In 1967, Egyptian (as the United Arab Republic), Syrian and Jordanian forces attacked Israel in an effort to “reclaim” territory taken by Israel in its post-WWII conquest of Palestine. Jews who had faced extermination in German-held lands during the war sought to return to their biblical homeland, in fulfillment of a British diplomatic exchange under what is known as the 1917 Balfour Declaration. By 1948, when the United States recognized the new state of Israel, many thousands of Palestinians had fled their cities, homes and farms in the violence that gave rise to the Jewish state, settling in refugee camps in neighboring countries.
The 1967 war, which ended in six combat days as Arab forces were overwhelmed by a vastly superior Israel military, ended badly for the attacking nations. Egypt lost the Sinai/Gaza. Jordan lost the West Bank. Syria lost the Golan Heights.
The mere existence of Israel, on lands most Arab countries believed (and many continue to believe) belonged to the incumbents who lived in Palestine (which did include some Jewish residents) before shiploads of Jews landed to establish their “homeland,” has been at the crux of the seemingly unresolvable Israeli/Palestinian crisis. The world hoped that at least the lands that Israel acquired as a result of the 1967 war could be restored to the Arab inhabitants, and that at least Gaza and the West Bank could form a new Arab state: Palestine.
The result was “United Nations Security Council Resolution 242 (S/RES/242) was adopted unanimously by the UN Security Council on November 22, 1967, in the aftermath of the Six-Day War. It was adopted under Chapter VI of the UN Charter. The resolution was sponsored by British ambassador Lord Caradon and was one of five drafts under consideration.
The preamble [3] refers to the ‘inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by war and the need to work for a just and lasting peace in the Middle East in which every State in the area can live in security.’
“Operative Paragraph One ‘Affirms that the fulfillment of Charter principles requires the establishment of a just and lasting peace in the Middle East which should include the application of both the following principles:
(i) Withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict;
(ii) Termination of all claims or states of belligerency and respect for and acknowledgment of the sovereignty, territorial integrity and political independence of every State in the area and their right to live in peace within secure and recognized boundaries free from threats or acts of force.’” Wikipedia
A second Arab challenge, the 1973 Yom Kippur War, saw Arab forces fighting Israeli troops on the Golan Heights and Sinai… pretty much resulting in a stand-off. The notion of total Israel military dominance took a hard lesson. Meanwhile, over the years, Palestinian “freedom fighters” – including terrorist groups like Hamas – waged insurrection and brutality against Israel military and civilians alike. Heavy waves of violent Palestinian protests/uprisings – notably the “Intifadas” of 1987-91 and 2000 – marked this exceptionally difficult “occupation.” After the first Intifada, with strong backing by the United States, steps were taken to create greater specificity to UN Resolution 242: the Oslo Accords.
“The Oslo Accords are a set of agreements between the Government of Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO): the Oslo I Accord, signed in Washington, D.C., in 1993; and the Oslo II Accord, signed in Taba, Egypt, in 1995. The Oslo Accords marked the start of the Oslo process, a peace process aimed at achieving a peace treaty based on United Nations Security Council Resolutions 242 and 338, and at fulfilling the ‘right of the Palestinian people to self-determination.’ The Oslo process started after secret negotiations in Oslo, resulting in the recognition by the PLO of the State of Israel and the recognition by Israel of the PLO as the representative of the Palestinian people and as a partner in negotiations.
“The Oslo Accords created a Palestinian Authority tasked with limited self-governance of parts of the West Bank and Gaza Strip; and acknowledged the PLO as Israel's partner in permanent-status negotiations about remaining questions. The most important questions relate to the borders of Israel and Palestine, Israeli settlements, the status of Jerusalem, Israel's military presence in and control over remaining territories after Israel's recognition of Palestinian autonomy, and the Palestinian right of return. The Oslo Accords, however, did not create a Palestinian state.” Wikipedia.
It has been official U.S. government policy continuously since the passage of U.N. Resolution 242 in 1967, reinforced by the Oslo Accords, to support a two-state solution (Palestine and Israel) to this disputed region. I could write volumes about the internal discord within the Fatah (West Bank) and Hamas (Gaza) factions within Palestine, the rocket fire from Gaza, the Israeli crush in response, but that goes beyond the focus of today’s blog: a truly dynamic change in the direction of long-standing U.S. policy in the region.
