"It is incorrect to assert that the Palestinians have no territory. That is demagoguery. Two-thirds of the historic territory of Palestine is already inhabited by Palestinians. If they choose to call that territory Jordan, or any other name,that is their business."
Mandate for Palestine - July 24, 1922
Jordan is 77% of former Palestine - Israel, the West Bank (Judea and Samaria) and Gaza comprise 23%.
Tuesday, June 26, 2007
PALESTINIANS OCCUPY TWO THIRDS OF HISTORIC PALESTINE
YIGAL ALLON - Australian Jewish Times April 21,1977
Sunday, June 24, 2007
Determining Sovereignty in the West Bank
[Published August 2004]
Benny Elon's plan provides the catalyst, though not necessarily the solution, for determining who gets sovereignty in the West Bank (and Gaza).
Re-drawing the boundary between Jordan and Israel to divide sovereignty of the West Bank (and Gaza) between those two States remains the only key left to finding any solution that has any chance of success.
The heavily populated Arab areas will become part of Jordan. The heavily populated Jewish areas will become part of Israel.
Very few residents will have to move unless they voluntarily want to do so because they don't want to live on the wrong side of the new border, where they are part of a minority of the population rather part of a majority. In those few cases compensation would be paid to those who voluntarily chose to move to the other side of the border.
Gaza could be joined to Jordan by means of an underground or overhead expressway.
The granting of sovereignty of the Arab areas returned to Jordan under this plan would restore such territories to Arab control, a situation that existed between 1948-1967.
It is time the Quartet addressed this type of solution to replace their ill-conceived and fatally flawed road map that sought to wedge a second Arab State in Palestine ( in addition to Jordan) between Jordan and Israel, the two successor States in former Palestine to the League of Nations Mandate.
Jordan and Israel have had a signed peace treaty since 1994. Redrawing the boundary between their respective States would be done as an extension of that Treaty, which already provides for the negotiation and peaceful resolution of such issues as refugees, water and Jerusalem.
Jordan needs international support to help it achieve these objectives, eradicate the terrorist groups running rampant in the territories and rebuild the destroyed infrastructure resulting from 10 years of hopeless diplomacy.
The sooner this help is forthcoming, the sooner some hope of sanity and normality might emerge to end the senseless killing and maiming of both Jews and Arabs that has turned what should be a paradise into a living hell.
Jordan comprises 77% of former Palestine and Israel 17% of former Palestine. Is it really that difficult to carve up the remaining 6% of Palestine between these two States without creating a 23rd Arab State stuck in between them?
As Sharon appears before the Likud Convention today he would do well to remember his own words and those of Shimon Peres with whom he seeks to unite:
Sharon: Jordan is Palestine! The capital of Palestine is Amman. If Palestinian Arabs want to find their political expression, they will have to do it in Amman.
[TIME - April 17, 1989 ]
Peres: It is not obstinacy to regard the populations of Jordan, the West Bank and Gaza as having greater similarities than differences. The Jordan River is not deep enough to turn into a knife blade serving to cut one piece of territory into three slices.... Jordan is therefore an existing State. It has an army. There is therefore no need to set up another State, another army.
[Jewish Telegraph - April 19. 1991 ]
If these two veteran politicians were to be true to their own words, then perhaps, just perhaps, some division of the West Bank and Gaza between Jordan and Israel could eventuate.
Arafat has always stuck to his policy - return of 100% of the West Bank and Gaza, an independent State there with Jerusalem as its capitol.
It's time that Israel's politicians adopted their own common response to Arafat's disastrous pursuit of these objectives by stating clearly and in a united voice - no State between Jordan and Israel but division of sovereignty over the West Bank and Gaza between Jordan and Israel in face to face negotiations and within the framework of the Israel - Jordan peace treaty, the Israel - Egypt Peace Treaty, Security Council resolutions 242 and 337, and Article 80 of the United Nations Charter.
Benny Elon's plan provides the catalyst, though not necessarily the solution, for determining who gets sovereignty in the West Bank (and Gaza).
Re-drawing the boundary between Jordan and Israel to divide sovereignty of the West Bank (and Gaza) between those two States remains the only key left to finding any solution that has any chance of success.
The heavily populated Arab areas will become part of Jordan. The heavily populated Jewish areas will become part of Israel.
Very few residents will have to move unless they voluntarily want to do so because they don't want to live on the wrong side of the new border, where they are part of a minority of the population rather part of a majority. In those few cases compensation would be paid to those who voluntarily chose to move to the other side of the border.
Gaza could be joined to Jordan by means of an underground or overhead expressway.
The granting of sovereignty of the Arab areas returned to Jordan under this plan would restore such territories to Arab control, a situation that existed between 1948-1967.
It is time the Quartet addressed this type of solution to replace their ill-conceived and fatally flawed road map that sought to wedge a second Arab State in Palestine ( in addition to Jordan) between Jordan and Israel, the two successor States in former Palestine to the League of Nations Mandate.
Jordan and Israel have had a signed peace treaty since 1994. Redrawing the boundary between their respective States would be done as an extension of that Treaty, which already provides for the negotiation and peaceful resolution of such issues as refugees, water and Jerusalem.
Jordan needs international support to help it achieve these objectives, eradicate the terrorist groups running rampant in the territories and rebuild the destroyed infrastructure resulting from 10 years of hopeless diplomacy.
The sooner this help is forthcoming, the sooner some hope of sanity and normality might emerge to end the senseless killing and maiming of both Jews and Arabs that has turned what should be a paradise into a living hell.
Jordan comprises 77% of former Palestine and Israel 17% of former Palestine. Is it really that difficult to carve up the remaining 6% of Palestine between these two States without creating a 23rd Arab State stuck in between them?
As Sharon appears before the Likud Convention today he would do well to remember his own words and those of Shimon Peres with whom he seeks to unite:
Sharon: Jordan is Palestine! The capital of Palestine is Amman. If Palestinian Arabs want to find their political expression, they will have to do it in Amman.
[TIME - April 17, 1989 ]
Peres: It is not obstinacy to regard the populations of Jordan, the West Bank and Gaza as having greater similarities than differences. The Jordan River is not deep enough to turn into a knife blade serving to cut one piece of territory into three slices.... Jordan is therefore an existing State. It has an army. There is therefore no need to set up another State, another army.
[Jewish Telegraph - April 19. 1991 ]
If these two veteran politicians were to be true to their own words, then perhaps, just perhaps, some division of the West Bank and Gaza between Jordan and Israel could eventuate.
Arafat has always stuck to his policy - return of 100% of the West Bank and Gaza, an independent State there with Jerusalem as its capitol.
It's time that Israel's politicians adopted their own common response to Arafat's disastrous pursuit of these objectives by stating clearly and in a united voice - no State between Jordan and Israel but division of sovereignty over the West Bank and Gaza between Jordan and Israel in face to face negotiations and within the framework of the Israel - Jordan peace treaty, the Israel - Egypt Peace Treaty, Security Council resolutions 242 and 337, and Article 80 of the United Nations Charter.
International Ignorance Incites Injustice
[Published July 2004]
The failure of the 15 judges of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to fully examine the international legal status of the West Bank is an error of monumental proportions which has fatally flawed the advisory opinion it has given to the United Nations on Israel's right to erect a security fence in the West Bank.
The ICJ appears to have been totally ignorant of the existence of Jewish rights in the West Bank arising under international law created by Article 95 of the Treaty of Sevres 1920 and the Mandate for Palestine 1922, and preserved by article 80 of the United Nations Charter.
It is hard to believe that a Court composed of such eminent jurists could have acted in such an incompetent and reckless manner to the detriment of the Jewish people.
Israel's presence in the West Bank extends far beyond that of being a military occupier since 1967. Israel also has the right in international law to facilitate the settlement of Jews in the West Bank for the purpose of reconstituting the Jewish National Home in that area.
Any action taken by Israel in the West Bank must accordingly be considered from this dual perspective, which the ICJ has failed to do.
Ironically only Judge Elaraby, an Egyptian judge whose presence on the Court was unsuccessfully objected to by Israel, was prepared to state that "the international legal status of the Palestinian Territory merits more comprehensive treatment" than the Court gave to this fundamental issue.
Judge Elaraby identified the need for such a review saying:
"A historical survey is relevant to the question posed by the General Assembly, for it serves as the background to understanding the legal status of the Palestinian Territory on the one hand and underlines the special and continuing responsibility of the General Assembly on the other. This may appear as academic, without relevance to the present events. The present is however determined by the accumulation of past events and no reasonable and fair concern for the future can possibly disregard a firm grasp of past events. In particular, when on one or more than one occasion, the rule of law was consistently sidestepped."
The failure of the ICJ to adopt this principled stand before reaching its decision is inexplicable and is deserving of the strongest condemnation. Its judgement, as a result, is not worth the paper it is written on.
Judge Elaraby said: "The point of departure, or one can say in legal jargon, the critical date, is the League of Nations Mandate which was entrusted to Great Britain" by the League of Nations.
Rather than examining the terms of the Mandate document and articles 94 and 95 of the Treaty of Sevres, both the Court and Judge Elaraby incorrectly asserted that the Mandate for Palestine was established under paragraph 4 of Article 22 of the Covenant of the League of Nations.
Paragraph 4 of the Covenant provided that "certain communities, formerly belonging to the Turkish Empire have reached a stage of development where their existence as independent nations can be provisionally recognized subject to rendering of administrative advice and assistance by a Mandatory until such time as they are able to stand alone".
Article 94 of the Treaty of Sevres clearly indicated that Paragraph 4 did apply to the Arab inhabitants living within the areas covered by the Mandates for Syria and Mesopotamia, which were created at the same time as the Mandate for Palestine.
Article 95 of the Treaty of Sevres however made it abundantly clear that paragraph 4 was not to apply to the Arab inhabitants living within the area covered by the Mandate for Palestine. This Mandate was to be of a unique character and nature unlike any other Mandate established by the League of Nations.
