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to make the most benefit of such article we showcased a brief history of the situation to fully understand the legal standings of the sides and to make sure we put the most accurate description on the situation , and we will showcase an interesting case in the Israeli side in trying to adjust the legal nature of the people living in Israel , and most importantly we will showcase how to assess the legal situation of the sides according to the legitimacy of them to let us understand how to put the right legal description on the acts of any legal personality including ofcourse the sides of this war , as well as discussing the war from the point of view of international law specifically and the conception of self defense and its application in our situation .
the article plan will be as follows :
a brief history about the war between the two sides
the attempt to transform a religion into a race
the difference between legitimate and non legitimate armed power and what description suits each side
the description of this war from an international law view
the conception of self-defense
a brief history of the war between the two sides
we can't really do the history of this war justice if we wrote books about it let alone "a brief history " it will be forever no matter what is the outcome of it a black mark in the human history , we heavily encourage all to read more dedicated articles about the history of palestine , nevertheless we will mark here the most impactful historical events on the situation today :
In the year 1914 palestine was a whole country it's borders included the palestine of today and all Israel , and it was under the ottoman empire in its land control enlargement , the population was consisting of 690 thousand inhabitants 3-5% of jews and a big difference on christians on 6.5-30% and the rest of population are muslims and there is no historical records of any internal conflicts in palestine , which indicates a peaceful relation between religious groups .
in 1917 a declaration was sent from the minister of foreign affairs of the united kingdom Balfour which famously known latter as - Balfour's declaration - announcing the United kingdoms support for the establishment of a "national home for the Jewish people'' in palestine , it’s no doubt that the land is not owned or even controlled by the UK government at this point and the declaration is being used to isolate a religious group from their home lands by multiple european states and the UK was only the first one , it must be noted that a jewish british politicians particularly in the House of Lords objected on such declaration based on the fact that it's clearly a violation on a british citizens rights , by expelling them from their homes to another state just because of their religious beliefs . These acts against jewish people are for multiple unjustifiable historical stereotypes we will discuss in the next paragraph .
in 29th of september 1922 the british "mandate" took over the previous ottoman control over palestine and it continued until 1947 , during this mandate the world was experiencing the last and the remains of the world wars , these all over the world armed conflicts and its remains couldn't take the adherents of judaism . This is mainly because one of the commandments of Judaism which is ' thou shalt not kill ' which made jews who adhere to their religion refrain from participating in the wars that their countries were getting into . in addition to the historical hate for the jewish people especially during the middle ages when the christian church was in its greatest political era , at that time the jewish people were forbidden by the government of the monarchs and the church to work in most lines of work except of course lending money for interest which the church itself couldn't get into for it is forbidden for them . and in the raising of taxes over the jews and accordingly raising of interest by jews and the abstention to participate in wars , the image of the - greedy coward jew - was created in europe by political and religious consequences , and it hit its highest points during the first world war were millions of people were dying while the jewish - don't bother to fight - as the idea was being held .
The idea of a national home for the jewish people in palestine was originally heavily rejected by the jewish community until the late 19th century for it's known as - the original sin - in the jewish religion . it's not until the zionist movement which embraces the changing of one of judaism commandment interpretation ' thou shalt not kill ' from the prohibition of killing anyone to the limitation of this prohibition to killing the jewish , in other words ' thou shalt not kill jewish ' by this they gave themself the right to kill anyone not jewish , therefore participating in many wars worldwide , although it must be noted that it's until 1945 this movement was pretty much isolated from the rest of the jewish community for what we discussed earlier . It wasn't until the Holocaust that the idea of the national home was somewhat tolerated .
During the time between 1932 and 1947 a big and small emigration groups of jewish refugees and only the jewish , was sent from the warfare in their home countries to Palestine . These refugees held about 318 thousand people , the historical records say that the citizens of Palestine even though under the British mandate treated the refugees with good care and hospitality . they treated them based on their religious and human beliefs this includes all religious groups in palestine muslims christians and jews
in 1948 the palestinian population was consisting of more than 2 million including the refuges and 1,4 million without them , in this year the british and zionist forces declared the wrongful ( without having the right ) emergence of Israel inside the already existing state of palestine , but how did they do that ? .
