More wisdom from our NGOs

 

Rudolf Ragonesi is a well-known figure in Malta's environmental NGO circles. A non-practising lawyer, he founded the GAIA Foundation and is active in Friends of the Earth. Although I do not know him personally, I have nothing but respect for his work in the environemntal field.

Unfortunately, however, Dr. Ragonesi shares with many of his colleagues in the local NGO movement a tendency to accept group dogma and to think with the heart rather than with the mind. An article he wrote in today's Times is a typical example of this suspension of the intellect. Ragonesi insists for example on repeating the usual far-left claim that Israel is an apartheid state because it does not grant the right to Palestinians (in the West Bank and Gaza) to vote in Israeli elections. Now, as everyone knows, the West Bank and Gaza are not part of Israel at all and they do have the right to vote for their own parliament and president. The whole point of the peace process is that the West Bank and Gaza should become a sovereign (Palestinian) state not that they should be given the right to elect representatives in the parliament of another country. As for Israeli Arabs, who now constitute around 20% of the Israeli population, they of course do have the right to vote in Israel.

In an ironic twist, Dr. Ragonesi then suggests that Israel should withdraw to its internationally-recognized borders and defend itself from there, 'with its vast arsenal'. Well, if I'm not living on a different planet from that of Dr. Ragonesi, that is exactly what Israel has done with regard to Lebanon. Its complete withdrawal from Lebanese territory was certified by the UN in 2000.

The only thing Dr. Ragonesi is undoubtedly right about is that Ehud Gol probably won few new friends for his country in Malta (or in Italy, for that matter). I have never really understood why a rather undiplomatic diplomat like Ehud Gol was chosen as Israel's spokesman in Italy, a country where Israel is already rather short of friends.