Jordan-PLO-Egypt negotiations with Israel could be key to peace

 

The Negev Summit (Summit) taking place on 27 and 28 March - hosted by Israel’s Foreign Minister Yair Lapid– could be the catalyst for promoting the beginning of direct negotiations - without preconditions - between Israel, Jordan, the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) and Egypt - on the allocation of sovereignty in Judea and Samaria (West Bank) and Gaza.

Summit attendees will include:

• US Secretary for State Antony Blinken
• Minister of Foreign Affairs of the United Arab Emirates H.H. Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed
• Minister of Foreign Affairs of Bahrain Dr. Abdullatif bin Rashid Al Zayani, 
• Minister of Foreign Affairs of Morocco Nasser Bourita, and 
• Minister of Foreign Affairs of Egypt Sameh Shoukry.

Jordan’s Foreign Minister Ayman al-Safdi will be meeting PLO leader Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah during the Summit. However - according to Israel’s Channel N12 - al-Safdi may join the Summit before the event is concluded. 

On March 18 Principal Deputy Spokesperson in the US State Department--Jalina Porter--had announced Blinken’s visit to the Middle East without mentioning the Summit.   

Porter articulated the Biden Administration’s views on creating a second Palestinian Arab State in former Palestine--in addition to Jordan:

... "the Biden-Harris administration believes that there should be a viable and democratic Palestinian state living in peace alongside a Jewish and democratic state. We believe that a negotiated two-state solution is the best way to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and the administration has also made clear on numerous occasions that Israelis and Palestinians alike equally deserve to live in security, prosperity, and freedom."

Porter’s choice of the term "Israeli-Palestinian conflict" was unfortunate. 

A more appropriate term would have been the "Arab-Jewish conflict" which has been raging unresolved in former Palestine for more than 100 years - long before the terms "Israelis" and "Palestinians" were created in 1948 and 1964 respectively. 

In this long-running conflict - every word counts. 

United Nations General Assembly Resolution 181- passed in 1947 - had called for Western Palestine - today called Israel, Judea and Samaria (West Bank) and Gaza - to be partitioned into one Arab State and one Jewish State.  This area comprised 22% of the territory in the 1922 League of Nations Mandate for Palestine.  Jerusalem was to become a separate entity to be governed by a special international regime.  

The remaining 78% of former Palestine - Transjordan - today called Jordan - had already achieved its independence in 1946. This area was exclusively populated by Arabs - having been excluded from Jewish settlement in 1922 by article 25 of the Mandate for Palestine. 

The Jews accepted Resolution 181 - but it was rejected by the Arabs - resulting in the invasion of Western Palestine by the armies of six Arab States - Egypt, Syria, Transjordan, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia and Iraq. 

Transjordan conquered East Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria and unified those areas with Transjordan to form a new territorial entity - renamed Jordan in 1950 - until these areas were lost to Israel in the 1967 Six Day War.  

Egypt conquered Gaza and administered it between 1948 and 1967.  

Summit participant - Egypt’s Sameh Shoukry - held talks in Cairo three weeks ago  with Ziad Abu Amr — the Palestinian Deputy Prime Minister and PLO Executive Committee Member — and Palestinian Minister of Social Development Ahmad Majdalani. 

Shoukry then reportedly expressed the importance of continuing contact with various regional and international parties concerned in order to create the appropriate atmosphere for reviving the negotiations between the Palestinian and Israeli sides at the earliest opportunity. 

The Summit could well be creating that appropriate atmosphere which eventually sees Jordan-PLO-Egypt negotiations with Israel to finally complete the solution first contemplated in 1922 - the division of former Palestine between Arabs and Jews.

Author’s note: The cartoon — commissioned exclusively for this article — is by Yaakov Kirschen aka "Dry Bones"- one of Israel’s foremost political and social commentators — whose cartoons have graced the columns of Israeli and international media publications for decades.

UN abandons moral compass in waging semantic warfare on Israel

 

The language being used by the United Nations (UN) and its officials to characterise the unresolved 100-years old conflict between Jews and Arabs disqualifies the UN from having any meaningful role to play in ending that long-running dispute.

The Report to the Security Council on November 30,2021 by Tor Wennesland — Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process – is the latest in the ongoing saga of semantic warfare being waged against Israel. 

Wennesland’s Report is peppered with the following terminology that reeks of prejudice against Jewish claims but is heavily-biased in favour of Arab claims:

1. “Occupied Palestinian Territory”

“Occupied Palestinian Territory” is in fact “Disputed Territory”: Territory which is claimed by both Jews and Arabs.  

Use of “Occupied Palestinian Territory” rather than “Disputed Territory” signals that the UN does not accept Jewish claims to any of this “Disputed Territory ” – notwithstanding that article 80 of the UN’s own Charter preserves the right of Jews to live in that Territory for the purposes of reconstituting the Jewish National Home there under the terms of the 1922 League of Nations Mandate for Palestine.

2. “West Bank”

The term “West Bank” was coined in 1950 to designate 4% of the territory of former Palestine west of the Jordan River - called “Judea and Samaria” for the previous 3000 years - which was unified with an additional 78% of the territory of former Palestine east of the Jordan River - called Transjordan — to form a new territorial entity renamed “Jordan”.

Wennesland’s use of the stand-alone term “West Bank” without any reference to its 3000 years old historic name indicates the immoral depths to which the UN and its officials have sunk.

