Palestinian land annexation unlawful
PLAN SERIOUS VIOLATION OF LAW, ENVOY TELLS UN COUNCIL
Israel must abandon threat, says UN Middle East envoy
Israel must abandon its threat to annex parts of the occupied West Bank, the UN Middle East envoy said yesterday, branding such a plan as a serious violation of international law that would “close the door to a renewal of negotiations.”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said cabinet discussions would begin on July 1 on his plan to extend Israeli sovereignty to territory Palestinians want for their own state. There is no publicly stated deadline for annexation of land that Israel captured in 1967.
‘Devastating blow’
“The continuing threat of annexation by Israel of parts of the West Bank would constitute a most serious violation of international law, deal a devastating blow to the two-state solution, close the door to a renewal of negotiations,” UN Middle East envoy Nickolay Mladenov told the Security Council.
“Israel must abandon its threat of annexation. And the Palestinian leadership to reengage with all members of the quartet,” he said, referring to the United States, Russia, the European Union and the United Nations.
Mladenov urged the 15-member council to back a push by UN chief Antonio Guterres against unilateral steps that would hinder diplomatic efforts to renew negotiations between the Israelis and the Palestinians.
Such a statement by the council is unlikely as it has to be agreed by consensus and the USA traditionally shields its ally Israel from any action. Mladenov urged the quartet to “come forward with a proposal that will enable the quartet to take up its mediation role.”
Meanwhile, Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas has warned that Israeli annexations in the occupied West Bank would spell the end of all security coordination, as international opposition to the plans grows.
Biden opposes plan
US Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden on Tuesday became the latest high-profile figure to oppose Netanyahu’s plan to apply Israeli sovereignty to Jewish colonies and the strategic Jordan Valley, which makes up around 30 per cent of the occupied West Bank. Palestinians say any annexation would put an end to their hopes of an independent state alongside Israel, the so-called two-state solution.
In a speech late Tuesday, Abbas said the annexation plans showed Israel was no longer abiding by peace accords between the two.
France, meanwhile, is working with European partners to come up with a joint action plan for prevention and reprisal should Israel make such a move, France’s foreign minister said yesterday.
“For the past few days we have held several video conferences with European colleagues ... with a view to deciding on a joint preventive action and eventually a reprisal if such a decision were taken,” Jean-Yves Le Drian said at a parliament hearing.
Anew unity government has been installed in Israel, set to govern for 36 months with the premiership shifting hands between Benjamin Netanyahu of the Likud Party and Benny Gantz of Blue and White. The agreement stipulates the operation of an emergency government in order to focus specifically on the coronavirus pandemic — with the singular exception of a possible vote on annexation of West Bank territory as early as July 1.
The urgency surrounding annexation reflects a desire to capitalise on the Trump administration’s “Deal of the Century,” which unilaterally consolidates all of Israel’s territorial takings over the past five decades. The plan cements the containment of Palestinians within a series of 115 bantustans and signals the irreversible death of a viable Palestinian state. And while the acquisition of territory by force is a war crime, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo referred to it as a matter of Israeli prerogative.
Many believe that the move would make clear Israel’s intention to oversee an “apartheid-like reality.”
The reality on the ground already reflects de facto annexation of Palestinian lands. Trump and Netanyahu’s plan for de jure annexation is based on decades of harmful US policy in the region, including the bilateral peace process, constructed by political centrists.
Since 1967, successive US administrations have insisted that colonies are contrary to international law and counterproductive to peace. In practice, each has provided Israel with unequivocal financial, diplomatic and military support, enabling it to expand and entrench its sprawling settlercolonial enterprise. Even the Carter administration, responsible for the 1978 State Department legal opinion that colonies in occupied territories are “inconsistent with international law,” only slapped Israel on the wrist when Menachem Begin accelerated colony expansion in 1977.
Diplomatic immunity
Continued unequivocal US support includes diplomatic immunity for Israel in the international community. In accordance with the land-for-peace arrangement enshrined in United Nations Security Council Resolution 242, the United States framed international law as an impediment to negotiations and used its Security Council veto 43 times between 1967 and 2017 to shield Israel from international accountability.
Even when the United States withholds its veto, as the Obama administration did when it abstained on UNSC Resolution 2334 condemning the colonies, it ensures the immutability of Israeli colonies. Just three months before the Security Council vote, President Barack Obama increased military funding to Israel from $30 billion (Dh110 billion) to $38 billion over a 10-year period.
As the self-appointed sole broker for peace, the United States only furthers Israel’s expansionist interests. As put by Aaron David Miller, who served six US secretaries of state on Arab-Israeli negotiations, the United States has operated more like “Israel’s attorney ... at the expense of peace negotiations.”
Contrary to what political centrists would like to believe, the “Deal of the Century” is a culmination of US policy. Similarly, Israel’s annexation scheme reflects a territorial reality ushered by the peace process.
The 60 per cent of the West Bank territory that Israel seeks to annex is known as Area C, a jurisdictional category invented by “Oslo II,” the 1995 Interim Agreement. According to the World Bank, Area C contains “the majority of the West Bank’s natural resources” and could generate up to $3.4 billion for the Palestinian economy. Since 1995, under the cover of peacemaking, Israel has steadily removed Palestinians from Area C and concentrated them into Areas A and B, expanding its colony enterprise in their place. According to the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights,
Palestinians now have access to less than 1 per cent of Area C lands.
Concern about Israel’s impending annexation of the West Bank is rightly placed, but we should be honest about how we got here. Formal annexation is the predictable outcome of decades of unequivocal support for Israeli policies and is simply a rubber stamp for Israel’s de facto annexation of Palestinian lands, as well as its current administration of a separate-and-unequal apartheid regime.
The calls for accountability from liberal quarters are inexcusably late but should not now be contingent on Israel’s next move. Palestinians can tell you that the worst-case scenario already exists: As non-sovereigns of their own state and non-citizens of Israel, they are subjected to perpetual Israeli domination. It is past time to censure Israel, by conditioning US funding at a minimum, and to reckon with US responsibility for this outcome by abandoning the bilateral framework in favour of an internationalist approach.