Barghouti Palestinian Hunger Strike and International Law

 

Most people have absolutely no idea what the International Law is concerning the treatment of prisoners who choose to stage a hunger strike. Most probably believe that it is the nation where the prisoners have declared a hunger strike responsibility to do everything possible to remedy the situation favorably. This would include caving to the demands of the prisoners if that is what was required. Obviously, these people have not figured this thing out and given it the depth of thought required. If caving to the demands was a required response, and if that is what was necessary to end a prisoner hunger strike, then there would be no prisoners anywhere as all any prisoner would need to do to be released is go on a hunger strike demanding their release and then wait for a couple of weeks and have some really intense hunger pangs. Then as their health became affected, they would be released in order to preserve their health, or at least their lives. Actually, nothing could be further from the truth. The truth is if the prisoner has been determined to be of sound mind when making the decision, then any consequence of their hunger strike, including death, is on the prisoner and not the holding authority. The International Law does not even permit forced-feeding to keep prisoners alive; it actually forbids such considering forced-feeding as a form of torture which can be the basis of bringing charges against the offending government and nation. So, what exactly is the wording of the law? That can be found in the declaration of Tokyo: Declaration #6; which can be read below.

Declaration of Tokyo
International Law Concerning Prisoner Hunger Strikes

Where a prisoner refuses nourishment and is considered by the physician as capable of forming an unimpaired and rational judgment concerning the consequences of such a voluntary refusal of nourishment, he or she shall not be fed artificially. The decision as to the capacity of the prisoner to form such a judgment should be confirmed by at least one other independent physician. The consequences of the refusal of nourishment shall be explained by the physician to the prisoner.

 

This Tokyo Declaration means that if the initial physician had determined that the prisoner or prisoners who decide on a hunger strike did so while of sound mind and while not under any coercion, then a second and independent physician is required to also explain the consequences of their actions at each stage of the strike and as long as the prisoner continues demanding they continue their hunger strike, then they must be permitted to continue. Even should their action result in their deaths, they must be allowed to continue their hunger strike. There is an exception which would permit their being force-fed and that is that should they become unconscious, then they can be determined to no longer be of sound mind and thus unable to rationally insist on continuing their hunger strike and can be fed by whatever means are necessitated. Waiting for prisoners to fall unconscious before feeding them is extremely risky, as once they have lost consciousness they would be so close to death that bringing them back from the edge would be a delicate situation. The percentages for saving their lives would have fallen well below optimum and may have fallen to a point where the chances would be negligible.

 

The difficulty Israel faces is the same ideal which the Arabs throw in our faces at every opportunity with their chant of, “We love death as much as you love life and that is why we will defeat you.” To be honest, this argument has never quite made sense to us and in my case, I remember a quote attributed to General George Patton in the movie “Patton” and attributed to the General in some references where he was reputed to have said, “No bastard ever won a war by dying for his country. He won it by making some other poor dumb bastard die for his country.” Apparently, the Arabs have decided to make that easier for Israel if their threat is to be taken literally. The truth is the Arab leadership loves life just as much as any Israeli, what they do not have much regard for are the lives of those they command. Arab commanders send others to die while Israeli officers are at the tip of the spear where their command to move forward is always, “Follow me,” as they lead out. The other side of the Israeli love of life is that we also value Arab lives even to include the hunger-striking prisoners. Israel was threatened of being brought before the International Criminal Court (ICC) or the International Court of Justice (ICJ) for War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity for torturing prisoners. Most people in the Western World have heard the claims that Israel tortures Arab prisoners but they have no idea what criminal definition of torture Israel is guilty of committing. Under the Declaration of Tokyo, forced-feeding of a prisoner, even to save their lives, is defined as torture. The life of the prisoner is presumably of no concern for the holding governance; it is on the prisoner if they lose their life due to a hunger strike. Under International Law, the death of a hunger-striking prisoner is considered a suicide and not the concern of the holding government. Israel cannot accept such a trivial treatment of a human life, even the life of a hunger-striking prisoner.

