The origin of the Palestine-Israeli conflict

PUBLISHED BY JEWS FOR JUSTICE IN THE MIDDLE EAST (extracts)

INTRODUCTION:

The standard Zionist position is that they showed up in Palestine to reclaim their ancestral homeland in the late 19th century. Jews bought land and started building their Jewish community their. They were met with increasingly violent opposition from the Palestinian Arabs, presumably stemming from the Arabs’ inherent anti-Semitism. The Zionists were then forced to defend themselves and, in one form or another, this same situation continues up to today. The problem with this explanation is that it is simply not true, as the documentary evidence in this booklet shall show. What really happened was that the Zionist movement, from the beginning, looked forward to a practically complete dispossession of the indigenous Arab population so that Israel could be a wholly Jewish state, or as much as was possible. Land bought by the Jewish National Fund was held in the name of the Jewish people and could never be sold or even leased back to Arabs (a situation which continues to the present). The Arab community, as it became increasingly aware of the Zionists intentions, strenuously opposed further Jewish immigration and land buying because it posed a real and imminent danger to the very existence to Arab society in Palestine. Because of this opposition, the entire Zionist project never could have been realised without the military backing of the British. The vast majority of the Population of Palestine, by the way, had been Arabic since the seventh century (over 1200 years).

In short, Zionism was based on a faulty, colonialist world-view that the rights of the indigenous inhabitants didn’t matter. The Arabs’ opposition to Zionism wasn’t based on anti-Semitism but rather on a totally reasonable fear of the dispossession of their people.

One further point: Being Jewish ourselves, the position we present here is critical of Zionism but is in no way anti-Semitic. We do not believe that the Jews acted worst than any other group might have acted in their situation. The Zionists (who were a distinct minority of the Jewish people until after WW II) had an understandable desire to establish a place where Jews could be masters of their fate, given the bleak history of Jewish oppression.

Especially as the danger to European Jewry crystallised in the late 1930s and after, the actions of the Zionists were propelled by real desperation.

But so were the actions of the Arabs. The mythic "land without people for a people without land" was already home to 700,000 Palestinians in 1919.

This is the route of the problem, as we shall see.

EARLY HISTORY OF THE REGION:

Before the Hebrews first migrated there around 1800BC, the land of Canaan was occupied by Canaanities.
"Between 3000 and 1100BC, Canaanite civilisation covered what is today Israel, the West Bank, Lebanon and much of Syria and Jordan… Those would remain in the Jerusalem hills after the Romans expelled the Jews [in the second century AD] were a potpourri: farmers and vineyard growers, pagans and converts to Christianity, descendants of the Arabs, Persians, Samaritans, Greeks an old Canaanite tribes."
Marcia Kunstel and Joseph Albright, "Their Promised Land".

The Present –day Palestinians’ ancestral heritage
" But all these [different peoples who had come into Canaan] were additions, sprigs grafted onto the parent tree…And that parentry was Canaanite…[the Arab invaders of the 7^th century AD] made Moslem converts of the natives, settled down as residents, and intermarried with them, with the result that all are now so completely Arabised that we cannot tell whether Canaanites leave off and the Arabs begin."
Ilene Beatty, " Arab and Jew in the land of Canaan."

How long has Palestine been specifically Arab country?
" Palestine became a predominantly Arab and Islamic country by the end of the seventh century. Almost immediately thereafter its boundaries and its characteristics – including its name in Arabic, Filastin – became known to the entire Islamic world, as much for its fertility and beauty as for its religious significance…In 1516, Palestine became a province of the Ottoman Empire, but this made it no less fertile, no less Arab or Islamic…Sixty percent of the population was in agriculture; the balance was divided between townspeople and a relatively small nomadic group. All these people believed themselves to belong in a land called Palestine, despite their feelings that they were also members of a large Arab nation…Despite the steady arrival in Palestine of Jewish colonists after 1882, it is important to realise that not until the few weeks immediately preceding the establishment of Israel in the spring of 1948 was there ever anything other than huge Arab majority. For example, the Jewish population in 1931 was 174, 606 against a total of 1,033,314."
Edward Said, "The Question of Palestine."

