T. Belman. This is a very detailed interview which highlights how the UN would like to deal with the “negotiations”. The problem is that they are unwilling to consider alternate solutions. Its the TSS or bust. Furthermore they ignore that the gaps are as wide as they are and somehow think with a little tinkering, the parties will come to an agreement. Pure fantasy. The divide is fundamental. Why not stop interfering and financing the PA. Let the PA sink or swim.
Israel is partly to blame because she hasn’t made it clear to them that the division of Jerusalem and ’67 lines plus swaps is totally unacceptable. This is not an oversight on Israel’s part. Israel limits their demands so that the international community thinks tinkering will do the job.
The international community is perpetuating the problem, not solving it.
UN envoy Mladenov tells ‘Post’ that very soon the two-state solution will not be realistic any more.
By Herb Keinon, Tova Lazaroff, JPOST
It is not an easy job that Nickolay Mladenov stepped into a year ago when he was appointed the UN special Mideast envoy, not the least because Jerusalem has but very little trust in the UN.
Yet, Mladenov had a couple things – at least from Jerusalem’s perspective – working in his favor. First, he was a former Bulgarian defense and foreign minister who had worked closely in the past with Israel in those capacities. Second, he was not Robert Serry.
Mladenov’s predecessor, Serry, had a very rocky relationship with the Israeli government during his more than six years here, culminating in former foreign minister Avigdor Liberman saying in 2014 he should be declared persona non grata for allegations that he worked inside the UN to transfer money from Qatar to pay Hamas salaries.
So far, Mladenov’s tenure – he spent the two years immediately prior to his posting here as the UN special envoy to Iraq – has been far less tempestuous than Serry’s. But not uneventful.
Currently, Mladenov is one of the key figures tasked with preparing a document that the Mideast Quartet – of which the UN is a member alongside the US, Russia and the EU – is preparing in the hopes of providing a way out of the current impasse with the Palestinians and back into negotiations .
In a candid, 45-minute interview with The Jerusalem Post last week in the UN’s palatial offices on the capital’s Hill of Evil Counsel, formerly the British Government House during the time of the Mandate, Mladenov explained the logic behind the Quartet’s new initiative, discussed why he thought it was “daydreaming” to think Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas could get into a room and negotiate now, and what he thought of Israel’s lack of trust in the UN.
He also discussed the current terrorism wave – careful in most cases to refer to “violence,” not “terrorism” – and his support for his boss, Ban Ki-moon’s, recent comment about Palestinian frustration driving the violence.
What follows is a transcript of the interview, edited for clarity.
The Quartet met in Munich earlier this month, and there was discussion about a new paper they want to put together.
What is that? What is in the works?
What we have decided to do is to have the Quartet sit down and produce a more extensive report on the situation on the ground.
All of this comes from an understanding we all share – the Americans, the Russians, the UN, European Union – that given where things stand right now, the parties are drifting apart and the prospects for a two-state solution, which has been the declared goal of everybody until now, is dimming.
Therefore, we need to sit down and look very seriously at what is happening on the ground and what are the risks to the prospect of achieving a two-state solution. That means looking at everything and trying to outline a way forward.
Obviously, to some, that is a bit minimalistic because it is not full-fledged negotiations going forward. But given the realities of where we are today, I think it is a good starting point in trying to rebuild some trust between the two sides so that they can inevitably come back to a full process, and also to keep the international community engaged in a constructive way of how we can support such a process when the parties come together.
The way you describe it sounds like the road map of the early 2000s. Is that what we are talking about, a new road map?
Words are very loaded in this environment. That is why we’re trying to avoid using certain words, because people fall into concepts they have from the past. The goal is really to look at what are the risks, what is the way forward and how can we, as the international community, help. Now you can call it pathway, road map, highway, sidewalk, whatever you want, but the goal is to keep everybody focused on this issue because otherwise we are risking continuing this status quo on the ground.
Does this mean the Quartet does not look favorably on the French initiative calling for an international peace conference and, if that doesn’t work, recognizing a Palestinian state. What is your position on that?