Unlike the Mandates for Syria and Mesopotamia, the Mandate for Palestine
1. was not established under paragraph 4 of Article 22 of the Covenant of the League of Nations
2. did not consider the Arab inhabitants as an independent nation that could be provisionally recognized
3. At best promised local autonomy to the Arab inhabitants if circumstances permitted
What the Mandate for Palestine recognised in clearly expressed terms was
1. the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine and to the grounds for reconstituting the Jewish National Home in that country provided that nothing should be done which might prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.
2. the authority of the Administration of Palestine to facilitate Jewish immigration and to encourage close settlement by Jews on the land, including State lands and waste lands not required for public purposes, whilst ensuring that the rights and position of other sections of the population were not prejudiced.
Yet the Court makes not one mention at all of these Jewish rights to settle in the West Bank created by an international instrument to which Members of the United Nations were parties and of the obligation of the United Nations to ensure that these rights were preserved for the benefit of the Jewish people in accordance with the obligations imposed on member States by Article 80 of its own Charter.
Who within the ICJ undertook the legal research, which resulted in the ICJ delivering a judgement which failed to identify and consider the existence of those Jewish rights in the West Bank and their relevance to the issues before the Court?
Was such researcher influenced by unsubstantiated material appearing on sites such as palestinefacts.org or palestinerembered.com, which contain similar erroneous statements that the Mandate for Palestine was created under paragraph 4 of Article 22 of the Covenant of the League of Nations?
The ICJ urgently needs to disclose who carried out the research to enable its judgement to be so formulated and the facts justifying it to come to such an unrealistic conclusion.
Had the Court been aware of and considered such Jewish rights in international law, it would have been patently clear that the United Nations General Assembly had consistently sidestepped the rule of law in the many resolutions it had passed on the illegality of settlements established by Israel in the West Bank and on Israel's right to build a security fence in the West Bank.
Why too did United Nations Secretary General, Kofi Annan, omit to include copies of the Treaty of Sevres and the Mandate for Palestine in the extensive dossier of documents given by him to the Court? Was he guilty of misleading the Court by withholding material documents bearing on the issues relating to the advisory opinion being sought? Did he have an obligation to highlight Article 80 of his own Charter and seek the Court's opinion on the relevance of that Article to the legal opinion being sought by the United Nations?
The ICJ's failure to properly consider the legal status of the West Bank in international law has amounted to a gross miscarriage of justice, which will have serious repercussions for resolving the ongoing struggle between Jews and Arabs over the sovereignty of, and the rights of Jews to reside in, the West Bank.
The decision will give credence to the perception of a biased and anti-Israel United Nations and a Court that cannot be trusted to properly consider legal issues referred to it by the United Nations in a fair and impartial manner.
The decision will certainly encourage those web sites continually proclaiming that Jews have no legal rights to settle in let alone claim sovereignty in any part of the West Bank to continue their campaign of vilification and hatred against Jews.
The Jewish People has since 1922 consistently indicated its preparedness to forego its legal rights in part of Palestine but the Arabs have always rejected such overtures. For the Arabs it has always been all or nothing at all.
The ICJ's decision will only encourage the hardening of such a view and weaken those voices within the Arab community who want to see an end to the murder and killing visited on both Jews and Arabs in the last 120 years.
No amount of disinformation, lies or propaganda can change the legal right of the Jewish people to live in the West Bank and to take all reasonable measures to protect their lives from deadly attacks involving ambushes, drive by shootings, home invasion and suicide bombings carried out by their Arab neighbours contrary to the right to life of every human being.
The fact that the ICJ failed to spell out that message loudly and clearly because of its own perceived incompetence and failure to consider the legal status of the West Bank in international law, will be the lasting legacy of a decision which binds no one yet has the power to affect so many.
The failure of the 15 judges of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to fully examine the international legal status of the West Bank is an error of monumental proportions which has fatally flawed the advisory opinion it has given to the United Nations on Israel's right to erect a security fence in the West Bank.
The ICJ appears to have been totally ignorant of the existence of Jewish rights in the West Bank arising under international law created by Article 95 of the Treaty of Sevres 1920 and the Mandate for Palestine 1922, and preserved by article 80 of the United Nations Charter.
It is hard to believe that a Court composed of such eminent jurists could have acted in such an incompetent and reckless manner to the detriment of the Jewish people.
Israel's presence in the West Bank extends far beyond that of being a military occupier since 1967. Israel also has the right in international law to facilitate the settlement of Jews in the West Bank for the purpose of reconstituting the Jewish National Home in that area.
Any action taken by Israel in the West Bank must accordingly be considered from this dual perspective, which the ICJ has failed to do.
Ironically only Judge Elaraby, an Egyptian judge whose presence on the Court was unsuccessfully objected to by Israel, was prepared to state that "the international legal status of the Palestinian Territory merits more comprehensive treatment" than the Court gave to this fundamental issue.
Judge Elaraby identified the need for such a review saying:
"A historical survey is relevant to the question posed by the General Assembly, for it serves as the background to understanding the legal status of the Palestinian Territory on the one hand and underlines the special and continuing responsibility of the General Assembly on the other. This may appear as academic, without relevance to the present events. The present is however determined by the accumulation of past events and no reasonable and fair concern for the future can possibly disregard a firm grasp of past events. In particular, when on one or more than one occasion, the rule of law was consistently sidestepped."
The failure of the ICJ to adopt this principled stand before reaching its decision is inexplicable and is deserving of the strongest condemnation. Its judgement, as a result, is not worth the paper it is written on.
Judge Elaraby said: "The point of departure, or one can say in legal jargon, the critical date, is the League of Nations Mandate which was entrusted to Great Britain" by the League of Nations.
Rather than examining the terms of the Mandate document and articles 94 and 95 of the Treaty of Sevres, both the Court and Judge Elaraby incorrectly asserted that the Mandate for Palestine was established under paragraph 4 of Article 22 of the Covenant of the League of Nations.
Paragraph 4 of the Covenant provided that "certain communities, formerly belonging to the Turkish Empire have reached a stage of development where their existence as independent nations can be provisionally recognized subject to rendering of administrative advice and assistance by a Mandatory until such time as they are able to stand alone".
Article 94 of the Treaty of Sevres clearly indicated that Paragraph 4 did apply to the Arab inhabitants living within the areas covered by the Mandates for Syria and Mesopotamia, which were created at the same time as the Mandate for Palestine.
Article 95 of the Treaty of Sevres however made it abundantly clear that paragraph 4 was not to apply to the Arab inhabitants living within the area covered by the Mandate for Palestine. This Mandate was to be of a unique character and nature unlike any other Mandate established by the League of Nations.
Unlike the Mandates for Syria and Mesopotamia, the Mandate for Palestine
1. was not established under paragraph 4 of Article 22 of the Covenant of the League of Nations
2. did not consider the Arab inhabitants as an independent nation that could be provisionally recognized
3. At best promised local autonomy to the Arab inhabitants if circumstances permitted
What the Mandate for Palestine recognised in clearly expressed terms was
1. the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine and to the grounds for reconstituting the Jewish National Home in that country provided that nothing should be done which might prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.
2. the authority of the Administration of Palestine to facilitate Jewish immigration and to encourage close settlement by Jews on the land, including State lands and waste lands not required for public purposes, whilst ensuring that the rights and position of other sections of the population were not prejudiced.
Yet the Court makes not one mention at all of these Jewish rights to settle in the West Bank created by an international instrument to which Members of the United Nations were parties and of the obligation of the United Nations to ensure that these rights were preserved for the benefit of the Jewish people in accordance with the obligations imposed on member States by Article 80 of its own Charter.
Who within the ICJ undertook the legal research, which resulted in the ICJ delivering a judgement which failed to identify and consider the existence of those Jewish rights in the West Bank and their relevance to the issues before the Court?
Was such researcher influenced by unsubstantiated material appearing on sites such as palestinefacts.org or palestinerembered.com, which contain similar erroneous statements that the Mandate for Palestine was created under paragraph 4 of Article 22 of the Covenant of the League of Nations?
The ICJ urgently needs to disclose who carried out the research to enable its judgement to be so formulated and the facts justifying it to come to such an unrealistic conclusion.
Had the Court been aware of and considered such Jewish rights in international law, it would have been patently clear that the United Nations General Assembly had consistently sidestepped the rule of law in the many resolutions it had passed on the illegality of settlements established by Israel in the West Bank and on Israel's right to build a security fence in the West Bank.
Why too did United Nations Secretary General, Kofi Annan, omit to include copies of the Treaty of Sevres and the Mandate for Palestine in the extensive dossier of documents given by him to the Court? Was he guilty of misleading the Court by withholding material documents bearing on the issues relating to the advisory opinion being sought? Did he have an obligation to highlight Article 80 of his own Charter and seek the Court's opinion on the relevance of that Article to the legal opinion being sought by the United Nations?
The ICJ's failure to properly consider the legal status of the West Bank in international law has amounted to a gross miscarriage of justice, which will have serious repercussions for resolving the ongoing struggle between Jews and Arabs over the sovereignty of, and the rights of Jews to reside in, the West Bank.
The decision will give credence to the perception of a biased and anti-Israel United Nations and a Court that cannot be trusted to properly consider legal issues referred to it by the United Nations in a fair and impartial manner.
The decision will certainly encourage those web sites continually proclaiming that Jews have no legal rights to settle in let alone claim sovereignty in any part of the West Bank to continue their campaign of vilification and hatred against Jews.
The Jewish People has since 1922 consistently indicated its preparedness to forego its legal rights in part of Palestine but the Arabs have always rejected such overtures. For the Arabs it has always been all or nothing at all.
The ICJ's decision will only encourage the hardening of such a view and weaken those voices within the Arab community who want to see an end to the murder and killing visited on both Jews and Arabs in the last 120 years.
No amount of disinformation, lies or propaganda can change the legal right of the Jewish people to live in the West Bank and to take all reasonable measures to protect their lives from deadly attacks involving ambushes, drive by shootings, home invasion and suicide bombings carried out by their Arab neighbours contrary to the right to life of every human being.
The fact that the ICJ failed to spell out that message loudly and clearly because of its own perceived incompetence and failure to consider the legal status of the West Bank in international law, will be the lasting legacy of a decision which binds no one yet has the power to affect so many.
