted out its standard complaint that Iran was the real danger and the UN should concentrate on ensuring that its nuclear weapons program is halted.
That indeed is what the UN is seeking to do. At Washington’s prompting, it is ratcheting up the demand for further sanctions to be imposed upon Tehran. Given that the existing sanctions are already hurting Iran — oil production is down by around 400,000 barrels a day due to the lack of replacement of oil field equipment and because local refining capacity has become so decrepit the country is having to import refined petroleum products — an increased tightening seems bound to add to the problems of the administration of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
The Obama White House has worked hard to bring both the Russians and the Chinese into agreement for further pressure on Iran. Now is the moment for Moscow and Beijing to use the leverage they have thus acquired to demand Washington pressure Israel in its turn into signing and complying with the terms of the NPT. What is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.
Obama has given some substance to his declared wish to halt and then reduce the presence of atomic weaponry. He has cut the new bilateral warhead reduction deal with the Russians and for the first time, set out the circumstances in which Washington might resort to a nuclear strike. It is therefore not surprising he immediately welcomed the UN call yesterday which envisages a 2012 conference of all Middle East states to establish a nuclear-free zone here.
That he also went on to regret the UN had singled out Israel need perhaps not be taken too seriously. He knows Israel’s nuclear warheads are a key factor which must have prompted Iran’s actions in recent years. Between now and the 2012 conference, he has to convince the Israelis to disarm. Success could produce a very different Israel that would commit to talking, not least on Palestine, rather than endless confrontation and heartless oppression in the occupied territories.
For many reasons it is a big risk. Yet Israelis have to understand that possessing nuclear weapons actually undermines their security because if it has not done so already, at some point it will prompt one or more countries in the region to match its arsenal, if only for deterrent purposes. Ultimately, if Israel ignores the calls to cooperate, then it too should face international sanctions that it has backed so enthusiastically against the Iranians.
Source: http://arabnews.com/opinion/editorial/article59052.ece
Khalej Times
Dubai, Editorial, 30 May 2010, Sunday
Ridding the Middle East of Nukes
The month-long Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference, held at the UN in New York, has concluded.
The significant development is that NPT member states have agreed to hold a conference in 2012 for making the Middle East a nuclear weapons free zone. What is more interesting is that there is unanimity on Israel signing the NPT. It is something the US has expressed its apprehensions about. President Barack Obama, for one, thinks it might jeopardise efforts to include Israel in the 2012 talks. However, this is indeed an important moment and will become more so if the NPT-signatories and the Non-Aligned member states are sincere in achieving this goal.
The Middle East hosts not only a nuclear-armed Israel, but its major rival Iran, allegedly pursuing its own covert militarised nuclear programme. While 2012 is still two years away—a long time for the rapidly shifting dynamics at play in the Middle East—it does impose a time frame. Moreover, it affirms the overwhelming support within the region and outside of clearing the region of nuclear weapons and those of mass destruction. Ironically, Iran an NPT signatory has reiterated that it will stand by its obligations as per the NPT regime—a strange contradiction when viewed against its recent activities and continued uranium enrichment prohibited by the Security Council and against International Atomic Energy Agency strictures.
Other important aims on the agenda of the five-yearly review were the US-led call for stricter security regime of NPT signatories including random and surprise inspections. It also called for penalties against those that had violated terms or exited the Treaty, for one reason or other, such as North Korea in 2003. At the same time Non-aligned member states were hoping to conceive a plan of action for complete nuclear disarmament, but that did not happen. Iran, for one, called on the five recognised nuclear powers to set a specific time-table to eliminate their arsenals.
The US seems to have hoped for more in view of what it feels it has done to prove its commitment towards disarmament in the past year. Both US and Russia, the world’s largest nuclear powers had formulated a new strategic reduction treaty and announced significant cuts in their respective nuclear arsenals. Still, they possess arsenals large enough to destroy the world, ten times over. However, that should not be used as an argument against disarmament efforts. Rather, they should be hastened. It may be worthwhile for the US and allies of Israel to think how flat and illogical their arguments appear in the case of Iran. Hypocrisy and double standards are the usual charges when pressuring Iran on the nuclear front. Ridding the Middle East of nuclear weapons, in fact, offers a great opportunity to meanwhile work on achieving regional peace, so Israel can willingly abolish its own. It may also check any untoward ambitions of Iran on that front.
The good news is that there is general consensus and commitment on achieving this. Now what remains to be seen is how far all states concerned states work together.
Source:
http://www.khaleejtimes.com/displayarticle.asp?xfile=data/editorial/2010/May/editorial_May56.xml§ion=editorial&col=
Gulf News
Dubai, Editorial, 30 May 2010, Sunday
Israel's defiance shows it is the real rogue state
Let the West be as stern with Tel Aviv as it has been towards Iran's nuclear agenda.
Israel has again shown its true colours, defying once more the will of the international community.
The United Nations announced that it will host, in 2012, a conference on establishing a nuclear-free Middle East — an Arab-led initiative backed by top Israeli ally, the US, and the 188 other signatories to the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty.
Israel, the region's only nuclear power, rejected the UN call, describing it as "deeply flawed and hypocritical". It is not clear why the Israelis think the conference is "hypocritical". But it shows how Israel feels about international norms.
They have been campaigning right and left to put pressure on Iran and slap the Islamic republic with new and crippling sanctions over Tehran's nuclear programme. Iran is believed to be years away from being able to produce nuclear weapons.
One would think the conference will be welcomed by Israel as it will pressure Iran into coming clean about its programme. But obviously Israel itself cannot come clean about its own arsenal.
The initiative to free the Middle East of nuclear weapons has been a long-time demand of the Arab states, which believe there is no chance for a sustainable, just and lasting peace in the Middle East without an end to the militarisation of the region.
For once, the world has agreed. Now, the ball is in the court of the international community to act on Israel's defiance. Western powers have been very tough on Iran, with recent agreement to place more sanctions. The West should be expected to show Israel the same determination.
History tells us that Israel will again defy the UN call. And it also tells us that the world will do nothing about it. However, this time, Israel has shown the world, including its allies, that it is the real rogue state.
Source: http://gulfnews.com/opinions/editorials/israel-s-defiance-shows-it-is-the-real-rogue-state-1.634590
Lipika Kamra is a research student at the School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi
As part of its editorial policy, the MEI@ND standardizes spelling and date formats to make the text uniformly accessible and stylistically consistent.
The views expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views/positions of the MEI@ND.
Editor, MEI Editorials Watch: P R Kumaraswamy
