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Abbas Flips US and Israel the Bird; Goes Back to UN — Judith Levy
Here we go again.
Mahmoud Abbas has announced that he is bypassing the US-sponsored peace talks with Israel and going directly to the United Nations to claim some of the benefits of de facto statehood. You might recall that in 2012, when Abbas first went to the UN, that august body granted Palestine nonmember observer-state status, which enables it to join 63 international agencies. Abbas has signed (but apparently not yet filed) the necessary paperwork to join 15 of them, thereby “gain[ing] the benefits of statehood outside the negotiations process,” according to the New York Times. The Americans adamantly oppose Palestinian membership in any of the agencies, “which under a law passed by Congress could prompt a withdrawal of financial aid to the Palestinian Authority and a shutdown of the Palestinian diplomatic mission in Washington.” The Palestinians have decided that’s a gamble worth taking, and it’s entirely possible that they’re right.
The embarrassed Americans are busy insisting that reality is as they choose to perceive it. Though he cancelled a planned trip to Ramallah today, John Kerry had this to say about the Palestinians’ gambit: “What is important to say about the Middle East right now is it is completely premature tonight to draw any kind of judgment, certainly any final judgment, about today’s events and where things are…And President Abbas has given his word to me that he will keep his agreement and that he intends to negotiate through the end of the month of April.”
Yes, well. Abbas’s solemn word to Kerry notwithstanding, this move a) torpedoes Kerry’s efforts to get the two sides to sit down; b) confirms Israeli suspicions about the Palestinians’ bad faith; and c) directly contravenes — again! — the terms of the Oslo peace accords, which expressly forbid unilateral moves prior to a negotiated agreement on permanent status.
Here are some points to take away from all this.
1. The Palestinians, not the Israelis, derailed the negotiations. The Israelis have been willing to extend talks despite the Palestinians’ categorical refusal to recognize Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people, a point one could argue would have been a reasonable deal-breaker for the Israelis. The Israelis have instead decided to elide that point and continue the time-honored tradition of making concessions while receiving nothing in return. This time around, the Israelis’ “confidence-building” concession took the form of three mass prisoner releases — already completed — with the promise of a fourth if the Palestinians agree to keep talking. Abbas’s response was to pocket the prisoner releases, push Kerry off a cliff, and run to the UN. (That fourth release might still happen if Netanyahu gets Kerry to sign off on the release of Jonathan Pollard, which would — controversial as it is — constitute a domestic political win for Bibi. It’s rumored that that concession to Bibi — the only thing Israel would have gotten in exchange for any of the prisoner releases, and it’s not even a concession from the Palestinians — was what pushed Abbas over the edge.)
2. The Palestinians are explicitly and deliberately humiliating John Kerry and, by extension, Barack Obama. One imagines Vladimir Putin, the Zen master of the art of humiliating Barack Obama, observing all this with warm satisfaction. As Omri Ceren at TIP (The Israeli Project) points out in a digest of these events, “The entire basis of the 9 months-long peace initiative by Secretary of State John Kerry had relied on the Palestinians abstaining from seeking membership in UN institutions.” The American position on this has been stated and restated for years:
Sec. Clinton in 2011: “a negative scenario”; Jay Carney in 2011: “not productive or helpful”; President Obama in 2011: “peace will not come through statements and resolutions at the United Nations”; Ben Rhodes in 2011: “we would have to oppose any action at the UN Security Council including, if necessary, vetoing.”; Sec. Clinton in 2012: “unfortunate and counterproductive“; Ambassador Rice in 2012: causes “the prospects of a durable peace [to] recede”; Victoria Nuland in 2012: “only realistic path for the Palestinians to achieve statehood is through direct negotiations”; President Obama in 2012 during a call with Abbas expressed “opposition to unilateral efforts at the United Nations”.