Monday, June 18, 2007
Resubdividing Palestine
[Published November 2004]
Yasser Arafat has finally joined Yitzchak Rabin in the next world.
Freed now from all pressures, internal and external, perhaps they might be able to frankly reflect on the mistakes they both made in trying to reach the "Peace of the Brave" for which they and last surviving member of the trio, Shimon Peres received the Nobel Peace Prize.
Perhaps their conversation would go something like this:
Yitzchak: Welcome to our eternal home Yasser. I always thought that the way to peace between the Jews and the Arabs was the resubdivision of Palestine into two States with Jewish Israel being sovereign in about 20% of Palestine and Arab Jordan sovereign in about 80% of Palestine. Shimon persuaded me to pursue a different path by accepting Oslo. In hindsight this was a terrible error of judgement by me and cost me my life, the lives of thousands of Jews and Arabs and the maiming, wounding and emotional scarring of our respective populations.
Yasser: Look Yitzchak, I know you weren't happy with Oslo. I felt it in that famous handshake at the White House. I was aware of your comment in The Australian newspaper on May 27, 1985 that "One tiny State between Israel and Jordan will solve nothing. It will be a time bomb." Oslo would have created just such a State.
Yitzchak: And after the collapse of Oslo, 9/11, your refusal of Barak's offer, the second Intifada and what's happening now in Iraq, I think my prediction is still relevant today. The Quartet are making a big mistake pursuing this failed policy after your death. They supposedly respect my memory but not my opinions. They know I also said at that time that "the Palestinians should have a sovereign State which includes most of the Palestinians. It should be Jordan with a considerable part of the West Bank and Gaza. East of the Jordan River there is enough room to settle the Palestinian refugees."
Yasser: On June 25, 1987 I myself told the New York Review of Books that before the Second World War "Jordan was an emirate, completely part of Palestine." I know my history as well as you, my dear partner in peace. We both agreed that Jordan was part of Palestine, part of the problem and part of the solution.
Yitzchak: We really should have built on this common agreement when we finally decided to talk about peace.
Yasser: You obviously were aware that I had also told Der Spiegel in 1986 that "Jordanians and Palestinians are indeed one people. No one can divide us. We have the same fate."
Yitzchak: Sure. Even Jordan recognised the historic and demographic reality of what you were saying. As early as Spring 1982 Crown Prince Hassan of Jordan was quoted in the Foreign Affairs Review as endorsing the words of a leading Jordanian social scientist that "the Jordanians and Palestinians are now one people, and no political loyalty, however strong, will separate them permanently.
Yasser: And Farouk Kadoumi, the Head of the Political Department of the PLO, told Newsweek on 14 March 1977 that "Jordanians and Palestinians are considered by the PLO as one people." Farouk stood by my wife Suha during my dying days in hospital in France.
Yitzchak: So why did you insist on separate Palestinian and Jordanian delegations at the Madrid Conference in 1991 instead of a joint Jordanian-Palestinian delegation?
Yasser: Come on Yitzchak. You know there had been a power struggle between King Hussein and myself for control of Jordan. Could I ever forget or forgive how my followers and I were driven out of Jordan in September 1970 and the slaughter that was inflicted on us at that time? Do you think it was fun being shunted to Lebanon and thence to Tunisia?
Yitzchak: But surely you could have resolved your dispute with King Hussein. Jordan would have had King Hussein as its monarch and you as its Prime Minister. By burying your differences you could have ended up as Prime Minister of 80% of Palestine instead of President of nothing. Your funeral would have been a vastly different ceremony to what I saw today.
Yasser: That's all water under the bridge. Now that I have been removed from the scene is there perhaps something we can do to influence those left behind down there to resubdivide Palestine along the lines you suggested 19 years ago?
Yitzchak: Well I know Shimon is just as aware as you and I are of Jordan's role in bringing peace to the region. Shimon told the Jewish Telegraph on April 19, 1991 that "It is not obstinacy to regard the populations of Jordan, the West Bank and Gaza as having greater similarities than differences. The Jordan River is not deep enough to turn into a knife blade serving to cut one piece of territory into three slices. Most of Jordan's population are Palestinians: the residents of the West Bank are Jordanian citizens and Jordan has distributed tens of thousands of passports to residents in the Gaza Strip. Jordan is therefore an existing State. It has an army. There is therefore no need to set up another State, another army."
Yasser: True, but Shimon is not at this moment in the Israeli Government. It will need the concurrence of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to make these views Israeli policy.
Yitzchak: That shouldn't be difficult. Ariel told Time on April 17, 1989, that "Jordan is Palestine! The capital of Palestine is Amman. If Palestinian Arabs want to find their political expression, they will have to do it in Amman." Couple those thoughts with his Disengagement Plan for Gaza and the building of a security fence in the West Bank, which has effectively divided the region into Jewish and Arab sections, and you have the basis for calling an international conference whose object is to resubdivide Palestine along the lines I first suggested in 1985.
Yasser: That's all fine, but what about my beloved Jerusalem? Can I ever hope that my mortal remains will be reburied there?
Yitzchak: Yes. It is possible. East Jerusalem was part of Jordan between 1948-1967 and would have been so today had King Hussein kept out of the six day War. The Holy Places are specifically to be dealt with in the Peace Treaty I signed with King Hussein in 1994. We can't solve all the problems from here. Those on earth are charged with negotiating the final outcomes. Now is a propitious time for them to attempt to do so.
Yasser: How can we get the Quartet to abandon their plans to continue pursuing the impossible? Visions have a habit of turning into the worst nightmares.
Yitzchak: The Quartet should heed the above things we said whilst on earth, but which we unfortunately failed to try to put into practice. This will be the finest tribute they can pay to our memories and will merit the Nobel Prize that we were in truth prematurely awarded. This will be the real peace of the brave. Pressure must be put on Jordan to resubdivide Palestine, the same kind of pressure that is being put on Israel to accept the badly flawed and thoroughly discredited Road Map. Then perhaps the peace we all desire will be attainable.
Yasser: Shalom Yitzchak
Yitzchak: Salaam Yasser.
Yasser Arafat has finally joined Yitzchak Rabin in the next world.
Freed now from all pressures, internal and external, perhaps they might be able to frankly reflect on the mistakes they both made in trying to reach the "Peace of the Brave" for which they and last surviving member of the trio, Shimon Peres received the Nobel Peace Prize.
Perhaps their conversation would go something like this:
Yitzchak: Welcome to our eternal home Yasser. I always thought that the way to peace between the Jews and the Arabs was the resubdivision of Palestine into two States with Jewish Israel being sovereign in about 20% of Palestine and Arab Jordan sovereign in about 80% of Palestine. Shimon persuaded me to pursue a different path by accepting Oslo. In hindsight this was a terrible error of judgement by me and cost me my life, the lives of thousands of Jews and Arabs and the maiming, wounding and emotional scarring of our respective populations.
Yasser: Look Yitzchak, I know you weren't happy with Oslo. I felt it in that famous handshake at the White House. I was aware of your comment in The Australian newspaper on May 27, 1985 that "One tiny State between Israel and Jordan will solve nothing. It will be a time bomb." Oslo would have created just such a State.
Yitzchak: And after the collapse of Oslo, 9/11, your refusal of Barak's offer, the second Intifada and what's happening now in Iraq, I think my prediction is still relevant today. The Quartet are making a big mistake pursuing this failed policy after your death. They supposedly respect my memory but not my opinions. They know I also said at that time that "the Palestinians should have a sovereign State which includes most of the Palestinians. It should be Jordan with a considerable part of the West Bank and Gaza. East of the Jordan River there is enough room to settle the Palestinian refugees."
Yasser: On June 25, 1987 I myself told the New York Review of Books that before the Second World War "Jordan was an emirate, completely part of Palestine." I know my history as well as you, my dear partner in peace. We both agreed that Jordan was part of Palestine, part of the problem and part of the solution.
Yitzchak: We really should have built on this common agreement when we finally decided to talk about peace.
Yasser: You obviously were aware that I had also told Der Spiegel in 1986 that "Jordanians and Palestinians are indeed one people. No one can divide us. We have the same fate."
Yitzchak: Sure. Even Jordan recognised the historic and demographic reality of what you were saying. As early as Spring 1982 Crown Prince Hassan of Jordan was quoted in the Foreign Affairs Review as endorsing the words of a leading Jordanian social scientist that "the Jordanians and Palestinians are now one people, and no political loyalty, however strong, will separate them permanently.
Yasser: And Farouk Kadoumi, the Head of the Political Department of the PLO, told Newsweek on 14 March 1977 that "Jordanians and Palestinians are considered by the PLO as one people." Farouk stood by my wife Suha during my dying days in hospital in France.
Yitzchak: So why did you insist on separate Palestinian and Jordanian delegations at the Madrid Conference in 1991 instead of a joint Jordanian-Palestinian delegation?
Yasser: Come on Yitzchak. You know there had been a power struggle between King Hussein and myself for control of Jordan. Could I ever forget or forgive how my followers and I were driven out of Jordan in September 1970 and the slaughter that was inflicted on us at that time? Do you think it was fun being shunted to Lebanon and thence to Tunisia?
Yitzchak: But surely you could have resolved your dispute with King Hussein. Jordan would have had King Hussein as its monarch and you as its Prime Minister. By burying your differences you could have ended up as Prime Minister of 80% of Palestine instead of President of nothing. Your funeral would have been a vastly different ceremony to what I saw today.
Yasser: That's all water under the bridge. Now that I have been removed from the scene is there perhaps something we can do to influence those left behind down there to resubdivide Palestine along the lines you suggested 19 years ago?
Yitzchak: Well I know Shimon is just as aware as you and I are of Jordan's role in bringing peace to the region. Shimon told the Jewish Telegraph on April 19, 1991 that "It is not obstinacy to regard the populations of Jordan, the West Bank and Gaza as having greater similarities than differences. The Jordan River is not deep enough to turn into a knife blade serving to cut one piece of territory into three slices. Most of Jordan's population are Palestinians: the residents of the West Bank are Jordanian citizens and Jordan has distributed tens of thousands of passports to residents in the Gaza Strip. Jordan is therefore an existing State. It has an army. There is therefore no need to set up another State, another army."