Was Palestine the only, or even preferred, destination of Jews facing persecution when the Zionist movement started?
"The pogroms forced many Jews to leave Russia. Societies known as ‘Lovers of Zion,’ which were forerunners of the Zionist organisation, convinced some of the frightened emigrants to go to Palestine. There, they argued, Jews would rebuild the ancient Jewish ‘Kingdom of David and Solomon’ Most Russian Jews ignored their appeal and fled to Europe and the United States. By 1900, almost a million Jews had settled in the United States alone."
"Our Roots Are Still Alive" by The People Press Palestine Book Project.

THE BRITISH MANDATE PERIOD, 1920-1948

The Balfour Declaration promises a Jewish Homeland in Palestine
" The Balfour Declaration, made in November 1917 by the British Government… was made a) by a European power, b) about a non-European country, c) in a flat disregard of both the presence and the wishes of the native majority resident in that territory…[As Balfour himself wrote in 1919], ‘ The contradiction between the letter of the Covenant (the Anglo-French Declaration of 1918 promising the Arabs of former Ottoman colonies that as a reward for supporting the Allies they could have their independence) is even more flagrant in the case of the independent nation of Palestine than in that of the independent nation of Syria. For in Palestine we do not propose to even to go through the form of consulting the wishes of the present inhabitants of the country… The four great powers are committed to Zionism and Zionism, be it right or wrong, good or bad, in rooted in age-long tradition, in present needs, in future hopes, or far profounder import than the desire and prejudices of the 700, 000 Arabs who now inhabit that ancient land.’ "
Edward Said, " The Question of Palestine."

Wasn’t Palestine a wasteland before the Jews started immigrating there?
Britain’s high commissioner for Palestine, John Chancellor, recommended total suspension of Jewish immigration and land purchase to protect Arab agriculture. He said,’ all cultivable land was occupied; that no cultivable land now in possession of the indigenous population could be sold to Jews without creating a class of landless Arab cultivators’…The Colonial Office rejected the recommendation."
John Quigley, "Palestine and Israel: A Challenge To Justice."

Given Arab opposition to them, did the Zionists support steps towards majority rule in Palestine?
"Clearly, the last thing the Zionists really wanted was that all the inhabitants of Palestine should have an equal say in running the country…[Chaim] Weizmann had impressed on Churchill that representative government would have spelled the end of the [Jewish] National Home in Palestine…[Churchill declared,] ‘ The present form of government will continue for many years. Step by step we shall develop representative institutions leading to full self- government, but our children’s children will have passed away before that is accomplished."
David Hirst, " The Gun and the Olive Branch."

Denial of the Arabs’ right to self- determination
"Even if nobody lost their land, the [Zionist] program was unjust in principle because it denied majority political rights…Zionism, in principle, could not allow the natives to exercise their political rights because it would mean the end of the Zionist enterprise."
Benjamin Beit-Hallahmi, " Original Sins"

Arab resistance to Pre-Israeli Zionism
"In 1936-9, the Palestinian Arabs attempted a Nationalist revolt …David Ben-Gurion, eminently a realist, recognised its nature. In internal discussion, he noted that ‘in our political argument abroad, we minimise Arab opposition to us,’ but he urged, ‘let us not ignore the truth among ourselves.’ The truth was that ‘politically we are the aggressors and they defend themselves… The country is theirs, because they inhabit it, whereas we want to come here and settle down, and in their view we want to take away from them their country, while we are still outside’… The revolt was crushed by the British, with considerable brutality."
Noam Chomsky, "The Fateful Triangle."

THE UN PARTITION OF PALESTINE

Why did the UN recommend the plan partitioning Palestine into a Jewish and an Arab state?
"By this time [November 1947] the United States had emerged as the most aggressive proponent of partition… The United States got the General Assembly to delay a vote ‘to gain time to bring certain Latin American republics into line with its own views.’ …Some delegates charged U.S. officials with ‘diplomatic intimidation.’ Without ‘terrific pressure’ from the United States on ‘governments which cannot afford to risk American reprisals,’ said an anonymous editorial writer, the resolution ‘would never have passed.’"
John Quigley, "Palestine and Israel: A Challenge to Justice."