One of the most consistently difficult sticking points in marching toward any chance of a two-state solution, supported for decades by every intervening U.S. president until now, is Israel’s non-stop, officially approved effort to build heavily-fortified “Jewish settlements” within that Palestinian West Bank. These enclaves and supporting military installations dot the interior of the West Bank, call into question how so many settlements could possibly allow Israel to allow a separate state – which would consume most if not the totality of the West Bank – for the Palestinians.
Certainly, the self-righteous Jewish settlers there seem willing to defend those enclaves as part of Israel with their lives, possibly even against Israeli forces, should Israel ever elect to relinquish that territory. The United Nations, supported by the United States, and most of the world have condemned these settlements as completely antithetical to the universally-approved two state solution. This reality strained relations between the right wing Likud (Netanyahu’s party) and the Obama administration, but Obama only continued what had been U.S. policy for a long time. Enter Donald Trump, whose “base” encompasses evangelicals – many of whom believe that their promised “rapture” (mass elevation to heaven) is conditioned on a strong Israel able to foment the required Armageddon in the Middle East. Their powerful support for Israel is religiously solid.
Trump began his erosion of U.S. support for that two-state solution during Benjamin Netanyahu’s visit to the White House (pictured above) last February: "I'm looking at two-state and one-state and I like the one that both parties like. I'm very happy with the one that both parties like,’ he said in response to a journalist’s question on the current U.S. position. A one-state solution, the Palestinian’s worst nightmare, was on the table? The erosion expanded with Trump’s appointment of a right wing and deeply Zionist choice for ambassador to Tel Aviv (some hoped the divided city of Jerusalem).
“U.S. Ambassador David Friedman appears to break with almost 25 years of American policy advocating a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict… Friedman also casts doubt on the American definition of the West Bank, which Israel won from Jordan in the 1967 war, and which has been considered occupied territory by the United States, Europe and the United Nations.
“‘I believe settlements are a part of Israel,’ Friedman says in a 90-second teaser posted Thursday [9/28] by the Israeli outlet Walla News, which conducted the interview. ‘I think that was always the expectation when Resolution 242 was adopted in 1967.’… U.N. Resolution 242, approved by the United Nations after the 1967 war, cites the ‘inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by war’ and is widely understood not to recognize the West Bank as Israeli territory.
“‘It was and it remains today the only substantive resolution that was agreed to by everybody,’ Friedman says in the clip. ‘The idea was that Israel would be entitled to secure borders. The existing borders of 1967 were viewed by everybody as not secure, so Israel would retain a meaningful portion of the West Bank and it would return that which it didn’t need for peace and security. There was always supposed to be some notion of expansion into the West Bank but not necessarily expansion into the entire West Bank…. They’re only occupying 2% of the West Bank’, Friedman adds.
“That also appears to be either a misstatement or a change in definition. In her Thursday briefing, State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert declined to state a figure held by the United States, but the European Union and Israeli nongovernmental organizations say that Israel occupies about 60% of the West Bank, including settlements and military bases… According to the most recently available Israeli statistics, from 2015, about 382,916 Israeli settlers live in 125 settlements spread throughout the West Bank… Nauert said Friedman’s remarks do ‘not indicate a shift in U.S. policy.’
“‘I don’t know where that [figure] came from,’ Nauert said about Friedman’s assertion regarding the Israeli occupation. ‘I want to be crystal clear that it should not be read as a way to prejudge any negotiations that the United States may hold with Israelis and Palestinians.’” Los Angeles Times, September 29th.
With the world slowly coming to grips with a U.S. president who is, piece by piece, undoing decades of international treaties, trade agreements, accords and commitments, let me be crystal clear how the world looks at Friedman’s statements: his statements plus Donald Trump’s earlier quote above indicate a truly seminal shift in U.S. policy, State Department denials to the contrary.
These words are wonderful recruiting materials for terrorists who want to attack us and will be used with little or no editing to achieve their malevolent goals. Once again, we are looked upon as an unreliable international partner, bordering on becoming a rogue state, stirring up hornets nests with North Korea and now with these statements in the Middle East (to name just two examples), fomenting instability and increasing the likelihood of conflict in many places around the world. We are among the least trusted and least popular nations on earth today. Putin is grinning. President Xi is laughing. I’m not.
I’m Peter Dekom, and I wonder if you feel safer and more secure from hostile international players with Donald Trump’s foreign policy efforts?
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