National Review Online
Friday, December 23, 2016
In a parting, spiteful shot at Israel, the Obama
administration permitted a U.N. Security Council resolution to pass that seeks
to permanently change the international legal status of so-called Israeli
“settlements” in Jerusalem and the disputed West Bank. Departing from almost 50
years of bipartisan American precedent — and from the administration’s own past
practice — the Obama administration abstained from a vote for the resolution
demanding that Israel “cease all settlement activities” and declaring that all
existing settlements were in “flagrant violation” of international law.
Just yesterday the resolution appeared dead, as Egypt,
the resolution’s original sponsor, withdrew it under pressure from the incoming
Trump administration. The president-elect took the unusual step of injecting
himself into a U.N. controversy before taking office precisely because the
Obama foreign-policy team was broadcasting its intent to abstain. Incredibly,
however, four nations with precisely zero security interests at stake in the
Middle East — New Zealand, Malaysia, Venezuela, and Senegal — revived the
resolution and forced a vote.
The administration’s fecklessness has harmed Israel,
endangers ordinary Israelis, and hurts the elusive quest for an enduring peace.
Moreover, the Trump administration is powerless to revoke the resolution: It
would have to introduce and pass a new resolution, and either Russia or China
would be sure to veto it. Thus, Israel will find itself at the bargaining table
in any future peace negotiation with Palestinian territorial demands backed by
the U.N.’s most powerful body.
By declaring that settlements — including “settlements”
in Israel’s capital — violate international law, the resolution purports to
carve into stone the armistice lines that existed at the end of Israel’s war
for independence. Yet these lines didn’t become lawful permanent borders
precisely because hostile Arab nations specifically refused to recognize the
existing battle lines as Israel’s border, specifically declined to create a
Palestinian state, and instead maintained a posture of armed hostility to
Israel. Indeed, since the West Bank hasn’t been part of a sovereign nation
since the fall of the Ottoman Empire, the so-called occupied territories aren’t
truly “occupied” under international law. They’re more accurately termed
“disputed” territories, with the precise resolution of the dispute to be
negotiated by the relevant parties.
There are implications for ordinary Israelis as well. If
an Israeli lives in a suburb of Jerusalem, is he or she now a criminal? Can he
be arrested and tried in activist courts in Europe or in international legal
tribunals? Radical U.N. action will only harden Palestinian intransigence and
worsen already rising anti-Semitism (thinly disguised as anti-Zionism) on the
international left. To put this radical resolution in context, under its terms,
it is now an alleged violation of international law that the Western Wall
remains in Israeli hands.
It’s difficult to interpret the Obama administration’s
actions as anything other than a parting shot at Israel and its prime minister,
Benjamin Netanyahu. The Obama administration’s frustrations with the Netanyahu
government are well known, but now was hardly the time to break with almost 50
years of American policy, and frustration or spite were hardly sufficient
reasons. As Trump said in his statement, if there is to be peace between the
Israelis and the Palestinians, “it will only come through direct negotiations
between the parties and not through the imposition of terms by the United
Nations.”
The world will soon move on from Barack Obama, but he’s
doing his best to extend his legacy of failure and appeasement. The
Palestinians deserved a rebuke. Instead they received a gift. Our closest
Middle Eastern ally will pay the price.
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