The following article was published by my friend, Dr Chandra Muzaffar, on January 4th, 2023, after the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) voted to refer Israel to the International Court of Justice over the ongoing occupation of Palestine and associated human-rights violations. It is unlikely that the Israeli government will pay any attention to the determination of the World Court. Even so, Dr Muzaffar believes that the UNGA decision is important.
with Dr Chandra Muzaffar in Kuala Lumper, Malaysia, in 2013
THE UN GENERAL ASSEMBLY DRAGS ISRAEL TO THE WORLD COURT
By Chandra Muzaffar
The United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) voted last week to refer Israel to the International Court of Justice (World Court) for its on-going violation of the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination in the occupied territories of the West Bank and Gaza and for adopting measures aimed at altering the demographic composition, character and status of the holy city of Jerusalem.
Before we analyse the significance of the vote, let us probe the actual voting pattern. 87 states voted to refer Israel to the World Court. This represents almost all the Muslim majority states including those that had recently established diplomatic relations with Israel. It shows that on this issue at least, the diplomatic manoeuvres of Israel and its backers have not helped the Zionist state. Other largely non-Muslim majority states in Latin America, Africa and Asia also endorsed the resolution. It is notable that both China and Russia supported the move to haul Israel before the World Court. 26 countries voted against the UNGA resolution. Among them were of course the US, Britain and a number of other Western states. A huge number — 53 — also abstained. India which at the time of the creation of Israel in 1948 was in the forefront of the struggle to defend the rights of the Palestinians was one of the abstentions. Its growing ties with Israel, especially in the military sphere have often been cited as the main reason for this change in attitude.
The Indian stance does not in any way nullify the significance of the vote for the resolution. The UNGA is asking the highest jurisdictional authority in the world to state its stand on Israel’s conduct as the Occupying Power over lands it has held in its grip for the last 55 years. Right from 1967, the UNGA has viewed Israel not only as an Occupying Power but has also demanded that Israel withdraw from the West Bank and Gaza. Needless to say, Israel has ignored this plea. It is worth observing that this time the UNGA’s request is being made when Israel is led by perhaps its most extreme right-wing government which has pledged to pursue policies that will undermine even further what little is left of the rights of the Palestinian people and demolish even more the Christian and Muslim features of Jerusalem.
By asking the World Court to examine Israeli behaviour in the Occupied Territories, the UNGA is telling Israel that it is under scrutiny. It is holding Israel accountable. It is forcing a rogue state to behave properly —a State that since 1948 has refused to abide by the norms and standards of conduct that all states are expected to uphold.
If the World Court concurs in essence with the UNGA resolution that Israel has violated the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination and has attempted to alter the character of Jerusalem, how would the Israeli government under Benjamin Netanyahu respond? Going on the basis of his past and present conduct, it is almost certain that he will ignore the World Court’s position and even rail against the body just as he has condemned the UNGA for its recent resolution. In other words, there will be no change in Israeli behaviour in the Occupied Territories or in Jerusalem. After all, in 2004 the World Court had already ruled that Israeli settlements in the Occupied Territories were in breach of international law but Israel continued to expand the settlements which today house about 700,000 Jewish settlers.
But this should not in any way diminish the usefulness of going to the World Court or working through the UNGA. These are important routes to take for at least two reasons. One, they reveal that Israel is the real problem and that it is this problem that has to be resolved in the interest of genuine peace. Two, by harnessing support from UN member states and UN agencies, the Palestinian cause is enhanced. It strengthens the Palestinian position as it confronts not just Israel but its principal backer, the US and a number of European states, sometimes joined by Japan and South Korea.
It is perhaps at this juncture that we should examine briefly Palestine’s relationship with the UN. It has been ambivalent at best. It was the UN under the influence of the US and other Western powers that presided over the unjust partition of historical Palestine in 1948 giving the less than 30% Jewish population two-thirds of the land while the 70% Palestinian majority comprising Muslims and Christians was awarded the remaining one-third. There was no plebiscite to determine how the people — the entire population — felt about the proposed partition. By ignoring the people’s feelings, the UN in effect transgressed its own Charter.
