As you may know, various voices emanating from the international community attacked the validity of the Levy Report. Baker held his ground and insisted that the Levy Report has it right. Good.
Dr. Alan Baker, an expert on international law and a member of the committee headed by Judge Edmond Levi recommending the extension of Israeli law to Jewish towns in Judea and Samaria, said at a conference discussing the matter Tuesday night that Israel would be fully in its rights to do so.
“The task of the Levi Committee was to look at the construction situation in Judea and Samaria and make the appropriate recommendations on how to proceed,” Baker said at the event sponsored by the Women in Green organization. The recommendation to authorize all construction in Judea and Samaria made by the committee was a very important one, he said.
Until very recently, the guiding document for governments in Israel had been a 2004 report authored by leftist attorney Talia Sasson, who recommended the dismantling of many new communities, termed “outposts,” in Judea and Samaria. Sasson later ran for Knesset on the far-left Meretz party list.
Baker said that much of the trouble relating to these communities was due to Sasson’s bad faith in preparing the report. She had been asked by then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to prepare a report on “unauthorized outposts, but when she produced the report she termed them ‘illegal’ outposts.” The government, Baker said, had no choice but to act on removing the communities, because “she turned anyone who builds there into criminals.”
Because of that report, Presidents Bush and Obama also adopted the attitude that the communities were illegal, Baker said. This attitude was mistaken, he claimed. “Not having authorization is not a crime…Our mission was to clarify the situation and make appropriate recommendations.”
The committee examined the rights of Israel to build in Judea and Samaria altogether. Leftist groups, said Baker, attempted to prove that only Arabs had the right to build on non-privately owned lands in the the region, but those proofs were rejected by the committee, he said.
“After and extensive investigation, we determined that Judea and Samaria were not legally ‘occupied.’ It was not under legal control of any entity,” including Jordan, whose declaration of sovereignty over the region was never recognized by international organizations like the UN, said Baker. As a result, “building by Israel in Judea and Samaria does not violate the Geneva Convention.”
In contrast, Israel, as the representative of the Jewish people, could claim an historic right to build in Judea and Samaria. “No one can deny this historic right. There are no pacts, treaties, or any other documents that attribute Palestinian rights to the region.” Baker added that he had presented the committee’s conclusions to many diplomats, and all accepted them – except for Israel.
@ Allen Z. Hertz:
Well, of course it’s offensive. But that is precisely because that identity is of such long standing, and in no objective way comparable to the local ethnic Arab charade of the past 55-something years.
It took the Jews centuries to become a people (let alone, a nation). The collection of clans that left Egyptian slavery ca 1300-1400 BC was hardly a ‘people’ by any stretch of the imagination. It constituted some 3 million persons with a shared experience of bondage linked to a common (yet increasingly remote) memory of shared ancestry; nothing more. Nor was it a ‘people’ that crossed the Jordan into Cana’an after wandering for 4 decades in the wilderness.
It would be literally hundreds MORE yrs till those fractious & often mutually antagonistic descendants of slaves would be forced by circumstances (primarily, the Philistine threat) to gradually begin putting aside their internecine squabblings & tribal fealties in favor of developing a rudimentary national sensibility with a civic underpinning.
Moreover, and with all due respect, to characterize the "ethnogenesis" that you speak of as having occurred around the 6th century BC is, I would submit, to miss the forest for the trees:
Had that ethnogenesis not been established & solidified well BEFORE the Babylonian Captivity (to which I assume you refer in citing the 6th century), then there would have been no cohesive Jewish People remaining to begin making the return to The Land when a victorious Cyrus gave the okay half-a-century later.
What is TRULY offensive is the notion that such a tempering & moulding over those many centuries should be EQUATED with the cheap, strictly P-R Pali effort of the past 55 years since 1967 —
let alone, discounted IN FAVOR of it — over the matter of who is, and isn’t, a people.
Offensive? — good God, it’s friggin’ OUTRAGEOUS. . . .
@ Allen Z. Hertz:
Why not, specifically?
Can you not see the loss of a powerful point by relinquishing that part of the narrative, particularly in view of what it reveals about their intentions?
You say, “Mala fides notwithstanding” — yet I fail to see HOW one can lay aside the bad faith of the soi-disant Palestinians (OR their sovereign Arab brethren).
— Mala fides as an issue is indeed INTEGRAL to the struggle, and thus also to the discussion.
Ponder, if you care to, the intentions implicit in the naked broodings of early ‘Palestinian’ Arab agitator & propagandist, Musa Bey al-Alami [1897-1984]:
The adoption & development of that myth is what has come to constitute the now 4-decade history of the Palestinian ‘national’ movement.
That myth has incorporated the flagrant & persistent bearing of false witness against the State of Israel and the Zionist cause, alongside the impudent & malicious slandering of the Jewish People’s good name, the calculated extortion of its material patrimony & the attempted usurpation of its very selfhood
— identity theft, indeed, of the highest order
and lowest intent.
@ Allen Z. Hertz:
“Perhaps”? — you mean you aren’t sure?
— You know far more than enough about the relevant history, Allen, to be using the qualifier “perhaps” here.
One need only note the indignant admonitions of local Arab leader, Aouni-Bey Abd al-Hadi, speaking in opposition to a Jewish Palestine independent & apart from the Arab world before there was a Jewish state. Testifying in 1937 before the Peel Commission — he fumed: “There is no such country [as Palestine]! ‘Palestine’ is a term the Zionists invented! There is no ‘Palestine’ in the Bible. ‘Palestine’ is alien to us; it is the Zionists who introduced it.”