 

Marwan Barghouti, arch terrorist serving five life terms
for only five of the dozens of Israelis murdered by his
bombs and terror plans as well as likely hundreds injured,
many horrifically suffering from crippling effects of these attacks

 

The whole situation is considered a win-win by the Arab terror organizations which is why there are three or four hunger strikes called virtually every year. They realize there are only two results which can come from their hunger strike. They realize that there is little if any chance that they will be allowed to die as a result of their choices and actions. This means either they will have their demands met which usually amounts to several of the strikers being freed and other concessions. This result often comes when nations of the world demand that Israel not force-feed the prisoners and ties their demands to threats to take Israel before the ICC or the ICJ with charges of torture by force-feeding prisoners against their will. Simply put in everyday words, usually at the behest of the Arab League and numerous Arab governments, through behind the scenes communications, call for numerous European nations or the European Union to threaten Israel with charges of preserving human lives of their sworn enemies and often terrorist lives through the torture of forced-feeding them against their will. Prisoner rights groups and the family of nations pressed for and got the decision that the forced-feeding of prisoners was torture such that International Law made it punishable before the community of nations thus leaving only one means for a civilized people to save the lives of hunger striking prisoners, surrender to their demands. Before the decision that forced-feeding was torture there were two choices for governments, they could give in to the demands or they could force-feed the prisoners while it was still safe and would guarantee their survival. With the removal of feeding as a solution, there still remain two choices which save the life of the prisoner, giving in to their demands or waiting for them to pass into unconsciousness and then feeding them. The waiting for unconsciousness is a very risky means as some prisoners will die at the point of losing consciousness, others will be able to be saved and for far too many, the probabilities for survival would be very slim. None of these options are acceptable to Israel, not to her government and not to the vast majority of the people, even including the ones who might act tough and say, let them die, who if they had to make the call they would not allow them to die and would choose life.

 

The prisoners know that when they start to refuse food then either their demands will be met or Israel will face the screams across the globe from leftists and the anti-Semites that Israel is guilty of torture and is once again torturing their prisoners. The accusations continue and are louder every time there is a prisoner who is force-fed. Torture, torture they cry with the prisoner rights groups up in protest supported by numerous others from left wing groups plus there are the Soros groups who live to accuse Israel of crimes, BLM, BDS, pro-Palestinian groups, anti-Israel, anti-Zionist and all the rest of the anti-Semitic groups, European nations and their funded NGO’s, B’Tselem, the numerous peace groups and the list is nearly endless. Torture, torture ringing across the globe and the sun never sets on the various protests against Israel for saving lives. Imagine the outcry were Israel to permit just one hunger striking prisoner to die. The world screamed and demanded investigations for close to a year, some still ringing that bell, when one prisoner died from a stroke. The claims were that Israel somehow brought on his stroke, exactly how was never stated, it was just accepted that Israel not only could cause a prisoner to suffer a stroke but that Israel actually had caused the Arab prisoner to suffer a stroke. Israel faces three choices which range from bad to unthinkable and all but one will raise instant worldwide and vehemently loud demonstrations. Should Israel feed the prisoner the screams of torture rise up. Should Israel obey International Law and allow the prisoner the right to dignity and die for their cause, the screams of murderers rise up. Only if Israel surrenders to their demands will Israel not be derided before the world, the only result of giving in to their demands will be an immediate new strike demanding even deeper concessions and another after that and another and another on and on. Where would that end? The end result would be Israel having to return to choosing feeding the prisoners and facing torture charges or not feed them and allow International Law to work to its final end result and the prisoners start to die and facing murder charges. Israel is in a no win situation and the Arab terrorists understand this so they hold hunger strikes and wait to scream that Israel is a monster and tortures prisoners or murders prisoners. Israel will choose accusations of torture by forced-feeding the hunger strikers. Sometimes doing the right thing and deciding on the side of life is difficult because we live in a strange and often cruel world but Israel will always choose life. This does not mean Israel will capitulate to demands but it does mean that Israel will risk the accusations of torture if that is what the world defines preserving human lives when that choice presents itself. Fortunately, most Israeli physicians also side with life and will claim that any prisoner pressing a hunger strike to the point where it will likely cause permanent damage is a decision which is proof of a lack of sanity and thus permits forced-feeding. The world does not agree, they want Israel to permit the hunger-striking prisoners to die as demanded by International Law such that they can then instead of having to settle for claiming that the Israeli forced-feeding is torture to Israel is murdering prisoners. Where is sanity, we ask you, where is sanity?

