The Independent
"After spending three days in Gaza, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, 76, launched a fierce attack on the international community for its "silence and complicity" over the long Israeli blockade of that area. "The entire situation is abominable," he thundered.
Tutu's comments came in the wake of a similar speech by 83-year-old former US president Jimmy Carter, appearing this week at the Hay-on-Wye literary festival. Carter has also been to Gaza and spoken to the Hamas leadership. He famously compared the situation there to that of apartheid in South Africa, remarks that earned him predictable accusations of anti-Semitism from the Israel lobby in America.
These two distinguished oldies deserve credit not just for their outspokenness but for actually visiting Gaza to see the situation there for themselves. But they might also help to raise the question of Tony Blair's failure to make the same journey.......
Whatever the explanation, Blair's reluctance to make any meaningful intervention renders his presence in Jerusalem completely pointless. The idea that with his record as Bush's poodle he might be able to bring peace to the Middle East was, in any case, always farfetched. But it must be even more so if he can't even be bothered to go into Gaza. Better for him now to devote his efforts to bringing reconciliation to the world's great religions. Another crusade for which he is quite ill-fitted but one less likely to prolong hardship."
"After spending three days in Gaza, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, 76, launched a fierce attack on the international community for its "silence and complicity" over the long Israeli blockade of that area. "The entire situation is abominable," he thundered.
Tutu's comments came in the wake of a similar speech by 83-year-old former US president Jimmy Carter, appearing this week at the Hay-on-Wye literary festival. Carter has also been to Gaza and spoken to the Hamas leadership. He famously compared the situation there to that of apartheid in South Africa, remarks that earned him predictable accusations of anti-Semitism from the Israel lobby in America.
These two distinguished oldies deserve credit not just for their outspokenness but for actually visiting Gaza to see the situation there for themselves. But they might also help to raise the question of Tony Blair's failure to make the same journey.......
Whatever the explanation, Blair's reluctance to make any meaningful intervention renders his presence in Jerusalem completely pointless. The idea that with his record as Bush's poodle he might be able to bring peace to the Middle East was, in any case, always farfetched. But it must be even more so if he can't even be bothered to go into Gaza. Better for him now to devote his efforts to bringing reconciliation to the world's great religions. Another crusade for which he is quite ill-fitted but one less likely to prolong hardship."
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