U.N. Bid Could
Give Palestinians A Diplomatic Tool
by
MICHELE KELEMEN September
21, 2011
Palestinians
say they are undeterred and plan to seek full U.N. membership as a state on
territories Israel occupied in the 1967 war. Palestinian President Mahmoud
Abbas is to present his application when he speaks to the U.N. on Friday. The
issue is dominating high level meetings as countries scramble to try to revive
a peace process that has failed for decades.
Palestinians
say they aren't interested in the same old peace process. They see their U.N.
membership bid as giving them a new diplomatic tool. If they gain
membership - or even an upgrade to their status in the U.N. General Assembly,
where the U.S. can't block them, they would gain access to U.N. bodies and international courts to challenge Israeli actions in the West
Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem. Zomlot
calls it a deterrent policy, and he says the arm-twisting by Western
diplomats and threats by U.S. congressmen to cut off aid to Palestinians won't
change their minds about this.
Palestinians
could pursue war crimes charges without full statehood: ICC prosecutor
Sep 28 2011
ICC chief
prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo says if Palestine becomese a non-member observer
state at the UN, it could be eligible to pursue claims against Israel even
without full statehood
The Tone-Deaf
ICC Prosecutor, by Kevin Jon Heller , Sep 29th, 2011
I cannot
imagine why Moreno-Ocampo chose to offer his opinion on that issue now — just as
debate over the Palestinian’s request for full membership in the UN is getting
underway.
MONDAY,
SEPTEMBER 26, 2011
(My
thanks to IntLawGrrls for the opportunity to contribute this guest post)
As
the director of Gisha, an
Israeli human rights organization that promotes the right to freedom of
movement in the occupied Palestinian territory, I sat riveted to this weekend's
television coverage of the submission of the Palestinian request for UN
membership. (Prior IntLawGrrls posts availablehere.)
On my mind was a seemingly trivial question:
On my mind was a seemingly trivial question:
Do we need to
stop saying and writing the "occupied Palestinian territory"
and start saying "occupied Palestine"?
I'll say more about the substance of that decision at the end of this post, but the fact that I – and much more importantly, world leaders – are raising this question highlights a benefit of the statehood bid: pressing the Israeli government (and the rest of the world) to decide what Gaza and the West Bank are and, therefore, who is responsible for safeguarding the rights of the residents of those places.
Here I'll confess to a frustrating aspect of litigating human rights and humanitarian obligations within the Israeli legal system: the pick-and-choose attitude toward international law displayed by the Israeli government.
In the West Bank, Israel claims the authorities of an occupying power, including arrest, detention, confiscation and military courts. But it also settles hundreds of thousands of Israeli citizens there, proclaiming that "in Judea and Samaria, the Jewish people are not foreign occupiers."
Just this month, the Israeli Supreme Court rejected a petition brought by Palestinian landowners who challenged confiscation of their land for construction of an express rail between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, citing the provisions of the Hague Regulations that permit confiscation of private property in occupied territory for the good of its residents. The court noted but was not overly troubled by the fact that the planned rail-line will be off-limits to the residents of the occupied territory, as it is to be a commuter rail for Israelis only.
A
similar situation exists in Gaza: Israel claims a right to control who and what
enters Gaza's borders, yet claims that it is no longer occupying Gaza and
therefore owes only minimal obligations to its
residents in exercising power over their lives.
Perhaps one outcome of the statehood bid will be to press the Israeli government to make up its mind: There's a claim that the West Bank and Gaza are a state. If you disagree, please explain what you think they are.
Of course, the very act of calling the West Bank and Gaza a state will not make them any less or any more occupied, nor will it change Israel's powers and responsibilities as an occupier. But the recent flurry of statements proclaiming the West Bank as belonging to the Jewish people (check out this Israeli Foreign Ministry animated clip) suggests a renewed interest in legal definitions, perhaps because they are starting to matter more.
