RIP UN two-State solution, Hello Hashemite Kingdom of Palestine

The United Nations  two-State solution - first proposed on November 29, 1947 - needs to be finally buried and replaced with the Saudi peace solution proposed on June 8, 2022. 

The 1947 UN solution: Creating one Jewish State and one Arab state between the River Jordan and the Mediterranean Sea (UN two-State solution) - was aimed at ending the Arab-Jewish conflict in Western Palestine which had then been raging for the previous 50 years.

This proposal was accepted by the Jews but rejected by the Arabs - becoming the catalyst for the War that broke out in May 1948.  

The Arabs ended up controlling some 22% of the territory between the River and the Sea. The major part was unified with Eastern Palestine located east of the Jordan River - (granted independence in 1946 as The Hashemite Kingdom of Transjordan) - and renamed the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan in 1950. The balance - the Gaza Strip -was occupied and administered by Egypt. 

The founding document of the Palestine Liberation Organisation in 1964 (PLO) expressly disavowed any claim to sovereignty "over the West Bank in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan" and "the Gaza Strip". 

It was only in 1968 - after Jordan and Egypt had lost these lands to Israel in the 1967 Six Day War - that the PLO began to agitate for an independent Arab state west of the Jordan River - employing terrorism to try and achieve it. The PLO strategy failed. However the long-dormant UN two-State solution was resurrected by the international community in:

• 1980: Venice Declaration 
• 1993: Oslo Accords
• 2002: Arab Peace Initiative.
• 2003: President Bush Roadmap 
• 2011: President Obama 
• 2020: President Trump 

Powerful backers indeed - but no such two-State solution has appeared a remote possibility for the last forty years.

A radically-different proposal however surfaced in Saudi Arabia on June 8, 2022 that was both revolutionary and ground-breaking: Merge Jordan, the Gaza Strip, and part of the West Bank into one territorial entity to be called the Hashemite Kingdom of Palestine - no new Arab State between the River and the Sea. 

The UN's response has been disgraceful.

Instead of welcoming this Saudi proposal and the prospects its successful implementation offers for ending the Jewish-Arab conflict - the UN has failed to even acknowledge its existence - denying it any oxygen, exposure or traction in the UN. 

Secretary General Antonio Guterres and UN Special Co-ordinator for the Middle East Process Torr Wennesland have made no public comments whatsoever on the Saudi proposal or included any reference to it in their monthly reports to the Security Council since its release. 

They need to break their silence. 

Until they do - they remain compromised and conflicted. 

A UN closed forum convened on 8 November by the UN Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People (CEIRPP) with Civil Society Organizations (CSO's) from "Palestine" Israel and the United States "Advocating for Accountability in the Occupied Palestinian Territory" --asserted  that "Safeguarding the two-State solution" remained their prime objective. 

Not one of them apparently mentioned the Saudi proposal - whose successful implementation would put them all out of business by finally ending a conflict that has defied resolution for more than 100 years. 

Guterres continued parroting the UN's commitment to the two-state solution on November 22 - without mentioning the Saudi solution - which needs to be aired and debated in the UN General Assembly, Security Council and CEIRPP and no longer suppressed. 

The UN's 75 years-old failed two-State solution to end the Jewish-Arab conflict has well and truly passed its use by date. The time has come for the UN to adopt the Hashemite Kingdom of Palestine solution to replace it. 

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.

Hashemite Kingdom of Palestine to end Mandate for Palestine saga

 

The creation of the Hashemite Kingdom of Palestine –the merger of Jordan, Gaza and part of the West Bank into one single territorial entity comprising about 80% of the territory of the Mandate for Palestine (Mandate) - will be a fitting end to the Mandate saga which began on July 24, 1922 with the unanimous approval of its terms by all 51 Members of the League of Nations. 

The remaining 20% of the Mandate territory will mark the final internationally recognised boundaries of Israel -3000 years after the loss of the Jewish ancient and biblical homeland to the Roman General -Pompey - following his conquest of Jerusalem and its surroundings in 63 BC.

This two-state solution in Palestine - one Arab the other Jewish - had not been that originally planned by the Principal Allied Powers at the San Remo Conference in April 1920 and confirmed by the Treaty of Sevres in August that year. 

San Remo had provided for: 

• Arab self-determination within the territory comprised in the Mandate for Syria and Lebanon and the Mandate for Mesopotamia - comprising 99.99% of the territory formerly part of the 400 years old Ottoman Empire liberated after World War 1
• Jewish self-determination within the territory comprised in the Mandate for Palestine located on both sides of the Jordan River - the remaining 0.01% of the liberated Ottoman Empire 

Two and a half of the 12 Tribes of Israel had settled East of the Jordan River after reaching the Promised Land - as recorded in the Old Testament. The other nine and a half tribes had continued on to settle West of the Jordan River.  

However the arrival of Abdullah - a member of the Hashemite dynasty - in Transjordan on 21 November 1920 accompanied by a band of armed troops en route to help his brother Faisal fight the French to retain Faisal's crown in Syria - resulted in:

• Great Britain - at the Cairo Conference held on March 12, 1921 - stopping Abdullah by creating the Emirate of Transjordan for Abdullah in 78% of Mandatory Palestine East of the Jordan River. The Emirate remained part of the Mandate until granted independence by Great Britain in 1946 - changing its name to the Hashemite Kingdom of Transjordan.
• Article 25 being inserted into the Mandate document on July 24, 1922--restricting the right of the Jewish people to reconstitute the Jewish National Home in 22% of Mandatory Palestine West of the Jordan River
• The Council of the League of Nations approving these changed arrangements on September 16, 1922.

These changes have been preserved until today under article 80 of the United Nations Charter. 

The United Nations failure to observe the terms of its own Charter has been the greatest obstacle to achieving the Mandate-contemplated two-state solution. 

That two-state solution has however become politically attainable following a detailed plan for its creation in an article dated 8 June - written by Ali Shihabi a close confidante of Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman the next King of Saudi Arabia - and published in Al-Arabiya News – owned by the Saudi Royal Family. 

Successful negotiations between Israel and Jordan to implement Shihabi's plan would result in:

• The merger of Mandate territory located East and West of the Jordan River into one Arab State and
• the recognition of a Jewish State in the remaining Mandate territory West of the Jordan River 

The last chapter of the Mandate saga begun on July 24, 1922 is on the diplomatic horizon. 

