Henry, Henry

Henry Seigman has been a favorite trendy-lefty anti-Israel opponent of mine. I have met and discussed issues with him. I'll be honest, despite he being a "professor" somewhere, I am not impressed with his academic mien. (*)

He has an article today in Haaretz, and this interests me:

Israel's contention has long been that since no Palestinian state existed before the 1967 war, there is no recognized border to withdraw to, because the pre-1967 border was merely an armistice line. Moreover, since Resolution 242 calls for a "just and lasting peace" that will allow "every state in the area [to] live in security," Israel holds that it must be allowed to change the armistice line, either bilaterally or unilaterally, to make it secure before it ends the occupation.

These are specious arguments for many reasons, but principally because UN General Assembly Partition Resolution 181 of 1947, which established the Jewish state's international legitimacy, also recognized the remaining Palestinian territory outside the Jewish state's borders as - at the very least - the equally legitimate patrimony of Palestine's Arab population, on which they were entitled to establish their own state, and it precisely mapped the borders of that territory. Resolution 181's affirmation of the right of Palestine's Arab population to national self-determination was based on normative law and the democratic principle that grants statehood to the majority population. (At the time, Arabs constituted two-thirds of the population in Palestine.) This right does not evaporate because of delays in implementation.

Comments:

a) Israel's contention has long been that since no Palestinian state existed before the 1967 war, there is no recognized border to withdraw to, because the pre-1967 border was merely an armistice line.

What everyone contends is that since the pre-67 line was not a political border, "Palestinian state" not withstanding, and it had no standing plain and simple. Nothing complicated about that.

b) Moreover, since Resolution 242 calls for a "just and lasting peace" that will allow "every state in the area [to] live in security," Israel holds that it must be allowed to change the armistice line, either bilaterally or unilaterally, to make it secure before it ends the occupation.

Since those armistice lines did not provide security, but of course they need to be altered and improved for the sake of peace, security and stability for all.

c) These are specious arguments for many reasons, but principally because UN General Assembly Partition Resolution 181 of 1947, which established the Jewish state's international legitimacy, also recognized the remaining Palestinian territory outside the Jewish state's borders as - at the very least - the equally legitimate patrimony of Palestine's Arab population, on which they were entitled to establish their own state, and it precisely mapped the borders of that territory.

And those borders included...Judea and Samaria. So why use "West Bank" which isn't even mentioned. Not at all.

d) Resolution 181's affirmation of the right of Palestine's Arab population to national self-determination was based on normative law and the democratic principle that grants statehood to the majority population. (At the time, Arabs constituted two-thirds of the population in Palestine.) This right does not evaporate because of delays in implementation.

The right should evaporate because the Arabs rejected it. It should evaporate because they tried to deny Jews the same right as decided upon in 181. So-called "normative law" doesn't and shouldn't apply as the original purpose of the Mandate was to reconstitute the Jewish national home on the territory of both banks of the Jordan River. It was the reneging of the British, pressured by Arab terror, that continually reduced the territory of the Jewish National Homeland, a Homeland that originally was not intended to be an Arab state, majority population or not. "Palestine" in international law was to be Jewish and "non-Jews" (not 'Arabs'; they were unidentified) had only personal, civil and religious rights to be protected.

Seigman, I would claim, is not that smart although quite pro-Arab clever.

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(*) UPDATE

The final pillar of the council's Middle East staff is Henry Siegman, resident at the council for more than a decade. His official biography trumpets him as the "Foremost expert on the Middle East peace process and inter-religious relations, Arab-Israeli relations, and U.S.-Middle East policy."[20] Yet, like Kipper, Siegman possesses no specialist qualifications. He holds only a bachelor's degree from the New School for Social Research. Prior to joining the council, Siegman was executive director of the American Jewish Congress for sixteen years.

Criticism of Israel and the support it receives from the American Jewish community[21] is a frequent theme of Siegman's writing. His perspective of the Arab-Israeli conflict is not based on fieldwork or practitioner experience but rather upon reference to his own background as a refugee from Nazism, which, he says, sensitized him to the tribulations of Palestinians under Israeli occupation.[22]

Siegman argues that Israel's occupation of the West Bank and Gaza is the root cause of the Arab-Israeli conflict,[23] a conclusion that discounts both pre-1967 hostilities and attempts by rejectionist states like Iran and Syria to undermine Palestinian-Israeli peace talks. It also ignores statements by Yasir Arafat that the Oslo agreement was merely a part of the Palestine Liberation Organization's "phased strategy [for] the complete liberation of Palestine."[24]

[20] Henry Siegman biography, CFR website, accessed June 3, 2005.
[21] Chris Hedges, "Separating Spiritual and Political, He Pays a Price," The New York Times, June 13, 2002.
[22] Henry Siegman, "How Palestinian Property Was Seized," The International Herald Tribune, Jan. 27, 2005; Hedges, "Separating Spiritual and Political."
[23] Henry Siegman, "Middle East Conflict: Seek Palestinian Confidence in What?" The International Herald Tribune, July 17, 2001; idem, "The Road Map Was Doomed from the Outset," The International Herald Tribune, Sept. 1, 2003.
[24] "Political Program for the Present Stage Drawn up by the 12th PNC, Cairo, June 9, 1974," Journal of Palestine Studies, Summer 1974, pp. 224-5; Daniel Pipes and Alexander T. Stillman, "Two-Faced Yasser," The Weekly Standard, Sept. 25, 1995.