An understandable enough (if terribly faulty) assumption, to be sure, given the circumstances. Actually, right up until Israel obtained her independence in 1948, the only people broadly & consistently identifying themselves as “Palestinians,” or indeed their country as “Palestine,” were in fact the JEWS of the Palestine region. The Brits, as League Mandatory, sought to create a new ‘nation’ of ‘Palestinians’ in order to deny the Jews distinctive nationhood there. But the ploy backfired — only the Jews accepted the appellation. Palestine’s ethnic Arabs would have nothing of it.
What’s more, Palestine’s Arabs, if ”unlucky” enough, in those pre-State days, to be addressed by an observer as “Palestinians,” would, more often than not, have responded to such a gaffe with either the characteristic irritation evinced by the above-cited barb of Abd al-Hadi, or a deeply offended (indeed, scandalized) sense of insult at this graceless faux pas & insufferably ignorant violation of their identity & loyalty to the greater “Arab Nation,” or greater Syria, from which they’d been separated at San Remo.
It was only with the 1948 Jewish Proclamation of Independent Sovereignty as the newly-named State of “Israel” and with the consequent designation of the infant state’s citizens as “Israelis” (thus, no longer as “Palestinians”) — together with the restored Commonwealth’s successful defense of that independence against the quarter century of continued pan-Arab attempts to abort or crush it — that the appellation of “Palestinian,” having fallen into disuse amongst the Jews (for whom, as noted, it had been common & even standard before statehood) — became available to the local ethnic Arabs (who, as likewise shown, had heretofore shunned it like the plague).
Having failed to prevent the birthing of the Jewish state, the self-appointed & self-serving Palestine Arab leadership now began — albeit, for the first 2 ensuing decades, with limited popular success (until Israel acquired the unincorporated heartland provinces of Judea & Samaria in the defensive war of 1967) — to appropriate “Palestinian” as their own name as an explicitly non-Jewish ‘nationality.’
The impudent notion of an old — and preexisting, ‘indigenous,’ self-identified, Arab — ‘nation’ in Palestine would provoke nothing but gales of giggles in any moderately informed observer, were it not for the fact that the proposition has acquired, in recent yrs, sufficient purchase on the popular consciousness as to render its pernicious potential sobering.
Allen Z. Hertz Said:
Well put. I think the greatest obstruction are the Jews themselves; lacking the information and thus the motivation to assert their rights and claims.
what does the international legal community say about restoring justice to the jews cleansed from arab lands after the advent of the Geneva conventions? What do they say about not fulfilling their obligations under san remo, LON mandate and UN charter article 80 to encourage jewish settlement west of river? What do they say about the fact that every part of the former palestine mandate territory under arab control is JEW FREE(gaza, west bank, jordan)? What does international law say about one sided application of law?
Bernard Ross Said:
Bernard, a lifetime studying history, international law and relations, as well as some practical work experience in Canada’s Department of Foreign Affairs, teach me that countries normally need both thugs and Ph.Ds. Human capital is one of Israel’s greatest assets. You are right to say that victors also need legal arguments, and lawyers too. In the rain or under sunny skies, we should always be looking for better political and legal arguments. Even far from the courtroom or from meetings of the UN Security Council, international law is much like an ongoing discussion about rights. And, some discussions are more interesting than others, even where we disagree with our interlocutors. For sure, law professors tend to exaggerate the role of international law in international affairs. Better to lose a legal argument than to lose a war, but even better is to lose neither.
XLucid Said:
XLucid, Where did you study your public international law? The modern political and legal doctrine of the self-determination of Peoples is probably a peremptory norm of modern public international law. As such, it likely overrides treaty law. Moreover, modern public international law recognizes self-identification as the principal criterion with respect to the existence of a People. This critical element is largely subjective. It is not for you or me to tell local Arabs who they are. If they tell us that they are now “the Palestinian People,” we pretty much have to accept that at face value. Moreover, beyond such subjectivity, there is also an objective element. Today, almost every one of the world’s governments –notably including that of Israel– accepts the existence of the Palestinian People. Far better to focus more deeply and intelligently on the existence and rights of the Jewish People than to tilt at the windmill of trying to argue the non-existence of the Palestinian People. However, there is also some good news here. The doctrine of the self-determination of Peoples cannot apply retroactively. This means that a People which first self-identifies with a particular new name circa 1960 cannot in that new name now make retroactive claims with regard to periods before its ethnogenesis. Neither subjectively nor objectively was there a specifically Palestinian People prior to the 1960’s. If this newborn Palestinian People today wants to make claims with regard to, e.g., the post-WW1 period, it would probably have to do so by way of claiming succession of rights from the great Arab People which was how the grandfathers of the modern Palestinians were perhaps identifying at that earlier time. And for sure, in terms of argumentation, it makes a real difference. As between the great Arab People and the great Jewish People, the equities look somewhat different. Moreover, looking at the last 1400 years in Eretz Israel, we know that the native Jewish population there was always victim of Muslim Arab discrimination, not to mention occasional periods of persecution at the hands of Muslim Arabs.
Allen Z. Hertz Said:
If jewish organizations, religious and secular, and the state of Israel are negligent in their responsibity to educate jewish children to all these rights, then what? I have never heard a GOI refute libelous and slanderous declarations alleging the illegality of jewish settlement west of jordan river. I have never heard a GOI demanding, of the signatories and guarantors of the relevant compacts and treaties, the fulfilling of their legal and moral obligations to the jews. The first to be blamed should be the state of Israel and jewish organizatins and institutions. If you do not claim and exercise your rights, if you do not contest the obstruction of those rights, then the only good of these legal pursuits is as an excuse to utter when invading and destroying ones enemies, seizing their assets and establishing puppet regimes. Giving such excuses enables fence sitters to move to the side of the victor without too much embarrassment, especially when their assets and supplies are in the victors control. If Israel seized the saudi oil then all the arguments would dwindle from those who continued to get their oil. Nobody cares who controls the oil if they are still getting what they want. Perhaps Israel will develop independence and a will to assert when it trly learns that all its legal, moral, aboriginal, etc rights dont mean a fig and that the world will sacrifice them to any crocodile to avoid inconvenience. This would set the jews free. As Yamit said on another posts: the jews need thugs not PHD’s
There is no reason to continue a charade which empowers jew killers and their european supporters; there is no reason to recognize self determination for a faux people who maintain Jew Free areas under their control: simply put they are existential enemies deserving of every trick. The value of law is as a tactic, but not to be taken seriously for its content.
