Juan Cole: What lies Behind Netanyahu’s Bluster on ’1967 Borders

http://www.juancole.com/2011/05/what-lies-behind-netanyahus-bluster-on-1967-borders.html

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s high dudgeon over the world community’s demand that Israel return more or less to ’1967 borders’ plays to two audiences, his domestic constituency among far rightwing ‘Greater Israel’ parties intent on usurping Palestinian land, and his American constituency among the third or so of US Jews who oppose trading land for peace.

For the rest of us in the US, being yoked to Netanyahu’s angry expansionism is like being forced to date Charlie Sheen. It won’t do our own reputation any good, and it won’t rescue him from his self-destructiveness.

The ’1967′ borders are actually those that obtained before Israel launched its 1967 ‘Six-Day War’ on Syria, Jordan and Egypt. (There is no doubt that Israel launched this war, and that its aggressiveness with Syria in the previous six months contributed mightily to the tensions that led to it.)

The reason Israel has to go back to 1967 borders is that the annexation of territory from a neighbor through warfare is illegal according to the United Nations Charter, which is a treaty to which Israel and the United States are both signatories. ‘Greater Israel’ apologists attempt to get out of this difficulty by saying that countries used to conquer land away from their neighbors all the time. This is a bogus argument, since countries used to do a lot of things, including sponsor the slave trade; Britain even insisted on China allowing the sale of opium in the early 19th century. The world changed when World War II ended and the countries of the world established the United Nations to forestall any recrudescence of Axis techniques of conquest and rule. If Israel does not believe in the UN Charter, it should renounce its UN membership.

Read more: http://www.juancole.com/2011/05/what-lies-behind-netanyahus-bluster-on-1967-borders.html

Thanks for posting..

He miscalculated badly on both the relative strength of the Israeli military and Israeli determination. And Syria and Jordan backed up Egypt. Jordan was probably victimized the most in terms of not really wanting war and losing the most in the process.

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neighbors in 1967. A ceasefire was in effect from the 1956 war but there was no peace agreement. And there was little doubt that an attack by Egypt was likely imminent in 1967, unlike the situation in 1941. I wasn't alive in 1941 but I distinctly remember the run up to the 67 war. There was very little sympathy for the Arab position outside of the Middle East. It was quite clear that Israel had been provoked by Egypt. Yes, Israel took the opportunity to grab the West Bank from Jordan and the Golan Heights from Syria.

Your logic makes no sense. There was de facto peace between Egypt and Israel before Israel decided to invade the Sinai

>>And there was little doubt that an attack by Egypt was likely imminent in 1967

Which of course, ignores the opinions of the Israeli officials I've posted below, who completely disagree with your assessment. I smell a whiff of hasbara in the air.

Regardless of what some Israelis may have said later, there is no doubt that Israel's Arab neighbors were acting as if they were going to attack Israel in early June, 1967. I added a few more details in another post. I distinctly remember the events leading up to the 6-Day war. There was little doubt a war was coming. The only question was who would attack first and most military people in the U.S. agreed that Israel would have to attack first if they were going to survive. Yes my impressions were no doubt influenced a lot by the pro-Israeli U.S. media. But there is no getting around the fact that Egypt, Syria and Jordan were mobilized for war with Israel in June 1967 and had the support of other Arab countries. The Palestinians were hardly even mentioned. It actually had little to do with them.

Is Egypt exonerated of its invasion in 1973? Was that not really aggression?

>there is no doubt that Israel's Arab neighbors were acting as if they were going to attack Israel in early June, 1967.

Except of course, for the doubt expressed by top Israeli generals/officials which I've already posted. This appears to be a shallow attempt to dodge the facts.

U.S. in Iraq in 2003. Continued dialog however bellicose, is always better than starting a shooting war. And contrary to your totally unjustified accusations I have nothing to do with hasbara. I didn't even know what the word meant. I had to look it up. My point was that the 6-day war, like most wars, was a consequence of miscalculations on many sides. When countries act war like and prepare for war, generally war results. Case in point - WWI, which seemingly no one wanted but which everyone prepared for, excepting maybe the U.S. (At least at first. If we had stayed out, we may have avoided WWII, imo.) WWII was just an extension of WWI, imo. A just peace after WWI would likely have prevented WWII and perhaps many of the other wars of the 20th century.

for all the bluster and keeping up appearances, it would have been actually very unlikely Nasser would have launched any full aggression-invasion (like the zionists did in blatent collusion with the decayed shells of European imperialism in 1956) -- their best armed forces were tied down fighting the Saudis in Yemen, which later became known as "Nasser's VietNam". That, and the Soviets were feeding his circle disinfo that acted as enough of a lullaby to allow the catastrophe to catch them all unaware.