3. The Palestinians intend to use the UN not to hasten peace with Israel but to enable more effective attacks on her, including the prosecution of Israel for war crimes in the International Criminal Court (ICC). And as bad as that is for Israel, it’s not too healthy for the UN either. Omri points out that by politicizing UN institutions, the Palestinians delegitimize and destabilize them for their own ends. UNESCO is a good example:
The ultimately successful Palestinian campaign to join UNESCO is the critical precedent. It was opposed and criticized by the White House (“premature and undermines the international community’s shared goal of a comprehensive, just and lasting peace in the Middle East”); the State Department (“very clear redlines in U.S. legislation and that if those are crossed in UNESCO, that the legislation is triggered”) and Susan Rice (“today’s vote to grant Palestinian membership in UNESCO is no substitute for direct negotiations, but it is deeply damaging to UNESCO.”). The US immediately cut off its funding to UNESCO, costing the organization more than $78 million per year. The loss of 22% of its core budget has crippled UNESCO.
The Palestinians’ intentions with regard to the ICC also have potentially damaging implications:
The Hague would be torn between the anti-Israel politics of some member-states and relatively clear black-letter law. It would also bring the ICC into conflict with a range of U.S. institutions and laws, risking a diplomatic crisis in which the U.S. would use financial leverage and diplomatic capital to reassert its interests. Either scenario would badly damage the credibility and viability of the ICC and of international law.
Well, them’s the breaks. You can’t unilaterally declare statehood and co-opt international bodies for the purpose of ultimately destroying your eternal enemy without breaking eggs. Kerry, zany old coot that he is, has decided that Israeli-Palestinian peace is his personal mission, so he’ll keep twisting reality to suit him, and Abbas is smart enough to dangle just enough of a carrot in front of Kerry to keep hope alive. The only way this negotiations charade will finally limp to a close will be if Obama tells Kerry to knock it off, and that’s unlikely at best. The rest of the world’s conflicts give Obama the vapors, but he still sees “legacy” possibilities somewhere between Jerusalem and Ramallah.
Lucky us.
Published in General
The Fourth Geneva Convention, Article 49:
Individual or mass forcible transfers, as well as deportations of protected persons from occupied territory to the territory of the Occupying Power or to that of any other country, occupied or not, are prohibited, regardless of their motive.
Nevertheless, the Occupying Power may undertake total or partial evacuation of a given area if the security of the population or imperative military reasons so demand. Such evacuations may not involve the displacement of protected persons outside the bounds of the occupied territory except when for material reasons it is impossible to avoid such displacement. Persons thus evacuated shall be transferred back to their homes as soon as hostilities in the area in question have ceased.
The Occupying Power undertaking such transfers or evacuations shall ensure, to the greatest practicable extent, that proper accommodation is provided to receive the protected persons, that the removals are effected in satisfactory conditions of hygiene, health, safety and nutrition, and that members of the same family are not separated.
The Protecting Power shall be informed of any transfers and evacuations as soon as they have taken place.
The Occupying Power shall not detain protected persons in an area particularly exposed to the dangers of war unless the security of the population or imperative military reasons so demand.
The Occupying Power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies.
Israel is not an Occupying Power. Your argument is based on a false premise.
Do you? Let me spell them out for you, just to clear up any doubts.
If anything I am biased in your favour, because I like you as an individual and as a human being. (From what I know.) I do not believe you are meaningfully different from me on the human being scale. I do not think Jews are more different from other groups than these groups are from each other. (I am somewhat creeped out by people that fetishise assumed intrinsic difference, postively or negatively, but that’s just me.)
I disagree with you (I think) and see the creation of Israel as something that caused a massive injustice to the Palestinians – because Israel displaced them then, and continues to do so today. I do not think ignoring this will make it go away, I do not think rewriting it out of history will be successful – no matter how much value people place on Israel existing as a Jewish State (and why) and how invested they are in its creation being entirely wonderful and justified.
Re spousal visas
Wrt ‘proving you are not a security risk’ – the assumption is that you are, if a Palestinian spouse, a security risk to Israel. In the article you cited, only 33 out of 3000 applicants were found not to be security risks, iow 0.011%.
This does lead to the reasonable question: in a country where 20% of the population is Arab, what specific security risk to Israel do the remaining 98.89% applicants pose?
Is demographic change intrinsically a security risk?
The legal definition is sort of vague when the occupied territory is of a country that hasn’t been formally recognised by the UN – which I guess is why the whole UN bid is such a big deal for Israel?