We still need to understand a little bit better what exactly the French are putting on the table because we’ve had some preliminary discussions with them, but I hope over the next few months we will see more details of what their proposal is.
My personal view is that it is not for us in the international community to tell you guys and the Palestinians how to come together. It is for us to actually help create the conditions which will bring people together around a negotiated solution.
We all agree the way forward, the way out of this conflict is through negotiations.
It is not through violence. It is not through stabbings. It’s not through fighting. It is through sitting down and negotiating based on all the issues that have been discussed in the past.
What is the format in which you sit, how you sit down to do that, how the international community comes to support this process is something we can talk about. But the fact that you do need a negotiated solution, I don’t think anyone questions that.
Are you going to do what you do each month at the UN, list how many incidents of violence, how many houses in settlements were built. Is that what will go in the paper, or something wider?
No, we will look at the bigger impediments and risks to the two-state solution.
On the one side, you have settlements and obviously settlement expansion, demolition of houses, these are two impediments to a two-state solution.
You see the resurgence of violence – that is also not helping a two-state solution, neither is incitement. So all these things need to be spoken out a little bit more clearly and identified more clearly so that political leaders can focus on dealing with them, rather than just avoiding things.
You said the goal is to return to negotiations and a negotiated solution. The PA foreign minister, Riad al-Maliki, said in Japan that the Palestinians are done with negotiations, that they don’t think it will help them and they are going to go in different ways now. Do those kind of comments have a sobering effect on this type of plan? Do you take them seriously, or is it just rhetoric?
No, we take everything seriously.
But, at the end of the day, we look at what is not just the situation on the ground, but what is the most reasonable way forward. I will not be convinced that stabbing a person in the street will bring a Palestinian state into existence, but I will also not be convinced that just putting a checkpoint, or moving the army from one area to another area, will strengthen security for Israelis.
Therefore, the only way forward is actually to have peaceful negotiations that reach the goal of having two states. But, if I were to say to you today, let’s get the president and prime minister in the same room tomorrow, that would be daydreaming.
Our role is to actually figure out how we can create the conditions under which such a process can resume in a meaningful manner.
In a 2010 interview with the ‘Post’ when you were Bulgaria’s foreign minister, you were asked whether you thought your colleagues in the EU understand what Israel is up against. You said, ‘Not always, no.’ You said, at the time, that ‘Many countries have lost the sensitivity to the difficult security environment in which Israel lives. We often say that “we recognize Israel’s legitimate security concerns,” but I sometimes wonder if we all know what stands behind these words.’ In your position now, do you still believe that?
Yes I do. Except let me caveat that. I think now, in Europe, because of what has been happening since 2010, there is perhaps a better public awareness of the risks of terrorism, or extremism and radicalism, then when we spoke six years ago. I think that has slightly changed.
Do you think the world gets the real sense of insecurity that you know all Israelis feel?
Not always, because very few countries in the world have to live with the daily threat of the risks that people here face. However, the world needs to also understand that how you deal with these risks and threats very much also says a lot of things about how you want to see your country in the future.
What I would like to see, actually, is that these security incidents that are occurring now be dealt with not just as security incidents, but rather put in the context of addressing the broader political underlining elements that have, unfortunately, made them possible.
And that is somewhere where I think a lot of work needs to be done.
That is why part of our message has been very clear, yes, you have to take security measures to keep people safe, but you have to put into place a political prospect that drives people away from violence toward something that is more constructive, which is obviously hope for the future.
There will be those who say we have had political processes in the past. Oslo was the mother of all political processes, and during that period we did not see the terrorism stop, we saw it increase. So why believe now that if you start this process it will tamp down the violence? What has changed?
But am I asking you to send secret teams to negotiate [an agreement] in a capital far away that you would present to your people now? We are not asking, today, to drop everything and go start negotiating a peace deal. We are asking you to get back into a position where negotiating a peace deal will be meaningful and possible and would reflect public opinion on both sides.