It was by forcfully displacing more than 800 thousend palastinian citizen form thier homes in 1,300 city and village commiting one of most horrifec genocides in history , we say that because not only at the time 774 villiages was controlled by this occupation force destroying 531 of them , and not because of the killing of 15 thousend civilian in the process , but because this genocide is still continuing untill today over the bodies of more than 100 thousend palastinian and over 1 million arrests .
In the justifications of these acts the zinosts claimed that the land of palestine was from the beginning their rightful property by being the pure jewish from Jacob the prophet . this claim can of course be countered by the fact the claim itself doesn’t give theme any right over the land itself simply because Inheritance doesn’t equal ownership moreover with this logice I myself can say that I own all the land on earth because without a doubt I’m the descendent of the first human . So you , dear reader, are now reading this article from my house .
additionally zionists and jewish people in general are in fact from different parts of the world and have the biological features of the people of these parts we can’t just ignore this fact and say that the north african jewishs is the same race and ethnicity as the german jewishs and they are 100% or even 10% pure descendent of the prophet jacob .
the attempt to transform a religion into a race
One of the most important features of the jewish history is the relatively recent attempt to transform the religion of Judaism into the race of Judaism under the name of ethnicity . This discussion is really the basis of most of the media justifications of the attacks on anyone who tries to point out the crimes in this war so here we will discuss the goals and effects of this transformation and how it lands on a logical point of view .
firstlly what is a religion ?
it’s the beliefs and acts that make out the relation to what humans regard as holy, sacred, absolute, spiritual, divine, or worthy of especial reverence
and what is a race ?
Race is a categorization of beings and things based on shared qualities into groups generally viewed as distinct within a given group of different categories
then a human race is a categorization of humans based on mostly physical shared qualities into groups generally viewed as distinct within a given society.
while ethnicity is the description of a group of people sharing history and culture
But what is Judaism objectively speaking ? . well judaism is usually defined as an Abrahamic monotheistic and ethnic religion which comprises the collective spiritual, cultural, and religious traditions of the Jewish people .
Now you can see from the brief history we monitored that the ethnic religion part of this definition is purely because of isolation of the judaism believers in the christian communities . as well as the transformation process itself and that is very contrary to one of the first goals of any religion . which is spreading to the largest number of people possible , and not being limited to certain people and this statement especially strongly applies to abrahamic religions . If we agree on these previous statements we can define Judaism apart from the historical misfortunes of it .
So the question would now be , is Judaism a religion ? a race ? or an ethnicity ?
To answer such a question we simply can compare the characteristics of the three that are stated in their definitions .
with the usual definition of Judaism ( removing the religion part ) to see which of the two fits its description , and it will be obvious that the religion definition fits best . One of the most important as well as obvious distinctions of religion from the other two is that you can change your religion by innerly changing your belief system . so a jew can convert to christianity or islam and vice versa .
but the same can not be said about race or ethnicity . The twos specialty makes them apply even if one doesn’t particularly have the physical qualities of the race or ethnicity he is descended from , the race has a blood relationship type that creates the similar physical attributes , while ethnicity must have a shared history and culture . and even if it intertwines the religions nature of believing, it rejects to be a cultural practice or it will contradict the main reason of its existence .
one would argue that judaism is not a race or just a religion it’s a nationality and a religion or a national religion . While nationality has a politically related definition as a connection between the citizen and his state it’s important to realize that nationality is used and utilized as a race alternative and under the name of ethnicity in our particular situation to unify the group of people whom a speech is directed to , and to avoid the definition problems . and this usage has surpassed its political function , additionally the nationality is a political connection which its nature contradicts any criteria other than the right of birth or the right of blood , and we’ve discussed previously why the zionists don't have any of these two .
nevertheless this is the point of mentioning the previous definitions , since 1897 a movement started trying to transform the religion of judaism to the nationality of judaism ( nationality as an alternative to race ) with the first zionist congress held by Theodor herzl . and we insisted to make the comparison mainly between the concepts of religion and race because the concept of ethnicity is only a cover , for the zionists address their statement to what fit a race not a religious or ethnic group .
but how could someone specify the group of people whom the speech of the congress is addressed to ?
