Love of the Land: Correcting President Obama: 242 does not set the size of the land mass under Arab control (Update)

Correcting President Obama: 242 does not set the size of the land mass under Arab control (Update)

Dr. Aaron Lerner
IMRA
22 May 2011

Speaking at the AIPAC Conference in Washington President Obama argued that by mentioning land swaps, President Obama did not actually call for Israel to withdraw to the indefensible '67 lines since Israel can trade [off huge chunks of the Negev] to avoid the '67 line.

But that's not really the point.

The point is that President Obama handed the Palestinians a tremendous concession by embracing the Palestinian assertion that it somehow has the implicit right to every square millimeter beyond the Green Line and thus must be compensated on a 1:1 basis for any adjustment to the line so that the final land mass under its control remains the same.

This was not - repeat not - the meaning of UNSC 242.

And the record on this is absolutely clear.

The framers of 242 were well aware that secure borders for Israel would be achieved by Israel retaining territory beyond the '67 lines - and this without any requirement of some quid pro quo in return to the Arabs to somehow compensate for the retention of said land.

[See below for references]

There is no reference in the series of Oslo documents, that serve as the basis and framework continuing from 242, to the concept that the size of the land mass to be ultimately under Palestinian control is not subject tonegotiation.

Again.

Let there be no confusion here.

Israel never asked President Obama to say that he endorses Israel swapping the Negev for parts of the West Bank.

Israel has instead every right to make it crystal clear that we completely reject attempts to change the rules of the game - in particular after we have made so very many extremely painful and expensive concessions based onpromises and commitments regarding the rules of the game.

Let's not forget that the tens of thousands of assault rifle armed Palestinians are deployed today in the West Bank along with many thousands of rockets in the Gaza Strip along with Israeli graveyards packed with "sacrifices for peace" because we decided to take a chance for peace and lifted Yasser Arafat from the dung heap of history - bringing him from his exile in Tunis. Israel's security situation at the time was nothing short of fantastic.

Each month the size of the "terrorist wanted list" got shorter as Israeli security forces captured or killed terrorists faster that the Arabs could produce new one.

Nothing on the Arab side compelled Israel to agree to Oslo.

President Obama argues that some previously democratically elected Israeli Governments engaged in negotiations that reflected the concept that any change from the '67 lines would be offset with transferring sovereign Israeli land to the Palestinians.

But that's not the point.

These negotiations were not concluded.

And in point of fact, the Israelis engaged in negotiations warned their Palestinian counterparts that if they failed to cut a deal with them before Israeli elections they ran the very real risk that the Israeli democratic process would erase whatever gains they may have made in talks not finalized.

Because while we cannot rescind a treaty we have already signed via the ballot box, we can most certainly revise our negotiating positions.

And that is just what we did.

So when President Obama tells Israelis that former PM Olmert embraced the positions he now wishes to dictate, we Israelis have a simple answer: Olmert's Kadima Party is not in power.

The Palestinians walked away from Olmert "negotiating stall" and thought he [or Livni who replaced him at the head of Kadima]would keep offering more. But instead the Israeli People spoke on Israeli election day and put a coalition headed by Binyamin Netanyahu in charge.

Israel has absolutely no obligation to promise the Palestinians that they will end up with a land mass equal in size to every square millimeter beyond the Green Line.

242, and in turn Oslo, never predetermined the size of the land mass under Palestinian control.

That, like everything else is a matter for negotiations - not American dictate.

