NEW YORK, January 26, 2016 — Morton A. Klein,, president of The Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) released the following statement:
The European Union (EU) (with the Obama administration’s support) and the Palestinian Authority (PA) are once again waging perverse diplomatic warfare to attempt to deny the fact that Israel has the strongest legal right to areas over the 1949 Armistice lines, including the Jewish towns and communities in Judea/Samaria (misleadingly so-called “settlements”), the eastern portion of Jerusalem (the old city, also called the City of David after the Jewish King David who ruled there), and the Golan Heights.
Specifically:
(1) On January 18, 2016, the European Union passed a resolution declaring legal Israeli “settlements” to be illegal and an “obstacle to peace,” and declaring that EU agreements with Israel will no longer apply over the 1949 Armistice lines (the non-binding lines marking where the fighting stopped after seven Arab nations invaded Israel in 1948-1949);
(2) On January 20, 2016, the Obama administration backed the EU’s anti-Israel resolution; and
(3) the Palestinian Authority (PA) is reportedly attempting to pass a UN resolution declaring legal Israeli “settlements” to be illegal and an “obstacle to peace.” The PA’s planned anti-Israel, anti-Semitic proposed UN resolution is expected to also demand that the (600,000) Jews living over the 1949 Armistice lines must removed from their homes, communities, jobs and synagogues. In other words, the PA seeks to ethnically cleanse Jews from the lands to which the Jewish people have the strongest legal right (as well as the strongest historical and religious rights).
The ZOA strongly urges the Obama administration to veto and strenuously oppose the PA’s planned anti-Israel UN resolution. Throughout the past seven years, the Obama administration has repeatedly attempted to ameliorate its anti-Israel actions by asserting that only a solution negotiated by the PA and Israel is appropriate. The PA’s unilateral UN resolution would be the death knell of any possibility of a negotiated solution. Such an anti-Israel UN resolution would enable the PA to avoid sitting down and negotiating with Israel, and avoid making a final peace. Instead, the PA would take whatever it can obtain from the Obama administration and the UN, and continue demanding the destruction of all of Israel. A UN resolution would also reward the PA for inciting the ongoing wave of Palestinian Arab knife, car ramming and shooting attacks that have murdered 29 and wounded 280 innocent Israelis in the past 4 months – and encourage the PA to increase these attacks.
Israel has the strongest legal right to Judea/Samara/Jerusalem/the Golan:
Under the internationally binding San Remo agreements, League of Nations’ decisions, British Mandate and the UN Charter [Article 80], Israel (known as “Palestine” when those legal agreements were signed and enacted) is the Jewish national home and belongs to the Jewish people. Palestine at the time also included all of Jordan. In 1920-1923, Britain unlawfully carved out and gave Jordan 78% of the territory designated for the Jewish people. Jordan is a majority Palestinian Arab state.
The Jewish people were the only people who ever had an independent sovereign state or kingdom in Israel. No independent Arab or Palestinian state ever existed in Palestine, and no Arab capital ever existed in Jerusalem, even after the Muslim invasions in the seventh century.
Jewish sovereignty lasted over 400 years – longer than the existence of the United States – through King Saul’s unification of Jewish tribes who had already lived in the land of Israel for hundreds of years, King David’s establishment of Jerusalem as the capital in 1000 BCE, King Solomon’s building of the First Temple and consolidation of government functions, and King Solomon’s son’s division of the kingdom into two parts, until the Babylonian conquest of Judea in 586 BCE.
The very name “Judea” -a term which was commonly used by the international community throughout the centuries – is derived from the same root as the word “Jew,” testifying to the deep Jewish connection to the land. The Jewish people also enjoyed brief periods of sovereignty during the next 700 years, until the Roman drove out many – but not all of the Jews in 135 CE after the Bar Kochba revolt and renamed Judea “Syria Palestina” in attempt to de-Judaize Israel. Josephus estimated the Jewish population at nearly 7 million in 70 CE. This was reduced to about 3 million by 135 CE.