This question is the reason for the idea of the jewish nationality . In a modern world where religious beliefs don't surpass a man's own private life his idea of the world around him is based on his own interpretations of his religion . living the desired life on this kind of holds becomes near impossible , so one would need to not speak in a religious fashion , to the religious group rather he should speak to this group of people as if they have more than a religious connection , a connection of goals, dreams and ideas .
this way theodor herzl asked the jewish wealth holders to support establishing a national homeland for the jewish in either argentina , oganda or palestine , and this idea was generally rejected from the jewish community for relatively the same reasons we mentioned about the original sin and the idea of isolating a group of people because of their religion as well as the nissesty for the jewish to get rid of the ugly picture painted on their history wrongly .
and undoubtedly a very important question arises , if Palestine is really the national homeland of the jewish people, the land of the ancestors , or at least the rightful place for the establishment of Israel , why wasn’t it the only choice ? or at least the first choice ?
Nevertheless this idea became more and more acceptable from the jewish community after the two world wars and all the crimes to all the human kind that came with it , and at that point we can say that theodor points were being seen as more necessary than justifiable . But are our decisions that we make in desperate times right ? More importantly should someone be punished for a crime they didn’t have anything to do with ?
The answers are no and no .
the difference between legitimate and non legitimate armed power
we mean by legitimacy the objective criterion which determine the correct ethical and moral level of the human conduct
accordingly the legitimate armed power is the militerial force , established by legitimate authority to achieve and protect its legitimate duties and goals .
The importance of the question of legitimacy is quite clear , but as an effect of such determination we would like to point specifically that legality is determined according to its legitimacy level , therefore any legal claim from any side of this war should be measured by the criteria of legitimate armed power which are stated in its definition above .
we also would like to point out that a respectful portion of the legal academic community see that the rules of law should be obligated to indifferently of its legitimacy level , these appeals are concentrated on municipal law however for the sake of protecting the system of rights and obligations created by the legitimate authority weather it was legitimate or not , for it’s better for men to live in unjust society than to live in unstable just one , nevertheless this doesn’t actually contradict with our criteria for in the situation in hand there are a dispute between tow authority each one claiming it’s the legitimate authority and using military power to take control over the other .
the measuring of legitimacy
We shall measure the legitimacy of armed power of the two sides by the three criteria stated in the definition of legitimate armed power. The benefit of such measurement is to know clearly which side has the right to use such power in the first place , therefore know which side the legal violations come from .
the establishment by legitimate authority : first thing to say is Israel claims to be a state authority . Meanwhile the Palestinians that rebel against it claim to be a rebellion power . Therefore, for each one to be considered legitimate it has to fulfill its distinctive conditions .
For a state authority to be legitimate it must be an active part of the components of state which are people , territory and political regime stated in a state authority , the reason for these condition is to eliminate the milsiast groups from the conception of legitimate state authority that doesn’t have an active part with the other components .
About Israel we should say clearly this authority has the support of the people it govern inside the claimed territory of Israel , which takes us to the second part of the criterion , the territory , and we tried to prove previously that Israeli claims for the land is based on historical misfortunes and crimes and has taken the same turn that the european countries took against the jews only now against the palestinians . Therefore the Israeli authority doesn’t have the right to govern the land thus it is not a legitimate governing . for not being a legitimate state .
on the other hand does Israel have a legitimate duty or goal ? the legal personality we call - state - is a necessity , for it’s necessary for the people who live in a certain territory to have an authority to protect the system of rights and obligations they create among themselves and the system of duties they accept to be part of , this is all internally , internationally however the benefit of such personality becomes more and more obvious it all comes to advance the internal goals by entering and creating lagal international relations .
With this in mind , we can say that protecting the systems of rights and obligations and duties is a part of the legal personality of the state , it is one of its characteristics . We want to apply this concept to the Israeli military force , does it work for such a goal ? Was it established for such goals ? . Israel surely covered our question . from the point of establishing this force it didn’t do any acts other than internal and international violations as well as the expanding attempts . We will discuss these violations which are stated by the UN and many other international organizations . The one obvious goal for Israel is to remove the idea and the people of Palestine whatever is the way of doing so . And we have not seen but the criminal way for a criminal goal .