Imo the only way Israel could credibly claim not to be an occupying power in the West Bank would be for it to annex it and give all its currently stateless people Israeli citizenship and equal political rights – iow something like Caroline Glick’s approach.
Do you see that happening?
There is nothing vague about it. Israel has as much a claim to the territory as the Arabs do. The territory is disputed not occupied. Two groups claim the same land, I believe Israel has the stronger legal claim. I also believe Israel would be better served by annexing the territory but ‘world opinion’ will prevent them from doing so for the foreseeable future.
Thank you for the lecture on history. But seriously, what happens in matters like this is that you examine the evidence for the particular matter under discussion, including the veracity of one’s sources and make a decision as to whether or not you find the evidence to be compelling. More importantly, one should try to focus on matters that are really relevant to the main issues under discussion. I think you’ve slipped in both cases.
I don’t seem to be able to append your comments, but thank you again for your comments about my Menschlichkeit.
You don’t need to repeat your views about Israel, because as I say, you’ve made them very clear in prior notes. Based on the evidence I have (from reading, living in Israel, having family there etc.), I believe most firmly that you are mistaken in your views. I can’t say any more than that.
As to the article, without knowing more about the specific criteria that were employed to determine whether or not an individual was considered to be a security risks, it’s not possible for me to comment further.
I do feel that the negotiations between Israel and Abbas and colleagues are like a parody of a scene in the movie Goldfinger where Sean Connery is strapped to a table and is about to be bisected by an industrial laser.
The dialogue between the negotiating parties goes something like this:
Israelis: Do you expect us to talk?
Abbas et al.: No, we expect you to die.
Correct. The presumption is that the territories in question are sovereign territory of another nation. They are not.
It was not the creation of Israel that caused massive injustice to the Palestinians, rather it was and continues to be the collected incompetence and malice of Arab leaders who have refused to countenance the idea of a Jewish state. Your comments about rewriting history or ignoring “it” are therefore inapplicable.
Based on what? The Arabs inhabited those areas continuously for over a thousand years. Why do Israeli settlers have a greater claim to the territory than the Arabs?
And you confuse two questions:
1 Which State should rule the West Bank. (I don’t care. States don’t have rights, individual people have rights. Who rules should be decided by the inhabitants.); And
2 Whether or not all the people of the West Bank should be full and equal citizens of the State by which they’re ruled. (I think yes, obviously.)
You confuse the injustice (people being driven off their land and homes and being made refugees) with whether there should be a Jewish State or not. (Why? Why not? When the majority of Jews still choose to live in North America?)
The Arab leaders didn’t drive the Palestinians off their land and they didn’t stop them from returning to their homes. Israel did. That’s what happened. We can’t pass the buck.
The reasons are never given, because security. Convenient, huh?
The West Bank is indistinguishable to my mind than the rest of Mandate area subject to the Partition Plan. The Arab leadership rejected the partition plan and instead went to war, multiple times, to destroy the Jewish state the partition created (and lost). Actions have consequences and by those acts, the Arabs lost any sovereign claim over any part of the territory.You are wrong to say states do not have rights. Individuals do not lose their rights when they act collectively as a nation-state.Full and equal citizenship requires a level of loyalty to the state. No state is required to grant citizenship to a group dedicated to its violent destruction.
Yes, and also true.
States may lose sovreignty over land due to military conquest, but civilians do not lose their right to their homes because of a change in sovreignty.
Israel could argue that it conquered the West Bank and so it will continue to rule it and ensure that it remains demilitarised. But israel cannot, at least according to the Geneva Conventions, then say that it will displace the local population and move its own citizens in to take their place. That becomes a war crime.
But the Palestinians of the West bank didn’t move to the State (say Judea and Samaria) and then ask for equal rights. The borders of the State de facto expanded to include where the people were (unasked). It may well claim sovreignty over the land, but the Israeli State owes all the land’s inhabitants equal rights as an absolute minimum. Otherwise what’s the difference between Israel and Apartheid South Africa?
