Tag Archives: Oslo Accords

Misplaced Concern For Human Rights

Posted on by

CBN News is reporting today that the United Nations has released a list of companies that have businesses in areas Israel captured as a result of the 1967 Six-Day War.

The article reports:

The list was designed to punish more than a hundred companies doing business in east Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria and the Golan Heights. Israel froze ties with the council’s leader, accusing the office of serving the BDS (boycott, divestment, sanction) campaign.

Reaction came quickly after the report’s release and US Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) accused the council of persecuting Israel while protecting the world’s worst tyrants. He called on the body to “investigate the crimes of its own members instead of obsessing over the Jewish state.”

The UN has a history of actions against Israel. The United Nations Human Rights Council was created in 2006. Since then, it has issued 45 resolutions against Israel, about 45% of all country-specific resolutions issued. The United Nations Human Rights Council includes Afghanistan, Pakistan, Qatar, Venezuela, and Libya. None of these countries are stellar examples of human rights.

The article notes:

After the release of the database Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to boycott those who boycott Israel, calling the Human Rights Council a “biased body that is devoid of influence.” His political rival, Benny Gantz, also condemned the publication, calling it a “dark day” for human rights.

Jason Greenblatt, one of the architects of President Trump’s Middle East peace plan, told CBN News the public should be pro-active against the boycott movement.

“First of all, shame on them. You know, they were working on this, they held it back and now after a peace plan is launched they go ahead and do that, shame on the Human Rights Council. The UN is a terrible place for Israel. I would actually encourage all of your viewers to write letters to [UN Secretary-General António Guterres] and protest that,” said Greenblatt.

…Ironically, any resulting boycotts would likely hurt Palestinians the most. For example, CBN News has reported how international pressure forced the SodaStream company to leave Mishor Adumim and move to Israel costing many of the 500 Palestinian employees their jobs.

“The Palestinians certainly stand to suffer if these types of measures are put in place. It will harm companies that employ Palestinians; it will harm companies that provide goods and services to Palestinians,” NGO Monitor’s Yona Schiffmiller told CBN News.

He also said the majority of the list’s information came from BDS linked groups.

“I think it’s also important to note that the activities these companies are being targeted for are completely legitimate. There is no international standard that bars business activity in occupied territories or in settlements,” Schiffmiller explained.

“Many of the companies that we’re talking about are conducting activities that are outlined in the Oslo Accords. So, these are internationally recognized agreements between Israel and the Palestinians that the UN is now completely disregarding by putting out this list,” he concluded.

The article concludes with actions that anyone can take to fight this:

Just last year, 600 businessmen and women from more than 50 countries will come to Israel to connect with and invest in Israeli business leaders for the second-annual ARISE conference.

“We’re really tackling some of the greatest crises around the world. And so, we’ve invited them to connect with Israeli businesses and meet face to face and create those connections and transactions that will help bring Israeli innovation to the world,” ARISE Founder and President Adv. Calev Myers told CBN News.

Over the last few years, various states in the US have passed laws against boycotting Israel. Schiffmiller said the international community is within its rights to stop supporting a UN body that’s potentially harming these companies.

STOP THE BOYCOTT OF ISRAEL! 
Sign the Petition
Text “STOPBDS” to 41-444
VISIT: CBN.COM/STOPBDS

Please do.

Painting A Picture That Is Totally False

Posted on by

Sara Carter posted an article today about the media’s misreporting on the recent destruction of buildings in Israel. The media has totally misrepresented the events.

The article explains a few facts the media ignored:

– The land on which the buildings stood is not under the jurisdiction of the Palestinian Authority, but, as explicitly provided by the Oslo Accords, under the jurisdiction, for security purposes, of the Government of Israel
– Instead it was included inside Israel’s security barrier at the request of the very Arabs who are now complaining;
– The Arab complainants had the benefit of years of due process, which they flaunted by continuously disobeying orders of the Israeli courts that required both the Army and the Arabs to maintain the status quo until the courts could assess the legal merits of the Arabs’ claims;
– The Arabs chose to build right up against Israel’s security barrier even though they had clear notice that such construction was illegal because it impeded the Israeli army’s ability to defend Israel’s citizenry from Arab terrorist attacks.
The fact that these realities are completely ignored by all of the outraged international “authorities” is a disgrace.

The article continues:

Israel follows the rule of law. Seven years ago it passed a law which, for security reasons, prohibits the building of a structure within 250 meters (820 feet) of the Security Barrier

The Barrier was built starting in the early 2000s after the second Palestinian Arab Intifada (“Uprising”). Hundreds of suicide bombings and other terrorist attacks murdered and maimed more thousands of Israeli civilians during that Uprising. Those acts of terrorism were committed by Arabs sneaking into Israeli cities and towns and blowing up buses, cafes, pizzerias, and ice cream stands. Once Israel commenced building and patrolling the Barrier, terrorism dropped dramatically, ultimately leading to a 90 percent decrease in terrorism within Israel.

Please follow the link to read the entire article. It clearly illustrates the bias in the media concerning Israel. Israel lives in a bad neighborhood. The actions it has taken in preventing construction in certain areas and building walls have allowed the country to survive in that neighborhood.

