Israeli Complicity in the Delegitimization of the Settlements
A judge that applies an irrelevant rule to a legal situation or (inclusive 'or') does not apply a relevant rule is acting illegally. The security fence illustrates a general situation in which Israel's current legal system gives preference to the irrelevant Fourth Geneva Convention at the expense of Jewish national rights (JNR) according to the mandate of the League of Nations; rights that are still valid today. (For a brief summary of JNR see statements A and B in www.think-israel.org/shifftan.paradox.html. The legality of a security fence anywhere in Western Palestine follows as a trivial by-product of JNR; see paradox 1 in www.think-israel.org/shifftan.paradox.html.)
Even on the basis of self-defense alone Israel is allowed to locate the security fence anywhere in the West Bank. Instead, Israel's Supreme Court has instructed the state to reroute the security fence closer to the 1949 armistice lines on the basis of the application of the Fourth Geneva Convention to the territories. And Israel's Attorney General Menni Mazuz and his specially appointed team, headed by Dr. Shavit Matias, Deputy Attorney General, propose to adopt de jure the Fourth Geneva Convention in the territories. According to some reports, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon accepted Mazuz's recommendations.
It is mind-boggling that professional jurists in the Ministry of Justice can even contemplate the proposition of a multiply irrelevant-and-therefore-illegal framework, while ignoring the relevant one. Cynics might say that this is an example of a symbiosis between the current government and the legal system. But there is no doubt that such an action will substantially contribute to the perception of illegality of Jewish presence beyond the Green Line and this delegitimization will in turn make it easier to freeze and uproot existing settlements and to avoid building new ones; even as building settlements is an urgent mandatory requirement of current international law (the Mandate for Palestine).
Indeed, there is a method in the madness. Israel's ruling classes whip up external pressure and then cite this pressure as a cause for freezing and dismantling Jewish settlement in Judea, Samaria and Gaza. This procedure, hitherto used by bodies such as Peace Now, has reached government circles.
Ariel Sharon talked about the "kibbush" (occupation) and initiated/accepted the Road Map, instead of pointing out that previous US administrations objected to another Arab state west of the Jordan River. Such a state has never been a "vision" of an American administration. Ariel Sharon should have pointed out that such a state violates international law since according to this law, Jews exclusively were given political rights in Western Palestine. Having failed to do that, he can now point to his obligation to the Road Map as an excuse to freeze and dismantle settlements. And the American administration keeps reminding him that this is what is expected: a White House spokesman said that the goal is the "end of settlement activity consistent with their [the Israelis] obligations under the Road Map." (the Jewish Chronicle, 27.8.04) In fact, even in the framework of the Road Map, Sharon's eagerness to proceed with his proposesd evacuation is legally invalid, since the Road Map does not call for unilateral moves.
A large part of the fundamental work of the eminent professor of international law, Julius Stone, and other specialists, is devoted to showing that there is nothing in international law that requires Israel to accept and facilitate the establishment of an additional Arab state in Western Palestine, but, on the other hand, there is plenty in international law that require that at least all of Western Palestine be destined for a Jewish state.
President George W. Bush is proud to say, "I'm the first President ever to have articulated a position that there ought to be a Palestinian State. I believe that Palestinian state will emerge." (Time, September 6, 2004, p. 39) But in view of the fact that the strong men of his administration, Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, were described as very loyal friends of Israel, and that rewarding terror with illegal statehood is against the Bush doctrine of fighting terror, it is hard to imagine that the present American administration would have adopted the Road Map and the principle of the establishment of an Arab state in Western Palestine without the enthusiastic support of the Sharon-Peres-dominated Israeli government.
