Jerusalem is a city of overwhelming emotions, a city that promises a religious and spiritual experience, excitement and pleasure, interesting tours and entertaining adventures. ​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

Jerusalem

Botanical garden

Jerusalem is a city of overwhelming emotions, a city that promises a religious and spiritual experience, excitement and pleasure, interesting tours and entertaining adventures. ​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

On this Page:

• The Old City »
• Discover the New City »
• History »
• More Information »
• Sites & Attractions »
• Accommodations »

What has not already been said about the holiest city in the world, the city that has been united, the eternal city first built thousands of years ago, whose history can be heard in the whispering of the wind along the walls, where every stone tells a wondrous story of a city that has drawn millions of faithful pilgrims for thousands of years. Such is Jerusalem, the capital of Israel, the only city in the world that has 70 names of love and yearning, the city that in old maps appears at the center of the world and is still adored like a young bride.

Jerusalem is a city of overwhelming emotions, a city that promises a religious and spiritual experience, excitement and pleasure, interesting tours and entertaining adventures. Here, alongside Jerusalem’s fascinating historic and archeological sites, there are amazingly modern tourist attractions for all lovers of culture, the arts, theater and music, architecture and gastronomic delights.

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The Old City

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At Jerusalem’s heart is the Old City, which is surrounded by a wall and divided into four quarters - Jewish, Armenian, Christian, and Muslim. Inside the walls are the important holy sites of the three major religions: the Western Wall, which is holy to the Jews, the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, and the Dome of the Rock on the Temple Mount. The Western Wall plaza is visited by millions of worshipers. Here, at the base of the massive wall that is a remnant of the Holy Temple, prayers are offered and notes containing heartfelt wishes are wedged between the crevices. 

Surrounding the Western Wall are other important Jewish sites - the Western Wall Tunnels, the unique Davidson Center, the Jewish quarter with its magnificent Cardo and David’s Citadel, towering proudly in its beauty. South of the Old City is the City of David, from which the ancient Can’anite and Israelite Jerusalem grew. This is a fascinating site with amazing findings that provide an unforgettable experience.

Jerusalem is also very important to Christianity, as Jesus Christ lived and died here. The Christian quarter alone houses some 40 religious buildings (churches, monasteries and pilgrims’ hostels). One of the most prominent and important sites in the Christian quarter is the Via Dolorosa, the “Way of Sorrows,” Jesus’ final path, which according to Christian tradition led from the courthouse to Golgotha Hill, where he was crucified and buried. Many pilgrims come to Jerusalem to follow Jesus’ footsteps along a route that starts in the Muslim Quarter, at Lions’ Gate, and passes the 14 stations of the cross, ending at the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. Several of the most important Christian relics are housed in this church, including the anointing stone (on which Jesus’ body was laid before his burial) and Jesus’ grave. The Church of the Holy Sepulcher is a pilgrimage site for millions of Christians from all over the world.

Southwest of the Old City is Mt. Zion, where the Dormition Abbey was built on the site Christian tradition believes Mary spent her last night. The abbey was built about 100 years ago and in the basement there is a statue of the sleeping Mary. Beside the abbey is the Room of the Last Supper, where Jesus ate his last meal.

East of the Old City is the Mount of Olives, where there are other important Christian sites, and several churches: The Ascension, Pater Noster, Dominus Flevit, Mary Magdalene,Gethsemane, Lazarus and Abraham’s Monastery. According to Christian tradition, Mary’s tomb is in the Kidron Valley, below the Mt. of Olives.

Apart from the holy places throughout the Old City, there are several charming sites that are well worth visiting. There is the wonderful market, which is one big sensual celebration. Here you can buy Armenian-style decorated ceramics, beautiful strings of beads, authentic clothing, embroidered cushions, colorful wool carpets, candles and amazing glassware, and countless different souvenirs. From the promenade along the tops of the Old City walls you can look out over the Old City and the New City. Tours along the walls are a wonderful night-time activity, too, when the city’s lights sparkle making the sights even more unforgettable. The Armenian Quarter has its own unique charm and is well worth visiting.