======================================



Statements Clarifying the Meaning of U.N. Security Council Resolution 242
http://www.mfa.gov.il/mfa/peace%20process/guide%20to%20the%20peace%20process/statements%20clarifying%20the%20meaning%20of%20un%20security%20c


Even before the beginning of the Jarring Mission (the Special Representative as mentioned in the Resolution), the Arab States insisted that Security Council Resolution 242 called for a total withdrawal of Israeli forces from territories occupied in the Six-Day War. Israel held that the withdrawal phrase in the Resolution was not meant to refer to a total withdrawal. Following are statements including the interpretations of various delegations to Resolution 242:



A. United Kingdom


Lord Caradon, sponsor of the draft that was about to be adopted, stated, before the vote in the Security Council on Resolution 242:

"... the draft Resolution is a balanced whole. To add to it or to detract from it would destroy the balance and also destroy the wide measure of agreement we have achieved together. It must be considered as a whole as it stands. I suggest that we have reached the stage when most, if not all, of us want the draft Resolution, the whole draft Resolution and nothing but the draft Resolution." (S/PV 1382, p. 31, of 22.11.67)

Lord Caradon, interviewed on Kol Israel in February 1973:

Question: "This matter of the (definite) article which is there in French and is missing in English, is that really significant?"

Answer: "The purposes are perfectly clear, the principle is stated in the preamble, the necessity for withdrawal is stated in the operative section. And then the essential phrase which is not sufficiently recognized is that withdrawal should take place to secure and recognized boundaries, and these words were very carefully chosen: they have to be secure and they have to be recognized. They will not be secure unless they are recognized. And that is why one has to work for agreement. This is essential. I would defend absolutely what we did. It was not for us to lay down exactly where the border should be. I know the 1967 border very well. It is not a satisfactory border, it is where troops had to stop in 1947, just where they happened to be that night, that is not a permanent boundary... "

Mr. Michael Stewart, Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, in reply to a question in Parliament, 17 November 1969:

Question: "What is the British interpretation of the wording of the 1967 Resolution? Does the Right Honourable Gentleman understand it to mean that the Israelis should withdraw from all territories taken in the late war?"

Mr. Stewart: "No, Sir. That is not the phrase used in the Resolution. The Resolution speaks of secure and recognized boundaries. These words must be read concurrently with the statement on withdrawal."

Mr. Michael Stewart, Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, in a reply to a question in Parliament, 9 December 1969:

"As I have explained before, there is reference, in the vital United Nations Security Council Resolution, both to withdrawal from territories and to secure and recognized boundaries. As I have told the House previously, we believe that these two things should be read concurrently and that the omission of the word 'all' before the word 'territories' is deliberate."

Mr. George Brown, British Foreign Secretary in 1967, on 19 January 1970:

"I have been asked over and over again to clarify, modify or improve the wording, but I do not intend to do that. The phrasing of the Resolution was very carefully worked out, and it was a difficult and complicated exercise to get it accepted by the UN Security Council. "I formulated the Security Council Resolution. Before we submitted it to the Council, we showed it to Arab leaders. The proposal said 'Israel will withdraw from territories that were occupied', and not from 'the' territories, which means that Israel will not withdraw from all the territories." (The Jerusalem Post, 23.1.70)

B. United States of America

Mr. Arthur Goldberg, US representative, in the Security Council in the course of the discussions which preceded the adoption of Resolution 242:

"To seek withdrawal without secure and recognized boundaries ... would be just as fruitless as to seek secure and recognized boundaries without withdrawal. Historically, there have never been secure or recognized boundaries in the area. Neither the armistice lines of 1949 nor the cease-fire lines of 1967 have answered that description... such boundaries have yet to be agreed upon. An agreement on that point is an absolute essential to a just and lasting peace just as withdrawal is... " (S/PV. 1377, p. 37, of 15. 11.67)

President Lyndon Johnson, 10 September 1968:

"We are not the ones to say where other nations should draw lines between them that will assure each the greatest security. It is clear, however, that a return to the situation of 4 June 1967 will not bring peace. There must be secure and there must be recognized borders. Some such lines must be agreed to by the neighbours involved."

Mr. Joseph Sisco, Assistant Secretary of State, 12 July 1970 (NBC "Meet the Press"):

"That Resolution did not say 'withdrawal to the pre-June 5 lines'. The Resolution said that the parties must negotiate to achieve agreement on the so-called final secure and recognized borders. In other words, the question of the final borders is a matter of negotiations between the parties."