After all — the UN itself had used the term “Judea and Samaria” in Resolution 181 (II) on November 29, 1947:

“The boundary of the hill country of Samaria and Judea starts on the Jordan River at the Wadi Malih south-east of Beisan”

The UN Special Commission on Palestine also used the term “Judea and Samaria” in its 1947 Report:

”...the interior of the country is very mountainous with the hills of Judea and Samaria in the centre” 

Removing any possible identification with Jews and Jewish history by expunging any reference to “Judea and Samaria” –-the Jewish People’s ancient and biblical heartland – exposes the UN’s anti-Jewish bias in papering over Jewish claims to this disputed territory in favour of an invented fake pro-Arab claim made for the first time in history in the 1964 PLO Charter.

3. “The Palestinian Authority”

On January 3, 2013 - the term “Palestinian Authority” was replaced by the term “State of Palestine” - when Mahmoud Abbas, acting in his capacities as President of the State of Palestine and Chairman of the Executive Committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization, signed “Decree No. 1 for the year 2013.” 

 Article 1 of the decree states:

“Official documents, seals, signs and letterheads of the Palestinian National Authority official and national institutions shall be amended by replacing the name ‘Palestinian National Authority’ whenever it appears by the name ‘State of Palestine’ and by adopting the emblem of the State of Palestine.” 

Article 4 states: 

“All competent authorities, each in their respective area, shall implement this Decree starting from its date.”

What motivates the UN and its officials to still turn a blind eye to this official name change after almost 9 years?

The UN continues to lose its credibility, neutrality and impartiality as it and its officials use language and terminology which is antithetical to seeking an end to the Arab-Jewish conflict.

Sticks and stones won’t break the UN’s bones – but waging semantic warfare against Israel is certainly doing just that.

Author’s note: The cartoon—commissioned exclusively for this article—is by Yaakov Kirschen aka “Dry Bones”—one of Israel’s foremost political and social commentators—whose cartoons have graced the columns of Israeli and international media publications for decades.

UN Secretary-General Guterres ignores Jordan-Palestine nexus

[Published 11 February 2018]


United Nations Secretary-General — Antonio Guterres — displayed how little he knows of the history, geography and demography of Palestine when addressing the opening of the 2018 Session of the Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People (“CEIRPP”).

Established by the General Assembly in 1975 - CEIRPP was responsible for the publication in 1978 of a false narrative of the Arab-Israel conflict - “The Origins and Evolution of the Palestine Problem 1917-1947” (“UN Study”) - which has undoubtedly influenced United Nations thinking and decision-making.

Three examples highlight the falsity and outright bias of this UN Study:

1. Deliberately misrepresenting General Assembly Resolution 181 spoke of a “Palestinian Arab State” - when claiming:

“After investigating various alternatives the United Nations proposed the partitioning of Palestine into two independent States, one Palestinian Arab and the other Jewish, with Jerusalem internationalized.”

The actual wording of Resolution 181 stated:

“Independent Arab and Jewish States and the Special International Regime for the City of Jerusalem, set forth in Part III of this Plan, shall come into existence in Palestine….”

2. Omitting any mention of the fact that 78% of Palestine had become an independent Arab State in 1946 and been renamed the Hashemite Kingdom of Transjordan.

3. Falsely alleging:

“The decision on the Mandate [for Palestine] did not take into account the wishes of the people of Palestine”

The evidence contradicting this falsehood actually sits in the United Nations own archives.

That evidence comprises:

(i) Meetings of the Palestine Arab Delegation (Delegation) with the recently appointed Secretary of State for the Colonies - Winston Churchill - on 12, 22 and 23 August 1921

(ii)Letters from 21 February 1922 to 23 June 1922 between the Delegation and the Secretary of State for the Colonies during the Delegation's stay in the Hotel Cecil in London.

CEIRPP concealed this crucial archival evidence - falsely inferring the Palestinian Arabs wishes had not been taken into account when in fact they had been fully considered.

Secretary-General Guterres told the CEIRPP opening session:

“I remain steadfast in the United Nations and my commitment to supporting the parties in their efforts to make the two-State solution a reality.

There is no Plan B.

A two-State solution is the only way to achieve the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people and secure a sustainable solution to the conflict.”

Secretary-General Gutteres is apparently unaware that:

1. The term “Palestinian people” was invented in the 1964 Palestine Liberation Organization Charter which also specifically excluded any claim to exercise regional sovereignty “over the West Bank in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan” and “on the Gaza Strip”

2. The Palestinian Arabs were never mentioned in the 1922 League of Nations Mandate for Palestine - being grouped in with “the existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine”

3. The “two-State solution” - Israel and Jordan — first envisaged in 1922 and actually proposed in 1937 - was accepted by the Jews but rejected by the Arabs on both occasions. It was 95% achieved in 1994 when the Israel-Jordan Peace Treaty was signed.

4. The “inalienable rights of the Palestinian people” went walkabout between 1948 and 1967 when an additional Arab State between Jordan and Israel could have been created with the stroke of an Arab League pen after all Jews living there had been forcefully expelled.

5. There are many Plan B’s involving Jordan — the major part of former Palestine — which remains the key to resolving this conflict.

Secretary-General Gutteres — with the greatest respect — needs a crash-course in the actual— not fictitious-history of the 100 years-old Arab-Jewish conflict. Relying on this false UN Study to gain his knowledge and understanding of the conflict is not recommended.

