-Caveat Lector- http://israelnationalnews.com/article.php3?id=2128
An Open Letter to Robin Cook by Yoram Halberstam March 27, 2003 Mr Cook, On March 17 you made the decision to resign from Tony Blair's government. Your statement on this occasion in the House of Commons was used as a platform to misinform the House and the British public. You stated that you "have heard" that "Iraq has not had months but 12 years in which to complete [compliance with UN resolutions]... Yet it is over 30 years since resolution 242 called on Israel to withdraw from the occupied territories." This analogy between Iraq and Israel is not only wrong, it is a premeditated attempt to mislead on your part. Mr Cook, your statement does not attempt to "redress the strong sense of injustice throughout the Muslim world", it only helps them in their attempt to continue to mislead world opinion at large. UN Resolution 242 is not under Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter, unlike most of the 17 UN Resolutions against Iraq. You should know that only the resolutions under this Chapter allow the use of force to impose the will of the international community. Mr Cook, UN Resolution 242 only applies to countries that were taking part in the war with Israel, which started on June 5th 1967. Those countries were Egypt, Jordan and Syria. "Palestine" was not at war with Israel, as it did not exist on paper, in history or in the hearts and minds of the Jordanian and Egyptian population that, today, call themselves Palestinians. Judea and Samaria were annexed by Jordan in 1950. They were renamed the "West Bank" by the Jordanians - that is west of Jordan, not east of a country that supposedly was taken over by the Jewish state. This annexation was never recognized by the United Nations, only by Britain and Pakistan. The reason why the annexation of this land was not recognized is because it was not a definite border. The so called "1967 borders" were no borders. On the contrary, they were an armistice line drawn up by the UN and which ended the 1948-49 war launched by the Arabs to destroy the State of Israel. Again no reference to "Palestine's borders". Should you care to look in a dictionary you shall see that "armistice" means "a temporary cessation of fighting by mutual consent" or "a truce". Again, no reference to defined borders. Nevertheless, Britain decided in 1950 to go along with Pakistan and recognize the "legitimacy" of the new border of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. Under UN Security Council Resolution 242, Israel is only expected to withdraw "from territories" to "secure and recognized boundaries" and not ‘from all of the territories’ captured in the Six-Day War. This language was the result of months of negotiations within the United Nations. Therefore, the Security Council recognized that Israel was entitled to part of these territories for new defensible borders. The later UN Resolution 338 made it clear that such peace must be achieved through "negotiations" not though "military imposition". Iraq resolution 660, on the other hand, demands that "Iraq withdraw immediately and unconditionally all its forces to the positions in which they were located on 1 August 1990." This "demand" was passed under Chapter VII with UN Resolution 678. Mr Cook, under the UN Resolution you are referring to and under UN Resolution 338, the negotiations would determine from which territory Israel must withdraw. You seem to have forgotten that the result of peace agreements between the parties must result in "termination of all claims" and "respect for and acknowledgment of the sovereignty, territorial integrity and political independence ". A peace agreement has been signed with Egypt in 1979 and Jordan in 1994; therefore, there cannot be any claim of territories, because the only ones that can claim it where the countries that formerly held these territories before the Six-Day War and until such time as they signed "peace" pacts with Israel. UN Resolution 242 did indeed refer to these territories as "occupied"; however, you have once again mislead the House of Commons into calling them as such in 2003. The term "occupied" was and is only used to refer to the "responsibility" for the well-being of a civilian population where the 1949 Geneva Convention applies. This convention states that "the Occupying Power shall be bound" by the Convention rules "to the extent that such Power exercises the functions of government in such territory". Since the Declaration of Principle signed at Oslo, Israel has given up these "functions of government" and transferred power to the Palestinian Authority in areas where most of the Arab civilians live. In March 1994, U.S. Ambassador to the UN, Madeleine Albright, stated: "We simply do not support the description of the territories occupied by Israel in the 1967 War as occupied Palestinian territory." On May 4 1998, James Baker was interviewed by Hoda Tawfik from the newspaper al- Ahram. He was asked, "What do you think is right? That these are occupied Arab territories and not disputed territories?" To which Baker replied, "They're clearly disputed territories. That's what Resolutions 242 and 338 are all about. They are clearly disputed territories." Mr Cook, since you were once Foreign Minister, I would want to believe that it was slander rather than a lack of knowledge of the UN Charter. I do hope, however, that you still have enough integrity to stop misleading the general public with blatantly wrong, inciting and incorrect statements. You have resigned from a government for a decision that has the democratic majority backing of the elected House of Commons and you have "jumped on the bandwagon" of baselessly criticizing Israel, which may have reminded you of the tense relationship you created many times between this country and the State of Israel in your years as Foreign Minister. -------------------------------------------------------- Yoram Halberstam is Software Architect and an Internet Service Provider in the United Kingdom. ************ -- Outgoing mail is certified virus free Scanned by Norton AntiVirus <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/";>www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are unwelcomed. Substance—not soap-boxing—please! 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