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.

Biden should push for Jordan & Israel to divide Judea & Samaria

 

President Biden's proposed visit to the "West Bank" is promising to end up becoming a fruitless trip to an artificially-coined destination supposedly inhabited by a mythical ancient "Palestinian people". 

This scenario is far removed from the biblical and historic realities that had existed for 3000 years prior to April 24, 1950 - when Biden's destination was called "Judea and Samaria" – the ancient and biblical heartland of the Jewish people. 

Biden's Press Secretary - Karine Jean-Pierre – exposed Biden's – and her--apparent ignorance of these indisputable facts when announcing the President's forthcoming visit in these terms: 

"The President will also visit the West Bank to consult with the Palestinian Authority and to reiterate his strong support for a two-state solution, with equal measures of security, freedom, and opportunity for the Palestinian people.

United Nations resolutions and Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) propaganda has used Jean-Pierre's faux narrative since 1967 in a concerted effort to deny the Jewish people have any right to reconstitute the Jewish National Home in Judea and Samaria and East Jerusalem under article 6 of the 1922 League of Nations Mandate for Palestine and article 80 of the 1945 United Nations Charter. 

This post-1967 narrative differs from that used on 1 December 1948 when a conference organized in Jericho and attended by numerous Arab delegations including mayors of Hebron, Bethlehem, Ramallah, the Arab Legion Military Governor General and military governors from all districts, and other notables adopted the following resolution:

"Palestine Arabs desire unity between Transjordan and Arab Palestine and therefore make known their wish that Arab Palestine be annexed immediately to Transjordan. They also recognize Abdullah as their King and request him proclaim himself King of new territory."

The Jericho Conference came after:

• The Mandatory Power – Great Britain – had granted independence on June 27, 1946 to Transjordan – 78% of the territory comprised in the 1922 Mandate for Palestine located East of the Jordan River
• Transjordan had invaded Judea and Samaria and East Jerusalem– 4% of the Mandate territory located West of the Jordan River – on May 15, 1948--driving out all the Jews living there as it assumed control of these areas.

The Jericho resolution confirms:

• There was then no identifiable "Palestinian people" – only "Palestine Arabs".
• The leaders of the "Palestine Arabs" were not calling for the creation of a second Arab State in the territory formerly comprised in the Mandate for Palestine with East Jerusalem as its capital –in addition to Transjordan.

Despite International and Arab League objections - unification of these two exclusively-occupied Arab territories - comprising some 82% of the territory of the Mandate for Palestine located on both sides of the Jordan River - was achieved on April 24, 1950 – resulting in:

• "Judea and Samaria" being designated the "West Bank"
• The newly-unified entity being named "Jordan"
• "Palestine Arabs" living in the "West Bank" becoming "Jordanian citizens"
• A two-state solution in former Palestine:  one Jewish State called Israel in 18% of former Palestine and one Arab State called Jordan in the remaining 82% of Palestine.

The Palestinian people were only identified for the first time in the 1964 PLO Charter - but the PLO expressly did not claim to exercise regional sovereignty over the "West Bank of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan" under article 24,

 Unification lasted until Jordan's loss of Judea Samaria and East Jerusalem to Israel in the 1967 Six Day War – although its Arab inhabitants enjoyed Jordanian citizenship until 31 July 1988. 

Dividing Judea and Samaria between Israel and Jordan in direct negotiations aimed at redrawing their existing international border is certainly attainable. 

Biden should push for this two-state solution that accords with history, geography and demography.

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.

San Remo Conference: Catalyst for Jewish and Arab independence

 

The San Remo Conference held on April 24-25, 1920 marked the beginning of self-determination for both the Jewish People after 3000 years of dispersion and the Arabs after 400 years of Ottoman rule. 

Among those participating in the Conference - indicating its historic importance and the significant decisions it would be tasked with making: 

• United States of America: Mr. Robert Underwood Johnson, American Ambassador in Rome; 
• British Empire: The Right Hon. D. Lloyd George, Prime Minister; The Right Hon; the Earl Curzon of Kedleston, Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs;
• France: M. Millerand, President
• Italy: Signor Nitti, Prime Minister (in the Chair);
• Japan: Mr. Matsui

The Minutes of the Meeting were headed: MINUTES OF PALESTINE MEETING OF THE SUPREME COUNCIL OF THE ALLIED POWERS HELD IN SAN REMO AT THE VILLA DEVACHAN  APRIL 24. 1920.

However the agenda covered far more than Palestine – dealing with: -

“the question of mandates for those territories which had been Mandates formerly under Turkish domination and which it was proposed should, in the future be administered by the various Principal Allied Powers”

Those territories were identified as Mesopotamia and Syria as well as Palestine. 

San Remo granted the Arabs independence in:

• Syria (estimated population 2.22 million) and 
• Mesopotamia (estimated population 3 million)

Comprising an area of 624000 km2 - 85% of the total area of these three territories: The Conference resolved:

“that Syria and Mesopotamia shall in accordance with the fourth paragraph of article 22, Part I (Covenant of the League of Nations), be provisionally recognised as independent States subject to the rendering of administrative advice and assistance by a mandatory until such time as they are able to stand alone. The boundaries of the said States will be determined, and the selection of the mandatories made, by the Principal Allied Powers”

Mesopotamia gained independence in 1932 and Syria in 1946. 

The Jews were initially allotted all of Palestine at San Remo –117000km2 - the remaining 15% of these three liberated Turkish territories – within which the Jewish National Home was to be “reconstituted” after 3000 years.  

However 78% of Palestine east of the Jordan River (Transjordan) was whittled away for Arab independence by the time the League of Nations Mandate for Palestine was promulgated in July 1922 - leaving Jewish self-determination to happen in just 3% of the territories dealt with at San Remo. 

Transjordan (today called Jordan) became independent in 1946. 

The British Government’s 1921 Interim Report on the Civil Administration of Palestine recorded that hardly 700,000 people were living in Palestine west of the Jordan River– 560000 of whom were Moslems, 77000 Christians and 76000 Jews:

“a population much less than that of the province of Gallilee alone in the time of Christ * (*See Sir George Adam Smith "Historical Geography of the Holy Land", Chap. 20.)”.