United Nations loses the plot in ignoring Israel-Jordan reality

[Published 27 November 2017]



29th November 2017 marks the 70th anniversary of United Nations General Assembly Resolution 181 (II) (Resolution) calling for the creation in Western Palestine of independent Arab and Jewish States and a Special International Regime for the City of Jerusalem (Partition Plan).

The Resolution did not mention:

1. the “West Bank” (a term dreamed-up in 1950) — using instead the terms “Judea” and “Samaria” - their correct geographical place names for the previous 3000 years

2. a “Palestinian State” - only an “Arab State”

3. one Arab State had already been created in Eastern Palestine on 25 May 1946 named the Hashemite Kingdom of Transjordan covering 78% of the territory comprised in the 1922 League of Nations Mandate for Palestine (Mandate).

The Partition Plan was accepted by the Jews but vehemently rejected by the Arabs.

H. R. H. Amir FAISAL AL SAUD (Saudi Arabia) fulminated:

"We have felt, like many others, the pressure exerted on various representatives of this Organization by some of the big Powers in order that the vote should be in favour of partition. For these reasons, the Government of Saudi Arabia registers, on this historic occasion, the fact that it does not consider itself bound by the resolution adopted today by the General Assembly. Furthermore, it reserves to itself the full right to act freely in whatever way it deems fit, in accordance with the principles of right and justice"

Mr. JAMALI (Iraq) protested:

"In the name of my Government, I wish to state that it feels that this decision is antidemocratic, illegal, impractical and contrary to the Charter. It contradicts the spirit and letter of the Charter. Therefore, in the name of my Government, I wish to put on record that Iraq does not recognize the validity of this decision, will reserve freedom of action towards its implementation, and holds those who were influential in passing it against the free conscience of mankind responsible for the consequences"

Amir ARSLAN (Syria) joined the chorus:

"Gentlemen, the Charter is dead. But it did not die a natural death; it was murdered, and you all know who is guilty.

My country will never recognize such a decision. It will never agree to be responsible for it. Let the consequences be on the heads of others, not on ours"

H. R. H. Prince Seif El ISLAM ABDULLAH (Yemen) was just as condemnatory:

"The Yemen delegation has stated previously that the partition plan is contrary to justice and to the Charter of the United Nations. Therefore, the Government of Yemen does not consider itself bound by such a decision for it is contrary to the letter and spirit of the Charter. The Government of Yemen will reserve its freedom of action to-wards the implementation of this decision."

This implacable Arab rejectionism was the catalyst for the 1948 invasion of Western Palestine by six Arab armies and the perpetuation of the Arab-Jewish conflict for the next 70 years.

2017 sees:
1. Iraq, Syria and Yemen as failed states - with Saudi Arabia in danger of joining them.

2. The General Assembly sinking in quicksand of its own making after creating “The Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People” in 1975 and adopting countless resolutions using emotive and artificially-contrived terms such as:

“West Bank”
“Occupied Palestinian Territory”
“historic Palestine”
“Palestinian People”
“Palestinians”
“Palestinian State”
“two-state solution”

The United Nations continues to lose the plot whilst it:

1. Uses such deceptive and misleading language

2. Fails to recognise that Jordan and Israel are the two successor states currently exercising sovereignty in 95% of former Palestine.

The United Nations must resurrect 1947 reality and abandon 2017 fiction.

United Nations Fabricated Arab Narrative Deceives Academics

[Published 3 May 2017]

The United Nations publication “The Origins and Evolution of the Palestine Problem 1917-1988” (“Study”) has deliberately misrepresented the actual wording of General Assembly Resolution 181 passed on 29 November 1947 - deceiving many academics who have disseminated the Study’s false message.

The Study has been published by the Division for Palestinian Rights of the United Nations Secretariat for, and under the guidance of, the Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People.

The offending statement in the Study misleadingly declares:

“After investigating various alternatives the United Nations proposed the partitioning of Palestine into two independent States, one Palestinian Arab and the other Jewish, with Jerusalem internationalized.”

The actual wording of Resolution 181 stated:

“Independent Arab and Jewish States and the Special International Regime for the City of Jerusalem, set forth in Part III of this Plan, shall come into existence in Palestine…."

The Study omits to mention that 78% of Palestine had already become an independent Arab State in 1946 and been renamed the Hashemite Kingdom of Transjordan

The Study’s claim that Resolution 181 called for an "independent Palestinian Arab State” was not accidental but deliberately done to deceive and mislead.

Resolution 181 had denied the existence of any distinctly identifiable Palestinian people in 1947.

The League of Nations Mandate for Palestine had also only spoken of the “existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine” in 1922.

“Palestinians” were first defined in the 1964 Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) Charter to mean Arab citizens normally resident in Palestine in 1947 and their descendants. Jewish and non-Arab Christian residents were excluded under this racist and apartheid definition.

The PLO also claimed that Palestine was the homeland of the Arab Palestinian people - even though Resolution 181 clearly did not.

That the Study deliberately changed the actual wording of Resolution 181 to advance these fictitious PLO claims — or perhaps others unknown - for spurious reasons - is scandalous.

