"The right to the first strike"

Washington Post publicerar idag en engelsk översättning av Grass dikt. Artikeln  - "Günther Grass says he was criticizing Netanyahu, not Israel" - citerar även ur en intervju med Grass i Süddeutche Zeitung: “I have often supported Israel, I have often been in the country and want the country to exist and at last find peace with its neighbors”.
Grass får dock inte längre besöka Israel. “If Günther wants to spread his twisted and lying works, I suggest he does this from Iran, where he can find a supportive audience,” säger landets inrikesminister EliYishi. Yishi hänvisar även till en lag som förbjuder tidigare nazister från att besöka landet.
Gideon Levy, kolumnist på den israeliska nyhetssajten Haaretz, menar att Grass tar upp viktiga frågor och att hans åsikter delas av många i Israel. “They are not anti-Semites, they are expressing the opinion of many people”, säger Levy, enligt Washington Post.

Saken gäller alltså Benjamin Netanyahus varning att "tiden för diplomati rinner ut". Hotet om en attack mot Iran kom strax efter överläggningar med Barack Obama, vars löfte att USA inte kommer att tillåta Iran att ta fram kärnvapen inte uppfattades som tillräckligt kraftfullt av Netanyahu.
“As prime minister of Israel, I will never allow my people to live in the shadow of annihilation”.

Här nedan är Günter Grass' dikt i engelsk översättning. Hur man än röntgar och rannsakar den tycker jag inte att det går att upptäcka tillstymmelsen till antisemitism. Grass säger även tydligt att han stödjer staten Israel. Som jag ser det finns det ingen underton av att inte erkänna Israels existensberättigande. Det hindrar förstås inte att den kan utnyttjas av antisemiter och av dem som inte accepterar Israels grundande som sådant.
Grass menar att det är dubbelmoral att Israels (eventuella) innehav av kärnvapen viftas undan, medan Irans (eventuella) ger upphov till diskussioner om en attack i förebyggande syfte, under åberopande av "the right to the first strike". Jag tror att de formuleringar som kan ha provocerat mest är "annihilate the Iranian people", "I am tired of the West's hypocrisy", och att de kan tolkas som att han bagatelliserar hoten mot Israel.
Men min övertygelse är att en israelisk attack på Iran skulle vara en katastrof, på både kort och lång sikt. Det kan även vara på sin plats i sammanhanget att erinra om Mordechai Vanunu.

Why do I stay silent, conceal for too long
What is obvious and has been
Practiced in war games, at the end of which we as survivors
Are at best footnotes.
It is the alleged right to the first strike
That could annihilate the Iranian people—
Subjugated by a loud-mouth
And guided to organized jubilation—
Because in their sphere of power,
It is suspected, a nuclear bomb is being built.
Yet why do I forbid myself
To name that other country
In which, for years, even if secretly,
There has been a growing nuclear potential at hand
But beyond control, because not accessible to inspections?
The universal concealment of these facts,
To which my silence subordinated itself,
I sense as an incriminating lie
And coercion--the punishment is promised
As soon as it is ignored;
The verdict of "anti-Semitism" is familiar.
Now, though, because in my country
Which time and again has sought and confronted
Its very own crimes
That is without comparison
In turn on a purely commercial basis, if also
With nimble lips calling it a reparation, declares
A further U-boat should be delivered to Israel,
Whose specialty consists of guiding all-destroying warheads to where the existence
Of a single atomic bomb is unproven,
But fear wishes to be of conclusive evidence,
I say what must be said.
But why have I stayed silent until now?
Because I thought my origin,
Afflicted by a stain never to be expunged
Forbade this fact as pronounced truth
To be told to the nation of Israel, to which I am bound
And wish to stay bound.
Why do I say only now,
Aged and with my last ink,
The nuclear power Israel endangers
The already fragile world peace?
Because it must be said
What even tomorrow may be too late to say;
Also because we--as Germans burdened enough--
Could become suppliers to a crime
That is foreseeable, wherefore our complicity
Could not be redeemed through any of the usual excuses.
And granted: I am silent no longer
Because I am tired of the West's hypocrisy;
In addition to which it is to be hoped
That this will free many from silence,
Appeal to the perpetrator of the recognizable danger
To renounce violence and
Likewise insist
That an unhindered and permanent control
Of the Israeli nuclear potential
And the Iranian nuclear sites
Be authorized through an international agency
By the governments of both countries.
Only this way are all, the Israelis and Palestinians,
Even more, all people, that in this
Region occupied by mania
Live cheek by jowl among enemies,
And also us, to be helped.



Fler artiklar: Svd Dagen