I am aware that the FT is not keen on anyone quoting more than about 100 words of an article that they publish, but this is too important not to share. The public interest justifies doing so. This article was published by the FT late yesterday afternoon:
As the FT notes, the Tony Blair Institute (TBI) initially pushed back at suggestions of their involvement, but when presented with evidence that they were, they tried to downplay their contribution. That said, as the FT has made clear, the TBI had an agenda for Gaza, which implied that the Palestinian people of that territory were seen as mere suppliers of labour to what a business community unrelated to the area might want to achieve.
This is shocking. It aligns the TBI with extreme neoliberalism, and with the Trump agenda for Gaza, which is essentially to use the territory to create a giant business opportunity for US and other commercial operators, regardless of what Palestinians want and regardless of their right to be recognised as a state.
As is well known, there are significant personnel and policy ties between Starmer's government and the TBI. AI is one major link, but Jonathon Powell's role in government and his close relationship with Blair and others with similar links reinforce the relationship.
So the obvious question is, where does the UK stand on this, and how serious is its commitment to ever recognise Palestine, which it says it will, but never gets round to doing. Is the TBI letting us know why?
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Shades of the Morgenthau Plan for a post WW2 Germany
Gives the Palestinians every reason to fight as it gave The Germans
Should be called the Tony Blair Colonialists.
“where does the UK stand on this” –
I’m guessing assorted property developers are rubbing their hands with glee & working out how to get a piece of the action.
I’m sure a queue is forming outside of the F.O. as I write (doubtless with a LINO donation box – next to it).
Wasn’t Tony Blair the Quadripartite Middle East envoy for several years after he left office as U.K. prime minister? Cashing in on this diplomatic role seems cynical beyond words!
Blair became an advisor to Blackrock either during or shortly after that time.
Blackrock invested in the companies that were exploiting the Gaza gas fields.
The Gaza gas fields were acquired by Israel i believe around a similar time, for the benefit of Israel, by changing the territorial limit offshore from 12 miles to 6 miles.
Coincidence is not correlation.
I have no evidence of anyone directly profiteering from plunder and am not making an accusation of such.
Thank you, Vicky.
The money from the gas fields off Gaza is held on behalf of the Palestine Authority at a US giant. Blair is adviser to and client of this firm. The Palestine Authority can’t do anything with the royalties, so the storied US bank uses it.
Further to my reply to Vicky, the US bank I refer to is not BlackRock, which is a fund manager.
Thank you, Doctor.
Israeli historian commented on that role: “It’s like putting Dracula in charge of the blood bank.”
This has been a thread on Mastodon for a week or so – probably where the FT picked it up.
Plainly – bribing people to leave their own land is not supporting them at all – it’s displacing them. I mean, where would they be allowed to go? Would the incentives end up in the criminal gangs that run illegal immigration rackets?
Honestly……………so we have another Chavez Ravine style operation, driven by rockets and extreme violence but it is all just about grabbing real estate by vested interests. No wonder Israel is prosecuting this war, rather than just self defence, it is an opportunity to boost their economy long term. Self defence is expensive after all. HAMAS walked into trap.
But it does give you an inkling as to how Blair’s mind works – he is Giddens personified isn’t he? And Giddens was always reductionist in his mode of thinking, no acknowledgement of history, no analysis of politics or power or where it derives its might from (money) – a more sanitised version of the justification of greed you could not find anywhere.
So, a post politics world is one where money talks – where – if money generates money – that’s all that matters. Money will solve everything – especially if it is private money.
Governments are not allowed or to be seen solving anything. That’s really bad – apparently.
Bollocks to that I say.
The UK does not ‘stand’ on anything; it squats, ready to poo on anyone the States tells it to for that matter.
I hate giving Blair any credit at all, but his determination certainly helped create the Good Friday Agreement.
It is therefore incredibly impossible for me to understand how a British leader with proven anti-colonial feelings could be a British colonial advocate.
Is there any oil off the shore of Gaza perhaps…
He and all he stands for is a sham. He’s simply another tax-avoiding neoliberal xxxxx (insert own swear word here).
Wasn’t the groundwork for the GFA laid before he arrived?
And wasn’t Mo Mowlam the real midwife of it?
Ministers (and the Clintons) did their work but as I guess we all know, in politics nothing gets done without the PM’s support.
“but his determination certainly helped create the Good Friday Agreement.”
Good Friday agreement was led by David Trimble. He won the Nobel peace prize along side John Hume. John Hume had done much of the prior work to get Gerry Adams to the negotiation table. Bill Clinton and John Major were international overseers.
