Opinions of Peter Belmont
Speaking Truth to Power
| Shortcomings of the Avishai NYT proposal |
|
by Peter A. Belmont / 2011-02-08
The very interesting article by Bernard Avishai (Feb 7, NYT/IHT on-line) appears to be an attempt to resurrect the Israel/PA negotiations which were revealed in the Palestine Papers, proposals which seemed to many to represent a “sell-out” by the PLO/PA. LAND and POPULATION The Avishai article and its very informative—and much larger—map  alert the reader to three territories of great interest: (a) land of West Bank agreed to be transferred by PLO/PA to Israel (green on map); (b) land in Israel agreed to be transferred by Israel to PLO/PA in compensation for (a) (purple on map); and (c) a quite large territory in West Bank (yellow on the map) which Israel “claims” and as to which, apparently, no exchange has even provisionally been agreed. As to exchanges, I believe that elementary fairness requires that the land to be exchanged be of equal quality (whatever that may mean), but the lands proposed from transfer by Israel (colored purple on the map) seem to be located in the Negev Desert and not to be comparable, in quality, to the lands the PLO/PA is asked to cede. There is also the question of population. It would seem reasonable to require that the lands Israel seeks to gain and those it offers to cede contain an equal number of Israeli Jews, so that if Israeli Jews who illegally entered the occupied West Bank in 1967-present are to be accommodated, then the same number of Israeli Jews should be required to be removed from the land to be exchanged—dis-accommodated. Furthermore, there is no reason why the areas of the lands exchanged should be the same: because Israel is 78% of Mandatory Palestine, and the occupied Palestinian territories are 22% (or about 1/4 Israel’s size), the land exchange should be 4:1 Israeli territory for Palestinian territory. If this seems unfair, let Israel renounce all its settlements and take no territory whatever in the West Bank. After all, it is in no wise entitled to retain them. UNSC 242 made it clear that “the inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by war” is a principle of law. In short, land transfers should not be allowed to compound the injuries and injustices of 1948. INTERNATIONAL LAW AND JUSTICE As a believer in justice and law, I am upset at the idea that Israel should “get away” with ethnic cleansing (and land stealing) in 1948 and then get away with more land-stealing (1967-present). As to the latter, and ideally, Israel should be required to remove the settlers and dismantle the wall and the settlements BEFORE a peace treaty is fully negotiated—and certainly before it is signed. If the principle “pacta sunt servanda”—that the international law of belligerent occupation should be complied with—is ever to be restated by the international community, the time to do it is now, while there is still some occupied territory. To wait to restate this principle until after a peace treaty has been negotiated—and the presently occupied territories are no longer occupied—would make a mockery of the law. There is also the legal question of “return” and/or reparations for the Palestinian refugees from 1948. The Avishai article suggests that someone other than Israel should pay whatever reparations are to be paid to refugees who lost land in the 1948 Nakba. Equally important, Olmert proposed that all sides work with international bodies and financial institutions to establish an international fund to “generously compensate” refugees for their loss of property. He made it clear that Israel would help organize this fund. “In return for this,” Olmert said, “I expected a written commitment that this was the end of all claims and the end of the conflict.” This is an attempt to shift an economic burden to others from Israel—which alone benefited from the expulsions and non-readmittance of Palestinian refugees and from the seizure of their lands in 1948-1951. Even if donors could be found, this is fundamentally inequitable, as Israel retains the land it took but shakes off (in Arabic, “intifada”) the burden of paying for it. Typical Israeli chutzpah—but I digress.