Eugene V. Rostow, Professor of Law and Public Affairs, Yale University, who, in 1967, was US Under-Secretary of State for Political Affairs:

a) "... Paragraph 1 (i) of the Resolution calls for the withdrawal of Israeli armed forces 'from territories occupied in the recent conflict', and not 'from the territories occupied in the recent conflict'. Repeated attempts to amend this sentence by inserting the word 'the' failed in the Security Council. It is, therefore, not legally possible to assert that the provision requires Israeli withdrawal from all the territories now occupied under the cease-fire resolutions to the Armistice Demarcation lines." (American Journal of International Law, Volume 64, September 1970, p. 69)

b) "The agreement required by paragraph 3. of the Resolution, the Security Council said, should establish 'secure and recognized boundaries' between Israel and its neighbours 'free from threats or acts of force', to replace the Armistice Demarcation lines established in 1949, and the cease-fire lines of June 1967. The Israeli armed forces should withdraw to such lines as part of a comprehensive agreement, settling all the issues mentioned in the Resolution, and in a condition of peace." (American Journal of International Law, Volume 64, September 1970, p. 68)

C. USSR

Mr. Vasily Kuznetsov said in discussions that preceded the adoption of Resolution 242:

"... Phrases such as 'secure and recognized boundaries'. What does that mean? What boundaries are these? Secure, recognized - by whom, for what? Who is going to judge how secure they are? Who must recognize them? ... There is certainly much leeway for different interpretations which retain for Israel the right to establish new boundaries and to withdraw its troops only as far as the lines which it judges convenient." (S/PV. 1373, p. 112, of 9.11.67)

D. Brazil

Mr. Geraldo de Carvalho Silos, Brazilian representative, speaking in the Security Council after the adoption of Resolution 242:

"We keep constantly in mind that a just and lasting peace in the Middle East has necessarily to be based on secure, permanent boundaries freely agreed upon and negotiated by the neighbouring States." (S/PV. 1382, p. 66, 22.11.67)

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Love of the Land: Correcting President Obama: 242 does not set the size of the land mass under Arab control (Update)

Love of the Land: Where Is the Knesset?

Where Is the Knesset?

Elliott Abrams
The Weekly Standard
21 May '11

http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/where-knesset_567623.html?nopager=1

In what country is the Knesset? That sounds like a rhetorical question, akin to the one Groucho Marx would ask losers on his TV show so they would get a consolation prize: “who’s buried in Grant’s tomb?”

Yet it seems that this question has stumped the State Department. It does not know or will not say what country the Knesset is in, nor—one must assume—does it know what country the prime minister’s office, the Israel Museum, or especially the Western Wall are in. The proof is in a remarkable press release from State about the travels of Deputy Secretary James Steinberg. The May 18 release, in toto, is as follows:

Deputy Secretary of State James Steinberg visits Israel, Jerusalem and the West Bank May 18-19, 2011. In Israel, Deputy Secretary Steinberg met with Israeli academic and student leaders. In the West Bank, he met with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and other Palestinian officials. Among other issues, he discussed moving forward on Middle East peace as well as the recent fundamental changes in the region and the United States’ response to them. On May 19, he will participate in the U.S.-Israel Strategic Dialogue. The Strategic Dialogue allows senior U.S. and Israeli leaders to discuss, on a regular basis and in depth, the many issues that affect our mutual security and partnership.

I suppose the poor benighted Israelis believed they were hosting Steinberg in their country when he visited government offices. But he knew better. What makes this especially egregious is that Israeli government offices—where Mr. Steinberg would have had his official meetings—are actually in west Jerusalem, the portion Israel controlled even before 1967. Yet the Clinton State Department is apparently unwilling to call even that portion of the city "Israel."



