The Israelization of International Relations: A View from a Small Country

Macedonia’s Foreign Minister Timcho Mucunski with Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa'ar -- image via Timcho Mucunski on Instagram

By Biljana Vankovska

A few days ago, when I landed at Budapest Airport on my way to an international conference devoted to serious questions of international politics, the first thing I saw was a huge civilian aircraft bearing a name unfamiliar to me: Isair. It was not difficult to guess, but I checked anyway. It was an Israeli air carrier.

At this time of year, Budapest is a wonderful tourist destination, and the plane was packed ‘like a hive.’ And there they were: Israeli tourists. Of course, they have flooded Cyprus, Greece (two countries where they not only spend their holidays but also buy apartments and real estate on a large scale), Montenegro, Spain, etc. People presumably go on holiday to relax from the ‘stress’ of constantly ignoring the genocide and war horrors their state is waging on all fronts. By the way, a friend from Greece has just informed me that at the Athens airport he noticed announcements for as many as 19 flights to Israel per day!?

As an activist who, even from a safe distance, cannot sleep peacefully while a genocide has been unfolding for more than 1,000 days, with children among its principal victims, I cannot look at such scenes with a calm heart. I ask myself: do they have a conscience? Is tourism really what is on their minds? It is fair to say that the Israeli tourists are not quite welcomed these days. Incidents and protests by local populations are increasingly reported, with people openly waving Palestinian flags to signal that Israeli tourists are not welcome.

I had barely settled into my hotel when I checked the news from my country. And it hit me like a thunderbolt: there was news of the visit of Macedonia’s Foreign Minister Timcho Mucunski to Tel Aviv. What an irony of fate, I thought, looking at his smiling face and his invitation to Israeli tourists to visit Macedonia, especially its most beautiful city on the shores of Lake Ohrid. The irony is that Ohrid, because of its historical and cultural significance, is also known as the ‘Jerusalem of the Balkans.’

Rather than interpret what the minister meant, let me quote a few passages from his ‘exclusive interview’ with The Jerusalem Post:

‘We are thriving democracies, nations that promote the free market and capitalism,’ Mucunski said. ‘My nation and Israel – both on the basis of political ideology, but also on the basis of our global outlook – have more things that unite them rather than divide them.’

And there is worse:

‘There are many things that we can learn from you. There are many common values that we share, both on a domestic as well as international level. And in that sense, since the formation of our government, we have made the bilateral relationship with Israel one of the priorities of our foreign policy.’

Mucunski is quite sincere when he says that Macedonia stands behind Israel (and the United States, of course) at all multilateral forums. Yes, my country is among those six-seven countries that are repeatedly isolated in votes at the UN General Assembly, together with Israel, the United States, Ukraine and a few other outliers, regardless of whether the vote concerns Gaza, Iran, Cuba, Venezuela or something else. Loyal to our allies unto death!

In a recent interview with an American media outlet, the Macedonian Prime Minister was even more explicit, saying that we are making ourselves available to the US Air Force as a base for attacks on Iran. When one (only ONE, and a brave woman) journalist asked whether this might perhaps endanger our national security by turning the country into a target in the middle of an ongoing war, he not only scolded her but publicly apologised to ‘our allies’ for the existence of such ‘irresponsible’ journalists. I believe even his allies must have felt embarrassed by such servile behaviour. As for our first female president, I have already written about her, including an open letter concerning the children of Gaza. In vain. She is a woman of a certain age, and she loves children very much; but apparently only if they are from Macedonia or allied countries. As for Gaza, she has still neither heard of it nor uttered its name. This is the country I increasingly feel ashamed of — because of both its domestic and its foreign policy.

But while my blood was boiling and I could barely wait to empty myself onto paper, I began looking more carefully at the news from other countries in my region, then Europe, and finally the wider world. It can be documented that Israel is not simply a state above morality and law, with an almost legendary impunity. And not only since October 2023, but going back to 1948. It is also a state with enormous, and to make things worse, growing global influence.

The figures reveal the astonishing number of countries that are happy to trade with Israel and conclude deals with it not only in security and defence, but also in education, healthcare, agriculture and culture. Finland is one of the more recent examples. Neither are several EU member states excluded: they either continue cooperating with Israel or warmly receive Benjamin Netanyahu, even though an arrest warrant has been issued for him.

Meanwhile, one of the priorities of the EU’s ‘Big Brother’ is to monitor antisemitism, and increasingly to find it where there is none, while empathy, solidarity and condemnation of what is happening to Palestine are treated with suspicion, even though what is happening there contradicts the most elementary standards of humanity and international law.

We also hear increasingly about Israel exporting its ‘expertise’ and providing training in crowd control, prison management and similar fields across the globe. If you remember the brutal scenes at a small European airport where members of the Sumud Flotilla landed after the deportation from Israel, you may also know that the police officers involved had been trained by Israeli counterparts.

So I ask myself: what values can anyone possibly share with Israel today? What kind of expertise can we learn from it? And most importantly: what the hell are we supposed to learn from them?

Under the flood of such news, I turned to colleagues with whom I served on the Jury of Conscience of the Gaza Tribunal, which completed its work last year with a clear condemnation of genocide and all its forms. The Tribunal was founded by the incomparable moral giant and model of integrity and conscience, Professor Richard Falk, who himself has Jewish roots. We remain in frequent contact. And although we at least did something to preserve testimonies and evidence of what is happening in Palestine, our consciences still give us no peace.

What more can we do as part of global civil society, at a time when our governments are becoming increasingly Israelized and international judicial institutions themselves seem to be fighting for their very existence? Public opinion around the world (except Israel) has little doubt about where it stands. It stands with the Palestinian people, who continue to die every day, now under the label of a ‘ceasefire.’

Incidentally, on the very day when Macedonia’s foreign minister was praising Israeli values in the middle of Tel Aviv, a mother and her son were killed in Gaza, while Israeli soldiers fired at people trying to approach the bodies and at least retrieve them. What kind of evil is that? I still find it difficult to comprehend. Perhaps it sounds banal, but I cannot normalise it in the way governments around the world increasingly do. They turn a blind eye to atrocities while signing trade agreements. They say one thing and do another.

As someone who comes from a region that has experienced the horrors of wars and conflicts (most of them encouraged or fueled from outside), I know that those who have not experienced such suffering cannot necessarily feel the pain of those who have witnessed it or survived it.

The BDS movement seems to me to be one of the clearest voices of protest, but also a direction in which our struggle should turn: a comprehensive boycott of Israel, the cutting of economic and other ties, and sanctions against a state that systematically disregards its obligations under international law and international judicial decisions.

But our task begins at home. The pressure must be directed at our own governments. We must first boycott and sanction them, at the ballot box or by other means. We must shame them, if they have even a shred of shame left. If we do not, we become accomplices. And Israelization will come knocking on our own doors.

This article was produced by Globetrotter. Biljana Vankovska is a professor of political science and international relations at Ss. Cyril and Methodius University in Skopje, the president of Synergia Orbi: Institute for Global Analysis in Skopje, and the most influential public intellectual in Macedonia. She is a member of the No Cold War collective.

This article was produced by Globetrotter.