By Ted Belman (originally published Mar 15, 2006)
A narrative has emerged that Israel’s settlements in the West Bank are a “tragedy.” The fatal flaw lies in the original sin of supposedly lawless occupation of land, in contravention of the Geneva Convention. It makes a strong emotional pitch to a sense of justice, a major influence on the thinking of many American Jews. But the narrative is built on a flawed foundation.
For example, Gershom Gorenberg in his Op—Ed in the New York Times, “Israel’s Tragedy Foretold,” on March 10, 2006, opines that Israelis and their leaders have finally seen the light, namely that Israel should abandon the settlements.
In so concluding, Mr. Gorenberg puts his faith in an opinion by Legal Counsel to the Israeli Foreign Ministry, one Theodor Merion who wrote in 1967
‘My conclusion is that civilian settlement in the administered territories contravenes the explicit provisions of the Fourth Geneva Convention.”
Mr Gorenberg laments that Israel, in disregard of this advice, started to build settlements with the ‘sadly mistaken confidence that the legal, ethical and diplomatic difficulties of settlement could somehow be avoided.’ The tragedy, according to Mr. Gorenberg, is that Israel now has to untangle the mess at great human and financial cost.
Mr. Meron’s conclusion has been thoroughly discredited by legal scholars over the years and Mr. Gorenberg’s thesis which rests upon it must suffer the same fate.
Professor Talia Einhorn, Adjunct Professor of Law, Tel Aviv University, in The Status of Palestine/Land of Israel and Its Settlement Under Public International Law published by NATIV Online in 1993, advises
In 1967, following the Six Day War, the territories of Yesha, which had been originally designated for the Jewish national home according to the Mandate document, returned to Israeli rule. Leading international law scholars opined that Israel was in lawful control of Yesha, that no other state could show better title than Israel to Yesha’s territory, and that this territory was not ‘occupied’ in the sense of the Geneva Convention, since those rules are designed to assure the reversion of the former legitimate sovereign which, in this case, does not exist. Israel was therefore entitled to declare that it has exercised its sovereign powers over Yesha.
In practice, however, for political and other reasons, Israel exercised its sovereign powers only with respect to East Jerusalem. Regarding the rest of Yesha, Israel’s official position was that Israel was entitled to annex them, and that, since they had not been taken from a legitimate sovereign, the Fourth Geneva Convention and the Hague Regulations 1899/1907 were inapplicable there. Nonetheless, Israel chose voluntarily to observe and abide by the humanitarian provisions included therein.’ [emphasis added]
One of the ‘leading international scholars’ she refers to was the late Eugene W. Rostow, Dean of Yale Law School, US Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs between 1966 and 1969. The New Republic, on April 23, 1990, published his article entitled, Historical Approach to the Issue of Legality of Jewish Settlement Activity, in which he argued
‘…The Palestine Mandate, recognizing “the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine and the grounds for reconstituting their national home in that country,” is dedicated to “the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, …’
‘…The State Department has never denied that under the Mandate “the Jewish people” have the right to settle in the area. Instead, it said that Jewish settlements in the West Bank violate Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention of 1949…..[which] provides that the occupying power “shall not deport or transfer part of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies.”
‘…But the Jewish settlers in the West Bank are volunteers. They have not been “deported” or “transferred” by the government of Israel, and their movement involves none of the atrocious purposes or harmful effects on the existing population the Geneva Convention was designed to prevent. Furthermore, the Convention applies only to acts by one signatory “carried out on the territory of another.” The West Bank is not the territory of a signatory power, but an unallocated part of the British Mandate…’…The controversy about Jewish settlements in the West Bank is not, therefore, about legal rights but about the political will to override legal rights
In 1991, The New Republic published another article by Dean Rostow, entitled Resolved: are the settlements legal? Israeli West Bank policies, in which he again argued,
It is common even for American journalists to write that Security Council Resolution 242 is “deliberately ambiguous,” as though the parties are equally free to rely on their own reading of its key provisions.
Nothing could be further from the truth. Resolution 242, which, as Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs between 1966 and 1969, I helped produce, calls on the parties to make peace and allows Israel to administer the territories it occupied in 1967 until “a just and lasting peace in the Middle East” is achieved. [..]
Five—and—a—half months of vehement public diplomacy in 1967 made it perfectly clear what the missing definite article in Resolution 242 means. Ingeniously drafted resolutions calling for withdrawals from “all” the territories were defeated in the Security Council and the General Assembly. Speaker after speaker made it explicit that Israel was not to be forced back to the “fragile” and “vulnerable” Armistice Demarcation Lines, but should retire once peace was made to what Resolution 242 called “secure and recognized” boundaries, agreed to by the parties. In negotiating such agreements, the parties should take into account, among other factors, security considerations, access to the international waterways of the region, and, of course, their respective legal claims.