Throughout the next 1900 years, there was also always a Jewish presence in Israel – despite persecutions and expulsions and foreign conquerors – none of whom ever established an independent state in Israel. The Mishnah (200 CE) and Jerusalem Talmud were compiled (200 to 500 CE) in Israel. In 614, there was another Jewish revolt, which enabled Jews to rule Jerusalem for 3 years – well before the various Moslem invasions began in 632. The Moslems ruled from afar – from Cairo, or Turkey or Damascus or Baghdad – and never established an independent sovereign kingdom or state in Israel/Palestina. Jews helped Arabs defend Jerusalem from the Crusaders. The famous Jewish poet Yehuda Halevi, died in Jerusalem in 1141. The famous Rambam Nachmanides died in Israel in 1270.
Israel continued to be central to Jews in the diaspora throughout all this time too. Jews pray towards Jerusalem every day and Shabbat – while Muslims pray towards Mecca. Jerusalem is part of Jewish wedding ceremonies, and Jewish comfort to mourners. Jerusalem is mentioned almost 700 times in the Bible – and is never mentioned in the Koran.
By the late 1700s to mid-1800s, most of Israel was a wasteland, as a result of repeated conquests, plunder and Bedouin raids. Mark Twain and others wrote about the desolation. In 1785, the total population of Palestine was about 50,000 to 100,000.
Numerous plans were suggested by writers, politicians including Napolean and Egyptian ruler Mehmet Ali and others for large-scale Jewish restoration to Palestine in the 150 years prior to Israel’s rebirth – and no one ever suggested that the Holy Land should not be returned to the Jews because it belonged to someone else.
Napolean launched a campaign in 1799 to conquer Palestine, with a promise to restore it to the Jews. Mehmet Ali, who ruled Palestine from Egypt from 1831-1840, agreed to Moses Montefiore’s plan for large-scale Jewish regeneration in Palestine – but Turkey regained control prior in the interim. The Turks were also interested in Jewish restoration plans.
Jewish immigration and restoration of the land also brought Arabs into the area, for the jobs created by Jewish development. The Arabs emigrated into Israel from Egypt, North Africa, Algeria, Syria, etc.; the Arabs are not an “indigenous” people to Judea/Samaria/eastern Jerusalem. Common “Palestinian” Arab names such as Mughrabi and al Masri make it obvious that they hailed from outside Israel.
During World War I, the Jewish legion and Jewish intelligence operations played a major role in helping Britain free Palestine from Turkish rule – while the Arab population did virtually nothing. T.E. Lawrence wrote that “there is no national feeling” among the Arabs.
In 1919, Emir Faisal, who was briefly king of Syria, and then became king of Iraq, and Chaim Weitzman signed a treaty outlining friendly relations between Syria and a Jewish Palestine that extended to the Litani River (now part of Lebanon), the territory east of the Jordan, and part of the Sinai.
In 1917, the Balfour declaration promised the Jewish people a homeland in Palestine – which then also included the area that is now Jordan. This was enshrined in the legally binding San Remo agreements. Britain used its promise to the Jewish people to obtain the British mandate over Palestine. League of Nations documents made the mandate a sacred trust on behalf of the Jewish people. However, in 1920 to 1923, the British carved out 78% of the Palestine mandate and gave it to Jordan – an immense betrayal of the Jewish people’s rights. (A betrayal which the recent EU resolution seeks to make even worse.)
In November 1947 the UN General Assembly adopted the United Nations committee’s recommendation to divide the Land of Israel west of the Jordan river into two states: one Arab and one Jewish. But this plan was never implemented, and therefore was not binding under international law, because the Arab states all rejected the 1947 “partition plan” and instead started a war to prevent the plan’s implementation and destroy the fledgling Jewish state.
When Israel declared its statehood in 1948, the UN and numerous nations recognized Israel. Seven Arab nations responded by invading the Jewish State, with the declared intention of murdering all the Jews there.