Part of the problem today is that if you look at Israelis and Palestinians they have drifted apart from each other, are drifting apart day by day. [The] less Israelis talk to Palestinians, they interact less with them, and vice versa.
You know this whole fad that is happening now, about separation, that ‘we need to separate’ – whether it is a wall or fence, or whatever. You don’t resolve conflict by separating.
As far as creating conditions on the ground, the Palestinians are saying that before starting negotiations they want to see Israel’s agreement to a two-state solution based on 1967 lines and an end to all settlement activity. So, what conditions, short of that, can you create that would bring about talks?
First, you have the current security situation, which needs to be addressed, and that, if left unaddressed, will keep deteriorating to the detriment of both Israelis and Palestinians. But we are saying that, on top of those security measures, you have to rebuild the sense of hope for the future for a whole community – the Palestinian community that has clearly lost that hope.
This is one part of it. The second part of it is that if you are going to want to return to all these issues – negotiating on the borders, on the final status issues, on the two-state outcome of this process – you need to get both sides to get back to a state of mind in which that negotiation is possible. We don’t believe that, currently, the way things stand negotiations are possible.
If we look at the situation on the ground, we all have to admit that there are certain things that drive anger, and then that drive anxiety. Settlement growth, demolishing people’s houses, this makes people angry and gets them out into the street and causes further anxiety on one side.
On the other side, yes, we have to talk more about incitement, we have to look more at the whole issue of violence and how acceptable violence is in a society, and how you incite people to certain acts, and what statements you make in order to make that acceptable. These are facts that need to be addressed But it is not going to happen overnight. It is not going to happen suddenly. We need to work on these conditions. Yes, obviously the leaders on both sides – in Ramallah and here in Jerusalem – will have their conditions, will have their statement, their public lines they have to take.
Our role is not to side with one against the other, our role is to ensure that we bring them to an area which is reasonable.
You take as a given that both sides want to negotiate. Much of the Israeli public does not believe the Palestinians want to negotiate.
So what’s the alternative? Give me a credible alternative.
Perhaps getting the international community take away the option that the Palestinians seem to believe that if they just hold out long enough the world will step in, impose a solution on Israel and save the day.
Whatever the international community does – however you want to define the international community – at the end of the day, you know that when you leave this building, you cross the street and see a human being living in a house and that’s what matters. How does that human being live in that house? What life do they have? Do they have a job? Do they have hope for the future to raise their children, or do they raise their children in fear. And this is valid both for Israelis and for Palestinians.
Now, tell me how the international community is going to make that single person’s house, and his children, safe for the future. We can’t. What we can do is create the environment in which leaders on both sides go back to their constituencies, build up their constituencies, whatever they need to do as politicians do, and reach a deal.
Right now, that deal is falling apart, we are losing it dayby- day. And, in this equation, somehow everybody is right, yet everybody is wrong. It gets you to the next day, but it does not get you to the ultimate goal.
There is a real trust deficit among Israelis with respect to the UN.
There is an absolute trust deficit.
Does that matter to you? If you want to push this thing, you will need the trust of the Israelis. How does the UN get that trust?
It does matter, of course. I see this on all sides, not just on the Israeli side. I see it on the Palestinian side. Sometimes the criticisms are exactly the same.
What really matters are two things: how committed the people doing this job are to actually getting it done, and being realistic about what is achievable, not dealing with pies in the sky.
The second thing is how can we steer the international community into a position that is reasonable and helpful [and] not a position that is unrealistic.
What is realistic today is to look at what can be done to reduce the tension on the ground. That will create the conditions under which negotiations will be possible [in the future].
I know people here are extremely cynical. They have been living with this problem for generations. There is a feeling that just about everything has been tried and nothing seems to have worked. Our job at the UN is to try and focus on what is realistic that can be done.
You have 18 standing resolutions against Israel in the General Assembly. You have one against Syria. Why do you think Israelis will say, ‘Let us give the UN a shot, because it is fair,’ when the sense is that it is not fair?