Bernard Ross Said:
Bernard, there is assuredly no significant sense in which Judaism, Jews, the Jewish People or Israel can really rely on international institutions (like those of the UN system) or on other countries. Sad to say there is again a tsunami of hatred against Jews (antisemitism) washing over much of former Christendom and almost all of the current Islamic World. And even some regions beyond Christendom and the Islamic World are today to some extent influenced against Israel by the circumstance that there are now no fewer than 57 Muslim countries banded together in the Islamic Cooperation Organization. Though President Obama himself is certainly not to be counted among Israel’s friends, most Americans remain friendly to Israel. The current Government of Canada is also exceptionally friendly to the Jewish State, though the Canadian People is not necessarily so warm. Vis a vis Russia, China and India, the Israel government should continue good work toward strengthening relations. I do not know whether specifically legal arguments would much help in the task of solidifying ties with the aforementioned more positive countries. But good legal arguments would certainly do no harm. Most important, good legal arguments might –at the very least– touch the hearts of some Jews both in Israel and abroad. Many Jews listen too much to Israel’s enemies. Many Jews have never heard confident, intelligent, articulate and persuasive legal arguments for Jewish Statehood in the aboriginal homeland of the Jewish People. If those pro-Israel arguments are interesting and compelling, they will instill pride and enhance Jewish dignity. This in itself will significantly reinforce the Jewish People and Israel.
@ Allen Z. Hertz:
Under international law, Palestinian people have never existed as a separate entity or a distinctive people.
As a matter of fact, the three treaties of international law only refer to “the different religious communities in Palestine“. As a result, all other communities which mean, including arabs, are put in the same level. All communities (other than Jewish) should be dealt with in the same way.
Palestinians have never been seen or heard of before in the world, they are a fictitious people made from Egyptians, Irakians, Lebaneses, Arabian Peninsula, etc…. According to the definition of UNRWA “whose normal residence was Palestine for a minimum of two years preceding the conflict in 1948“.
Therefore, Palestinians have no legal right other than civil and religious rights, as would any other community living in the Land of Israel. No political rights and no self-determination.
reply 40 to Hertz in moderation
Allen Z. Hertz Said:
This perpetuates the swindle of the severance of 80% of former palestine mandate. If a jew free arab land has been created from the overwhelmingly major portion then why should more be given to be jew free? This does not result in equity: the creation of more jew free land on former mandate. there needs to be a transfer of arabs west of the jordan river to the east bank which is jew free and obviously created to exclude jews and therefore the arab portion. The ethnic cleansing of jews from the arab nations as a result of the arab israeli wars put a burden on Israel for more land. The only equitable solution that can legalize and restore justice for the jewish transfer, and the creation of Jew free jordan, is the transfer of the arabs to jordan. Population exchanges have occurred before and the nations did not object to jewish transfer after the creation of the GC. Not to transfer creates a double standard which encourages more swindling. Resolution will not come through agreements but through facts on the ground and transfer. Anything else will be a postponement of resolution.
@ Allen Z. Hertz: I do not disagree with the application of natural, historical or aboriginal law/rights. However, if the Jew cannot rely on the international community to observe its own treaties, etc with the Jews there there would be no reason to seek to rely on international approval or acknowledgement of other rights of any kind. In fact, I view the appeal to international treaties and law etc primarily to use as a basis for acting unilaterally as I do not expect the internationals to honor or apply law equitably but rather to continue double standards for Jews. When acting unilaterally Israel can quote all the legal, moral, aboriginal, etc rights as its basis for seizing the lands and assets due from agreements and as reparations for committing and funding terror against the Jewish people. Quoting these rights are not for the institutions which will not honor them but rather to give others an excuse to side with Israel. EG If Israel were to seize the oil assets of the saudi kingdom she would have more of the world on her side by stating that the reason was to exact reparations for terror funding; however, the real reason for them to side with Israel would be that Israel would be in control of their oil. They just need a BS excuse to rationalize acting in their own interests. This is the real value of international law and rights; unless you believe that Israel would have a chance in an international court of law or the court of public opinion.
