Palestinians: Is It Really About 'Annexation'?

Video Of The Week -Through Palestinian Eyes https://tinyurl.com/yappsfyo

by Khaled Abu Toameh

June 25, 2020

The picture Palestinian Authority officials are painting is that the Israeli annexation of any part of the West Bank is the one and only obstacle to regional peace, security and stability. According to these officials, the Israeli plan would deprive the Palestinians of their right to establish an independent and sovereign state on the pre-1967 armistice lines.

A large group of Palestinian Islamic scholars and clerics, however, evidently disagree with the Palestinian Authority's claim.

On June 21, the Association of Palestine Scholars held a meeting in the Gaza Strip to discuss the Israeli plan. The meeting was attended by several Islamic religious judges representing the Supreme Council of Sharia Judiciary, senior officials of the Hamas-controlled Ministry of Waqf and Religious Affairs, academics from several Islamic colleges and universities, as well as jurists who issue rulings on Islamic law (sharia).

In a statement issued after the meeting, the Islamic religious personalities, referring to Israel as the "usurping entity," condemned as "dangerous" the Israeli plan to extend sovereignty to parts of the West Bank.

Their statement quickly makes clear that what is really bothering the Islamic scholars and clerics is not the possibility that Israel might impose its sovereignty on Jewish settlements and the Jordan Valley.

They are not really worried about the possibility that Israel might annex 10% or 20% or 30% of the West Bank. There is something that worries them much more than any part of the West Bank, and that is the very existence of Israel. The Islamic scholars and clerics believe that Israel has no right to sovereignty over Tel Aviv, Haifa, Nazareth, Tiberias, Jerusalem or and any other part of Israel.

The Islamic leaders even contradict their own statement by pretending to be worried only about the ostensible loss of West Bank land to Israel.

On the one hand, they say that "one of the most dangerous things that this [Israeli] enemy intends to do is to annex a part of the Palestinian lands to its usurping entity." They are pretending, in other words, that they are worried only about the "annexation" of parts of the West Bank.

On the other hand, The Islamic leaders emphasize that "Palestine, all of Palestine, from the [Mediterranean] sea to the [Jordan] river, is a Palestinian Arab Islamic land for which the Jews and Zionists have no right." They go on to explain that "this fact won't be changed by any measures taken by the [Israeli] enemy."

It is clear from the statement that whether the "annexation" plan is implemented or not, many Muslims would still reject the State of Israel because, in their view, it continues to "usurp" Palestinian Arab Islamic land stretching from the Mediterranean Sea to the Jordan River. It is dead wrong to assume that if Israel abandons its plan, most Muslims would give up their desire to destroy Israel and replace it with an extremist Iran-style Islamic state.

To back up their argument even further that the main problem is not the West Bank, the scholars and clerics said that "recognizing the state of this usurping entity is a religious, legal, humanitarian and historical crime that must be immediately corrected by cancelling the abhorrent Oslo Accords."

So, the problem is not really the "annexation" plan that they want to see cancelled, but the Oslo Accords signed in 1993 and 1995 between Israel and the PLO. These accords marked the beginning of the so-called Israeli-Palestinian peace process after the PLO purportedly recognized Israel's right to exist in peace and security.

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Vicious Bigoted Slur Against Israel

Video Of The Week - Black Lives Matter - https://tinyurl.com/yachzcfc

For the complete video go to - https://tinyurl.com/y9xjawpy

                      

For the full Article go to - https://tinyurl.com/y9xtkadf

On Monday, an alliance of groups affiliated with the Black Lives Matter movement unveiled their first official platform. The 40,000-word manifesto contained many recommendations, including concrete policy proposals, for rectifying the wrongs perpetrated against America’s African-American citizens in the past and present. 

Unfortunately, the platform also contained a vicious bigoted slur against the Jewish state, which the document’s foreign policy section accused of perpetrating “genocide” against Palestinians. (The platform also labeled Israel an “apartheid state” and joined with the BDS movement in calling for the total academic, cultural, and economic boycott of the country.