So the UN is not fair when it passes resolutions against Israel, but it is fair when it passes resolutions in support of Israel; like getting rid of the Zionism equals racism [resolution], recognizing the Holocaust, a number of security council discussions and all of that? I understand that you would like to have the UN as a punching bag.
Well, you make it pretty easy sometimes.
There is no other UN and any other version of the UN would be a worse version for the world.
So let us hang on to what we have today, not just for the sake of Israel, but for the sake of just about everyone else in the rest of the world.
The secretary-general has been absolutely clear and supportive of Israel when he has had to be, and he has been critical of Israel’s policies when he has had to be. Yes, you may feel that there is too much focus on your country because you look at it from your perspective. I can assure you that having spent quite a lot of time dealing with Iraq, for example, any country can say that they are not treated the same. Many countries can point to various resolutions, etc. To me that debate does not carry much weight. The criticism will always be there. My job is to make sure that what we do is effective.
Do you think Israel is treated fairly at the UN?
Not always.
Can something be done to change that?
You have to talk to your Foreign Ministry about that, not me. You are a sovereign state.
You have your foreign policy.
You have your foreign policy establishment. It is their job to present your views to the world.
It is not my job to present them.
Is the secretary-general’s comment about frustration leading to terrorism something that you subscribe to? Did he say that frustration drives terrorism?
As far as I recall, he said that frustration drives violence.
The difference being?
There is a fundamental difference because he also condemned terrorism.
What we saw February 17 in Turkey was a horrible terrorist act. I find it hard to believe that anyone is going to say, ‘Well, that is because the Kurds are a really frustrated people.’ Israelis ask, ‘Why is there this double standard? Why is some terrorism the cause of frustration and other just plain evil?’
The secretary-general’s message was very clear and I fully subscribe to it. When you have an occupation of one people by another people, that always drives frustration. Ultimately, that frustration drives violence.
It doesn’t justify terror, but it does drive [it and] creates the conditions under which that violence becomes acceptable, possible and a fact of life. It doesn’t mean it justifies terror.
Nothing justified terror here or anywhere else in the world.
The Palestinian people feel anger and they feel frustration.
Otherwise, how do you explain the 16-year-old girl with a knife going out into the street and stabbing a neighbor. Yes, you will say incitement and I am sure that you will be right, incitement is part of it. That is why it is important to actually show a different alternative, a different way forward, that drives people away from violence, that gives them hope for the future, that creates perspective, that shows them the aspirations that they have and how they can reach them. Would you disagree?
The Israeli skepticism is born of the fact that you are saying, ‘If you remove the occupation, you remove the source of terrorism and violence.’ Most Israelis would say, ‘If you go back to the ’67 lines, it will still be considered occupation.’ The violence didn’t start with ’67. You have Hassan Nasrallah in Lebanon, saying he will bomb the ammonia plant [in Haifa] to liberate all of occupied Palestine. The Israelis say, ‘It is a pipe dream, to remove the occupation [and to imagine that] terrorism will be gone, remove the occupation [and the violence] won’t end.
What is the alternative?
Maybe a more realistic managing of the conflict. I am just throwing this out – rather than a belief that you can solve it right now, maybe you can’t solve it?
Isn’t that exactly where we started? Right now we are not in a position in which the parties can sit down and solve it, as you say, but we are in a position where we need to [create] the conditions so that [it] becomes possible in the future.
Then essentially you agree with what Netanyahu said before the elections that we are not going to have a two-state solution now because the conditions are not right? The two-state solution remains the goal, but to get to that process we need to take some steps right now. Very soon, the two-state solution will not be there any more. It will just not be realistic because the reality on the ground would have changed. The political leaders would have drifted apart even further than today.
Then you are stuck with a really seriously, very big problem.
Let’s have that discussion about frustration then. People lose hope, they lose the belief in their future, it undermines their society, their institutions, their leaders, radicals step in. Let us stop there.