Tony Blair did nothing apart from appear for the cameras on the day pen was put to paper.
We’ll agree to disagree on that one. And bejaybers I’m not a Blair fan. But as a Northern Irish person with mixed families I had lots of dog in this fight.
But it’s the one and only positive entry on his political and moral ledger book.
Without his unwavering support the whole process would have floundered.
It was relatively easy for the parties in NornIron to get on board when it became obvious that Downing street was not going to back down and would go all the way.
Thank you, Richard, for shining a light on one of the most inglorious chapters in British imperial history and the new depths plumbed by Blair.
Firstly, BCG would be an obvious choice as Netanyahu used to work there. He became friends with former Republican governor, senator and presidential candidate Mitt Romney when the pair worked there. Former Democrat governor and presidential candidate Deval Patrick works at BCG.
You are right to highlight Blair’s influence on the Starmer government. It’s not an exaggeration to say there’s no such thing as Starmerism, as Starmer has pointed out. As professor David Edgerton said last week, Starmer is reheating tired and inappropriate Thatcherism and Blairism.
Let’s go back a bit.
As the pandemic receded, Blair began to hire civil servants, especially those with experience of the pandemic. He saw such emergency management as the next wave to ride and wanted to sell his firm’s services based on that knowledge. In addition, Blair foresaw the Tories losing, not Labour winning, as in 1997 and wanted his people in place. The Blair team is at all levels of the government. Those not seconded to Whitehall are at his office, conducting similar work.
The team that put Starmer at the helm of Labour is really Blair’s team, but with some reporting to Mandelson, like Morgan McSweeney and Wes Streeting. McSweeney and his wife, Imogen Walker, also report to Gary Lubner.
When Blair “retires to his country estate”, “ducal” Wotton in Buckinghamshire, red boxes, just like in Whitehall, are placed outside his Connaught Square town house and office for matters requiring his attention. He had these boxes made a couple of years ago. Blair would like a more prominent role in government, but realises that would provoke Rupert Murdoch. Murdoch blames Blair for the break up of his marriage to Wendi Deng.
Blair developed a taste for squirearchy* at Chequers, a dozen miles cross country in my beloved Buckinghamshire, and the money that facilitates such a lifestyle and wanted his own estate. His elder sons, cashing in, have also bought country homes in Buckinghamshire. *Being a squire meant, for example, not adhering to lock down and not scaling the hedge rows, so one could not see what the family got up to. Covid restrictions are for the little people, not the Blair family.
As PM, Blair often complained about being the CEO of UK PLC (the late Queen being chairwoman), but not being paid like a business CEO. He’s obsessed with money. Apparently, that goes back to Oxford. Like many of his followers, he thought about the Tories as the vehicle for advancement, but Oxford and its Tory association were dominated by the Cameron types, so Labour made some sense and an idea that, by the late 1990s, the Tories would have exhausted themselves in office. Like Trump, Blair found it easier to get on and ahead with new money, including attracting Arab and other autocrats as investors, one reason why Starmer ditched the green new deal and screamed that he “hated tree huggers” at Ed Miliband at a shadow cabinet meeting.
Blair’s association with Trump AND Kushner goes back to Trump’s first term, but may be even longer as an old deal for oil concessions in the occupied Golan Heights suggest. They have friends, donors and investors in common. Blair even thought he could mediate in the stand off between Trump and Biden in January 2021 and sought to fly to Washington.
Michael Crick has tweeted about this sorry affair and asked if anyone at BCG and the Blair organisation considered the ethics. What a ridiculous question. The only issue for these people is getting caught. From Blair down, these people are, to quote William Dalrymple from yesterday, “pig ignorant”.
When briefed about the hand over of Hong Kong to China soon after becoming PM, Blair confessed to not knowing about how Hong Kong became British and the opium trade and British oligarchs (extant, not extinct) and asked why the Chinese can’t get over such matters. A dozen or so years ago, Blair was asked to make opening remarks at Cape Town’s annual mining “indaba”, held every January. He embarrassed the hosts and upset attendees by talking in cliches about religion, not political developments and risk as planned.
Finally, let’s remind ourselves of what Israeli historian Ilan Pappe said about Blair as Middle East mediator: “That’s like putting Dracula in charge of the blood bank.”
I should have added Ilan Pappe.
Mandelson was a key fixer for Blair. It’s no coincidence that Starmer sent him to Washington. The UK-US trade agreement, still not final and unpublished, is his work, especially the diversionary tactic of a letter of intent which has been given far too much credence.