{"article":{"id":114179,"heading":"Up Against The Wall ! Israel !","author":"Ray Williams","created":"2004-07-15 17:58:55","modified":"2004-07-20 19:15:32","last_modified":"Wed, 21 Jul 2004 02:15:32","article":"

In doing so, they are calling into question the United Nations Charter, and the whole foundation of international law and humanitarian conventions and treaties: which in the end are the legal basis of the state of Israel's international recognition, and, in a broader sense, everyone else's best hope for a global order that does not rely on anarchistic violence and force majeure.

The court in The Hague said in its ruling that the 600-kilometer wall, about a third built, \"severely impeded\" Palestinian rights to self-rule. It curves at points deep into the West Bank around Jewish settlements built on land occupied in the 1967 Middle East war. The court said the wall violated international humanitarian law and called on the UN Security Council and General Assembly to stop the barrier's construction.

It is not often that the court comes out with such an unequivocal opinion. Just because it ruled against Israel and, by extension, its US protector, on every point, does not invalidate the reasoning for the rest of the world.

Rather it is a wake-up call to Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and his supporters in the United States to reconsider their stands and return from orbit. You cannot cherry-pick international law, enforcing the parts you like on others and denying those that impinge on your interests.

The one dissenting vote was American judge Thomas Buergenthal, who said the opinion did not take into account Israel's need to protect itself against terrorism. His opinion was seconded by many American politicians seemingly more mindful of the coming presidential election in November than of ensuring a sound and peaceful world order.

In any case, Buergenthal's statement was economical with the truth. The court considered the issue of Israel's security needs and the threat of terrorism in some depth and length in its 56-page opinion - and it concluded that if Israel wanted to build the wall, it could do so entirely legally, on its own side of the \"Green Line\". However, it could not do so on illegally occupied territory. Indeed, the court specifically excluded the small section of the wall built in Israel from its judgment.

Presumably well-lobbied beforehand, most of the US media reports about the case have sought to qualify the court's opinion as \"non-binding\". Of course, an authoritative statement of international law, issued by a 14-1 majority, is non-binding only if you do not accept the applicability of international law.

In reality, it would be difficult to get a more authoritative decision, not least since this opinion is being delivered to the General Assembly of the UN - with part of the opinion being that states party to the various conventions have a duty to enforce them on Israel.

The combination of the court and the General Assembly is the route that led to the independence of Namibia and sanctions against South Africa. It is the route that led to the eventual independence of East Timor - and a route that has kept Morocco's annexation of Western Sahara unrecognized by any other country in the world.

It may be slow - but such opinions are binding on all law-abiding countries. Indeed, it was the General Assembly that voted for the partition of mandatory Palestine into Jewish and Arab states.

The other defense is to attack the decision as one of a kangaroo court. Just before the hearings, Howard Meyer, an authoritative historian of the World Court, pointed out that the lead counsel for Israel would \"be Dr Shabtai Rosenne, an Israeli diplomat and longtime observer of the ICJ [International Court of Justice]\". As a student of the court, he has written more books about its procedures and its rulings than anyone.

In 1989, four years after the US walked out of the courthouse in Nicaragua's case, Rosenne wrote in an introduction to a new edition of one of his works on the court that it had \"rendered important services in the evolution of international law through the United Nations and in the peaceful settlement of disputes, more in the last decade than in the first 30 years of its existence ... it has performed a major service to the international community as a whole because the need to bring international law into line with present-day requirements is real and urgent\".

As Meyer points out, \"Some kangaroo!\" It does not help the detractors' case that the Israeli Supreme Court itself ruled last month that the route of the wall violated international humanitarian law, even it did not go so far as to rule occupation and settlements illegal.

It is hardly biased of the court to find that the Occupied Territories are indeed occupied and that the settlements are illegal. That is the position that the UN has always taken, and even the US had supported explicitly until very recently. The Israelis beg to differ, but then Saddam Hussein decided unilaterally that Kuwait was his 19th province and the world disagreed with him. In the end, the world tends to win.