This false rendition of Resolution 181 has been repeated verbatim in many books including:

1. Handbook of Ethnic Conflict: International Perspectives - Dan Landis and Rosita D Albert

2. Youth Citizenship and the Politics of Belonging - Madeleine Arnot and Sharlene Swartz

3. Bridges Over Troubled Waters - Dahlia Moore and Salem Aweiss

Richard Cummings PhD propagated this false statement during a lecture to the Arab Society of Princeton University on 21 February 2002.

This falsehood again appears in “Shaping Foreign Policy in Times of Crisis: The Role of International Law and the State Department Legal Adviser written by Michael Scharf and Paul Williams.

Their book grew out of a series of meetings with all ten of the living former U.S. State Department legal advisers from the Carter administration to that of George W. Bush.

Both authors are law professors and formerly served in the Office of the Legal Adviser of the US Department of State.

That two such eminent lawyers apparently accepted this official United Nations document as being unerringly accurate speaks volumes for those who have been similarly deceived because they didn’t take the time to verify what they were disseminating.

Many other academics have swallowed this duplicitous Study hook line and sinker to form hostile anti-Israel views - especially regarding Israel’s claims in Judea and Samaria - geographical place names actually used in Resolution 181 and for 3000 years continuously until the Arabs renamed those areas the “West Bank” in 1950.

The Roman Empire used the same ploy in 135 AD — changing the name of its conquered province from “Syria Judaea” to “Syria Palestina”.

Change the name - change the game.

Correcting this fabricated United Nations Arab narrative is urgently required.

Palestine - Unearthing Past Remains Key To Resolving Future

[Published 29 August 2014]


The cease fire agreement ending hostilities in the Fifty Day War between Israel and Hamas marks yet another milestone attesting to the failure of Jews and Arabs to peacefully resolve their claims to sovereignty and self-determination in the territory once called “Palestine”.

Amazingly - the continuing inability of the parties - and the international community — to reach consensus on identifying when this long running conflict actually commenced —ensures it will continue to remain unresolved.

Emeritus Professor Richard Falk — formerly United Nations Special Rapporteur on Palestinian human rights in the West Bank — still claims in his latest article that the conflict started in 1947.

“Israel was born in 1948. Resolution 181 of the United Nations General Assembly [dated 29 November 1947 — Ed] is widely regarded as the most convincing legal basis for founding the State of Israel.”

Falk gave the following reasons for his viewpoint on 1 August 2012:

“I regard the Balfour Declaration and the mandatory system as classic colonial moves that have lost whatever legitimacy that they possessed at the time of their utterance, and prefer to view the competing claims to land and rights on the basis either of the 1948 partition proposal or the 1967 boundaries, although if there was diplomatic parity, I would respect whatever accommodation the parties reached, but without such parity, it seems necessary to invoke the allocation of rights as per settled international law.”

Falk’s opinion mirrors article 20 of the Palestine Liberation Organization Charter:

”The Balfour Declaration [1917], the Mandate for Palestine [1922], and everything that has been based upon them, are deemed null and void.”

Falk’s opinion is not shared by Matti Friedman — who in his latest article identifies the starting date as being much earlier than 1947:

“The Israel story is framed in the same terms that have been in use since the early 1990s — the quest for a “two-state solution.” It is accepted that the conflict is “Israeli-Palestinian,” meaning that it is a conflict taking place on land that Israel controls — 0.2 percent of the Arab world — in which Jews are a majority and Arabs a minority. The conflict is more accurately described as “Israel-Arab,” or “Jewish-Arab” — that is, a conflict between the 6 million Jews of Israel and 300 million Arabs in surrounding countries. (Perhaps “Israel-Muslim” would be more accurate, to take into account the enmity of non-Arab states like Iran and Turkey, and, more broadly, 1 billion Muslims worldwide.) This is the conflict that has been playing out in different forms for a century, before Israel existed, before Israel captured the Palestinian territories of Gaza and the West Bank, and before the term “Palestinian” was in use.

The “Israeli-Palestinian” framing allows the Jews, a tiny minority in the Middle East, to be depicted as the stronger party. It also includes the implicit assumption that if the Palestinian problem is somehow solved the conflict will be over, though no informed person today believes this to be true. This definition also allows the Israeli settlement project, which I believe is a serious moral and strategic error on Israel’s part, to be described not as what it is — one more destructive symptom of the conflict — Sanbut rather as its cause.”

Adopting Friedman’s viewpoint over Falk’s - one can confidently nominate the 1920 San Remo Conference as the legal basis for founding the State of Israel — when England, France, Italy, and Japan agreed to divide the areas of the 400 years old Ottoman Empire conquered by them in World War 1 into three mandates — Mesopotamia (now Iraq), Syria/Lebanon and Palestine.

This carve up was intended to see Arab self-determination eventually achieved in 99.99% of the conquered Ottoman territory and Jewish self-determination in the remaining 0.01%.

These proposals were unanimously endorsed by all 51 member States of the League of Nations in 1922.

But they proved to be temporary only in relation to Palestine—because three months later the provisions of Article 25 of the Mandate for Palestine enabled Great Britain to restrict the reconstitution of the Jewish National Home to within 23% of the tiny area of land originally set aside to achieve that objective at San Remo — with the remaining 77% of Mandatory Palestine eventually becoming an independent Palestinian Arab state in 1946 — that is today called Jordan.

The period 1920-1947 without doubt covers a host of critically important legal and historical signposts that cannot be forgotten or buried.