Do you believe that if Israel would withdraw to the ’67 lines that would be the end of the conflict?
If you reach an agreement based on the ’67 lines and if you address the issue of clearly defining the Israeli and the Palestinian state side-by-side. If you resolve the issue of Jerusalem, which is resolvable. If you address the issue of people returning back, the Palestinian refugees, then yes, you can solve it. It will be tough. It will be very, very tough. It will be very, very, long. But, yes, you can, because both communities – the Israeli community and the Palestinian people – both long so much, long for two things, their own state and security. Both want it.
And then Nasrallah is not going to want to incinerate us?
Nasrallah? Is he Palestinian? No, but it is all part of the same problem, right? Hamas won’t want to [incinerate us]? Did I say it would be easy? You asked me whether it was possible or impossible. Yes, it is possible. Look at how many wars you had with Egypt. If you had asked someone, before the peace with Egypt, would peace be possible, 99 percent would have said it’s not possible. So why give up this hope for your own people, deny it for the Palestinian people and say this is how we want to live, with daily security incidents. Do you think this is the way that Palestinians want to live, with limitations? One person can’t reunite themselves with their family from Gaza because they do not have the right paperwork and they cannot cross the check point.
In the absence of any negotiations or any hope in the immediate future for a two-state solution, how important does Area C become?
It is very important. Just to give you one example, you have Palestinian cities not just villages, town and cities, that are physically outgrowing the ABC division. So a city is being physically stifled. It cannot build [expand] because that infringes on Area C. Just for the development of communities for [the] normal life of people it becomes very important. I went and visited one village, and if you look at the map, part of the village is Area B, but the house we were physically in was actually Area C. It is that level of detail that affects people’s lives.
Is the UN focusing more on Area C these days?
I do not know if it is less or more than before, but yes, we are focused. Not just us, but you will see a lot of effort by the Americans, the European Union.
****
[..]
The Mladenov comments were much more specific than Ban Ki-Moon has been about Palestinian incitement to violence and Hamas’s threats against Israel. Ban would only generally refer to incitement by both Israelis and Palestinians and never refer to Hamas at all.Perhaps a giant breakthrough at the United Nations, that it is active incitement by the Palestinians to commit murder, and not “human nature” that is causing the deaths of hundreds?
Don’t be too sure.
Endorsement of Hamas
Even while Mladenov more specifically placed blame on Hamas, he still urged for a Palestinian government that included the group, just as Ban has.
Mladenov stated that “[a]dvancing genuine reconciliation on the basis of non-violence, democracy and PLO principles is a key priority. I welcome the recent unity talks in Qatar and urge all sides to continue their discussions and implement previous agreements, particularly those brokered by Egypt. The formation of a National Unity Government and long-overdue elections are vital to laying the foundations of a future Palestinian state.” Those comments suggested that either Hamas’s threats and acts of violence are a passing phase, or not objectionable to be part of a ruling Palestinian government. In this regard, he echoed the sentiments of the Secretary-General who said:“I strongly urge the Palestinian factions to advance genuine Palestinian unity on the basis of democracy and the PLO principles.
Reconciliation is critical in order to reunite the West Bank and Gaza under a single legitimate Palestinian authority.
Healing Palestinian divisions is also critical so that Palestinians can instead focus their energies on establishing a stable state as part of a negotiated two-state solution.
Genuine unity will also improve the Palestinian Government’s ability to meet pressing economic problems, which are adding to the frustration and anger driving Palestinian violence.”The urgency to place Hamas into the Palestinian Authority, even while it promotes the murder of Jews, is a critical part of the UN strategy. Perhaps it is because those violent actions threaten “the fragile reconstruction process in the devastated [Gaza] Strip,” which is a key UN concern.
Mladenov’s comments are a baby step forward for the United Nations on Israel: words that finally call out the Palestinian incitement and threats. Unfortunately, the UN still urges for flawed policies to elevate the terrorist group.