Bernard Ross Said:
The raison d’etre of the newborn Palestinian People may very well be the destruction of Israel. Cancelling Jewish aboriginal, treaty and self-determination rights was clearly the motive that prompted local Arabs to begin generally self-identifying as the specifically Palestinian People for the first time around the mid-1960’s. Before then, there is absolutely no historical evidence of any human population generally self-identifying as the specifically Palestinian People. Mala fides notwithstanding, this newborn Palestinian People now probably has a right to self-determination, including claims to both territory and independence. This is likely the case principally because the doctrine of the self-determination of Peoples is probably a peremptory norm of modern public international law. However, the fly in the Palestinian ointment is that there are also relevant Jewish rights which taken together are probably even more powerful than those of the Palestinians. Namely, the Jewish People has a combination of aboriginal, treaty and self-determination rights. If there is to be some realization of the rights of the newly self-identified Palestinian People, it can only lawfully be achieved in a way that does not threaten to cancel the prior rights of the Jewish People. For example, the Palestinian People already lacks the right to wage a decolonization war against the Jewish People because Israel is not colonial in character and the Jewish People lawfully resides between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea. For any full-and-final peace settlement, the primary principle would likely have to be the self-determination of Peoples. Areas that now are mostly inhabited by Jews should remain part of Israel. To another jurisdiction (Palestine? Jordan?) should go those areas that are now mostly inhabited by those Palestinians wishing to live in that other jurisdiction. To respect the aboriginal rights of the Jewish People, there must be secure and effective Jewish access to religious sites sacred to Judaism for millennia. To respect Jewish aboriginal, treaty and self-determination rights, the new jurisdiction west of the Jordan River must be “unmilitarized,” with airspace control remaining with the Israel government. Nor is there any legal requirement for Israel to compensate this new jurisdiction for a frontier deviating from the 1949 armistice demarcation line, the Green Line. The Green Line counts for next to nothing in terms of the paramount doctrine of the self-determination of Peoples, not to mention Jewish aboriginal and treaty rights that run from the Mediterranean Sea to the Jordan River. Will the Palestinian People ever accept this? If not, too bad for them! In that event, Jews are probably entitled to continue building homes, schools, synagogues, hospitals, businesses and farms on lawfully acquired land anywhere between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River. On December 2, 2012, the Israel Cabinet said: “The Jewish People has a natural, historical and legal right to its homeland.” The Palestinian People also has some rights that are subsequent to the prior rights of the Jewish People. The Palestinian People can realize its hopes for self-determination, territory and independence provided that it forever abandons its plan to destroy the Jewish State. Any full-and-final peace treaty should certainly include both ironclad security arrangements and unequivocal recognition of the legitimacy and permanence of Israel as the Jewish State, i.e. as the political expression of the self-determination of the Jewish People in a part of its larger aboriginal homeland. Is this going to happen? Not bloody likely!
Allen Z. Hertz Said:
If it is not the business of the victim being swindled then who’s business is it? When a person assumes a false identity in order to rob you it is fraud. It is our business because this faux group assumed the identity for the EXPRESS purpose of swindling the Jews. This has been stated from time to time by their leadership.
@ Bernard Ross: Bernard, your definition of what validly constitutes law might be too limited to serve the long-term interests of the Jewish People and Israel. On December 2, 2012, the Israel Cabinet significantly opined: “The Jewish People has a natural, historical and legal right to its homeland.” Inter alia, this means that the Israel Cabinet argues that the Jewish People also has a natural law right to its homeland. And, this is precisely, my difference with the scholarship of writers like Howard Greif, who quite rightly emphasizes (without any real originality) the legal effects of the series of declarations, resolutions and treaties from 1917 to 1923. Like any other careful student of public international law, I concur entirely with Howard, particularly because modern public international law recognizes relevant treaties as the primary source of the law of nations. However, where I differ from you and Howard is in my very firm understanding of the pre-existing moral and legal right of the Jewish People to Eretz Israel. Even before the Balfour Declaration and the San Remo Resolution, the Jewish People already had a natural law right to Eretz Israel that was created by history. This natural law right was clearly already to some extent effective in the minds of some Jews, but also in the conscience of some non-Jews, particularly in Great Britain and the USA. Good to study the post WW1 settlement and great to know that the 1922 Palestine Mandate of the League of Nations is akin to a treaty that still has some legal effects today. However, I prefer to supplement my public international law with the wisdom of the Aboriginal Peoples of Canada who are too canny to ever be fooled into acknowledging that their right to the land flows merely from the “White man’s law.” Rather, the Aboriginal People’s of Canada will argue that their right to the land has existed ever since the sun began to shine and the rivers to flow. And in some ways, this viewpoint of the Aboriginal Peoples of Canada dovetails with Jewish Law which, with regard to rights to Eretz Israel, tells us in Genesis about God’s covenant with Abraham and his descendants. Nor would this aspect of Jewish law necessarily be without some effect in other legal systems. For example, let us consider how –in a purely secular context– the Supreme Court of Canada (SCC) might treat God’s covenant with Abraham, were Eretz Israel on Vancouver Island and the Jewish People one of Canada’s First Nations. Given that bizarre hypothesis, the SCC would probably regard the historical and anthropological fact that, for centuries the Jewish People has always believed in the covenant, as powerful evidence of the importance of that particular land (i.e. Eretz Israel) in the culture and civilization of that specific tribe (i.e. the Jewish People). You do not fancy this line of argument? Too bad, because public international law is now closing in on Israel and trying to destroy it. Now, you and I know that the International Court of Justice (ICJ) was guilty of bias and perverted treaty interpretation in the 2004 advisory opinion on the legal consequences of the building of a wall in the occupied Palestinian territory. However, the fact remains that international lawyers have some regard for ICJ opinions. So, what to do? Well, for starters, we now craft our arguments adding some elements that are beyond the reach of the ICJ. We enrich the mix with arguments drawn from other legal systems, including Jewish Law. And, where it is to our advantage, we also refer to morality and natural law, as did former Quebec Premier Lucien Bourchard shortly after the separatist defeat in the 1995 Quebec referendum. No accident that Lucien Bouchard is trained in the civil law, where there is a fuller appreciation for the potential for raising natural law arguments. And, that is why former Canadian Justice Minister Irwin Cotler spoke very significantly around 2008, when in more than speech, he compared the Jewish People to the Aboriginal Peoples of Canada. In the same vein, there is extraordinary importance to my own writing on the aboriginal rights of the Jewish People which really has added something new to the debate. I do not know whether you have yet to follow my advice to go to http://www.allenzhertz.com to look at an October 2011 posting entitled “Jewish Aboriginal Rights to Israel.” Whatever you think, the fact is that as time passes, the Israel government is gradually coming closer to these aboriginal rights arguments that I have been sharing with others since early 2009. The intent is not to replace work such as that of Howard Greif, but rather to supplement our understanding of the nature of public international law.