Resolution 242 built on the text of the Armistice Agreements of 1949, which provided…. “no provision” of the Armistice Agreements “Shall in any way prejudice the right, claims, and positions” of the parties “in the ultimate peaceful settlement of the Palestine problem.” In making peace with Egypt in 1979, Israel withdrew from the entire Sinai, which had never been part of the British Mandate.
… As a result, more than 90 percent of the territories Israel occupied in 1967 are now under Arab sovereignty.
Now that Israel has withdrawn from Gaza, this percentage has increased.
Thus the ‘occupation’ was and is legal, having been authorized by the Security Council and the settlements are legal pursuant to the trust created by the British Mandate. In accordance with Israel’s rights, The Oslo Accords did not restrict further settlement. The Mitchell Report which recommended a freeze on settlement activity was incorporated into the Roadmap which Israel accepted. The Palestinian Authority is in fundamental breach of its obligations under the Roadmap. Therefore, Israel is not bound to maintain the freeze.
The fact remains that Israel has every right, according to international law, to defend its citizens, to remain in occupation, to build settlements and to refuse to acknowledge a ‘right of return’.
The tragedy is that the Arabs refused to accept the existence of the State of Israel and have refused to negotiate peace based on the intent of Resolution 242. Anwar Sadat broke the mold in 1979 and was assassinated for his pains.
The tragedy is that the Arabs have refused to absorb the Arab refugees as Israel absorbed the Jewish refugees, preferring instead to doom them to live in squalor as a means of putting pressure on Israel. The late King Hussein of Jordan was the only exception. He too recognized the State of Israel.
The tragedy is that the PA created and empowered by the Oslo Accords choose to make war rather than peace thereby sacrificing the well being of the people it represented. And the tragedy is that the world aided and abetted it in this endeavor never once demanding that it honor its obligations or else.
May 30, 2025 at 8:05 am
@Peloni I’d like to draw attention to Edgar G.’s repeated ad hominem attacks against me over time, including one in which he used personal medical information I had disclosed as an insult. He is another intolerable offender who deserves a warning.
OH MR ZORN
Talking about “respect” As Rodney Dangerfield says…. Tanna was suggesting earlier that I should have my eyes tested…
Do you think I’d look OK in Re-spectacles……???-
MR. ZORN- Oh MR. ZORN
Your referring to my post as “mishagas” is, by your own standard an Ad Hominem……..
Although I’m not saying you’re wrong. You should be loose enough to see
I’m just having a bit of fun…….
@Peloni Case in point. See what I mean? I won’t bother responding to his mishigas, myself, as I don’t waste my time on people for whom I have lost all respect.
Oh Mr. Zorn, Oh Mr Zorn
What’s on your mind today oh Mr.Zorn
Da de-da de-da-da-da. “(‘Da” is “Ad” backwards)…..
Da de-da-da-da-da-da….
Positively Mr Hom-in-em
Absolutely Mr. Zorn……
(To the tune of Gallagher and Shean).
Your concept of Ad Hominems set to music…….cute….eh???
SEBASTIEN ZORN-
Maybe your “argument” is such irrelevant nonsense that no one wants to bother responding.
SEB-
Softy…..crybaby, pussy cat…
Let me dry your tears kid…Are all these endearments also “ad hominems”….????
Besides I did not use your so-called medical information as an insult. I totally deny this …you are deliberately lying.
If you didn’t want your medical conditions to be mentioned why did YOU post them in the first place…and a public forum….? When you do this, they can be discussed by all and sundry.
I didn’t even discuss them, I just repeated what you posted with NO other comments attached.
Cowardly custard…….another ad hominem??? Baldylocks….Another….??
Besides….I could add a lot more about you but what’s the poijnt. Seb isn’t Seb any more????
And I’m still waiting for someone to respond to the substance of my argument. All this irrelevant nonsense.
@Peloni I’d like to draw attention to Edgar G.’s repeated ad hominem attacks against me over time, including one in which he used personal medical information I had disclosed as an insult. He is another intolerable offender who deserves a warning.
SEB-
So, amongst all the other rubbish, you’re saying that G-D killed millions of innocent Americans and others because Trump released his Plan.
Why is it that you just can’t see how ridiculous and puerile you sound….??