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Discover the New City

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The construction of the new city’s Jewish neighborhoods began in the late 19th century. Some of the neighborhoods have retained their original picturesque charm, and wandering among the houses is a real pleasure. Some of these neighborhoods are Even Yisrael, the German Colony,Yemin Moshe, Me’a She’arim, Makhane Yisra’el, Nakhla’ot, Nakhalat Shiv’a, Ein Karem, Komemi’ut, Rekhavia, the Bukharian Quarter and the Ethiopian Quarter. There are many other interesting and unique sites from different periods throughout the city, such as Armon HaN​atsiv and the Promenade, Ammunition Hill, Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial Museum, Mishkenot Sha’ananim, the Monastery of the Cross, Elias Monastery and the YMCA building. Among the more modern sites are the Supreme Court, theIsrael Museum, the Biblical Zoo, the Knesset, Mt. Herzl,Makhane Yehuda market, with its unparalleled variety of exciting sounds, colors, flavors and aromas.

Young people who like to go out in the evenings will love Jerusalem’s main night life regions: the German Colony, the Ben Yehuda pedestrian mall, Nakhalat Shiv’a, Shlomtsiyon HaMalka Street, and the Russian Compound.

Museum lovers will be delighted to discover that Jerusalem is dotted with dozens of museums full of rich exhibits, such as the Israel Museum, the Natural History Museum, theBloomfield Science Museum, Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial Museum, the Rockefeller Museum, the Bible Lands Museum, the Islamic Art Museum, the Old Yishuv Court Museum, the Armenian Muse​um and the Museum of Italian Jewish Art.

Children will enjoy the Time Elevator (an interactive, three-dimensional presentation on the history of Jerusalem), the spacious Biblical Zoo, Ein Ya’el - which offers workshops in Biblical arts and crafts, the Armon HaNatsiv tunnels, the beautiful botanical gardens and the hands-on interactive exhibits at the Bloomfield Science Museum.

Since Jerusalem is a city that has become home to people from many different faiths, traditions and ethnic groups, the city’s culinary culture offers something for everyone. Alongside Bohemian gourmet restaurants you will find eateries where the food is cooked slowly over ancient stoves, coffee shops with style, ethnic restaurants, fast food stands and bars that come to life in the evening hours. In addition to an abundant variety of dining opportunities, Jerusalem also has many different types of tourist accommodations, from luxury hotels to inexpensive youth hostels.

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History

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If you are wondering how Jerusalem became such a center of religions and spirituality and a pilgrimage site for millions of tourists from around the world, the answer begins thousands of years ago. Jerusalem’s history is one of wars and struggles. Its strategic location attracted many nations that wanted to capture the city, and some of them did rule over it for various periods. This city has known war and peace, love and hate, riches and poverty, destruction and renewal, happiness and pain.

According to Jewish tradition, the creation of the world began (5766 years ago) with the foundation stone on Mount Moriah (under the Dome of the Rock on the Temple Mount). This is where an important royal Can’anite city was built (about 4,000 years ago), and which was conquered from the Jebusites by King David in 1004 BCE and became the capital of his kingdom and a holy city. David’s son Solomon built the First Temple and his descendents (Hezekiah, Zedekiah and the Judean Kings) continued to enlarge and fortify the city’s boundaries, and to build a water supply system (Hezekiah’s tunnel). These efforts paid off, and when King Sennacherib of Assyria besieged Jerusalem he could not subdue the city and withdrew. Only in 586 BCE did Nebuchadnezzar conquer the Jewish capital. The city was destroyed and most of its inhabitants exiled to Babylon. In 538 BCE Xerxes, the King of Persia, who has conquered Babylon, permitted the exiled Jews to return to Judea and Jerusalem, where they rebuilt the city and built the Second Temple. For 370 years Judea was an autonomous district, first under the Persians and then under the Greeks. After the Hasmonean Revolt in 168 BCE, Jerusalem again became the capital of a Kingdom, that later became under the rule of the Roman Empire. King Herod the Great further expanded the Temple in the years 73-4 BCE.

At the end of the Second Temple period Jerusalem was a city of great social and religious tension. It was during this period that Jesus was preaching in Nazareth. In 66 CE the Jews rebelled against the Roman Empire and took over Jerusalem. The suppression of this revolt ended in 70 CE, and the Romans, led by Titus, conquered the capital, destroyed the Temple completely and exiled the city’s inhabitants. For the next 60 years Jerusalem was desolate, until the Bar Kokhba Revolt, when the Jews returned for a short while. In 135 CE, the Romans rebuilt and renamed the city Aelia Capitolina and barred the Jews from living there.