Was the partition plan fair to both Arabs and Jews?
" Arab rejection was… based on the fact that, while the population of the Jewish state was to be [only half Jewish] with the Jews owning less than 10% of the Jewish state land area, the Jews were to be established as the ruling body-a settlement which no self-respecting people would accept without protest, to say the least…The action of the United Nations conflicted with the basic principles for which the world organisation was established, namely, to uphold the rights of all peoples to self-determination. By denying the Palestine Arabs, who formed the two-thirds majority of the country, the right to decide for themselves, the United Nations had violated its own Charter."
Sami Hadawi, " Bitter Harvest"

Were the Zionists prepared to settle for the territory granted in the 1947 partition?
" While the Yishuv’s leadership formally accepted the 1947 Partition Resolution, large sections of Israeli society- including…Ben Gurion- were opposed to or extremely unhappy with the partition and from early on viewed the war as an ideal opportunity to expand the new state’s borders beyond the UN-earmarked partition boundaries and at the expense of the Palestinians."
Israeli Historian, Benny Morris, in "Tikun", March/April 1998.

The war begins
" In December 1947, the British announced that they would withdraw from Palestine by May 15, 1948.Palestinains in Jerusalem and Jaffa called a general strike against the partition. Fighting broke out in Jerusalem’s streets almost immediately…Violent incidents mushroomed into all-out war …During that fateful April of 1948, eight out of thirteen major Zionist military attacks on Palestinians occurred in the territory granted to the Arab state."
"Our Roots Are Still Alive," by the People’s Press Palestinian Book Project.

Culpability for escalation of the fighting
"Menachem Begin, the Leader of the Irgun, tells how ‘in Jerusalem, as elsewhere, we were the first to pass from the defensive to the offensive…Arabs began to flee in terror…Hagana was carrying out successful attacks on other fronts, while other Jewish forces proceeded to advance through Haifa like a knife through butter’ …The Israeli’s now allege that the Palestine war began with the entry of the Arab armies into Palestine after 15 May 1948.But that was the second phase of the war; they overlook the massacres, expulsions and dispossessions which took place prior to that date and which necessitated Arab states’ intervention."
Sami Hadawi, "Bitter Harvest".

The Deir Yassin Massacre of Palestine by Jewish Soldiers
" For the entire day of April 9, 1948,Irgun and LEHI soldiers carried out the slaughter in a cold and premeditated fashion…The attackers ‘lined men, women and children up against the walls and shot them,’…The ruthlessness of the attack on Deir Yassin shocked Jewish and world opinion alike, drove fear and panic into the Arab population, and led to the flight of unarmed civilians from their homes all over the country."
Israeli author, Simha Flapan, "The Birth Of Israel"

Was Deir Yassin the only act of this kind?
" By 1948, the Jew was able not only to ‘defend himself’ but to commit massive atrocities as well. Indeed, according to the former director of the Israeli army archives, ‘in almost every Arab village occupied by us during the War of Independence, acts were committed which are defined as war crimes, such as murders, massacres and rapes’…Uri Milstein, the authoritative Israeli military historian of the 1948 war, goes one step further, maintaining that ‘every skirmish ended in a massacre of Arabs’ "
Norman Finkelstein, "Image and Reality of the Israel-Palestine Conflict."

STATEHOOD AND EXPULSION - 1948

What was the Arab reaction to the announcement of the creation of the state of Israel?
" The armies of the Arab states entered the war immediately after the State of Israel was founded in May. Fighting continued, almost all of it within the territory assigned to the Palestinian state …About 700,000 Palestinians fled or were expelled in the 1948 conflict."
Noam Chomsky, " The Fateful Triangle."