Yasser: True, but Shimon is not at this moment in the Israeli Government. It will need the concurrence of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to make these views Israeli policy.
Yitzchak: That shouldn't be difficult. Ariel told Time on April 17, 1989, that "Jordan is Palestine! The capital of Palestine is Amman. If Palestinian Arabs want to find their political expression, they will have to do it in Amman." Couple those thoughts with his Disengagement Plan for Gaza and the building of a security fence in the West Bank, which has effectively divided the region into Jewish and Arab sections, and you have the basis for calling an international conference whose object is to resubdivide Palestine along the lines I first suggested in 1985.
Yasser: That's all fine, but what about my beloved Jerusalem? Can I ever hope that my mortal remains will be reburied there?
Yitzchak: Yes. It is possible. East Jerusalem was part of Jordan between 1948-1967 and would have been so today had King Hussein kept out of the six day War. The Holy Places are specifically to be dealt with in the Peace Treaty I signed with King Hussein in 1994. We can't solve all the problems from here. Those on earth are charged with negotiating the final outcomes. Now is a propitious time for them to attempt to do so.
Yasser: How can we get the Quartet to abandon their plans to continue pursuing the impossible? Visions have a habit of turning into the worst nightmares.
Yitzchak: The Quartet should heed the above things we said whilst on earth, but which we unfortunately failed to try to put into practice. This will be the finest tribute they can pay to our memories and will merit the Nobel Prize that we were in truth prematurely awarded. This will be the real peace of the brave. Pressure must be put on Jordan to resubdivide Palestine, the same kind of pressure that is being put on Israel to accept the badly flawed and thoroughly discredited Road Map. Then perhaps the peace we all desire will be attainable.
Yasser: Shalom Yitzchak
Yitzchak: Salaam Yasser.
The fence is on whose land?
[Published July 2004]
The construction of Israel's security fence on land within the West Bank has aroused the ire of 90 of the 191 members of the General Assembly of the United Nations, who claim such land is "Occupied Palestinian Territory".
Is this true or is this land in fact "Jewish National Home Territory" in international law?
Are those 90 members of the United Nations and their legal advisors aware of the terms of the Mandate for Palestine and Article 80 of the United Nations Charter, which confer on Israel the right to construct the fence on its present location?
Why has the Secretary General, Kofi Annan, submitted to the International Court of Justice, a dossier purporting to set out the relevant documents relating to the case, yet has excluded the League of Nations Mandate for Palestine, which is the definitive legal document on who is entitled to build on West Bank land?
The West Bank is an area of land comprising about 5% of the territory once called Palestine administered by Great Britain from 1920 to 1948 pursuant to the Mandate for Palestine created by the League of Nations.
The West Bank was called Judea and Samaria in the Bible and had been continuously so described since then right up to the British War Maps of the 1940's and in the Mandate documents themselves.
The change of name from Judea and Samaria to the West Bank in 1950 was an attempt by Jordan to blot out the Jewish connection with this land, matching that of the Romans who changed the name of the country from its Hebrew name "Eretz Yisrael" (the land of Israel) to "Palestina" about 2000 years earlier so as to erase any recognition of Jewish sovereignty, which had finally succumbed to the might of the invading Roman Legions.
This semantic obsession is mirrored once again in the description of the land as "Occupied Palestinian Territory" in the brief presented to the International Court of Justice by the 90 United Nations members and their front man, Kofi Annan.
Again as in the past, this pathetic attempt to propagandise the status of this area will backfire on those who rely on it to assert land rights to the total exclusion of the principal beneficiary recognized in international law - the Jewish people.
I will however use the term "West Bank" to describe the area so as not to be accused of necessarily favoring the use of a name with obvious Jewish connotations and connections to advance Jewish rights in that area.
This is not necessary since international law has expressly recognized that Jewish rights do exist and still remain unfulfilled in the West Bank, irrespective of what name that area is given.
The Mandate for Palestine was the legally binding expression of the International Community of Nations - the League of Nations.
The Mandate document:
1.recognized the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine and the grounds for "reconstituting" their national home in that country;
2.created for the first time an identifiable territory called "Palestine" with defined territorial boundaries which incorporated today�s Israel, the West Bank and Gaza, and Jordan
3.safeguarded the civil and religious rights (but not any political rights as none were intended to be conferred) of the existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine;
facilitated Jewish immigration and encouraged "close settlement by Jews on the lands, including State lands and waste lands not required for public purposes" (Article 6);
All this might have been ancient history but for the occurrence of six subsequent events between 1945-1967, which together form the legal basis for Israel's construction of its present security fence in the West Bank.
The six events were the birth of the United Nations in 1945, the demise of the League of Nations in 1946, the United Nations Partition Plan of 1947, Israel's War of Independence in 1948, the decision of the International Court of Justice in 1950 in the South West Africa case, and the Six Day War in 1967.
Jordan (then called Transjordan), which had comprised 75% of the Mandate for Palestine, was granted its independence in 1946 at the last session before the League of Nations was dissolved. Although originally designated as part of the proposed site for the Jewish National Home, not one Jew then or until today has been allowed to live in this part of former Palestine.
The Arab inhabitants of Palestine were thus granted a sovereign State in 75% of Palestine, without a shot having to be fired in anger. Not a bad result, considering the Arabs had initially been granted no political rights there in 1920.
Arab political rights had been secured in other vast tracts of the former Ottoman Empire that today bear such names as Lebanon, Syria, Saudi Arabia and Iraq - areas hundreds of times larger and far richer than the pitiful area designated as the site for the reconstitution of the Jewish National Home.
The remaining 25% of Palestine, however, still remained under the League of Nations Mandates System, as did a number of other territories around the world, where the terms of those Mandates were yet to be completed at the time of the demise of the League of Nations.
To deal with these continuing Mandates, Article 80 was introduced into the United Nations Charter.
Article 80 provided that nothing in the International Trusteeship System set up under the United Nations Charter should be construed in or of itself to alter in any manner the rights whatsoever of any states or peoples or the terms of existing International Instruments to which members of the United Nations might respectively be parties.
The importance and relevance of this clause for the West Bank was not to become fully evident until 1950. A lot was to happen within the next three years to bring Article 80 into play in the West Bank.
The United Nations Partition Plan of 1947 had attempted to resolve the issue of sovereignty in that part of Palestine then still subject to the Mandate. The proposal was accepted by the Jews and rejected by the Arabs.
Had the Arabs accepted that proposal, Article 80 of the UN Charter would not need to be discussed today, and the proceedings before the International Court of Justice would not be happening.
After rejecting that proposal, six invading Arab armies marched into Palestine in May 1948 in a war to wipe out the newly declared State of Israel and replace it with Arab sovereignty in the entire 25% of the remaining Mandate.
The Arabs failed in this attempt, leaving Israel in sovereign control of the entire area with the exception of the West Bank, which came under the control of Jordan, and Gaza, which came under Egyptian control.
Israel was then recognized by the United Nations as the sovereign authority in 19% of the original Mandate for Palestine, whilst Transjordan continued to enjoy sovereignty in 75% of the original Mandate granted to it in 1946 and additionally it had gained control of another 5% - the West Bank - at the conclusion of the 1948 war.
There was no recognized international border between Israel and the West Bank, only an armistice line delineating the positions of the warring parties at the time of cessation of hostilities. This position still exists today.
The West Bank and Gaza - in total just 6% of Palestine - then remained the only territories of the Mandate in which sovereignty was unallocated between Arabs and Jews.
In 1950, when Transjordan changed its name to Jordan, it attempted to annex the West Bank but only Britain and Pakistan recognized the annexation.
In the same year the International Court of Justice in an advisory opinion on South West Africa (1950 I.C.J.Reports 128) decided that the substantive obligations of the Mandate over that territory continued in force despite the dissolution of the League of Nations. The Court affirmed that these obligations remained the essence of "the sacred trust of civilization" despite the dissolution of the League of Nations.
The ramifications of this case as applied to the mandated area of the West Bank, are, of course, highly significant
This case confirmed that Israel's right to closely settle and reconstitute the Jewish National Home on land within the West Bank was not extinguished by the demise of the League of Nations.
The Mandate continues to have important legal significance until this very day, because of the provisions of Article 80 of the United Nations Charter - something that has been consistently overlooked and ignored by the world body and those of its members who have taken their case to the International Court of Justice this week.
Jordan continued to occupy and administer the West Bank from 1948 until 1967 when Israel then gained control as a result of the 6-Day War. No mention was ever made during those 19 years of this land being "Occupied Palestinian Territory", nor was Palestinian Statehood in the area, with Jerusalem as its capitol, ever raised or demanded.
When control of the West Bank came back into Jewish hands in 1967 for the first time since its loss to the Roman Legions almost 2000 years before, Jews then began returning and settling in these areas as they were permitted and encouraged to do under Article 6 of the Mandate, in some cases returning to places from where they had been driven out in the 1948 War.
These six events and the Mandate itself have now become of the utmost importance in 2004 because they establish that:
1. The West Bank and Gaza are not "Occupied Palestinian Territory" but rather "Jewish National Home Territory" designated as such in the League of Nations Mandate for Palestine and Article 80 of the United Nations Charter.
2. Jewish settlements presently established in the West Bank and Gaza accord with the objectives of the Mandate which encouraged close settlement of these areas by the Jews. They are not illegal in International Law;
The Arab States have never accepted the legality of the Mandate for Palestine or anything subsequently flowing from it. They seem to have convinced Kofi Annan, that he can ignore it as well.
They have now run off to the International Court asking it to set aside a considerable volume of international law, as though it never existed, and have sought to make their own prejudgment as to who is entitled to build and what can be built on the land in the West Bank where the security fence is located.
International law clearly supports Israel's right to build that security fence in the West Bank providing it is either State land , waste lands not required for public purposes, or privately owned land if agreed with the owner of that land.
This situation will continue until sovereignty of the West Bank is determined between Israel and its Arab neighbours.
The United Nations endorsement of the Road Map can be seen as a positive step by the United Nations to bring the Mandate to a final resolution.