In a further move to deligitimize and weaken Jewish presence in the territories, Deputy Premier Ehud Olmert has agreed, reportedly against the advice of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom, to the European demand to mark products from the territories and to the ensuing higher tariff on these products. Again, there was no compelling need to do so and Israel could have continued to resist such demands. It is the same Deputy Prime Minister that has said: "There is no escape from the evacuation of settlements in order to prevent daily confrontation with the world." (Arutz-7 Radio on August 13, 2004) Prime Minister Sharon, too, has said that the "hitnatkut" (disengagement, read: retreat) will improve Israel's diplomatic position in the world. But to quote external pressure as a reason for uprooting Jewish settlements and at the same time to conceal the most relevant legal framework (JNR) is both illegal and hypocritical.
Typically, an extreme left-winger such Meron Benvenisti salivates at the prospect of Israel adopting de jure the Fourth Geneva Convention. He feels vindicated that the "false" legal structure that Israel has built for decades to hide its human rights violations in connection with Jewish settlement activity is now crumbling (Haaretz of August 25, 2004). Indeed many of the organizations hostile to Israel, such as Amnesty International, have based their labeling of the settlements as "illegal according to international law" on the Fourth Geneva Convention. In a rare recent occurrence, the ex-legal advisor of the Foreign Ministry, Dr. Meir Rosen, objected on Israel Radio to Amnesty labeling the settlements as illegal. But this is a rearguard action of the old guard.
It seems that, increasingly, the long-held position of Israel's Foreign Ministry, faithfully represented in Julius Stone's book entitled Israel and Palestine: Assault on the Law of Nations (Johns Hopkins University Press; 1981), according to which Israel has a right to sovereignty and legal annexation of the territories, is giving way to what was the position of a lunatic fringe in Israel itself and the position of foreign hostile bodies. If the position of the lunatic fringe will become mainstream, then the destruction of the Jewish state will advance by leaps and bounds.
The poet Nathan Alterman warned us that the loss of the belief in the justice of our cause is the main enemy of the Jewish state. It is therefore important to understand the traditional position of Israel about the multiple irrelevance and non-applicability de jure of the Fourth Geneva Convention to the post-1967 territories. Discourse 2 (pp 177-181) in Julius Stone's aforementioned book is devoted to this topic. His words of more than 20 years ago are just as relevant now as then (plus ca change plus c'est la meme chose).
[Part 1 of 3]
A judge that applies an irrelevant rule to a legal situation or (inclusive 'or') does not apply a relevant rule is acting illegally. The security fence illustrates a general situation in which Israel's current legal system gives preference to the irrelevant Fourth Geneva Convention at the expense of Jewish national rights (JNR) according to the mandate of the League of Nations; rights that are still valid today. (For a brief summary of JNR see statements A and B in www.think-israel.org/shifftan.paradox.html. The legality of a security fence anywhere in Western Palestine follows as a trivial by-product of JNR; see paradox 1 in www.think-israel.org/shifftan.paradox.html.)
Even on the basis of self-defense alone Israel is allowed to locate the security fence anywhere in the West Bank. Instead, Israel's Supreme Court has instructed the state to reroute the security fence closer to the 1949 armistice lines on the basis of the application of the Fourth Geneva Convention to the territories. And Israel's Attorney General Menni Mazuz and his specially appointed team, headed by Dr. Shavit Matias, Deputy Attorney General, propose to adopt de jure the Fourth Geneva Convention in the territories. According to some reports, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon accepted Mazuz's recommendations.
It is mind-boggling that professional jurists in the Ministry of Justice can even contemplate the proposition of a multiply irrelevant-and-therefore-illegal framework, while ignoring the relevant one. Cynics might say that this is an example of a symbiosis between the current government and the legal system. But there is no doubt that such an action will substantially contribute to the perception of illegality of Jewish presence beyond the Green Line and this delegitimization will in turn make it easier to freeze and uproot existing settlements and to avoid building new ones; even as building settlements is an urgent mandatory requirement of current international law (the Mandate for Palestine).
Indeed, there is a method in the madness. Israel's ruling classes whip up external pressure and then cite this pressure as a cause for freezing and dismantling Jewish settlement in Judea, Samaria and Gaza. This procedure, hitherto used by bodies such as Peace Now, has reached government circles.