About 350000 non-Jews lived in Palestine east of the Jordan River:

The San Remo Conference unanimously agreed that the civil and religious rights of these existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine were not to be prejudiced by San Remo’s decisions and that the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country were also not to be affected – guarantees that were expressly included in the terms of the Mandate for Palestine.

The Arabs have never accepted that the decisions simultaneously made in relation to Mesopotamia Syria and Palestine at San Remo in 1920 were part of a plan that by 1922 offered:

• The Arabs: independence in 97% of the liberated Ottoman territories.
• The Jews: independence in the remaining 3%

The Jewish-Arab conflict will remain unresolved whilst the Arabs remain in their 102 years-old state of denial.

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.

Jordan & Israel can end the 100 years old Jewish-Arab conflict

 

It took Jordan's King Abdullah II just a 10 minutes helicopter flight from Jordan to Ramallah on 26 March to meet Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) leader Mahmud Abbas in Ramallah - itself only 15 minutes' drive from Jerusalem - Abdullah's first trip to Judea and Samaria (West Bank) since 2017.  The Arab Weekly reported on Abdullah's visit:

"Well-informed Jordanian sources have linked the previously unannounced visit of the Jordanian king to Ramallah, the seat of the Palestinian Authority, to the Negev Summit. They said that Jordan was uncomfortable with the new "Abrahamic" peace process between Israel and Arab countries. It particularly resents being marginalised and losing control over its most important card, the Palestinian issue."

Abdullah has only himself to blame for Jordan's growing marginalisation--abandoning the policy pursued by his great-grandfather King Abdullah I and his father King Hussein  of unifying the two Arab populations living on both sides of the Jordan River into one State between 1950 and 1967. 

Abdullah instead has been supporting the PLO demand for the creation of an independent Arab state west of the Jordan River - in addition to Jordan east of the Jordan River: two Arab states and one Jewish state within the territory comprised in the 1922 League of Nations Mandate for Palestine (Mandate). 

Abdullah needs to rethink supporting the PLO's demand if he wishes to regain control of decisions to be made west of the Jordan River affecting Arabs and Jews in the last 5% of former Palestine where sovereignty still remains unallocated between Jordan and Israel after 100 years of conflict. 

Abdullah's marginalisation also risks Jordan losing its role as the custodian of the Muslim Holy Shrines in Jerusalem conferred on Jordan in 1994 by the Washington Declaration and Israel-Jordan Peace Treaty.  

Between 1950 and 1967: 

• Judea and Samaria (West Bank) - which included Ramallah - was part of Jordan - and its residents were Jordanian citizens
• The PLO did not claim regional sovereignty "over the West Bank in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan" or the "Gaza Strip" on its founding in 1964 - claiming only that "Palestine with its boundaries at the time of the British Mandate is a regional indivisible unit"
• Abdullah's father King Hussein - at page 118 of his published memoirs Uneasy Lies the Head (1962) - justified  continuing Jordanian rule on both sides of the Jordan River against international condemnation:

"Palestine and Jordan were both under British Mandate, but as my grandfather pointed out in his memoirs, they were hardly separate countries. Transjordan being to the east of the River Jordan, it formed in a sense, the interior of Palestine" 

Jordan comprises 78% of the territory of former Palestine whilst Judea and Samaria (West Bank) comprises just 4%.

Abdullah's visit to Ramallah took place at the same time as the Negev Summit was putting life into the Abraham Accords - Israel's Foreign Minister working with his counterparts from Bahrain, Egypt, Morocco and the United Arab Emirates on shared challenges and interests--along with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken's encouragement and support. 

Ending the 100 years-old conflict between Arabs and Jews has become increasingly urgent with no movement in sight to create an additional Arab State west of the Jordan River after almost 30 years of failed political and diplomatic attempts and pressure from the United Nations. 

The reunification of the Arab populations living on both sides of the Jordan River - as existed between 1950 and 1967 - by re-drawing the current international border between Israel and Jordan in direct negotiations - is the kiss of life that can end the Arab-Jewish conflict.

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 Security Council incites Jew-hatred thanks to Obama & Biden

The Obama-Biden administration’s failure to veto UN Security Council Resolution 2334 on December 23, 2016 — as President Obama was vacating the White House to hand over the reins of power to President-elect Donald Trump — has seen that Resolution being weaponized for the last five years to incite Jew-hatred worldwide — with UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres firing the bullets.

Guterres is required to report to the Security Council every three months on the implementation of Resolution 2334 and recently issued his 20th such report covering the period September 29 — December 9, 2021.

Guterres states:

“In its resolution 2334 (2016), the Security Council reaffirmed that the establishment by Israel of settlements in the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967, including East Jerusalem, had no legal validity and constituted a flagrant violation under international law and a major obstacle to the achievement of the two-State solution and a just, lasting and comprehensive peace. In the same resolution, the Council reiterated its demand that Israel immediately and completely cease all settlement activities in the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem, and that it fully respect all of its legal obligations in that regard. No such steps were taken during the reporting period.”

This Security Council Resolution falsely accuses Jews of:

• Illegally settling in “the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967 including East Jerusalem” (“Territories”): 

These Territories have been designated for 3000 years as “Judea and Samaria” and “Jerusalem” — the ancient and biblical heartlands of the Jewish People — and were so designated in 1947 by the UN Special Commission Report on Palestine and UNGA Resolution 181 (II). 

• Having no right to live in these Territories: 

All Jews living there were ethnically cleansed in 1948 by six invading Arab armies and prevented from returning until 1967. 

• Acting in flagrant violation of international law

The right of Jews to live in these Territories is expressly authorized by articles 6 and 25 of the 1922 League of Nations Mandate for Palestine and preserved until today by article 80 of the United Nations Charter.

Resolution 2334 institutionalized Jew-hatred in the Security Council. 

Jew-hatred is now being preached and practiced under the cover of United Nations respectability.

Guterres further points out:

“In its resolution 2334 (2016), the Security Council called upon all States to distinguish, in their relevant dealings, between the territory of the State of Israel and the territories occupied since 1967.”

Dealing with Jews living in Israel differently from Jews living in the Territories:

• Violates anti-discrimination international humanitarian law 
• Disregards the UN Charter’s call “to practice tolerance”.
• Constitutes racial apartheid

An Obama-Biden veto would have consigned Resolution 2334 to the dustbin of history — like so many other similar Resolutions reeking of Jew-hatred vetoed by them. 