In conclusion we can not from the legal point of view which is the only relevant view , accept that Israel is any kind of state or even a regime-entity with legitimate goals . For this point of the article we will call it - the entity - as many other respectful articles , and will name the nature of this entity at the end of this article .
in the other hand the palestinians that stands against Israel claims to be an occupation reasistince , standing at the fact of the non legitimacy of any occupation imposed on people , for such a group to be legitimate there must be a non legitimate occupation as well as a public support for the resistance , a valid claims and no other way but armed resistance to have these valid claims .
about the existence of a non legitimate occupation , there is no objective doubt about it in palestine even though the international community doesn’t move against it for the sake of its members legal and economic interests in the entities occupation and in its supporters from the international community especially the United states , this doesn’t mean the acceptance of a deliberate overlook to be the truth . We will discuss this situation according to the charter of the United Nations in more elaboration later .
And about the question of public support for the armed power . Is the so-called rebellion power supported by the Palestinians ? The answer is yes . Throughout the ongoing war and although the miseries that the Palestinians came by they didn’t stand against or let down the rebellion forces , the reality is they are helping them as much as they could on their will . They simply have the same goal , claiming the land back , and the western media supporting the zionist entity try to manipulate this phenomenon to justify the killing of innocent civilians , by accusing the rebellion force of using the civilian as a human shield . Obviously this doesn’t justify the killing of civilians , in the legal sense this situation doesn’t always justify the killing of the enemy fighter as stated in the geneva conventions of 1949 let alone the killing of non fighters . The reality is the entity is fully aware of the intentions and claims of the Palestinians , whether a fighter or not the palestinian wants all his land back , and the zionist entity wants to terminate anyone whose intent comes close to this , which makes the killing of civilians clearly deliberate .
about the valid claims and the ways to get it , a lot of europeans politicians and media professionals call for a tow stats solution proposing a division of palestine between the zionist entity and the palestinians , to make this suggestion clear , they ask the palestinians to let go a part of their land for a force they consider - rightfully so - an occupation so they can keep their lives . From a legal point of view the application of such a proposal is a mockery to any legal system , for there is no just law that tells a human being to let go of some of his essintial rights to keep some others , and we could say this solution is conceptually applied . and the entity still deports civilians from their homes to let illegal settlers to live in them , and about the government of palestine , sadly it’s well known that it is controlled by the entity , you can sense that by its absence in all this happenings , the entity has made sure to make a simulation of a government to export an idea for the public of an attempt of the two states solution . You can see the situation of the palestinian government when knowing that the last presidential election was in 2005 . as well as the absence of any military image under the name of this government , meaning that all the land of Palestine is controlled in some way or another by the zionist entity .
Is there another way to get to a solution between the two sides with the least human losses ? this depends on the circumstances of the situation and on the goals of each side if it’s openable for negotiation , negotiations implies a contract of some sort , and this contract with us knowing the history of the situation and the legal conditions of the parties is basically a waiver of rights without compensation from one party to the other , the wavering party being none other than the palestinian people . and as we established earlier we can’t consider a rule legal without it being legitimate and there is no legitimacy in forcing a party to waiver its rights so it can keep its existence . and we’re here speaking in the general sense, let alone our special situation where Palestinians are asked to waive the ownership of their homes , history , and their wellbeing so they can stay alive .
For the obvious reason Palestinians had refused such a waiver long ago , and Israel with the political and armed international support wasn’t short of imposing this occupation over the Palestinians since 1948 as we mentioned in the brief history . As a result the resistance was created , and we shouldn’t think of the resistance as hmmas or al kassam or any other names as such . The resistance is the collection of goals that holds the armed forces properties no matter what is its name today , in conclusion the resistance will have and will stay having legitimate goals as long as these goals are the repealing of the violations of the zionist entity or any entity in its place .
the description of this war from the view of international law
we will discuss the view of international law subject to article 38 of the statute of the international court of justice , accordingly our discussion will be subject to the charters of the UN , and will show the history of violation by the zionist entity now that we have discussed its nature and how it cannot be considered a state .
We also will compare the actions taken by the international organizations against the zionist entity and against other states to show how effective the actions were .
the history of violations of the zionist entity
the severance of diplomatic ties of the soviet union and the eastern bloc countries with the zionist entity in 1967 as a result of the entities attack on egypt and other arab countries .