But after Israel seized Gaza and the West Bank including East Jerusalem in 1967, UN resolutions — as we have seen — clearly recognise Palestinians living in those territories as victims of Occupation. It should also be emphasised that through various resolutions the UN continues to recognise the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination, national independence and sovereignty. Besides, since November 2012, Palestine is a non-member observer state of the UN General Assembly.
The UN also looks after Palestinian refugees. The United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) provides education, health relief and social services for over 5 million Palestinian refugees in Jordan, Lebanon, Syria. Gaza and West Bank, including East Jerusalem.
Palestine’s relationship with the UN is one wrapped in obligations, responsibilities, rights and aspirations. It has had its ups and downs. But it should continue to be viewed as one of the many channels through which the Palestinian people seek to secure their justice, freedom and dignity.
Dr Chandra Muzaffar is the president of the International Movement for a Just World (JUST).
Filed under Israel and Palestine, israel and palestine conflict by on Jan 7th, 2023. Comment. 
Father Roy writes:
AIPAC’s annual policy conference in Washington is scheduled for 3-5 March. The conference schedule will emphasize "the Iranian threat": Netanyahu : Only military sanctions will stop Iran. Let’s bear in mind that Iran has never threatened to attack anybody, only to defend itself if attacked. The highlights in the following article are mine.
Peace, Roy
source: www.haaretz.com……
No Obama or Netanyahu, but AIPAC conference still looking to make noise
For the first time in at least seven years, neither the U.S. president nor the Israeli prime minister will attend. In addition, for the second year in a row, no mention of the Palestinians, negative or positive, appears on the conference’s legislative agenda.
WASHINGTON – Next week’s annual AIPAC policy conference in Washington may be as notable for what — and who — is missing as what is planned.
For the first time in at least seven years, neither the U.S. president nor the Israeli prime minister will attend. In addition, for the second year in a row, no mention of the Palestinians, negative or positive, appears on the conference’s legislative agenda.
Instead, the agenda will focus on the Congress enacting legislation that would designate Israel a “major strategic ally” of the United States — a relationship not enjoyed by any other nation — and on facilitating a U.S. green light should Israel decide to strike Iran. Should the measures being considered by the Senate and the House of Representatives pass, it would constitute the most explicit congressional sanction for military action against Iran’s suspected nuclear weapons program.
An official with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee who spoke on condition of anonymity said the thinking behind this year’s theme is the twin urgencies of what appears to be an accelerated Iranian nuclear program and turbulence in Syria and Egypt, both Israel’s neighbors. The official also said AIPAC remains as committed as ever to advancing the two-state solution and noted that the peace process did not feature on the legislative agenda of last year’s conference, either.
Both emphases dovetail with recent signals from the Israeli government that talks with the Palestinians are not going anywhere soon, and that Iran is the largest looming threat in the region.
The absence of both President Obama and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu appears to be due to external circumstances more than anything else.
Obama will be visiting Israel just two weeks after the conference — his first visit to the Jewish state as president — obviating the need for the president to deliver another Israel policy speech at AIPAC. In his stead, the administration is sending Vice President Joe Biden, who will address the conference on Monday morning. Obama has been at four of the last six AIPAC conferences.
For his part, Netanyahu is still trying to cobble together a coalition government following Israel’s Jan. 22 elections, in which the prime minister’s Likud-Yisrael Beiteinu faction was weakened. Netanyahu will deliver a video message to AIPAC; Ehud Barak, Israel’s outgoing defense minister, will address the conference in person.
Democratic and Republican leaders in both houses of Congress also will address AIPAC.
Despite the absences, AIPAC expects 13,000 activists, including 2,000 students, to attend the conference — a number commensurate with last year’s record-breaker. AIPAC officials say the number is more remarkable in 2013 because it’s not an election year.