If the West Bank is part of Israel, then its 2-million-plus Palestinian residents must be granted Israeli citizenship, including full political, civil and social rights. If it is occupied territory, then its residents must be granted the full range of protections offered by international humanitarian law, including the protection against citizens of the occupying country being transferred into their land. If Gaza is not a state (under blockade) and not occupied territory, then under what legal authority is Israel controlling its borders?
I still believe that international law can play a role in protecting civilians subject to control by a foreign power. I think that renewed international attention to defining Israel's relationship to the territory where 4 million Palestinians are living under its control could lead to increased protections for those residents. After all, international law is enforced primarily through diplomacy.
By the way, it is not only Israel who adopts a pick-and-choose attitude toward international law – Gisha has repeatedly tried to remind those who claim that Israel, as an occupying power in Gaza, has no right to stop ships from reaching its shores of a basic principle of the law of occupation: it allows the occupying power to determine travel arrangements for the occupied territory, including a ban on maritime travel. International law also requires the occupying power to allow people and goods to enter and leave by other means. Israel is not meeting this obligation, but failure to do so does not negate the authority to stop ships.
Now back to my own struggle to define Gaza and the West Bank, where we offer legal services to residents seeking to overcome Israeli-imposed travel restrictions in order to access schools, jobs, and family members.
I
have scheduled consultations with colleagues, read some interesting background material, and talked to
other international lawyers about whether Gaza and the West Bank constitute a
state.
I have questions about the Montevideo Convention criterion requiring a state to have an effective government. Even if we can get beyond the Gaza-West Bank split, there is the reality that the Palestinian Authority was created by agreement with the occupying power, and its competences are delegated to it by Israel and exercised under Israeli supervision and approval.
I have questions about the Montevideo Convention criterion requiring a state to have an effective government. Even if we can get beyond the Gaza-West Bank split, there is the reality that the Palestinian Authority was created by agreement with the occupying power, and its competences are delegated to it by Israel and exercised under Israeli supervision and approval.
I am also sympathetic to arguments that whether Palestine should be viewed as a state is a political question whose resolution depends largely on the ramifications of the UN bid, still in its infancy.
I'll let you know what I discover, but one thing is sure – whatever the Palestinian territory is or isn't, its people have rights that must be protected. I hope the renewed debate over their status will lead to greater protection of those rights.
Time
For U.S. To Recognize A New Middle East , September 19, 2011
(Read
Columbia University professor Rashid Khalidi's New York Times Op-Ed,
"The Middle East Has Changed.")
NEAL
CONAN, host: And now the opinion page. On Friday, Mahmoud Abbas, the president
of the Palestinian Authority, said he would take the issue of Palestinian
statehood to the United Nations Security Council this week. The Obama
administration says the U.S. will veto the application but will have little
support, even among its European allies. Last week, as part of The New York
Times Room for Debate, Rashid Khalidi wrote: As long as the United
States supports Israel in standing in the way of an immediate
rollback of illegal settlements and end its illegal
occupation, a Palestinian
state will not see the light of day, and any discussion of it is futile.
What
will change after a vote in the Security Council on Palestine?
Rashid
Khalidi is the professor of Arab Studies at Columbia University, and he joins
us now on the phone from his office there in New York. Nice to have you with us
again.
CONAN:
When you say futile, do you think nothing will change as a result of this vote?
things are not going to change in terms
of Palestinian statehood as long as the U.S. does not take a firm stand on
illegal settlement and illegal occupation, and monopolizes negotiation
KHALIDI:
No. Things will change, but I don't think things are going
to change in the direction of a sovereign, independent, contiguous
Palestinian state. They'll change in the sense that the United States and
Israel are likely - at least the U.S. Congress and Israel - are likely to
impose sanctions on the Palestinian people and on the Palestinian Authority.
They'll change in the sense that the status of Palestine and of the Palestinian
representation at the United Nations might be different at the end of this. But
in terms of the Palestinians achieving statehood, self-determination,
freedom from occupation, unfortunately, I don't think this
will change as a consequence of what happens in
New York.