Falsely accusing the state founded by Jews in the ashes of their own genocide of committing genocide is, simply put, a blood libel on a national scale. It is a slur against the 6 million Jews in Israel and the vast majority of world Jewry that supports them. That Black Lives Matter would indulge in such ignorant and incendiary claims undermines its standing as an anti-racist organization.

Now, to be clear, given the platform’s 40,000-word length and numerous sections and subjects, it is extremely unlikely that most activists involved in its drafting had anything to do with the small portion pertaining to Israel. Doubtless most of the many thousands of Americans, including American Jews, who deeply sympathize with the aims of Black Lives Matter and similarly seek criminal justice reform, see no connection between this activism and assertions of Israeli genocide.

But it is sadly just as clear that those select activists who shoehorned such a slur into the Black Lives Matter platform, whether out of ignorance or malice, have needlessly driven a wedge into the very necessary alliance to ensure equal treatment of America’s African-American brothers and sisters.

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UAE says “Not Speaking To Israel Is Not Getting Us Anywhere”

Video Of The Week –

Anti-Semitism: The World's Oldest Virus - https://tinyurl.com/yc2ml74s

By RAPHAEL AHREN from Times of Israel

For the full article go to: https://tinyurl.com/y7en6yrz

A senior official from the United Arab Emirates on Tuesday called for increased cooperation with Israel and explained his country’s ongoing rapprochement with Jerusalem, saying it wanted to separate disagreements over the Palestinian issue from the mutual benefits of cooperation in other fields.

Addressing a major US-Jewish online conference, Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Anwar Gargash reiterated his view that the decades-long Arab boycott of Israel has not yielded the desired results and advocated for “open lines of communications” and increased liaison with Jerusalem in various areas, such as technology and health.

His statements appeared to mark a significant turnaround from just days earlier, when a senior Emirati diplomat warned in an Israeli newspaper that annexation would spell the end of any rapprochement between Israel and the Gulf.

Gargash reiterated Abu Dhabi’s opposition to Israel’s planned unilateral annexation of parts of the West Bank, but underlined his country’s policy of “decoupling the political from the non-political.”

“Can I have a political disagreement with Israel but at the same time try and bridge other areas of the relationship? I think I can. I think that is fundamentally where we are,” Gargash said during an interview for the American Jewish Committee Virtual Global Forum.

Egypt, Jordan and Turkey already have formal relations with Israel, and Qatar and other Gulf states “led the way on having more normal relations with Israel,” he went on.

Gargash, a member of the UAE’s federal cabinet, said there was no reason not to cooperate with Israel on efforts to bring medical aid to Palestinians suffering from the coronavirus pandemic. Such collaboration, which last week led to the second of two Emirati airliners landing in Tel Aviv, does not affect his country’s opposition to Israel’s planned annexation, he stressed.

The Palestinians oppose any attempts by the Arab world to normalize ties with Israel before a peace deal is signed. The Palestinian Authority has refused to accept the UAE supplies on the planes.

Gargash noted that decades of Arab hostility toward Israel has only bred animosity that now makes it harder to work together for the common good.

“The UAE is clearly against any annexation as is being proposed by the current Israeli government. Having said that, that is the political domain. Do I have to really look at all the other domains and make them almost static because of the political domain? We have tried that, as a group of Arab countries, over many years, and I don’t think it has really led to what we want in terms of bringing stability to the region,” he told the interviewer.

The Emirates wants to promote stability in the Middle East,  “What we see today is that negotiations, and having lines of communications open, actually will yield better results for us and for the Israelis,” he said.

The traditional Arab policy of “stonewalling and closed lines of communications” has only radicalized the Israeli-Palestinian crisis, the senior diplomat added.

During the 45-minute interview, which the AJC hailed as “a historic public appearance by a senior Arab government official before a global Jewish organization,” Gargash referred to Israel’s much-maligned plan to apply sovereignty over the Jordan Valley and all settlements in the West Bank three times.

As opposed to the UAE ambassador to Washington, Yousef al-Otaiba, Gargash did not explicitly warn that annexation would spell the death of the recent rapprochement between Jerusalem and Abu Dhabi.

