|
Trending Topics
|
How Britain Stepped Back from the Brink with Israel
(The Times-UK) Matthew Gould - Thursday was the deadline set by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Foreign Minister Gideon Saar for the closure of the British consulate in Jerusalem and the departure of 27 diplomats in retaliation for British Foreign Minister Ed Miliband's announcement of sanctions against Israeli communities in Judea and Samaria. Reuters reported that Britain had threatened to expel a proportionate number of Israeli diplomats from the embassy in London. Yet escalating would have done grievous harm to a vital bilateral national security partnership. If we did not match Israel's expulsions we would look weak. If we did match them we risked spiraling escalation. Saar had made clear that every hostile step would be met by a proportionate response. But Thursday arrived with a surprise compromise in which both sides saved just enough face to step away from the brink. The agreement was that seven British diplomats would stay on in the consulate. But it would no longer be called a consulate, instead becoming the UK mission, Jerusalem. Israel got to remove the signs; Britain got to keep the flag flying above a building that had been in Jerusalem since 1838. Neither side had to cross their public red lines. But the UK only had a crisis to diffuse because we created it. Tom Tugendhat, the shadow foreign secretary, said to me: "We should never have got into this mess in the first place. Ed Miliband's performative politics, playing to his base, have put a critical national security partnership at risk." The writer was the British ambassador to Israel, 2010-15.