After the 1948-1949 war, Egypt occupied Gaza, and Jordan illegally occupied Judea/Samaria and eastern Jerusalem. The Jews living in these areas were killed or were expelled. Jordan destroyed 58 synagogues in eastern Jerusalem, and used the tombstones from the 3,000-year-old Jewish Mount of Olives cemetery to line latrines and pave roads. Jordan denied Jews access to the holiest Jewish religious sites, including the Kotel (Western wall of the Temple) – thereby violating Article VIII of the Israel-Jordan Armistice Agreement, which called for “free access to the Holy Places and cultural institutions and use of the cemetery on the Mount of Olives.”
The Arab states also demanded that the armistice agreements signed in 1949 needed to state that the cease-fire line (the Armistice Demarcation Lines, also referred to as the “1949 Armistice lines” or “green line”) should not be construed in any way as a political or territorial border. In accordance with the Arab states’ demand, the armistice agreements reiterated that the armistice lines were not permanent boundary lines: The parties recognized that the armistice agreement “shall not in any way prejudice the rights, claims and positions of either Party” (Israel-Jordan Armistice Agreement (April 3, 1949), Article II, para. 2); and the parties agreed that the Armistice Demarcation Lines defined in the agreement were “without prejudice to future territorial settlements or boundary lines or to claims of either Party relating thereto.” (Id., Article VI, para. 9)
Thus the 1949 Armistice lines are not and have never been an internationally recognized border – and do not limit Israel’s rights. The recent EU resolution, and expected PA UN resolution thus have no legal grounds to transform the 1949 Armistice lines into a border. There is no legal basis for claiming that Jewish communities beyond the 1949 Armistice lines are “illegal.”
Post-1949 developments further reveal the legal absurdity of the EU’s resolution.
The Palestinian Arabs made no claim to Judea/Samaria/eastern Jerusalem during the 19 years of Jordan’s illegal occupation of these areas. In fact, the original Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) Charter, written in 1964, specifically disclaimed PLO (the declared representative of the “Palestinian” Arab people)’s sovereignty rights to Judea/Samaria/eastern Jerusalem, stating: “This Organization does not exercise any regional sovereignty over the West Bank in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, on the Gaza Strip or the Himmah Area.” (Article 24.)
In 1967, Israel pleaded with Jordan to remain out of the 1967 war. Jordan ignored Israel’s entreaties, and began shelling of western Jerusalem. In the defensive war, Israel reunited Jerusalem and recaptured Judea/Samaria. It was only after Israel captured these areas in a defensive war that the PLO demanded that Judea/Samaria and eastern Jerusalem should be theirs.
And Israel’s lawful self-defense in and of itself gives Israel the better claim.
The Levy Commission Report on the Legal Status of Building in Judea and Samaria (cleaned up translation of key sections) noted that:
“Thus the original legal status of the territory was restored, namely, a territory designated as a national home for the Jewish people, who had a “right of possession” to it during Jordanian rule while they were absent from the territory for several years due to a war imposed on them, and have now returned to it.”
The Levy Commission Report also concluded, after careful legal analysis that: “Israel has had every right to claim sovereignty over these territories, as maintained by all Israeli governments” and “that from the perspective of international law, the establishment of Jewish settlements in Judea and Samaria is not illegal.”
Despite Israel’s right to claim sovereignty over the areas beyond the 1949 Armistice lines, Jewish communities comprise only 2% of Judea/Samaria. Moreover, Israel gave away control of all of Gaza and 42 percent of Judea/Samaria, where the Palestinian Arabs have their own parliament, schools, universities, TV and radio stations, newspapers and police force running all aspects of their lives except some Israeli security control necessitated by continuing Palestinian Arab terrorism.
Jewish communities over the 1949 Armistice lines are clearly not the obstacle to peace; the obstacle to peace is the PA’s refusal to accept any state (including the over-generous offers to the Arabs in 1937, 1947, 2000, 2008 and 2015) that would require them to give up their ambition of destroying all of Israel.
