Sir, – Ruadhán MacCormaic (World View, February 10th) is surely correct when he asserts that "there is no Israeli-Palestinian peace process". I would go further: there never has been such a process. Rather, there has been a pacification process in which ways and means were sought by Israel's sponsors (the US and EU) to further its colonial aims with, ideally, a minimum of Palestinian bloodshed.
Senator George Mitchell’s resignation in 2011 as US special envoy for Middle East peace sealed the fate and exposed the hollowness of this process. The principles successfully applied by Senator Mitchell as special envoy for Northern Ireland – in particular, the willingness to speak to all parties and the moratorium on preconditions – were deemed inapplicable to the Middle East, precisely because the aims of the incomparably more powerful side were to be furthered at all costs.
However, your columnist omits two relevant factors. First, the EU’s lucrative arms trade with Israel disqualifies it from consideration as a peace broker, quite apart from its internal divisions.
Second, global civil society is not prepared to wait for a hypothethical “post-Trump era” to isolate the Israeli state by a growing campaign of boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS).
The only way that governments can stop this is by taking their responsibilities seriously and ending their complicity – both active and passive – with Israel’s interminable and brutal occupation. – Yours, etc,
RAYMOND DEANE,
Dublin 1.