Source: Asia Pacific Report
Asia Pacific Report
Israel is working with US Christian Zionists to make the Pacific “an Israeli pond” to help deliver votes in the United Nations, warns the advocacy and protest movement Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa (PSNA).
National spokesperson Rinad Tamimi said in a statement today that PSNA would picket the Fiji High Commission in Wellington and Consulate in Auckland tomorrow at 12.30pm in protest over Israel opening its first Pacific Islands Embassy in the Fiji capital Suva later on Tuesday.
Tamimi said PSNA was acting in solidarity with a call for support from the Fijians for Palestine Solidarity Network (Fijians4Palestine) in Fiji.
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Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar arrived in Fiji today and is scheduled to cut the ribbon to open the embassy at 5pm.
Tamimi said that while the rest of the world was “distancing itself from Israel for its genocide in Gaza, illegal settlements on the West Bank and invasion of Lebanon,” Fiji was “deepening its ties with the [Benjamin] Netanyahu regime”.
“It’s partly personal. Fiji Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka is grateful for Israeli support for his coup in 1987, when the rest of the world were distancing themselves from the Rabuka-led military junta,” Tamimi said.
“But it’s mostly the result of intense diplomatic activity by Israel throughout the Pacific, its determined attempts to reverse the trend around the world to isolate Israel and its institutions.
‘Working with Christian Zionists’
“Israel is working with US Christian Zionists to make the Pacific an Israeli pond, to deliver votes in the United Nations and embassies in Jerusalem.”
In the September 2024 landmark UN General Assembly resolution to order Israel out of the Palestinian Occupied Territory within 12 months, no fewer than seven Pacific countries, including Fiji, voted against, out of a world total of 14 votes against.
“It’s the same Pacific slant with embassies in illegally Occupied Jerusalem. The world would locate all their embassies in Tel Aviv because they didn’t recognise Israeli sovereignty over East Jerusalem.
“Then Trump opened a US embassy in Jerusalem in 2018.
“Since then, only Kosovo, Honduras and Guatemala have joined the US. That is, except for the Pacific — Papua New Guinea and Fiji are now in Jerusalem and they are soon to be joined by Samoa,” Tamimi said.
“It’ll be Samoa’s only country post outside the Pacific. Is Israel paying for it?”
According to the Jewish News Syndicate (JNS), Israel previously had an embassy in Fiji in the 1970s and 1980s. But this was closed in the 1990s due to budgetary cuts, and its role was replaced by non-resident ambassadors.
“Our affinity and affection to Israel actually predates our official establishment of ties over half a century ago and dates back to 1835 when Christian missionaries came to Fiji and taught the Bible,” said Fiji’s Ambassador to Israel Jesoni Vitusagavulu.
“We have a deep appreciation for Israel.”
Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/06/01/pro-palestinian-activists-plan-protest-against-israeli-pond-diplomacy-push-in-pacific/