After the Roman Empire accepted Christianity in 324 (and later became the Byzantine Empire), Jerusalem again became an important city. The site’s connected with Jesus’ life and death were located and declared holy, and many magnificent churches were built, including the Church of the Holy Sepulcher (the Church of the Resurrection) and the “Mother of all the Churches,” on Mt. Zion.

In 638 the Muslims conquered Jerusalem and built the Dome of the Rock and the Al Aqsa mosque over the next few centuries. Following the Muslim conquest the Jews returned to Jerusalem, and around the 10th century this city again became the spiritual capital for the Jews of the Land of Israel.

The Crusaders also wanted to rule Jerusalem. They conquered the city in 1099, massacred the Jewish and Muslim residents and made Jerusalem their own capital. Less than 100 years later, in 1187, the Crusaders were defeated by Saladin a battle at Khitin. At that time the Jews returned to Jerusalem and have been here ever since.

In 1250 the Mamluk dynasty rose to power in Egypt and its rulers conquered this region and became the new lords of Jerusalem. In 1517 the Ottoman Empire spread to Jerusalem and for 400 years was under Turkish rule. During the first 100 years the city flourished and its walls were rebuilt. In the second half of the 16th century, as the Ottoman Empire began to decline, so did Jerusalem’s fortunes.

By the beginning of the 19th century Jerusalem was a small neglected city inside its walls, and only toward the end of the century (from 1860 onward), did the New City begin to grow, thanks to the generosity of British philanthropist Moshe Montifiore, who financed the construction of Mishkenot Sha'ananim. The success of this new neighborhood led to more neighborhoods being built outside the walls. More Jews began moving to Jerusalem, becoming a majority of the population in 1873.

In 1917, with the start of the British Mandate period, Jerusalem retained its status as the capital of the land. When Israel was established in 1948, Jerusalem was declared the state capital, and all the major government institutions were built here. These including the Knesset (Israel’s parliament building), the Supreme Court and the various government offices.

During the War of Independence, following bloody battles and ceasefire agreements, Jerusalem was left divided between Israel and Jordan, until the capital’s liberation in the Six Day War in 1967, when the two parts of the city were united and Jerusalem became Israel’s largest city.

From the very beginning, Jerusalem has been the one and only, a unique city second to none in the whole world.

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More Information

​For more information about Jerusalem : www.itraveljerusalem.com​

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Sites & Attractions   Mount Herzl Cemetery . Mount Herzl. The State of Israel’s national cemetery was named after the state visio... The Knesset The House of Representatives of the State of Israel, comprising a plenary, conference r... Ammunition Hill Memorial established on the Jordanian military post, with a permanent exhibition on the... Yad Avshalom Avshalom’s Shrine. An ornate monument from the first century BCE, said to be the tomb o... Tsidkiyahoo Cave Large, well-lit cave in the wall of the Old City, which was a quarry in the days of the... Monastery of Zion Sisters Monastery of the Order of the Sisters of Zion on Via Dolorosa in the Old City. Part of ... More Sites Attractions » Back To Top

Accommodations   Harmony Hotel Harmony Hotel is a boutiqe hotel with 50 rooms facing the roofs and the uniqe alles of ... The Golden Walls Hotel HI-Jerusalem Agron Hostel The HI-Agron Guest House Hostel is situated in the heart of the Jerusalem and as such i... Bayit Vagan Guest house ​Bayit Vagan Guesthouse This guesthouse is located in Jerusalem's tranquil, country-sty... More Accommodations »

Jerusalem Hotel FAST in the 1930's? It was replaced by The Jerusalem Pearl Hotel in 1995 by the Draiman family. See picture at the bottom.

Why Was a Nazi Flag Flying from a Jerusalem Hotel FAST in the 1930's? - Jerusalem Pearl Hotel - Draiman -YJD

Why Was a Nazi Flag Flying from a Jerusalem Hotel FAST in the 1930's? - Jerusalem Pearl Hotel - Draiman

Why Was a Nazi Flag Flying from a Jerusalem Hotel FAST in the 1930's?

It was replaced by The Jerusalem Pearl Hotel in 1995 by the Draiman family. See picture at the bottom.

Posted: 30 Aug 2015 11:11 AM PDT

We recently published pictures from the British Library's Endangered Archives Program, including this incredible picture of Jaffa Gate of Jerusalem's Old City which we have dated to the mid-1890's. Only in 1898 was the wall near Jaffa Gate breached so that carriages could drive into the city.