Interestingly, what is referred as the causus belli of that war was the Egyptian naval blockade in the Gulf of Aqaba, affecting Elat & Jordan's port of Aqaba. This blockade, according to the argument, is the pretext that legitimized the Israeli aggression and land grab. But oddly enough, the same people do not cheer when resistance actions are taken against the blockade when it applies to Gaza; consistency is just a bridge too far sometimes.

"I do not think that Nasser wanted war. The two divisions which he sent to the Sinai, on May 14, would not have been sufficient to start an offensive against Israel. He knew it, and we knew it." --Yatzik Rabin

"In June 1967 we again had a choice. The Egyptian army concentrations in the Sinai approaches did not prove that Nasser was really about to attack us. We must be honest with ourselves. We decided to attack him." -- Menachem Begin

"To pretend that the Egyptian forces massed on our frontiers were in a position to threaten the existence of Israel constitutes an insult not only to the intelligence of anyone capable of analyzing this sort of situation, but above all an insult to the Zahal ." -- Matityahu Peled

Tiran, an act which Israel had declared would be viewed as an act of war in 1957. Remember, all of these countries were still technically at war, so it is kind of useless to argue about what tactics Egypt might or might not have pursued. Strategically Egypt was behaving as if it were at war with Israel, as was Syria, and to a lesser extent but still real, Jordan. All three countries had mobilized for war with Israel, and Iraq had also stationed tanks and aircraft near the Jordanian border in striking distance of Israel. Other Arab countries also contributed aircraft. The Jordanian West Bank Commander was talking about occupying Tel Aviv. Maybe the Arabs never would have attacked, but it sure did not feel that way in the early days of June 1967.

In the end, it was Israel that decided to launch the attack. The fact that the countries were not *officially* at peace, did not justify a renewal of hostilities from Israel. The closing of the Straits of Tiran did not justify a war the ended with the deaths of thousands of people, at most it gave Israel the authority to break the blockade. The Israeli officials/generals quoted above hold views that are completely opposed to yours, and these are people who in positions that make them inherently more informed regarding Egypt's military capacity and intentions at the time. Rabin doesn't believe the forces Egypt had moved into the Sinai were sufficient for an invasion of Israel, nor does Peled. Despite your desperate attempts at apologizing for Israel's aggression, all of these gentlemen confirm that it was Israel who made the ultimate decision to go to war. Go away hasbara

Edit, a great summary of the events leading up to the 1967 war, for observers: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/05/05/973396/-Revising-the-June-1967-Arab-Israeli-War

Moshe Dayan himself conceded that the “nature and scale of our reprisal actions against Syria and Jordan had left Nasser with no choice but to defend his image and prestige in his own country and throughout the Arab world”. (cited in Finkelstein 2003:127) Nasser decided to send troops into the Sinai, in a move interpreted by Israel, correctly, as an effort to deter it from attacking Syria. (Maoz 2009:89) Before proceeding further, we should clarify two points about which a scholarly consensus exists but has yet to be communicated successfully to the public. First, Nasser had neither the intention nor the capacity to successfully attack Israel; and second, Israeli officials were well aware of this. Thus: “Egypt was not ready for a war; and Nasser did not want a war” (Mossad chief Meir Amit); I “did not believe that Nasser wanted war” (IDF chief of staff Rabin); “The Egyptian army concentrations in the Sinai... do not prove that Nasser was really about to attack us. We must be honest with ourselves. We decided to attack him.” (1967 National Unity government minister Menachem Begin); Egyptian forces in the Sinai were in a state of “total chaos” (IDF intelligence chief Yariv, at the end of May); the Egyptian army was “perhaps in a defensive orientation only” (IDF chief of staff Rabin, in the crucial 2 June cabinet meeting); etc. US intelligence at the time was clear that Nasser’s formations in the Sinai were “defensive in character” and were “merely gestures” Nasser felt compelled to make “in the interests of the fiction of Arab unity” (CIA Appraisal). President Johnson told Israeli representatives at the end of May that “no military attack on Israel is imminent” and that if Nasser attacked, even in concert with the other Arab states, “you will whip the hell out of them”. Mossad chief Meir Amit declared that Israeli intelligence was in full agreement with US intelligence on these issues. As he assured Eshkol: “If strikes first, he’s finished”. In public Israeli leaders fretted about a looming “second Holocaust”, but the documentary record reveals this posture to be, in the words of Israeli general Mattityahu Peled, “a bluff”. (quotes from Finkelstein: 2003)

"Another bogus argument the Greater Israel expansionists trot out is that the UN Charter only forbids the acquisition of territory from other countries, and the Palestinians did not have a country, and so they are fair game. This argument is morally despicable, since the Israelis made the Palestinians stateless, thwarting the intention of the League of Nations that Palestine become a state; and now they are using the abjectness and statelessness as an argument that Palestinians can be stolen from at will. But the argument is also incorrect. Both the League of Nations and the UN made it perfectly clear that they intended that the Palestinians have a state in the future, so in preventing this from happening the Israelis are defying international law. The 1947 UN Partition Plan, the legitimacy of which the Israeli government says it recognizes, awarded Gaza and the West Bank to the Palestinians. So it is not true that these territories are no-man’s land or that there is no legal framework for their people’s existence, such that anyone could enslave them or expropriate them at will."