But it does not and cannot stop Israel's construction of its security fence until the provisions of the Road Map have been fully implemented and a Peace Treaty signed
The construction of Israel's security fence on land within the West Bank has aroused the ire of 90 of the 191 members of the General Assembly of the United Nations, who claim such land is "Occupied Palestinian Territory".
Is this true or is this land in fact "Jewish National Home Territory" in international law?
Are those 90 members of the United Nations and their legal advisors aware of the terms of the Mandate for Palestine and Article 80 of the United Nations Charter, which confer on Israel the right to construct the fence on its present location?
Why has the Secretary General, Kofi Annan, submitted to the International Court of Justice, a dossier purporting to set out the relevant documents relating to the case, yet has excluded the League of Nations Mandate for Palestine, which is the definitive legal document on who is entitled to build on West Bank land?
The West Bank is an area of land comprising about 5% of the territory once called Palestine administered by Great Britain from 1920 to 1948 pursuant to the Mandate for Palestine created by the League of Nations.
The West Bank was called Judea and Samaria in the Bible and had been continuously so described since then right up to the British War Maps of the 1940's and in the Mandate documents themselves.
The change of name from Judea and Samaria to the West Bank in 1950 was an attempt by Jordan to blot out the Jewish connection with this land, matching that of the Romans who changed the name of the country from its Hebrew name "Eretz Yisrael" (the land of Israel) to "Palestina" about 2000 years earlier so as to erase any recognition of Jewish sovereignty, which had finally succumbed to the might of the invading Roman Legions.
This semantic obsession is mirrored once again in the description of the land as "Occupied Palestinian Territory" in the brief presented to the International Court of Justice by the 90 United Nations members and their front man, Kofi Annan.
Again as in the past, this pathetic attempt to propagandise the status of this area will backfire on those who rely on it to assert land rights to the total exclusion of the principal beneficiary recognized in international law - the Jewish people.
I will however use the term "West Bank" to describe the area so as not to be accused of necessarily favoring the use of a name with obvious Jewish connotations and connections to advance Jewish rights in that area.
This is not necessary since international law has expressly recognized that Jewish rights do exist and still remain unfulfilled in the West Bank, irrespective of what name that area is given.
The Mandate for Palestine was the legally binding expression of the International Community of Nations - the League of Nations.
The Mandate document:
1.recognized the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine and the grounds for "reconstituting" their national home in that country;
2.created for the first time an identifiable territory called "Palestine" with defined territorial boundaries which incorporated today�s Israel, the West Bank and Gaza, and Jordan
3.safeguarded the civil and religious rights (but not any political rights as none were intended to be conferred) of the existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine;
facilitated Jewish immigration and encouraged "close settlement by Jews on the lands, including State lands and waste lands not required for public purposes" (Article 6);
All this might have been ancient history but for the occurrence of six subsequent events between 1945-1967, which together form the legal basis for Israel's construction of its present security fence in the West Bank.
The six events were the birth of the United Nations in 1945, the demise of the League of Nations in 1946, the United Nations Partition Plan of 1947, Israel's War of Independence in 1948, the decision of the International Court of Justice in 1950 in the South West Africa case, and the Six Day War in 1967.
Jordan (then called Transjordan), which had comprised 75% of the Mandate for Palestine, was granted its independence in 1946 at the last session before the League of Nations was dissolved. Although originally designated as part of the proposed site for the Jewish National Home, not one Jew then or until today has been allowed to live in this part of former Palestine.
The Arab inhabitants of Palestine were thus granted a sovereign State in 75% of Palestine, without a shot having to be fired in anger. Not a bad result, considering the Arabs had initially been granted no political rights there in 1920.
Arab political rights had been secured in other vast tracts of the former Ottoman Empire that today bear such names as Lebanon, Syria, Saudi Arabia and Iraq - areas hundreds of times larger and far richer than the pitiful area designated as the site for the reconstitution of the Jewish National Home.
The remaining 25% of Palestine, however, still remained under the League of Nations Mandates System, as did a number of other territories around the world, where the terms of those Mandates were yet to be completed at the time of the demise of the League of Nations.
To deal with these continuing Mandates, Article 80 was introduced into the United Nations Charter.
Article 80 provided that nothing in the International Trusteeship System set up under the United Nations Charter should be construed in or of itself to alter in any manner the rights whatsoever of any states or peoples or the terms of existing International Instruments to which members of the United Nations might respectively be parties.
The importance and relevance of this clause for the West Bank was not to become fully evident until 1950. A lot was to happen within the next three years to bring Article 80 into play in the West Bank.
The United Nations Partition Plan of 1947 had attempted to resolve the issue of sovereignty in that part of Palestine then still subject to the Mandate. The proposal was accepted by the Jews and rejected by the Arabs.
Had the Arabs accepted that proposal, Article 80 of the UN Charter would not need to be discussed today, and the proceedings before the International Court of Justice would not be happening.
After rejecting that proposal, six invading Arab armies marched into Palestine in May 1948 in a war to wipe out the newly declared State of Israel and replace it with Arab sovereignty in the entire 25% of the remaining Mandate.
The Arabs failed in this attempt, leaving Israel in sovereign control of the entire area with the exception of the West Bank, which came under the control of Jordan, and Gaza, which came under Egyptian control.
Israel was then recognized by the United Nations as the sovereign authority in 19% of the original Mandate for Palestine, whilst Transjordan continued to enjoy sovereignty in 75% of the original Mandate granted to it in 1946 and additionally it had gained control of another 5% - the West Bank - at the conclusion of the 1948 war.
There was no recognized international border between Israel and the West Bank, only an armistice line delineating the positions of the warring parties at the time of cessation of hostilities. This position still exists today.
The West Bank and Gaza - in total just 6% of Palestine - then remained the only territories of the Mandate in which sovereignty was unallocated between Arabs and Jews.
In 1950, when Transjordan changed its name to Jordan, it attempted to annex the West Bank but only Britain and Pakistan recognized the annexation.
In the same year the International Court of Justice in an advisory opinion on South West Africa (1950 I.C.J.Reports 128) decided that the substantive obligations of the Mandate over that territory continued in force despite the dissolution of the League of Nations. The Court affirmed that these obligations remained the essence of "the sacred trust of civilization" despite the dissolution of the League of Nations.
The ramifications of this case as applied to the mandated area of the West Bank, are, of course, highly significant
This case confirmed that Israel's right to closely settle and reconstitute the Jewish National Home on land within the West Bank was not extinguished by the demise of the League of Nations.
The Mandate continues to have important legal significance until this very day, because of the provisions of Article 80 of the United Nations Charter - something that has been consistently overlooked and ignored by the world body and those of its members who have taken their case to the International Court of Justice this week.
Jordan continued to occupy and administer the West Bank from 1948 until 1967 when Israel then gained control as a result of the 6-Day War. No mention was ever made during those 19 years of this land being "Occupied Palestinian Territory", nor was Palestinian Statehood in the area, with Jerusalem as its capitol, ever raised or demanded.
When control of the West Bank came back into Jewish hands in 1967 for the first time since its loss to the Roman Legions almost 2000 years before, Jews then began returning and settling in these areas as they were permitted and encouraged to do under Article 6 of the Mandate, in some cases returning to places from where they had been driven out in the 1948 War.
These six events and the Mandate itself have now become of the utmost importance in 2004 because they establish that:
1. The West Bank and Gaza are not "Occupied Palestinian Territory" but rather "Jewish National Home Territory" designated as such in the League of Nations Mandate for Palestine and Article 80 of the United Nations Charter.
2. Jewish settlements presently established in the West Bank and Gaza accord with the objectives of the Mandate which encouraged close settlement of these areas by the Jews. They are not illegal in International Law;
The Arab States have never accepted the legality of the Mandate for Palestine or anything subsequently flowing from it. They seem to have convinced Kofi Annan, that he can ignore it as well.
They have now run off to the International Court asking it to set aside a considerable volume of international law, as though it never existed, and have sought to make their own prejudgment as to who is entitled to build and what can be built on the land in the West Bank where the security fence is located.
International law clearly supports Israel's right to build that security fence in the West Bank providing it is either State land , waste lands not required for public purposes, or privately owned land if agreed with the owner of that land.
This situation will continue until sovereignty of the West Bank is determined between Israel and its Arab neighbours.
The United Nations endorsement of the Road Map can be seen as a positive step by the United Nations to bring the Mandate to a final resolution.
But it does not and cannot stop Israel's construction of its security fence until the provisions of the Road Map have been fully implemented and a Peace Treaty signed
A Mandate for Peace - 2004
[Published February 2004]
Madrid, Oslo and the Road Map have capped a disastrous 13 years of international diplomacy trying to find an Arab partner, other than Jordan, to negotiate the sovereignty of the West Bank and Gaza with Israel.
One wonders how long this mindless process will be allowed to continue.
Death, injury and human suffering by both Jews and Arabs seem to be the only tangible results from this non-stop diplomacy as both sides struggle to assert sovereignty over Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and Gaza - an area of land comprising just 6% of the territory once called Palestine administered by Great Britain from 1920 to 1948 pursuant to the Mandate for Palestine created by the League of Nations.
The Mandate came into being at the time of the distribution of former Turkish lands conquered by the victorious allied countries in World War I. The only competing claims were those of Jewish nationalism and Arab nationalism.
The territorial allocation made to the Arabs was more than 100 times greater in area and hundreds of times richer than the area of Palestine mandated for the establishment of the Jewish National Home.
The Mandate was the legally binding expression of the International Community of Nations. The Mandate continues to have important legal ramifications until this very day, because of the provisions of Article 80 of the United Nations Charter, - something that has been consistently overlooked and ignored by the world body and its members.
The Mandate document expressed some very important principles, including.
1.recognition of the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine and the grounds for "reconstituting" their national home in that country;
2.the creation for the first time of an identifiable territory called "Palestine" with defined territorial boundaries which incorporated Israel, Judea and Samaria (the West Bank), Gaza and Transjordan (today's State of Jordan).
3.safeguarding the civil and religious rights (but not any political rights as none were intended to be conferred) of the existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine;
4.facilitating Jewish immigration and encouraging "close settlement by Jews on the lands, including State lands and waste lands not required for public purposes" (Article 6);
All this might have been ancient history but for the occurrence of six subsequent events, which could result in the Mandate now being resurrected onto the current political stage to break the deadlock that currently exists.