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

The Sliding Scale of International Law

 

What is International Law? Well, that all depends on any number of varying particulars. The Geneva Conventions are considered by the average person as being universally applied International Law. That is not true. The Geneva Conventions only apply to the member nations. Any nation which has not signed onto the Geneva Conventions does not need abide by them. The Geneva Conventions are more of a gentleman’s agreement where thugs do not abide by them. We could call them the Marquis of Queensberry Rules for warfare. They apply to the nations who have agreed so as long as you are fighting another signatory it is as if you were fighting in the ring with rounds and a referee enforcing the rules. But if you are fighting a nation which has not signed the rules you are in an alley having a street fight where there are no rules. The problem is the nations who have signed the Geneva Conventions are required to fight by those rules no matter who the enemies are and whether they are signatories or not so the signatories fighting a war against another nation who is not a signatory is hamstrung while the other side can act however they please. This was evidenced in World War II as none of the Axis Powers (Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy and Imperialist Japan) were signatories and thus could treat prisoners of war as they desired including torture, summary executions, taking particular prisoners and treating them differently as the Nazis did with Polish and Russian prisoners and often with any British or American prisoners found to be Jews or considered troublesome such as those who had a habit of escaping and being recaptured. The movie The Great Escape was based on real events and mass escape during World War II where a large number of the men who were recaptured were simply machine gunned down in cold blood. The Japanese were equally brutal as the movie Bridge Over the River Kwai which was more loosely based on actual events and what was done to Alec Guinness’s character was just a simplified version of how the Japanese tortured prisoners but they were far more sadistic than any film could depict including beheadings and shooting squads as well as simple starvation and confinement in a metal box in the heat of the equatorial jungle. The United States and Britain were both signatories to the Geneva Conventions and as such had a code to follow in their treatment of prisoners. Many Japanese who knew how their side treated prisoners were told the Americans and British would be just as brutal which was part of why they refused to be taken and those who did fall prisoner were shocked when they were fed well and not subjected to torture. What are interesting are the claims by the Palestinians that they have rights under the Geneva Conventions as they are neither a nation nor a signatory thus the Geneva Conventions have absolutely no application nor grant them any rights whatsoever. That is just one modern example of attempting to use International Law for benefit under false pretenses.

 

Probably one of the most basic and often overlooked forms of International Law are treaties. Any treaties signed by two or more nations have the full weight of International Law. The missile and nuclear warhead treaties such as Salt and the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty are forms of International Law and are enforceable with consequences for any violations, complete with rules for enforcement and other ramifications and schedules for execution. The treaties which ended the two great world wars are still applicable today though some of the treaties from World War II superseded those from World War I such as the border definitions for Germany and France and Germany and Poland. The treaties at the end of World War I has some of the deepest ramification of any set of treaties in history as it redefined the entirety of the Balkans and eastern Europe with the breakup of the Austria-Hungarian Empire and the delineating the borders of nations carved from all of the lands from the Ottoman Empire and also lands from the retreat of the Caliphate with the exception of the lands reclaimed by Spain, Portugal and, in a sense, France. The Allied Powers (France, Britain, Italy, Russia, Japan, Poland and the United States) met in a series of Conferences, Treaties and Mandates to setup new nations across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). Many of these nations were setup with little consideration for stability, or directly to cause instability. This was called the Sykes-Picot Agreement after the two men, one the Foreign Secretary of Britain the other the Foreign Secretary of France. Another agreement came from the San Remo Conference which formalized the Balfour Declaration and set up the Mandate System and was further included in the Treaty of Sèvres as we have discussed numerous times here at BTC.

 

 

The United Nations through the Security Council can also make enforceable International Law through what are called Chapter Seven Resolutions. The serious nature of the consequences of such resolutions is partially why the five permanent members (Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States) have veto power as these would be the primary nations who would be required to enforce such a resolution. The United Nations Security Council also has Chapter Six Resolutions which carry slightly greater weight as any resolution out of the General Assembly but both are simply advisories. The major difference between these types of resolutions is if any single party to a General Assembly Resolution refuses to agree then all parties are released from the resolution and things continue as if that resolution had never been issued. These are different from resolutions which condemn a single nation which are largely statements of discontent or condemnation which in the General Assembly often are brought against Israel more than any other nation simply because the Arab and Muslim nations with their allied nations from the developing world, most belong to the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) will pass any resolution brought before the General Assembly which targets Israel and similarly against the United States, an even somewhat rarer than those against Israel as too many nations receive largess from the United States and are intelligent enough not to push their luck while attacking Israel carries less risk.