Jaffa Gate and A(braham) Fast's restaurant.  (Debbas Collection, British Library)

We wanted to know more about the store on the left with the sign "A Fast. Restauranteur."  Was this a tourist establishment of Abraham Fast, who in 1907 took over a large hotel several hundred meters to the west of the building pictured above and renamed it "Hotel Fast?"

German troops marching in Jerusalem on Good Friday,  April 6, 1917. The building on the left is  the Fast Hotel. (Imperial War Museum, UK)

It was a leading hotel with 100 rooms, built around a court yard with Ionic, Corinthian and Doric columns.

Hotel Fast and its kosher restaurantwas a well-known establishment in Jerusalem for decades, and was probably considered by many to be a Jewish-owned establishment because of its Jewish clientele.
Nothing could be further from the truth.  The Fasts were German Templers.

The German consulate in the Fast Hotel, 1933. (Wikimedia, Tamar Hayardeni)

They lived in Jerusalem's German Colony and were exiled by the British after World War I and during World War II because of their support for Germany.


We recently uncovered pictures of German troops marching in Jerusalem streets on Good Friday 1917. Readers were able to identify the building on the left as the Fast Hotel.

Our biggest surprise was finding this picture of the German consulate in the Hotel Fast with the German Swastika flag flying from the building. 


During World War II, the hotel was taken over by the British army command and turned into the Australian army club. 

The Hotel Fast housed Australian soldiers in World War II.  Here they are greeting the Australian Prime Minister Robert Menzies and the commander of the Australian troops in Australia,  Lt. Gen. Thomas Blamey in February 1941. The Matson Photo Service, shown on the ground floor, was run by Eric Matson, originally from the American Colony Photographic Department.   Matson left Palestine in 1946 for the United States.  His collection of photos were bequeathed to the Library of Congress where many of the pictures in this  website were found.  (Library of Congress)

The Hotel Fast building was abandoned in 1967 and torn down in 1976 to make way for the Dan Pearl Hotel - Built by the Draiman family.

Joint Arab-Jewish agreement on Jewish Homeland, January 3, 1918 - YJD

Joint Arab-Jewish agreement on Jewish Homeland, January 3, 1918

Feisal Hussein, King of Iraq and Syria agreed to Jewish National Home according to British Mandate (Israel and Jordan) in 1918.  King of Iraq from 1921; eldest son of Hussein, sherif of Mecca.  He led the Arab intifada against Turkey (1916-1918) and was designated king of Syria.  Feisal was at first sympathetic to a Jewish Homeland from which he hoped to receive aid in building his future kingdom.  He met Dr. Weizmann in Jordan (1918) and Paris (1919) where they reached an agreement on mutual aid, conditional on the implementation of British promises to the Arabs.  Later, owing to his expulsion from Syira by the French (1920) and the influence of other Arab leaders, his attitude later became hostile.

By the mid-19th century, up to 100,000 people lived in Palestine, including a high percentage of Jews, whose forebears had lived there for thousands of years. In 1882, roughly 200,000 Muslims lived in all of Western Palestine.¹ By 1918, the situation had not changed much: That was why Hussein ibn-Ali, Sherif of Mecca, and his son, King Faisal of Iraq, both endorsed and extolled the Balfour Declaration ²

Hussein wrote in Mecca's Al Qibla, in 1918, "The resources of the country are still virgin soil and will be developed by the Jewish immigrants. One of the most amazing things until recent times was that the Palestinian used to leave his country, wandering over the high seas in every direction. His native soil could not retain a hold on him.... At the same time, we have seen the Jews from foreign countries streaming to Palestine from Russia, Germany, Austria, Spain, and America. The cause of causes could not escape those who had a gift of deeper insight. They knew that the country was for its original sons [abna'ihi-l-asliyin], for all their differences, a sacred and beloved homeland. The return of these exiles [jaliya] to their homeland will prove materially and spiritually an experimental school for their brethren who are with them in the fields, factories, trades and all things connected to the land." ³

In early 1919, King Faisal, then the only recognized Arab leader in the world, executed a treaty with Chaim Weizmann adopting the understanding of the Balfour Declaration. It outlined relations between Palestine and the Arab state, recognizing the former as a National Home for the Jews, in which they should quickly settle. He wrote, "We Arabs, especially the educated among us, look with the deepest sympathy on the Zionist movement. Our delegation here in Paris is fully acquainted with the proposals submitted yesterday to the Zionist organization to the Peace Conference, and we regard them as moderate and proper." (emphasis added) ⁴

