British restrictions and blockade on Jewish
immigration to Palestine
1938-1948 caused the death of over 2 million Jews trying to escape German
extermination camps.
The British in
1922 gave away in violation of the Mandate 77% of the land in Palestine allocated for the Jewish people to the
Arabs as the State named Jordan of which 80% of the population is
Arab-Palestinians. This is the Palestinian State and no other.
British actions inPalestine during the Mandate 1918-1948 are the cause of the continued
violence and terrorism in the Middle East . The British wanted to control the oil in the Middle East and they were willing and did cross anyone
to accomplish their goals. In today’s time in history, nothing has changed.
British actions in
The British went
as far as blowing up Holocaust refugees Ships destined for Palestine-Israel
under Operation Embarrass.
In less than 20 yearsEngland and the rest of Europe will be controlled by Muslims with Sharia
laws in place.
In less than 20 years
Prohibiting Jews
for residing anywhere where the map of Mandate for Palestine territory of 1920 is a violation of
International Law and the San Remo Treaty confirmed by the 1920 Treaty of
Sevres and Lausanne , which was adopted by the League of Nations in 1920.
Any housing,
factories, goods and services produced by Jews in the area that was designated
as the Mandate for Palestine is granted by the International agreements and treaties of
the 1918-1920, which are in affect for perpetuity.
They started deporting Jews from Germany to Palestine (now known as Israel . To
the Arabs (Palestinians) however this was not a good idea and they threatened Great Britain that if they
continued to let shiploads of Jews arrive in Palestine ,
they would cut off Great
Britain 's OIL supply. Shortly
thereafter the British Navy blockaded the English Channel and effectively
stopped the flow.
Ottoman land ownership law –
It is time to learn the facts
about Judea and Samaria
To truly understand the
status of this territory we have to first differentiate between the personal
and the national. The recent furor surrounding the government’s decision to
declare nearly 1,000 acres at Gvaot in Gush Etzion “State Land ” is a classic example of the ignorance of history and
law that governs most discussions of Israeli actions beyond the internationally
hallowed “Green Line.” Media headlines around the world screamed about
“annexation” and “land grab,” the Palestinian Authority declared it a “crime” and
foreign ministries around the world have demanded the reversal of the decision.
However, few articles, press releases or communiqués mention the crux of the
matter; the legal and historical status of the land in question.
For many, if not most, around
the world, every inch of land beyond the 1949 armistice lines is automatically
Palestinian; a display of unfamiliarity with history and international law.
To truly understand the
status of this territory we have to first differentiate between the personal
and the national.
Of course there is land
privately owned by Palestinians in Judea and Samaria , what many call the “West Bank ” in seeming deference to the Jordanian occupation, which invented the
term as juxtaposition to its eastern bank. These areas, like privately owned
territory anywhere in the world, cannot be touched unless there is very
pressing reason for a government or sovereign power to do so. These areas,
according to Ottoman and British records, constitute no more than a few percent
of the total area, meaning the vast majority is not privately owned.
However, to contend that
these territories are “Palestinian” on a national level is problematic. To
claim an area belongs to a particular nation requires the territory to have
belonged to that people, where they held some sort of sovereignty that was
broadly recognized.
All of these criteria have
been met historically by the Jewish people, and none by the Palestinians.
In fact, the Jewish people
were provided with national rights in these territories not just by dint of
history and past sovereignty, but also by residual legal rights contained in
the League of Nations Mandate, which were never canceled and are preserved by
the UN Charter, under Article 80 – the famous “Palestine Clause,” that was
drafted, in part, to guarantee continuity with respect to Jewish rights from
the League of Nations.
For the past almost 2,000
years, since the destruction of Jewish sovereignty and expulsion of most of its
indigenous people, it remained an occupied and colonized outpost in the
territory of many global and regional empires.
The Ottomans were the most
recent to officially apportion the territory, in what they referred to as
Ottoman Syria, which today incorporates modern-day Israel, Syria, Jordan and
stretching into Iraq. Before The Ottoman Land Code of 1858, land had largely
been owned or passed on by word of mouth, custom or tradition. Under the
Ottomans of the 19th century, land was apportioned into three main categories:
Mulk, Miri and Mawat.
Mulk was the only territory
that was privately owned in the common sense of the term, and as stated before,
was only a minimal part of the whole territory, much of it owned by Jews, who
were given the right to own land under reforms.
Miri was land owned by the
sovereign, and individuals could purchase a deed to cultivate this land and pay
a tithe to the government. Ownership could be transferred only with the
approval of the state. Miri rights could be transferred to heirs, and the land
could be sub-let to tenants. In other words, a similar arrangement to a tenant
in an apartment or house as having rights in the property, but not to the
property.
Finally, Mawat was state or
unclaimed land, not owned by private individuals nor largely cultivated. These
areas made up almost two-thirds of all territory.
The area recently declared “State Land ” by the Israeli government, a process which has been
under an intensive ongoing investigation for many years, is Mawat land. In
other words, it has no private status and is not privately owned.
Many claims to the territory
suddenly arose during the course of the investigation, but all were proven to
be unfounded on the basis of land laws.
Interestingly, it should be
clearly understood by those who deem Judea and Samaria “occupied territory”
that according to international law the occupying power must use the
pre-existing land laws as a basis for claims, exactly as Israel has done in
this case, even though Israel’s official position is that it does not see
itself de jure as an occupying power in the legal sense of the term.
None of these facts are even
alluded to in the many reports surrounding the government’s actions in Gvaot.
This is deeply unjust and a semblance of the relevant background, history and
facts would provide the necessary context for what has been converted into an
international incident where none should exist.
I frequently take foreign
visitors and officials on a tour of Efrat and Gush Etzion and am amazed at the
well-meaning ignorance and preconceived positions that many, even friends of Israel , hold about the status of this area and wider Judea
and Samaria . Usually, however, by the end of the tour many of
these positions have been debunked and those that I speak with are astonished
that there is even another side to the story, having been assured that the
pro-Judea and Samaria position is based solely on the Bible.
I welcome and even challenge
anyone and everyone to come and see the reality for themselves and learn the
history and context of the region, if only for the sake of intellectual
honesty. No one ever lost out through intellectual curiosity, and I am certain
that we can lessen the next furor and international incident if a greater
number of people can be made more familiar with the facts of history.
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