How the West Bank became an ‘occupied Palestinian territory’ - opinion
ICRC’s rulings have distorted and confused the issue of Israel’s legitimate claims to the territories, and are used to condemn Israel.
Shortly after the Six Day War in 1967, the United Nations asked the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) – a private Swiss organization that is the official guardian of the Fourth Geneva Convention (FGC) – for its opinion on the legal status of the territories that Israel had conquered, including Judea and Samaria, known as the West Bank of the Jordan River.
Unilaterally, the ICRC decided that Israel had violated international law (meaning the FGC) and declared the disputed areas to be Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT). This decision was adopted by the international community as law. The basis for the committee’s decision, however, was, and still is, secret – as are many things in Switzerland.
The ICRC later claimed that its decision was based on the Hague Regulations (1907), particularly Article 42, which defines occupation. It chose to ignore Article 43, however, which stipulates that occupation occurs when “the authority of the legitimate power... passe(s) into the hands of the occupier...” Since neither Jordan nor Egypt were the sovereign legitimate powers in the territories, Israel’s claims are not illegal.
In fact, earlier decisions of the international community, such as the San Remo conference (1920), which supported the idea of a “Jewish national home” in Palestine, validate Israel’s claims.
A Palestinian state did not exist at the time, nor has one ever existed.
The issue of "occupation"
The issue of “occupation” in The Hague Regulations and the FGC refers to states, not to “Palestinians.” The ICRC has never applied its criteria to any other “disputed territory.” Yet, because of its special “observer” status at the UN, the committee is considered the authority on what constitutes occupation and the law.UN Security Council Resolution 242 (1967), refers to “territories occupied in the recent conflict,” but does not specify what those territories are, or to whom they belong.
Nowhere in the resolution is the term “Palestinian” used. Later, UN resolutions adopted the ICRC’s interpretation and referred to “the Palestinian and other Arab territories.” The committee decisions, therefore, have no legal standing; and cannot be accepted as long as their archives remain secret.
The bases for Israel’s claims were examined thoroughly in a study by former High Court justice Edmund Levy and others but have been ignored by the international community.ICRC’s rulings have distorted and confused the issue of Israel’s legitimate claims to the territories, and are used to condemn Israel. The committee’s goal was to deny Israel’s claims to the historical heartland of the Jewish people, by promoting controversial issues: the right of Palestinian self-determination; a Palestinian state; the two-state solution; and “ending the occupation.”
Unfortunately, the Israeli government led by the Labor Party was complicit when it agreed to the Oslo Accords, which legitimized the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO), and then, under prime ministers Ehud Barak and Ehud Olmert, offered almost everything that the terrorist organization demanded, including withdrawal based on the 1949 Armistice Lines, in return for recognizing Israel’s right to exist.
The PLO, of course, refused, continuing to act toward its goals of killing Jews and destroying Israel.
The Israeli government went even further by supporting the PLO, Hamas, and other terrorist organizations, and allowing Hamas and the Islamic Jihad to take over Gaza.
The failure of Israeli leaders to understand this threat despite the role of Iran’s goal of using proxies to annihilate Israel is directly related to the ICRC’s efforts – supported by the international community – to undermine Israel. Unfortunately, some Israelis, especially those who were involved in the Oslo Accords, support an immediate ceasefire and the rebuilding of Gaza as a basis for a future terrorist state.
The ICRC’s declaration of OPT was meant to prevent any attempt by Israeli Jews to build homes and communities beyond the 1949 Armistice Lines as well as any rapprochement between Israel and Arab states. Promoting Palestinianism was the committee’s way of ensuring that Israel would be both subjected to constant terrorism and vilified by the international community, especially by European countries.
Recently, the ICRC has been accused of employing people who hate Jews and Israel; and it is complicit in Hamas crimes. For example, the committee was at Al Shifa and other hospitals when October 7 hostages from Israel were taken there, but did nothing to help them, nor did they alert Israeli authorities. The ICRC has been criticized for doing nothing to help the hostages.
Because the ICRC is considered the leading humanitarian organization in the world, everyone accepts its declaration of “Occupied Palestinian Territory” as legitimate and final. It is neither and should therefore be rejected.
The writer is a PhD historian and journalist.
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