KHALIDI:
Some (of Palestinians) will be thrilled. I think many Palestinians are
more cynical than that and understand that realities on the
ground are not going to change. .. as long as the
United States will (i) not take a firm stand in terms of
occupation and settlement .. (ii) insists on monopolizing
negotiations, won't allow a different framework or venue for
negotiations, and given (iii) the current Israeli government,
which is, by far, the most pro-settler, the most extreme in Israel's history -
I'm not sure why there should be any grounds for
optimism about actual changes on the ground.
CONAN:
And some fear that there could be, indeed, grave disappointment when, as you
suggest, things don't really change for the Palestinian people.
easy to be biased toward Palestinians
KHALIDI:
Well, I think the people stirring up those fears are perhaps secretly hoping
there will be violence because some of those people feel much more comfortable
when the Palestinians are not following nonviolent or diplomatic means. They -
it's very easy to put the Palestinians in a box if they
can be portrayed as violent or terrorists or whatever. And,
frankly, you have to assume a great deal of naivete on the part of the
Palestinians to assume there's going to be a huge disappointment. I think most
Palestinians are fully aware of the realities, and that those are not going to
change as the result of what happens in New York in the next few weeks or month
or two.
both factions in Palestinians—Fatah and
Hamas—stuck in a narrow political consideration
CONAN:
We speak of Palestinians as a - well, there are many strains of thought. It's
interesting, Hamas has not embraced this idea.
KHALIDI:
Not at all, and probably on narrow party political lines. Anything that
reinforces their rival, they're afraid, is not good. And so, unfortunately,
like - both factions, I think, of Palestinian politics, Fatah
and Hamas, are thinking of narrow political considerations rather
than the Palestinian national interests all too
often, and this is, I think, a case of that.
failed “peace process”
KHALIDI:
Well, I mean, they are committed to negotiations. Negotiations have failed.
We've been - since the process I myself was involved in back in '91 to '93, we've
been engaged in 20 years of negotiation. The situation has gotten
measurably worse for the Palestinians in those 20 years.
We've gone from 200,000
illegal Israeli settlers in the occupied territories to 600,000 by Prime
Minister Netanyahu's count.
We've gone from a situation
where Palestinians could move completely freely in 1991 - anywhere inside
Israel to Gaza, from Gaza to the West Bank to Jerusalem - to a situation where
all of those areas are closed to most Palestinians.
So the
situation has gotten measurably worse for the Palestinians in 20 years of what
is, in my view, laughably labeled a peace
process, whatever it was. It was a process. It made some great careers in
the American diplomatic service, but it certainly was not a process that
brought about peace. It made things, in my view, much worse and took us very
far away from real, just, lasting, sustainable peace.
the US should be awakened to the changes
in the New Middle East
CONAN:
Some - given the events that we've seen these last seven,
eight months or so in Egypt and Tunisia and,
well, now in Syria, of course, and again in Yemen and,
of course, in Libya, some people wondered how that was
going to affect the situation in Israel, between Israel and the
Palestinians. And you say it really should be the United
States who needs to be awakened to the changes in
the Arab world.
KHALIDI:
I think the United States and Israel and the Europeans and everybody else has to be
awakened to the fact that this is not your grandfather's Middle
East. This is not a Middle East where colonial powers or external powers
could push people around and pliable, pliant governments would do as they were
told, whether by Moscow or Washington or, in an earlier era, by London or
Paris. This is an era
of growing demand for popular sovereignty. Even if there are not successful or
fully successful democratic transitions, people will have a bigger
voice.
And
the people's voice has been kept out of this. Most
people in the Arab world are deeply sympathetic to the Palestinians.
Most governments have done what Washington wanted for the past several decades.
That's the reality. Israel was very comfortable with that, because its
patron, the United States, made sure that the Arabs were essentially kept out
of the equation, except those people who are wheeled in to fund with the
Americans had decided they wanted to have happen and Israel was willing to have
happen. So, we're in a different Middle East. I'm not sure that it's entirely
changed.
KHALIDI:
Well, I mean, those (Turkey and Egypt) were
the two motors of change in the Middle East in the 19th century.