Was the part of Palestine assigned to a Jewish state in mortal danger from the Arab armies?
" The Arab league hastily called for its member countries to send regular army troops into Palestine. They were ordered to secure only the sections of Palestine given to the Arabs under the partition plan. But these regular armies were ill-equipped and lacked any central command to co-ordinate their efforts…[Jordan’s King Abdullah] promised [the Israelis and the British] that his troops, the Arab Legion, the only real fighting force among the Arab armies, would avoids fighting with Jewish settlements…Yet Western historians record this as the moment when the young state of Israel fought off ‘ the overwhelming hordes’ of five Arab countries. In reality, the Israeli offensive against the Palestinians intensified."
"Our Roots are Still Alive" by the Peoples Press Palestine Book Project.

Didn’t the Palestinians leave their homes voluntarily during the 1948 war?
"Israeli propaganda has largely relinquished the claim that the Palestinian exodus of 1948 was ‘self-inspired’. Official circles implicitly concede that the Arab population fled as a result of Israeli action – whether directly, as in the case of Lydda and Ramleh, or indirectly, due to the panic that and similar actions (the Deir Yassin massacre) inspired in Arab population centres throughout Palestine. However, even though the historical record has been grudgingly set straight, the Israeli establishment still refuses to accept moral or political responsibility for the refugee problem it – or its predecessors – actively created."
Peretz Kidron, quoted in "Blaming The Victims," ed. Said and Hitchens.

The Deliberate destruction of Arab villages to prevent return of Palestinians
"During May [1948], ideas about how to consolidate and give permanence to the Palestinian exile began to crystallise, and the destruction of villages was immediately perceived as a primary means of achieving this aim…[Even earlier’]

On 10 April, Haganah units took Abu Shusha…The village was destroyed that night…Khulda was levelled by Jewish bulldozers on April 20…Abu Zureiq was completely demolished…By mid- 1949, the majority of the [350 depopulated Arab villages] were either completely or partly in ruins and uninhabitable."
Benny Morris, " The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem, 1947-1949.

Is there any justification for this expropriation of land?
" The fact that the Arabs fled in terror, because of real fear of a repetition of 1948 Zionist massacres, is no reason for denying them their homes, fields and livelihoods. Civilians caught in an area of military activity generally panic. But they have always been able to return to their homes when the danger subsides. Military conquest does not abolish private rights to property; nor does it entitle the victor to confiscate the homes, property and personal belongings of the non-combatant civilian population. The seizure of Arab property by the Israeli’s was an outrage."
Sami Hadawi, "Bitter Harvest."

Israel admitted to the UN but then reneged on the conditions under which it was admitted
" The [Lausanne] conference officially opened on 27 April 1949. On 12 May the[UN’s] Palestine Conciliation Committee reaped its only success when it included the parties to sign a joint protocol on the framework for a comprehensive peace… Israel for the first time accepted the principle of the repatriation [of Arab refugees] and the internationalisation of Jerusalem…[but] they did so as a mere exercise in public relations aimed at strengthening Israel’s international image…Walter Eytan, the head of the Israeli delegation,[ stated] …"My main purpose was to begin to undermine the protocol of May 12, which we had signed only under duress of our struggle for the admission to the UN Refusal to sign would… have immediately been reported to the Secretary – General and the various governments.’"
Israeli historian, Ilan Pappe’, "The making of the Arab-Israeli Conflict, 1947-1951."

Israeli admission to the UN – continued
" The Preamble of the resolution of admission included a safeguarding clause as follows:’ Recalling its resolution of 29 November 1947(on partition) and 11 December 1948 (on repatriation and compensation), and taking note of the declarations and explanations made by the representative of the Government of Israel before the ad hoc Political Committee in respect of the implementation of the said resolutions, the General Assembly …decides to admit Israel into membership in the United Nations.’