The Palestinians by now may be a little bewildered. If they had sent people to place bombs next to the wall, or launched armored bulldozers against it, they would have been roundly condemned for terrorism. So they go to court and find both themselves and the judges condemned for bias and worse.

In fact, there is a lot of material in the opinion that may well provide sound precedents for future disputes.

First of all, the court decided that it did, indeed, despite the US and the Israeli opposition, have the right to consider the question, and that the UN General Assembly indeed had the right to ask it to do so. In this, as in all its other issues, it cited numerous precedents for its reasoning.

Then the judges voted by 14-1, with Buergenthal dissenting in each case, that:



The construction of the wall being built by Israel, the occupying power, in the occupied Palestinian territory, including in and around East Jerusalem, and its associated regime, are contrary to international law.

Israel is under an obligation to terminate its breaches of international law; it is under an obligation to cease forthwith the works of construction of the wall being built in the occupied Palestinian territory, including in and around East Jerusalem, to dismantle forthwith the structure therein situated, and to repeal or render ineffective forthwith all legislative and regulatory acts relating thereto, in accordance with Paragraph 151 of this opinion.

Israel is under an obligation to make reparation for all damage caused by the construction of the wall in the occupied Palestinian territory, including in and around East Jerusalem.

The United Nations, and especially the General Assembly and the Security Council, should consider what further action is required to bring to an end the illegal situation resulting from the construction of the wall and the associated regime, taking due account of the present advisory opinion.

In a very important clause, Buergenthal was joined by the Dutch judge in his dissent, but it was nevertheless passed 13-2.

All states are under an obligation not to recognize the illegal situation resulting from the construction of the wall and not to render aid or assistance in maintaining the situation created by such construction; all states party to the Fourth Geneva Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War of August 12, 1949, have in addition the obligation, while respecting the United Nations Charter and international law, to ensure compliance by Israel with international humanitarian law as embodied in that convention.

However, the decision has many other implications that should concern all who want law-based solutions to the world's problems.

The court had already allowed Palestine as an entity all the privileges of a state in representation to the court and it refers to Palestine throughout on a par with Israel as a party to the proceedings.

It had then further gladdened Palestinian hearts by vindicating their whole position of reasserting international law and UN decisions on the issue, as opposed to US and Israeli attempts since Oslo to relegate the conflict to a bilateral issue, excluding the UN.

\"Given the powers and responsibilities of the United Nations in questions relating to international peace and security,\" says the opinion, the wall was of direct concern to the organization and while it welcomed the \"roadmap\" and negotiations for a settlement, it qualified such negotiations as being \"on the basis of international law\".

Interestingly, it also finds that the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights applies to all people over which a state has jurisdiction, which means that they apply to the Occupied Territories - and so one must conclude would also apply to the US in such places as its detention center in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, although the court does not wander that far that explicitly.

It also affirmed the applicability of other conventions that the Israelis have signed to people in the territories.

As a coup de grace, the court notes that the wall's route has been drawn to include over 80% of the settlements - and it rules that the settlements are illegal, a violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention, as repeated Security Council resolutions have also termed them, not merely \"unhelpful\" as the Bill Clinton reformulation of the US position has it.

In a further blow to the expedient US position that decries the \"Uniting For Peace Resolution\", which allows issues stalled by vetoes in the Security Council to be dealt with by the General Assembly, the court ruled that the procedure was indeed valid - and obligingly cited precedents from the time that the US and others had pioneered the procedure.

The Palestinians had of course used just this procedure in the face of yet another US veto in the Security Council to ask for the opinion from the court. An expedient Clinton administration declared the procedure as \"no longer applicable\".

The next step is for the reconvening of the Special General Assembly, probably on July 15-16 to receive the report. As the draft resolution for that session has it, \"Considering that acceptance of advisory opinions issued by the International Court of Justice is essential to the rule of law and reason in international affairs\", so most states will vote to accept the resolution, since to vote otherwise would indeed be tantamount to a vote to dismantle the UN charter.