 

That brings us back to the varying sliding scale of International Law and its application. When one looks into International Law and its applications in the past century there becomes one very clear problem, why is a nation the size of Israel been targeted with so many denunciations of being across the boundaries of International Law? Israel has been accused of genocide, collective punishment, targeting civilians intentionally, war crimes, crimes against humanity, occupation and just about anything you can think of, Israel has likely been accused of wrong-doing. What makes this all the more confusing is the guilt of some of the nations which have received exactly the opposite from Israel, aid in times of distress or natural catastrophe, yet virtually no censoring by the United Nations General Assembly for their transgressions. That list includes such nations as North Korea, Iran, Libya, Algeria, Cuba, China, Myanmar (Burma), Pakistan and even Syria. Then there are those nations which are seldom censored which are as expected such as Canada, Italy, Poland, and other nations which are seldom in the news. The true test of whether or not a nation actually receives sanctions, which are presumably applied worldwide, or if nations are brought before the international courts system such as the International Criminal Court or the International Court of Justice or any special courts setup to judge genocides or other special situations, as such measures are a sign that there has been a unforgivable transgression of International Law or against humanity.

 

This is where the case we are most concerned with here at BTC, in case one had not noticed, Israel becomes interesting. There have been exceedingly few cases compared to the number of accusations spewed before the world media, which is more than accommodating when it comes to denouncing Israel, that have been brought before the world courts. The one case we can think of off the top was about the so-called Apartheid Wall, the anti-terror wall which Israel put in place to end the Second Intifada and especially to end the waves of suicide bombings. Before the wall, which is largely a barrier made up of fences and only used walls where sniper fire was a potential problem such as in cities, there were multiple suicide bombings weekly, or so it seemed much of the time, and after the construction of the wall that number dropped to zero. Terrorism also dropped off and the barrier brought an end to the Second Intifada in conjunction with an IDF operation in Judea and Samaria to clear out much of the terrorist infrastructure and restore an IDF presence which served to provide intelligence and as a preventive influence against further terror. The General Assembly voted at the urging of the Palestinian Authority observer to request from the International Court of Justice (ICJ) a ruling on the legality of the wall with the hope of gaining a ruling which would lead to its dismantling such that the terrorist operations would not be hindered by the barrier. The barrier was cleared but that was just the initial good news for Israel. In addition to being cleared of any wrongdoing, there was an advisory opinion issued as a cautionary warning by Egyptian Judge, Justice El Araby, from the ICJ and who sat in judgement as part of the panel which heard the case from the United Nations General Assembly in 2003 on the legality of the security barrier erected by Israel. The Honorable Justice El Araby warned the UNGA and others that filing further ran some risks, as he stated,

 

“The international legal status of the Palestinian Territory (paras. 70-71 of the Advisory Opinion), in my view, merits more comprehensive treatment. A historical survey is relevant to the question posed by the General Assembly, for it serves as the background to understanding the legal status of the Palestinian Territory on the one hand and underlines the special and continuing responsibility of the General Assembly on the other. This may appear as academic, without relevance to the present events. The present is however determined by the accumulation of past events and no reasonable and fair concern for the future can possibly disregard a firm grasp of past events. In particular, when on more than one occasion, the rule of law was consistently side-stepped. The point of departure, or one can say in legal jargon, the critical date, is the League of Nations Mandate which was entrusted to Great Britain.”