Allen Z. Hertz Said:
Actually it is not exceedingly complex. It is rendered complex by the numerous violations of treaties and trusts with the intent of swindling the jewish people. If these violations did not occur, or were removed and restored to justice as contained in the legal documents, it is all simple. Trying to rationalize an outcome which does not recognize the occurrence of the swindles only seeks to continue the swindles. EG UNGA 181 was an attempt to illegally subdivided the palestine mandate and swindle the jews of more territory after a JEW FREE arab “palestinian” homeland was already severed earlier (also illegally and antisemitic-ally). Future “complexities” sought to preserve and perpetuate the swindling of the Jewish people. It is insulting to talk of “palestinian” indigenous rights when 80% was already dedicated as an ethnically pure JEW FREE state for them.
Allen Z. Hertz Said:
The basis for this recognition was the historical connection. After that the succeeding treaties of San Remo, LON mandate, UN Charter art 80 clothed the historical rights with legal rights and obligated the signatories and guarantors to “encourage the jewish people to close settlement west of the Jordan river”. Other than Israels treaty with Jordan there is no resolution or declaration of any parties (inc the UN 181 and 242) which is legally superior. Clearly stated in the treaties, etc was that jews will enjoy political, civil and religious rights and arabs will enjoy civil and religious rights. Furthermore, the creation of the JEW FREE state of trans jordan on the 80% of the mandate territory sets precedents regarding the disposition of the balance of the territory(west of the river) and the content of the populations therein(implying segregation in both portions) Double standards are unacceptable and where the law, or other process, creates a double standard for jews it must be repudiated and rejected.
@ dweller: General self-identification is the normal rule for determining the existence of a People. If local Arabs now generally tell us that they are today the Palestinian People, we are obliged to take them at their word. Moreover, most of the world now seems to agree that they are today the Palestinian People. As for the specific moral and legal consequences of such Palestinian Peoplehood, I invite you to read the concluding parts to my essay on “Jewish Aboriginal Rights to Israel,” which is an October 2011 posting at http://www.allenzhertz.com
@ Bernard Ross: I never wrote that the relevant rights of the Jewish People and the Palestinian People are identical. What I understand in this connection is set out in “Jewish Aboriginal Rights to Israel” which deserves careful reading. Versions have been published in various venues. You can find the latest version as an October 2011 posting at http://www.allenzhertz.com When in the 1960’s local Arabs decided to generally self-identify as the Palestinian People, the land between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea had already been internationally recognized (1917-1922) as “national home for the Jewish People.” The then rationale was “the historical connection of the Jewish People to Palestine.” This means that the connection of self-identified Jews to Eretz Israel was already a 26-centuries-old “fact on the ground” when the generality of local Arabs suddenly woke up one morning in the 1960’s to tell us that now they are the Palestinian People.
@ dweller: Dweller, within the context of the modern political and legal doctrine of the self-determination of Peoples, the general rule is probably self-identification. It is hard for you or me to deny the current Peoplehood of the Palestinians, if they themselves generally self-identify as “the Palestinian People” and commonly tell others that they are the Palestinian People. Moreover, in addition to this subjective aspect of how they see themselves, there is also an objective aspect in which others see them as “the Palestinian People.” For example, most of the world seems to believe that the local Arabs are now the Palestinian People. Perhaps true that this Palestinian self-identification has been only recently adopted (circa the 1960’s) and perhaps even purpose-built for the never-ending war against the Jews. Nonetheless, I do not think that it is our business to go about second guessing the national self-identifications of other Peoples. For example, I find it particularly offensive to have others questioning the self-identification of the specifically “Jewish” People, which probably was born (ethnogenesis) sub nomine Yehudim some time around the 6th century BCE. But without any reference to history, a currently existing People normally does have self-determination rights. And, this can mean a variety of things depending on the specific circumstances. Here, “the specific circumstances” probably include the rights of the Jewish People, including the prior aboriginal and treaty rights of the Jewish People, but also the current self-determination rights of the Jewish People. Inter alia, this means that realizing the self-determination rights of the newborn Palestinian People cannot be lawfully achieved in a manner that promises to destroy Israel and cancel the aboriginal, treaty and self-determination rights of the Jewish People. The current dispute over the existence of the Jewish State in Eretz Israel is exceedingly complex and is not put to rest simply by the observation that today there exists both the Jewish People and the Palestinian People. Though there now probably exists a distinct Palestinian People, it is probably an anachronism to retroactively read that Palestinian self-identification back in time. With respect to historical periods before the 1960’s, it is doubtful whether the Palestinian People can today make news claims in its own name. Rather, the newborn Palestinian People would have to make such historical claims by way of supposed succession from alleged precursor identities. For example, for the modern Palestinian People to complain about the outcome of the diplomatic settlement after the First World War, it would have to try to step into the shoes of the Arab People and/or the Muslim ummah, because that is the way that the local Muslim Arabs generally self-identified at that point in time. This has a number of implications, including weighing the 1917-1923 global settlement in terms of the benefits that were then accorded to the great Arab People. And in this regard, it is probably true that both history and international law recognize the intertemporal principle which likely means that the doctrine of the self-determination of Peoples cannot be applied retroactively to historical periods before the birth of that particular People. And make no mistake, with regard to this matter of self-identification as a People, the matter of the specific name is indeed crucial. However, better than doubting the current Peoplehood of the Palestinians is to think more deeply about the 26 centuries of the Peoplehood of the Jews. The Israel Cabinet was probably entirely correct (December 2, 2012) in declaring that “the Jewish People has a natural, historical and legal right to its homeland. Whether a thousand years ago or today, Jews returning to Eretz Israel to live with other Jews, cannot be compared to the 17th-century Pilgrim Fathers who went to build English “settlements” in America, where they had neither ancestors nor native kin. Moreover, since the ethnogenesis of the self-identified “Jewish” People (circa the 6th century BCE), there have always been self-identified Jews living in Eretz Israel, where for more than two millennia, they have always had the strongest claim to be the aboriginal People. Thus, Jews have a moral and legal right to acquire property and build in the aboriginal homeland of the Jewish People. Moreover, the aboriginal rights of the Jewish People also probably include the right to life, i.e. Jews probably have a moral and legal right to live safely in their aboriginal homeland, in relation to which the Palestinian People likely lacks title to wage a decolonization war.