In addition, the April 14, 2004 letter from former U.S. President George Bush to former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon confirmed that Jewish communities over the 1949 Armistice lines would remain in Israel in any peace agreement. President Bush’s letter stated:
“As part of a final peace settlement, Israel must have secure and recognized borders, which should emerge from negotiations between the parties in accordance with UNSC Resolutions 242 and 338. In light of new realities on the ground, including already existing major Israeli populations centers, it is unrealistic to expect that the outcome of final status negotiations will be a full and complete return to the armistice lines of 1949, and all previous efforts to negotiate a two-state solution have reached the same conclusion. It is realistic to expect that any final status agreement will only be achieved on the basis of mutually agreed changes that reflect these realities.”
President Bush’s letter thus further confirms that Israeli Jewish communities beyond the 1949 Armistice lines are legal. Moreover, in the Wall Street Journal, Elliott Abrams (who handled Middle East affairs at the National Security Council from 2001 to 2009) demonstrated that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s claim that “there were no informal or oral enforceable agreements” between President Bush and PM was incorrect.
Accordingly, ZOA urges the Obama administration to should retract its support for the EU resolution, and to oppose any similar PA-instigated resolution at the UN.
Ted Belman Said:
that is the image they always portray when they omit right wing agenda, implement left wing agenda, facilitate euro illegal bldg in C and obstruct Jewish building in C. the fact that they imply that does not lend it truth…. in fact they never say that, it is always implied in non committal anonymous leaks that do not have to be supported with evidence… perhaps its a sham, a fraud? For all we know they are simply portraying their behavior as a struggle when they may simply be implementing agreements made under the table and putting on a show. There is as much evidence for my speculation as the speculation that they must build “responsibly” to avoid euro ire. The euros use israel as their toilet, to do anything they want… C belongs to europe and BB Yaalon are simply their ghetto Jewish cops who tell the Jews where the ghetto wall boundary lies.
deanblake Said:
I once thought that too
Obama Joins Israel Boycott, Labels West Bank Goods
http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/01/28/report-obama-joins-israel-boycott/
Obama and his liberal Jewish enablers are execrable.
whats BB’s reaction?????
……..
I have no problem calling them traitors… they associate with and support the libels of the Israaeli left which incite the murder of Jews in Israel and the diaspora. Those who supported the nazi party were also guilty of murdering Jews… just like these leftists. The finger must be pointed, they must be identified as foreign paid moles, mercenaries who benefit from the libeling of jews and their murder. the left cannot be relieved of responsibility for their crimes,,,, they must be brought to justice.
this is the logical outcome of a PPM who finds it impossible to differ with the EU, UN and the US when they say that Jewish settlement in YS us illegal and illegitimate. Surely a PM of Israel should be able to once in 7 years:
“JEWISH SETTLEMENT IN YS IS LEGAL AND LEGITIMATE”
No one should be surprised that BB’s facilitation of illegal euro building in YS has given Israel nothing and encouraged more intransigence by the foreign liars. BB kept giving them an inch and they keep taking miles. BB says nothing because he wants to hide his under the table deals from Israel.
What’s BB’s plan B?
He had no plan B for Iran, none for the euro labeling, none for the tunnel building, none for the stabbings, none for the muslim abuse of Jews…… the man who never was.
@ 1DavidKA:
1. General Assembly resolutions are non binding. Security Council resolutions have power.
@ Bear Klein:
Thanks. 2 questions:
1) i thought that the UN resolutions are non-binding; so what’s there for Israel to fear?
2) do you really think that by uttering the word ‘responsibly’ you can prevent the UN from seeing the actual building / expansion?! Don’t Pals and Peace Now have cameras and do their diligence in recording and reporting?
So the “Levy report” will ROT in the dustbin of history because the successive IL Gvts decided to procrastinate believing that the enemy of Israel will do the same. Vacuum is being filled by others. See Iraq!!! The EU & US want to impose a fatal concoction to IL!!!
bernard ross Said:
@ 1DavidKA:
The issue is not addressing what to do with the Arabs, but having an executable strategy. And, given all the water under the bridge, it needs to be a highly innovative one, so *it* can be executed quietly.
