Palestine, Brazil And Argentina - Outing The Jew Haters

[Published 13 December 2010]


Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas openly espouses Jew-hating qualities under the three hats he currently wears.

1. As President of the Palestinian Authority (PA) - Abbas refuses to recognize Israel as the Jewish National Home.

2. As Chairman of the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) - Abbas is sworn to enforce the provisions of its Charter which prescribes:

“Claims of historical or religious ties of Jews with Palestine are incompatible with the facts of history and the true conception of what constitutes statehood. Judaism, being a religion, is not an independent nationality. Nor do Jews constitute a single nation with an identity of its own; they are citizens of the states to which they belong."

3. As Chairman of Fatah - the largest faction in the PLO - Abbas presided over a meeting of its Revolutionary Council on 27 November which resolved:

“The Council stresses the revolutionary rejection of the so-called ‘Jewish state’ and any formula [that] can be considered in future contribution to achieving this end, and renew this rejection of any attempt by a racist state based on religion, in accordance with international law and human rights charters…”

Abbas has gone even further and persuaded Brazil to out itself as a Jew-hating State by calling for the recognition of a Palestinian Arab State between Jordan, Egypt and Israel “on 1967 borders”.

There were no “1967 borders“ - as Brazil must surely know - only 1949 demarcation lines that had been established between

1. Israel and Egypt on 24 January 1949 and

2. Israel and Transjordan (now called Jordan) on 3 April 1949

- to designate the armistice lines where hostilities had ceased between the nascent State of Israel and the six Arab armies that had invaded it in May 1948.

Brazil’s recognition signifies that 500000 Jews presently living on the Arab side of those demarcation lines in the areas called the West Bank (Judea and Samaria) and East Jerusalem - will either have to voluntarily leave or be forcibly removed from their homes and businesses.

Brazil’s decision - which smacks of the infamous Nazi “Judenrein” policy that called for the mass deportation of Jews from their homes and businesses before and during World War 11 - is in breach of existing international law specifically:

1. Article 6 of the Mandate for Palestine - which recognized the right of the Jewish people to reconstitute the Jewish National Home in precisely the area that Brazil now wants to see cleared of Jews - which Brazil itself agreed to when the Mandate was unanimously approved by the League of Nations in 1922

2. Article 80 of the United Nations Charter - which reserved the rights of Jewish settlement granted by the Mandate - which had also been endorsed by Brazil when the UN Charter came into being.

Argentina has been quick to follow Brazil’s headlong rush into identifying itself as a fellow Jew-hating state. Expectations are that they will be soon joined by Uruguay and some other South American countries.

Both Argentina and Uruguay were also - like Brazil - consenting signatories to the Mandate and Article 80.

One cannot stop people or States being Jew-haters but on the other hand they need to be identified and exposed.

Racism and vilification of this kind have no place in humankind.

In the case of those States which choose to follow Brazil and Argentina - one would hope to see their citizens protesting loudly at such a decision. Standing by and doing nothing will only stigmatize the citizens of those States as Jew-haters.

Neither Brazil nor Argentina have made any call on the PA to recognize Israel as the Jewish National Home in return for the recognition they have now extended to the PA.

Brazil and Uruguay supported the creation of a Jewish State proposed by the UN in 1947. Argentina abstained.

All three countries became places of refuge for fleeing Nazis at the conclusion of World War 11. Their shadowy past seems to be coming back to haunt them.

Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay never recognized the attempted annexation of the West Bank and East Jerusalem by Transjordan in 1950.

Israel’s position on the status of these areas was explained by Israel’s then Foreign Affairs Minister - Moshe Sharett - in Israel‘s Parliament on 3 May 1950 as follows:

“The Government Spokesman issued the following statement, in the Government’s name: “The decision to annex the Arab areas west of the River Jordan to the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan is a unilateral step to which Israel is not a party in any way. We are connected with the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan through the Armistice Agreement, which we will uphold rigorously. This agreement does not include any final political settlement, however, and no such settlement is possible without negotiations and a peace treaty between the sides. It must be evident, therefore, that the question of the status of the Arab areas west of the River Jordan remains open as far as we are concerned.”

This position holds true today - with the exception that the areas cannot be described as “Arab areas” since they are now inhabited by 500000 Jews as well. Many of the Jews returning to live there after 1967 had been forced to leave their homes and businesses following Jordan’s conquest of the West Bank and East Jerusalem in 1948.

Announcements by countries such as Brazil and Argentina signifying their assent to the wholesale deportation of this Jewish population once again sends a dangerous message of support to the 21 Jew-hating States comprised in the Arab League - which have unanimously endorsed the Saudi Peace Plan in 2002 calling for precisely such an outcome.

This call should be contrasted with the view expressed by President Bush to Israel’s then Prime Minister Ariel Sharon on 14 April 2004:

“In light of new realities on the ground, including already existing major Israeli populations centers, it is unrealistic to expect that the outcome of final status negotiations will be a full and complete return to the armistice lines of 1949, and all previous efforts to negotiate a two-state solution have reached the same conclusion. It is realistic to expect that any final status agreement will only be achieved on the basis of mutually agreed changes that reflect these realities.”