 

This has been one of the reasons that the Palestinian Authority, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, the Arab World, Iran, the Muslim Brotherhood and others such as the European Union and many individual European and other nations or even individuals have never challenged the claim to all the lands west of the Jordan River as being meant for anything other than Israel, the Homelands for the Jewish People, they know what the actual treaties, conferences and agreements all state clearly, the land belongs to Israel and by agreement and International Law only the Jewish People have full political rights while the others who reside in the area must be guaranteed civil rights, property rights, equality under the law, religious rights but not political rights. The agreements simply state that only the Jewish People and those they willingly extend such rights may exercise political rights. Everybody is to be granted civil rights, religious rights, property rights, and equal treatment under the law. That is the International Law as delineated by numerous treaties, conferences, agreements and is exactly what Justice El Araby, the Egyptian Judge on the ICJ, was warning the Palestinian Arabs and the Arab World about, Israel holds all the cards and other than receiving written and signed treaty with Israel, there is no legal means that the Arabs can claim even a single inch of the lands west of the Jordan River. Should they challenge such claiming anything under International Law as backing their claims, including, may we add, United Nations Security Council Chapter Sic Resolution 2334 which President Obama presented as his parting gift to the Palestinian Arabs and Mahmoud Abbas along with Iran all hoping that would cripple Israel, they will lose because Israel has every right to the lands and the best the Arabs can hope to gain, something they already have, is to live in peace under Israeli rule.

 

They would be granted all rights with one glaring exception, the right to political power or even to vote as all political power was vested for the Jews and only the Jews and those they decide to grant such rights. Israel, counter to the claims of too many ignorant and deceiving people, has granted full political rights to those Arabs who remained within the areas she was capable of holding after the Arab assault of intended genocide against the Jews in 1948-9 when half a dozen Arab armies and numerous militias and other units attacked Israel the morning of her inception. All the remaining Arabs, the Muslims, the Christians, the Baha’I, the Buddhists, everybody residing within Israel legally once the fighting ended were granted full citizenship and full civil, religious, legal, and political rights. Jordan extended similar to the Arabs in Judea and Samaria which they renamed West Bank as Judea and Samaria sounded too Jewish, and Egypt controlled Gaza but never annexed it or gave the residents there any rights leaving them under military occupation. There was no outcry for Palestinian rights or for the founding of any Arab Palestine while Egypt and Jordan held the lands, only after the Six Day War in June of 1967 and Israel liberating these lands did the world become obsessed. After the Six Day War Jordan reneged on her offer of citizenship and even stripped citizenship from the Jordanians which had been forced or given land and moved into Judea and Samaria making them people without a country and this was the birth of the Palestinian demands for their own nation. The claim that Israel had invaded and stolen Arab Palestinian lands was born three years earlier in 1964 with Yasser Arafat and the Palestinian Liberation Organization except it was not Judea and Samaria that Israel had stolen but Israel herself was the lands claimed by Arafat. The PLO and their claims to Palestine was initially a direct challenge to Israel claiming that Israel was an illegitimate entity born atop of sacred Arab lands and that the Jews were to be exterminated if they refused to leave. After the Six Day War a readjustment was made and they now claimed all the lands west of the Jordan River, the twenty-two percent of the British Mandate which was not Jordan, this is what they claim must be given to them, not just Judea and Samaria and make no mistake. Their problem is simply, International Law actually backs the Jewish claim, it, for once, backs Israel. For once the rules actually are not stacked against Israel, though all the denunciations and referendums and resolutions and they amount to little more than noise because in the end there is only the written agreements of the nations of the world, and those all support Israel as the home for the Jewish People, just as an Egyptian Judge sitting on one of the highest courts in the world has admonished the Arabs to take note. Sometimes the noise is but an attempt to hide the truth, sometimes the truth wins out in the end. International Law, remarkable, isn’t it?

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

Palestinian Statehood Will Not End Occupation Claims

 

The mainstream media has spent gallons of ink on newssheet and/or ASCI code on digital memory storage mediums covering the Arab proposal before the United Nations Security Council. This proposal, which Jordan has initiated for the Palestinian Authority (PA), is seeking a Chapter 7 binding resolution. This would result in forcing a mere twelve months for negotiations after which the United Nations member states would be put upon to enforce vacating all Israelis, both civilian and military and security personnel from all the lands gained during the Israeli defensive war known as the Six Day War of early June 1967. Pushing Israel back behind the Green Line, regardless of whether any agreement was attained during the period of negotiations, places the nation into what former Israeli Ambassador to the United Nation Abba Eban referred to as the Auschwitz borders due to the threat and indefensibility these borders entailed. The twelve months for negotiations was added in order to satisfy and quell the complaints voiced by some Security Council member states including one or two permanent member demands for the inclusion of at least token negotiations. These negotiations have little if any ability to alter or effect the final enforcement sought by Jordan and the PA as the resolution itself presupposes the final solution when it demands for United Nations enforcement to return all Israelis back within the Green Line regardless of any other influences or alterations. Currently the PA is continuing to add amendments and change the wording softening some assumptions while playing with the time frames and addressing other concerns in order to gain more nations’ support and potentially avoid the veto from any of the permanent members. These alterations and refinements are presumably a worthless waste of time as it is assumed that the United States will veto the resolution should it ever receive sufficient support for ratifications. Granted, the United States has not stated openly that it will veto the resolution though its representatives have expressed displeasure with the resolution in each and every rendition and form.

