Resolution 242

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If the 1949 Armistice Line was not a recognized international border,

Then_why_is Clinton saying,"we believe that the 1967 borders,with swaps, should be the focus of the negotiations over borders."
...but the 1949 Armistice Line never was a border. Jordan repeatedly clarified this through history. Example days before the Six-Day War Jordan clarified that for any claiming parties the the old armistice agreement "did not fix boundaries".Article II of the 1949 Armistice Agreement with the Jordanians explicitly specified that the line that was designated did not compromise any future territorial claims of the two parties, since it had been “dictated by exclusively by military considerations.  Even the "famous" UN Resolution 242 which was passed by the UN Security Council five months after the Six-Day War recognized that the 1949 Armistice line was not supposed to designate final Israeli borders.
At the UN General Assembly in September 2009, Obama used in his address the road-map phrase of "ending the occupation that began in 1967," but he did not refer to Resolution 242 as his predecessors did.

Over the last decade, Israel has made repeated mistakes in allowing the restoration of the 1967 lines and the downgrading of Resolution 242. It should have fought harder over the language of the Road Map back in 2003. Israel's right to defensible borders, that must replace the 1967 lines, has a strong foundation in international law and in the past policies of the UN Security Council.
Arab declarations about destroying Israel were made preceding the war when control over the West Bank and the Gaza Strip (or Sinai and the Golan Heights) were not in Israel’s hands, and no so-called Israeli occupation existed.
That is why the UN Security Council recognized that Israel had acquired the territory from Egypt, Jordan, and Syria not as a matter of aggression, but as an act of self-defense. That is also why http://xrl.us/Resolution242 was passed under Chapter VI of the UN Charter rather than Chapter VII. As explained above, UN resolutions adopted under Chapter VI call on nations to negotiate settlements, while resolutions under the more stringent Chapter VII section deal with clear acts of aggression that allow the UN to enforce its resolutions upon any state seen as threatening the security of another state or states.
Professor Julius Stone, a leading authority on the Law of Nations, has concurred, further clarifying:
Franz Stone with Julius Stone
Julius Stone via stonelab.osu.edu
“Territorial Rights Under International Law. … By their [Arab countries] armed attacks against the State of Israel in 1948, 1967, and 1973, and by various acts of belligerency throughout this period, these Arab states flouted their basic obligations as United Nations members to refrain from threat or use of force against Israel’s territorial integrity and political independence. These acts were in flagrant violation inter alia of Article 2(4) and paragraphs (1), (2), and (3) of the same article.”(11)
If the West Bank and Gaza were indeed occupied territory
– belonging to someone else and unjustly seized by force – there could be no grounds for negotiating new borders.
via crethiplethi.com
Lord Caradon
President Lyndon Johnson made this very point in September 1968: "It is clear, however, that a return to the situation of 4 June 1967 will not bring peace. There must be secure and there must be recognized borders." It is for this reason that Resolution 242 did not call for a full withdrawal from all the territories that Israel captured in the Six Day War; the 1949 Armistice lines were no longer to be a reference point for a future peace process.


Lord Caradon, the British ambassador to the UN admitted at the time: "I know the 1967 border very well. It is not a satisfactory border, it is where the troops had to stop." He concluded: "it is not a permanent border."




Arthur Goldberg
via
cpsalumni.org
His U.S. counterpart, Ambassador Arthur Goldberg, added that "historically, there have never been secure or recognized boundaries in the area"; he then added that the armistice lines did not answer that description.

Lord Caradon, sponsor of the draft that was about to be adopted, stated, before the vote in the Security Council on Resolution 242:
“… the draft Resolution is a balanced whole. To add to it or to detract from it would destroy the balance and also destroy the wide measure of agreement we have achieved together. It must be considered as a whole as it stands. I suggest that we have reached the stage when most, if not all, of us want the draft Resolution, the whole draft Resolution and nothing but the draft Resolution.” (S/PV 1382, p. 31, of 22.11.67)
Even the Soviet
delegate to the U.N.,
Vasili Kuznetsov
,

who fought against
the final text,

conceded that
the resolution

gave Israel
the right to

"withdraw its
forces only

to those lines
it considers
appropriate."

- Danny Ayalon

Arthur Goldberg, US representative, in the Security Council in the course of the discussions which preceded the adoption of Resolution 242:
“To seek withdrawal without secure and recognized boundaries … would be just as fruitless as to seek secure and recognized boundaries without withdrawal. Historically, there have never been secure or recognized boundaries in the area. Neither the armistice lines of 1949 nor the cease-fire lines of 1967 have answered that description… such boundaries have yet to be agreed upon. An agreement on that point is an absoute essential to a just and lasting peace just as withdrawal isS/PV. 1377, p. 37, of 15. 11.67


MICHAEL STEWART via independent.co.uk
Michael Stewart, (Great Britain) Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, in reply to a question in Parliament, 17 November 1969:
“Question: “What is the British interpretation of the wording of the 1967 Resolution? Does the Right Honourable Gentleman understand it to mean that the Israelis should withdraw from all territories taken in the late war?”