The AIPAC official interviewed by JTA said that part of what motivates the push to name Israel a major strategic ally is an appeal to maintain defense assistance funding, averaging more than $3 billion annually, at a time when both parties are seeking ways to drastically cut spending.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry wrote congressional appropriators last week to warn that across-the-board “sequestration” cuts due to kick in Friday — unless the White House and Congress achieve a compromise — will hit Israel funding, among other things.
“This is no time to cut aid to an ally,” the AIPAC official said. Conferring major strategic ally upon Israel “would mean that the United States and Israel would work together on a cooperative basis on missile defense, homeland security, energy independence, medical research and innovation and military technology,” the official said.
The push to name Israel a major strategic ally comports with a longstanding preference among some leading Republicans to tweak apart assistance for Israel from other foreign aid, which the conservative wing of the party advocates slashing.
The overriding consideration in such a designation, however, was Israel’s increasingly close security ties with the United States, in the Middle East and across the globe, where the two nations have collaborated on cyber-security issues, the AIPAC official said. The major strategic ally legislation will be introduced in the House and Senate in the coming days.
Separately, a nonbinding resolution that would call on the president to support Israel “if it is compelled to act against the Iranian nuclear threat” will be introduced in the Senate. The House will consider legislation that would authorize the president to sanction any entity that trades with Iran.
The conference schedule heavily emphasizes the Iranian threat, Middle East turmoil and the perceived need to intensify further the U.S.-Israel security alliance. There are a few sessions dealing with the Palestinian issue — some with a pronounced skeptical tone when it comes to the peace process.
“Why, despite persistent efforts and an acknowledgment of the general outline for such an agreement, have the parties failed to attain a negotiated peace?” reads the promotional material for one session.
This year’s “AIPAC action principles,” to be considered by the array of American Jewish groups that makes up AIPAC’s executive committee, mention the Palestinians only in the context of keeping them from advancing toward statehood outside the confines of negotiations but do not explicitly endorse the two-state solution. Most of the principles address the security relationship, as they did last year.
Missing also, however, from the AIPAC legislative agenda is any effort to limit U.S. funding of the Palestinian Authority. AIPAC had pushed such efforts in December, after the U.N. General Assembly vote in which the Palestinians gained boosted recognition as a non-member state, but they fell by the wayside in part because of mixed signals from the Israeli government.
The conference runs March 3-5, ending with the annual AIPAC lobbying blitz on Capitol Hill next Tuesday.
Filed under israel and palestine articles by on Mar 1st, 2013. Comment.
Father Roy writes: Alan Hart is a former ITN and BBC Panorama foreign correspondent who has specialized in the Middle East. His Latest book Zionism: The Real Enemy of the Jews, is a three-volume epic in its American edition. He blogs on AlanHart.com…. Peace, Roy
"The most dangerous man in the world"
Netanyahu v Obama
By Alan Hart
There is, Burston wrote, something new in the air, something Netanyahu does not like. What is it? “American conservatives have begun to think out loud that Barack Obama will win in November.”
In my opinion there’s a better than evens chance that in the course of a second Obama term, America would put its own best interests first, which would mean an end to unconditional American support for the Zionist state of Israel right or wrong. (As is often the case, the Gentile me and Gideon Levy are on the same page. The headline over one of his recent articles in Ha-aretz was It’s only a matter of time before U.S. tires of Israel).
There are three main reasons why I have that opinion.
The first is my belief that Obama hates being a prisoner of the Zionist lobby and its stooges in Congress. (I think that Max Hastings, a former editor of the Daily Telegraph and a well respected military historian, was spot on when he wrote the following in a recent article for the Daily Mail. “Privately, Obama yearns to come down hard n Netanyahu, whom he dislikes intensely. But the U.S. President does not dare to do this when his own re-election may hinge on the three per cent of American voters who are Jewish.”)
The second, and much more to the real point, is that behind closed doors there are now many in the top levels of America’s military, intelligence and foreign policy establishments who are aware that an Israel which has no interest in peace with the Palestinians, and is led by men who want war with Iran, is an Israel that is much more of a liability than an asset for the U.S. There is also awareness in the top levels of America’s military, intelligence and foreign policy establishments that Netanyahu decided to play the Iran threat card in order to divert attention away from Israel’s on-going consolidation of its occupation of the West Bank and, in short, to have Palestine taken off the American foreign policy agenda.