@ Allen Z. Hertz:
Why is it ‘insulting’?
Because it isn’t true?
Or because it is
— but it isn’t ‘nice’ to say so?
Which?
Define (with particularity), please, the term “self-determination,” as you use it here.
Allen Z. Hertz Said:
I cannot disagree more. There is no comparison analogy between the 2 peoples in terms of history or legality. Political, religious and civil rights were granted to the Jews but only civil and religious to the arabs. The”pals did not refer to themselves as such before 1960’s. Jordan representing 80% of palestine mandate territory was created Jew free and given to an arabian tribe from mecca. It is well-known that the local arabs considered themselves as arabs or southern syrians. They may have self-determination rights but not in Israel. If the mandate was severed and the majority portion was banned to Jews, who prior had settlement rights, then it follows that the remaining portion should be banned to arabs so as to create equity to all who had vested rights prior to severance. It is a disingenuous double standard to create an exclusive jew free arab homeland on 80% yet still vest rights to the same arab party in the remaining territory. What did the jews get in exchange for the stealing of their settlement rights east of the river? Also, it is my understanding that there has been no expiration, cancellation or rescission of the Jewish right to settle west of Jordan river. that the jordanian occupation, and the british recognition of it, violated the relevant treaties by obstructing jewish settlement. That the enfranchisement of those rights is superior to later declarations or resolutions which conflict with those rights. That the GOI has a current and continuing obligation as the mandate successor,and as agent of jews, to “facilitate the settlement of Jews west of the jordan river and east of the green line. Also, that the GOI is violating this internationally guaranteed mandate obligation as did the Jordanians. Any occupier of the west bank is obligated to observe the mandate which did not expire simply because the british abandoned it as its objectives were not fulfilled between the green line and river…
@ CuriousAmerican:
You make this same proposal every time the subject arises, Curio.
But despite having been called on it several times, you’ve yet to respond by way of any followup that I’m aware of.
No sovereign country is obligated to offer BLANKET citizenship to everybody who comes within its governmental purview if this will endanger its existing populace.
OTOH, there is no reason it might not place those individuals who were interested on a “citizenship track” — to be considered for enfranchisement, and to be provided the opportunity to establish & demonstrate their readiness for it over a period of, say, 12-15 yrs. Needless to say, there might well be those who’d rankle under the prospect of finding themselves under a magnifying glass for that stretch of time, and would choose therefore not to opt for the proposition. Others would likely object to the very idea of becoming citizens of a country that explicitly & constitutionally declared itself to be a Jewish state. But that would be their choice to make.
This is pragmatically unworkable unless — and UNTIL — the terror groups (including the PA itself) are all . . . . liquidated.
— You up for that?
@ Allen Z. Hertz</a
"First we will kill all the lawyers" Shakespere "The horses pulling a lawyer's hearst to the graveyard,snicker all the way" Dickens
@ Allen Z. Hertz:
@ deborah lurya:
You go girl!!! You due your name honor.
@ deborah lurya: Deborah, there are several kinds of law, not only “public international law.” This is exactly why Alan Baker and the Israel Cabinet are now basing Israel’s arguments also on “natural law” and “historical rights.” For example, it seems to me that “Jewish Law” (halacha) also has something to say about the status of Eretz Israel. Moreover, I can think of some circumstances in which what Jewish Law has across the centuries been saying on this specific topic might have some bearing in relevant matters that might be considered in litigation, transactions or negotiations conducted under other legal systems. By the way, victors also need lawyers and legal arguments. Though no country can manage without its soldiers, there is also some sort of a role for lawyers and for strong legal arguments.
@ Morten I Refsaas: You are entirely correct! The British forced the Turks to accept the current border in 1906. Before that time the Sinai was not part of Ottoman Egypt which then stopped around the Suez Canal.
@ Morten I Refsaas: You are completely correct! The British forced the Ottoman Turks to accept the current border only in 1906. Before that time Ottoman Egypt stopped near the Suez Canal and the Sinai was not part of Ottoman Egypt, i.e. an Egypt that was nominally subject to the Sultan until the Ottoman Empire entered World War I in October 1914. There are some late 19th-century Ottoman maps that show the Sinai as administered by the Ottoman Turks in a unit together with the Jerusalem area.
