By Ted Belman
Its real name is Judea and Samaria.
In June of this year, famed Canadian Lawyer David Matas wrote,
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“Every member of the Security Council, except for the United States, in February 2011 voted in favour of a resolution condemning all Israeli settlements established in occupied Palestinian territory since 1967 as illegal.
“To anti-Zionists, the language of settlements and occupied territory applies to all of Israel. The very phrase “occupied Palestinian territory since 1967” in the vetoed resolution implies that there is other Palestinian territory occupied before 1967.”
When I read this, I focused on the idea that the lands were not occupied or that there never was a “Palestinian territory”. I failed to appreciate something more pernicious was afoot.
The leaders of Judea and Samaria wrote a letter to Ban ki Moon in May which started with this opening paragraph,
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In this letter we respectfully wish to draw your attention, inter alia, to the repeated references by the UN to the territories liberated by Israel in the 1967 Six Day War – territories until then illegally occupied by the Kingdom of Jordan – as “occupied Palestinian territory (oPt)” in UN communiqués. For your own most recent use of this term, see UN News Service, 23 March 2011, “UN Chief condemns bomb attack in West Jerusalem”. By repeatedly referring to the “occupied Palestinian territory” (or “occupied Palestinian territories” (as in UN News Service, 1 April 2011), you are unwittingly concealing from the public the true legal status of the lands to which you refer and causing the Jewish people unwarranted anguish. We describe hereunder in concise fashion the facts relevant to the topic:
Even they miss the point.
The phrase was used in the Opinion of the ICJ dealing with the fence.
Now the UN and the Arabs are not really describing the territory as occupied and Palestinian but they have renamed the West Bank. Henceforth they will call it The Occupied Palestinian Territory.
[I seem to recall that a Jewish child was recently born in the territories in an Arab Hospital and his place of birth was noted as “The Occupied Palestinian Territory. Can someone find me the link.]
Arnold Harris I respectfully second your emotion.
Hag Sameah
HBendor
If you really truly want it to be Yehuda i Shomron — or Judea and Samaria — then fill the place with Jews and stop worrying you heads about what the rest of the world thinks of that.
Hopefully, everybody in the Jewish world must know by now just what the Arabs have known since shortly after the Balfour Declaration and Treaty of San Remo was put in place. Namely, that the only thing that counts are concrete facts on the ground. Real concrete. Real facts. Real ground. All the rest is just the endless legalist bullshit of Shysterspeak.
Yes, Ted. I know that you are a Canadian lawyer. But since when has that ever counted for anything in the endless war of the goyim against the Jewish nation?
Arnold Harris
Mount Horeb WI
Perhaps we should call Lebanon and Damascus “Occupied Jewish Israel”. At least THOSE territories actually WERE once part of Israel.
Just Populate Yehuda and Shomron with Jews… This will be the best answer to the sanctimonious appellation…
The fun part of all of this is Bibi’s reflecting the OBIQUITOUS three monkeys, DO NOT SEE, DO NOT HEAR AND DO NOT TALK!
The benevolence of the Israeli Government towards the Arabs i.e. returning 100 million Dollars in taxes has reaped the inverse reaction. When would the Israeli Government understand that these kinds of gestures are interpreted as signs of weakness by the Arabs?
They can CALL it “Spaghetti-&-Meatballs” if they like; it is what it is.
If GOI were made up of officials with stones, they would refuse to honor any documents containing the words, “occupied” or “Palestinian” — or accept the credentials of diplomats who did honor such docs.
What
The UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights has a site under the banner of Occupied Palestinian Territory http://www.ohchr.org/en/countries/menaregion/pages/psindex.aspx
The battle of words and ideas likely has already been won by the Palestinians/Arabs given the support they receive from a host of nations that believe it in their interests to recognize those territories as Palestinian and a host of Jew hating nations and peoples who whether they feel any sympathy for Palestinians or not, hate the Jews and Israel more.
The odds of overcoming this accepted perception seems insurmountable, especially since Israel does not seem to be into it and many diaspora Jewish organizations are going along with it. Still, it would be a shame not to try.