By Ted Belman
I spent the entire day today at the President’s Conference 2012. It was a huge event with thousands in attendance.
The panel discussion on borders started with a presentation by Mr. Dan Rothem, Israel – Senior Research Consultant, S. Daniel Abraham Center for Middle East Peace; Expert on Israeli-Arab final status issues. He and the Abraham Centre are left wing. Rothem was there to provide the audience with demographics from the left which basically stuck with the figure of 2.6 million Arabs in J&S and not once did he say those numbers were in dispute. He also used old fertility rates and said we were losing the demographic battle. This really bothered me because on both counts he was intellectually dishonest and wrong.
The next speaker made use of such numbers and argued for making a deal ..fast.
Naftali Bennet stressed the point that this is our land historically and legally and faulted the government for never saying so. He advised that there were over 300,000 Jews in Area C and only 55,000 Arabs. His plan is to extend Israeli law to these lands and give the Arabs there, citizenship. I introduced myself to him afterwards and he told me he read Israpundit which made my day. We agreed to get together to discuss his plans and my ideas.
Cazroline Glick informed everyone that the left overestimated the Arab numbers by over one million and that Arab fertility rate was in decline and the Jewish one was on the up tick. They are now almost the same. Caroline advocated for a full annexation right to the Jordan River. She supported citizenship for the Arabs as we would still have a 2:1 majority. Finally in support of her plan, she said we can’t afford to have another two million Arabs come into Palestine which would happen if such a state would ever be created.
I have a strong preference for Bennett’s plan. We could always spend the next 20 years negotiating autonomy with the Arabs of Areas A and B.
Rather than make a declaration of annexation or of extending Israeli law I feel we should do it quietly and that we should lift the freeze.
The writing is on the wall for all to see. Anything short of Annexation, whether Area C or all the land West of the Jordan, is Suicidal.
The government’s unwillingness to assert its Rights to the Land according to the San Remo Resolution is ill conceived, and detrimental to its future.
Either a change of Government, or government policy is the only solution to the ‘no-peace-process merry go round.
yamit82 Said:
It appears that only after a change will Israeli leadership have the guts to repudiate prior giveaways and institute a paradigm shift. However, I actually believe there is good precedent for any current leadership to make a paradigm shift on the basis that all prior agreements were made under the duress of survival resulting from 2000 years of slaughter in europe followed by another 60 years of arab slaughter. Simply put leadership states that agreements made under that duress will not be accepted as legally binding. I agree with Wallace Brand regarding the land issue. Regarding the “palestinian” issue Israel should invoke precedent in that jordan was created out of the palestine mandate to be jew free and that this implies that the balance was to be muslim/arab free. Also, the only way to legalize the jew cleansing from arab states, Jordan, gaza and west bank arab areas is as a swap of populations with the remaining arabs west of jordan to go to participants of the arab israel wars. All of these actions can be accomplished unilaterally but by taking advantage of opportunities arising(eg salvo from hezbulal and hamas precipitating invasion, annexation and transfer). A further leadership statement would be that any areas captured in war again with the same participants will result in permanent annexation and the transfer of populations and that the geneva conventions normally applicable will be considered null and void due to all those states having been involved in terror and due to the ethnic cleansing of Jews from arab nations under the auspices, and watchful eyes, of the Geneva conventions.
In my view Mahmoud Abbas application to the UN for statehood is a material breach of the OSLO agreement that justifies its termination. I would make that claim and then annex all of Palestine outside the Green Line that is West of the Jordan River except for Gaza under the claim of the exclusive political rights granted on April 15, 1920 and preserved in Article 80 of the UN Charter. These were ceded by the Ottoman Empire in Article 95 of the Treaty of Sevres, confirmed in the Treaty of Lausanne.. Gaza should be liberated and be given Home Rule. All that rocket firing that has been going on is an adequate casus belli. That, in my opinion, will satisfy the requirement that Israel respect the civil rights of the non-Jewish communities in Palestine for reasons I have discussed heretofore relating to the French process verbal, and the history of Arab exercise of civil rights in Palestine prior to 1920. Those Jews and Arabs who do not swear fealty to Israel should not receive citizenship. Israel should decide whether or not to compensate them to leave or let them stay on as non-citizen residents.
The only objection I have is making the Arabs citizens. I prefer your idea of paying them to leave. And I also agree it should be done quietly.
