“For decades, international law was the keystone on which states could rest. Today, it is openly questioned.” By these words, Philippe de Belgique sets the tone for a television discourse oh so heavy with meaning, the most loaded without any doubt since his accession to the throne. As every year, on the occasion of the Belgian national holiday, this July 21, the king addresses his fellow citizens on subjects that are close to his heart. Still in consultation, of course, with his chief of staff and his advisers. If his Prime Minister provides final rereading, it was he who chose to evoke Gaza.
The king calls for immediately ending the crisis
He thus joins his “voice to all those who denounce the serious humanitarian drifts in Gaza where innocents die of hunger and fall under the bombs suffocated in their enclave,” he said. If sometimes, its speaking can be timid, it is concise, without ambiguity. For the sovereign, human rights have been raped. A situation which “has only lasted too much” and which it calls “shame for all of humanity”. “However, when international law is flouted the whole world is a loser.”
King Philippe therefore declares to support “the appeal of the United Nations Secretary General to immediately end this unbearable crisis.“An assertion that contrasts with the disagreements that reign within the Belgian government. The politicians of his country cannot agree on the approach to be adopted vis-Ã -vis Israel. The fact remains that his Prime Minister, Bart de Wever, validated in fact The committed message from the father of the Duchess of Brabant. Did he have to adjust the text? Sources of the palace argue “that there have been few comments,” reveals Wim Dehandschutter in the columns of HLN.
“I was turned upside down by their testimony”
But why get out of his reserve now? “He estimated that he could no longer remain silent, according to initiates,” we can read in HLN. On June 15, the “Red Line for Gaza” gathering – “greater solidarity demonstration with Palestine never organized in Belgium”, reports the Belgian antenna of Amnesty International – saw up to 100,000 people in the streets of Brussels. If the king discusses current news every morning, including in the Middle East, it is probably his overwhelming meeting with two fathers, one Israeli and the other Palestinian, who decided him.
“Both share indescribable suffering that of having lost a child, victim of the same conflict, “says Philippe de Belgique in his speech. “They gave up any spirit of revenge and chose to carry a message of peace. A peace that would reduce their suffering. These fathers remind us that, beyond the political dimension, it is always human dignity which is at stake. “If he assumes his position, the sovereign is however paying attention to the choice of the words he uses. He never explicitly cites Israel or uses the word” genocide “. A way of taking into account” political sensitivities “, analyzes the royal journalist, Wim Dehandschutter.
A pique in the Belgian government
And faced with all the conflicts that are rampant in the world – the sovereign does not forget the courage of the Ukrainians who defend their sovereignty -, he insists on “internal concerns” which concern Belgium. “In Brussels in particular, it is urgent that a new government finally puts itself at work.” An unconted spade, judge our colleagues from Sudinfowhich shows that the king does not have his eyes riveted only on the major international issues. And that is all the interest of this national holiday. Not to forget what goes elsewhere, “but to remind us who we are and what we can achieve together, as Belgians and as European.”