There's no reason. There's no reason why that by far biggest and in some
ways most important countries in the region shouldn't play that kind of role in
the 21st century. It would require the Egyptians solving some very deep,
profound, internal problems for them to be anything like the economic dynamo
that Turkey now is. Turkey is an enormously vibrant and successful economy, and
that's the basis of its current power.
Turkey and Egypt
Much
of that power is soft power. It's not Turkish fleets or Turkish generals or
whatever that are the extension of Turkish power. It's Turkish exports,
Turkish investment, Turkish know-how, Turkish
television series, Turkish retail products that are just everywhere in the Arab
world, and in many other areas. I mean, the Arab world isn't even their major
trading partner. Europe is. And they're in the Balkans and many other places,
too. That - Egypt would have to really solve some very grave, internal
socioeconomic problems to be anything like the economic power that Turkey is.
CONAN:
Is Turkey seeing some of the limits of its soft power in
Syria?
KHALIDI:
Well, and its dealings with Israel and its dealing with the
United States, unfortunately. Yeah. I think perhaps, it could be argued
that Turkish foreign policy may be a little bit over-ambitious. But
there is no question that if you compare the reach that Turkish diplomacy has
today with where it was 10 or 15 years ago, Turkey has - much more attention is
paid to Turkey today.
SERGE:
Yeah, hi. Thanks for being able to have me comment. I guess that the real issue
is the ability - the U.S.'s ability to be both able and willing to influence a
Palestinian state. And while they have a lot of leverage with Israel with $3
billion a year of support, given the hard-line government in Israel, it's
questionable to what extent they're really able to affect change. But I think
what's more important with the vote coming up this week is exposing the U.S.'s
willingness to affect change.
the U.S. in dilemma
KHALIDI:
Well, United States is between a rock and a hard place. The rock is the
domestic realities where Israel is concerned, where, basically, the
Israeli position is the bottom line. Whatever position an Israeli
government takes is the bottom line for whatever administration is in office.
And the hard place is that the Middle East is a
much less-forgiving zone of American hypocrisy - you know, rhetoric
in favor of self-determination, but voting against a Palestinian
state at the United Nations.
EU and the Middle East – energy and
emigration
It's
not an enviable place that this administration is in, and it's the political
realities, and this kind of - the domestic the political realities in this
country and our inability to understand that this is really a foreign policy
problem, that this is not - and that there are very important interests to the
United States. The Europeans understand it better, I think,
because their energy dependence on them, at least, is much
greater. And they're much more concerned about emigration from
the Middle East to Europe, though the Europeans have not yet gotten their act
together and put together a coherent unified European policy.
the far too right Israeli incumbent government
And
here's an email from Blake in San Antonio: The only thing that will truly
change things regarding the relationship between the Palestinians and the
Israelis is an overhaul of the structure of the government in Israel. Because
of proportional representation the far-right, ultra-religious
parties have way too much power in relationship to their numbers.
That's informing every coalition, even the government of Benjamin Netanyahu, as
to attract much smaller parties who then are further to the right than they
are.
Palestinians without a strategic vision
for where they would go
KHALIDI:
Well, I would add to that that there's a problem on the Palestinian side, which
is you haven't had elections recently. You have two factions, both of which - Fatah
and Hamas, both of which, I think, have pretty much failed to put
forward any kind of strategic vision for where the Palestinians
would go, any kind of idea of how they achieve and end the occupation
and other Palestinian national goals, and where you need to have a Palestinian
leadership that can appeal to the rest of the world, including to Israelis, and
at the same time can put pressure on the United States, on Israel, on - to
change the status quo.
I
don't think Hamas and I don't think Fatah has the slightest notion of how to go
about it, very frankly. This U.N. initiative has moved things off - out of a
situation of stagnation. But at the end of the day, as I said, and as I think
many people would agree, this is not going to lead to an end of occupation.
This is not going to lead to Palestinian statehood. It's not going to lead to
the rollback of settlements. And Palestinians have to think about how to
achieve that, and that requires some very hard thinking.