Whilst the two-state solution ultimately created between 1946-1948 as a result of the San Remo Conference is ignored - attempts to resolve sovereignty in today’s highly volatile West Bank and Gaza are destined to certain failure and renewed conflict.

The two-state solution posited by the Oslo Accords and the Bush Roadmap creating a 22nd independent sovereign Arab State in the West Bank and Gaza between Jordan and Israel for the first time ever in recorded history has failed to materialize - despite twenty years of intensive political and diplomatic efforts by the international community.

The PLO (founded in 1964) and Hamas (founded in 1987) both seek to unravel the decisions made at San Remo in 1920.

They need to be replaced as Israel’s Arab negotiating partners by the two successor States to the Mandate for Palestine - Jordan and Israel - and possibly Egypt — to determine and allocate sovereignty of the West Bank and Gaza between their respective States.

Unearthing the past still remains the key to peacefully resolving the future.

Palestine - Kerry's Credibility Crashes As Abbas's Intransigence Increases

[Published 28 March 2014]


US Secretary of State John Kerry has seen his reputation and prestige shredded to tatters over the past few weeks.

On 13 March Kerry told members of the House Foreign Relations committee that:

1. international law has already declared Israel a Jewish state, and

2. Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu’s insistence on a public declaration of Israel’s Jewish character from the PLO was “a mistake” in the diplomatic process.

Kerry also told a Senate panel:

“‘Jewish state’ was resolved in 1947 in Resolution 181 where there are more than 40-30 mentions of ‘Jewish state’. In addition, chairman Arafat in 1988 and again in 2004 confirmed that he agreed it would be a Jewish state. And there are any other number of mentions.”

PLO Chairman and President of the State of Palestine—Mahmoud Abbas - was unimpressed with Kerry’s knowledge of international law.

On 16 March the New York Times reported:

“.. Mr. Abbas, speaking before a meeting in the Oval Office, made clear that he was no closer to uttering the words that are a litmus test for the Israelis: that he recognizes Israel as a Jewish state.

“Since 1988, we have recognized international legitimacy resolutions” on Israel, Mr. Abbas said as Mr. Obama looked on, a hand on his chin. “And in 1993, we recognized the State of Israel.”

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has insisted that the Palestinians go further and recognize Israel as a nation-state for the Jewish people in order to get a peace deal. Mr. Abbas has flatly refused, and his comments on Monday suggested he had gone as far as he would.”

On 19 March Associate Professor of Journalism and Political Science at The City University of New York - Peter Beinart - provided this advice to Abbas:

“I have a suggestion for Mahmoud Abbas. The next time Benjamin Netanyahu demands that you recognize Israel as a “Jewish state,” tell him that you’ll agree on one condition. The Israeli cabinet must first agree on what “Jewish state” means. That should get you off the hook for a good long while.

Israel has never been able to define the term “Jewish state.”

The good Professor was obviously unaware that the term “Jewish State” had been defined for the United Nations Special Committee on Palestine in evidence given by David Ben-Gurion on 7 July 1947:

“What is the meaning of a Jewish State? As I told you before, a Jewish State does not mean one has to be a Jew. It means merely a State-where the Jews are in the majority, otherwise all the citizens have the same status. If the State were called by the name “Palestine,” - I said if - then all would be Palestinian citizens If the State would be given, another name - I think it would be given another name - because Palestine is neither a Jewish nor an Arab name. As far as the Arabs are concerned, and we have the evidence of the Arab historian, Hitti, that there was no such a thing as “Palestine” at all: Palestine is not an Arab name. Palestine is also not a Jewish name. When the Greeks were our enemies, in order not to annoy the Jews, they gave different names to the streets. So, maybe the name of Palestine will be changed. But whatever the name of the country, every citizen of the country will be a citizen. This is what we mean. This is what we have to mean. We cannot conceive that in a State where we are not in a minority, where we have the main responsibilities as the majority of the country, there should be the slightest discrimination between a Jew and a non-Jew.”

Abbas rejected Beinart’s unsolicited advice for one simple reason—any state that contained the word “Jewish” or any suggestion of being Jewish would never be acceptable to Abbas.

As Pinhas Inbari reported:

“On March 22, 2014, Abbas spoke before the Central Committee of the Fatah Movement. According to Nabil Abu Rodena, spokesman for the Palestinian Authority presidency, the Fatah body supported Abbas’ position of “non-recognition of Israel being a Jewish state.” The Palestinians did not release a complete text of Abbas’ Fatah speech.

At the Arab League summit in Kuwait on March 25, Abbas took this a step further. The official Arabic transcript of his speech before reveals how he has moved toward a more uncompromising diplomatic posture, opposing Israel’s stand that it be recognized as the nation-state of the Jewish people, just as it recognizes the Palestinian state as the nation-state of the Palestinian people:

“Israel has invented new conditions that it did not raise before, like recognizing it as a Jewish state. This we oppose as well as even holding a discussion on this matter.”

The Arab League was more than happy to oblige Abbas and rebuff Kerry - its final communiqué at the summit’s close stating:

“We express our absolute and decisive rejection to recognizing Israel as a Jewish state.”

Kerry - left high and dry by this united show of Arab opposition to accepting what Kerry had trumpeted just 12 days earlier - was suddenly forced to fly to Amman on 26 March to meet with Jordan’s King Abdullah in the afternoon and Abbas in the evening.

As Kerry’s credibility crashes - Abbas’s intransigence in refusing to recognize Israel as the Jewish State increases—a certain recipe for diplomatic disaster.

