OUR SAY

No justice

The ICJ judgment that "occupation" of East Jerusalem and West Bank "settlements" are illegal fails on historical and legal grounds.

The ICJ advises that Israel's settlement policy is in violation of international law. Photo: Lina Selg/ANP/Sipa US
The ICJ advises that Israel's settlement policy is in violation of international law. Photo: Lina Selg/ANP/Sipa US

The deeply flawed advisory opinion on the “occupied territories” by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) evokes memories of the 1967 Khartoum Resolution. Shortly after Israel’s victories in the Six-Day War reversed an existential threat – taking the West Bank and Gaza, and East Jerusalem in the process – the Arab League summit issued its infamous resolution with its “Three No’s” for Israel – no peace, no recognition and no negotiations.

A reunified Jerusalem, Israel’s capital and spiritual wellspring, was and is off any negotiating table. But the West Bank and Gaza were negotiable. However, no negotiations were considered by Arab nations until the 1979 Sinai Accords with Egypt, which showed the world Israel would cede territorial gains for peace.

Sadly that was the last land-for-peace deal. In 1994, Israel and Jordan signed a peace treaty, but Jordan renounced claims to the West Bank six years earlier, reluctant to rule again over Palestinian Arabs destabilising its society. Egypt was similarly unprepared to take back Gaza.

Israel’s 2005 unilateral withdrawal from Gaza, with no prospect of rapprochement, has been one of its costliest moves. Years before the horrific events of October 7, Gaza had become a launchpad for relentless Hamas rocket barrages, bankrolled by Iran.

Meanwhile, while the “settler” movement may have according to some created facts on the ground that complicate a potential deal, Israel has ever remained open to negotiations if only the Palestinians would come to the table.

Memo ICJ and Foreign Minister Penny Wong: the West Bank was never “occupied” by Israel in 1967; under the 1947 UN partition plan, it was envisioned for the new Arab state that would be thwarted when Israel’s neighbours tried to destroy the new Jewish state. The area’s status since the 1949 armistice with Jordan remains “disputed”.

So, the ICJ judgment that “occupation” of East Jerusalem and West Bank “settlements” are illegal fails on historical and legal grounds. But it is also deeply immoral, blaming Israel for defensive measures against two intifadas and never-ending terrorism from a Palestinian movement, which despite its pieties about self-determination, rejects coexistence with Israel, spurning three landmark offers of statehood.

The ICJ opinion will only serve to embolden extremists. It deserves to be condemned.

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