The first two events were the birth of the United Nations in 1945 and the demise of the League of Nations in 1946.
Transjordan, which comprised 75% of the Mandate for Palestine, was granted its independence in 1946 at the last session before the League of Nations was dissolved. Although originally designated as part of the proposed site for the Jewish National Home, not one Jew then or until today lives or is allowed to live in this part of former Palestine.
The remaining 25% of Palestine, however, still remained under the League of Nations Mandates System, as did a number of other territories around the world.
To deal with these continuing Mandates, Article 80 was introduced into the United Nations Charter.
Article 80 provided that nothing in the International Trusteeship System set up under the United Nations Charter should be construed in or of itself to alter in any manner the rights whatsoever of any states or peoples or the terms of existing International Instruments to which members of the United Nations might respectively be parties.
In 1950 the International Court of Justice in an advisory opinion on South West Africa (1950 I.C.J.Reports 128) decided that the substantive obligations of the Mandate over that territory continued in force despite the dissolution of the League of Nations. The Court affirmed that these obligations remained the essence of "the sacred trust of civilization" despite the dissolution of the League of Nations.
The ramifications of this case as applied to the Mandate for Palestine, are, of course, highly significant
The third event of crucial importance was the United Nations Partition Plan of 1947, which attempted to resolve the issue of sovereignty in the remaining 25% of Palestine then still subject to the Mandate. The proposal was accepted by the Jews and rejected by the Arabs.
This led to the fourth crucial event, the Israeli War of Independence in 1948, when against six invading Arab armies, Israel was left in sovereign control of present day Israel, whilst Transjordan obtained control of Judea and Samaria, and Egypt gained control of Gaza.
In 1950, Transjordan renamed itself Jordan, and also renamed Judea and Samaria - the West Bank. Jordan then attempted to annex the West Bank but only Britain and Pakistan recognized the annexation. Egypt was content to administer Gaza and not seek to annex it.
Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and Gaza, comprising a mere 6% of the original Mandate, were therefore the only territories of the Mandate in which sovereignty remained unallocated between Arabs and Jews after 1948. Israel was then internationally recognised as the sovereign authority in 19%, and Jordan as the sovereign authority in 75%, of the original Mandate.
However, by virtue of Article 80 of the United Nations Charter, the terms of the Mandate for Palestine were still alive and kicking in relation to Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and Gaza, where sovereignty still remained unallocated to anyone.
The fifth event of significance occurred in 1967 when Israel gained control of Judea and Samaria, (the West Bank) and Gaza as a result of the 6-Day War. Jews then began settling in these areas as they were permitted to do under Article 6 of the Mandate, in some cases returning to places from where they had been driven out in the 1948 War.
The sixth event of significance was the signing of the Peace treaty between Israel and Jordan in 1994.
This has not been achieved in Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and Gaza between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, despite the best and worthy endeavours of a succession of American Presidents, British Prime Ministers, United Nations Secretaries General and other talented European and world dignitaries.
These six events and the Mandate itself have become of the utmost importance in 2004 because one can glean from them the following -
1.Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and Gaza are not "occupied Arab lands" but are in fact areas of the Mandate which are still to be dealt with in accordance with the "sacred trust of civilisation" declared by the League of Nations and preserved by Article 80 of the United Nations Charter.
2.All Jewish settlements presently established in Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and Gaza accord with the objectives of the Mandate which encouraged close settlement of these areas by the Jews. They are not illegal in International Law;
3. There are already two successor sovereign States in the territory formerly called "Palestine". One is the Jewish State of Israel and the other is the Arab State of Jordan. Together they exercise sovereignty in 94% of the Mandate area.
4.It is only in the remaining 6% of the Mandate - Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and Gaza - that sovereignty remains undetermined and the terms of the Mandate uncompleted;
Jordan and Israel, the two sovereign successor States at peace with each other for the last 10 years, are obviously the most appropriate partners to negotiate the sovereignty of this small parcel of land wedged in between their respective countries, and to determine the future of both the Jewish and Arab populations residing in those areas.
With goodwill and mutual respect, not one resident of those areas, be he Jew or Arab, would have to move from his present home.
Such negotiations would have very real prospects of success because they would be predicated on firm historic, geographic and demographic bases. Ethnically there is no difference between Arabs living on the west side of the Jordan River and those on the east side. Jordan can, and should, speak for and govern all of them.
Madrid, Oslo and the Road Map possessed none of these attributes and the results have now become plain for all to see.
Former Israeli Minister of Defence and Israeli Ambassador to Washington, Moshe Arens, has described it better than anyone, - a border dispute involving the redrawing of the boundary line between Jordan and Israel.
Jordan renounced all claims to these areas in 1988. It is not beyond the bounds of possibility that it could now have a change of heart, following the descent into chaos that it has been witnessing on its own doorstep over the last 2 years in particular.
International support in the shape of financial, military, and diplomatic assistance would help Jordan make this brave decision and give a real boost to efforts to end the 125 years old conflict between Jews and Arabs in Palestine.
The sooner Jordan and Israel are brought together to revisit the Mandate's clear and unambiguous terms and to implement its provisions to final completion in Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and Gaza, the sooner justice will be done to both the Jewish and Arab inhabitants of former Palestine.
Jordan's mission would be a noble one in the search for peace. Those who could help bring about the opening of negotiations between Jordan and Israel over this small piece of real estate with possibly a confederation between them at the end of those negotiations, would find their efforts far more rewarded than the authors of so many plans that have hardly left the drawing board before being consigned to historical oblivion.
Madrid, Oslo and the Road Map have capped a disastrous 13 years of international diplomacy trying to find an Arab partner, other than Jordan, to negotiate the sovereignty of the West Bank and Gaza with Israel.
One wonders how long this mindless process will be allowed to continue.
Death, injury and human suffering by both Jews and Arabs seem to be the only tangible results from this non-stop diplomacy as both sides struggle to assert sovereignty over Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and Gaza - an area of land comprising just 6% of the territory once called Palestine administered by Great Britain from 1920 to 1948 pursuant to the Mandate for Palestine created by the League of Nations.
The Mandate came into being at the time of the distribution of former Turkish lands conquered by the victorious allied countries in World War I. The only competing claims were those of Jewish nationalism and Arab nationalism.
The territorial allocation made to the Arabs was more than 100 times greater in area and hundreds of times richer than the area of Palestine mandated for the establishment of the Jewish National Home.
The Mandate was the legally binding expression of the International Community of Nations. The Mandate continues to have important legal ramifications until this very day, because of the provisions of Article 80 of the United Nations Charter, - something that has been consistently overlooked and ignored by the world body and its members.
The Mandate document expressed some very important principles, including.
1.recognition of the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine and the grounds for "reconstituting" their national home in that country;
2.the creation for the first time of an identifiable territory called "Palestine" with defined territorial boundaries which incorporated Israel, Judea and Samaria (the West Bank), Gaza and Transjordan (today's State of Jordan).
3.safeguarding the civil and religious rights (but not any political rights as none were intended to be conferred) of the existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine;
4.facilitating Jewish immigration and encouraging "close settlement by Jews on the lands, including State lands and waste lands not required for public purposes" (Article 6);
All this might have been ancient history but for the occurrence of six subsequent events, which could result in the Mandate now being resurrected onto the current political stage to break the deadlock that currently exists.
The first two events were the birth of the United Nations in 1945 and the demise of the League of Nations in 1946.
Transjordan, which comprised 75% of the Mandate for Palestine, was granted its independence in 1946 at the last session before the League of Nations was dissolved. Although originally designated as part of the proposed site for the Jewish National Home, not one Jew then or until today lives or is allowed to live in this part of former Palestine.
The remaining 25% of Palestine, however, still remained under the League of Nations Mandates System, as did a number of other territories around the world.
To deal with these continuing Mandates, Article 80 was introduced into the United Nations Charter.
Article 80 provided that nothing in the International Trusteeship System set up under the United Nations Charter should be construed in or of itself to alter in any manner the rights whatsoever of any states or peoples or the terms of existing International Instruments to which members of the United Nations might respectively be parties.
In 1950 the International Court of Justice in an advisory opinion on South West Africa (1950 I.C.J.Reports 128) decided that the substantive obligations of the Mandate over that territory continued in force despite the dissolution of the League of Nations. The Court affirmed that these obligations remained the essence of "the sacred trust of civilization" despite the dissolution of the League of Nations.
The ramifications of this case as applied to the Mandate for Palestine, are, of course, highly significant
The third event of crucial importance was the United Nations Partition Plan of 1947, which attempted to resolve the issue of sovereignty in the remaining 25% of Palestine then still subject to the Mandate. The proposal was accepted by the Jews and rejected by the Arabs.
This led to the fourth crucial event, the Israeli War of Independence in 1948, when against six invading Arab armies, Israel was left in sovereign control of present day Israel, whilst Transjordan obtained control of Judea and Samaria, and Egypt gained control of Gaza.
In 1950, Transjordan renamed itself Jordan, and also renamed Judea and Samaria - the West Bank. Jordan then attempted to annex the West Bank but only Britain and Pakistan recognized the annexation. Egypt was content to administer Gaza and not seek to annex it.
Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and Gaza, comprising a mere 6% of the original Mandate, were therefore the only territories of the Mandate in which sovereignty remained unallocated between Arabs and Jews after 1948. Israel was then internationally recognised as the sovereign authority in 19%, and Jordan as the sovereign authority in 75%, of the original Mandate.
However, by virtue of Article 80 of the United Nations Charter, the terms of the Mandate for Palestine were still alive and kicking in relation to Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and Gaza, where sovereignty still remained unallocated to anyone.
The fifth event of significance occurred in 1967 when Israel gained control of Judea and Samaria, (the West Bank) and Gaza as a result of the 6-Day War. Jews then began settling in these areas as they were permitted to do under Article 6 of the Mandate, in some cases returning to places from where they had been driven out in the 1948 War.
The sixth event of significance was the signing of the Peace treaty between Israel and Jordan in 1994.