Then US Secretary of State—John Kerry—explained why America allowed this pernicious Resolution to pass:

”...the two-state solution is the only way to achieve a just and lasting peace between Israelis and Palestinians… the vote in the United Nations was about preserving the two-state solution”

Really?

A different solution worked successfully between 1948 and 1967: Unifying the two banks of the Jordan River to create one State replacing “Transjordan”  — re-named “Jordan” in 1950.

Why couldn’t a similar solution work again?

Obama and Biden’s abstention-decision on Resolution 2234 — as they were leaving office — to preserve the two-state solution by creating a second Arab state in former Palestine in addition to Jordan – has seen Jews paying the price — being increasingly exposed to targeted attacks worldwide fuelled by UN Secretary-General quarterly reports on the implementation of a Security Council Resolution that falsely demonises the Jewish People.

Jew-hatred has become firmly entrenched in the UN Security Council to its eternal shame.

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.

Israel swallows UN, EU and Arab propaganda on Judea and Samaria

•  

United Nations (UN), European Union (EU) and Arab propaganda has perverted the history of the Arab-Jewish conflict. Their heinous conduct enables them to falsely claim that Jews have no legal right to live in Judea and Samaria (West Bank).  Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) has seemingly swallowed parts of their disingenuous narrative hook line and sinker. 

Achieving this triumvirate’s sinister agenda has been amazingly simple: Start with the year 1967 —instead of 1920 — when talking about resolving a conflict that has in fact been raging for more than 100 years.

Doing so has seen the UN, EU and Arab propagandists:

• Term the conflict: The “Israel-Arab conflict” or the “Israeli-Palestinian conflict” —instead of what it has always been — the “Jewish-Arab conflict”. 

• Ignore that Arabs living in Palestine in 1922 were only regarded as part of the “existing non-Jewish communities” — that “Israelis” and “Palestinians” did not then exist.

• Paper over that the San Remo Conference and Treaty of Sevres in 1920 decided that: 

(i) Arab self-determination was to occur in 99.99% of the territory captured from the Ottoman Empire in World War 1 — including those territories designated under the Mandate for Syria and Lebanon and the Mandate for Mesopotamia (now Iraq) 

(ii) Jewish self-determination was to occur in the remaining 0.01% — “Palestine” — under the Mandate for Palestine (Mandate) — unanimously adopted by all 51 member states of the League of Nations in 1922 

• Avoid any consideration or discussion that under the Mandate:

(i) The territory of Palestine encompassed what is today called Jordan (78%), Israel (17%), and the West Bank and Gaza (5%) 

(ii) Jews were prevented from reconstituting the Jewish National Home in Jordan under article 25 of the Mandate – but “close settlement by Jews” in Judea and Samaria was to be encouraged under article 6 and that the right of Jews to do so was expressly reserved under article 80 of the UN Charter notwithstanding the subsequent demise of the League of Nations in 1946.

(iii) Self-determination for the Palestinian Arabs was achieved in 78% of Palestine in 1946 when Jordan (then called Transjordan) was granted its independence by Great Britain.

• Not condemn the ethnic cleansing of every Jew living in Judea and Samaria and East Jerusalem between 1948 and 1967.  

• Use the 1950 Arab-coined name “West Bank” to replace the 3000 years old UN-recognised name “Judea and Samaria”  

• Cover up that the “Palestinians” were not identified or defined until 1964 under article 6 of the PLO Charter and that they made no claim to regional sovereignty under article 24 to “the West Bank of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan” or “on the Gaza Strip”. 

• Disregard that Transjordan was unified with Judea and Samaria between 1950 and 1967 to form a single Palestinian Arab state — renamed Jordan — and that all its residents were Jordanian citizens.

Falsely claiming Jews have no legal right to live in Judea and Samaria reeks of Jew-hatred.

Israel’s MFA website has given some of this revisionist rewrite of history unwarranted credibility: 

“Israel’s territory according to the agreed 1949 Armistice Demarcation Line encompassed about 78% of the Mandate area, while the other parts, namely the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, were occupied by Jordan and Egypt respectively.”

Israel’s territory only encompassed about 17% — not 78% — of the Mandate Area. The remaining 83% comprised Jordan (78%) - and Judea and Samaria (West Bank) and the Gaza Strip (5%). 

Using the stand-alone term “West Bank” expunges recognition of that territory’s Jewish identity as “Judea and Samaria” — part of the Jewish People’s ancient biblical and historic homeland. 

Words count. 

Israel’s Foreign Ministry needs to correct these monumental gaffes. 

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.

Israel & Jordan dividing Judea & Samaria is the key to peace

 

Two Australian politicians from Australia’s two major political parties – one of them Australia’s former Ambassador to Israel and Government backbencher Dave Sharma – have embarked on a trip to fantasyland in a rare show of bipartisan solidarity that has nothing to do with Australian domestic policy – but involves the “Palestinian People”.

Sharma (Liberal Party) seconded a motion by Chris Hayes (Australian Labor Party) which includes the following paragraphs:

"That this House:

(1) notes that 29 November 2021 is the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People as declared by the United Nations in 1977;

(2) recognises the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people, including their right to self determination and a future built on peace, dignity, justice and security;"

Their hyperlinking of “Palestinian People” clarifies who these two politicians are talking about: 

The Palestinian people (Arabic: الشعب الفلسطيني, ash-sha‘b al-Filasṭīnī), also referred to as Palestinians (Arabic: الفلسطينيون, al-Filasṭīniyyūn; Hebrew: פָלַסְטִינִים) or Palestinian Arabs (Arabic: الفلسطينيين العرب, al-Filasṭīniyyīn al-ʿarab), are an ethnonational group[31][32][33][34][35][36][37] comprising the modern descendants of the peoples who have lived in Palestine continuously over the centuries and who today are largely culturally and linguistically Arab.[38][39][40][41][42][43][44][45]

This definition is fabricated - ignoring history, geography and demography by falsely claiming the existence of a Palestinian People with roots purportedly going back 3000 years ago when the Jewish People entered the Promised Land – rather than to the year 1964 - when the term “Palestinians” was first defined.