Have you gone crazy….or simple????
Amongst other idiocies concerning your “Jewish” upbringing, how did it fit in with your Buddhism??? and other trial beliefs you dabbled in????
You seem to have changed almost overnight from a keen observer to a befuddled nincompoop.
You and your “spiritual personal journey”….PoooH ……!!!!!!
Oy. I regard spirituality as a personal journey. That’s the way I was brought up and there is no point i discussing it. The point is that SINCE 1948, at least, it’s super clear that anybody who tried to divide the land of Israel will reap the whirlwind. Empirically. Too many coincidences to dismiss.
Five—and—a—half months of vehement public diplomacy in 1967 made it perfectly clear what the missing definite article in Resolution 242 means.
Exactly. And that’s why I didn’t trust Trump’s assurance that if the Fakestinians didn’t recognize Israel as a Jewish state and renounce violence in 4 years, Israel was free to settle and apply sovereignty to the land without hindrance if it recognized Fakestinian statehood in principle in his cockamamie plan issued almost at the very end of his first term, as if there was no chance he wouldn’t be elected or any chance a Dem regime would honor such a promise. Especially when Kushner, speaking for Trump as Trump later acknowledged, lied and said Bibi was making it up when he said Trump had promised immediate sovereignty in the 30 percent of Yesha where Jews already were living. Until Bibi shut them up by producing Trump’s letter in which he had made this promise in writing.
At the end of the day, when the smoke had cleared, nothing would have been left but the lie that Israel had recognized a Pal state. Just like “territorie(s) with 242. Man, I saw so many documentaries on PBS, growing up about the work around the clock that went into taking the s out of territories, back when the center-left was pro-Israel. (I was glad to see that Trump just defunded PBS.)
Speaking of the center-left, Times of Israel has this highlighted disgusting article today in which illegal Arab settlers on state land are portrayed as an indigenous Bedouin village and Jews who move next door are settlers intimidating them. What’s even worse, is that the IDF said it had no problem with the Arab takeover. I tried to comment, but it wouldn’t let me log in. Might have been a technical glitch but then, again, maybe not. Who knows?
The information is all in the body of the article. Explicitly, Shamelessly. Times of Israel apparently endorses illegal Arab settlement of state lands. And so does the leadership of the IDF. Boom.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/in-the-west-bank-settler-harassment-swiftly-uproots-a-bedouin-hamlet/
May 29, 2025 at 11:28 pm
Times God Has Hit America With a Major Disaster After the US Attempted to Divide the Land of Israel
Jessilyn Lancaster 3:00PM December 27, 2016
https://charismanews.com/opinion/10-times-god-has-hit-america-with-a-major-disaster-after-the-us-attempted-to-divide-the-land-of-israel/
And Covid struck at the same time Trump’s plan was released. That’s number 11
TANNA-
Yes my eyes are old eyes and a still can’t wear glasses, but nothing to do with your silly questions.
But I’ll answer them.
HISTORY tells us why the Jews lost Jerusalem twice. It was because they were defeated by stronger opponents expanding their possessions.
Regardless of the food stores the Canna-im destroyed with internal bickering, the result would eventually have been the same.
G-D had nothing to do with it, it was a natural event resulting from the stronger beating the weaker.
Jewish thought and mind patterns made them into Prophesies by G-d to fit in with thie conception of the “Jewish Mission”.
Except by accidental coincidence all prophesies are predictions post events or obvious contemporary events, or clever comments by clever people. The prophesies that fail to materialise….like the Christian ones… are the effulgencies of silly or doped up imbeciles.
It’s well known that “Prophets” used drugs, like amanita and hasheesh to put them into mystic trances believed by the ignorant, -and ALL were ignorant and superstitious in those days to be G-d induced.
That these foolishnesses have survived to this day in people like you is not surprising because humanity has not become noticeably smarter.
YOU are a prime example of superstitious credulity echoed by many just like you, a whole and numerous world religion in fact.
NO you didn’t say anything about a “Second Coming”. Surely you are minimally intelligent enough to know that I used it as an example of the woolly mind sets of your particular man-made faith.
PS . What if YOUR Messiah is a woman????
PPS The word is “feisty”…not” fisty”……..
Esgar, I guess it’s time to have your eyes examined again. I did not say anything about a second coming. Christians have their Messianic theology and Jews have theirs. They are similar in some ways and different in others. However, they both agree there is one {messiah to come] to come. I lean more to the Jewish side of the issue but am convinced that both camps will be surprised as hell, when he does show up…. Regardless of what is name is. Take care of those eyes.
