Anna Who? David Singer adds his view
Palestine – Peter Slezak’s Statements Do Not Add Up….
Peter Slezak and Anne Baltzer need to put their emotions aside and calmly reflect on the rubbish they have swallowed from Arab propagandists as they make statements that are inaccurate, half truths and downright misleading.
Peter adopts and uses material distributed by Anne Baltzer which states:
“… by 1946 only 8% of the land was Jewish. In 1947 the UN Partition Plan proposed giving 54% of Palestinian land for a Jewish State.
Peter just happens to overlook that:
1. Only 8% of the land was owned by Arabs in 1946. The remaining 84% was state land vested in Great Britain as Mandatory under the Mandate for Palestine for the purposes of reconstitution of the Jewish National Home . Arab claims to ownership of such state land is pure bunkum.
2. The 1947 UN Partition Plan only dealt with the 22% of historic Palestine west of the Jordan River. The remaining 78% of historic Palestine had already become the sovereign Arab state of Transjordan in 1946 with not one Jew living there.
3. True the Jews were awarded 54% of this remaining 22% of historic Palestine and the Arabs the remaining 46%. What Peter however omits to tell your readers is that the 54% awarded to the Jews included the Negev – a largely arid and unpopulated area that made up more than 70% of the land awarded to the Jews.
4. The Arabs rejected the UN Partition Plan
Peter continues:
“In 1948 Jewish control expanded to 78% of historical Palestine through the expulsion of ¾ million Palestinians…”
Peter is wrong on the following counts:
1. Jews ended up with 17% of historical Palestine – not 78% as Peter claims. The remaining 83% – Transjordan, the West Bank and Gaza was under Arab control for 19 years until 1967.
2. Peter’s use of the emotive word “expulsion” ignores the well documented fact that the majority of Arabs fled their homes at the behest of the Arab League – six of whose armies had invaded Palestine with the intention of slaughtering the Jews and wanted the Arabs out of the way so they could complete their planned annihilation.
Peter’s flight into fantasyland is not over. He continues:
“The remaining historic Palestinian land was occupied in 1967, now with ½ million Israeli settlers all prohibited by international law (4th Geneva Convention, Article 49).
Peter is in error parroting this Arab claim that ignores that :
1. Jews were legally permitted to settle in the West Bank and Gaza pursuant to article 6 of the Mandate for Palestine and article 80 of the United Nations Charter and in fact had done so prior to being driven out in the 1948 War.
2. These rights were vested in the Jews by international law and cannot be varied or abrogated without the consent of the Jews and have not been superseded or varied by the Geneva Convention.
3. The Jewish claim to sovereignty in the West Bank is far more compelling and weightier than that of the Palestinian Authority, which was only created in 1993.
4. The West Bank is currently “no man’s land” in which sovereignty is yet to be determined between Jews and Arabs.
The inaccuracies continue to flow from Peter’s pen when he states:
“The separation wall weaves through Palestinian communities and farmland annexing around 8% more Palestinian land, and was declared illegal by the International Court of Justice in 2004.”
In fact:
1. No land has been annexed
2. The land is not Palestinian land. At present it belongs to no-one.
3. The International Court’s judgment was an advisory opinion only and is not binding.
Peter is not yet finished as he continues:
“The UN Security Council resolution 242 for a 2-state solution requires the withdrawal of Israel to the 1967 borders.
Wrong again Peter for the following reasons.
1. Resolution 242 only requires Israel to withdraw to secure and recognized boundaries as part of a negotiated peace agreement.
2. Resolution 242 never postulated a two-state solution
3. There were no 1967 borders – only armistice lines.
Peter sanctimoniously continues:
“We may ask: Who is guilty of inaccuracies and wilfully ignoring facts? Is Baltzer “intellectually and morally biased” for seeking to draw these matters to the attention of Jewish and other audiences?
My answer to this is a resounding “Yes”.
Anne Baltzer is but one of many decent people that have swallowed the continued repetition of Arab falsehoods designed to deceive and mislead. She is a young starry eyed individual who can possibly be excused for believing what she has been told by her Arab interlocutors but certainly needs to be made aware of her misstatements of facts that are critical to an informed understanding of the conflict that began in the 1880’s and is till ongoing.
Peter Slezak – an academic – should know better. His reliance on some propaganda rag distributed by Anne Baltzer cannot measure up to any serious academic scrutiny nor does his use of this material have any measure of credibility just because it happens to be adopted by an Associate Professor in the School of History and Philosophy.
David Singer is a Sydney Lawyer and Foundation Member of the International Analysts Network
It is inconceivable that an academic could accept and endorse such a tissue of falsehoods,without any research.The sad fact is that the Arab narrative is almost universally accepted as true,doing irreparable harm to Israel’s image.It is vital to Israel’s interests that the true facts, so clearly set out by David Singer, be repeated, and repeated again, until the facts are known and accepted.Only then, will we stop hearing the wearisome nonsense about the ‘occupied territories’,dispossesion, and illegal occupation.
#Sam Goldman
Thanks for the wrap but there are many like me who know the facts but who have given up on answering the Anna Baltzer’s and Peter Slezak’s of this world who are then left to peddle inaccurate and misleading facts which soon become accepted fare in the ongoing conflict.
Of course the media and politicians are easy targets without any other information to counteract what they are being told on almost a daily basis as they are bombarded with false and deceptive Arab propaganda such as that identified by me in this article.
I have no objection to Jews expressing support for the plight of the West Bank and Gazan Arabs as well as those Arabs of Palestinian descent who have been left rotting in the refugee camps by their Arab brethren for the last 62 years.
After all the Israeli Government has done so for the last 17 years but has been rebuffed in the offers it made in 2001 and 2008.
What I do object to is the reliance on false information that totally misconstrues the nature of the conflict and how it can be resolved.
One way is by restoring the status quo as far as possible as existed at 5 June 1967. This can be achieved by Jordan, Israel and Egypt dividing sovereignty of the West Bank and Gaza between their respective States in the relatively simple act of redrawing existing boundary lines between them . The Arabs don’t want to know – just as they haven’t since many offers to settle the conflict have been rebuffed since the first one made in 1937.
It now remains the only solution in the face of the failure to implement the “two state solution” – the creation of a new Arab State between Jordan, Egypt and Israel where none has ever existed before.
The claim that the Jews have sovereignty in 78% – not 17% – of historical Palestine is the greatest canard and propaganda coup the Arabs have perpetrated and seen regurgitated once again in this article by Anna Baltzer and Peter Slezak..
The PLO Covenant makes it clear that Palestine – with the boundaries it had during the British Mandate – is one separate and indivisible territory. The Mandate included what is today Jordan – 78% of historic Palestine.
Jordan is part of the problem and must be part of the solution.
Understand that one simple fact and you have the key to resolving the conflict.
If Slezak and Baltzer focused their efforts on this one simple proposition they would be doing the Arabs as well as the Jews a great service in advancing the cause of peace to which they are so passionately committed.
there is nothing like the facts, that it seems only david singer knows verbatim.
a very well documented, factual reply to the uninformed peter slezak and anna baltzer.