Israel’s legal occupation
June 7, 2007, 11:09 am |
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By Zionist.com
Israel this week marked 40 years since its stunning victory over vastly superior Arab forces in the 1967 Six Day War. The rest of the world remembered the event by unleashing a flood of criticism over Israel’s continued “occupation” of Judea, Samaria and the Golan Heights.
When Israel’s detractors speak of the “illegal occupation” they are basing their position on UN Security Council Resolution 242.
However, an honest examination of the resolution and the subsequent events of of the past four decades reveals that Israel’s control of these territories in fact constitutes a legal occupation.
The US and British authors of 242 were deliberately ambiguous when they called for an Israeli withdrawal from territories captured during the war. They did not demand that Israel leave “the territories” or “all territories,” but simply “territories.”
Nor did they determine that Israel was required to hand lost territories back to each of the three offending Arab states - Egypt, Syria and Jordan. Again, the resolution simply says “from territories” without any specification whatsoever regarding how much of each of the different territories was to be returned.
Since 1967, Israel has relinquished control of well over 90% of the territories it captured in the Six Day War, including the entire Sinai Peninsula, the whole of the Gaza Strip and large portions of Judea and Samaria.
It is safe to say from a legal standpoint that Israel has fulfilled its primary obligation under Resolution 242.
What’s more, Jordan waived its right to complain about receiving no land concessions from Israel when, in 1988, it publicly backed Palestinian sovereignty in Judea and Samaria.
With 242 satisfied, and Jordan renouncing its claim to the “West Bank,” Israel’s possession of Judea and Samaria as far as that landmark resolution is concerned is absolutely legal.
Taking the argument even further, it is important to note that 242 and every other UN resolution regarding Israel and the Middle East conflict since the establishment of the Jewish state in 1948 have been passed under Chapter VI of the UN Charter. That means they are in effect nothing more than recommendations on conflict resolution, and not legally binding rulings.
The last and only legally binding international decision regarding control of the land remains the closing statement of the 1920 League of Nations conference in San Remo, which granted Great Britain the right to temporarily govern the area known as “Palestine” with the intent of facilitating “close Jewish settlement” in all of what is today Israel, the Palestinian-controlled territories and the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan.
That document - which, again, constitutes international law - actually acknowledges the “historic ties between the Jewish People and the Land of Israel,” which everyone in 1920 recognized as including Judea, Samaria, Gaza, the Golan Heights and the mountainous territories east of the Jordan River.
If the Palestinian Arabs want to dispute Israel’s control over those areas based on their own presence there, that is one thing. But to claim that their cause is backed by modern international law is a grievous distortion of facts.
Unfortunately, in today’s world, dishonest slogan-based propaganda usually wins out over truthful and thorough fact-checking in the battle for people’s hearts and minds.
Related: Arab/Muslim World, Israel, Palestinians, United Nations (UN)