@ Salubrius:The foreign ministry asserting Israel rights in a manner that a foreign ministry employee can explain it to contemporaries in a broad manner.
You have a good start of a legal brief which is in a fine start of a legal setting. They are working diplomatically. Maybe far from perfect but finally an assertion of rights.
Israel by the way is now Jewish people’s state and has the rights granted the Jewish people at San Remo. I prefer what Alan Baker wrote,
“Upon Israel’s taking control of the area in 1967, the 1907 Hague Rules on Land Warfare and the Fourth Geneva Convention (1949) were not considered applicable to the West Bank (Judea and Samaria) territory, as the Kingdom of Jordan, prior to 1967, was never the prior legal sovereign, and in any event has since renounced any claim to sovereign rights via-a-vis the territory.
2. Israel, as administering power pending a negotiated final determination as to the fate of the territory, nevertheless chose to implement the humanitarian provisions of the Geneva convention and other norms of international humanitarian law in order to ensure the basic day-to-day rights of the local population as well as Israel’s own rights to protect its forces and to utilize those parts of land that were not under local private ownership.
3. Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, prohibiting the mass transfer of population into occupied territory as practiced by Germany during the second world war, was neither relevant nor was ever intended to apply to Israelis choosing to reside in Judea and Samaria.
4. Accordingly, claims by the UN, European capitals, organizations and individuals that Israeli settlement activity is in violation of international law therefore have no legal basis whatsoever.
5. Similarly, the oft-used term “occupied Palestinian territories” is totally inaccurate and false. The territories are neither occupied nor Palestinian. No legal instrument has ever determined that the Palestinians have sovereignty or that the territories belong to them.
6. The territories of Judea and Samaria remain in dispute between Israel and the Palestinians, subject only to the outcome of permanent status negotiations between them.
7. The legality of the presence of Israel’s communities in the area stems from the historic, indigenous and legal rights of the Jewish people to settle in the area, granted pursuant to valid and binding international legal instruments recognized and accepted by the international community. These rights cannot be denied or placed in question.
8. The Palestinian leadership, in the still valid 1995 Interim Agreement (Oslo 2), agreed to, and accepted Israel’s continued presence in Judea and Samaria pending the outcome of the permanent status negotiations, without any restriction on either side regarding planning, zoning or construction of homes and communities. Hence, claims that Israel’s presence in the area is illegal have no basis.
9. The Palestinian leadership undertook in the Oslo Accords, to settle all outstanding issues, including borders, settlements, security, Jerusalem and refugees, by negotiation only and not through unilateral measures. The Palestinian call for a freeze on settlement activity as a precondition for returning to negotiation is a violation of the agreements.
10. Any attempt, through the UN or otherwise, to unilaterally change the status of the territory would violate Palestinian commitments set out in the Oslo Accords and prejudice the integrity and continued validity of the various agreements with Israel, thereby opening up the situation to possible reciprocal unilateral action by Israel.”
The above is the writing of Alan Baker legal expert and former Israeli ambassador. He has a blog.
The Palestine Mandate was a trust instrument created pursuant to the agreement of the Allied Principal War Powers of WWI at San Remo in 1920 to carry out the policy established by Britain in the Balfour Declaration. They had the collective political rights to the power of self-determination in Palestine having won the territory in a defensive war and having entered into a treaty with the Ottoman Empire in which the latter agreed to relinquish its political rights over Palestine and other countries in the Middle East. The Allies recognized the collective political rights of the Christian Arabs and Arab Muslims to 99% of this land including Syria, Lebanon, Iraq and others. It recognized the political rights of 1% of the land as owned by the Jewish People because of their long association with this territory. However it and the Jewish People recognized that the Jews, although 2/3rd the total population in the Jerusalem area were only 1/6th the total population. To ensure a stable government and at the request of the Jews, the Allies decided to permit immediate occupancy by the Jews and vesting of the collective political rights to self-determination not until if and when the Jewish People built up the land from a malarial wasteland to a land of milk and honey to permit large scale immigration, and they had the capability to exercise sovereignty.
