pristina, kosovo | Hashim Thaci may be the tough-talking prime minister of Kosovo and ex-commander of the Kosovo Liberation Army, but he gushes over Israel like a kid recalling a trip to Disney World.
“I love Israel. What a great country. Kosovo is a friend of Israel,” the grinning Thaci, 39, said in a hotel crowned by a miniature Statue of Liberty. “I met so many great leaders when I was there — Netanyahu, Sharon — I really admire them,” Thaci continued.
With the province of Kosovo preparing to declare independence from Serbia following years of failed negotiations and the expiration of a United Nations deadline Dec. 10 for an agreement with the Serbs, Thaci is poised to become the prime minister of Europe’s newest country.
Kosovo is home to some 2.2 million people, 90 percent of whom are ethnic Albanians with Muslim roots.
Despite Kosovo having the most pro-American vibe in Europe and a profoundly secular stance on Islam, as well as Thaci’s supportive line on Israel, some Israeli analysts are warning that recognizing its independence from Serbia is not in Israel’s interest.
These analysts argue that recognition sets a precedent for foreign interference in bilateral disputes that could affect negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians.
There is also general concern among Israeli officials about encouraging Muslim separatist movements and that Kosovo’s independence will help create a new Muslim corridor within Europe where radical Islam could take root.
Kosovo experts say this fear is misplaced based on an overgeneralization of Muslims that does not recognize that Kosovo Muslims are secular, pro-Western and, in many cases, fond of Jews and Israel.
“You’ll find far more radical Islamists in Brooklyn than you will in the Balkans,” said James Lyon, the Belgrade-based special Balkans adviser for the International Crisis Group, a nongovernmental organization that focuses on conflict prevention.
Kosovars tend to place much more emphasis on their ethnic Albanian identity than on their Muslim identity, which developed under centuries of Ottoman rule.
“The Albanians, including the Albanians of Kosovo, do whatever they can to steer clear of any identification with Islam,” said Jonathan Eyal, director of studies at the London-based Royal United Services Institute for Defense and Security Studies. “The idea of a Muslim corridor is absurd.”
Kosovo is intensely pro-America — U.S. sponsorship of NATO’s bombing of Belgrade in 1999 is widely viewed in Kosovo as having saved the province from Serbian aggression — and Thaci is expected to coordinate recognition of his new country with the United States and the European Union. Serbia and its key ally, Russia, vehemently oppose Kosovo independence.
Kosovo, the southernmost province of Serbia, has been run as a United Nations protectorate since 1999, when Serbian dictator Slobodan Milosevic waged a brutal war to purge Kosovo of its ethnic Albanian population and quash a bid for independence by Kosovo rebels.
Israel is concerned that if it recognizes Kosovo’s independence from Serbia, it will be more difficult for the Jewish state to oppose unilateral Palestinian independence in the West Bank, should that moment ever arrive.
“I do think Israel — as Cyprus, and I would guess also Sri Lanka, as any other country that has to deal with ethnic conflict and secessionist claims — should be somewhat worried by an international acceptance of an independent Kosovo,” said Gallia Lindenstrauss, the Neubauer research fellow at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv.
“It will basically mean that in the eyes of the international community, partition is the only way to go,” she said.