On a Jordanian complaint in 1968\5\21 against the entities actions aimed at Jerusalem. The security Council declared that "all administrative, legislative and other actions taken by Israel, including the expropriation of land and property, which have altered or are likely to alter the character and status of the Holy City of Jerusalem, are invalid -illegal- and cannot be recognized as having any legal force." This resolution also called on the entity to "take forthwith steps to rescind all such measures and to desist forthwith from taking any action which would alter the status of the Holy City of Jerusalem." The Council requested the General-Secretary to report on the implementation of the resolution. The General-Secretary subsequently submitted two reports, numbered 9194 and 9199, which indicated that the entity was continuing to change the character of Jerusalem
the resolution above did consider -as declared by the legislative and administrative authority of the international community - all actions by the zionist entity weather legal - legislative - or not , illegal , and have no effects on the international condition of palestine or jerusalem , and ordered to stop it immediately , the zionist entity ignored the UN and continued its illegal actions .
This resolution had been repeated in 1968 in the resolution number 253 .
and repeated again in 1969\7\3 in the resolution number 267 .
and repeated again in 1969\9\15 in the resolution number 271 after the burning of al-aqsa mosque and the forced changing of the condition of Jerusalem .
and again in 1971\9\25 in the resolution number 298 .
and again in 1972\7\21 resolution number 317 .
and again in 1979 in the resolution number 452 , after the starting of building settlements in place of the destroyed homes of the Palestinians who were displaced by the zionist entity , declaring that the settlements have no legal value -non legitimate- .
The resolution above was repeated in 1980\3\1 in the resolution number 465 .
and again in 1989\5\8 resolution number 468 now calling the zionist entity - the occupying force - .
the denouncement of the security council in 1968\12\28 after the zionist entity attack on birutes international airport destroying 13 commercial planes of 8.43 million dollars .
in 1980 the resolution number 478 declaring the non-recognition of the entities law on Jerusalem .
the denouncement of the security council in 1981\6\9 of the attack of the zionist entity against the iraqi nuclear reactor .
the denouncement of the general assembly of the united nations in 1982\9\14 of the slaughter of the palestinians people in lebanon .
the condemning and the denunciation of the security council in 1985\10\4 in the resolution number 573 of the bombing of the palestinian liberation organization in tunisia , which was a civilian organization .
The list goes on for international violations . and we should notice that these violations interrupted international peace without a doubt , and it permits moreover puts a duty on the security council of the United Nations to stop such violations .
but the security council chose to stay put in contrast to what happened in Iraq in 1991 where the security council declared the attacks of the iraqi army on kuwait were a violation of world peace and took - unprecedented - measures in all the history of the organization till present day . The security council declared resolution number 661 in 1990 imposing economical and naval blockades and declared Iraq as no-fly zone after a month . This ground-air-sea blockade on Iraq continued for 13 years , causing the death of more than a 1.6 Iraqi civilians .
in comparing the legal condition of both iraq and the zionist entity , the international law got enforced arbitrarinessly on iraq after one violation of the international law while the zionist entity did almost a major violation of international law and international peace every year since 1948 with no enforcing of any international rule on it , permitting the entity to attack any state it wants . and we should notice that the list of violations of the zionist entity above is not all the recorded violations , it is a chosed cases .
We found more than 55 resolutions from the UN security council alone , 17 from the general assembly and 15 from UNESCO condemning the zionist entity crimes in the course of 75 years . of course not including in these numbers the other international organizations . Is this through all the violations ?
The answer is sadly no . We monitored the situation of iraq-kuwait or the Gulf War to show the inconsistency of the resolutions of the UN , accordingly we advise to search the crimes of the entity indifferently to the international community resolutions . for such resolutions wouldn’t usually - contrary to iraq situation - come out directly after the violation , it will usually connect with the last of a series of violations from the international party , that’s if any resolution has came out anyway , and then we could imagine - and it is actually true - that the zionist entity did a series of destructions , disturbing of peace and humanitarian crimes before every single resolution .