@ Ted Belman:To expound on what they mean by responsibly is that Israeli government wants to quietly continue the settlement expansion.
Why quietly because they are concerned that a PA resolution in UN Security Council that passes and declares the settlements illegal or gives all the land past the green line to the Palestinians could result in serious problems for Israel. Such as sanctions.
So they prefer to go about this quietly and establish facts on the ground. So they may not at all times make the declarations they would truly like to make but do things incrementally.
@ 1DavidKA:
We can only build in Area C of Judea and Samaria which is about 60% or the territories.1DavidKA Said:
Obviously it can mean many things. But Bibi and Yaalon use this word to mean without bringing down the ire of the West too much.
@ 1DavidKA:
You have your numbers wrong. There are less than 1.7 million in J&S.
“Despite Israel’s right to claim sovereignty over the areas beyond the 1949 Armistice lines, Jewish communities comprise only 2% of Judea/Samaria.”
Only 2%?! I thought that about 40% of the WB is ‘settled’?
I wish ZOA addressed the question of what to do with all those 2.3 mil pal’s who live in the WB.
@ bernard ross:
If we can build in all of WB 100% legally, what does this word, ‘responsibly’ mean? My question is not rhetorical.
http://www.memritv.org/clip_transcript/en/5269.htm
The ZOA condemnation is right on the mark.
I’m interested in what the EU would say to calling on Poland, its member state, to evict Polish citizens from the newly estabished urbanities in the former Kingdom of Prussia based on the 1939 borders. They are all ‘settlers’!
Certainly I agree with Bernard in that arguing from the immediate pre-history of 1947 is futile because current people in the EU and American bureaucracies have no concept of history or honouring committments made by their predecessors.
In fact Israel, and the Israeli Government need a new strategy to combat these idiotic claims.
First of all, the UN must be forced to accept the responcibility for its failure to resettle refugees and displaced persons in the mandates before 1947.
Secondly, the World needs to acknowledge that “West Bank” is a fantasy location created for purely propaganda reasons, and that Yehudim come from Yehudia. To that end “Jews” everywhere must insist that our ethnic name needs to be written as used by us, in the way that other ethnicities are called by their proper names, and not the pejorative elided form of Old French! After all, 1 million Estonians aren’t called Estis, and it would be considered offensive to refer to an Italian as an Itaker (in Germany) these days. In fact I can think of only one other ethnic group that is not called by their proper name. The Japanese are Nihonjin, and not ‘jin pin’ (Chinese) (sunrise).
Americans may not have any concept of ethnic identity, and the Europeans may have lost this also, but not others. The Israeli Government must press claims to Yehudim being idigenous to the eastern Mediterranean, and certainly more so than the Arabs are indigenous to Egypt, or Turks to Anatolia/Mikrá Asía.
And, the Israeli Government needs a strategy to resettle the Arabs out of the camps and other urbanities in Yehudia and Shomron regions.
Finally (or perhaps firstly!), the Israeli Government must annex Shomron and Yehudia.
Bear Klein Said:
“build responsibly”????????????
I thought that the responsibility of everyone concerned was to build homes for jews in YS? what is responsible about at least 8 years of illegal EU building in C as compared to obstructed settlement for Jews in C? It seems that they can say anything and no one questions it.
Bear Klein Said:
LOL, chicken feed!!!!!!!
@ Bear Klein:
Bear, whats happening, this was posted a while back and already answered and discussed. the gist being that acquiring it for state lands does not guarantee jewish settlement. The GOI already gave state lands in C to the pals a few years back. for all we know they might be acquiring it for transfer to PA
I notice that you never answer on why BB NEVER in the last 7 years uttered the words:
“JEWISH SETTLEMENT IN YS IS LEGAL AND LEGITIMATE”
Are you avoiding that issue?
http://www.timesofisrael.com/israel-to-announce-major-land-seizure-in-jordan-valley/
Bear Klein Said:
bernard ross Said:
I was happy to see last month when Hotovely did this but it does not answer to my accusations regarding Netanyahu who as the PM of Israel should be the FIRST to utter those words but in the past 7 years we could not hear it yet to this day.