The third is the insight given to me by former President Carter when my wife and I met with him and Rosalyn after they had said goodbye to the White House. “Any American president has only two windows of opportunity to break or try to break the Zionist lobby’s stranglehold on Congress on matters to do with Israel Palestine.”
The first window is during the first nine months of a president’s first term because after that the soliciting of funds for the mid-term elections begins. Presidents don’t have to worry on their own account about funds for mid-term elections, but with their approach no president can do or say anything that would offend the Zionist lobby and cost his party seats in Congress. The second window of opportunity is the last year of his second term if he has one. In that year, because he can’t run for a third term, no president has a personal need for election campaign funds or organised votes. (I imagine that incoming President Obama, briefed by Carter or not, was fully aware of these limited windows of opportunity and that was why he tried in his first nine months to get a freeze on Israel’s illegal settlement activity).
So my answer to Burston’s headline question is yes, Netanyahu could very well be in trouble if Obama wins a second term.
A good indication of Netanyahu’s fear of a second term Obama is, I think, the mountain of money his seriously wealthy supporters in America are investing in the effort to get a Republican into the White House who will allow Netanyahu and the Zionist lobby to pull his strings.
Question: Given that he does not want Obama to have a second term, what now are Netanyahu’s options?
I can see three possibles.
One is to watch and wait and hope that there will be a downturn in the American economy between now and November that will assist a Republican presidential candidate to defeat Obama.
Another is to launch a unilateral attack on Iran’s nuclear sites (never mind that Iran’s leaders have not taken a decision to go nuclear for weapons and possibly never will unless Iran is attacked).
Question: How might initiating a war with Iran assist Netanyahu to put Obama in real trouble?
One short answer is that the probable regional and global fall-out of an Israeli attack on Iran, including soaring oil prices, could bring what is being presented as a slow but sure recovery of the American economy to a swift halt. And that, most likely, would be enough to guarantee Obama’s defeat in November. (In an analysis for The National Interest, an American bi-monthly foreign policy journal, Paul Pillar, a former, very senior CIA analyst and today a visiting professor at Georgetown University for security studies, noted that the welfare of American consumers and workers is “not high” on the list of decision-making criteria for Netanyahu and his government).
There is, however, one thing that could cause Netanyahu not to go with this option. Quite apart from the fact that Israel’s past and present intelligence and military chiefs are divided on the wisdom of a unilateral Israeli attack on Iran, the polls are showing that a majority of Israeli Jews are opposed to Israel going it alone with an attack on Iran. They’re in favour of Iran being attacked but only if America becomes engaged and takes the lead.
And that brings us to a possible third option for Netanyahu. It is to commission a Mossad false flag operation – an attack on a vital American interest or interests for which Iran could be and would be framed.
The Zionist lobby, Obama’s Republican rivals and much if not all of the American mainstream media would promote this falsehood as fact, and that could leave Obama with no choice but to commit American military power. If he did not, his Republican challenger or challengers, assisted by the Zionist lobby and most if not all of the American mainstream media would accuse him of failing to protect America’s security interests and betraying Israel. And that, given the ignorance of American public opinion, would almost certainly be enough to guarantee Obama’s defeat.
For his own part Obama absolutely does not want war another war. He’s frightened, as he should be, of the possible/probable consequences.
Quite apart from the possible/probable economic consequences (including soaring gasoline prices in America), Obama understands completely that U.S. engagement in a new and broader regional war will ignite more anti-Americanism and play into the hands of Arab and other Muslim radicals and extremists, perhaps to the point of assisting them to become the dominant political power in the region. And that, were it to happen, would be potentially catastrophic for America’s best interests in the Arab and wider Muslim world. (Netanyahu would, of course, be quietly pleased because his Israel needs enemies).