History is clear:

• The League of Nations 1922 Mandate for Palestine only recognised the Arab inhabitants of Palestine as forming part of “the existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine” whose civil and religious rights irrespective of race or religion were to be protected without any political rights to self-determination.
• The 1947 United Nations Partition Plan only spoke of two states – one Jewish, the other Arab – not a Palestinian State.

• The Palestine Liberation Organisation – the sole spokesman for the Palestinian Arabs recognised by the Arab League since 1974 – defined the term “Palestinians” for the first time in history in its founding 1964 Charter: 

Article 1. Palestine is an Arab homeland bound by strong national ties to the rest of the Arab Countries and which together form the large Arab homeland.

Article 2. Palestine with its boundaries at the time of the British Mandate is a regional indivisible unit.

Article 3. The Palestinian Arab people has the legitimate right to its homeland and is an inseparable part of the Arab Nation. It shares the sufferings and aspirations of the Arab Nation and its struggle for freedom, sovereignty, progress and unity.

Article 6. The Palestinians are those Arab citizens who were living normally in Palestine up to 1947, whether they remained or were expelled. Every child who was born to a Palestinian parent after this date whether in Palestine or outside is a Palestinian.

• Palestine’s boundaries at the time of the British Mandate (1920-1948) included Transjordan – 78% of the Mandate territory – until Transjordan became independent in 1946. 
• Following the invasion and conquest of Judea, Samaria and East Jerusalem by Transjordan in 1948: Transjordan was renamed Jordan in 1949  and unified with these conquered territories  on 24 April 1950  until their loss to Israel in 1967 .

Two States exist in former Palestine today: one Jewish - called Israel – the other - Arab - called Jordan. 

The key to achieving peace is Jordan’s return to the heavily-populated Arab areas of Judea and Samaria - restoring Jordanian citizenship to its Arab residents as existed between 1950 and 1988.

Sharma and Hayes hold different opinions – but their opinions - based on fiction rather than fact – are nothing more than meaningless mumbo jumbo made by grandstanding politicians.

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.

Biden backs UN racist plan to exclude Jews from East Jerusalem

Israel has a real fight on its hands in resisting President Biden’s push to re-open the US consulate in Jerusalem.

The consulate was closed on March 4, 2019 — after former President – Donald Trump—had issued a Presidential Proclamation on 6 December 2017 that saw the US Embassy moved from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem on 14 May 2018.

Trump’s Secretary of State – Mike Pompeo – has slammed Biden’s decision:

“I think it’s illegal. We don’t have consulates in the same city we have embassies anywhere in the world… It’s unnecessary and counterproductive, and I think, frankly, sends the wrong signal to the Palestinians as well. It signals to them back to business as usual, back to the kleptocracy, and ‘pay to slay’ and all the horrors that the Palestinian leadership and the West Bank imposed on its own people as well” 

Biden’s decision will certainly give added impetus to United Nations Security Council Resolution 2334 – passed on 23 December 2016 as then Vice President Biden was vacating his office in the White House prior to the handover of power from President Obama to President-elect Trump.

Security Council Resolution 2334:

1. Reaffirmed that the establishment by Israel of settlements in the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967, including East Jerusalem, had no legal validity and constituted a flagrant violation under international law and a major obstacle to the achievement of the two-State solution and a just, lasting and comprehensive peace; 

2. Reiterated its demand that Israel immediately and completely cease all settlement activities in the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem, and that it fully respect all of its legal obligations in this regard; 

3. Underlined that it will not recognize any changes to the 4 June 1967 lines, including with regard to Jerusalem, other than those agreed by the parties through negotiations;

This racist resolution: 

• Ignored that all Jews living in East Jerusalem before 1948 had been ethnically cleansed from there following Jerusalem’s invasion and partial conquest by Transjordan in 1948.
• Denied Jews had any right to return or take up residence there after 1967
• Failed to acknowledge that Jews had lived there for 3000 years

The Obama-Biden administration failed to veto this overtly anti-Jewish Resolution to ensure it could never be weaponised to attack Israeli policies. 

The departing administration shamefully chose instead to only abstain — as then Secretary of State John Kerry — now currently serving as Biden’s United States Special Presidential Envoy for Climate — explained:

“.. . the vote in the United Nations was about preserving the two-state solution.  That’s what we were standing up for: Israel’s future as a Jewish and democratic state, living side by side in peace and security with its neighbors.  That’s what we are trying to preserve for our sake and for theirs.”

Preserving the two-state solution was more important for the Obama-Biden administration than denouncing the UN for denying Jews the right to live in East Jerusalem

President Trump’s closure of the US Consulate in Jerusalem helped neutralise this anti-Jewish parting shot fired by Obama and Biden.

Biden’s current Secretary of State – Antony Blinken – has announced that re-opening the US Consulate in Jerusalem will serve: 

“to underscore the commitment of the United States to rebuilding the relationship with the Palestinian Authority and the Palestinian people”

Why does rebuilding this relationship justify consular offices separate from the US Embassy in Jerusalem for those seeking to deny Jews the right to live in East Jerusalem alongside them? 

The US House of Representatives rejected Resolution 2334 by a vote of 342-80 on January 5, 2017. So should Biden – by keeping the former US Consulate doors in Jerusalem firmly and permanently closed.

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.

 

European Union and Germany plot to see Jerusalem divided

The decision by the European Union (EU) and Germany to launch the East Jerusalem Tourism Development Programme is in reality a blatant attempt by them to see Jerusalem divided by creating political facts on the ground under the guise of helping promote tourism in East Jerusalem.

The German representative—Oliver Owcza – was quite happy to create this tourism smokescreen:

 “As Germans and Europeans we value tourism that is of quality and locally owned. We therefore are confident this project will connect the tourism community and support new concepts and services. As it will contribute to more and better job and career opportunities”

European Union Representative — Sven Kühn Von Burgsdorff – however — did not seek to hide the consortium’s real objective — firing these bullets:

“Palestinians in East Jerusalem are facing daily political, economic, and social challenges. Tourism has always been one of the main income-generating activities in the city and helped maintaining the Palestinian presence and identity of the city. 

Our joint work as Europeans reflects once again the clear and united position of the EU and its Member States with regard to East Jerusalem. For us, East Jerusalem is part of the occupied Palestinian territory and the status of Jerusalem as the future capital for the two states should always be respected and protected.”  