Edgar, Good to see your still fit and fisty. Based on what you said below, Can you tell me why the Jewish people lost Jerusalem twice? That’s TWO times. And Hashem told them before hand it was going to happen.
They are ALL natural causes not unnatural, and can all be explained by factual science….even foretold in many instances.
Your “conversion” is like me bein nasty to someone and then accidentally stubbing my toe and believing it was a punishment for being nasty.
TANNA-
Don’t you know that the “Second Coming” is a very late Christian concept which was concocted because it was all too obvious that NOT ONE of the suppoed Parousia events was happening or had happened.
For instance, “Lions didn’t lie down with lambs…unless they were fed a fresh one every day”…….”Swords were not veaten into. ploughshares”
“Jews didn’t convert en mass for a Jesus belief”, but only on the very tiniest level as to be nothing.
And much more I just can’t think of now.
So the early Christian Machers concocted the so-called “Second Coming” and converted it into a prophesy, to avoid taking personal responsibility for Another failure which was bound to happen. In fact HAS happened ove rand over again for hundreds of years……
The Jewish Messiah , also a very late blief, came about through Jewish despair and longing for better times etc…… For them (us) it had to be G-D given…Miraculous etc. And so the dummies still wait for a restoration of the peimitive ancient kingdom of King David of 3,000 years ago.
Oxheads indeed.
SEB-
I’m surprised that you would believe that nonsense. What about the unnumbered times that disasters hit various parts of the world with no reason expected weather conditions.
And other times when the scientists were able to give cogent treasons for the events.
Your attitude is like going back to primitive thinking….totally not befitting you.
I’m a Jew because I was born one, and also believe in our uniqueness and the massive benefits we’ve brought to humanity.
I’m proud of my Judaism and wouldn’t swap it for anything on this earth.
But I’m not a primitive thinker of miracles and events caused by G-D .
They are ALL natural causes not unnatural, and can all be explained by factual science….even foretold in many instances.
Your “conversion” is like me bein nasty to someone and then accidentally stubbing my toe and believing it was a punishment for being nasty.
********Besides a MINOR disaster is a MAJOR event to those who suffered
it. LOGIC is needed badly here.*******
Mr. Zorn, it’s ok not to be a Christian. You believe in the Messiah, you just don’t agree with the Christians on what his name is.
Actually though Orthodox Jews believe there will be a Messiah who has not yet lived, not all Jews do. Then that be said their are Christians who also doubt Jesus was anything more than a man. Jews at best believe he was a man, if he existed at all and certainly not part of some Trinity.
This was the article that cured me of my atheism. Though it didn’t turn me into a Christian. Thank God.
https://charismanews.com/opinion/10-times-god-has-hit-america-with-a-major-disaster-after-the-us-attempted-to-divide-the-land-of-israel/
And Covid struck at the same time Trump’s plan was released. That’s number 11
Exactly. And that’s why I didn’t trust Trump’s assurance that if the Fakestinians didn’t recognize Israel as a Jewish state and renounce violence in 4 years, Israel was free to settle and apply sovereignty to the land without hindrance if it recognized Fakestinian statehood in principle in his cockamamie plan issued almost at the very end of his first term, as if there was no chance he wouldn’t be elected or any chance a Dem regime would honor such a promise. Especially when Kushner, speaking for Trump as Trump later acknowledged, lied and said Bibi was making it up when he said Trump had promised immediate sovereignty in the 30 percent of Yesha where Jews already were living. Until Bibi shut them up by producing Trump’s letter in which he had made this promise in writing.
At the end of the day, when the smoke had cleared, nothing would have been left but the lie that Israel had recognized a Pal state. Just like “territorie(s) with 242. Man, I saw so many documentaries on PBS, growing up about the work around the clock that went into taking the s out of territories, back when the center-left was pro-Israel. (I was glad to see that Trump just defunded PBS.)
Speaking of the center-left, Times of Israel has this highlighted disgusting article today in which illegal Arab settlers on state land are portrayed as an indigenous Bedouin village and Jews who move next door are settlers intimidating them. What’s even worse, is that the IDF said it had no problem with the Arab takeover. I tried to comment, but it wouldn’t let me log in. Might have been a technical glitch but then, again, maybe not. Who knows?
The information is all in the body of the article. Explicitly, Shamelessly. Times of Israel apparently endorses illegal Arab settlement of state lands. And so does the leadership of the IDF. Boom.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/in-the-west-bank-settler-harassment-swiftly-uproots-a-bedouin-hamlet/