Times are changing when Alan Baker talks about the historical right of the Jewish People to its ancestral homeland. And, I am also pleased that the Israel Cabinet (December 2, 2012) also affirmed that “the Jewish People has a natural, historical and legal right to its homeland.” This should not be understood as necessarily denying the possible existence of others with rights. For example, today there probably exists a newly self-identified “Palestinian” People which likely also has some claims to self-determination, territory and independence. The moral, political and legal point is that now there ought to be some sort of a peaceful process for effecting something like a juridical reconciliation of the rights of the ancient Jewish People with those of the newborn Palestinian People. And, essential for such a reconciliation of rights is fully respecting the honor and dignity of both Peoples. For example, suggesting that international law is violated by Jews building homes, schools, synagogues, hospitals and farms east of the 1949 armistice demarcation line is to smear the name of the Jewish People in its ancestral homeland. Equally insulting is to say that there is no Palestinian People or that it lacks the right to self-determination that belongs to all other Peoples. Since 2009, I have been reading, thinking, writing and publishing about the aboriginal rights of the Jewish People. My current thoughts are now expressed in “Jewish Aboriginal Rights to Israel” which is an October 2011 posting at http://www.allenzhertz.com There, I argue that the Jewish People has aboriginal and treaty rights to all the land from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea, and also self-determination rights to all those areas that are now mostly inhabited by Jews. Moreover, I compare the Jewish People’s aboriginal rights to its ancestral homeland with the right of the Greek People to Greece and that of the Aboriginal Peoples of Canada to their tribal lands. At this time, there is an urgent need to flesh out the natural and historical right of the Jewish People to its aboriginal homeland, exactly because UN institutions like the International Court of Justice (ICJ) are daily busy fabricating and counterfeiting a false public international law purposely designed to sink Israel. For example, the 2004 ICJ advisory opinion on the legal consequences of the building of a wall in the occupied Palestinian Territory mentioned “the Palestinian People” close to a dozen times, but did not have a single reference to the Jewish People. There can be no doubt that there was shocking bias and a perverse reading of treaties in that ICJ advisory opinion, which is not binding on the Israel government. Accordingly, Jewish lawyers now need to reach for a rich array of legal sources and concepts to make the case for Israel. Public international law alone will not suffice. Moreover, looking at the kind of historical evidence that the Supreme Court of Canada considers in aboriginal cases, I am reminded that there is also an important role to be played by Israel’s historians. We know that the self-identified “Jewish” People was born some time around the 6th century BCE. We also know that there have been Jews living in Eretz Israel in each year across the 26 centuries since the 6th-century BCE ethnogenesis of the Jewish People. However, we now need something like a year-by-year data base of all the evidence relating to Jews living in Eretz Israel from the 6th century BCE until the present. For example, from the late 16th century, there are some Ottoman-Turkish registers that even list the names of Jewish taxpayers. And for some earlier periods, there are many sources like the documents from the Cairo Geniza. Normally, a lawyer lacks the skills of an historian and vice versa. We now need “all hands on deck” for a cooperative effort to substantiate the Jewish People’s natural, historical and legal right to its ancestral homeland. I have been doing my part. Are you doing your part?
The Zuez chanal was made 1860 – 1870. They had problems with Arab Pirats attacing the ships so they removed the
barder between Africa and Asia till a defenceline from Gasa to Eilat. The border between Africa had been permanent
in thousands oh years. – from the river of Egypt to Zuez
@ Yidvocate:
You are wrong, It was group called Palestinnians in the British mandate. They were all jews. The invented group
Was made at the arab sumit in 1964. They should be a wepond against Israel
Antisemitism has long ago infiltrated the international legal system to the point that a mother would not recognize her children.
@ CuriousAmerican:
American citizenship and political rights as an American are not forfeited by a change in residence outside of the borders of the U.S.A.
An American citizen in a foreign country can vote by Absentee Ballot and for sure while residing in a territory of the U.S.
@ XLucid:
Engineers make better attorneys. 🙂
Israeli Law has not been extended to Yehuda and Shomron, They are controlled/managed by military regulatory documents.
Why are the “supreme courtiers” of Israel, as well as the AG, prosecution, police, whose jurisdictions are within Israel as it is known today, acting on territories not under their jurisdiction?
History is not the issue–its not about history–its about God giving the land to the Jews!
@ NormanF:
That is a faulty analogy–how things are in Puerto Rico and anywhere else is completely irrelevant!
It’s really much simpler than the above comments suggest. Let’s go back to when these lands were first parceled off. The Mandate for Palestine at the end of WW1 was carved up with 80% of it promised for the Jewish homeland given to the Arabs and the creation of Trans-Jordan. Of the 20% remainder, we now have Hamastan as another piece parceled off to the Arabs. In the scant remainder that is left, where the Jews didn’t kick out the Arabs as the Arabs did to close to a million Jews who had lived in Arab lands for centuries (even before Mohammad appeared on the world stage), the Arabs that behave can stay as residents of Israel and they can look to their political rights to the now Arab lands that comprise over 80% of the original Mandate lands. We don’t owe them anything further! In fact one could with justice advocate that all Arabs in Israel forfeit their citizenship until such time as Jordan and Gaza afford citizenship to Jews. Let’s not forget that until Jordan unilaterally revoked the Jordanian citizenship of the Arabs in J&S, there was no such thing as a “Palestinian”. They went to bed Jordanians and woke up fakestinian. Why should we accept such a fraud? Would they have any claim as Jordanians? Of course not. Why do we buy into such outrageous and self-destructive fictions??
Various nation states limit granting of citizenship and rights even to those born within a country. the west bank arabs accepted JOrdanian citizenship and the unilateral withdrawal of that citizenship by Jordan does not create an obligation for Israel. If there were Brazilians residing in Russia and Brazil withdrew its citizenship from them this would not confer an obligation on Russia to grant them citizenship.
In any situation re YS the land should remain under Israeli sovereignty. They may be granted a degree of autonomy and impermanent residency on Israel land until future dates but no citizenship and no sovereignty. As time goes on and JOrdan improves they will desire to move there and when they become a minority in YS the autonomy may be removed. Better not to give autonomy or citizenship but consider them as temporary residents who are citizens of Jordan or stateless. There is no imperative that citizenship must be granted to non citizens, which they are. They may be allowed temporary residence until JOrdan restores their citizenship to them or until they violate a law(then deported) JOrdan has left its citizens in Israel but they are not Israel’s responsibility.
Unlike Curious American arguments: that there must be citizenship and voting rights if annexation is executed, I do not agree. There may be any form of sovereignty or govt that one desires, creates or invents. There is no one universal law in such issues and there is no universal imperative that a state may not create a new model as it sees fit.
It is strange that he does not mention legal rights derived from san remo, LON mandate, and UN Charter 80.
In any regard, Israel should embark on a diplomatic program which disputes with each country who uses the term illegal, on bilateral bases. Israel should demand that they withdraw the libel or be considered a hostile state. I especially refer to European nations such as UK who continue to libel Israel as being an illegal occupier. Their ambassador should be summoned and given a dressing down and be asked as to why they are operating in an aggressive and hostile manner. They cannot be allowed to utter slanders and libels on the state of Israel and the Jewish people.