Words do have meaning.

“Palestinians in East Jerusalem”, “Palestinian territory” and “maintaining the Palestinian presence and identity of the city” excludes any rights Jews, non-Arab Christians and non-Arab Moslems might have in East Jerusalem — according to the definition of “Palestinians” in Clause 6 of the 1964 Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) Charter:

“The Palestinians are those Arab citizens who were living normally in Palestine up to 1947, whether they remained or were expelled. Every child who was born to a Palestinian parent after this date whether in Palestine or outside is a Palestinian.”

This Arabs-only definition was repeated in article 5 of the new PLO Charter adopted in 1968. 

Jewish claims in East Jerusalem are expressly rejected by the PLO in the 1964 PLO Charter – repeated almost verbatim in article 20 of the 1968 Charter: 

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

The EU and Germany have trashed the uniquely shared Jewish, Moslem and Christian identity of East Jerusalem — evidenced by the centuries–long presence of Jews, Moslems and Christians there and the formative and normative role East Jerusalem has played in the development of these three monotheistic religions.

The EU and Germany’s support for a recently-minted Palestinian identity fabricated to erase this shared identity is disgustingly racist. 

The only time in history that Jerusalem has ever been a divided city occurred between 1950 and 1967 after East Jerusalem was conquered in 1948 and then unified with Transjordan to form a single territorial entity called Jordan.

During this period:

• The Jewish Quarter of the Old City in East Jerusalem was destroyed and its residents expelled. 
• Fifty-eight synagogues—some hundreds of years old—were destroyed, their contents looted and desecrated. 
• The 2500 years old Jewish cemetery on the Mount of Olives was ransacked; graves desecrated; thousands of tombstones smashed and used as building material, paving stones or for latrines in Arab Legion army camps. 

Jerusalem must never be divided again. 

 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.

Jordan is the Palestinian State: Hussein and Abdullah differ

 

It is rare for CNN host Fareed Zakaria to issue an apology – but he did so after interviewing Jordan’s King Abdullah II last week.

Zakaria had wrongly attributed the following comments to prominent Israeli diplomat Dore Gold when questioning the King:

“Jordan needs to start thinking of itself as the Palestinian state. In other words, there is a two-state solution, the Palestinian state is Jordan.”

Abdullah’s response to Zakaria was dismissive:

“Jordan is Jordan. We have a mixed society from different ethnic and religious backgrounds… it is our country. The Palestinians do not want to be in Jordan; they want their lands, they want their football team, they want their flag to fly above their houses.”

Jordan – then called Transjordan - was founded on 77% of the territory comprised in the 1922 League of Nations Mandate for Palestine - following the San Remo Conference and Treaty of Sevres in 1920 and the 1921 Cairo Conference.

The planned reconstitution of the Jewish National Home in Transjordan was postponed or withheld under article 25 of the Mandate with the result that no Jews live there today – the population being entirely Arab.

Transjordan achieved independence in 1946 – changing its name to Jordan in 1950 after unifying its territory with Judea and Samaria (West Bank) and East Jerusalem conquered by Transjordan in the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. Only Great Britain and Pakistan recognised Transjordan’s decision.

Zakaria’s apology to Gold was unqualified:

“On last week’s show, I asked King Abdullah about the concept that there would be no stand-alone Palestine state in the future that but instead his nation, Jordan, would become the de-facto Palestine state. I said the idea had been recently mentioned by long time Israeli diplomat, Dore Gold. I was wrong. Many have talked about that concept, but not ambassador Gold. I apologize for that error.”

One Arab leader who talked about “that concept” was King Abdullah’s father – the late King Hussein - who in 1972:

• lauded his grandfather King Abdullah 1’s legacy: 

“On 24 April 1950, the new Jordanian National Assembly - with its two chambers, deputies and senators - representing the two Banks held an historic meeting which marked the first real step in modern Arab history towards Arab unity, which the revolution has advocated since its inception. The meeting announced the unity and merger of the two Banks in a single independent Arab State, a parliamentary monarchy known as the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan.” 

 

• pointed out the memorable period that followed during King Hussein’s reign:

“The primary fact that the unity of the two Banks represented day after day has been that the people in both Banks are one and not two peoples. This fact was manifested for the first time in the reunion of the sons of the East Bank with their emigrant brothers, the sons of the Palestine areas occupied in 1948. It was manifested when the former shared with the latter food and shelter and the sweetness and bitterness of life. This fact became more salient and took deeper roots with every step the State took.

The unity of blood and destiny reached its greatest significance in 1967 when the sons of the two Banks stood together on the West Bank as they have been doing for twenty years and jointly sacrificed their blood on its pure soil. But the struggle was too great for them and its conditions and complexities were too much for their valour. The catastrophe occurred and what happened did happen.”

Abdullah’s repudiation of his ancestors’ reunification of the two Banks of the Jordan River and their Arab populations within one State marks the lowest point in Jordan’s 100 years-old history.


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.

King Abdullah cannot exclude Jordan from any two-state solution

 

King Abdullah’s continuing attempt to exclude Jordan from being part of any two-state solution remains the major obstacle to ending the 100 years old unresolved Arab-Jewish conflict.

The King’s intransigent position came in this exchange with CNN’s Fareed Zakaria this week:

Zakaria: Dore Gold, an influential adviser to Prime Minister Netanyahu, recently said, Jordan needs to start thinking of itself as the Palestinian state. In other words, there is a two-state solution, the Palestinian state is Jordan, I think the implication would be, of course, you have 60-70 percent Palestinians, you could absorb the Palestinians in the West Bank. This has been touted before, but here you have a fairly influential Israeli saying it. What is your reaction?

King: Well, again, that type of rhetoric is nothing new, and basically, those people have agendas that they want to do at the expense of others. Jordan is Jordan. We have a mixed society from different ethnic and religious backgrounds. I would maybe contest the percentage in the figures that you have mentioned, but it is our country. The Palestinians do not want to be in Jordan; they want their lands, they want their football team, they want their flag to fly above their houses.”