It
does - I agree with the questioner. It will require Israelis understanding that
the situation they're in, which they seem to think it can be maintained
indefinitely, vis-a-vis the occupation of four million people and controlling
their lives. We're now going on 45 years. We're in the 45th year of an
occupation. And most Israelis don't seem to think that this is a critical
problem. That has to change. And I agree. The system in Israel, like many good
systems in democratic countries, unfortunately, doesn't enable dissatisfaction
with that to break through.
’67 borders
KHALIDI:
.. he asked multiple interesting questions. The one that I would focus on is if
the '67 borders aren't a basis, then what should be the
basis? (anybody who puts it that way is going to have to answer
that question, as well. And why should the Palestinians accept that?)
if we're going to throw out the
U.N. charter and everything that has emerged since World War II in the
way of international law and say that conquest is a basis to
throw out U.N. Security Council Resolution 242, the acquisition of territory by
force is perfectly okay.
.. but where are the borders
of this Israel state, and what precisely are the Palestinians supposed to
accept? What scraps are, in fact, supposedly sufficient for them? And anybody
who puts it that way is going to have to answer that question, as well. And why
should the Palestinians accept that?
Hamas designated by the US as terrorist
CONAN:
Hamas is considered a terrorist organization by the State
Department.
KHALIDI:
That is absolutely correct. And, of course, we have a very skewed
definition of what's terrorist. We had a war between - war in which Israel
waged on Gaza in 2008, 2009. There were 1,400 people killed in Gaza. There
were 13 Israelis killed, and we castigate Hamas as a terrorist
organization. I think that that's an American political determination
of what is terrorist, unfortunately.
I
agree any attacks on unarmed civilians should be correctly be defined as
terrorist. But, in that case, everybody who attacks unarmed civilians - and
that includes, in this case, the death of most those civilian - most of those
people were civilians, in my view.
Israel
Braces For Palestinian Statehood Bid ,
September
18, 2011
Host
Audie Cornish talks about the
possible repercussions of the Palestinians' statehood bid with Michael Oren, the
Israeli ambassador to the United States
AUDIE
CORNISH, host: Israel's ambassador to the United States, Michael Oren, says ..
Palestinians .. statehood bid
at the U.N., .. will jeopardize
the existing agreements between the Palestinian Authority, Israel and the United States.
Ambassador
MICHAEL OREN: The United States and Israel have numerous agreements with the
Palestinian Authority, established under the 1993 Oslo Accords. The
United States is a co-signatory to those accords between Israel and the
Palestinians. Great number of agreements that cover a wide range of issues;
trade issues, water rights, security. We have all these agreements with the Palestinian Authority.
We
have no agreements with a government of Palestine, and neither
does the United States. So the emergence of a government of Palestine in place
of the Palestinian Authority would place all of these pre-existing agreements
in jeopardy.
CORNISH:
What are the other repercussions that Israel is considering? I know, in the
United States, Congress is talking about what to do with the aid to the Palestinian Authority, which is about five hundred million dollars annually.
OREN:
Well, Congress is indeed talking about that. They're talking about cutting off
that aid because the Palestinians have violated their agreements, also by going
to the U.N. And also by making a reconciliation pact with Hamas, which is
listed by the United States as a terrorist organization.
Beyond
that we are preparing a number of possible reactions - a toolbox, if you will.
We fear that there will be large-scale demonstrations in the
West Bank orchestrated by the Palestinian Authority, and we don't
want these to be confused with the Arab Spring. This is not
about jobs or opportunity. This is about attacking
Israel, and we're preparing our security forces and some of our
citizens to deal with those demonstrations through nonlethal means.
And
that's a fear.
CORNISH:
Are you saying this is about attacking Israel. But,
of course, the argument from the Palestinian Authority is that this is a move for recognition that would bring some kind of parity or equitable role for them within peace talks.
OREN:
Well, they haven't been at peace talks. We've been waiting for them to come to
the negotiating table for about two and a half years now, and they haven't come
to the negotiating table.
Our
position was and remains: We are ready to negotiate with the Palestinians at
any time, any place - whether in Ramallah or in Jerusalem - without
preconditions on all the core issues to reach a two-state solution, a
Palestinian state, an Israeli-Jewish state, living side by side in mutual recognition,
security and peace, if only the Palestinians will come back to the negotiating
table.