How dare the “legal experts” of international law use the naivety of Israeli people to make false statements?
1. The Oslo Accords are null and void because signed with a terror organization.
2. The Oslo Accords are null and void because, as any agreement, as soon as one party fail to any of the obligations it was liable to perform (ie stop terror attacks, cease hatred, against Israel…), the other party become liberated from its obligations (ie give up territories in favour of the palestinians).
3. The signing of the Oslo Accords rendered automatically Israel complicit of the PLO (the terror organization) in the war crimes and crimes against humanity the PLO perpetrated against Israel.
3. Annexing Judea and Samaria is merely the implementation of the three treaties of international law (Palestine Mandate, San Remo Resolution and the Anglo-Saxon Treaty) that Israel should have executed a long time ago before the barking of ignorant dogs all over the world, including from inside Israel.
Negligence and failure by Israel to implement the provisions of the three treaties of international law, the day after the Independence Declaration on 1947, rendered the successive governments of Israel responsible and liable for all the deaths, injuries and all the sufferance of Israeli people since that period of time.
True patriots should not count on the Israeli “””legal experts””” but they should rather take all necessary legal actions to enforce their rights.
Puerto Ricans are citizens though, and have absolutely free movement.
Your idea is acceptable IF you are willing to give Judean and Samarian Arabs free movement into pre-1967 Israel, and to disenfranchise those Jews who move to the commonwealth areas.
Puerto Ricans could always move to New York and vote for President, there.
Conversely those Jews who move to Judea and Samaria would be disenfranchised.
For ex: Were I as a white to relocate to Puerto Rico, I would not be able to vote in US elections for the duration of my residency.
Moreover, Congress give Puerto Rico the right, every 10 years, to vote for
1) Independence
2) Commonwealth
3) Statehood
Your analogy is not exactly the dream you think it is.
The problem is:
Israel does NOT have a federal system.
The reason: It was considered; but if Israel went to a federal system, the Galilee and Negev would return an Arab majority all the time.
The Puerto Ricans have greater autonomy thanm Israel would give the Arabs in Judea and Samaria.
You are not the first one to make the suggestion, but in the end, neither Puerto Rico nor Guam are good models.
Shy Guy Said:
Puerto Ricans have no congressional or Senate representation because they’re not a state. They vote for their own elected government on the island and they speak their own language and have a culture different from that of the United States. My point is the Arabs of Judea and Samaria do not need to be incorporated into Israel. They can have commonwealth status under Israeli rule just like Puerto Rico has with America. So I don’t see how such an arrangement would up-end Israel’s demographic and political balance. It doesn’t have to be total annexation or an Arab state. I prefer a less extreme solution between these two outcomes. I think commonwealth approach is exactly what is needed. And Israel is not turned into a bi-national state. Along with the fact it precludes a Hamas takeover of Judea and Samaria. The Israeli Right hasn’t offered an alternative to the so-called 2state solution, which would be a disaster for Israel. As I see it, the Arabs don’t deserve full independence and the Jewish people should not be asked to relinquish their rightful claim to the Land Of Israel.
Judea and Samaria having been finally declared not “illegally occupied”, the next steps shall consist of implementing the foregoing conclusion. Among others:
1. SUPREME COURT DECISIONS
All the orders and decisions issued by the judges of the Israeli Supreme Court with respect to destructions in Judea and Samaria (Migron, Zion, etc…) should be declared null and void.
2. WRIT OF QUO WARRANTO
A writ of quo warranto should be filed against all the judges of the Supreme Court who have forfeited the office they were entitled to, for having issued illegal orders and decisions.
3. COUNTER-CLAIM AND COMPENSATION CLAIMS
Counter-Claims should be filed against all who participate in those illegal actions: Supreme Court, Civil Administration, Defense Ministry, Justice Ministry, etc..
In addition, claim compensations and damages for men, women, children, and babies for beatings, emotional distress, and all the pain and suffering they encountered due to these illegal orders and decisions which were all in violation of the Human Rights Declaration.
@ CuriousAmerican:
We can pay them. A good majority already say they would take it. It was pointed out at the conference that if it’s alright to offer Jewish “settlers” monetary compensation to leave why is there some sort of mysterious ethical problem with offering the Arabs the same deal (Martin Sherman) which, by the way, will also improve, if not solve, the humanitarian problem, for those willing to take it, of such concern in the international community
@ NormanF:
We have a big enough 5th column as is with the existing Israeli Arabs. We’re not interested in having the Fakestinians join them to create an even greater voting block and more representation in the Knesset.
@ Shy Guy:
I’ve always advocated the Puerto Rican model. Puerto Ricans are US citizens but because the island is not a state, it can’t vote in federal elections. Puerto Ricans can vote in them if they move to the mainland.
The Arabs can be Israeli citizens but they don’t have to be incorporated into Israel. I don’t see it as an “all or nothing” formula. The only thing that deters Israel from exercising full sovereignty over Judea and Samaria is fear itself.
yamit82 Said:
BB is the odd man out in the Likud and to the Right in holding out hope for the “peace process.” But he knows there is not a snowball’s chance in hell the Arabs will ever make peace with Israel and he hasn’t squelched the talk of annexation. He probably won’t do it but he’s leaving that up to a future Prime Minister to complete.
@ CuriousAmerican:
Or
C) grant them autonomy but not citizenship. Too bad.
Serprised at Bakers current position as it differs from his past positions.
WATCH
Middle East Panel – One State or Two? Host Leland Vittert, Alan Baker, Yishai Fleisher – Fox News Live
If you want to annex, go ahead.
But you will have to
A) Offer citizenship to the Arabs
– or –
B) Pay them to move elsewhere.
Since the Arab states refuse to take them, South America might.