As the trust instrument was self-executing, the political rights to some of the area vested in 1948 and the remainder in 1967. The British and other members of the League of Nations and the Americans anticipated that the League of Nations would recognize the statehood of the Jewish People’s state when these rights vested. Therefore, their confirmation of the Palestine Mandate served as tacit recognition of the Jewish People’s state. The Government of the State of Israel is an agent for the Jewish People in setting up a government and administering it within the Green Line and in the old city of Jerusalem. Nothing in International Law requires it to annex all the territory in which it owns the collective political rights. The Supreme Court of Israel is authoritative in matters of domestic law. It has no authority to create international law. The Jewish People were intended by this lawful two step process first to obtain the unrestricted right of immigration and settlement and subsequently the right to set up a government and administer it. The Arabs residing in the territory of Palestine have not advanced any facts supporting their claim to own Palestine under international law.
I do not agree that the Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs has correctly stated the factual and legal support for the Jewish People’s sovereignty in Palestine, nor the lack of any support for the Arab claim nor the proposition that there is no need for a state owning the collective political rights in a territory to exercise all of it.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/west-bank-settlements-are-legal-foreign-ministry-asserts/
This is now official Israeli government policy.
@ Salubrius:
This is the West promoting Arab entitlement.
The Arabs residing in Judea and Samaria have never advanced any facts relevant under international law to show they have sovereignty over Judea and Samaria. The fact that there were Arabs living in those provinces of the Ottoman Empire in greater number than the Jews living there, is irrelevant to any determination under international law. What is relevant is that the Allied Principal War Powers entered into a treaty with the Ottomans that redrew its boundaries giving them the collective political rights to Judea and Samaaria and in 1920 they agreed to place them in trust for the Jewish People, to occupy on the effectiveness of the Palestine Mandate and to rule when the Jews attained a majority population and the capability to exercise sovereignty. The Jews attained this capability for Judea and Samaria in 1967.
If the Arabs could point to any facts justifying their claim under international law it wold be reasonable to compromise and trade land-for-peace. But without any justification for an Arab claim, trading land for peace is simply giving in to extortion. SSRN.com/abstract=2679399 The Ministry of Foreign Affairs should state the Israeli claim and reveal the lack of any credible claim by the Arabs. Even Lord Curzon who drafted the Palestine Mandate stated that the Allied Principal War Powers had implicitly rejected the Arab claim at San Remo in 1920. He was no great friend of the Jewish People.
@ watsa46:
Yes, watsa46. We can only hope IL will change its tack soon.
Salomon Benzimra Said:
IL never considered making a case for her legal ownership of J & S. Furthermore one may wonder what was the purpose of the Levy report in this context?
Nickolay Mladenov is certainly a nice guy. But as long as he carries the albatross of the Two-State Solution (TSS), his project is doomed. The two central points are:
1. Even suspending disbelief to the point of assuming the Palestinians are a specific “people,” we should remember Eugene Rostow’s observation: “Neither customary international law nor the United Nations Charter acknowledges that every group of people claiming to be a nation has the right to a state of its own.”
2. More importantly, when the national aspirations of that “people” are centered on claims of a territory that has been lawfully adjudicated to another real people (the Jewish people) nearly 100 years ago, recognized under international law and never questioned ever since, such claims should be dismissed as frivolous.
But as long as the Government of Israel continues to toy with the idea of the TSS and avoids the above two points, what is doomed is the whole State of Israel. This is how I read Mladenov’s sibylline statement when he referred to Israel’s Foreign Affairs: “It is their job to present [Israel’s] views to the world…. You are a sovereign state”
For the past 68 years the Muslim world and the West have rejected a serious TSS while claiming the opposite. UNRWA was a creation of the West and an obvious back-stabling of Israel. It is up to the Muslims and the West to get serious with the Palestinians. Both are beating on the wrong target. But then they have to get rid of their respective antisemitism! And that is a story for another day!!!!