Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, May 2013, Pages 20-21

Special Report

Getting the Words Right: Israel Isn’t Occupying Palestine—It’s Conquered It

By Delinda C. Hanley

PEOPLE WERE still talking about President Barack Obama’s Jerusalem Convention Center speech a week later, on March 27, at the Al-Hewar Center in Vienna, VA. The conversation that evening focused on what concerned Americans should do, now that Obama is back, to make U.S. foreign policy more even-handed. Many participants experienced an “Aha! moment” that I’m chagrined to admit was not prompted by the evening’s speaker (this writer). Not surprisingly, it was Clovis Maksoud, 85, the eloquent former ambassador and permanent observer of the League of Arab States at the United Nations, who provided electrifying observations about our careless use of words, during a “brainstorming” discussion after the talk.

“There are certain legal issues that should be clarified before we undertake a campaign to dislodge the United States from its unquestioning support of Israel,” Ambassador Maksoud began. “First, let’s all agree the West Bank is not occupied.”

There was a collective gasp, until Maksoud reminded us that in July 2012 a committee headed by former Israeli Supreme Court Justice Edmond Levy looked at Israel’s legal status in the West Bank and decided Israel is not an occupying power. The Levy Report insisted that the Fourth Geneva Convention—which prohibits an occupier from settling any of its population in an occupied area—is not relevant. That’s because, according to Levy, Israel’s presence in the biblical land it calls Judea and Samaria was taken by conquest.

The Levy Report makes it painfully clear that Israelis believe “It is impossible to foresee a time when Israel will relinquish these territories, if ever.” Israelis no longer make an effort to pretend they’re merely occupying Palestinian territory. It’s not a temporary stay. Mainstream right-wing Israelis have proposed annexing most of the West Bank. Israelis have just elected a government which has no intention of leaving the West Bank or Golan Heights, no matter what they say in so-called peace talks.

The head of the pro-settler Jewish Home party, Naftali Bennett, a former commando leader, confirmed this stance. “A Palestinian state is not the right way forward,” the newly appointed economy and trade minister declared, dismissing Obama’s calls for an end to the occupation. “Generally, there is no occupation within one’s own land,” Bennett explained.

“Bennett has stated publicly what has been the policy of Israel since June 1967 and what the Oslo agreement and subsequent so-called ‘negotiations’ have sought to cover up,” Maksoud argued. “This establishes what has been obscure for a long time—Israel is not an occupying power. It is a conquering power.”

So, according to Maksoud, the first word Palestinians and their supporters should toss in the wastebin is occupation. (The Fourth Geneva Convention, of course, applies both to conflicts and occupations.)

Another term Maksoud advised friends of Palestine to stop using is to call for a settlement freeze. Maksoud stated: “Settlements should not be frozen. Settlements should be disbanded or dismantled. They’re illegal.” Merely freezing or halting settlement growth implies that existing settlements are somehow acceptable. Settlements, especially in East Jerusalem, are a form of creeping annexation, Maksoud stated. West Bank Settlers should leave or agree to be part of a democratic Palestinian state.

The most dangerous terminology of all, Maksoud warned, are the words Jewish state. The Israeli government of Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is demanding—for the first time—Palestinian recognition of Israel as a Jewish state. “It’s outrageous to call for a single ethnic or racial nation in the 21st century,” Maksoud emphasized. Imagine the outcry if the United States called itself a white state or a Christian state, or if Egypt decided to become an Islamic state, he added.

The first U.S. official to call on Palestinians to recognize Israel as a Jewish state was then-U.S. Secretary of State Colin L. Powell, after an Israeli diplomat convinced an aide to slip the phrase into a 2001 speech. A Jewish state ignores the million and a half Palestinians living inside the 1948 Israeli borders—a higher percentage than that of African Americans in this country—and the millions of Palestinian refugees outside. Palestinians regard acceptance of the demand to recognize Israel as a Jewish state as giving up their right of return.

Most Americans believe that Arabs don’t recognize the right of Israel to exist, but that’s just not true. The Palestine Liberation Organization recognized the State of Israel as part of the Oslo accords in 1993. The 2002 Arab Peace Initiative sought to normalize relations between the entire Arab region and Israel in return for Israel’s withdrawal from the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem. Arabs—including Hamas—have come to accept a multi-ethnic democratic Israeli state, but the requirement that it be a Jewish state is recent. Maksoud urged peace activists to focus on pressuring our leaders to drop the phrase Jewish state.