Mugged By Reality

Posted on by

“Mugged by reality” was the expression used by Senior Foreign Affairs Correspondent for the Jerusalem Post Herb Keinon to describe Israel when he spoke at the Ahavath Torah Congregation’s Memorial Lecture Free Speech Series. The Free Speech Series lectures are always enlightening, and the speakers are always people who have been involved with their subjects for many years. Mr. Keinon has lived in Israel for 28 years. He has a first-hand perspective on current events in the Middle East as well as friendships with many of the key players.

He reminded us that many of the events in Israel over the past twelve years are the result of the Second Intifada, which began in September 2000 and ended roughly around 2005. The Second Intifada began a few months after the July 2000 Camp David Summit failed to bring a negotiated peace between the Palestinians and Israelis.  In July 2000, Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat was offered probably the best deal possible by the left-leaning government of Israel, and Arafat turned down the offer. Mr. Keinon stated that the terrorism that the Palestinians inflicted on Israel during the Second Intifada permanently influenced the minds and viewpoints of Israelis. The events created a sense of insecurity and vulnerability that changed the nation. One example of this is that the government of Israel, which tended to be center left, has now moved toward the right.

Mr. Keinon pointed out that the Israelis embraced the Oslo accords of the 1990’s, believing that negotiations were the path to peaceful co-existence with their Palestinian neighbors. The Israelis have always wanted peace; it seems as if the Arabs only wanted Israel. When the Palestinians went to the United Nations last year in an attempt to force a settlement without negotiations, that ended the possibility of further negotiations.

Mr. Keinon dealt with current events (will Israel attack Iran?) and stated quite frankly that no one really has the answer to that question. He provided a lot of insight into the impact of terrorism on Israel and the feelings of Israeli families in dealing with the threat. Sometimes when we look at world events, we forget that there are actual people involved.

The Free Speech Series put on by the Ahavath Torah Congregation is always an evening well spent.

 

 

Enhanced by Zemanta

Anti-Semitism In England

Posted on by

Yesterday Scott Johnson at Power Line posted a story about protests that took place in London last Thursday when the Israeli Philharmonic, led by Zubin Mehta, participated in the annual eight-week summer season of daily orchestral classical music concerts known as the Proms. The concert by the Israeli Philharmonic was disrupted to the point that the BBC cut off its live broadcast.

The New York Times reported:

…the repeated disruption of its (the Israeli Philharmonic) concert at Royal Albert Hall in London on Thursday night by pro-Palestinian demonstrators, to the point that the BBC cut off its live broadcast and played recordings of the evening’s program instead. 

Stephen Pollard in the UK Telegraph had a slightly different take:

But Thursday night’s events can only be understood in the context of anti-Semitism. When have there been similar protests against “violations of international law and human rights”, as was chanted on Thursday, by any other country? And this in the middle of the Arab Spring, when genuine protesters for human rights are daily risking their lives in Syria against a murderous dictatorship.

If, indeed, this was a protest against the actions of the Israeli government, rather than against Jews, where have been the similar disruptions of performances by Russian, Chinese, Turkish, Iranian or any number of other nations’ musicians? What about disruptions of British national companies, in protest at British human rights abuses? To pose the question is to answer it. There’s little doubt in my mind that this was an action motivated specifically by the fact that the performers were playing in the national orchestra of the Jewish state. 

If the Jews are the canary in the coal mine, we need to pay attention–the gas is rising. As the day nears when Palestine will unilaterally declare itself a state–regardless of the fact that it has never adhered to the Oslo Accords, we can expect to see more accusations against Israel and more anti-Semitism under the guise of supporting human rights. This is the same kind of upside down logic that has been used in the past to persecute Jews. We need to our own research on what is happening rather than believing everything we see in the news.

Enhanced by Zemanta

The Law Of Unintended Consequences At Work

Posted on by

CNS News reported today on some of the unintended consequences of the Palestinian Authority’s decision to go to the United Nations next month and ask to be recognized as a state. The article points out that since 1975 the United Nations has recognized the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) as the “sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people.” If the United Nations recognizes the Palestinian Authority as a state, the Palestinians’ representation will change from the PLO to a “state of Palestine.” All Palestinians living outside the boundaries of the “state of Palestine” will no longer be represented at the United Nations.

The article further points out:

Goodwin-Gill  (Oxford University professor of public international law Guy Goodwin-Gill, an expert on refugee issues) also cited problems relating to the ability of the P.A. to assume greater powers. (Established under the Oslo Accords as an interim body to administer the self-rule areas, the P.A. is not empowered to conduct foreign affairs, a role that was left to the PLO.)

The academic said in the brief that the P.A. is a subsidiary entity set up by the PLO with “limited legislative and executive competence, limited territorial jurisdiction, and limited personal jurisdiction over Palestinians not present in the areas for which it has been accorded responsibility.”

There is another issue–Palestinian representation in Washington, D.C. The article points out:

The PLO has been permitted to maintain an office in Washington since 1994. Because of the PLO’s long history of involvement in terrorism, presidential waivers have been required by law every six months to allow its continued operation.

“Would that waiver henceforth be permitted, or be exercised?” Abrams wondered. “But if the PLO office is closed, would the United States accredit an embassy for the State of Palestine? Obviously not, as it would be the American position that there is no State of Palestine, not yet anyway.”

I don’t support a Palestinian state until the Palestinians agree to the existence of Israel. I also don’t believe that the Palestinians are entitled to any part of Jerusalem–Jerusalem has been the capital of Israel since King David–it should not be given away. The difficulties in creating a Palestinian state show that the idea has not been well thought out and might have results that are not good for anyone.

Enhanced by Zemanta