1967. Jordan controlled the West Bank and Egypt controlled the Gaza strip. People also forget that King Hussein of Jordan drove Palestinian fighters out of Jordan in September 1970. Most of the Palestinian fighters ended up in Lebanon, where they were a contributing factor to the Lebanese Civil War which began in 1975. The Palestinians in Jerusalem, West Bank and Jordan proper actually outnumbered native Jordanians two to one (800,000 to 400,000) prior to the 1967 War.

The League of Nations had the intention of establishing a Palestinian state. That alone makes Israel's acquisition of Palestinian territory illegal. And even if it weren't illegal it would still be morally reprehensible to steal land from it's native inhabitants, stateless or no.

They chose to fight the Jews with the support of the Arab countries. War creates its own logic so it becomes difficult to sort out what would have happened had negotiation rather than armed struggle carried the day. But basically the Arab armies failed to defeat the Israelis and were in fact driven back so that Israel had even more territory than they were awarded under the partition plan. Maybe this was the Israeli plan all along. I don't know but it does not seem helpful to talk about what the intentions of the League of Nations might have been given that it no longer existed after WWII and that it basically failed to do anything to resolve conflicts in the Middle East or anywhere else. My personal belief is that there is plenty of blame to go around on all sides - Israeli, Palestinian, Arab nations, U.S., USSR, Britain, France, the U.N. The question is what to do now? Israel exists. The Palestinians exist but Palestine doesn't. My belief is that Obama's prescription of starting at the 67 borders with land swaps makes a lot of sense. I hope the Israelis and the Palestinians can come to a permanent peace agreement based on that. Both are clearly going to have to give something more than what they appear to be willing to give now. It is unfortunate that both sides seem to still be listening to their most militant factions.

The war between Israel and Egypt appears to be over, but not the war between Israel and the Palestinians. And in 1967 Israel was still at war with all her Arab neighbors, so an assertion that the events of 1947-8 have nothing to do with the post-1967 occupation ignores reality. Wars don't always end with ceasefires and armistices. They don't even always end with peace treaties, though they are obviously preferable and more likely to result in actual peace.

here does not change the information Cole addressed; you're adding contrived excuses, not nuance.

"This argument is morally despicable, since the Israelis made the Palestinians stateless, thwarting the intention of the League of Nations that Palestine become a state;"

=========

Israel did no such thing. They accepted partition in 1948 while the Arabs rejected it. They didn't thwart anything.

Cole's a shameless hack.

Neither he nor you get to make up facts.

"Another bogus argument the Greater Israel expansionists trot out is that the UN Charter only forbids the acquisition of territory from other countries, and the Palestinians did not have a country, and so they are fair game. This argument is morally despicable, since the Israelis made the Palestinians stateless, thwarting the intention of the League of Nations that Palestine become a state; and now they are using the abjectness and statelessness as an argument that Palestinians can be stolen from at will. But the argument is also incorrect. Both the League of Nations and the UN made it perfectly clear that they intended that the Palestinians have a state in the future, so in preventing this from happening the Israelis are defying international law. The 1947 UN Partition Plan, the legitimacy of which the Israeli government says it recognizes, awarded Gaza and the West Bank to the Palestinians. So it is not true that these territories are no-man’s land or that there is no legal framework for their people’s existence, such that anyone could enslave them or expropriate them at will."

"This argument is morally despicable, since the Israelis made the Palestinians stateless, thwarting the intention of the League of Nations that Palestine become a state"

He made that up.

It's pointless taking anything he says seriously. But you probably believe that's good scholarship.

jrcole@umich.edu

He definitely responds if you don't act like a total jackass (which, admittedly, might be asking too much).

....WRT who is to blame for 1967.

Yitzak Rabin had a nervous breakdown while Arab armies were amassed on Israel's borders. Had the Arab armies attacked first, Israeli citizens would have been massacred. Also, in addition to being choked off from the blockade, Israel's military could not possibly stay on high alert for such a long time.

No one in their right mind believes Israel is to blame for 1967.

Given the amount of bragging about it, it's weird to hear people playing "timid mouse" later when it's convenient to some other argument. It's like saying Japan was not the aggressor when it bombed Pearl Harbor because we were going to kick their ass in the end.

If you actually are interested in the legalities of Mandate Palestine, there is plenty on the web, like Wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Mandate_for_Palestine

It is also easy to find stuff about Mandate Palestine coins, passports, etc. etc.