The resolution asks the UN Secretary General to compile a register of property damage caused by the construction - which is innocent sounding but allows a suit for damages.

However while restating the opinion, the draft mostly leaves the issue hanging like a sword of Damocles - until after the American election, when the diplomatic mills will begin to grind.

However, it does reiterate focus on the court's finding that states have a duty to apply international law when it is flouted.

After all, how can democratic governments outside the US, and particularly in the European Union, explain to their people their failure to \"ensure compliance by Israel with international humanitarian law\", when told by the world's highest court that they have an obligation to do so?

The resolution will certainly strengthen pressure inside the EU to take a stronger line against Israel's behavior, and the EU is a far bigger trading and commercial partner for Israel than the US.

The nightmare for Israel is of course South African-style sanctions, both state imposed and consumer boycotts.

But the way to avert that is simple, and mandated by the court. \"Mr Sharon, tear down this wall.\"

(Copyright 2004 Asia Times Online Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact content@atimes.com<\/a> for information on our sales and syndication policies.)

\n","contact":"","link":"","address":"","phone":"","parent_id":0,"mime_type":"text\/plain","summary":"\r\n\r\n\r\nPeople who attack the World Court for its July 9 Ruling on the Israeli wall in the Occupied Territories should beware.","numcomment":14,"fileurl":"\/uploads\/","filesize":null,"article_url":"\/news\/2004\/07\/114179.php"},"attachments":[],"comments":[{"id":114197,"heading":"FK the UN","article":"There is no margin for error about a monstrosity that was created for the alleged purpose of preventing wars by uniting the world against any aggressor, but proceeded to unite it against any victim of aggression. The expulsion of a charter member, the Republic of China [Taiwan]\u2014an action forbidden by the U.N.'s own Charter\u2014was a 'moment of truth,' a naked display of the United Nations' soul. \r\n

\r\nWhat was Red China's qualification for membership in the U.N.? The fact that her government seized power by force, and has maintained it for twenty-two years by terror. What disqualified Nationalist China [Taiwan]? The fact that she was a friend of the United States. It was against the United States that all those beneficiaries of our foreign aid were voting at the U.N. It was hatred of the United States and the pleasure of spitting in our face that they were celebrating, as well as their liberation from morality\u2014with savages, appropriately, doing jungle dances in the aisles.<\/B>","author":"PK Proiler","parent_id":114179,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2004-07-14 17:39:04","modified":"2013-11-11 00:30:24","fileurl":""},{"id":114198,"heading":"FK the UN","article":"There is no margin for error about a monstrosity that was created for the alleged purpose of preventing wars by uniting the world against any aggressor, but proceeded to unite it against any victim of aggression. The expulsion of a charter member, the Republic of China [Taiwan]\u2014an action forbidden by the U.N.'s own Charter\u2014was a 'moment of truth,' a naked display of the United Nations' soul. \r\n