"Here, it must be observed, is a condition and an undertaking to implement the resolutions mentioned. There was no question of such implementation being conditional on the conclusion of peace on Israeli terms as the Israeli’s later claimed to justify their non-compliance."
Sami Hadawi, "Bitter Harvest"

What was the fate of the Palestinians who had now become refugees?
"The winter of 1949, the first winter of exile for more than seven hundred fifty thousand Palestinians, was cold and hard… Families huddled in caves, abandoned huts, or makeshift tents…many of the starving were only miles away from their own vegetable gardens and orchards in occupies Palestine- the new state of Israel…At the end of 1949 the United Nations finally acted. It set up the United Nations Relief Works Administration (UNARWA) to take over sixty refugee camps from voluntary agencies. It managed to keep people alive, but only barely."
"Our Roots Are Still Alive", by The People’s Press Palestine Book Project

THE 1967 WAR AND ISRAELI OCCUPATION OF THE WEST BANK AND GAZA

Did the Egyptians actually start the 1967 war, as Israel originally claimed?
" The former Commander of the Air Force, General Ezer Weizmann, regarded as a hawk, stated that there was ‘no threat of destruction’ but that the attack on Egypt, Jordan and Syria was nevertheless justified so that Israel could ‘exist according to the scale, spirit and equality she now embodies.’…Menachem Begin had the following remarks to make: ‘In June 1967, we again had a choice. The Egyptian Army concentrations in the Sinai approaches do not prove that Nasser was really about to attack us. We must be honest with ourselves. We decided to attack him.’ "
Noam Chomsky, "The Fateful Triangle."

Israeli expansionism
" The acceptance of partition does not commit us to renounce TransJordan; one does not demand from anybody to give up his vision. ‘We shall accept a state in the boundaries fixed today, but the boundaries of Zionist aspirations are the concern of the Jewish people and no external factor will be able to limit them.’"
David Ben Gurion, in 1936, quoted in Noam Chomsky, " The Fateful Triangle"

Expansionism- continued
" The main danger which Israel as a ‘Jewish state’, poses to its own people, to other Jews and to its neighbours, is its ideologically motivated pursuit of territorial expansion and the inevitable series of wars resulting from this aim…No Zionist politician has ever repudiated Ben-Gurion’s idea that Israeli policies must be based (within the limits of practical considerations) on the restoration of the Biblical Borders as the borders of the Jewish State."
Israeli Professor, Israel Shahak, "Jewish History, Jewish religion: The Weight of 3000 years."

Expansionism – continued
In Israeli Prime Minister Moshe Sharatt’s personal diaries, there in an excerpt from May of 1995 in which he quotes Moshe Dayan as follows:"[Israel] must see the sword as the main, if not the only, instrument with which to keep its morale high and to retain its moral tension. Toward this end it may, no-it must- invent dangers, and to do this it must adopt the method of provocation- and – revenge…and above all- let us hope for a new war with the Arab countries, so that we nay finally get rid of our troubles and acquire our space."
Quoted in Livia Rokack, "Israel’s Sacred Terrorism."

But wasn’t the occupation of Arab lands necessary to protect Israel’s security?
"Senator [J. William Fullbright] proposed in 1970 that America should guarantee Israel’s security in a formal treaty, protecting her with armed forces if necessary. In return, Israel would retire to the borders of 1967.The UN Security Council would guarantee this arrangement, and thereby bring the Soviet Union- then a supplier of arms and political aid to Arabs- into compliance. As Israeli troops were withdrawn from the Golan Heights, The Gaza Strip and the West Bank they would be replaced by a UN peacekeeping force. Israel would agree to accept a certain number of Palestinians and the rest would be settled in a Palestinian state outside Israel.

" The plan drew favourable editorial support in the United States. The proposal, however, was flatly rejected by Israel. ‘The whole affair disgusted Fullbright,’ writes [his biographer, Randall] Woods.’ The Israeli’s were not even willing to act in their own self-interest.’ "
Allan Brownfield, in "Issues of the American Council for Judaism," Fall 1997. [Ed – this was one of many such proposals]

What happened after the war ended?
" In violation of International law, Israel has confiscated over 52 percent of the land in the West Bank 30 percent of the Gaza Strip for military use or for settlement by Jewish civilian …From 1967 to 1982, Israel’s military government demolished 1,338 Palestinian homes on the West Bank. Over this period, more than 300,000 Palestinians were detained without trial for various periods by Israeli security forces." "
"Intifada: The Palestinian Uprising Against Israeli Occupation," ed. Lockman and Beinin.