Brazil and Argentina - and any other States that are attracted to follow them - have some serious explaining to do to justify their decision in endorsing an outcome in the West Bank and East Jerusalem that requires both areas to be completely cleared of Jews.

Palestine - Obama Should Quit While He's Ahead

[Published 17 November 2010]


President Obama has now shown his hand on what he believes is possible in order for a new Palestinian Arab state to be created between Israel, Jordan and Egypt.

It is a losing hand. He should throw in the cards now before he ends up yet another failed President of the United States who like all his predecessors believed he could achieve a lasting peace to end a conflict that has gone on unresolved for the last 130 years.

President Obama’s ideas are contained in a Joint Statement of the Office of the Prime Minister of Israel and The Office of the Secretary of State of The United States publicly released on 11 November.

That Statement declares:

“the United States believes that through good-faith negotiations, the parties can mutually agree on an outcome which ends the conflict and reconciles the Palestinian goal of an independent and viable state, based on the 1967 lines, with agreed swaps, and the Israeli goal of a Jewish state with secure and recognized borders that reflect subsequent developments and meet Israeli security requirements.”

President Obama has apparently given up on this new State being “democratic” - a declared feature of President Bush’s Roadmap which stated:

“Such a settlement, negotiated between the parties, will result in the emergence of an independent, democratic Palestinian state living side by side in peace and security with Israel and its other neighbors”

The element of “maximum territorial contiguity” expressed in the Bush Roadmap has also disappeared in this latest Statement indicating that President Obama sees the new State being created without Gaza figuring in the equation.

This is not surprising given the virtual state of warfare between the Palestinian Authority (PA) and Hamas.

However, the President’s belief that the PA will agree to abandon Gaza is hardly likely to be accepted by the PA in any renewed negotiations between them - if indeed they are ever resumed, which at the moment hangs in the balance.

The reference to “land swaps” in the Statement does supposedly reflect a possible compromise discussed in the context of earlier negotiations between Israel’s then Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and PA President Mahmoud Abbas in 2008.

However an offer made by Israel to the PA at that time was rejected and there is no certainty the current Israeli Government is in a mood to consider land swaps now.

Israel would be comforted in rejecting land swaps having regard to the provisions of UN Security Council Resolution 242 - which did not require any such concession being made by Israel from its sovereign territory when its final borders between the West Bank and Gaza were ultimately determined.

President Obama’s belief that the PA will accept and recognize that Israel is a Jewish State as part of a final settlement flies in the face of everything that has been said by the Arab League, the Palestine Liberation Organization, the PA, Hamas and Hezbollah for the last 63 years.

Any Arab spokesman suggesting such a possibility would be dead the next day.

President Obama’s belief that the PA would accept that Israel’s secure and recognized boundaries will reflect subsequent developments (presumably that have occurred in the West Bank since 1967) - acknowledges that some Israeli settlements will become part of the State of Israel following the conclusion of a peace treaty with the PA.

That may be his belief. It is certainly not the belief of the Arabs.

The Arab call for the West Bank to be ethnically cleansed of all Jewish settlement or recognition of Jews having any rights there at all was starkly revealed in an explanatory note sent to UNESCO on 19 March 2010 by Algeria, Egypt, Kuwait, Morocco, Saudi Arabia, Syria and Tunisia.

That explanatory note declared:

“Israel’s military occupation of Palestinian territory is inherently temporary and does not give the occupying power (Israel) sovereignty or title over the occupied territory."

The 2002 Saudi Peace Plan calls for Israel to withdraw to the armistice lines existing at 5 June 1967. This would now entail 500000 Jews voluntarily moving or being removed from their existing homes and businesses.

If President Obama believes these demands are going to be dropped by the PA in any resumed negotiations with Israel - then he is engaging on a flight of fancy.

Pushing the “two-state solution” in the belief it will pan out in the form suggested in the Joint Statement is to fly in the face of everything that has occurred in negotiations over the last 17 years.

President Obama needs to realize that at best any arrangement between the Jews and Arabs on a territorial division of the West Bank will not result in enduring peace between the Jews and the Arabs.

He needs to focus on bringing back Jordan into the negotiations to restore as far as possible the territorial status quo that existed in the West Bank at 5 June 1967. That remains the only way forward.

The President needs to focus on Jordan and leave the PA to its inevitable demise.

The sooner the President recognizes this fact the sooner he will be able to extricate himself from the quicksand of the two-state solution into which he is steadily sinking.

This proposed solution has so far claimed too many American Presidents.

President Obama should quit while he is still ahead.

Palestine - Serious Negotiations Or Spurious Nonsense?

[Published 30 September 2010]

The threat by the Palestinian Authority (PA) to walk away from direct negotiations with Israel following Israel’s refusal to extend its ten month moratorium on some residential building construction in the West Bank - has brought forth an almost universal plea for Israel to reconsider its position.