Ariel Sharon talked about the "kibbush" (occupation) and initiated/accepted the Road Map, instead of pointing out that previous US administrations objected to another Arab state west of the Jordan River. Such a state has never been a "vision" of an American administration. Ariel Sharon should have pointed out that such a state violates international law since according to this law, Jews exclusively were given political rights in Western Palestine. Having failed to do that, he can now point to his obligation to the Road Map as an excuse to freeze and dismantle settlements. And the American administration keeps reminding him that this is what is expected: a White House spokesman said that the goal is the "end of settlement activity consistent with their [the Israelis] obligations under the Road Map." (the Jewish Chronicle, 27.8.04) In fact, even in the framework of the Road Map, Sharon's eagerness to proceed with his proposesd evacuation is legally invalid, since the Road Map does not call for unilateral moves.
A large part of the fundamental work of the eminent professor of international law, Julius Stone, and other specialists, is devoted to showing that there is nothing in international law that requires Israel to accept and facilitate the establishment of an additional Arab state in Western Palestine, but, on the other hand, there is plenty in international law that require that at least all of Western Palestine be destined for a Jewish state.
President George W. Bush is proud to say, "I'm the first President ever to have articulated a position that there ought to be a Palestinian State. I believe that Palestinian state will emerge." (Time, September 6, 2004, p. 39) But in view of the fact that the strong men of his administration, Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, were described as very loyal friends of Israel, and that rewarding terror with illegal statehood is against the Bush doctrine of fighting terror, it is hard to imagine that the present American administration would have adopted the Road Map and the principle of the establishment of an Arab state in Western Palestine without the enthusiastic support of the Sharon-Peres-dominated Israeli government.
In a further move to deligitimize and weaken Jewish presence in the territories, Deputy Premier Ehud Olmert has agreed, reportedly against the advice of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom, to the European demand to mark products from the territories and to the ensuing higher tariff on these products. Again, there was no compelling need to do so and Israel could have continued to resist such demands. It is the same Deputy Prime Minister that has said: "There is no escape from the evacuation of settlements in order to prevent daily confrontation with the world." (Arutz-7 Radio on August 13, 2004) Prime Minister Sharon, too, has said that the "hitnatkut" (disengagement, read: retreat) will improve Israel's diplomatic position in the world. But to quote external pressure as a reason for uprooting Jewish settlements and at the same time to conceal the most relevant legal framework (JNR) is both illegal and hypocritical.
Typically, an extreme left-winger such Meron Benvenisti salivates at the prospect of Israel adopting de jure the Fourth Geneva Convention. He feels vindicated that the "false" legal structure that Israel has built for decades to hide its human rights violations in connection with Jewish settlement activity is now crumbling (Haaretz of August 25, 2004). Indeed many of the organizations hostile to Israel, such as Amnesty International, have based their labeling of the settlements as "illegal according to international law" on the Fourth Geneva Convention. In a rare recent occurrence, the ex-legal advisor of the Foreign Ministry, Dr. Meir Rosen, objected on Israel Radio to Amnesty labeling the settlements as illegal. But this is a rearguard action of the old guard.
It seems that, increasingly, the long-held position of Israel's Foreign Ministry, faithfully represented in Julius Stone's book entitled Israel and Palestine: Assault on the Law of Nations (Johns Hopkins University Press; 1981), according to which Israel has a right to sovereignty and legal annexation of the territories, is giving way to what was the position of a lunatic fringe in Israel itself and the position of foreign hostile bodies. If the position of the lunatic fringe will become mainstream, then the destruction of the Jewish state will advance by leaps and bounds.
The poet Nathan Alterman warned us that the loss of the belief in the justice of our cause is the main enemy of the Jewish state. It is therefore important to understand the traditional position of Israel about the multiple irrelevance and non-applicability de jure of the Fourth Geneva Convention to the post-1967 territories. Discourse 2 (pp 177-181) in Julius Stone's aforementioned book is devoted to this topic. His words of more than 20 years ago are just as relevant now as then (plus ca change plus c'est la meme chose).
[Part 1 of 3]