Tony Blair on a visit to Israel’s wall in Qalqiliya in the occupied West Bank, August 2009. (Khaleel Reash/MaanImages)
Jim Holstun, The Electronic Intifada, 14 October 2009
On 7 October 2009, Tony Blair gave a lecture at a New York university. In responding to an unexpectedly direct student question, he publicly joined, for the first time, the US and Israeli Zionist consensus rejecting the Goldstone report.
On 27 June 2007, Blair left his job as UK prime minister under the cloud of the war on Iraq that he had concocted with former US President George W. Bush. Just hours later, he assumed his new position as the Special Envoy to the Mideast Quartet (EU, Russia, UN, US). He had long been a Zionist and a member of Labor Friends of Israel, and he received heartfelt farewells-and-hellos from Ehud Olmert (“A true friend of the State of Israel”) and Tzipi Livni (“a very-well appreciated figure in Israel”). Palestinians living under Israeli occupation did not find this a very a promising development.
Though Blair spends only a week a month in the Middle East, he has managed to keep busy. He maintains a grueling, globe-trotting schedule of lectures, for which he receives up to $500,000. On top of this, he has been at work on his memoirs, for which he received a $7.3 million advance. Consulting work brought him $3.2 million (including a bonus) from J. P. Morgan Chase and $800,000 from Zurich Financial Services. By October 2008, he had amassed at least $19 million, far outdistancing even the enterprising Bill Clinton. He is thought to be the highest paid public speaker in the world.
Blair’s schedule has caused some concern in the Middle East. His office insists that his “current role in the Middle East takes up the largest proportion of his time,” but in late 2008, a Western diplomat in Jerusalem wondered if “his overstretchedness has produced a tactical blunder,” while a UN official in Jerusalem said, “There is a general sense that he is not around” (“Lectures see Tony Blair earnings jump over #12,” The Times, 29 October 2008). In September 2008, a coalition of Mideast aid groups accused the Quartet of “losing its grip,” adding that its “failings could have serious ramifications for implementing international law around the globe” (“Aid groups: Tony Blair faces imminent failure in Middle East,” The Times, 25 September 2008).
On 27 December 2008, Israel launched the Gaza massacre, which it dubbed “Operation Cast Lead.” Eight days later, when asked about Blair’s reaction, UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown explained, “Tony’s on holiday at the moment.” While Blair found time to attend a private opening of the new Armani store in Knightsbridge, he found none to call for a ceasefire in Gaza, thus recalling his silence during the 2006 Israeli war on Lebanon (“As Gaza is torn apart by war, where is Middle East peace envoy Tony Blair? He’s been on holiday,” Daily Mail, 5 January 2009). In early January, Blair flew to Israel, but he did not condemn the Israeli assault. In February 2009, while Palestinians in Gaza were still digging themselves out and mourning their dead, he accepted a $1 million prize from Tel Aviv University as the “Laureate for the Present Time Dimension in the field of Leadership” (Press release, 2009 Dan David Prize, 17 February 2009).
On 1 March 2009, he finally made it to Gaza. He conceded “a huge amount of damage” and the deaths of “large numbers of civilians,” but rejected as “not very sensible” any discussion of disproportionality in Israel’s attacks (“Blair shocked at devastation on first Gaza visit as envoy,” The Scotsman, 2 March 2009). Blair did not meet with Hamas leaders, and his visit to Gaza lasted only a few hours, for he had to make a pilgrimage to Sderot, the Gilad Shalit of western Negev settlements (“Middle East envoy Tony Blair in Gaza for first time,” The Independent, 1 March 2009). In June, he visited Gaza a second time and, as proof of his deep humanitarian instincts, went so far as to say that the Palestinians were in a “tough situation” (“Former British PM Blair Visits Gaza Strip,” Voice of America News, 15 June 2009).
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