\r\nWhat was Red China's qualification for membership in the U.N.? The fact that her government seized power by force, and has maintained it for twenty-two years by terror. What disqualified Nationalist China [Taiwan]? The fact that she was a friend of the United States. It was against the United States that all those beneficiaries of our foreign aid were voting at the U.N. It was hatred of the United States and the pleasure of spitting in our face that they were celebrating, as well as their liberation from morality\u2014with savages, appropriately, doing jungle dances in the aisles.<\/B>","author":"PK Proiler","parent_id":114179,"mime_type":"text\/html","created":"2004-07-14 17:40:11","modified":"2013-11-11 00:30:24","fileurl":""},{"id":114214,"heading":"to the racist who said f the UN","article":"Let me get this straight: Israel claims that it had the right to carve a state out of Palestine against the wishes of its indiginous inhabitants because the UN said that it could. That is Israel's only legal claim to existence. But when the UN or any other international body orders Israel to stop building a wall on Arab land to fence in the Palestinians like cattle, the UN has no authority and should mind its own business. Don't ever accuse the Zionists of not being cynical.\r\n The real savages in today's world are poeple like Sharon, Bush and Blair.","author":"Meyer London","parent_id":114179,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2004-07-16 17:46:32","modified":"2004-07-16 17:46:32","fileurl":""},{"id":114217,"heading":"The UN -- United for What?","article":"Today, the \u201cUnited Nations\u201d are best known for having assumed the direct inheritance of the erstwhile Nazi Party, their predecessors such as the Spanish Inquisition, the Crusaders, and all those endless haters of Israel and God who preceded them.\r\n\r\nThe United Nations Organization was first founded in 1945 when the representatives of 50 nations met in San Francisco to draw up its charter. That charter was signed by representatives of those 50 countries on the 26th of June, 1945.\r\n\r\nIt is hard to believe today that the effort then made sought to bring to an end the constant warfare that has plagued mankind for so long and to insure a least a minimum of \u201chuman rights\u201d for all men, even Jews.\r\n\r\nIn 1945 there were at least some politicians included in the UNO delegations who thought it \u201cunfortunate\u201d that 6 million Jews had just been slaughtered by the Europeans. No doubt, Germany was in the lead in promoting these horrors. However, most Europeans, with some honorable exceptions, cooperated with the killers and profited from those mass murders. Today we know that even Sweden and Switzerland, the so-called \u201cneutrals\u201d during the Second World War, are still sitting on Nazi gold robbed from the Jewish corpses of 1933-45.\r\n\r\nRecall now that when the Jewish people sought to return to the Land of Israel which has been our inheritance since the days of Abraham, the British colonizers hunted down the refugees who had survived the death camps and imprisoned them on Cyprus, then a British colony, so as to prevent their entrance into their ancient homeland.\r\n\r\nDespite the effort of the British to prevent Jewish independence in Israel, six hundred thousand Jews, the majority of the inhabitants of that land, declared their independence on May 5, 1948. \r\n\r\n____There are those who like to pretend that the United Nations created Israel by voting in favor of the partition of the so-called \u201cPalestine\u201d in 1947. ____\r\n\r\nThat is of course ridiculous, not only because the Jews of Israel created their own independence by their own \u201cblood, sweat and tears\u201d but also because there never was, is not now, and never will be a \u201cPalestine\u201d.\r\n\r\nAfter the Romans destroyed all of Judea and Samaria in 135, they called the land they had devastated \u201cPalestina\u201d so as to obliterate the name Judea from the memory of mankind. They used the name of an ancient people, the Philistines, who were no more even in 135, so as to wipe out any vestige of Jewish connection to the \u201cPromised Land\u201d. Today, of course, Rome is no more but Israel exists.\r\n\r\nThose who now call themselves \u201cPalestinians\u201d are Arab immigrants to Israel who came from Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Jordan and Egypt in order to take advantage of the high standard of living the Jews had achieved in Israel. Yassir Arafat Husseini, the current Hitler, is an Egyptian. He was not born in Jerusalem as he pretends. He was born in Egypt. He is the poster boy of the United Nations, despite the old laundry he wears on his head.\r\n\r\nNow today, the United Nations has become the direct promoter of all that is hateful in the world. This is visible in many ways. The best and most recent example of the hate mongering of the United Nations was their \u201cWorld Conference Against Racism\u201d, held in Durban, South Africa in September of 2001. That conference should have been called the World Conference to Persecute the Jewish People.\r\n\r\nOur delegation to that conference withdrew when it became clear that the conference had no interest in alleviating the consequences of racism but that, on the contrary, the conference sought to enhance and promote hatred in this world. The entire conference was used to denounce Jews, to revive all the ancient hate slogans about \u201cChrist killers\u201d, to repeat the Nazi dictums of the 1940\u2019s and to call for the destruction of Israel. It is to the credit of our government and President George W. Bush that we walked out of that United Nations cabal.\r\n\r\nA second example of the moral failure of the United Nations and its promotion of anti-Judaism in the world was the appointment of Mary Robinson as United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights. At the insistence of the United States, Ms. Robinson is no longer in that position because Ms. Robinson used her office to agitate against Jews and Israel.\r\n\r\nA yet more grievous example of the anti-Jewish attitude of the so-called \u201cUnited Nations\u201d is the recent effort by the U.N. to send an investigating team to Israel with the announced purpose of blaming Israel for the terrorism unleashed there since last September. That terrorism consists, of course, of the homicide bombings committed daily by the minions of Arafat and his Nazis whose religion teaches them that no Jew has a right to live.