More than 800 officials in the United States, the United Kingdom and the European Union released a public letter on Friday opposing their governments’ support of Israel in the Gaza war.
The letter marks the first time that officials from allied nations across the Atlantic have come together to openly criticize their governments over the war, say current and former officials who are organizing or supporting the effort.
The officials say it is their duty as civil servants to help improve policies and work in the interests of their nations, and that they are speaking out because they believe their governments need to change direction in the war. The signatories say they raised concerns through internal channels but these were ignored.
“Our governments’ current policies weaken their moral standing and undermine their ability to advocate for freedom, justice and human rights around the world,” the letter said, according to a copy obtained by The New York Times on Thursday. It continues: “There is a plausible risk that the policies of our governments contribute to serious violations of international humanitarian law, war crimes and even ethnic cleansing or genocide.”
The Israeli military launched a bombing and ground campaign in Gaza after Hamas militants invaded Israel on October 7, killing about 1,200 people while kidnapping about 240, Israeli officials said. According to the Gaza Health Ministry and United Nations officials, more than 27,000 people have been killed and nearly 2 million displaced in Gaza since Israel’s offensive began.
The document does not include the names of the signatories because they fear reprisals, said one organizer, an official who has worked at the State Department for more than two decades. But about 800 current officials agreed to the letter because it had been quietly circulated among national-level employees in several countries, the official said.
The effort shows the extent to which the pro-Israel policies of American, British and European leaders have fueled resentment among officials, including many who implement their governments’ foreign policies.
About 80 of the signatories were from American agencies, with the largest group from the State Department, an organizer said. The European Union institutions are the most represented among the signatories, followed by the Netherlands and the United States.
National-level officials from eight other North Atlantic Treaty Organization member states, as well as Sweden and Switzerland, have agreed to the letter, another person familiar with the letter said. Most of these supporters work in the foreign ministries of these countries.
“Political decision-making by Western governments and institutions” about the war “has created unprecedented tensions with the expertise and duty that non-political officials bring,” said Josh Paul, who worked in the State Department’s office that oversees arms transfers in October over the Biden administration’s support for Israel’s military campaign resigned. Mr. Paul said he knew the organizers of the letter.
“One-sided support for Israeli atrocities in Gaza and a blindness to Palestinian humanity is both a moral failure and, despite the damage it inflicts on Western interests around the world, a political failure,” he said.
U.S. officials released several similar letters and dissenting messages last fall. In November, more than 500 employees from around 40 US government agencies sent a letter to President Biden criticizing his war policies. The officials also did not mention their names in this letter.
More than 1,000 employees of the U.S. Agency for International Development published an open letter along the same lines. And dozens of State Department officials have sent at least three internal dissent cables to Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken.
Across the Atlantic, there have also been disagreements among European officials in the months since Israel’s military response in Gaza following the Oct. 7 attack.
In the European Union, which maintains a joint diplomatic corps known as the European External Action Service as well as agencies dealing with humanitarian aid and development, hundreds of officials have signed at least two separate letters of dissent to the bloc’s leadership. Unlike the United States, the EU does not maintain “dissent channels” through which officials can formally express their disagreements with policy.
The 27 EU countries and their shared institutions have taken different positions on the war, but the majority of governments are largely pro-Israel.
Only a handful of EU states – notably Ireland, Spain and Belgium – have done so They repeatedly called on their partners and the EU to moderate support for Israel, push for a ceasefire and focus on the suffering of the people of Gaza.
Berber van der Woude, a former Dutch diplomat, said she wanted to speak on behalf of the active officials who signed the letter anonymously because they feared retaliation for dissent.
Ms. van der Woude, a conflict and peacekeeping expert who served in the Dutch Foreign Ministry, including in its mission in Ramallah in the West Bank, resigned in 2022 in protest against her government’s policies. Since then she has been a prominent pro-Palestinian voice in the Netherlands.
Ms. van der Woude said that disagreements in situations like the Israel-Hamas conflict, even among officials who tend to work behind the scenes and take policy direction from elected governments, were justified if the actions taken were deemed harmful would be viewed.
“Being a public servant does not absolve one of the responsibility to think ahead,” she said. “When the system produces perverse decisions or actions, we have a responsibility to stop it. It’s not as simple as “shut up and do as you’re told”; We also get paid to think.”
Source link
2024-02-02 11:35:09
www.nytimes.com