King Abdullah ignored Jordan’s chequered origins in asserting:

• "Jordan is Jordan”,
• “it is our country” and
• ”the Palestinians do not want to be in Jordan”

The following historic, geographic and demographic realities contradict King Abdullah’s remarks:

• Jordan — then called Transjordan — comprised 78% of the territory of former Palestine designated in the 1920-1948 Mandate for Palestine (British Mandate).
• Transjordan only became an independent state in 1946
• Abdullah’s great-grandfather and Transjordan’s first ruler — King Abdullah I — told a meeting of the Arab League in Cairo on April 12, 1948:

“Palestine and Transjordan are one, for Palestine is the coastline and Transjordan the hinterland of the same country”

• Israel achieved its independence in May 1948 in 17% of the territory comprised in the British Mandate.
• Transjordan was unified with Judea, Samaria and East Jerusalem into one territorial entity and renamed Jordan in 1950 after Transjordan had conquered those areas in the 1948 Arab-Israeli War— which lasted until their loss to Israel in the 1967 Six Day War.
• Judea, Samaria and East Jerusalem were designated “the West Bank of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan” in the founding 1964 Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) Charter — whilst regional sovereignty was not claimed by the PLO.
• The 1964 PLO Charter asserted that “Palestine with its boundaries at the time of the British Mandate is a regional indivisible unit.”
• The revised 1968 PLO Charter confirmed that “Palestine, with the boundaries it had during the British Mandate, is an indivisible territorial unit”.
• Arab residents of Judea and Samaria were Jordanian citizens between 1950 and 1988
• Abdullah’s uncle—Prince Hassan—told the Jordanian National Assembly on February 2, 1970:

"Palestine is Jordan and Jordan is Palestine, there is one people and one land, with one history and one and the same fate”

• The PLO unsuccessfully tried to seize power in Jordan in 1970
• Prime PLO political strategist—Abu Iyad—declared in Near East Report on January 8, 1990:

“All those who tried in the past and are still trying to create divisions between the Jordanian and Palestinian people have failed. We indeed constitute one people”

Abdullah ignores these long-standing realities at his peril.

Abdullah is deluding himself in denying the role Jordan must inevitably play in achieving the long sought-after two-state solution: Redrawing the international border between Jordan and Israel — the two successor States to the British Mandate — allocating sovereignty between them in Judea Samaria and Gaza — without creating another State.


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 discrimination against Jews traps Unilever and J Street

 

The United Nations (UN) false designation of Judea, Samaria and East Jerusalem as the “Occupied Palestinian Territories” (OPT) has seen the sorry spectacle this week of:

• A multinational corporation — Unilever PIC (Unilever) — discriminating against the sale of ice cream to Jews who live in those areas by its wholly owned subsidiary Ben & Jerry’s and
• A Jewish organisation — J Street — defending Unilever’s decision.

The term “Occupied Palestinian Territories” ignores the 1948 Arab-Israeli War that saw every Jew living in those territories prior to 1948 being:

• driven out and expelled from their homes and businesses by the invading army of Transjordan and
• prevented from returning to resume life there until the conclusion of the Six Day War in 1967.

Moreover this loaded anti-Jewish term papers over the destruction, damage and vandalizing of Jewish synagogues, cemeteries and properties during the 19 years those areas remained Judenrein.

Had the UN any intellectual honesty in presenting a fair and balanced account of what happened between 1948 and 1967 — it would be calling these territories the “Re-occupied Disputed Territories”. Its continuing failure to do so indicates the disturbing anti-Jewish bias that permeates the United Nations and its agencies.

Ben & Jerry’s’ press release headlined “Occupied Palestinian Territory” (below) has clearly influenced Unilever’s decision to justify its policy of discriminating against Jews living there — whilst being more than happy to continue selling its ice cream to those Jew-haters who:

• Forcibly evicted and expelled all the Jews living there between 1948 and 1967
• Murder and maim Jews living there now on an ongoing basis and are financially rewarded for doing so.

Strange values indeed for a multinational organisation to embrace — values that are leading Unilever into growing commercial challenges internationally by those decent enough to not share Unilever’s perverse values.

Even more disturbing and reprehensible is this J Street defence of Unilever’s anti-Jewish discrimination policy:

J Street gets it very wrong in relying on false and misleading decades-old UN propaganda when making the following claims:

• The battleground is not the “Israeli-Palestinian debate” — it is the “Jewish-Arab conflict” - begun 100 years ago with the 1920 San Remo Conference and Treaty of Sevres and still unresolved - when there were no “Israelis” or “Palestinians” — only “Arabs” and “Jews”.
• The “Palestinian people” was not defined until 1964 — a racist and apartheid Arabs-only definition that excludes all non-Arabs and Jews who lived in Palestine after 1917.
• The “rights and freedom of the Palestinian People” specifically excluded any claim by its sole spokesman — the Palestine Liberation Organisation - to sovereignty in “the West Bank of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan” - or the right to establish a separate State there — in addition to Jordan — which occupies 78% of former Palestine.
• “Illegal settlements” are “legal” under article 6 of the League of Nations Mandate for Palestine and article 80 of the UN Charter.

Words do count.

J Street’s readiness to defend Unilever’s decision is appalling. No self-respecting Jewish organisation espousing “our Jewish values” should ever defend decisions discriminating against Jews.

Israel’s Ambassador to the UN — Yehuda Blum – confronted the UN General Assembly and trashed its treatment of the Jewish-Arab conflict on November 16, 1978:

“The history of international conflicts, and particularly those with complex historical origins, can only be properly written by objective historians who enjoy complete academic freedom. The practice of writing and rewriting history according to the transient interests of a political body is of course characteristic of certain regimes. It is regrettable that the United Nations has now been drawn into that pattern.”

Unilever and J Street have seemingly swallowed the UN’s pernicious rewriting of history to justify discrimination against Jews because of where they live.

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.

Abdullah-Biden meeting will not help resolve Jewish-Arab conflict

 

The meeting between Jordan’s King Abdullah and President Biden at the White House on 19 July seems set to achieve absolutely nothing towards resolving the 100 years-old conflict between Jews and Arabs.

Biden’s Press Secretary — Jen Psaki – has claimed:

“It will be an opportunity to discuss the many challenges facing the Middle East and showcase Jordan’s leadership role in promoting peace and stability in the region.”

The King has shown no leadership in resolving the conflict between Jews and Arabs over sovereignty in Judea and Samaria (West Bank) [“Disputed Territory”] and Gaza – comprising the remaining 5% of the territory of the League of Nations Mandate for Palestine where sovereignty still remains unallocated (“Unallocated Territories”).