However, PA negotiator Nabil Shaath has now indicated that even if Israel were to renew the limited moratorium - it would not be acceptable to the PA - telling Arab News:

“There is no alternative to one formula ending this crisis: the full stopping of the settlement building, even for a specific time.”

One has learned to take such PA pronouncements with a grain of salt. Hyperbole and rhetoric are part and parcel of PA negotiating tactics. When push comes to shove they usually give in to pressure.

President Abbas dithered for more than nine months of the initial ten month moratorium period before deigning to enter into direct negotiations with Israel. He demanded then what Shaath is now recycling - a total building freeze. It proved - and will continue to prove - to be a disastrous error of judgment by the PA. Abbas can only blame himself for the dilemma he currently faces as to whether to resume negotiations or not in view of the expiry of the moratorium period on 26 September.

Assuming however that some compromise is eventually agreed on for a further moratorium - questions must be asked and answers given as to the basis on which such negotiations are to be resumed.

Israel’s position is clear but the PA‘s position is steeped in uncertainty.

The parameters under which Israel has been negotiating are:

1. The Bush Roadmap - subject to Israel‘s 14 expressed written Reservations to it

2. United Nations Security Council Resolutions 242 and 338 and

3. The letter from President George Bush to former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon dated 14 April 2004

Roadmap references to the Saudi Peace Plan - adopted subsequently as the Arab Initiative - were expressly rejected by Israel as playing any part in the negotiating process - the Reservations stating:

“The removal of references other than 242 and 338 (1397, the Saudi Initiative and the Arab Initiative adopted in Beirut). A settlement based upon the road map will be an autonomous settlement that derives its validity therefrom. The only possible reference should be to Resolutions 242 and 338, and then only as an outline for the conduct of future negotiations on a permanent settlement. “

Israel was also adamant in its Reservations that :

“… declared references must be made to Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state and to the waiver of any right of return for Palestinian refugees to the State of Israel.”

Abbas’s reaction to Israel’s Reservations was starkly revealed in an article by Akiva Eldar on 28 May 2003 when he wrote in Ha’aretz newspaper:

“When Abu Mazen talks about the road map it’s important for him to emphasize that the 14 Israeli reservations have nothing to do with him. “They don’t interest me,” he says. As far as he’s concerned, the only document that matters is the road map that was finalized in December 2002 and handed over to the parties at the end of April this year. Nothing more, nothing less.

“We do not accept each side picking and choosing only those specific elements that are convenient for them in the road map.

“The map was prepared last December and we accepted it, despite our own comments and reservations. We wanted to give this initiative a chance, but it’s impossible to continue inventing comments and reservations after it was submitted.”

He says:

“We understood from the Americans that there are no changes in the road map. This is an historic opportunity to return to a track of normalcy. We are saying to the Israelis, `follow the map and don’t waste time haggling over details.’ We must get into the implementation phase. It is vital the two peoples feel something is changing on the ground. In any case nobody will pay attention to this or that reservation.”

Abbas was wrong.

America did indeed pay serious attention to Israel’s Reservations - as was indicated in the letter President Bush gave to Prime Minister Sharon on 14 April 2004 which stated:

“The United States is strongly committed to Israel’s security and well-being as a Jewish state. It seems clear that an agreed, just, fair, and realistic framework for a solution to the Palestinian refugee issue as part of any final status agreement will need to be found through the establishment of a Palestinian state, and the settling of Palestinian refugees there, rather than in Israel.

As part of a final peace settlement, Israel must have secure and recognized borders, which should emerge from negotiations between the parties in accordance with UNSC Resolutions 242 and 338. In light of new realities on the ground, including already existing major Israeli populations centers, it is unrealistic to expect that the outcome of final status negotiations will be a full and complete return to the armistice lines of 1949, and all previous efforts to negotiate a two-state solution have reached the same conclusion.

It is realistic to expect that any final status agreement will only be achieved on the basis of mutually agreed changes that reflect these realities.”

The PA has consistently refused to accept these parameters as defining the goals of the negotiating process.

On 27 November 2007 Israel’s then Prime Minister Ehud Olmert once again clarified these parameters at Annapolis before the leaders of the international community assembled there when he said:

“The negotiations will be based on previous agreements between us, UN Security Council Resolutions 242 and 338, the Roadmap and the April 14th 2004 letter of President Bush to the Prime Minister of Israel."

The PA clearly is not negotiating on the same wavelength as Israel as it continues to:

1. Demand the right for millions of Arabs to emigrate to Israel

2. Refuses to accept the right of any Jews to live in the West Bank

3. Attempts to introduce the Saudi Peace Plan into the negotiations

4. Refuses to recognise Israel as the national state of the Jewish people

5. Refuses to accept Israel’s Reservations to the Road Map as having any relevance

Israel and the PA have each been playing the negotiating game under different sets of rules. Until they start to play the game under the same rules - any further talks will - like the talks held since 2003 - prove to be a complete waste of time.