Maksoud turned next to the legal status of Gaza. Israel claims it withdrew from Gaza in 2005, even though Tel Aviv continues to exercise control over the area. Israel has declared Gaza a sui generis entity, which means that it cannot be defined in precise legal terms. In 2007 Israel declared the Gaza Strip an “enemy” entity and later, in 2009, a “belligerent” entity, paving the way for border closures, sanctions, a blockade of essential supplies, and even military assaults.

“If we’re serious about resuming negotiations it is important to realize that Israel believes the West Bank is a conquered land and Gaza is a belligerent entity, which Israel doesn’t want back,” Maksoud explained. Washington says it’s the responsibility of Palestinian leadership, especially President Mahmoud Abbas, to return to negotiations. Negotiations presume an outcome—in this case, a two-state solution based on the 1967 borders. But that is cheating the Palestinian people, because it is now clear that Israel was just talking. It has no intention of having a Palestinian state next door. The Oslo peace process brought 22 years of disappointment, Maksoud concluded, and the situation we’re faced with today.

Before we intensify the campaign to educate Americans, it’s essential that those who support Palestinian rights clarify the terms.If serious negotiations are renewed, it’s important to get the legal terms right.

“CONSIDER THESE WORDS AND RESOLVE TO DROP THEM”

Former Ambassador Edward Peck has long championed direct, descriptive words to explain Palestine and Israel to Americans, emphasizing that euphemisms and omissions complicate this critical issue. Ambassador Peck submitted a paper on this topic to the International Conference on Jerusalem we both attended in Doha, Qatar on Feb. 26 and 27, 2012. (See May 2012 Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, p. 26.) His description of the more misleading words employed by virtually everyone on either side of the issue are paraphrased below. “Consider the words and then let us resolve to drop them from the vocabulary,” Peck advised conference attendees.

Ending the Conflict: Conflicts are fought by nations’ armies across their borders. In Palestine there is only one army, and there is no border. It’s ending the occupation, not the conflict, that must be achieved.

Peace Process: A peace process between the occupier and the occupied is an oxymoron, a contradiction in terms, since there is no war, and no conflict, just a brutal occupation.

Negotiations: This describes an agreement between independent, relatively equal parties to discuss how to resolve an issue that divides them. Armed guards do not “negotiate” with prostrate prisoners, There is not the smallest shred of anything even distantly resembling balance or equality between the two sides, eliminating any meaningful “negotiations.”

Direct Talks: Israelis and Palestinians are already in constant, far too often unpleasant contact. They are not even separated by a border. If Israelis want to talk to Palestinians, they know precisely where they are, and exactly how to get there. It should by now be abundantly clear that Israel sees nothing to be gained from “direct talks,” since it can continue doing whatever it wishes under existing arrangements. Total failure to generate any truly meaningful results in past sessions should be the clincher.

Concessions: There is talk about the need for Israeli concessions, including ending the illegal occupation and inhumane actions and policies surrounding the occupation. Describing these actions as “concessions” obscures the real issues and conceals the benefits of security, peace and global acceptance that would accrue to Israel.

Recognition: The U.S. and Israel insist that Palestinians recognize Israel—but recognition is reciprocal. A recognizes B in exchange for B recognizing A. No one has ever even mentioned, let alone proposed, that Israel should recognize Palestine, but mutual recognition is how it is done. Recognition is given to a state, defined as an entity with its territory enclosed by recognized international borders, but no one knows exactly where Israel’s borders are now, or where they will be in the future.

Ambassador Peck concluded by urging “constant and careful replacement of those unfortunate, misleading descriptions with more accurate, powerful, evocative words. They should accurately describe circumstances and actions that threaten the stability and future of an entire region and its inhabitants, as well as those far away.”

Israeli forces attacked and injured Palestinian demonstrators and journalists alike in the West Bank and Gaza on the 37th anniversary of Land Day this year. Protesters commemorated the day—March 30, 1976—when Israeli soldiers killed six protesters and wounded or jailed hundreds of other Palestinians living within the 1967 borders who resisted Israeli plans to confiscate their private property. If Americans and others don’t use the right words, non-Jewish Israeli citizens and Palestinian refugees will find themselves locked out of their homeland forever.

Delinda C. Hanley is news editor of the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs.