History: UN resolutions 242 and 338

Following the June 1967 Six-Day War, the situation in the Middle East was discussed by the United Nations General Assembly, which referred the issue to the Security Council.
After lengthy discussion, a final draft for a Security Council resolution was presented by the British Ambassador, Lord Caradon, on November 22, 1967. It was adopted on the same day.
Pro-Arab ( and uneducated leftists) sources often claim that UNSCR 242 requires Israel to withdraw from the West Bank, Gaza, and other areas.
This is not true! Lets see what UNSCR 242 actually means.
U.N. Security Council Resolution no. 242 states, in full, as follows:

United Nations Security Council Resolution 242 (November 22, 1967).
The
Security Council,
Expressing its continuing concern with the grave situation
in the Middle East,
Emphasizing the inadmissibility of the acquisition of
territory by war and the need to work for a just and lasting peace in which
every State in the area can live in security,
Emphasizing further that all
Member States in their acceptance of the Charter of the United Nations have
undertaken a commitment to act in accordance with Article 2 of the Charter:

1. Affirms that the fulfillment of Charter principles requires the
establishment of a just and lasting peace in the Middle East which should
include the application of both the following principles:

(i)
Withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from territories occupied in the recent
conflict;
(ii) Termination of all claims or states of belligerency and
respect for and acknowledgement of the sovereignty, territorial integrity and
political independence of every State in the area and their right to live in
peace within secure and recognized boundaries free from threats or acts of
force;

2. Affirms further the necessity:

(a) For
guaranteeing freedom of navigation through international waterways in the
area;
(b) For achieving a just settlement of the refugee problem;
(c) For
guaranteeing the territorial inviolability and political independence of every
State in the area, through measures including the establishment of demilitarized
zones;

3. Requests the Secretary-General to designate a Special
Representative to proceed to them Middle East to establish and maintain contacts
with the States concerned in order to promote agreement and assist efforts to
achieve a peaceful and accepted settlement in accordance with the provisions and
principles in this resolution;

4. Requests the Secretary-General to
report to the Security Council on the progress of the efforts of the Special
Representative as soon as possible.

Lets see of whom the resolution is talking...
"to work for a just and lasting peace in which every State in the area can live in security,"
every state in the area means: Israel, Syria, Jordan, Egypt and Lebanon.
lets look again... maybe some other state is hidden in the text?
"all Member States in their acceptance of the Charter of the United Nations"

Lets guess what countries in the region were member states of the charter of the UN... well you were right... its
Israel, Syria, Jordan, Egypt and Lebanon - no more, no less.

now when we understood of which parties the resolution speaks, lets see what does it says.

"establishment of a just and lasting peace in the Middle East which should include the application of both the following principles:"

and I will translate: UNSCR 242 calls on all parties to the conflict to negotiate a solution, on what terms?
"the application of both the following principles: "
that means only if both of the principles are fulfilled, not one not zero not half,- BOTH.

and what are the principles?
the first:
"Withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict"
lets understand what is said in this line,

Israeli armed forces, not sovereignty, and not anything else.
territories occupied in the recent conflict, is it said "the territories"?- no, is it said "all the territories?" well, no.
so we learn that Israel is not required to withdraw from all the territories "occupied" in the recent conflict.
but from which territories Israel is required to withdraw then?
well we will learn in the second principle.
wait a minute... now a smart person like you will probably say "what the heck? you're just playing with semantics here! not with the "real" intention"
well, lets see what the real intention was:

The British UN Ambassador at the time, Lord Caradon, who introduced the resolution to the Council, has stated that:

It would have been wrong to demand that Israel return to its positions of June
4, 1967, because those positions were undesirable and artificial. After all,
they were just the places where the soldiers of each side happened to be on the
day the fighting stopped in 1948. They were just armistice lines. That's why we
didn't demand that the Israelis return to them.

and
The United States' UN Ambassador at the time, former Supreme Court Justice Arthur Goldberg, has stated that:

The notable omissions - which were not accidental - in regard to withdrawal are
the words "the" or "all" and the "June 5, 1967 lines" ... the resolution speaks
of withdrawal from occupied territories without defining the extent of
withdrawal. [This would encompass] less than a complete withdrawal of Israeli
forces from occupied territory, inasmuch as Israel's prior frontiers had proved
to be notably Insecure.

Lets see in the second principle from which territories Israel is obligated to withdraw:

"Termination of all claims or states of belligerency and respect for and
acknowledgement of the sovereignty, territorial integrity and political
independence of every State in the area and their right to live in peace within
secure and recognized boundaries free from threats or acts of force;"

that means that the real intention is: that Israel will decide according to negotiations with the other parties to which borders to withdraw in order to achieve peace, and those borders must be secured "free from threats or acts of force", no more, no less.
Does Israel have to withdraw its forces even if the other parties don't want to negotiate? lets see:
Eugene V. Rostow (Distinguished Fellow at the United States Institute of Peace, and former US Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs), Rostow was one of the US officials involved in drafting 242 so he knows first hand what was and was not intended. He states:

Resolution 242, which as undersecretary of state for political affairs
between 1966 and 1969 I helped produce, calls on the parties to make peace and
allows Israel to administer the territories it occupied in 1967 until "a just
and lasting peace in the Middle East" is achieved

that means , if the "other" parties (i.e. Syria, Jordan, Egypt and Lebanon) will not negotiate, Israel has the right to ADMINISTER the territories.
Paragraph 2 in the UN resolution add more topics to negotiate between the parties, and paragraphs 3 and 4 are strictly administrative, and has no interest for us.
of course back in 1967 no Arab country wanted to negotiate with Israel because they didn't recognized the state. so the territories were administered by Israel until the "Yom Kippur" war broke, after the war, (when Israel has captured more territories in Egypt and in Syria almost reaching the capitals of these states) UN came with resolution 338:

United Nations Security Council Resolution 338 (October 22, 1973).
The Security Council
1. Calls upon all parties to the present fighting to cease
all firing and terminate all military activity immediately, no later than 12
hours after the moment of the adoption of this decision, in the positions they
now occupy;
2. Calls upon the parties concerned to start immediately after
the cease-fire the implementation of Security Council resolution 242 (1967) in
all of its parts;
3. Decides that, immediately and concurrently with the
cease-fire, negotiations start between the parties concerned under appropriate
auspices aimed at establishing a just and durable peace in the Middle East.

the UNSCR 338 says that all the "parties to the present fighting" which means Israel, Syria and Egypt have to negotiate peace.
Israel unconditionally withdraw its forces Kuneitra district in vicinity to Damascus ( Syria), and from Cairo vicinity to the east bank of the Suez canal (Egypt).
Later in 1979 Israel eventually signed peace agreement with Egypt, and withdrew from Sinai peninsula territories to secure borders, thus withdrawing from 91% of the territories achieved in the last two wars. Gaza strip remaining as an Israeli territory (satisfying the Resolution's nonspecific withdrawal component).
in 1994 Israel signed a peace agreement with Jordan, withdrawing from some land near river Jordan and leasing some portions of agriculture land in the Jordan valley. (satisfying the Resolution's nonspecific withdrawal component) Judea and Samaria stays under Israel's sovereignty.
the Syrian border is still unresolved, since Syria's initial acquisition of the Golan Heights was illegal under international law!
Syria was created by the French mandate, while the Golan heights were under British mandate and part of the Trans-Jordania and part of the Jewish state as agreed in San Remo Conference. so the Golan heights were not legally Syrian in the first place. Israel's reacquisition of this territory was, and its present retention thereof is, lawful under international law.

Sources:
the UN document
INTERNATIONAL LAW AND THE JEWISH PEOPLE’S COLLECTIVE RIGHTS OF SETTLEMENT AND SELF-DETERMINATION IN THE LAND OF ISRAEL
What was United Nations Security Council Resolution 242 and what does it say?
The San Remo Conference, 1922
The Golan Heights Law
the British mandate 1920-1946

POLITICS: The Thin Green Line...

The launching of this Blog was planned for a later period, but due to the latest events in Israeli politics. I couldn’t wait any longer.

Yuli Tamir proposes students learn about Israel's disputed borders. 'You can't sketch Israel's borders without bringing in politics' says Tamir

Education Minister Yuli Tamir decided that Israeli students should learn about the country's 1967 borders. Tamir ordered the Green Line be included on all maps in all future textbook publications.

The Green Line outlines Israel's borders from the 4th of June, 1967, just before the Six day War broke out.

This decision is politically loaded since the 1967 borders are at the base of the Palestinian and Arab demands for establishing an independent Palestinian state.

You don’t have to be a PHD in Political Studies to understand that this is a typical post–Zionist political decision, another step in the Bolshevik brainwash for schoolchildren to make them forget our history, creating literally "another brick in the wall".

So since you don’t learn this material in school, you will at least learn it here:


Lets start With the UN announcement, at 29th of November - 1947.
When the Arabs legions under the watchful eye of the British, launched their Jihad against the future Jewish state. They were attacking Jewish settlements until May 14, 1948.

At that day, when the last British forces of the Mandate were leaving the territories of "Palestina",(which bordered in the east with sovereign "Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan" (the Jordan river), the sea to the west, and the border with Egypt to the south west (the borders from Egypt independence from 1922)).
All the territory of "Palestina" was still under the British mandate and sovereignty.

On midnight May 14, 1948 David Ben-Gurion has proclaimed the new State of Israel,
Implementing the resolution of the UN General Assembly of the 29th of November - 1947.
Eleven minutes after the Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel, the United States formally recognized the State of Israel, followed by Guatemala, Nicaragua and Uruguay. ( The Soviet Union recognized the State of Israel on 17 May 1948, followed by Poland, Czechoslovakia (formally), Yugoslavia (formally) and South Africa).

The next day the newborn state of Israel was immediately attacked by five Arab armies (Egypt, Jordan, Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon) and by the uprising of the local Arab marauders.

Why?

Their intentions were declared by Azzam Pasha, Secretary-General of the Arab League:

"This will be a war of extermination and a momentous massacre which will be
spoken of like the Mongolian massacres and the Crusades."

This onslaught on the Jewish state ended at early 1949 with armistice agreements,
Because none of the Arab states would negotiate a peace agreement.
It was a hard and a long war, in process of which the Arab armies ILLEGALLY, against the international law, Occupied (and held for almost 20 years) the former British mandate territories also known as Judea, Samaria and Gaza- these territories were never intended to belong to one of the invader states.
Armistice agreements neither granted to these invading Arab nations internationally-recognized ownership of these newly-occupied territories nor otherwise purported to infringe the Jewish people's rights of settlement and self-determination therein authorized by the Mandate.
In the aftermath of their unsuccessful effort to destroy Israel, the Arab states eventually expelled approximately 950,000 of their Jewish residents, cleansing the entirety of their Jewish populations (the real ethnic cleansing).

These "new" borders of territories illegally occupied by Jordan and Egypt were named the "Green line" the name is derived from the green pencil used to draw the line on the map.

Now we know how the Arabs got there from the beginning…
(We will talk about the so called "refugees" in one of my future posts)

From 1949 to 1967 Israel has been the victim of genocidal Arab aggression,
For all this time Syria, Egypt and Jordan had all permitted the various components of the fedayeen precursors to mount terror attacks against Israel from the Golan Heights, from Sinai and Gaza, and from Judea, Samaria and the eastern portion of Jerusalem, respectively. Syria regularly employed mortars and snipers against the Jewish communities of northern Israel from well-fortified positions on the Golan Heights.
Shortly before June 1967 Egypt closed the Straits of Tiran to all maritime traffic going to and from Israel. (- a recognized casus belli under international law), Syria began to thicken its forces in the Golan Heights.

