Wednesday, March 29, 2006

Lieberman Reconsidered

Everybody is afraid of Avigdor Lieberman's Yisrael Beitenu and its platform of redrawing the borders of Israel to fit demographic realities. The Left/Liberals scream that such a position is both racist and patently illegal. (Reality Check: The British and the Americans invented the approach. See the Peel Commission and the UNSCOP Report of 1947.)

Anyway, the indefatigable Professor Richard Landes shows (once again) that it's not that simple and that Lieberman is not calling for the de rigeur disenfranchisement of those Arabs who wish to remain within the borders of the State of Israel.

Interesting reading.
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3 comments:

  1. Anonymous11:40 AM

    Richard Landes is a great man.
    A medievalist who actually makes his work relevant!

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  2. Anonymous12:03 PM

    Funny, Yisrael Yuval said basically the same thing the other day...
    Great minds think alike?

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  3. Ben Bayit12:35 PM

    I have to disagree with that assessment. Most of the Arabs are located in areas that were "captured" in 1949. I.e. they are in areas that were alloacted to the Arab State under the partition plan. There is no logical reason why the Supreme Court's doctrine of "belligerent occupation" that is applied to the "non-annexed" areas captured in 1967 would not be applied to these areas. Judge Edmund Levy touched upon this issue in his minority opinion in the Gush Katif decision. Israeli Law was applied to these areas AFTER 1967 by government order - not by knesset law (E.g. unlike Jerusalem and the Golan).

    Thus any forward thinking student of the social and legal scene in Israel will clearly see how the legal status of "belligerent occupation" can be applied to those areas beyond the partition borders captured and "occupied" in 1949. In general, International Law - and it's application within the Israeli system - is very fluid. So things can change very quickly. Also, Israel can change the citizenship law so that children born "abroad" are no longer granted automatic citizenship (there are already differences applied to such in the Israeli common law e.g. regarding rights of "Israelis" under the extradition laws in israel)

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