This has not been achieved in Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and Gaza between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, despite the best and worthy endeavours of a succession of American Presidents, British Prime Ministers, United Nations Secretaries General and other talented European and world dignitaries.
These six events and the Mandate itself have become of the utmost importance in 2004 because one can glean from them the following -
1.Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and Gaza are not "occupied Arab lands" but are in fact areas of the Mandate which are still to be dealt with in accordance with the "sacred trust of civilisation" declared by the League of Nations and preserved by Article 80 of the United Nations Charter.
2.All Jewish settlements presently established in Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and Gaza accord with the objectives of the Mandate which encouraged close settlement of these areas by the Jews. They are not illegal in International Law;
3. There are already two successor sovereign States in the territory formerly called "Palestine". One is the Jewish State of Israel and the other is the Arab State of Jordan. Together they exercise sovereignty in 94% of the Mandate area.
4.It is only in the remaining 6% of the Mandate - Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and Gaza - that sovereignty remains undetermined and the terms of the Mandate uncompleted;
Jordan and Israel, the two sovereign successor States at peace with each other for the last 10 years, are obviously the most appropriate partners to negotiate the sovereignty of this small parcel of land wedged in between their respective countries, and to determine the future of both the Jewish and Arab populations residing in those areas.
With goodwill and mutual respect, not one resident of those areas, be he Jew or Arab, would have to move from his present home.
Such negotiations would have very real prospects of success because they would be predicated on firm historic, geographic and demographic bases. Ethnically there is no difference between Arabs living on the west side of the Jordan River and those on the east side. Jordan can, and should, speak for and govern all of them.
Madrid, Oslo and the Road Map possessed none of these attributes and the results have now become plain for all to see.
Former Israeli Minister of Defence and Israeli Ambassador to Washington, Moshe Arens, has described it better than anyone, - a border dispute involving the redrawing of the boundary line between Jordan and Israel.
Jordan renounced all claims to these areas in 1988. It is not beyond the bounds of possibility that it could now have a change of heart, following the descent into chaos that it has been witnessing on its own doorstep over the last 2 years in particular.
International support in the shape of financial, military, and diplomatic assistance would help Jordan make this brave decision and give a real boost to efforts to end the 125 years old conflict between Jews and Arabs in Palestine.
The sooner Jordan and Israel are brought together to revisit the Mandate's clear and unambiguous terms and to implement its provisions to final completion in Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and Gaza, the sooner justice will be done to both the Jewish and Arab inhabitants of former Palestine.
Jordan's mission would be a noble one in the search for peace. Those who could help bring about the opening of negotiations between Jordan and Israel over this small piece of real estate with possibly a confederation between them at the end of those negotiations, would find their efforts far more rewarded than the authors of so many plans that have hardly left the drawing board before being consigned to historical oblivion.
Time for a new initiative
LONDON SUNDAY MAIL 4 July 2002
Israel needs to articulate some coherent policy stance to try and break the present impasse in the Middle East.
There is a way forward.
It involves Israel, Jordan and Egypt, by direct negotiations, dividing the sovereignty of the West Bank and Gaza between their respective States. No Arab or Jew need move from his present home, unless he voluntarily chooses to do so.
These negotiations could be held under the chairmanship of the Secretary General of the United Nations pursuant to Article 80 of the United Nations Charter, dubbed the “Palestine clause”, which preserves the right of the Jews to reconstitute the Jewish National Home in that area of Palestine west of the Jordan River.
The West Bank and Gaza are the only areas of Palestine where sovereignty has not yet been allocated between Arabs and Jews. Jordan is 77% of former Palestine and Israel is 17% of Former Palestine.
The late Yitzchak Rabin once said: "A tiny State between Israel and Jordan will solve nothing. It will be a time bomb." How right he was.
Israel needs to articulate some coherent policy stance to try and break the present impasse in the Middle East.
There is a way forward.
It involves Israel, Jordan and Egypt, by direct negotiations, dividing the sovereignty of the West Bank and Gaza between their respective States. No Arab or Jew need move from his present home, unless he voluntarily chooses to do so.
These negotiations could be held under the chairmanship of the Secretary General of the United Nations pursuant to Article 80 of the United Nations Charter, dubbed the “Palestine clause”, which preserves the right of the Jews to reconstitute the Jewish National Home in that area of Palestine west of the Jordan River.
The West Bank and Gaza are the only areas of Palestine where sovereignty has not yet been allocated between Arabs and Jews. Jordan is 77% of former Palestine and Israel is 17% of Former Palestine.
The late Yitzchak Rabin once said: "A tiny State between Israel and Jordan will solve nothing. It will be a time bomb." How right he was.
Sunday, June 17, 2007
A Mandate for Peace - 1997
[Originally published in August 1997]
1997 marks an auspicious year for world Jewry as it commemorates the 100th year of the holding of the first Zionist Congress in Basle, the 80th anniversary of the Balfour Declaration, the 50th anniversary of the United Nations General Assembly Resolution on the partition of Palestine and the 30th anniversary of the Six Day War.
Remarkably however, no attention has been given to the forthcoming 75th anniversary of the promulgation by the League of Nations of the Mandate for Palestine on July 24, 1922, and the British Memorandum relating to Transjordan, approved by the Council of the League less than three months later on September 16, 1922.
The Mandate came into being at the time of the distribution of former Turkish lands conquered by the victorious allied countries in World War I. The only competing claims were those of Jewish nationalism and Arab nationalism. The Mandate did not come into existence by way of Jewish encroachment on already vested sovereign Arab lands. The territorial allocation made to the Arabs was more than 100 times greater in area and hundreds of times richer than the area of Palestine mandated for the establishment of the Jewish National Home.
The otherwise excellent web site of Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs does not include the Mandate in its collection of historical documents. Indeed one can search the Internet in vain to find a complete copy of the text of the Mandate.
Whilst the Balfour Declaration was a critical step in the formation of the Jewish homeland in Palestine it had no legal effect. The Mandate, on the other hand, was the legally binding expression of the International Community of Nations. The Mandate continues to have important legal ramifications until this very day, which continue to bind the United Nations as the successor to the League of Nations.
The Mandate document expressed some very important principles, including.
1. recognition of the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine and the grounds for "reconstituting" their national home in that country;
2. the creation for the first time of an identifiable territory called "Palestine" with defined territorial boundaries which incorporated what is to-day called Israel, Judea and Samaria (The West Bank), Gaza and the State of Jordan;
3. safeguarding the civil and religious rights (but not the political rights) of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine;
4. facilitating Jewish immigration and encouraging "close settlement by Jews on the lands, including State lands and waste lands not required for public purposes";
5. reserving the right, in the territory lying between the River Jordan and the eastern boundary of Palestine, to postpone or withhold application of such provisions of the Mandate as may be considered inapplicable to the existing local conditions. Pursuant to this provision, Britain as the Mandatory for Palestine presented a Memorandum to the League Council on the 16th September, 1922, declaring inapplicable to the area to-day called Jordan (then called Transjordan) those provisions of the Mandate dealing with the establishment of the Jewish National Home in Palestine. However, Jordan remained part of Palestine and 22 of the 28 Articles of the Mandate continued to apply to Jordan until 1946.
All this might have been ancient history but for the occurrence of four subsequent events which could soon result in the Mandate being resurrected onto the current political stage.
The first two events were the birth of the United Nations in 1945 and the demise of the League of Nations in 1946. Transjordan, which comprised 75% of Palestine, was granted its independence in 1946 at the last session of the League of Nations. The remainder of Palestine, however, was still under the League of Nations Mandates System, as were a number of other territories around the world. To deal with these continuing Mandates, Article 80 was introduced into the United Nations Charter.
Article 80 provided that nothing in the International Trusteeship System set up under the United Nations Charter should be construed in or of itself to alter in any manner the rights whatsoever of any states or peoples or the terms of existing International Instruments to which members of the United Nations might respectively be parties. This Article was dubbed "The Palestine Article" because it had been incorporated into the Charter as a result of intense Zionist lobbying. The Jews were concerned to ensure that the terms of the Mandate for Palestine were fully implemented in their favor and not allowed to die with the League of Nations.
Their efforts were vindicated when the International Court of Justice in an advisory opinion on South West Africa (1950 I.C.J.Reports 128) decided that the substantive obligations of the Mandate over that territory continued in force despite the dissolution of the League of Nations. The Court affirmed that these obligations remained the essence of "the sacred trust of civilization" despite the dissolution of the League of Nations.
The third event of crucial importance was the 1948 War of Independence, which at the conclusion of hostilities left Jordan in control of Judea and Samaria and Egypt in control of Gaza. Jordan attempted to annex Judea and Samaria but only Britain and Pakistan recognized the annexation. Egypt was content to administer Gaza and not seek to annex it. Judea, Samaria and Gaza (about 5% of former Palestine) were therefore the only territories of the Mandate in which sovereignty remained unallocated between Arabs and Jews. However, by virtue of Article 80 of the United Nations Charter the terms of the Mandate for Palestine were still alive and kicking in relation to those areas. The use of the term "West Bank" to describe Judea and Samaria did not emerge until 1950 when King Hussein coined that name in an attempt to obliterate the Jewish character of these areas.
The fourth event of significance occurred in 1967 when Israel gained possession of Judea, Samaria and Gaza as a result of the 6-day War and subsequently engaged in settling Jews in these areas.
These events and the Mandate itself have become of the utmost importance in 1997 because one can deduce from them the following -
Judea, Samaria and Gaza are not "occupied Arab lands" but are in fact areas of the Mandate which are still to be dealt with in accordance with the terms of the Mandate;
All Jewish settlements presently established in Judea, Samaria and Gaza accord with the Mandate encouraging close settlement in these areas by the Jews. They are not illegal in International Law;
There are already two successor sovereign States in the former territory called "Palestine". One is the Jewish State of Israel and the other is the Arab State of Jordan. Together they exercise sovereignty in over 95% of the Mandate area. It is only in the areas of Judea, Samaria and Gaza that sovereignty remains undetermined and the terms of the Mandate uncompleted;
The Mandate does not provide for a separate Arab State to be created in Judea, Samaria and Gaza. Indeed the Arab residents of Judea and Samaria enjoyed political rights as citizens of Jordan from 1948 until 1988. There is no reason why this status cannot be recreated.