This has not always been the position of the United States government. On May 18, 2008, exactly three years before the Steinberg announcement, the Bush White House issued a press release beginning as follows: “The President and Mrs. Bush will travel to Israel, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt from May 13-18, 2008. In Israel, the President will meet with President Peres and Prime Minister Olmert and address the Knesset.” So foolish and ignorant, so consumed by pro-Israel bias, was the Bush administration that it obviously believed the Knesset to be in Israel.

There is a very serious point here. In the last two days we have seen considerable debate over the so-called “1967 borders,” and President Obama said that “We believe the borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps.” Those swaps are usually said to be needed to take account of settlement activity in the years since 1967, but that is entirely wrong. Indeed, the entire position that the basis must be “1967 lines” is wrong, for several reasons.

The first is historical: this has not been the American position and it constitutes a damaging abandonment of our traditional support for Israel.

As Glenn Kessler pointed out in his “Fact Checker” blog the Washington Post, in September 1968 President Johnson said: “It is clear, however, that a return to the situation of 4 June 1967 will not bring peace. There must be secure and there must be recognized borders.” President Reagan said, in September 1982: “In the pre-1967 borders, Israel was barely ten miles wide at its narrowest point. The bulk of Israel’s population lived within artillery range of hostile armies. I am not about to ask Israel to live that way again.” Reagan’s secretary of State, George Shultz, was equally categorical in September 1988: “Israel will never negotiate from or return to the 1967 borders.” Citations from Presidents Clinton and Bush make the same points.

The second reason is legal. U.N. Security Council Resolution 242 did not require that Israel withdraw, after the 1967 war of aggression against it, from every inch it had captured, but rather from some of it. The resolution said Israel should have “secure and recognized boundaries” and obviously contemplated changes in the 1949 armistice lines that had existed until the 1967 war broke out. Put another way, Resolution 242 can be said to have viewed the 1949 armistice lines—which President Obama called “the 1967 lines”—as delineating a minimum Israeli territory, to which more would now be added.

The third reason is security, for the reasons Presidents Johnson and Reagan, as well as George W. Bush and Secretary of State Shultz, well understood. We should not be asking an ally to begin the negotiation from the assumption that every deviation from the 1949 armistice lines is wrong, is a problem, is a virtual act of aggression, when we know full well that the 1949 armistice lines are simply not the secure and defensible borders we have long said we support.

The fourth reason is what might be called logic, or common sense, or realism. While Deputy Secretary Steinberg and Secretary Clinton’s State Department may believe that the Western Wall of the ancient Temple is actually not in Israel, and are apparently unwilling to confirm that the Knesset and prime minister’s office are in Israel, it’s an unsustainable position. It is a ludicrous, insulting, morally untenable position. I urge some member of Congress to put this to the Secretary Clinton at her next appearance, or some journalist to ask it of her at her next press conference: “In what country is the Knesset? And in what country is the Western Wall of the Temple?”

What is striking about all four reasons that the “1967 lines” cannot be the basis for negotiations is that they have nothing to do with settlements. All existed before there was one single settlement. It would be wrong to ask Israel to negotiate from the 1949 armistice lines even if not one settlement had been built.

We should not be asking Israel to negotiate for the Knesset or the Western Wall, nor treating the 1949 armistice lines as if they were holy ordinances laid down in the Bible. Those lines were the product of war. And Israel’s control of Sinai and Gaza, which it has given up, and of the West Bank, which it still controls, are and were equally the products of aggressive war aimed at eliminating the Jewish State. To call for negotiations is fair. To burden an ally by weakening its negotiating position is not. The Knesset is in Israel, and the Western Wall is in Israel, and the sooner the Obama administration realizes this, the closer it will be to a Middle East policy worthy of our country and its long alliance with our ally in Jerusalem—which is, actually, the capital of the state of Israel.

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Love of the Land: Where Is the Knesset?