Furthermore, I find it strange that the EU just again defamed all the Jews of the world plus the state of Israel by once more declairing the lying insult that Jews are illegal in their homeland, especially when the EU nations signed into its legality in the LON mandate. Hotovely should be calling them in and demanding a retraction, she should be declaring it to be a libelous insult which incites the murder of Jews in Israel and elsewhere. What is the use of a fool pr campaign when the FM does not call in the ambassadors and even expel them for their vicious lies. Instead Israel has a stockholm syndrome PM who does not want to upset the filthy despicable euro anti semites.
Frankly, I find your posting of this token BS move without any GOI follow through to confirm it actually means anything, to be disingenuous because you and I both know that BB still cannot utter the words and the FM cannot call in the ambassadors like any normal country so despicably insulted with anti semitic lies would do. You are covering up for BB’s transparent omission of his duty as PM. In fact your post makes it even more despicable as after the FM declares it the euros slap the jews face again and the FM and BB do nothing other than continue to allow the euros to illegally build in YS without being jailed or expelled or demolished. Its time to end the cover up.
The ZOA represents the true blue American Jewish Community, please do not forget that. Thank you Ted for posting this. WM
http://www.timesofisrael.com/west-bank-settlements-are-legal-foreign-ministry-asserts/
Yaalon is BB’s point man….. everything Yaalon does is a mirror of what BB’s real policy is. Yaalon sees settlers as “intruders”….. BB sees them as obstructions to his agenda.
these long tomes of jews perenially complaining about the foreigners and imploring them to recognize Jewish rights are futile…. Israel needs to find ways to bring damage to its enemies as individuals and as collectives. In the same way that the chaos of arab spring has weakened Israels enemies in the ME so must the chaos be sent to europe which is the origin of all the blood libels currently slaughtering Jews. Chaos and suffering in the lands of the enemies is a good thing….. and NOT stability.
I have been writing for at least a year pointing out that it is foolish to condemn the foreigners for declaring Jews in YS illegal and illegitimate when BB netanyahu the PM of Israel in all his past 7 years has NEVER rebutted that claim. Has anyone ever heard BB say that “JEWISH SETTLEMENT IN YS IS LEGAL AND LEGITIMATE” and that the euros, UN, obama are serial, chronic, pathological liars. I would be happy to hear BB utter those words which appear to be taboo to him. Does anyone in Israel wonder why he NEVER utters those words? Is it because he is so afraid that even words cannot leave his mouth, shivering in his boots…..OR…. is it that the wants the narrative of illegal and illegitimate Jewish settlement to become the only narrative that Israelis hear? After all, he did get rid of Feiglin, he did give Benett the eunuch ministry, he did obstruct the Shaked bill to neuter the leftist supremes, he did appoint Yaalon to obstruct settlement and keep down nationalist Jews, he did facilitate the euro illegal building of muslim homes in YS for the last 7 years while obstructing Jewish settlement.
Is he afraid…. or is he complicit?
If he is complicit then his behavior makes sense in his demonization of settlers without evidence at Duma and in his do nothing attitude about the revenge stabbings cause by his behavior at Duma. The stabbings are a low intensity war of attrition to make the Jews want to give away YS for peace. It is the combination of the demonization and the stabbing “tough love” war which point to a method to his madness. First, is to paint settlers and nationalists as dangerous extremists, lawbreakers and intruders in the eyes of the Israeli public AND THEN second to wear down the publics to the point of them throwing away YS with the settlers. If I were wrong we would see BB demolishing the EU illlegal muslim homes of the past 7 years AND expelling all euro orgs from area C…. and jailing non diplomatic perps in the crime AND declaring the didplomatic perps Persona Non Grata……. but I doubt that will happen….. in any normal country that is what would happen if a PM discovered such an illegal sabotage from foreign nations.