So far as I am aware there is no well informed commentator who is prepared to make an explicit prediction about what Netanyahu will do – whether he will or will not order a unilateral Israeli attack on Iran in the closing stages of the American election. If I had to bet my life on it, I’d say he won’t; but there’s a real danger that his anti-Iran rhetoric, described in a recent Ha’aretz editorial as “a combination of wretchedness and megalomania”, may create an unstoppable momentum for war.
As my readers know, I regard Ha’aretz as the most honest newspaper in the world on the subject of what is really happening in Israel. Its view of Netanyahu was on display in a recent editorial headlined Israel must not lend itself to Netanyahu’s vulgar rhetoric on Iran. I think the whole editorial ought to be required reading not only for those who want to replace Obama as president but for all American voters. Here is the text of it (with my emphasis added).
Anyone who cares about Israel’s future could not help but feel a chill upon hearing Benjamin Netanyahu’s recent speech at the AIPAC conference – if not because of the gravity of the existential threat it described, then because of its sheer vulgarity and bad taste. The prime minister, as if he were no more than a surfer leaving feedback on a website, did not hesitate to crassly compare Israel today to the situation of European Jewry during the Holocaust. And to spice up his speech with one of those visual gimmicks he so loves, he even pulled out a photostat of correspondence in order to imply a comparison between U.S. President Barack Obama’s cautious approach toward attacking Iran and President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s refusal to bomb the rail lines to Auschwitz.
Netanyahu sometimes seems like he is holding a debating competition with himself. Every speech is the “speech of his life” and must overshadow its predecessor, while afterward, as if they were rehashing a sporting event, he and his aides gleefully count the number of standing ovations, especially from his American listeners. And in order to wring an ovation from the end of every sentence, it seems as if all means are legitimate: kitsch (trash) and death, threats and vows, warnings and rebukes of the entire world.
This time, too, it’s not quite clear what he wanted to obtain via this inane rhetoric – a combination of wretchedness and megalomania – aside from applause. Did he want pity? To prick the conscience of the world? To terrify himself, or perhaps to inflame the Churchillian fantasy in which he lives? But one thing is clear: Aside from the fact that he deepened our feelings of victimhood, insulted the American president and narrowed the options for diplomacy, Netanyahu did not improve Israel’s situation one jot by this speech, just as he hasn’t by any of his others.
Netanyahu isn’t the first Israeli prime minister, especially from the right, to harp on the trauma of the Holocaust. But in contrast to Menachem Begin and Ariel Sharon, who at the moment of truth also displayed diplomatic and leadership abilities, Netanyahu was and remains essentially a PR man: someone for whom words and rhetoric replace reality. The spine-chilling fear is that one day, all of us – himself included, despite his caution and hesitation – will discover too late that we have become hostages to his Churchillian speech, but without a Churchillian victory.
I’ll conclude with my own favourite story about Netanyahu.
Way back in 1984 I had an appointment for lunch in New York with the Englishman I most admire, Brian (later knighted) Urquhart. He was an Undersecretary General of the UN with the responsibility for conflict management. He served four Secretary Generals and was, in fact, the world’s number one trouble-shooter. Because of his matchless grasp of international affairs and his integrity, he was respected by leaders on both sides of all the conflicts he managed. And he never pulled his punches in behind-closed doors exchanges with leaders. On one private occasion Prime Minister Begin said he should not talk with Arafat. Urquhart looked Begin in the eye and said: “Mr. Prime Minister, I am the servant of the international community, don’t you dare to tell me who I can and cannot talk to!”
When Brian arrived for lunch, he said as he was sitting down, “I’ve just met the most dangerous man in the world.”
I asked who it was.
Brian replied: “He’s just presented his credentials as Israel’s ambassador to the UN, Benjamin Netanyahu.”
Alan Hart is a former ITN and BBC Panorama foreign correspondent who has covered wars and conflicts wherever they were taking place in the world and specialized in the Middle East. His Latest book Zionism: The Real Enemy of the Jews, is a three-volume epic in its American edition. He blogs on AlanHart.com…
Filed under israel and palestine articles by on Mar 20th, 2012. Comment.
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