Further Jewish settlement in these areas is to be encouraged in compliance with the express terms of the Mandate.
It is ironic therefore to see Resolution after Resolution in the United Nations General Assembly condemning Israel for building on Har Homa, planning new settlements or expanding existing settlements, when, by the terms of Article 80 of its own Charter, the U.N. should be affirming such actions as being entirely consistent with the terms of the Mandate the U.N. is obliged to uphold.
The P.L.O. takes an entirely different view. The P.L.O. Charter accepts "Palestine" as the territory "with the boundaries it had during the British Mandate". Yet the Charter then forthrightly declares that the "Balfour Declaration, the Mandate for Palestine and everything that has been based on them, are deemed null and void."
Of course, the P.L.O. is obliged to revoke these clauses of its Charter under the terms of the Oslo Agreements. When one realizes the implications of the P.L.O. doing so, its continuing reluctance to honor that obligation becomes understandable. Submitting itself to International Law is not a priority on the P.L.O. agenda.
However, this was the pain the P.L.O. was required to bear if the Oslo negotiations were to have any chance of success. Were the P.L.O. to now repeal these provisions, any claim by the P.L.O. to create a second Arab State in Palestine, in addition to Jordan, would be greatly weakened.
The continued application of the Mandate to Judea, Samaria and Gaza highlights the fact that Oslo was doomed to failure from the start, because the wrong negotiating partners were chosen. The proper partners to negotiate the future of Judea, Samaria and Gaza and of the Jewish and Arab populations residing in those areas should be the sovereign Governments of Jordan and Israel - the two successor States to the Mandate for Palestine.
Such negotiations would have a reasonable prospect of success because they would be predicated on firm historic, geographic and demographic bases. Oslo possessed none of these attributes and the results are now become plain for all to see.
Two peoples need two states not three, two capitals not three.
The 75th anniversary of the Mandate's birth should give the opportunity to both Arabs and Jews as well as the United Nations to revisit the Mandate's clear and unambiguous terms and to implement its provisions to final completion in Judea, Samaria and Gaza, so that Justice will finally be done to both peoples and peace be allowed to take over from violence and bloodshed.
How many lives have been lost and suffering has been inflicted on both Jews and Arabs in the last 10 years because the following simple prescription for peace was not followed? Perhaps the realisation that this is the only workable solution is now beginning to sink in
1997 marks an auspicious year for world Jewry as it commemorates the 100th year of the holding of the first Zionist Congress in Basle, the 80th anniversary of the Balfour Declaration, the 50th anniversary of the United Nations General Assembly Resolution on the partition of Palestine and the 30th anniversary of the Six Day War.
Remarkably however, no attention has been given to the forthcoming 75th anniversary of the promulgation by the League of Nations of the Mandate for Palestine on July 24, 1922, and the British Memorandum relating to Transjordan, approved by the Council of the League less than three months later on September 16, 1922.
The Mandate came into being at the time of the distribution of former Turkish lands conquered by the victorious allied countries in World War I. The only competing claims were those of Jewish nationalism and Arab nationalism. The Mandate did not come into existence by way of Jewish encroachment on already vested sovereign Arab lands. The territorial allocation made to the Arabs was more than 100 times greater in area and hundreds of times richer than the area of Palestine mandated for the establishment of the Jewish National Home.
The otherwise excellent web site of Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs does not include the Mandate in its collection of historical documents. Indeed one can search the Internet in vain to find a complete copy of the text of the Mandate.
Whilst the Balfour Declaration was a critical step in the formation of the Jewish homeland in Palestine it had no legal effect. The Mandate, on the other hand, was the legally binding expression of the International Community of Nations. The Mandate continues to have important legal ramifications until this very day, which continue to bind the United Nations as the successor to the League of Nations.
The Mandate document expressed some very important principles, including.
1. recognition of the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine and the grounds for "reconstituting" their national home in that country;
2. the creation for the first time of an identifiable territory called "Palestine" with defined territorial boundaries which incorporated what is to-day called Israel, Judea and Samaria (The West Bank), Gaza and the State of Jordan;
3. safeguarding the civil and religious rights (but not the political rights) of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine;
4. facilitating Jewish immigration and encouraging "close settlement by Jews on the lands, including State lands and waste lands not required for public purposes";
5. reserving the right, in the territory lying between the River Jordan and the eastern boundary of Palestine, to postpone or withhold application of such provisions of the Mandate as may be considered inapplicable to the existing local conditions. Pursuant to this provision, Britain as the Mandatory for Palestine presented a Memorandum to the League Council on the 16th September, 1922, declaring inapplicable to the area to-day called Jordan (then called Transjordan) those provisions of the Mandate dealing with the establishment of the Jewish National Home in Palestine. However, Jordan remained part of Palestine and 22 of the 28 Articles of the Mandate continued to apply to Jordan until 1946.
All this might have been ancient history but for the occurrence of four subsequent events which could soon result in the Mandate being resurrected onto the current political stage.
The first two events were the birth of the United Nations in 1945 and the demise of the League of Nations in 1946. Transjordan, which comprised 75% of Palestine, was granted its independence in 1946 at the last session of the League of Nations. The remainder of Palestine, however, was still under the League of Nations Mandates System, as were a number of other territories around the world. To deal with these continuing Mandates, Article 80 was introduced into the United Nations Charter.
Article 80 provided that nothing in the International Trusteeship System set up under the United Nations Charter should be construed in or of itself to alter in any manner the rights whatsoever of any states or peoples or the terms of existing International Instruments to which members of the United Nations might respectively be parties. This Article was dubbed "The Palestine Article" because it had been incorporated into the Charter as a result of intense Zionist lobbying. The Jews were concerned to ensure that the terms of the Mandate for Palestine were fully implemented in their favor and not allowed to die with the League of Nations.
Their efforts were vindicated when the International Court of Justice in an advisory opinion on South West Africa (1950 I.C.J.Reports 128) decided that the substantive obligations of the Mandate over that territory continued in force despite the dissolution of the League of Nations. The Court affirmed that these obligations remained the essence of "the sacred trust of civilization" despite the dissolution of the League of Nations.
The third event of crucial importance was the 1948 War of Independence, which at the conclusion of hostilities left Jordan in control of Judea and Samaria and Egypt in control of Gaza. Jordan attempted to annex Judea and Samaria but only Britain and Pakistan recognized the annexation. Egypt was content to administer Gaza and not seek to annex it. Judea, Samaria and Gaza (about 5% of former Palestine) were therefore the only territories of the Mandate in which sovereignty remained unallocated between Arabs and Jews. However, by virtue of Article 80 of the United Nations Charter the terms of the Mandate for Palestine were still alive and kicking in relation to those areas. The use of the term "West Bank" to describe Judea and Samaria did not emerge until 1950 when King Hussein coined that name in an attempt to obliterate the Jewish character of these areas.
The fourth event of significance occurred in 1967 when Israel gained possession of Judea, Samaria and Gaza as a result of the 6-day War and subsequently engaged in settling Jews in these areas.
These events and the Mandate itself have become of the utmost importance in 1997 because one can deduce from them the following -
Judea, Samaria and Gaza are not "occupied Arab lands" but are in fact areas of the Mandate which are still to be dealt with in accordance with the terms of the Mandate;
All Jewish settlements presently established in Judea, Samaria and Gaza accord with the Mandate encouraging close settlement in these areas by the Jews. They are not illegal in International Law;
There are already two successor sovereign States in the former territory called "Palestine". One is the Jewish State of Israel and the other is the Arab State of Jordan. Together they exercise sovereignty in over 95% of the Mandate area. It is only in the areas of Judea, Samaria and Gaza that sovereignty remains undetermined and the terms of the Mandate uncompleted;
The Mandate does not provide for a separate Arab State to be created in Judea, Samaria and Gaza. Indeed the Arab residents of Judea and Samaria enjoyed political rights as citizens of Jordan from 1948 until 1988. There is no reason why this status cannot be recreated.
Further Jewish settlement in these areas is to be encouraged in compliance with the express terms of the Mandate.
It is ironic therefore to see Resolution after Resolution in the United Nations General Assembly condemning Israel for building on Har Homa, planning new settlements or expanding existing settlements, when, by the terms of Article 80 of its own Charter, the U.N. should be affirming such actions as being entirely consistent with the terms of the Mandate the U.N. is obliged to uphold.
The P.L.O. takes an entirely different view. The P.L.O. Charter accepts "Palestine" as the territory "with the boundaries it had during the British Mandate". Yet the Charter then forthrightly declares that the "Balfour Declaration, the Mandate for Palestine and everything that has been based on them, are deemed null and void."
Of course, the P.L.O. is obliged to revoke these clauses of its Charter under the terms of the Oslo Agreements. When one realizes the implications of the P.L.O. doing so, its continuing reluctance to honor that obligation becomes understandable. Submitting itself to International Law is not a priority on the P.L.O. agenda.
However, this was the pain the P.L.O. was required to bear if the Oslo negotiations were to have any chance of success. Were the P.L.O. to now repeal these provisions, any claim by the P.L.O. to create a second Arab State in Palestine, in addition to Jordan, would be greatly weakened.
The continued application of the Mandate to Judea, Samaria and Gaza highlights the fact that Oslo was doomed to failure from the start, because the wrong negotiating partners were chosen. The proper partners to negotiate the future of Judea, Samaria and Gaza and of the Jewish and Arab populations residing in those areas should be the sovereign Governments of Jordan and Israel - the two successor States to the Mandate for Palestine.
Such negotiations would have a reasonable prospect of success because they would be predicated on firm historic, geographic and demographic bases. Oslo possessed none of these attributes and the results are now become plain for all to see.
Two peoples need two states not three, two capitals not three.
The 75th anniversary of the Mandate's birth should give the opportunity to both Arabs and Jews as well as the United Nations to revisit the Mandate's clear and unambiguous terms and to implement its provisions to final completion in Judea, Samaria and Gaza, so that Justice will finally be done to both peoples and peace be allowed to take over from violence and bloodshed.
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