World opinion on the legality of Israeli control of the West Bank and Gaza
" Under the UN Charter there can lawfully be no territorial gains from war, even by a state acting in self-defence. The response of other states to Israel’s occupation shows a virtually unanimous opinion that even if Israel’s action was defensive, its retention of the West bank and Gaza Strip was not… The [UN] general Assembly characterised Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza as a denial of self – determination and hence a ‘ serious and increasing threat to international peace and security.’ "
John Quigley, " Palestine and Israel: A Challenge to Justice."

All Jewish settlements in territories occupied in the 1967 war were a direct violation of the Geneva Conventions, which Israel had signed.
" The Geneva Convention requires an occupying power to change the existing order as little as possible during its tenure. One aspect of this obligation is that it must leave the territory to the people it finds there. It may not bring its own people to populate the territory. This prohibition is found in the Convention’s Article 49, which states, ‘The Occupying Power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies’ "
John Quigley, "Palestine and Israel: A challenge to justice."

JEWISH CRITICISM OF ZIONISM

"Albert Einstein- ‘ I should much rather see reasonable agreement with the Arabs on the basis of living together in peace than the creation of a Jewish State. Apart from practical considerations, my awareness of the essential nature of Judaism resists the idea of a Jewish state, with borders, an army, and a measure of temporal power, no matter how modest. I am afraid of the inner damage Judaism will sustain’…

"Professor Erich Fromm, a noted Jewish writer and thinker, [stated]…’In general international law, the principle holds true that no citizen loses his property or his rights of citizenship; and the citizenship right is de facto a right to which the Arabs in Israel have much more legitimacy than the Jews. Just because the Arabs fled? Since when is that punishable by confiscation of property, and by being barred from returning to the land on which a people’s forefathers have lived for generations? Thus, the claim of the Jews to the land of Israel cannot be a realistic claim. If all nations would suddenly claim territory in which there forefathers had lived two thousand years ago, this world would be a madhouse…I believe that, politically speaking, there is only one solution for Israel, namely, the unilateral acknowledgement of the obligation of the State towards the Arabs- not to use it as a bargaining point, but to acknowledge the complete moral obligation of the Israeli State to its former inhabitants of Palestine’…

"Martin Buber-‘only an internal revolution can have the power to heal our people of their murderous sickness of causeless hatred… It is bound to bring complete ruin upon us. Only then will the old and young in our land realise how great was our responsibility to those miserable Arab refugees in whose towns we have settled Jews who were brought from afar; whose homes we have inherited, whose fields we now sow and harvest; the fruits of whose gardens, orchards and vineyards we gather; and in whose cities that we robbed we put up houses of education, charity, and prayer, while we babble and rave about being the "People of the Book" and the "light of the nations"

GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS

Israel has sought peace with its Arab neighbour states but has steadfastly refused to negotiate with Palestinians directly, until the last few years. Why?
"My friend, take care. When you recognise the concept of ‘Palestine’, you demolish your right to live in Ein Hahoresh. If this is Palestine and not the Land Of Israel, then you are conquerors and not tillers of the land. You are invaders. If this is Palestine, then it belongs to a people who lived here before you came. Only if it is The Land Of Israel do you have a right to live in Ein Hahoresh and in Deganiyah B. If it is not your country, your fatherland, the countries of your ancestors and your sons, then what are you doing here? You came to another people’s homeland, as they claim, you expelled them and you have taken their land."
Menachem begin, quoted in Noam Chomsky’s " Peace in the Middle East"

Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians have been detained in Israeli prisons, often without trial for many months. In 1996, The Israeli Supreme Court sanctioned the use of "force:" in interrogating them.
"Israel’s two main interrogation agencies in the occupied territories engage in a systematic pattern of ill-treatment and torture- according to internationally recognised definitions of the terms …The methods used in nearly all interrogations are prolonged sleep deprivation; prolonged sight deprivation using blindfolds or tight-fitting hoods; forced, prolonged maintenance of body positions that grow increasingly painful; and verbal threats and insults.