On May 18, 1967 the Cairo-based government-controlled Kul al-Arab (Voice of the Arabs) radio proclaimed:

“As of today, there no longer exists an international emergency force to protect
Israel. We shall exercise patience no more. We shall not complain any more to
the U.N. about Israel. The sole method we shall apply against Israel is total
war, which will result in the extermination of Zionist existence.”

On May 20, 1967 Syrian Defense Minister Hafez al-Assad declared:

“Our forces are now entirely ready, not only to repulse the aggression, but to initiate the act of liberation itself, and to explode the Zionist presence in the Arab homeland. The Syrian army, with its finger on the trigger, is united....I, as a military man, believe that the time has come to enter into a battle of annihilation.”

And on May 28, 1967 Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser stated:

“We intend to open a general assault against Israel. This will be total war. Our basic aim is the destruction of Israel.”

On 5 of June 1967 started the Six Day War…
During the war Israel reclaimed back the territories of eastern Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria and Gaza, and capturing the Sinai and the Golan Heights.

After the war inspite the arab assault due to pressure of the Arab states, UN released resolution 242
(Of which we will also learn providing further details, in one of my future posts, lets just say that Israel is not required by the issued Resolution to withdraw to the military separation-of-forces lines of 1949 but to "negotiate with the neighbors over secure borders")

But the Arab states still refused to accept or even acknowledge/negotiate with the Jewish state.

Later, Egypt and Syria launched a coordinated invasion against Israel in 1973 without provocation.
At the end of this military adventure, (in which Israel was caught off-guard)
Israel armed forces passed the Suez Canal almost reaching Cairo, and passed the Kuneitra district almost reaching Damascus …

The war ended with United Nations Security Council Resolution 338,
Which ment that all nations involved should stop fighting and make peace by negotiating over secure borders, implementing resolution 242.
After the war of 1973, Israel withdrew from 100% of the territory captured in Yom Kippur War... and from 90% of the territory captured in 1967… (Sinai plus all of the additional lands captured by Israel in that War beyond Sinai towards Cairo, and the district of Kuneitra on the Golan Heights plus all of the additional lands captured by Israel in that War beyond the Golan Heights towards Damascus).
At this year Israel made peace with Egypt… on which both parties agreed over withdrawal to secure borders, by this peace treaty; Sinai goes to Egypt and Gaza strip belong to Israel by ALL international laws.(UN resolution 242 and 338 is fulfilled on the Egyptian border).

Next, after two decades at 1994 Israel Signed peace treaty with Jordan… Some territories were given to Jordan, but the Judea and Samaria were ended belong to Israel by the international laws (UN resolution 242 and 338 is fulfilled on the Jordanian border).

Syria has not yet signed a peace treaty with Israel although Israel did withdraw from the Kuneitra district to "secure borders".

It is noteworthy that nowhere does U.N. Security Council Resolution no. 242 assert “Palestinian” ownership of - or call for the establishment of a “Palestinian” state in -- any portion of the biblical Land of Israel. On the contrary, the Resolution's explicitly-stated goal of safeguarding the “territorial integrity” and the “territorial inviolability” of “every State in the area” conclusively demonstrates that the Resolution was intended to address, not the present “Palestinian” Arab claim of sovereignty over certain portions of the lands captured by Israel in the 1967 Six Day War, but rather that which its drafters viewed as, fundamentally, a non-existential boundary line ( the green line) dispute among the combatant countries, namely, Israel, Egypt, Jordan and Syria.

Thus after being acknowledged with these FACTS… we can understand that the "green line" is an obsolete concept, which play absolutely no role in the international law regarding the State of Israel.

In conclusion, not only the proposition of Yuli Tamir, to draw the green line in schoolbooks is a promotion of her twisted Political agenda, but it is a dangerous brainwashing of the schoolchildren,
Someone should tell her what the difference between the thin Green line and a big fat lie.




Sources:

International law and the Jewish people’s collective rights of settlement and self-determination in the land of Israel

The San Remo Conference, 1922 Extract

Myths & Facts Online Boundaries

Myths & Facts Online The 1967 Six-Day War

Myths & Facts Online The war of 1948

British Mandate 1920-1946

The Palestine facts