Palestine - UNESCO Rebuffs, PLO Huffs And Puffs

[Published 2 November 2011]


The PLO application seeking admission of Palestine to the UN has been dealt a serious blow - after 86 of its 193 members failed to support a mirror application for Palestine to join UNESCO.

The poor UNESCO majority vote recorded in favor is even more remarkable when one excludes the 56 Islamic member States - whose vote to recognize Palestine’s admission to UNESCO was always assured. Only 51 of UNESCO’s remaining 137 members were prepared to publicly out themselves in support of the PLO application.

Any of the four following reasons could be possible explanations for this rebuff to the PLO and could signal a similar disastrous outcome when the UN deals with the Palestine issue later this month:

1. Member States were concerned that any favorable UNESCO decision would be in breach of Article II (2) of UNESCO’s constitution- which only provides for States to be admitted to full membership.
2. Palestine does not possess the attributes for statehood required in customary international law and codified in article 1 of the Montevideo Convention 1933.
3. Palestine could have chosen an easier and less controversial option by applying for associate membership of UNESCO as a territory which was not responsible for the conduct of its international affairs under Article II (3). Such an application - however - would have been an admission that Palestine was not a state - dooming the UN application to almost certain defeat.
4. The UNESCO vote came just days after PLO Chairman - Mahmoud Abbas - sought to appease the UN by admitting that the Arab refusal to accept the 1947 UN Partition Plan was a “mistake“.

Non-supporters of Palestine’s admission to UNESCO would have had serious reservations after hearing Abbas’s untruthful and misleading remarks to Israel’s Channel 2 on 28 October:

“At the time, 1947, there was [General Assembly] Resolution 181, the partition plan for Palestine and Israel. Israel existed. Palestine diminished.”

Arafat was clearly misrepresenting the situation in 1947 since:

(i) The partition plan was not for Palestine and Israel. It was for partition into a Jewish State and an Arab State
(ii) Israel did not exist in 1947.

Abbas however had every reason for stressing that Palestine had been diminished by 1947 - since 78% of Palestine had been granted independence by Britain in 1946 when it was permanently placed under Hashemite control and re-named the Hashemite Kingdom of Transjordan.

Britain’s action was in flagrant violation of article 5 of the Mandate for Palestine - which required Britain to see that no Palestine territory should be ceded or leased to or in any way placed under the control of, the Government of any foreign Power.

The PLO has never accepted Britain’s decision.

Article 2 of the PLO Charter still insists that Israel, the West Bank, Gaza and Jordan is one separate and indivisible territorial unit that must be liberated.

Not content with reminding those listening that the PLO still coveted all of this area - Abbas then attempted to ameliorate its intransigent stance in rejecting the 1947 partition plan by stating:

“It was our mistake. It was an Arab mistake as a whole. But do they punish us for this mistake for 64 years?”

This statement must have sent shudders through the UNESCO waverers.

Abbas was being totally untruthful in failing to acknowledge that the Arabs had from 1948 to 1967 to correct their 1947 mistake - after six Arab armies had invaded a “diminished Palestine” and Jordan had ended up occupying the West Bank and East Jerusalem whilst Egypt had occupied Gaza and all the Jews then living in those areas had been driven out.

Blaming Israel for 19 years of Arab failure to do anything to create Palestinian statehood could explain why many states did not support the push to recognize a fictitious Palestine now.

Abbas had already blotted his copybook when he told Dream 2 TV on 23 October:

“First of all, let me make something clear about the story of the ‘Jewish state.’ They started talking to me about the ‘Jewish state’ only two years ago, discussing it with me at every opportunity, every forum I went to – Jewish or non-Jewish – asking: ‘What do you think about the “Jewish state”?’ I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: I will never recognize the Jewishness of the state, or a ‘Jewish state.’

This clear repudiation of the 1947 UN Partition Plan calling for a Jewish state indicated a resolute refusal to ever live in peace with its Jewish neighbour - making the possibility of the two state solution an impossible dream to accomplish.

Such a display of unadulterated racism and hatred could have also weighed heavily on the minds of many UN member states as they failed to support Palestine‘s admission to UNESCO.

The preamble to the UNESCO Constitution requires the Governments of the State Parties to declare on behalf of their people:

“That since wars begin in the minds of men, it is in the minds of men that the defences of peace must be constructed;
That ignorance of each other’s ways and lives has been a common cause, throughout the history of mankind, of that suspicion and mistrust between the peoples of the world through which their differences have all too often broken into war; “

Believing Palestine could ever respect and honor these lofty principles after Abbas’s remarkable statements during the few days prior to the UNESCO vote could have been the final nail in the coffin for so many states voicing their displeasure and failing to support Palestine’s admission to UNESCO.

The fact that the PLO still was refusing to enter into direct negotiations with Israel to peacefully resolve the creation of a Palestinian State- preferring instead to take unilateral action at UNESCO and the UN - could be another explanation for the poor vote recorded in UNESCO.

Whatever happens from here on in at the UN - the UNESCO vote shows that the UN vote will not be the cakewalk predicted by the PLO.

The PLO can huff and puff - but a large number of the UN members have made it clear they are not prepared to be blown down in the process.

Jewish Rights Undermined By Media Indulgence

[Published 1 December 2010]

The Sunday Observer describes itself as “Sri Lanka’s English Newspaper with the largest circulation”. If its shoddy editorial policy is anything to go by it could soon be relegated to having that circulation drastically reduced.