 

The main reason for the Arabs to seek an imposed solution, which sidesteps a negotiated settlement with Israel by having the United Nations enforce the formation of a Palestinian Arab state without demanding or requiring any agreement reached through negotiations or reaching an actual peace agreement with Israel, was to be able to continue their terror war as they will have gained the desired territories without needing to declare an end to hostilities. This is the alternate method that Mahmoud Abbas has sought through pressuring nations worldwide as well as seeking United Nations organizations, accords, committees, treaties and courts to officially recognize a Palestinian Arab state as a member or observer state as it is all about those statehood recognitions. The aim by the PA has nothing to do with establishing their statehood over the lands lost by Jordan and Egypt in the Six Day War, it is about the definition given by Yasser Arafat, and echoes and repeated by Mahmoud Abbas and other Arab leading representatives, when he claimed to be following the plan for defeating the Zionist entity (Israel) in stages of which reclaiming the lands lost by Egypt and Jordan in 1967 was simply the first and very important stage. The concept, as defined by both Arafat and Abbas, demands that first one needs to gain as much lands through negotiations as is conceivable even if such required expanded terror wars and a lengthy time before such a deal was granted and then restart the terror war while demanding further lands be ceded until defeating the Zionists becomes readily simple and easily achieved and then executing that final battle. There is no expectation for establishing two states for two peoples living side-by-side in peace, security and economic prosperity; they have and still do seek a one state solution where an Arab state replaces all of Israel covering the lands from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea. That right there is the definition and description as to why there will never be an agreement but only the leadership of the PA seeking to circumvent having to negotiate and thus will consistently refuse to recognize Israel as the homeland of the Jewish People and they continue to refuse to ever agree that the occupation has ended, further that a treaty ends all claims, any agreement signifies the end to resistance of the Zionist occupation of Arab lands and amongst other forms of actively maintaining aggressive acts against Israelis they refuse to alter the textbooks and teaching of incitement radicalizing their children such that they learn that dying as a martyr by killing Israelis who are the reason for poverty and all social and individual ills which plague each and every Arab as well as their families and friends whether they perceive it or not.

 

Proof of how Hamas imposes restrictions even to the point of preventing orphans taking a trip during which they might actually enjoy themselves and even, dare we say, smile and laugh with members of the Zionist occupiers; Hamas Interior Ministry spokesman Iyad Al-Bozom wrote this entry on his Facebook pages Sunday, “Security forces prevented thirty-seven children of martyrs from entering the land occupied in 1948 for a suspicious visit to a number of settlements and occupied cities. This move came in order to safeguard our children’s education and protect them from the policy of normalization.” Iyad Al-Bozom was referring to an invitation by Israel’s Kibbutz movement and two Israeli Arab towns for the orphans going to visit were not part of what the world is told is “occupied territory.” Hamas was harping on the occupied places defining them such that every place on their itinerary was Israeli territory. This defined even those lands prior to the Six Day War in June 1967 which was defined as Israel, that is Israeli within the Green Line, was also defined as “occupied territory.” This meant that Hamas held the same views which the Palestinian Liberation Organizations (PLO) held and defined in their charter as “occupied territory” by the Zionist entity in 1964 when it was formed. The same definition passed on to Fatah which was to be the political arm of the PLO adopting and based on the same premises even though Yasser Arafat always permitted the western representatives to differentiate between the two entities claiming that Fatah did not view Israel within the Green Line as “occupied territory” thus making them a viable entity with which Israel had a partner for peace. Carrying the entire political splitting of hairs even further the western nations and their leadership then allowed the formation of the Palestinian Authority which, being one step further apart from the PLO and also a step away from Fatah, simply had to be the Israeli partner for peace which obviously had to meet the western definition which separated the lands gained by Israel in 1967 as separate from the lands Israel gained in the defensive war in 1967, the Six Day War.

