But the United Nations was benign
then, compared to what it has become today. What would he call it
now?
~~~~~~~~~~
In my last posting, I alluded
to a ridiculous statement made by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon, and said I'd
be dealing further with the UN next time I wrote.
Well, no sooner had that posting
gone out, then I saw news about another Ban statement. This one was not
simply ridiculous, it angered me.
Ban said that he was "greatly
concerned" about the fact that Israel allegedly breached Syrian air space,
He was referring to the sorties by Israel late Tuesday night and into Wednesday
morning, in which a convoy carrying weapons to Hezbollah and a Syrian chemical
factory were apparently hit (I'll come back to this).
Please understand. Assad has
murdered more than 60,000 of his own people. He has a huge cache of weapons of
mass destruction that are a threat to the world and continues to manufacture
them, and he supplies weapons to the terrorist Hezbollah. But what is Ban
"concerned" about? An Israel action that was pre-emptive, and thus
defensive. Because we violated Syrian air space.
Such is the insanity of the world
today.
~~~~~~~~~~
And this is merely preface to what
I wanted to write:
There is no agency of the UN more
blatantly anti-Jewish/anti-Israel then the UN Human Right Council (UNHCR).
Israel, in fact, is the only country out all the UN's member-states to
be the target of a dedicated permanent item on the UNHRC agenda. One other
item on the permanent agenda -- “Human rights situations that require the
council’s attention” -- refers to all of the other 192 countries in the
UN. There have been more special sessions devoted to Israel than any other
country.
For some time now, Israel has
refused to cooperate with this severely biased Council. For one important
instance of Israel not going along, see this by Anne Bayefsky:
And note, please, the pressure on
Israel by the US to play the game.
~~~~~~~~~~
The most recent issue involving
Israel to be visited by the UNHRC has to do with the "settlements" in Judea and
Samaria. Here, too, anticipating all too well what the outcome would be,
the Israeli government declined to cooperate.
Now the "findings" -- referred to
as the "Report of the independent international fact-finding mission to
investigate the implications of the Israeli settlements on the civil, political,
economic, social and cultural rights of the Palestinian people throughout the
Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem" --have been
released.
We should not be surprised that it
says:
"Article 49(6) of the Fourth
Geneva Convention also prohibits an occupying Power from transferring parts of
its own civilian population into the territory that it occupies. This
prohibition has attained the status of customary international law. The Mission
notes that the Israeli settlements in the OPT, including East Jerusalem, violate
this provision and are, thus, illegal under international
law...
"Israel must, in compliance with
article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, cease all settlement activities
without preconditions. In addition it must immediately initiate a process of
withdrawal of all settlers from the OPT..."
~~~~~~~~~~
I cite this here in order to
refute it, because that refutation remains important. While the findings
are in no way legally binding, they will be used against Israel in a host of
situations.
First, there is constant reference
to the "Occupied Palestinian Territories," but there is absolutely no basis in
law for assuming that everything past the Green Line belongs to the Palestinian
Arabs.
On the contrary. The Mandate for
Palestine, going back to 1922, and based upon the earlier legal decisions of the
San Remo Conference, determined that all of the land from the Jordan River to
the Mediterranean Sea was to be established as a Jewish Homeland and
close Jewish settlement was to be encouraged.
This was a matter of international
law, and has never been superseded.
The Mandate explicitly
recognized the prior presence of the Jews on the land. And in point
of fact, Judea and Samaria are the sites of ancient Jewish heritage:
the Temple Mount, Hevron and the Machpela, Shilo where the Tabernacle rested,
etc. etc. were all past what is known today as the Green Line.
~~~~~~~~~~
In 1948, when Israel declared
independence, the State was established on less than all of Palestine.
This was in accordance with the non-binding recommendation of the UN General
Assembly the year prior, that Palestinian be partitioned. Had the Arabs
agreed to establish a state in the other part of Palestine, and had Israel and
that Arab state signed a treaty agreeing to a mutual border, then the part
of Palestine on which Israel was not established would have belonged legally to
the Arabs.
But the Arabs refused to
cooperate. They have no claim to the land now. That land remained
unclaimed Mandate land.
~~~~~~~~~~
Not only did the Arabs refuse to
cooperate, they attacked Israel immediately after independence was
declared. The Green Line was no more than an armistice line -- a ceasefire
line, not a border. When Jordan signed the armistice agreement
with Israel, it included a clarification that the current armistice line would
in no way prejudice determination of a final border, which would be determined
via negotiations.
The UNHRC has simply adopted the
PLO line in its entirety, with regard to Judea and Samaria being
"Palestinian." But this is without historical foundation.
~~~~~~~~~~
Additionally, in 1967, when Israel
took all of Judea and Samaria, it was in the course of a defensive war.
There is solid legal precedent for saying that land acquired in
defensive wars may be retained.
After the war, the Security
Council passed Resolution 242, which declared that Israel, as all states, had a
right to secure borders. Recognizing that the Green Line would not provide a
secure border, it did not demand that Israel return behind that
line. What it said was negotiations would determine the final
border. To this day, this has not happened.
~~~~~~~~~~
The Levy Committee, mandated last
year by Prime Minister Netanyahu to consider the status of the
"settlements," determined in its final Report that the situation is sui generis
-- that is, a unique, one-time situation. Because of the legal and
historical precedents here, Israel's presence in Judea and Samaria
cannot be considered to be a "belligerent occupation." And
the settlements are not illegal.
It is the fact, as well, that
"occupation" occurs when one nation moves into the land of another nation. But
there was no legal sovereign in Judea and Samaria before Israel took
control. This was still unclaimed Mandate land that Jordan had seized
illegally in the course of a offensive war.
~~~~~~~~~~
As to the Fourth Geneva
Convention, it does not apply to Israel's situation. What was intended was
that a belligerent occupying government not move its people into the land of
another sovereign nation. But there was no sovereign state, and there is
no belligerent occupation. Besides which, the Israeli government does not
move parts of its population. Individual Israelis voluntarily
choose to live in these areas. And it's time we began to look at
Jewish rights.
~~~~~~~~~~
Referring very briefly to the
action in Syria this past week: I reported that an arms convoy and a
chemical weapons factory were both hit, because that is the information that
came to me. And, indeed that may be the case. Some sources continue to say this.
But there are other sources that
say that it was only the convoy that was hit, or only the chemical
factory. Maddening, because in each instance there are intelligence
sources cited as verifying what is being said. Which does lead one to
believe it may well have been both that were hit, does it not?
And so, I am not withdrawing or
amending my original report, so much as informing you, my readers, that
information coming out of Syria -- with the Israeli government of course not
talking -- is less than a certainty. I can only say that this is
reportedly what has happened, this appears to be the case.
~~~~~~~~~~
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Arlene Kushner. This material is produced by Arlene Kushner,
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