Take the recent publication of an article headlined : “Palestine: The Holy Land is shrinking and vanishing”.

That headline immediately caught the eye - arousing many intriguing thoughts.

Was a Sri Lankan newspaper privy to some information that suggested a land mass which had existed unchanged for thousands of years since Biblical times was disappearing? Could this herald an end to the 130 years old conflict between Jews and Arabs and leave them both lamenting for having failed to settle their differences before this looming catastrophe occurred?

Alternatively was this an expose of Moslem attempts to diminish Jewish and Christian reverence for sites in the Holy Land such as the Tomb of the Patriarchs, Rachel’s Tomb, Joseph’s Tomb and the Kotel not to mention Jerusalem?

An entirely different message was however conveyed in the body of the article.

It was written by Dr T Jayasinghe - the Founder General Secretary of the Sri Lanka Committee for Solidarity with Palestine and the Representative for Sri Lanka in Palestine.

Dr Jayasinghe is what I term - “a Jewish Underminer” - a person who seeks to undermine the rights of the Jewish people to pursue their inalienable right in international law to reconstitute the Jewish National Home in former Palestine pursuant to the rights granted to them by League of Nations Mandate for Palestine and the United Nations Charter.

Such undermining occurs when statements are made relating to the conflict between Jews and Arabs that are factually wrong, deceptive or misleading and serve to undermine or denigrate Jewish rights. They are usually made in ignorance by well intended but misguided persons relying on factually inaccurate or deliberately misleading Arab propaganda.

Consider these statements appearing in Dr Jayasinghe’s article:

1. “Ironically it was the United Nations General Assembly in 1947 that passed the resolution 181 (partition plan) to create Israel. Unfortunately it is from that day onwards that an Israeli - Palestinian conflict came into being.”

The UN Resolution did not create Israel. It recommended the creation of a Jewish State and an Arab State. Its recommendation was accepted by the Jews and refused by the Arabs. The conflict did not start in 1947. It had been ongoing since about 1880. The Arabs had refused a similar proposal to divide the territory of Mandated Palestine between Jews and Arabs in 1937 and had already received 78% as an independent Arab State in 1946. Arab riots in 1920, 1929 and between 1937-1939 are further evidence to rebut Dr Jayasinghe’s statement.

2. “This conflict is considered the main explosive issue in Middle East that drag on with no sign of a solution"

The conflict could have been resolved at any time between 1948-1967 when Jordan and Egypt occupied the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza when any negotiations with the Jews was unnecessary. Trying to rectify in 2010 what was available for 19 years and was passed up more than 50 years ago is impossible to achieve.

3. “With the partition plan Palestinians were allocated an area called the West Bank and also the Gaza Strip with no connection by land to the West Bank.”

There is no mention of “Palestinians” in the Partition Plan - only “Arabs”. The Arabs were allocated an area much larger than the West Bank and Gaza in the Partition Plan. These two areas were connected to each other.

4. “…the main issue where the negotiations resolve round is the question of settlements that are being established by Israel in West Bank that was allocated to Palestinians.“

The West Bank was allocated to the Arabs in 1947 but they rejected that proposal. How does a rejected offer become an entrenched right 63 years later?

5. “These settlements occupy 43% of the land in West Bank.”

They only occupy 1% of the West Bank

6. “Many settlements have been built on confiscated Palestinian privately owned land”

The majority of the land in the West Bank was not privately owned but was State land and waste lands that had become vested in Israel as the successor to Jordan which lost control of the land to Israel in the Six Day War in 1967.

Under Article 6 of the Mandate for Palestine close settlement by Jews on such land was encouraged. This right had been exercised by the Jews prior to 1948 until they were all driven out by the invading Jordanian army. Jewish rights to reconstitute the Jewish National Home in the West Bank are preserved by article 80 of the United Nations Charter.

7. “Their struggle is for a free State within the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as the capital.”

This state could have been achieved at any time between 1948-1967. That missed opportunity can only now be possible in part - but not all - of the territory. There were no 1967 borders - only armistice lines that had been agreed between Israel and Jordan in 1949.

8.“As far as Sri Lanka is concerned, since 1970, it has become a consistent supporter of Palestine and with the establishment of Sri Lanka Committee for Solidarity with Palestine November 29 every year is marked with a suitable public event to educate the masses"

If this article is part of the program to educate the masses then they are being poorly informed and indeed misled.

Dr Jayasinghe is perfectly entitled to support the creation of a Palestinian State. However in doing so he makes it apparent that his view has been formed on the basis of a serious misunderstanding of the facts of the conflict.

Perhaps his view might still be the same when these errors are brought to his attention. That is fine. But in recanting these statements he will at least be seen to not be falsely undermining the rights of the other side to the conflict.

The Sunday Observer in allowing these inaccuracies to be printed has placed its own editorial policy under a cloud.

One cannot expect every error in a story to be detected. But when an article like this is replete with so many errors - one must seriously question the paper’s policy in failing to adequately edit submissions so as to ensure the article is factually correct and not misleading.

Jewish underminers and their errant media publishers will not go away. They need to be constantly monitored and exposed to prevent the reader being misled or deceived as to the facts of what is a very difficult and complicated conflict.