 

In reality, Yasser Arafat and his second in command from the very forming of the PLO in 1964, a time before there existed any “occupied territory” by Israel, all three entities defined in their charters the terminology defining everything between the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea as occupied Palestine, an Arab state which must be made Judenrein, devoid of any and all Jews. This western self-delusion has continued from the very start through to and continuing today and is at the heart of the efforts by the United States to forge a peace deal between Mahmoud Abbas and the PA with Israel. This western delusion is also very much the reason that the Israelis now demand that any peace deal, in order to be considered and acceptable to Israel, must include two stipulations which the PA must agree with; first, the PA recognizes that Israel is the nation state of the Jews and second, the PA must recognize any peace as an affirmation that all grievances are settled and no further claims or violence be instituted by either side. Because both Fatah and the PA are actually in complete agreement with Hamas on the what the definitions of “occupied territories” consists of that Mahmoud Abbas cannot agree to any peace which ends the conflict and also makes all territorial claims satisfied as neither stipulation is true. This is why Mahmoud Abbas is seeking for the United Nations to institute the Green Line as the borders for the Palestinian state as having those gains guaranteed by the international powers, Abbas, and thus the PLO, Fatah and the PA, can agree to this being enforced without having to recognize Israel or having to end incitement and their terror war with Israel continuing to claim the rest of Palestine is occupied and thus the interim solution was exactly that, an interim solution, or a Hudna as it is define by the Islamic laws and customs.

 

The fact that the PLO, Fatah and the PA are in complete agreement with Hamas as far as territorial claims, the sole difference is one of authorization of the claims to all of the lands between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea. Hamas claims the lands based on their religious grounds where the Quran defines the areas considered a part of Dar al Islam as once lands are so defined it becomes every Muslim’s religious obligation to assure that these lands remain forever within Dar al Islam and thus Israel is a religious abomination which must be returned to being Dar al Islam which requires that Sharia be the ruling law and that Muslims are the rulers with all those outside of Islam accept their Dhimmitude, their lower position as second class citizens beneath any Muslim accepting of their demeaning restrictions both socially and before the law. This further causes problems for Hamas as the Israeli justice system does not differentiate thusly though many Israelis would beg to differ with such a claim as they view decisions by the Supreme Court of their lands. On the other hand, both the PLO and Fatah are secular nationalists and claim the lands as part of the political entity of the Caliphate which was defeated and cut into separate national identities of which both Israel and Lebanon were unacceptable as they were denoted to be lands not under the autocratic or religious rule under an Islamic governance. Thus the PLO and Fatah held the same belief but under slightly different reasons which while accepting the required dictates of Islam, they did not accept Sharia as the basic law of the lands. This led to a simple confrontation of secular socialists and the Islamic Fundamentalists, the very same battle being waged between Saudi Arabia and Iran as well as the difficulties Egypt is facing against the Muslim Brotherhood. No matter how one parses the differences between Hamas and the other entities, Hamas is a product of the Muslim Brotherhood while the PLO and Fatah are ghosts resulting from the efforts of the Soviet Union’s subversive outreach with the KGB playing a strong role which resulted in numerous nations which practiced secular socialism to varying degrees as long as these beliefs did not necessarily run contrary to Islam.

 