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Improper Use Of EU Funds

Video Of The Week-Are the Gazan Protests Peaceful? https://tinyurl.com/ycq5eu36

  From Israel Hayom - https://tinyurl.com/y7tzm4pn

Report by Israeli watchdog triggers EU turmoil over funding of NGOs linked to terrorist groups.

NGO Monitor data prompts Brussels to order its envoys in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem to investigate if EU funds are reaching organizations affiliated with Palestinian terrorist groups. EU Ambassador to Israel Emanuel Joffre: If there is evidence of improper use of EU funds we will investigate them.

The EU on Tuesday ordered its representatives in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem to investigate whether EU funds are reaching organizations affiliated with Palestinian terrorist groups.

The move follows a report by NGO Monitor, a watchdog group that promotes greater transparency among foreign-funded nongovernmental organizations operating in Israel.

The watchdog recently exposed an EU letter to an umbrella organization of 142 leading Palestinian NGOs assuring them that, even if a Palestinian NGO applying for EU grants is an affiliate of EU-designated terrorist groups or employs individuals from these groups, the EU will still provide the organization with funds and legitimacy.

After the information became public, EU Commissioner for Neighborhood and Enlargement Oliver Varhelyi stated that the EU "will have to conduct an in-depth review, and if there is any concern we will act immediately. ... This [funding terrorism] will not be tolerated. And if it happens it will have to be rectified."

The Commission for Neighborhood and Enlargement is in charge of overseeing the accession process of prospective member states and relations with states bordering the European Union. The commission's policy is directed towards candidate states along the EU's eastern border and on the coast of the Mediterranean Sea.

Following the exposé on how the EU was potentially skirting the ban on financing terrorism, the Foreign Ministry in Jerusalem had summoned EU Ambassador to Israel Emanuel Joffre, asking for clarifications on the matter.

Tuesday saw Joffre reiterate that "if there is evidence of improper use of EU funds we will investigate them."

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Does The Term 'Annexation' Even Apply?

Video Of The Week - Palestinian Illegal Occupation! https://tinyurl.com/y8vx9b8t

From Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs. https://tinyurl.com/y9p72489

Is it correct to label Israeli actions with respect to the West Bank "annexation?" Can you annex territory that has already been designated as yours?

It so happens that this year is the 100th anniversary of the San Remo Conference, where the victorious Allied powers from World War I divided the Ottoman Empire and proposed Mandates for the former territories of Ottoman Asia. The territory that was to become British Mandatory Palestine was designated as a future Jewish national home already then. British diplomacy in 1920 set the stage for not only the emergence of Israel in 1948, but also the entire system of Arab states.

This history is pertinent to the debate that has emerged about Israel retaining parts of the West Bank this year in fulfillment of the Trump plan. It is commonly referred to as "annexation" and states have pointed out that they oppose the annexation of someone else's territory. The statute of the International Criminal Court in fact defines as one of the acts that constitute the crime of aggression specifically as the annexation of the territory of another state.

So is it correct to label Israeli actions with respect to the West Bank "annexation?" Can you annex territory that has already been designated as yours?

Indeed, annexation resulting from aggression is unacceptable. The Turkish invasion of Cyprus was an act of aggression. The Russian invasion of Crimea was an act of aggression. Israel in the West Bank is an entirely different story.

In addition to the designation of these territories as part of the Jewish national home, one must remember that the West Bank was captured by Israel in a war of self-defense in 1967. That makes all the difference. The great British authority on international law, Sir Elihu Lauterpacht, drew a distinction between unlawful territorial change by an aggressor and lawful territorial change in response to an act of aggression.

It would be more correct not to use the term "annexation" but rather "the application of Israeli law to parts of the West Bank."

The idea that the Jewish national home applied there was backed by much of the international community from San Remo onwards. Even Article 80 of the United Nations Charter established that national rights from the period of the League of Nations carried over to the newly established United Nations.

In 1920 British leadership under Prime Minister Lloyd George was pivotal in protecting Jewish national rights. Today, 100 years later, British leadership should follow that example.

Thus, the foundations of Jewish legal rights established through San Remo were preserved for the future.

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