\r\n\r\nNow this team has been rejected by Israel because it is evident that the members of that team are a gang of Jew-hating politicians who have already decided in advance that the army of Israel conducted a \u201cmassacre\u201d in Jenin, an Arab town devoted to attacks on Jews and proud of the mass murder conducted by its citizens these fifteen months.\r\n\r\nIncluded in that U.N. team is Cornelio Sommaruga, an Italian-Swiss citizen who formerly headed the International Red Cross. In that capacity, Sommaruga refused to allow the membership of Israel into the International Red Cross although every Moslem state in the world is a member. Sommaruga said repeatedly that he would rather see the Crooked Cross, i.e., the Swastika of the Nazi party, become a Red Cross emblem than the Mogen Dovid Adam. This hater is a member of a United Nations \u201cinvestigating committee\u201d to look into the fighting in Jenin provoked by the killers who bombed a Seder in an Israeli hotel last month. Of course, the committee is not interested in investigating the murder of Jews. Their only interest in the defamation of the Jewish people.\r\n\r\nAnother hate-filled gang of religious bigots is Amnesty International. They too are endlessly blaming \u201cthe Jews\u201d for all the world\u2019s ills but find nothing wrong with the murder of Jews, with Hitler, with Nazis, with the homicide bombers, with the burning down of synagogues, with the persecution of the small Jewish community in Iran or with anything causing Jewish suffering. Theirs is indeed the old \u201cChrist killer\u201d mentality.\r\n\r\nThe U.N. is of course not only opposed to the existence of the Jewish people. They don\u2019t like the Serbs either. The Serbs committed the \u201ccrime\u201d of defending themselves against Osama bin Laden and his Albanian allies who sought to destroy that country, annex large parts of Serbia to Albania and flatten every Christian church in Kosovo, a Serbian province.\r\n\r\nThe Albanian Moslems even have an air force. It is called the NATO air force, which bombed Belgrade on their behalf. Having destroyed that city, the U.N. assembled a kangaroo court which pretends to \u201ctry\u201d the former president of Yugoslavia, Slobodan Milosovich, for defending his country against the Osama bin Laden attacks. Included in the panel of judges are only those whose long history of anti-Serb attitudes is impeccable. Of course, Milosovich will be convicted. Is it not a crime to defend oneself against Moslem atrocities?\r\n\r\nThe lesson to be drawn from all the pain and misery the United Nations has brought to this world is that the U.S., our country, should no longer contribute any of our tax money to these haters. The majority of the members of that criminal gang also hate the U.S.A., although they are more than willing to take our money or attend our colleges for free.\r\n\r\nWe don\u2019t need these haters. We don\u2019t need the bigots. We don\u2019t need the persecutors. We don\u2019t need this gang of organized criminals. They need us. Therefore, let us write to our congressional delegation and insist that our money not be spent on the U.N. henceforth. Congress votes all expenditures. If Congress refuses to include money for the U.N. in our next budget then they can take their lunatic hatred elsewhere. They can get out of New York and go to Baghdad, where they will all be welcome by Saddam Hussein, their mentor and their idol.\r\n\r\nShalom u\u2019vracha.\r\n","author":"Shalom u\u2019vracha","parent_id":114179,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2004-07-16 19:35:00","modified":"2026-10-25 17:02:53","fileurl":""},{"id":114223,"heading":"preceeding rant","article":"The preceeding rant proves that, contrary to the assurances we hear in the media, LSD usage did not disappear after the early 1970's. Surely the rant was penned by someone having a bad trip. Frenzy like that simply would not be exhibited by anyone who was not under the influence of some substance or certifiably psychotic. Maybe both.","author":"Meyer London","parent_id":114179,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2004-07-16 20:26:22","modified":"2004-07-16 20:26:22","fileurl":""},{"id":114224,"heading":"nah...","article":"more like speed, although it seems to be just before the effects of prolonged usage begins to produce utter incoherence...","author":"Sheepdog","parent_id":114179,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2004-07-16 20:56:20","modified":"2004-07-16 20:56:20","fileurl":""},{"id":114226,"heading":""That guy is crazy."","article":""The U.N. wants what's best for ALL of us."\r\n\r\n \r\nhttp:\/\/unisevil.com","author":"quark","parent_id":114179,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2004-07-16 21:16:40","modified":"2004-07-16 21:16:40","fileurl":""},{"id":114229,"heading":"another comment","article":"Since when hasn't the UN been a figleaf for US aggression? The representatives that vote in this body are merely the errand boys of the countries rulers represented and not the mandate of the people. The US has many attack dogs with a veto to control them from getting too close to popular justice anyway.","author":"Sheepdog","parent_id":114179,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2004-07-16 23:40:33","modified":"2004-07-16 23:40:33","fileurl":""},{"id":114231,"heading":"get rid of U.N.","article":"Kick their welfare asses out of NY and demolish the buliding.\r\n\r\n\r\nhttp:\/\/unisevil.com\/","author":"give 'em the boot","parent_id":114179,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2004-07-16 23:58:57","modified":"2004-07-16 23:58:57","fileurl":""},{"id":114246,"heading":"demolish the building","article":"Thank you for that contribution, Timothy McVeigh. I knew the media was telling a lie when they said you were executed.","author":"Meyer London","parent_id":114179,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2004-07-17 12:47:55","modified":"2004-07-17 12:47:55","fileurl":""},{"id":114249,"heading":"as if unilateralism has worked so well","article":"Unilateralism in Iraq's failed.\r\n\r\nOur actions in the former Yugoslavia were screwed up too, but, the UN helps to share the blame.\r\n\r\nUltimately, the goal of any body like the UN is to help legitimate and preserve the power of the already-powerful.","author":"more rational","parent_id":114179,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2004-07-17 13:52:14","modified":"2004-07-17 13:52:14","fileurl":""},{"id":114265,"heading":"the real racists","article":"Thank you for that contribution, Timothy McVeigh.<\/I>\r\n