Sovereignty in the remaining 95% of the Mandate territory was divided between:

• Jordan—78% – upon the establishment of the Hashemite Kingdom of Transjordan in 1946
• Israel—17% – upon its establishment in 1948.

Concerted attempts over the last 25 years to create an additional Arab State in the Unallocated Territories for the first time in recorded history (“two-state solution”) have all failed. Abdullah has been a principal protagonist for this solution.

Jordan’s failure to take a leadership role in agreeing to an alternative solution — division of the Unallocated Territories between Jordan and Israel within the framework of their existing 1994 Peace Treaty – has gone begging during Abdullah’s 22 year reign.

The following historic, geographic and demographic realities bind Jordan with the Disputed Territory:

• Transjordan in 1948 conquered and occupied the Disputed Territory until 1967 – renaming the newly-merged territorial entity “Jordan” in 1950.
• The Arab residents of the Disputed Territory were Jordanian citizens between 1950 and 1988 and elected their own representatives to the Jordanian Parliament in Amman.
• Statements made by Arab leaders over decades have attested to the territorial and population ties between Jordan and the Disputed Territory

“Jordan and Palestine until 1945 were one state, actually. After the Second World War Churchill himself said ‘This is Transjordan and this is Palestine’. Before that, Jordan was an emirate, completely part of Palestine.” – Yasser Arafat New York Review of Books 25 June 1987

“Jordanians and Palestinians are indeed one people. No one can divide us. We have the same fate.”—Yasser Arafat Der Spiegel 1986

“The Jordanians and Palestinians are now one people, and no political loyalty, however strong, will separate them permanently… Small as Jordan is, our country is politically, socially, economically, militarily and historically inseparable from the Palestinian issue” - Crown Prince Hassan of Jordan Foreign Affairs Spring 1982

“Palestine and Jordan were both under British Mandate, but as my grandfather pointed out in his memoirs, they were hardly separate countries. Trans-Jordan, being to the east of the River Jordan, it formed in a sense, the interior of Palestine” – King Hussein of Jordan Uneasy Lies the Head, New York 1962 p. 118

“This Organization does not exercise any regional sovereignty over the West Bank in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, on the Gaza Strip or the Himmah Area” – Article 24 Palestine Liberation Organisation Charter 1964

Jewish settlement — prohibited under article 25 of the 1922 Mandate document in what is today’s Jordan – was encouraged under article 6 in the Disputed Territory on State land and waste land not required for public purposes. That right is preserved until today under Article 80 of the United Nations Charter.

Jordan’s return to such part of Judea and Samaria (West Bank) as is agreed with Israel in direct negotiations remains the key to ending the Jewish-Arab conflict.

Jordan — part of the problem — must be part of the solution.

Abdullah will continue to hide behind the two-state solution in his meeting with Biden.

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.

Arab riots challenge private Jewish ownership rights in Jerusalem

 

Tension between Arabs and Jews in Jerusalem has reached boiling point as Arab riots erupt threatening the postponement of Court-ordered evictions of Arab squatters from Jewish-owned houses in the area known as Sheikh Jarrah.

The facts – as is usual in the Arab-Jewish conflict – are lost in a welter of Arab and international condemnation comprising wildly unsubstantiated claims of unlawful dispossession of Arabs and denial of their property and legal rights.

NGO Monitor describes the current situation as dispassionately and factually as it can:

"On February 10, 2021, the Jerusalem District Court upheld an October 2020 Jerusalem Magistrate Court decision, requiring a number of Sheikh Jarrah residents to vacate properties they are living in by May 2, 2021. Following this decision, the residents appealed to the Supreme Court. The Court has given the two sides until May 6, to report if they have reached a compromise to settle out of court.

These developments have been the source of extensive NGO campaigning - particularly by the Palestinian group, Al-Haq - including submissions to the International Criminal Court (ICC) and to UN officials, alleging that the court order and the expected forcible removal represent war crimes.

Such claims and campaigns distort, obfuscate, and erase the facts of the case, as litigated over 50 years in multiple Israeli courts."

Israel’s Supreme Court in 2009 had determined:

• The land in question “was owned by Chief Rabbi (Hacham Bashi) Avraham Ashkenazi and Chief Rabbi Meir Orbach until the War of Independence [1948], after they purchased it in 1875 from its Arab owners.”
• Subsequently, two Jewish organizations, Va’ad Eidat HaSfaradim and Va’ad HaKlali L’Knesset Yisrael, worked to register the land with British Mandatory government in 1946.
• The properties were registered with Israeli authorities under these two organizations’ names in 1973 and were later sold to the Nahalat Shimon organization in 2003.

The land encompassed the site of the tomb of Shimon Hatzadik — a third century BCE High Priest -       also known as Simeon the Just.

This chain of Jewish ownership and the reverence shown by Jews for one of their religious luminaries buried there  —  by visiting and praying at his tomb — was interrupted by certain events that happened in 1956 – after Sheikh Jarrah had been invaded and conquered in 1948 by Transjordan which expelled all the Jews living there and did not let them return to their homes or pray at Simeon’s tomb.

Sheikh Jarrah was included in the conquered territory unified with Transjordan in 1950 and renamed Jordan.

In 1956 — Jordan in cooperation with the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) housed 28 families of Palestinian refugees as tenants in a compound built on the lands of the two Jewish trusts— managed after 1948 by the Jordanian “Custodian of Enemy Property.”

Jordan lost control of Sheikh Jarrah to Israel in the 1967 Six Day War.

In 1972 the Israeli Custodian General ordered that the properties be released and registered under the ownership of the Jewish trusts and that their occupants pay rent.

Israel’s Foreign Ministry has issued a statement accusing the Palestinian Authority of “presenting a real estate dispute between private parties, as a nationalistic cause, in order to incite violence in Jerusalem,” adding that Ramallah would bear responsibility for any violence that ensued.

Jewish settlement in Sheikh Jarrah is indeed the work of private Jewish entities using legal procedures to reclaim their private property rights.

Refusing to accept the decisions of Israel’s Supreme Court is a sure recipe for disaster.

Arabs rioting and inciting to violence can never replace the rule of law or help end the 100 years-old unresolved Arab-Jewish conflict.


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.

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