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| Pâ•qidꞋ Yi•rᵊmᵊyâhꞋu |
2004.08.04 Shmuel Katz, The Jerusalem Post – Israel's hold on Judea and Samaria is emphatically not in contravention of international law. The law in question, The Fourth Geneva Convention, is simply not relevant to Israel. The convention, after all, defines its own scope in clear and simple language.
Clause 2 reads: "The present Convention should apply to cases of partial or total occupation of the territory of a High Contracting Party."
Israel captured the territory in question, Judea and Samaria (together with the Jordan Valley), from the Kingdom of Jordan in a war of defense in 1967. Jordan, far from being a High Contracting Party, was an illegal occupier of the territory, and had been ever since its illegal invasion of western 'Palestine' in 1948.
That crucial piece of information is conspicuously not discernible in the Hague judgment.
Indeed, once the judges did undertake a case of this nature they could be expected to delve into the unique history of the 'Palestinian' question, and the juridical aspects of that history. There is no sign that they made any such investigation.
Let us take a close look.
The last sovereign ruler of 'Palestine' was the Ottoman Turkish Empire, which was defeated in World War I. [And the Ottomans, like the Romans, were an illegal occupying foreign power!] Substantial areas of land in the Middle East fell into the hands of the victorious Allies, Britain and France. Under the auspices of the [bogus] League of Nations (set up after the war), allocations of lands were made to the Arabs and to the Jews.
These lands were to be administered by mandatory powers until they were deemed ripe for self-government: Britain over 'Palestine' and Mesopotamia (which is Iraq); and France over Syria and Lebanon.
The terms of the Mandate for 'Palestine' were unique. Its preamble establishes that the Mandatory Power was to put into effect the British Declaration of 1917 favoring the establishment of a national home for the Jewish people in 'Palestine'.
The preamble goes on to explain that "recognition has thereby been given to the historical connection of the Jewish people with 'Palestine' and to the grounds for reconstituting their national home in 'Palestine'.”
This recognition lends stress to the additional fact that, throughout the dynasties that ruled 'Palestine' over the centuries, no people except the Jews presented a national claim to 'Palestine'.
Later in the body of the text the Mandate lays on the administration the obligation to “encourage,” in the projected Jewish National Home, close settlement of the land, including state lands and waste lands."
On the eve of the Mandate's ratification, the British mandatory power excluded from the provisions on 'Palestine' three-quarters of the territory (all of 'Palestine' east of the Jordan) and handed them over to the Arabs. This territory ultimately became the Kingdom of Transjordan – [the 'Palestinian' State!!!]
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