CORNISH:
But negotiations have essentially been stalled for various
reasons. And in effect, isn't what they're doing actually in some ways
succeeding in goosing this conversation forward?
OREN:
Well, I think it's actually stopping the conversation dead, Audie. You know,
when you go to negotiations you have to be able to give up a few things.
Palestinian leaders are going to come to their people and say, we're going to
have to give up a lot, but we're going to be getting something from it. We're
going to be getting a Palestinian state. The Palestinian people will come back
to leaders and say, but wait a minute, we already have a Palestinian state. Why
are you making all these sacrifices?
So
essentially, by getting a Palestinian state unilaterally recognized without
paying any price for it in the U.N., the Palestinians will hamstring their
ability to make negotiations and make concessions, maybe for generations to
come. It'll be very tragic.
Jimmy
Carter: 'No Downside' to Palestine Statehood
September
18, 2011
Former President Jimmy Carter urges
the United States
to not veto the Security Council vote for
Palestinian statehood anticipated to take place next week.
Carter
admits that for President Obama, failure to veto "would have some adverse
effects perhaps on his political future."
But
he thinks it's a price worth paying. His predecessor Harry Truman backed the
creation of Israel for moral reasons, against the advice of his inner circle.
Harry
Truman
backed the creation of Israel for moral reasons, against the advice of
his inner circle. Carter says that today, Palestinian statehood is "a
basic moral commitment" for the U.S.
In
1977, Carter became the first American president to call for the
creation of a Palestinian "homeland." He signed the Camp David
Accords, which established diplomatic relations between Egypt and Israel,
and called for self-governance of the Palestinian people.
The
statehood vote is largely symbolic, making Palestine akin to the Vatican.
Its greatest value, according to Carter, is to break the impasse in
negotiations for a two-state solution. Without a vote, Carter says, "the
only alternative is a maintenance of the status quo."
American
Presidents On Palestine
by
AARTI SHAHANI
September
18, 2011
In
1948, President Truman endorsed the creation of an Israeli state. Nearly three
decades later, before finalizing the Camp David accords, Jimmy Carter became
the first U.S. president to call for the creation of a Palestinian
"homeland." Presidents have put their own spins on that effort ever
since. Here's a sampling:
March
16, 1977 — Carter, at a town hall meeting in Massachusetts, said that after
Palestinians recognize Israel's right to exist, "There has to be a
homeland provided for the Palestinian refugees who have suffered for many, many
years."
Sept.
1, 1982 — Ronald Reagan: "The United States will not support the
establishment of an independent Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza,
and we will not support annexation or permanent control by Israel. ...
Self-government by the Palestinians of the West Bank and Gaza in association
with Jordan offers the best chance for a durable, just, and lasting
peace."
Oct.
30, 1991 — George H.W. Bush: "Throughout the Middle East, we seek a stable
and enduring settlement. We've not defined what this means; indeed, I make
these points with no map showing where the final borders are to be drawn.
Nevertheless, we believe territorial compromise is essential for peace."
Jan.
7, 2001 — Bill Clinton: "There can be no genuine resolution to the
conflict without a sovereign, viable Palestinian state that accommodates
Israelis' security requirements and the demographic realities."
June
24, 2002 — George W. Bush, outlining a new Middle East peace plan: "It is
untenable for Israeli citizens to live in terror. It is untenable for
Palestinians to live in squalor and occupation. ... My vision is two states,
living side by side in peace and security."
June
4, 2009 — Barack Obama, in Cairo: "The only resolution is for the
aspirations of both sides to be met through two states, where Israelis and
Palestinians each live in peace and security. ... Israelis must acknowledge
that just as Israel's right to exist cannot be denied, neither can Palestine's.
The United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli
settlements."
May
19, 2011 — Obama: "The borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on
the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps, so that secure and recognized
borders are established for both states. The Palestinian people must have the
right to govern themselves, and reach their potential, in a sovereign and
contiguous state."
