Rydberg Wants to Get Rid

Akiva Eldar reports:

A senior European Union official rules out any compromise with Israel over the issue of settlements, unless reached in the framework of a final-status agreement with the Palestinians.

Robert Rydberg, head of the Middle East desk in the Swedish Foreign Ministry, (chef för enheten för Mellanöstern och Nordafrika på UD)

stressed on Monday it was inconceivable for the international community to legitimize natural growth of the settler population, since all settlements beyond the Green Line were illegal.

Speaking at a conference in Munich, Rydberg slammed the settlements as creating a new reality on the ground in the occupied territories and spawning obstacles, and he said that roadblocks were intended mainly to protect the settlements rather than Israel proper within the Green Line.

Rydberg said Israel's settlement policy did not build credibility among the Palestinian leadership and that Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas wanted to reach an agreement with Israel. He said the ideology that guides most settlers is based on utter denial of the rights of Palestinians in the occupied territories.

Israel has had some run-ins with him before. Back in 2006:

Foreign Ministry Director-General Ron Prosor summoned Swedish Ambassador Robert Rydberg to Jerusalem to express Israel's displeasure after Sweden pulled its eight jet fighters from an international air force exercise once it found out Israel would be participating.

Prosor conveyed the message that Sweden would not be looked upon favorably as a participant in the peace process following Stockholm"s indication that Israel was not considered a peace-loving country, according to Foreign Ministry Spokesman Mark Regev.

"If a country believes that Israel is not good enough to participate in peacekeeping maneuvers, Israel will be entitled to think that that country is not qualified to play a role in the Middle East peace process," Regev said.

...Israel was also not pleased with the response it received on the issue of visas for two Hamas representatives of the Palestinian Legislative Council, Salah Muhammad el-Bardawil and Muhammad al-Rantisi, slated to visit Sweden on March 16.

A source familiar with Thursday's meeting at the Foreign Ministry said that Rydberg told the Israelis that no visas had yet been granted, but that he couldn't rule out their being granted in the future. Rydberg did stress, however, that the visit was unofficial and would not include any meetings with government representatives.

Follow-up on that:

The Swedish ambassador to Israel, Robert Rydberg, told the Jerusalem Post that the decision to issue the visa "was not a break with EU policies, since there is no EU policy on the issuing of visas to Hamas representatives."

And he doesn't wear that helmet for fun:

The European Union’s use of the linkage weapon has been far less sophisticated than Washington’s. EU officials simply warn that if Israel does not embrace the two-state model, work begun in 2008 on a planned upgrade of Israel’s relations with Europe will be frozen.

During a late April [2009] visit to Jerusalem, Robert Rydberg, director general of the Foreign Ministry of Sweden, which assumes the union’s rotating presidency in July, delivered the message in no uncertain terms.

Although he sometimes takes it off:



How legitimate, when you think of it, is he?



P.S. Don't give up on Swedish diplomats yet:

Kent Ekeroth, 25, was sacked last October from the Swedish mission to Israel over contributions he made to an online discussion forum. Ambassador Robert Rydberg said his sacking was also due to the fact that he hadn't mentioned his links to the Sweden Democrats.

...According to anti-racist magazine Expo, Ekeroth has written that Europe is on the brink of collapse due to "completely irresponsible immigration policies, naivety and left-wing influences combined with a fascination for Islamism and contempt for our own cultural inheritance."

Ekeroth also expressed concern that Sweden will soon not exist "except as a term for a geographical area."

Kent thinks a bit like me.