[1] Worse, Avishai’s article appears to suggest making a peace treaty which merely requests non-signatory third parties (international donors) to make good refugee land claims without compelling them to do so—leaving the important detail of reparations in lieu of “return” of Palestinians as a suggestion to the international community rather than as a promise or responsibility of Israel’s. Avishai’s proposal here, as elsewhere, is not ideal. A SUGGESTION TO ENERGIZE NEGOTIATION BY RESORT TO LAW But life and politics are never ideal. The so-called “peace process”, for example, has been dismally non-ideal (except for those who intended it to fail) because the Israelis have enjoyed the benefits of a quasi-peace-treaty (the occupation) without its costs (creation of a Palestinian state, removal of some settlers). The Palestinians have been under extreme pressure for 43 years whereas the Israelis have been on easy street for all those years. To energize the “peace process” what is needed is to equalize the pressure. Israelis must be as desirous of peace as the Palestinians are. One way toward the ideal would be for the UNSC to issue a strengthened form of UNSC 465 (1980). That resolution called for removal of all settlers and dismantling of all settlements. Today, in the 21st Century, and after Tunisia and Egypt’s eruptions, it should be strengthened by adding to it, first, a requirement that the separation wall be removed and, second, a meaningful regime of credible and stern sanctions in the event of (initial) performance-reluctance by Israel, with all removals and dismantlings to be completed over a one-year period on a schedule required to be published by Israel within one month of enactment of the resolution. Such UNSC action would not only begin the process of removal of the illegal Israeli settlement presence in the West Bank but would also, and not unimportantly, create a one-year window within which Israel and the PLO/PA might negotiate peace on a basis much more favorable to the Palestinians than the present, but by no means making retention by Israel of some settlements impossible. Such action by the UNSC would end Israel’s sense that it can defer peace without undesired consequences to itself—that it can “have its cake and eat it.” It would also put the international community, necessarily led by the USA, into a stance firmly supportive of the “rule of law”, a stance to which much of that community would be glad to return after 43 years of exclusion (due to the USA’s oft-repeated use of its pro-Israel veto in the UNSC). RATIFICATION BY ISRAEL Furthermore, it should be noted that it is not merely the Palestinians who have a hard job ahead of them to persuade their people to ratify whatever draft peace treaty may evolve. The Israelis themselves have a difficult internal political problem where the removal of settlers (and renouncing the dream of greater Israel) is proposed for agreement. If you doubt this, have a look here. Any Israeli government proposing a peace treaty which renounces greater Israel and calls most of the settlers home (and undertakes the not inconsiderable expenses of building new housing for the returning settlers) will need help. Although such “help” might take the form of a financial gift “carrot” to Israel—by the USA?—it might also take the form of a sanctions-enforced “stick” such as I now propose. Or, of course, both. Were the Israelis “under the gun” of a UNSC resolution calling for removal of all settlers and dismantling of the wall and of all settlement buildings—the resolution energized by a regime of sanctions upon non-performance by Israel—the Israeli negotiators would have a “lever” to secure agreement (ratification) from the Israeli public, a lever they do not have as long as the USA maintains that negotiation must—so far as Israelis are concerned—be a strictly voluntary and uncoerced affair. And this “lever” would in no way be unfair to Israel, nor de-legitimizing of Israel, because it would merely be requiring Israel to do what the law requires. Far from de-legitimizing Israel, it is hard to imagine any step more legitimizing of Israel than for it to assert that it is, and intends to be, a law-abiding member of the community of nations. That assertion cannot be credited now, or at any time since 1967, since Israel at that time took its capture of the occupied territories as a license to violate international law with impunity. Compliance by Israel with international law (to the extent of removing illegal settlers, illegal settlements, and the illegal wall), if done only under compulsion, would do little to repair Israel’s pariah status, but it would be better than nothing. And it would be far better than the situation which has prevailed from 1967 until today. ----------- [1] It should be recalled that the expulsion of the Palestinians, and their non-readmittance, in 1948, was the result of a voluntary act of the Jewish population of Palestine. They were under no obligation to seize territory for a Jewish State. They did so as a freely chosen act of aggression against the Palestinians, among whom they might have lived comfortably—and without making war—had they not demanded unlimited Jewish immigration. It is well understood that they did so because of European anti-Semitic violence, but the Palestinians were not responsible for that violence and should not have had to pay the high price that they in fact paid. Israel profited from the land it (illegally) seized and should pay for it. |
Comments:
Submit a comment, subject to review:
|
123pab.com | Top
©2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024 www.123pab.com |