\r\nUnlike Tim, I'm giving the crooks time to leave the building. I'm sure most of the 3rd Whirled savages have jungle vines they can slide down in case of emergency. There's nothing funnier than a savage wearing a cheetah skin, with a bone through his nose and riding a rhinoceros while denouncing the U.S. as "barbaric." Or a moon-worshiping Ali Bomba. \r\n

\r\nNow let's hear you defend how the UN stole billions of Food-for-Oil dollars in collusion with saddam. (And they call ME the 'racist').\r\n

\r\nStupid one-worlders.\r\n\r\n\r\n","author":"unisevil.com","parent_id":114179,"mime_type":"text\/html","created":"2004-07-17 21:41:14","modified":"2004-07-17 21:41:14","fileurl":""},{"id":114411,"heading":"They call him "the racist."","article":"And they are obviously so right. Don't trip on your Klan sheet on your way to the Aryan Festival.","author":"Meyer London","parent_id":114179,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2004-07-20 15:46:48","modified":"2004-07-20 15:46:48","fileurl":""},{"id":114418,"heading":"Mc Veigh and the OK bombing","article":"When this massacre happened I remember the news telling of rescue teams being pulled from the site when dogs found other bombs in the building. Subsequent investigations revealed that all government employees were given the day off. Like the WTC, explosives were planted inside the federal building. Someone used civilians, including children, to install the first of the 'anti terror' laws rape of the Bill of Rights.\r\n\r\nANFO truck bomb, my butt.","author":"Sheepdog","parent_id":114179,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2004-07-20 19:15:32","modified":"2004-07-20 19:15:32","fileurl":""}]}