Love of the Land: The Value of an International Guarantee

The Value of an International Guarantee

Evelyn Gordon
Contentions/Commentary
23 November 09

Yesterday, I noted that a UN Security Council endorsement of “a two-state solution based on the June 4, 1967 borders,” such as Mahmoud Abbas is seeking, would radically alter the existing international position, prejudice the outcome of negotiations, and probably spark an escalating war of unilateral moves and countermoves. But it would also have another deleterious effect: it would provide further proof that international guarantees to Israel are worthless. And because reliable international guarantees will be a necessary part of any Israeli-Palestinian agreement, this would make a deal significantly less likely.

After all, Resolution 242 was the strongest international guarantee anyone could hope for: a binding Security Council resolution that, as explained yesterday, explicitly assured Israel that it would not have to withdraw to the 1967 lines. And all subsequent Israeli governments relied on this assurance: while Labor and Likud governments disagreed over where Israel’s final border should run, each built settlements in those areas they thought Israel would retain under any peace deal.

Thus if the Security Council were to change its mind now and retroactively invalidate the guarantee it gave Israel in 242, it could clearly change its mind on anything — meaning that Israel could not rely on any international guarantee it might receive as part of a final-status deal.

(Continue article)

Love of the Land: The Value of an International Guarantee

Love of the Land: Unilateral Moves and Countermoves

Unilateral Moves and Countermoves

Evelyn Gordon
Contentions/Commentary
22 November 09

Interviewed by BBC Arabic this weekend, Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas denied reports that he would seek UN Security Council approval for unilaterally declaring a Palestinian state. Rather, he said, “We will turn to the United Nations and the Security Council to strengthen what has been agreed on in the road map and approved by the Security Council, a two-state solution based on the June 4, 1967 borders.”

That may sound innocuous. But in fact, Security Council acquiescence to this proposal would both radically alter the current international position and demolish the already faltering principle that the talks’ outcome should not be prejudiced by unilateral action.

While most of the world already believes the 1967 lines should be the final border, the formal basis for the talks remains Security Council Resolution 242, which says no such thing. This resolution purposefully required an Israeli withdrawal only from “territories” captured in 1967, not “the territories” or “all the territories.” As Lord Caradon, the British UN ambassador who drafted 242, explained, “It would have been wrong to demand that Israel return to its positions of June 4, 1967, because those positions were undesirable and artificial.” America’s then UN ambassador, Arthur Goldberg, similarly said the two omitted words “were not accidental …. the resolution speaks of withdrawal from occupied territories without defining the extent of withdrawal.” This was equally clear to the Soviet Union and Arab states, which is why they unsuccessfully pushed to include those extra words.

(Full article)

Love of the Land: Unilateral Moves and Countermoves

Love of the Land: Ha'aretz Errs on U.N. Resolution 242

Ha'aretz Errs on U.N. Resolution 242

TS
CAMERA/Snapshots
10 November 09

Ha'aretz, considered by some the New York Times of Israel, claimed in its editorial Friday:

. . . Israel must seek peace with Syria in the context of Security Council Resolution 242 of November 1967: full and secure peace in return for complete withdrawal.

The New York Times corrected this falsehood three times back in 2000, making clear that in fact the resolution does not specify how much and from which territory Israel should withdraw. The Sept. 8, 2000 correction, for example, read:

An article on Wednesday about the Middle East peace talks referred incorrectly to United Nations resolutions on the Arab-Israeli conflict. While Security Council Resolution 242, passed after the 1967 Middle East War, calls for Israel's armed forces to withdraw "from territories occupied in the recent conflict," no resolution calls for Israeli withdrawal from all territory, including East Jerusalem, occupied in the war.

Other media outlets which likewise corrected the false claim that U.N. Resolution 242 requires a complete Israeli withdrawal from territories captured in 1967 include the Associated Press, the International Herald Tribune (published in Israel alongside Ha'aretz), the Boston Globe, the Wall Street Journal and Reuters. Will Ha'aretz join them and set the record straight?

Love of the Land: Ha'aretz Errs on U.N. Resolution 242