Artikkel i Haaretz om Bidens kommende reise til Midt-Østen, Saudi Arabia og Israel.
"The True Price of Biden’s Mideast Refueling Campaign"
(Hele artikkelen under Kilde.)
Det påpekes at Biden lar være å stå opp for journalistene Abu Akleh og Jamal Khashoggi.
Prisen på olje overstyrer prinsipper og etikk.
Skudeneshavn 10. juli 2022
Jan Marton Jensen
Kilde:
HELE artikkelen i Haaretz 9. juli 2022:
U.S. President Joe Biden’s visits to Saudi Arabia and Israel this week
will be overshadowed by the absence of two journalists unable to cover
the events: Jamal Khashoggi and Shireen Abu Akleh. The two were killed
under completely different circumstances, but ahead of the presidential
visit, they have become, jointly, a symbol of the lack of international
consequences for attacking the press and journalists.
“At a time when attacks on press freedom are at an all-time high, your
visit will… send a message to autocrats all over the world that they can
imprison, torture or even murder journalists with no repercussions,”
Hatic Cengiz, Khashoggi’s fiancee, wrote to Biden in an open letter in
the Washington Post. Abu Akleh’s family also sent a letter to Biden, in
which they asked to meet with him during his visit. The family, the
letter said, feels “a sense of betrayal concerning your administration’s
abject response to the extrajudicial killing of our sister and aunt by
Israeli forces.”
In the Saudi case, most Israelis can understand why Khashoggi became a
symbol (ignoring the claims of involvement by the Israeli company NSO in
the murder). Most Israelis would be infuriated at any attempt to equate
his case with that of Abu Akleh.
But although the cases are completely different, there is one fact that
is hard to argue with: Despite the extensive findings, of the Americans
as well, by which it is “most likely” that the military was indeed
responsible for shooting Abu Akleh, Israel so far has not accepted any
real responsibility. No one has been interrogated, no one has been
punished and no clear lessons have been drawn for the future. In this
sense, Israel has single-handedly turned Abu Akleh into a symbol by its
continued insistence on abdicating responsibility for the affair.
There is hardly a report in the American coverage of Biden’s trip to
Saudi Arabia that does not mention his election promise to make the
kingdom a “pariah” following the Khashoggi’s murder.
Articles are also proliferating that connect Abu Akleh’s killing to a
test of protection of freedom of the press, which Biden will face on his
trip. These reports insist on noting that the context of the American
change of policy toward Saudi Arabia is the fuel crisis in the United
States. Put another way, there is clear tension between the
democratic-liberal values in the name of which Biden ran for president,
and on which the United States’ self-image is largely based, and
national, as well as personal interests, that now oblige him to solve
the energy crisis.
Israel’s part in these analyses on the tension between values and
foreign relations is absent in ways far beyond the Abu Akleh affair. For
example, the United States is marketing Biden’s trip as if it is
intended to promote normalization between Israel and Saudi Arabia.
Advancing peace in the Middle East
sounds like a better, more liberal democratic reason to traffic in
principles like freedom of the press. But is this really the reason for
the visit? There is no doubt that gas prices trouble the United States
much more than Israeli-Saudi relations. Secondly, all parties
acknowledge that there will be no festive peace agreement but rather
public revelation of high-tech security cooperation, which already
exists behind the scenes.
And although they make fewer headlines – partly because of censorship
restrictions – these high-tech security agreements, such as the alleged
Saudi purchase of Israeli capabilities like Pegasus – have a critical
role in the breach of liberal values. And so it is not exactly a warm
peace in exchange for diverting attention from attacks on the press. And
just a reminder, this whole show is just to fight Russia in the name of
these values. It would have been far better for them to admit that this
is the true price of gasoline.
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