"These methods are almost always combined with some of the following abuses; confinement in tiny, closet-like spaces; exposure to temperature extremes, such as deliberately overcooled rooms; prolonged toilet and hygiene deprivation; and degrading treatment…beatings are far more routine in IDF interrogations than in GSS interrogations. Sixteen of the nineteen detainees we interviewed [detained between 1992 and 1994] reported having been assaulted in the interrogation room. Beatings and kicks were directed at the throat, testicles, and stomach. Some were repeatedly choked; some had their heads slammed against the walls…

"Israeli interrogation consistently use methods in combination with one another, over long periods of time. Thus, a detainee in the custody of the General Security Service (GSS) may spend weeks during which, except for brief respites, he shuttles from a tiny chair to which he is painfully shackled; to a stifling, tiny cubicle in which he can hardly move; to questioning sessions in which he is beaten or violently manhandled; and then back to the chair.

"The intensive, sustained and combined use of these methods inflicts the severe mental or physical suffering that is central to internationally accepted definitions of torture. Israel’s political leadership cannot claim ignorance that ill treatment is the norm in interrogation centres. The number of victims is too large, and the abuses are too systematic."
1994 Human Rights watch report, Torture and Ill-Treatment: Israel’s interrogation of Palestinians from the Occupied territories."

The use of ‘force"- continued
"Amnesty International also observed that, when brought to trial, most Palestinian detainees arrested for ‘terrorist’ offences are tortured by the Shin Bet (General Security services) ‘have been accused of offences such as membership in unlawful associations or throwing stones. They have also included prisoners of conscience such as people arrested solely for raising a flag.’ On a related point, Haaretz columnist B. Michael noted that there wasn’t a single recorded case in which the Shin Bet’s use of torture was prompted by a ‘ticking bomb’ scenario: ‘ In every instance of a Palestinian lodging a formal complaint about something that had already happened, not about something that was about to happen."
Norman Finkelstien, "the Rise and Fall of Palestine"

The 1997 U.N Commission against Torture rules against Israel
‘B’tselem estimates…that the GSS annually interrogates between 1000-1500 Palestinians [as of 1998]. Some eighty –five percent of them – at least 850 persons a year- are tortured during interrogation…

"The [UN] Committee against Torture …reached an unequivocal conclusion…’The methods of interrogation [used in Israeli prisons] …are in the Committee’s view in breach of article 16 and also constitute torture as defined in article 1 of the convention…As a State Party to the Convention Against Torture, Israel is precluded from raising before this Committee exceptional circumstances’…the prohibition on torture is, therefore, absolute, and no ‘exceptional’ circumstances may justify derogating from it."
1998 report from B’tselem, The Israeli Information Centre for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories, "Routine Torture: Interrogation Methods of the General Security Service."

The answer? A sovereign Palestinian state.
‘The final destination of a Palestinian – Israeli settlement has begun to emerge from the political haze. Such a settlement must… give the Palestinian people a sovereign, uncontested, independent state of their own. This is a matter of justice and practicality. If a truly lasting and stable peace is the goal, there is no other option…the mere trappings of statehood will not suffice. The state has to be real and workable. The following are its essential conditions:

Territorial integrity and contiguity…Any further dissection of Palestinian territory would make it politically and economically impossible to maintain a state… There can be no civilian pockets under Israeli rule on Palestinian land…

A sovereign capital in Jerusalem. East Jerusalem is Palestine’s historical, spiritual and commercial heart. To exclude it from a Palestinian state is unthinkable…

Justice and fairness to refugees…As a matter of principle, the Palestinians’ right to return or to be compensated for their lost homes, and land, is nonnegotiable…Israel must acknowledge the suffering and hardship Palestinian refugees have faced as a result of their eviction from their homeland, and must assist in their rehabilitation and reabsorption."
A.S. Khalidi, Op-Ed piece in The New York Times, February 11, 1997.