Determined to Forget the Palestine Mandate, EU Condemns Israel for Five New Settlements

Peloni:  Those who forget their past, routinely live to regret it once they finally rediscover it.

Hugh Fitzgerald | July 5, 2024

You have to keep rubbing your eyes in disbelief — how is it that so much of the world thinks it can get away with ignoring the Mandate for Palestine? For that is the birth certificate of modern Israel. That mandate was one of several created in 1921-1922 by the League of Nations, in its attempt to fashion states from the vast territories that were previously part of the Ottoman Empire. Several of those mandates were intended to lead to the creation of Arab states — Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon. In a controversial case, the Emirate of Transjordan was carved out of land originally intended to be part of the Mandate for Palestine. Only one of the mandates was created for the future national home of the Jewish people, to be built in the Land of Israel, where Jews had lived for 3500 years, the place where it was expected they would resurrect their ancient homeland, and live in that homeland by right and not by sufferance. The Palestine Mandate was entrusted to Great Britain, which as Mandatary was obligated, according to Article 6 of the Mandate, to “facilitate Jewish immigration” and “close settlement by Jews on the land.” Which land? All the land between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean, and from the Red Sea in the south to close to the Golan Heights in the north.

The Mandate did not take private property and hand it to the Jewish pioneers. All it did was to give Jews the right to buy land from the local owners, many of them absentee Arab and Turkish landowners who lived in Amman and Beirut. In addition, Jews were able, by Article 6 of the Mandate, to settle on “state and waste lands.”

The latest outrage against history and the truth comes from the European Union, that still refuses to recognize the borders of Israel, as set out in the Mandate for Palestine: “European Union condemns Israeli authorization of five new settlements,” by Tovah Lazaroff, Jerusalem Post, June 29, 2024:

The European Union on Friday [June 28] condemned “in the strongest terms possible” Israel’s decision to transform five West Bank outposts into new settlements, as well as to advance plans for thousands of new settler homes.

“This is another deliberate attempt at undermining peace efforts,” it said and urged Israel to rescind the decision….

No, Israel is not undermining so-called “peace efforts.” It is simply asserting its right to build anywhere it wishes in the territory assigned to it according to the Mandate for Palestine, on private land Israelis have purchased, and on state and waste lands. It will not buckle under pressure from the EU, the UN, or any other organization or nation, to give up that right. The outposts that have just been elevated by the Israeli government to the status of settlements are on “state and waste lands,” to which the state of Israel is entitled by the Mandate for Palestine, Article 6.

The security cabinet authorized one outpost for every country that unilaterally recognized Palestine as a state in the last month, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich explained.

That’s by way of riposte to those countries that have recognized a non-existent state called “Palestine.” But Israel doesn’t have to wait to build settlements in response to something others do. It has had a right to build those settlements, on land properly purchased from private owners, or belonging to the state, anywhere in the territory of Mandatory Palestine, and has had that right for more than a century.

He [Smotrich] agreed in exchange for the authorizations of the outposts to release three months of tax fees he has withheld from the Palestinian Authority….

The taxes on imports that Israel collects for transfer to the Palestinian Authority have in recent years been withheld because of the PA’s “Pay-for-Slay” program, which rewards imprisoned terrorists, and the families of terrorists killed while committing their attacks, with generous stipends. As a concession to the PA, in the hope that it will not react violently against these five new settlements, Smotrich is prepared to give them three months’ worth of withheld taxes.

By leaving the announcement on settlements to Smotrich, Netanyahu hopes to deflect American anger away from himself and onto his Minister of Finance, who is already greatly disliked by the Bidenites.

The PA has been moving heaven and earth to blacken Israel’s image and to turn every international forum into a vehicle for anti-Israel pronouncements. Smotrich sees the new settlements as a kind of payback, and should the PA continues its diplomatic offensive, more settlements will no doubt be recognized, as long as the current Israeli government remains in power.

Steps to be taken against the Palestinian Authority would include canceling exit permits for officials to leave the country and increased enforcement against illegal Palestinian buildings in Area C of the West Bank.

Measures would also be taken to protect Jewish heritage sites located in Area B of the West Bank, which is under the auspices of the Palestinian Authority.

Until now, the Jewish heritage sites in Area B of the West Bank have been largely under the “protection” of the Palestinian Authority — a protection that is largely nonexistent. The Palestinians have been destroying Jewish archeological sites, of which there are many thousands, in order to efface the Jewish connection to the land. They have attacked sites that are sacred to the Jews. They have vandalized and set fire to Joseph’s Tomb in Nablus (Shechem), and have repeatedly attacked Rachel’s Tomb in Bethlehem, and the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron. Until now, it has been impossible to adequately guard all of those sites that are in the West Bank, but given the scale of the destruction, it is long past time to spend much greater sums on their protection.

The new determination by the Netanyahu government to spend more on the security that is needed to protect both the Jewish holy sites, and Jewish archeological sites that the Palestinians have been vandalizing, looting, and setting fire to, is most welcome.

Representatives of the European Union should brush up on their knowledge of the Mandate for Palestine, especially Article 6, and study carefully the Mandate maps showing the territory that was assigned to it by the League of Nations. Perhaps they could also come to Israel for an eye-opening visit, to see some of the many thousands of Jewish archeological sites in Judea and Samaria, some dating back 3500 years. That should provide a salutary shock to those in the EU who are so quick to attack Israel for creating settlements exactly where it has every right to do so.