Settlements - Legal or Not?

(Guest posting by Charles Smith)

The subject of “settlements” has been made a top factor in the Palestinian fight to discredit and eventually overcome Israel. It is discussed constantly in the media, and has been made into a big political issue in Europe, America, generally. You’d think the matter concerned at least China or Russia and was of world-wide importance. But it does concern the Jews, so the facts are that it concerns only one out of about 200 cases of building in “occupied” land by other nations worldwide, and then it is only on a dot on the map.

I'd class the supporters of the Palestinian narrative - that the "settlements" are illegal and are preventing peace in the M.E. - including representatives of many countries, large numbers of students and others – into two categories: 

a) those who are influenced by antisemitism and 

b) those who are ignorant of the facts and have accepted blindly what they’ve heard from spokesmen or the media.

I'm sure  that 95% of them haven’t the time or the interest, so haven’t checked the true legal situation via reliable sources. This probably applies to Jewish people as well, since most people can’t start reading legal opinions about everything that’s going on. I have made the effort, however, as it’s so important to us living here.

I came across a fairly short article in the papers today. It gives, what I think is a very  good summary of the important facts of the matter, and so a basic understanding of what we Israelis see as the true situation, and the flaws in the situation as it is broadcast and accepted by a huge majority world wide (for the two reasons mentioned above).

There is one more relatively minor factor, regularly used in discussions on the matter, which is not mentioned in the article. So just to add this to your ammunition if needed:

Another clause in the Geneva Convention (after WWII) on which most arguments are based, states that one state can’t occupy land captured from another state in a war. The Israeli (and now apparently also American) position is that the so-called West Bank was taken back from Jordan in the war they started in order to destroy the new Israeli state, but was never recognized as part of Jordan i.e. it was never part of another state. All the opposition choose to ignore that small problem, while accepting and relying absolutely on another clause !! (Questionable motive?)

Last note before you read the short article: Just to remind, once again, that the whole subject is a total red herring, since the one and only factor actually preventing any progress in the non-existent “peace process”  is the absolute refusal of the Palestinians to EVER consider acceptance of any Jewish independent state in the M.E. All the rest could be settled in no time if they dropped that eternal brick wall.