Mr. Stewart: “No, Sir. That is not the phrase used in the Resolution. The Resolution speaks of secure and recognized boundaries. These words must be read concurrently with the statement on withdrawal.”
George Brown
VIA spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk
George Brown, British Foreign Secretary in 1967, on January 19, 1970:
“I have been asked over and over again to clarify, modify or improve the wording, but I do not intend to do that. The phrasing of the Resolution was very carefully worked out, and it was a difficult and complicated exercise to get it accepted by the UN Security Council. “I formulated the Security Council Resolution. Before we submitted it to the Council, we showed it to Arab leaders. The proposal said ‘Israel will withdraw from territories that were occupied’, and not from ‘the’ territories, which means that Israel will not withdraw from all the territories.” (The Jerusalem Post, January 3 1970)


Joseph J. Sisco via nndb.com

Joseph Sisco, Assistant Secretary of State, 12 July 1970 (NBC “Meet the Press”):

“That Resolution did not say ‘withdrawal to the pre-June 5 lines’. The Resolution said that the parties must negotiate to achieve agreement on the so-called final secure and recognized borders. In other words, the question of the final borders is a matter of negotiations between the parties.”
Eugene V. Rostow,
Professor of Law and Public Affairs
via images.library.yale.edu
Eugene V. Rostow, Professor of Law and Public Affairs 
, who, in 1967, was US Under-Secretary of State for Political Affairs:

“… Paragraph 1 (i) of the Resolution calls for the withdrawal of Israeli armed forces ‘from territories occupied in the recent conflict’, and not ‘from the territories occupied in the recent conflict’. Repeated attempts to amend this sentence by inserting the word ‘the’ failed in the Security Council. It is, therefore, not legally possible to assert that the provision requires Israeli withdrawal from all the territories now occupied under the cease-fire resolutions to the Armistice Demarcation lines.” (American Journal of International Law, Volume 64, September 1970, p. 69)
Geraldo de Carvalho Silos via untreaty.un.org
Geraldo de Carvalho Silos, Brazilian UN representative, speaking in the Security Council after the adoption of Resolution 242:

“We keep constantly in mind that a just and lasting peace in the Middle East has necessarily to be based on secure, permanent boundaries freely agreed upon and negotiated by the neighboring States.” (S/PV. 1382, p. 66,22.11.67 ).
So this is what adults, from both political parties, have had to say about UN 242, and pulling back to 1967 borders. 
U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger recalled the first time he heard someone invoke "the sacramental language of United Nations Security Council Resolution 242, mumbling about the need for a just and lasting peace within secure and recognized borders". He said the phrase was so platitudinous that he thought the speaker was pulling his leg. Kissinger said that, at that time, he did not appreciate how the flood of words used to justify the various demands obscured rather than illuminated the fundamental positions. Kissinger said those "clashing perspectives" prevented any real bargaining and explained: "Jordan’s acquiescence in Resolution 242 had been obtained in 1967 by the promise of our United Nations
Arthur Goldberg
via exhibits.library.northwestern.edu
Ambassador Arthur Goldberg that under its terms we would work for the return of the West Bank of Jordan with minor boundary rectifications and that we were prepared to use our influence to obtain a role for Jordan in Jerusalem."
However, speaking to Henry Kissinger, President Richard Nixon said "You and I both know they can’t go back to the other [1967] borders. But we must not, on the other hand, say that because the Israelis win this war, as they won the '67 War, that we just go on with status quo. It can't be done." Kissinger replied "I couldn't agree more"
Moreover, President Gerald Ford said: "The U.S. further supports the position that a just and lasting peace, which remains our objective, must be acceptable to both sides
Of all the Presidents, Gerald Ford said it best: it must be acceptable to both sides.  Trying to jam a dead UN Agreement down the throats of Israel, sets the stage for another blood bath. via Bob Schneider
http://xrl.us/Resolution242
President Bush made clear in his 2004 letter to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon that "it is unrealistic to expect that the outcome of final status negotiations will be a full and complete return to the armistice lines of 1949".
The Bush letter was approved by massive bipartisan majorities in both houses of the US Congress. 
the Obama administration has avoided stating that it is legally bound by the contents of the letter. This came out in a long exchange between a Fox News reporter and the State Department's Deputy Spokesman, Robert Wood, on June 1, 2009.


At the UN General Assembly in September 2009, Obama used in his address the road-map phrase of "ending the occupation that began in 1967," but he did not refer to Resolution 242 as his predecessors did.


the truth about Resolution 194
[Count Bernadotte's]  report also considered the possibility of resettlement outside Palestine, with those who chose not to return being adequately compensated for their lost property. “It must not... be supposed that the establishment of the right of refugees to return to their former homes provides a solution to the problem” the report read.

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