Conditions for Israel's Legitimacy Not Yet Met

In 1922 the League of Nations entrusted Britain with a mandate over Palestine in response to the 1917 defeat of the Turks by British forces and the subsequent collapse of the Ottoman Empire. Though in 1937, Britain accepted a Zionist proposal for a partition plan, two years later they published a white paper reversing the plan, leaving the Arabs with the whole of Palestine. As a result the Zionists opted for offensive weapons and tactics.

Following WW II, after the extent of the Holocaust was known, Britain as the Mandating Power placed the partition plan on the table. On November 29, 1947, the United Nations General Assembly passed Resolution 181 concerning the "future Government of Palestine" and the creation of "Independent Arab and Jewish States and the Special International Regime for the City of Jerusalem" - 33 in favor, 13 against, and 10 abstained. The Resolution was opposed by Afghanistan, Cuba, Egypt, Greece, India, Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Turkey, and Yemen.

The 1948 proclamation by Zionists declaring Israel a state (Hey, Napoleon declared himself an Emperor) utilized the passage of Resolution 181 as justification. Ben-Gurion's exact words were, "We hereby proclaim the establishment of the Jewish State in Palestine to be called the State of Israel." Despite many reservations the UN eventually bought into the argument in 1949 with the understanding that there were certain conditions that Israel had to meet along with recognizing Palestine's right to self-government. Today most Zionists like to point out that Resolution 181 was non-binding, perhaps because they don't want to go back to the 55-45% borders proposed by the plan. However, if Resolution 181 is regarded as non-binding and of no legal consequence then the Zionist aggression that subsequently led to the creation of the state of Israel should never have been validated.

According to International Law no nation shall acquire territory by force of arms -- only by negotiation. In 1948, the Arabs were acting in defense of the Palestinian territory that had been granted to the Arabs. The forces that supported the creation of Israel were the aggressors and territorial usurpers.

"The Kellogg-Briand Peace Pact of 1928, as defined by the International Tribunal at Nuremberg in 1948, abolished forever the idea of acquisition of territory by military conquest.'No matter who was the aggressor, international borders cannot change by the process of war. Resort to war is itself illegal, and while self-defense is of course legal, the self-defense cannot go so far as to constitute a new war of aggression all its own. And if it does, the land taken may at best be temporarily occupied, but cannot be annexed.'"

To put it another way, Israel was not defending itself in 1948 at the time of Al Nakba because Israel did not exist. Palestine did exist and the Mandating Authority declared in 1939 it was Arab. Because the Resolution was non-binding, Arab attempts to secure the territory against Zionist aggression were legitimate. Israel had no internationally recognized right to "proclaim itself a state," anymore than it had a legal leg to stand on in declaring all Palestinian Arabs absent from their land, property and bank accounts by passing the Absentee Property Law in 1948. Since its inception, Israel seems to live by the "Whatever Lola Wants, Lola Gets" approach to international relations.

Despite the illegality of the Zionist territorial acquisition, Israel's statehood was accepted by the United Nations in 1949 but the conditions placed on its formal recognition have yet to be met.

These conditions include the guarantee to Palestinian Refugees of the Right to Return or Compensation (the Absentee Property Laws are in direct violation of this condition), access to Holy Sites, plus the freest possible access to Jerusalem by road, rail or air which is to be accorded all inhabitants of Palestine. Additional conditions placed upon Israel involve the facilitation of economic development of the area, including arrangements for access to ports and airfields and the use of transportation and communication facilities.

But instead of Israeli compliance and attempts to behave as a responsible partner with Palestine and in the world, we find 800 plus roadblocks and checkpoints, Israeli-only roads, the Apartheid Wall and electrified razor wire fence plus the ongoing brutalization of the Palestinian population by the Israeli Defense Force since 1967.

Meanwhile the Palestinian Refugee population is the largest in the world. According to UNRWA statistics from 2000 there are 3.7 million Palestinian refugees with 1.6 million in Jordan; 824,622 in Gaza; 583,009 in the West Bank; 383,199 in Syria and 376, 472 in Lebanon.

Though I believe in a two-state solution and recognize Israel's right to exist, the nations of the world must take into consideration Israel's refusal to comply with the basic tenets of the Charter of the United Nations and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The Israeli/Palestinian conflict belongs to the world because it is the thorn in the side of the Arab world and the key to peace in the region, along with a successful resolution of the Iraq War into Iraqi freedom. The activities of the so-called Palestinian terrorists must be weighted against a people's right to resist death by occupation and the vicious policies that create the conditions that have led to squalor and desperation of a once prosperous and well-educated people.

Today there are many voices of moderation present in both Israel and Palestine. However if one is to believe the Israeli press, many others including Sharon and his administration promote not only the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian population but the expulsion of the Arab Israeli and Bedouin populations that reside within the state. Obviously the multitudes of Resolutions citing Israel's misbehavior (which are subsequently vetoed by the United States) have had little effect on Israel's determination to continue wholesale crimes against humanity. Perhaps what is needed is a world-wide boycott of Israeli products, a tactic which was employed with success in the liberation of South Africa from its worst instincts.

On May 5, 1949 a meeting of the General Assembly was held at Lake Success, New York, to consider the application of Israel for admission to membership in the United Nations. (A/818) The most fitting way for me to end this article is to present the misgivings expressed at that time:

"The State of Israel, in its present form, directly contravened the previous recommendations of the United Nations in at least three important respects: in its attitude on the problem of Arab refugees, on the delimitation of its territorial boundaries, and on the question of Jerusalem."

"The United Nations had certainly not intended that the Jewish State should rid itself of its Arab citizens. On the contrary, section C of part I of the Assembly's 1947 resolution had explicitly provided guarantees of minority rights in each of the two States. For example, it had prohibited the expropriation of land owned by an Arab in the Jewish State except for public purposes, and then only upon payment of full compensation. Yet the fact was that 90 per cent of the Arab population of Israel had been driven outside its boundaries by military operations, had been forced to seek refuge in neighboring Arab territories, had been reduced to misery and destitution, and had been prevented by Israel from returning to their homes. Their homes and property had been seized and were being used by thousands of European Jewish immigrants."

"The United Nations had only recently taken measures to relieve temporarily the plight of the Arab refugees and to arrange for their resettlement in other countries. However, the problem was not a humanitarian one; it was not one of temporary relief and resettlement. The real need was to find means to prevent the growth in the hearts of those uprooted people and their children of deep resentment toward their fellow men and the spread of that resentment to the body politic of the countries in which they had taken refuge. Surely the Jews, who claimed that they had always been an uprooted people whose homelessness had driven them to fight for their ancient home, could not in all justice and conscience seek to remedy that uprooting by inflicting it upon others."

ENDS

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