Parisians protest ’Ben Gurion Promenade’
Friday, April 16, 2010
original article in The Jerusalem Post
The Jerusalem Post
By Greer Fay Cashman
For President Shimon Peres, one of the crowning achievements in a six decades plus career as a politician and statesman was the inauguration on Thursday of the Ben Gurion Promenade in Paris.
However, the dedication ceremony was not without incident. For several months prior to the event there had been attempts by Communists and pro-Palestinian elements to prevent the naming of the promenade after Ben Gurion. Moreover there was frustration on the part of the same elements because Delanoe would not agree to name a square or promenade after PLO leader Yasser Arafat.
Anti-Israel demonstrators lined the banks of the Seine and some even boarded a pleasure boat from which they displayed banners and posters with anti-Israel slogans. Some of the demonstrators called Ben Gurion a criminal, shouted that he had been responsible for expelling Palestinians from their homeland in 1948 and charged the Netanyahu government with continuing a policy of seizing Palestinian property and indulging in needless killing of Palestinians.
Despite the fact that Peres is widely recognized throughout the world as a peacemaker, and notwithstanding the fact he and Yitzhak Rabin received the Nobel Peace Prize together with Yasser Arafat, his peacemaking efforts were not recognized by the demonstrators who claimed that he was no less a criminal than Ben Gurion.
During Ben Gurion’s second term as prime minister, Peres began to weave the very special relationship that Israel has with France, and although that relationship has gone through highs and lows over the years, Peres has remained an ardent Francophile, and France, regardless of its attitude to Israel, has almost always been happy to lay out the red carpet for Peres.
On that basis it could be said that no one was more suited than Peres to represent Israel in a ceremony to launch a Parisian promenade named for Ben Gurion on a date so close to Israel Independence Day.
Located in the Seventh Arrondisement alongside the River Seine and close to the Eiffel Tower, the promenade, according to Peres, is a tribute not only to Ben Gurion, but does honor to the State of Israel.
On a personal level it is even more than that for Peres because of the extraordinary close ties that he had with Ben Gurion who was not only his mentor but his political patron.
Peres attended the gala ceremony together with Bertrand Delanoe, the mayor of Paris, who said that he was overjoyed that a true friend of France who had worked alongside Ben Gurion, was honoring Paris with his presence on such an auspicious occasion. He was proud, he added, to be able to name a promenade within the context of the history and legacy of France-Israel relations.
Lauding Ben Gurion’s vision, Delanoe said that Ben Gurion had not only created a state but was a man who had been in constant pursuit of peace under the motto that it was preferable to have a small state living in peace than a large state always caught up in war.
Delanoe also referred to those who had opposed the naming of a promenade for Ben Gurion and said that not only would he not apologize for going ahead with the plan, but that he regarded it as an honor and a privilege to inaugurate the promenade. He was also proud of the fact that the municipality of Paris had been unanimous in its agreement to honor Israel’s founding prime minister. Paris was proud of the decision he said, because it conveys a message to a world in which dignity and liberty are important, that Paris will place on her map the names of great people such as Ben Gurion, because doing so enhances the honor of Paris.
Peres made no effort to hide his emotions, and recalled that when the State of Israel came into being so soon after the Holocaust, France had ignored the arms embargo which had made it almost impossible for the nascent state to defend itself and had put tanks and weapons at Israel’s disposal.
Ben Gurion had been the leader of the state before it even existed, said Peres, and his big dream was to bring his people, scattered around so many parts of the globe back to their ancestral homeland. "He even commanded a war, before we had an army. He pursued peace and he pursued ethics – and this is the legacy he bequeathed us."
Following the inauguration Peres met with French President Nicolas Sarkozy who assured him that he would continue to do his utmost to secure the release of hijacked soldier Gilad Schalit who is also a French citizen.
Sarkozy also reiterated France’s commitment to Middle East peace and a resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, saying that there was no alternative other than to resume negotiations between the two sides and to get the peace process back on track.
Sarkozy also said that his admiration and respect for Peres was a well-known fact, and because of this, Peres knows that he can always depend on France as a loyal friend.
France would like to see a free, independent democratic Palestinian state alongside Israel, with full guarantees of Israel’s security, said Sarkozy.
While confident that peace would eventually be achieved, Sarkozy warned that continuation of the conflict would impact on everyone because it fed the influence of extremists on both sides and led to incitement and terror.
Peres conceded that there had been a crisis of confidence between the sides, but was optimistic that this would be overcome in the final analysis. Israel is ready to extend the hand of peace and to accept the principle of a two-state solution, he said. He also said that it was imperative that negotiations be renewed as quickly as possible.
With regard to Iran, Peres said that while he would stop short of comparing Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad with Hitler, nonetheless, Israel could not remain silent and indifferent in the face of Ahmadinejad’s continuing calls for Israel’s extermination.
Sarkozy was likewise highly critical of Iran and said that Iran was behaving in an intolerable manner and must be subjected to the severest of sanctions.
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