The United Nations Organization is an active partner in the occupation of Palestine . for instated of refusing an occupying force as an authority of law enforcement in the international community the organization tried over the years to legalize this occupation . the first attempt in 1947 in the resolution number 181 dividing palestine . and we have established earlier that a rule of law is considered legal based on its legitimacy level , accordingly we can’t consider this resolution having any legal value , this idea of measuring the legality by the legitimacy isn’t a new or an alien idea . It's the way we actually accept or refuse the application of a rule of law whether we are law professionals or not in everyday life .
the concept of self defense
Over the years of occupation and ethnic cleansing and history theft , a palestinian liberation movements started to rebel against the zionist entity . The names and the forms of these movements don't matter , what matters is how could we consider it a liberation movement ? and we have showcased that above in the Measuring of legitimacy .
The destruction of civilian homes and killing civilians in order to eradicate as many Palestinians as possible was a lot of times defended in the international media and community with the concept of self defense , as it’s the right of the entity to defend itself from the attacks of the terrorist organizations .
The concept of self defense is a legal description of a certain situation , that allows the victim in a criminal offense to rebel against the offense in the same means at most . Self defense is a natural right and to be considered a legitimate reaction to the situation it should fulfill a number of conditions . because the violation the victim is going through will be repealed by what is considered another violation in normal circumstances .
The conditions are , being in a criminal offense , having no other way to stop the violation , repealing the violation using means equal in force with the criminal means at most , using the means in the timeline of the offense itself and not before or after .
So if we want to assess the situation and search the conditions we have to point out the victim , by looking for the side whose rights are violated in this certain situation , and point out the offender by looking for the side who violated rights with his actions in this certain situation . and in the palestine and zionist entity war the situation is 75 years long and ongoing so to point out the victim and the offender we can’t ignore the first actions in a situation that didn’t split in any way shape or form . we can’t in the middle of this war of colonization make a point of a start and say who ever commit a violance is the offender .
the rest of the conditions have no place to be discussed in the sense that it suggested in the european discussion , for it puts the zionists in the victim place and then there’s no need to look for the rest of the conditions , because we are not even in a self defense situation when we look at it from a point of view so short it transforms into looking for excuses to kill all the palestinians people .
If we look at the situation from the beginning we would surely put the Palestinians in the victim's place , but this victim doesn’t even have the means to rebel against the offense . so we are not in self defense until a resistance from the palestinians , which we did see in different circumstances in the years of occupation . and the zionist entity will always be the offender .
this is for the fact that it’s occupation and occupier commiting a crime . and can not be but a criminal , until they stop their criminal act . This means that the zionist entity will still be an offender even if it stopped killing and destroying because it is still occupying the land of Palestine, the land before 1948 , the land mentioned by herodotus in the fifth century BCE .
We have established earlier that we will determine the nature of the zionist entity at the end of the article. and now that we have showcased the history of the establishment and actions of this entity, we cannot look at it without noting that it fulfills the conditions of a weapon and when this weapon is used to spread terror we call its holder a terrorist . Therefore the zionist entity. is a terrorist entity.
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sources and other useful resources
1- Al-Daheh episode for additional information : Palestine .. a tale of land - caption translated on youtube - https://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=shared&v=f0oy-NicIgE
2- Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics 2020
3- Arij Center for Applied Research, 2021
4- Hatem Bazian - Palestine … it is something colonial - .
5- avi - Collusion across the Jordan : king Abdullah , the zionist movement , and the partition of Palestine - .
6- Israeli Settlements in the West Bank 2019. Ramallah-Palestine.
7- Pedro Brieger - The arab - Israeli conflict , a hundred question and answer - .
8- Documentary - Tantura (2022 ) : https://www.imdb.com/title/tt16378034/?ref_=nm_flmg_t_1_dr
9- Documentary - Executions and mass graves - : https://forensic-architecture.org/investigation/executions-and-mass-graves-in-tantura-23-may-1948
10-Eugene Rogan - The Arabs : a history - .
11- Ilan pappe - The ethnic cleansing of Palestine - .
12-Ilan pappe - Ten myths about Israel - .
13- Human Rights Watch (HRW), 2021.
14- Hameid Hanoon : Principles of constitutional law
15- United Nations Library :Security council resolutions