Palestine - Fantasy And Fiction Feature At The United Nations

[Published November 2008]

The gross ignorance displayed by current United Nations General Assembly President - Miguel D’Escoto Brockmann - highlights the difficulty in having any kind of rational discussion at the United Nations about finally resolving Jewish and Arab claims to the territory once called Palestine.

Speaking on the Question of Palestine at the 57th Plenary Meeting at UN headquarters in New York on 24 November, President Brockmann stated (apparently without anyone present attempting to correct him) :

“No amount of arm twisting and intimidation will change the Security Council resolution 181, adopted 61 years ago, calling for the creation of two states”

The President was demonstrably wrong in making this remarkable utterance.

Resolution 181 calling for the partition of western Palestine into one Jewish State and one Arab State was a resolution of the General Assembly not the Security Council. Being a General Assembly resolution it did not bind any member state of the United Nations - even those Arab States violently opposing it.

However many member states were concerned that Arab rejectionism of Resolution 181 could result in outright war and sought to qualify their support for Resolution 181 by seeking assurances that the Security Council would enforce the resolution once it was passed.

Resolution 181 therefore specifically requested

“The Security Council determine as a threat to the peace, breach of the peace or act of aggression, in accordance with Article 39 of the Charter, any attempt to alter by force the settlement envisaged by this resolution; “

The subsequent invasion of western Palestine in May 1948 by the armies of all the Arab League members (excepting Yemen) - signalled open defiance of Resolution 181 by the Arab League and exposed the Security Council as a toothless tiger unwilling to stop this clear act of aggression by the Arab League in its campaign to wipe out the nascent Jewish State.

Yet the opportunity presented by Resolution 181 could still have been translated into reality between 1948 and 1967 - after the Jews living in Gaza and the West Bank had been driven out by the invading Arab armies leaving the solely Arab population under Egyptian and Jordanian occupation.

However instead of creating a state in the West Bank and Gaza in that 19 year window of opportunity and self determination for its exclusively Arab population - the United Nations bowed to Arab League pressure and perpetuated a refugee problem instead - haunting its thought processes on Palestine to this very day.

Yet worse was to come as President Brockmann continued his journey into Fantasyland by declaring:

“Shamefully there is no Palestinian state to celebrate today and the prospects are as distant as ever”

Really?

The President of the General Assembly had obviously not read the debates of the General Assembly on 26 November 1947 when the Question of Palestine was being discussed. Had he done so he would have come across Uruguay’s representative - Rodriguez Fabregal - reminding those present on that day:

“But this word “partition” is not new; it has not been suddenly introduced into the present debate on the question. It goes back further than that. The territory of the old League of Nations Mandate [ for Palestine] has already been divided; and an independent State has already been established in its territory. That new State, Transjordan, has already been considered as a candidate for admission by the competent organs of the United Nations”

Not one of the hostile Arab delegations then present disputed Mr Fabregal’s statement of fact - namely that in 1946 Transjordan - with its exclusively Arab population - had been the first sovereign and fully independent state to be created in Palestine on territory that comprised 77% of Palestine.

Transjordan still exists today - having been renamed Jordan in 1950. Israel - established in 1948 comprises 17% of the former territory of Palestine. The West Bank and Gaza - in which sovereignty still remains undetermined - makes up the remaining 6% of what was once known as Palestine.

This historic truth makes a mockery of Arab propagandists and sympathisers who claim today that Israel comprises 78% of Palestine whilst Gaza and the West Bank comprise the remaining 22% of Palestine.

President Brockmann - revelling in his fictitious world - then appealed to member states :

“All explanations notwithstanding, this central fact[no Palestinian state] makes a mockery of the United Nations and gravely hurts its image and prestige. How can we continue like this?”

President Brockmann’s blatant attempt to bury any explanation for this “central fact” indicates the extent to which he has become a victim of his own rhetoric and a guarantor for the continued mockery of the UN.

Resolution 181 was adopted on 29 November 1947 by a vote of 33 nations in favour , 13 against and 10 abstentions. Those against the resolution included Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Syria, and Yemen - the then entire membership of the Arab League with the exception of Transjordan.

Arab outrage at the proposed Resolution clearly failed to win the day in the General Assembly. The Arabs were simply not prepared to accept this overwhelming international support for Resolution 181. Their failure to do so has been the root cause for everything that has occurred since then in relation to Palestine.

Even today Articles 19 and 20 of the PLO Covenant proclaim that the partition of Palestine in 1947 was illegal and the Balfour Declaration, the Mandate for Palestine and everything that has been based on them are deemed null and void.

Respect for this body of international law still has no place in the Arab lexicon.

This is the explanation President Brockmann did not have the moral courage to identify, face up to or address.

No amount of crocodile tears by President Brockmann - or those who have pushed proposals such as Oslo and the Road Map - can ever hope to succeed in bringing about a 22nd Arab State in all of the West Bank and Gaza.

This is the clear message to be understood on the 41st Anniversary of Resolution 181.

Redrawing the boundary lines between Israel, Egypt and Jordan to allocate sovereignty of the West Bank and Gaza between them represents the last - and now the only - hope for peace between Jews and Arabs.

Until the United Nations abandons the notion of three states in former Palestine its image and prestige will continue to remain at rock bottom. It has become the victim of its own gutlessness.

It is indeed time for fact to replace fantasy and fiction at the United Nations.
Starting at the top with the President of the General Assembly would be a welcome first step in the right direction