It took 65 years.
But finally the world recognized.
Finally!
So says Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.
Really?
It took 65 years, for the world?
You have here classic amnesia.
Actually, it was the world that recognized a Palestinian state 65 years ago in UN Resolution 181. It was the Palestinians that did not recognize what was called the “partition plan” that divided Palestine into a Jewish and a Palestinian state. The “two-state solution!” Sixty-five years old, accepted by the Zionists; 65 years ago, rejected by the Palestinians, not by the world.
Note the irony: Right now, the Palestinians are positively crowing that the world has recognized at Palestinian state within the 1967 lines, that is, minus current Israeli settlements therein. But had the Palestinians accepted UN Resolution 181 in 1947, the Jewish state would have been much smaller than it is now. Israel would have contained much less territory than it now does.
For waiting 65 years to recognize itself, Palestine has actually acknowledged and legitimated Israel’s acquisition of much territory during Israel’s War of Independence, 1947-1949 (whose armistice lines of 1949 are, by another name, the pre-1967 lines that, to the Palestinians, are sacred). So don’t be surprised when Israel, in peace negotiations with the Palestinian Authority (if they ever come), insists on the right to lands it won in the 1967 Six Day War.
Speaking of wars, had the Palestinians recognized UN Resolution 181 in 1947, there would be zero Palestinian refugees. Whether you believe that the Palestinian refugee problem was caused by the urgings of Arab leaders to flee Palestine while Arab armies finished Israel off, or whether you believe that the nascent Israel forced the Palestinians to leave, or whether you believe a little of both — note the irony. Any explanation for the origins of the Palestinian refugee problem pertains to the post-Palestinian rejection of UN Resolution 181.
Partition? Had the Palestinians recognized it, there would have been peace, not refugees.
So where does the Palestinian amnesia at the UNleave us now?
With a functioning Palestinian state? No.
With more Palestinian jobs? No.
With greater Palestinian trade? No.
With more Palestinian territory within the West Bank? No.
With greater PA control of Gaza? No.
With peace with Israel? No.
That the world recognized Palestine in 1947, and re-recognized it in 2012, has not brought peace to the Palestinians.
For that, there needs to be two things. First, a cessation of war. Blessedly, for the past few years, the Palestinians have mostly stopped their terrorism. Second, peace negotiations. Cursedly, for the past few years, the Palestinians have totally stopped them.
Another irony: Hamas, which neither recognizes Israel nor negotiates directly with it, does not demand a halt to Israeli settlements as a precondition to its indirect negotiations with Israel. Only thePalestinian Authority demands that. Only the PA gains absolutely nothing from Israel by insisting absolutely on a cessation of settlements as a precondition to negotiations.
Israel has responded to the Palestinian recognition of itself as a Palestinian state, spurning negotiations with Israel, with more Israeli settlements. The message to the PA is clear: If you want independence in fact, not in theory; if you want land, not just kudos at the UN, then sit down and talk. Otherwise, face the consequences. Two can play the game of scuttling the Oslo Accords, which say that all disputes between Israel and the Palestinians are to be resolved in negotiations, not at the UN.
Israel has responded to the PA’s scuttling of the Oslo Accords by saying: When the PA tries everything — war, terrorism, unilateralism at the UN — except sitting down to negotiate a settlement with Israel, essentially nothing has changed since 1947. Same old, same old.
Copyright © 2012 by the Intermountain Jewish News