Israel did not conquer the West Bank or any of the territory it currently controls with the exception of the Golan Heights.The land in question was part of the British Mandate, just like the land on the other side of the Green Line. The Arabs were offered sovereignty over a portion of that land and refused to accept it. Israel is the sole sovereign nation with any legitimate claim to the territory.The Arab inhabitants of the area are currently a hostile population. Israel has no obligation to extend citizenship to those who deny its right to exist.To compare Israel to South Africa is an absurdity unworthy of reply.
Klaatu, I obviously agree with you 100%, but I suspect that you’re wasting your breath. Besides, I think all of this discussion misses the real point about what’s just happened. Israel has, by now, woken up to the fact that they have been negotiating against themselves with a bunch of untrustworthy, murderous thugs. I can’t be any nicer about it. Worse still, they’ve been assisted in this self-delusion by John Kerry and boss. The “quid pro quo” of introducing Jonathan Pollard (not something that the Israelis requested on this occasion) which was really a “quid pro nihilo” was a cynical attempt by Kerry to ensure that the latest release of murdering scumbags would go through as planned in order for him to save face. O, Israel, Israel, beat at this gate that let thy folly in and thy dear judgement out.
If Israel took the West Bank and East Jerusalem in 1967 by force of arms then it conquered these areas.
And all of this just evades the issue of the Palestinians. They were there first. They lost their homes and their freedom.
They have no moral obligation to recognise the Israeli State’s right to exist, but Israel (the power that controls their homes and cities) has an unavoidable moral obligation to them.
I know it’s not a comparison that you like, but it really does look like Apartheid South Africa in a lot of ways. (Which is optimistic, because that resolved itself, not perfectly, but far better than we had thought it might for all concerned.)
Oh GCM – Israel increased the number of settlers in the West Bank by 400,000 over the two decades they were negotiating to leave the West Bank.
Folly or good judgement? Time will tell, I guess.
Again, leaving doesn’t mean the area must be Judenrein.
GCM – let’s say that all your criticisms of the Arab leadership are correct – that they are corrupt, venal, incompetent and vicious. What does this have to do with how Israel treats the Arab civilian population of the West Bank? Does it justify land grabs and displacement? How?
My criticisms are indeed correct, but you have not followed up on the consequences of my criticism. My reason for citing the appalling treatment of the Palestinians by the other Arab countries is not to indulge in the sort of “whataboutery” that you tend to follow. Instead, I’m citing this fact as one of the reasons for the creation and maintenance of the situation in which we find ourselves now. Most of the world is either ignorant of it or conveniently ignores it. That is unacceptable.
The other reason for the situation, the primary reason is the continued refusal to accept (not just recognize) the idea of a Jewish state. That refusal predates the Partition Plan and was noted by David Ben Gurion when he visited various Arab leaders prior to 1947 (as set down in My Talks With Arab Leaders). I don’t see any resolution to this situation without a change of heart in the Arab world on both issues.
Jordan conquered the West Bank and East Jerusalem in 1948, an area it had no legitimate claim to. Jewish communities existed in this area for centuries up until Jordanian conquest of it.To call Israel the conquering power is to turn history and language on its head.Israel has proven itself willing live with Arabs, it is the Arabs who insist their nations be free of any Jews. Given this, comparing Israel to South Africa is simply absurd.
Because it comes at the expense of the Palestinian Arabs who lived there. Asing the civilian populatin to accept that it’s right that they be moved out of their homes for no fault of their own, jsut because they were Arabs. Who is going to accept that this is right?
Here’s a graph showing the Arab and Jewish population in Palestine:
http://palestineisraelpopulation.blogspot.com.au/
At the time fo the Balfour Declaration Jews made up about 13% of the population. How that can justly translate to control of 50% of the land remains unclear.
Plan Dalet tells us that the creators of Israel wanted a Jewish majority, they were not willing to live with the Arab majority that existed in 1948 and they are clearly not too keen on even an Arab minority of any size now.
At the time of the Balfour Declaration, the Mandate included what would become Transjordan/Jordan. Israel, even including Judea and Samaria is not close to 50% of the land area of the Mandate. The fact is there is an Arab state formed from the Mandate, it’s name is Jordan. It, by the way is free of Jews. The Jewish state has a substantial Arab population.