Israeli Government Announces New Measures in Aftermath of UNGA

As you may have heard, the Israeli government in the past few days has announced a number of measures undertaken in the aftermath of last week’s Palestinian drive to secure an upgrade in the UNGA, and has faced international criticism over some of them. I wanted to touch base to give you some background on what’s going on and highlight some of the points of disagreement.

The Palestinian resolution, which saw the UN grant the Palestinians non-member statehood status, constituted a material breach of the Oslo Accords, under which the Israelis traded functionally irreversible territorial concessions in exchange for Palestinian commitments not to “take any step that will change the status of the West Bank” outside of bilateral negotiations (http://is.gd/W7iLtR). Palestinian officials declared before the vote that a successful upgrade would mark the end of the Oslo peace process between Israel and the Palestinians (http://is.gd/ctkXjW) and would set up the Palestinians to sue Israel internationally(http://is.gd/yNH5ZX).

In the aftermath the Israelis announced two responses. First, they are withholding a little more than $100 million that they’ve collected in tax revenue for the Palestinian Authority, and instead transferring the funds to Israeli energy companies to which the Palestinian Authority owes money. Second, they have advanced plans to create 3,000 new homes in areas directly east of Jerusalem in the E1 corridor that connects Jerusalem to the city of Ma’aleh Adumim, which is a city a little more than 4 miles outside the current municipal bounds of Jerusalem and in which almost 40,000 Israelis live.

OUR ADVERTISERS SUPPORT US – PLEASE SUPPORT THEM


PATRIOTSBILLBOARD DEPENDS ON OUR SPONSORS FOR ITS EXISTENCE-PLEASE SUPPORT THEM-

The housing announcement triggered international condemnation by the US and others and even saw rumors, now denied, that France and the UK might recall their ambassadors. The Israelis for their part see the outcry as feeding Palestinian intransigence. Understanding the Israeli stance is critical to understanding why as of this afternoon Prime Minister Netanyahu has indicated that he’s unlikely to reverse the decision (http://is.gd/NQBd2G).

(1) Israeli officials consider construction in E1 as necessary to ensure territorial contiguity between Israeli cities. Palestinian territorial contiguity can exist without Palestinian control of E1, Israeli contiguity can’t. Critics of Israel claim the opposite, that construction in E1 makes it impossible for Palestinians to create contiguity between areas they reserve for themselves in the West Bank with territories they reserve for themselves in a future Palestinian capital of Jerusalem, which is exactly backward:

• Israeli construction in E1 doesn’t preclude connections between the West Bank and Jerusalem. The Israelis have built substantial infrastructure and bypass roads to connect parts of Jerusalem with parts of the West Bank without going through E1 (http://is.gd/RR7ISC).
• In contrast, Palestinian construction in of E1 actually does cut off Ma’aleh Adumim from the rest of Israel. There’s no parallel infrastructure to maintain Israeli access, the way there actually would leave parts of Israel divided from other parts. It could also undermine another vital Israeli interest, the country’s access to the strategic Jerusalem-Jericho road that Israel uses to move troops and equipment north and east.

OUR ADVERTISERS SUPPORT US – PLEASE SUPPORT THEM


PATRIOTSBILLBOARD DEPENDS ON OUR SPONSORS FOR ITS EXISTENCE-PLEASE SUPPORT THEM-

(2) Israeli insists Palestinian criticism over construction in E1 and Ma’aleh Adumim is a pretext for abandoning negotiations, since those areas have since the beginning of the peace process been envisioned as eventually Israeli. Palestinian negotiators have historically been willing to negotiate with Israel as long as Israeli construction was consigned to areas broadly envisioned as ending up under Israeli soverignty. It’s also important to note that for Israel E1 and Ma’aleh Adumim are functionally part of Jerusalem, making the issue one of domestic political consensus not controversy.

• E1 and Ma’aleh Adumim were always envisioned as Israeli under the 2000 Clinton parameters and described as such in Dennis Ross’s map reprinted below (click on it for a larger version). The Parameters emerged in the months after Camp David in summer 2000, when secret negotiations mediated by Ross continued took place and resulted in terms presented in a meeting with Clinton in December 2000 (http://is.gd/8pwOXC). The E1 corridor linking Jerusalem to Ma’aleh Adumim is clearly visible as under Israeli sovereignty, and was the result of understandings reached in light of Israeli concessions on Jerusalem.
• The Clinton Parameters extended more than half a decade of Israeli understandings about what a final peace accord would look like. In October 1994 during the beginning of the Oslo Accords, then-Labor prime minister Yitzhak Rabin declared that a “united Jerusalem” would include Ma’aleh Adumim and even provided then-mayor Benny Kashriel with annexation documents for E1. In 1996 then-Labor prime minister Shimon Peres reaffirmed the government’s position that Israel will demand sovereignty over Ma’aleh Adumim and was backed by dovish politician and co-author of the Geneva Initiative, Yossi Beilin

• In 2008 then-Kadima prime minister Ehud Olmert and then-foreign minister Tzipi Livni demanded that Ma’aleh Adumim remain a part of Israel

OUR ADVERTISERS SUPPORT US – PLEASE SUPPORT THEM


PATRIOTSBILLBOARD DEPENDS ON OUR SPONSORS FOR ITS EXISTENCE-PLEASE SUPPORT THEM-

(3) Israeli officials have expressed surprise that European governments, especially, would attempt to blame Jerusalem for stalling the Oslo-based peace process, a week after France voted yes and Britain abstained on the Palestinian statehood resolution. The resolution violated decades of Oslo-linked agreements and Palestinian officials declared that it marked the end of the bilateral peace process. The European votes have complicated EU attempts to sway Israel, with some analysts even suggested that by declining to oppose the vote, the Europeans may have squandered diplomatic capital and damaged their ability to play a positive role in the Middle East.