Only a politician could be so far removed from the reality the rest of us live in to suggest, as Israeli justice minister Haim Ramon did, that the world supports his governments actions in Lebanon. It does raise questions about the language of diplomacy though.
My initial reaction on hearing his statement in the news was one of incredulity. How could anyone possibly believe that the failure of the Rome summit implied any sort of ‘green light’ to Israel? Failure to condemn something does not imply approval.
As I thought about though, I was struck by two things. The first is that one thing which stands out from teaching political history is the remarkable ability of political leaders to be completely divorced from reality, to see only what they want to see and disregard anything which contradicts their frame of reference.
The other is that the Rome Summit wasn’t just a happenstance meeting of foreign ministers, it was convened specifically to discuss the fighting in Lebanon. In the world of diplomacy, what you do not say is as important as what you do say. If you hold a major summit, and you apparently cannot agree on a communique which addresses even the basics, you do leave the door open to a wide range of interpretations. In the case of most high level summits, the communique is usually written by the civil servants before the meeting, with only a few details to be worked out by the principals at the summit. In the case of Lebanon, the world has the deal with a real crisis, with little or no time to prepare agreement on common ground, if there is in fact common ground between the participants.
Haim Ramon may live in a world which seems to operate on lines far removed you or me, but his outburst reminds me how important it is to understand how the culture of International poltics operates, and the try and educate people so that they can keep a grip on reality while dealing with real crises.
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