No matter the route one takes be it down the religious demand of Hamas or the secular socialist demands of the PLO, Fatah or the PA, Israel poses a problem as she resists being subverted and surrendering to the powers of Islamic society be that religious or strictly political surrender. The key word in both instances is surrender. We have taken a long route back to a premise we investigated in our article, ” Similarities Between Islam and Communism.” What we discussed was how in both Islam and Communism both systems demanded that the nations of the world necessarily must eventually surrender and accept being ruled under such a system. Thus both Islam and Communism demand not only one’s surrender to the will of either but also to recognize their eventual unavoidable and unalterable victory over all competing ideas and ideals. The failure of both systems to produce productive societal frameworks is due to this surrender as well. Both systems claim the reason behind their inevitability is a more perfect vision of the future with a society filled with fellow believers whose acceptance of either Islam or Communism is part and parcel of the definition accepted by Islam or Communism. What is interesting is that Communism purports that there is no G0d and the state runs supreme while Islam claims the Allah is the one and only and, just as important, the deity over the final incarnation of G0d and will rule over all of society in some perfect end-times. Either philosophy taken by the Arabs claiming to be the Palestinians will have similar arguments which are backed up with claims that their demands are valid because they who know the only truths that matter are making those demands. Their argument goes one step further and posits that their victory is guaranteed simply because they are the followers of the final victorious political or religious entity depending on which you support, Hamas or PLO/Fatah/PA. Where it gets interesting is within the PA, which claims to include both Fatah and Hamas, it is pretended that both systems are permitted and which one prevails will very likely be dependent upon which one has the support of the larger numbers of people, currently that appears to be Hamas but that will probably change with whomever controls the economy and other portfolios in any future Arab government. Ruling the Arab areas is actually the recipe for failure which will result in the winner simply being the last man standing. Currently polls show the PA as favored to win in Gaza which has been ruled by Hamas while the PA ruled Judea and Samaria are expected to vote overwhelmingly for Hamas should elections be held in the near future. Such an outcome is unlikely as Mahmoud Abbas has resisted holding elections regularly since 2006 when the last elections were held for the parliament and Hamas proved victorious. This fact led to the cancelling of elections for the leader of the PA, a position which Abbas has clung to ever since those cancelled elections in 2006.

 

There are a few things which we can expect in the near future other than no PA elections, or at least not for the office held by Mahmoud Abbas. The lack of such elections will eventually cause the rift between Hamas and Fatah and the PA to widen eventually leading to a return to Hamas control in Gaza and the PA clinging to control in Judea and Samaria for as long as the Shin Bet (Israeli intelligence) and the IDF continue to patrol and control checkpoints. Abbas will be in no hurry to force the Israeli security forces from Areas B and C as their operating is a large part of why Abbas remains in office. This became evident when the IDF arrested a group of Hamas members who had been tasked by their leadership in Turkey to foment violence and lawlessness which they were to utilize removing Abbas from office. So, Mahmoud Abbas may allow a vote on the resolution currently before the United Nations Security Council but he will find some manner or path by which to make it impossible to implement the expulsion of the Jewish settlers along with the Shin Bet and the IDF and thus the PLO and Fatah will survive remaining in control of Judea and Samaria for the foreseeable future. After it becomes plainly obvious that Abbas is refusing to fully implement any of the agreements by which a unity governance agreement was reached with Hamas being permitted reentry to the PA which was presumably leading to elections with the appointment of a board of members to run the PA until new leadership had been established, those elections will be postponed indefinitely. At the Security Council of the United Nations the current resolution in its eight-hundred-fifty pound form will be postponed and withdrawn such that it can be reworked making the phraseology more acceptable. In the meantime the French initiative for a solution will make its way to the floor of the Security Council where the United States may be less likely to use their veto provided the resolution is merely a Chapter 6 and not Chapter 7 thus making it not much more significant as a resolution than had it been passed by the General Assembly. This will be followed by the usual protestations by Mahmoud Abbas as he demands that Israel be forced from the lands as suggested by the Security Council’s non-binding resolution. This may even lead to the PA petitioning the International Court of Justice (ICJ) or the International Criminal Court (ICC) immediately after being accepted, and as Abbas and the PA have been tentatively approved by the ICC, which tries war crimes and crimes against humanity, the threats to drag Israel before the court on charges are already being made. Things between Israel and the United States will continue in their downwards trending until a new election for President has been held and the new President sworn into office. This will remain true no matter who wins the upcoming Israeli elections. Meanwhile, the United Nations Security Council has been rocking back and forth between permitting a vote or further postponing the PA initiative. Any prediction this far out on the Israeli election when not even all the candidates and leaders of the parties have been chosen in the party primary elections, makes prediction nearly impossible and quite worthless. The daily polls continue to place Labor and Likud tied which is not surprising as that is exactly what one would expect this early on. The real winner has been undecided as when that option has been offered the polls show it having the largest number of votes usually having comfortably over fifty percent. My prediction is that will change and eventually undecided will lose its leading slot.

 

Beyond the Cusp