@ Ted Belman:
Absolutely. No big announcements. Just go ahead and build on state lands, and settle jews on their land wherever they are willing and able to build. Get the government out of the process and let the private sector deal with it. This is up to the Jewish people. not the MAndate
Thanks Ted
Ted, please this moderation thing is out of wack. Whatever triggers it should be corrected or removed. There is no reason for a number of comments to be moderated. A Mickey Mouse program.
@ Salomon Benzimra:
The sooner the better.
@ yamit82:
There is a definite need for a leadership change.
Israeli leadership should be committed to securing the land that belongs to them without hesitation.
Hamas continues to rain rockets into Israel and this needs to stop.
Israel has every right to protect her sovereignty and her people and it should begin by strikes that not only take out the terrorist but the leadership along with them.
I think we all agree on one point: Israel should exercise its sovereignty over Judea and Samaria.
We may differ on the tactics. My view is that prior to any de facto annexation, the Israeli Government should assert its de jure title of sovereignty and tell the world powers that they, themselves, should officially accept this title given that they have already approved it in 1922-23 as an act of international law (see details here). The main reason for this approach is that you cannot make a train, going downhill for 20-40 years, all of sudden make a U turn.
On the other hand, Wallace Edward Brand, a Harvard lawyer whose views I highly respect, is of the opinion that Israel should proceed to annexation immediately. He will certainly comment on these pages soon, as I would hate to put words in his mouth.
@ Squall:
Ce qu’il dit?… Merde!!!
Arnold Harris Said:
Israel can also “give up” 5 ou 10% of Area C where most arabs live. It could also make Area B more contiguous. It would make the law easier to swallow for many centrist MKs. And the arab palestinians would actually benefit from this move because they dont live in Area C but in A and B.
@ Ted Belman:
Tactically there must first be regime change here in Israel and Leaders elected who favor annexation. Will never happen under BB.
Tactically there are pros and cons for each approach but that’s tactics. There must be first a strategic and operational agreement by the government that would create facts on the ground even without publicly declaring what our objectives are. The Labor and Mapai governments understood this and implemented it to great success.
Likud are big mouth populists who talk the talk but almost never walk the walk.
I am for quietly establishing sovereignty over all of Y&S while at the same time de-fanging by all means Peace Now and their clones. Purging the bureaucracy of all hardened leftist ideologues,is a must, difficult but doable if there is a strong enough will but not under the likes of BB who is one of them
Israel should withdraw support and protection of Abbas and allow a Hamas takeover of the PA. First military provocation Israel should take control over all of Y&S. Anyone with any connection to Hamas should then be killed and or deported and all property owned by Hamas real or effective should be expropriated by the Israeli government.
I disagree that citizenship should be offered the Arabs or to any non Jew. They are entitled to no political rights. They must be forced to leave willingly or otherwise. As long as even a few remain they will vanguard opposition and terror which would be supported by most of the world against us.
Let the Arabs demonstrate and plead for sympathy for their cause and plight from Mt Horeb WI(Where I hope many many will settle) and not from within our sovereignty.
We should be debating whether we should announce the end of the peace process or simply go about building in Area C and begin applying Israeli law to our citizens the Area C.
Along with Ted Belman, Caroline Glick and Naftali Bennet, I too agree that Area C of Shomron and Yehuda should be annexed immediately by Israel. As for the relatively small population of local Arabs, they can be offered Israeli citizenship under condition that they agree to obey all laws of the State of Israel, and that anyone among them who fails to do that after having accepted citizenship will have that status revoked and be expelled. I think most of them will keep the peace, and learn to enjoy the blessings of civil rights for all bestowed upon all other Israeli citizens.
Once that step is taken, and with some 72% of Shomron and Yehuda under Israeli sovereignty, notions of any future Arab state in these territories would fall into the same classification as hopes of reviving the Austro-Hungarian Empire or the Dutch, Swedish or British colonial rule of parts or all of the US eastern seaboard. Instead of that, local municipal autonomy can be offered separately to the Arab leaderships of Jenin, Schchem, Tulkarem, Ramallah, Kalkilya, Jericho, Beit-Lechem and Hevron. After Israeli annexation of Area C, it is doubtful the Palestine Authority would be able to function, and the local Arab municipal leaderships probably would take action to break up Yasser Arafats would-be imperium.
Arnold Harris
Mount Horeb WI