The 1919 Faisal-Weizmann treaty provided a firm foundation for League of Nations ratification of the Balfour Declaration at the San Remo Conference in 1920. The proposals covered Palestine - from the Mediterranean through the entire Galilee, up to the Litany River, hundreds of miles east of the Jordan River through all of current day Jordan, and into part of the Sinai. The League assigned Palestine Mandate administration to Britain, entrusting it to establish the National Home for the Jews. ⁵

Agreement Between Emir Feisal Husseini and Dr. Weizman

His Royal Highness the Emir FEISAL, representing and acting on behalf of the Arab Kingdom of Hedjaz, and Dr. CHAIM WIEZMANN, representing and acting on behalf of the Zionist Organization.mindful of the racial kinship and ancient bonds existing between the Arabs and the Jewish people, and realising that the surest means of working out the consumation of their national aspirations is through the closest possible collaboration in the development of the Arab State and Palestine, and being desirous further of confirming the good understanding which exists between them,
have agreed upon the following Articles;-
ARTICLE I
The Arab State and Palestine in all their relations and undertakings shall be controlled by the most cordial goodwill and understanding and to this end Arab and Jewish duly accredited agents shall be established and maintained in the respective territories.
ARTICLE II
Immediately following the completion of the deliberations of the Peace Conference, the definite boundaries between the Arab State and Palestine shall be determined by a Commission to be agreed upon by the parties hereto.
ARTICLE III
In the establishment of the Constitution and Administration of Palestine all such measures shall be adopted as will afford the fullest guarantee for carrying into effect the British Government's Declaration of the 2nd of November, 1917.
ARTICLE IV
All necessary measures shall be taken to encourage and stimulate immigration of Jews into Palestine on a large scale, and as quickly as possible to settle Jewish immigrants upon the land through closer settlement and intensive cultivation of the soil.  In taking such measures measures the Arab peasant and tenant farmes shall be protected in their rights and shall be assisted in forwaxiiing their economic development.
ARTICLE V.
No regulation nor Iaw shall be made prohibiting or interfering in any way with the free exercise of religion; and further the free excercise and enjoyment of religious profession and worship without discimimtion or preference shell forever be allowed. No religious test shall ever be required for the exercise of civil or political rights.
ARTICLE VI
The Mohammedan Holy Places shall be under Mohammedan control.
ARTICLE VII
The Zionist Organization proposes to send to Palestine a Commission of experts to make a survey of the economic possibilities of the country, and to report upon the best means for its development. The Zionist Organisation will place the aforementioned Comission at the disposal of the Arab State for the purpose of a survey of the economic possibilities of the Arab State and to report upon the best means for its development. The Zionist Organization will use Its best efforts to assist the Arab State in providing the means for developing the natural resources and economic possibilities thereof.
ARTICLE VIII.
The parties hereto agree to act in complete accord and harmony on all matters embraced herein before the Peace congress.
ARTICLE IX
Any matters of dispute which my arise between the contracting parties shall be referred to the British Government for arbitration.
Given under our hand at LONDON.
ENGLAND, the THIRD day of
JANUARY, ONE THOUSAND NINE
HUNDRED AND EIGHTEEN.
Chaim-Weizmann.
Feisal ibn-Hussein.
RESERVATION BY THE EMIR FEISAL
If the Arabs are established as I have asked in my manifesto of January 4th addressed to the British Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, I will carry out what is written in this agreement. If changes are made, I cannot be answerable for failing to carry out this agreement.
Feisal ibn-Hussein.

1. Katz, Battleground, pp. 90-115 (citing De Haas, Jacob, History of Palestine: The Last Two Thousand Years, New York: Macmillan, 1934), 123-127; Peters, Joan, From Time Immemorial, pp. 244-245, citing Dr. Carl Herman Voss, The Palestine Problem Today, Israel and Its Neighbors (Boston: Beacon Press, 1953), p. 13. Western Palestine (also then called Southern Syria) was considerably larger than the area that later became Israel. It is very misleading to cite their populations interchangeably, as Peters details. 

Wednesday, August 26, 2015

Napoleon Bonaparte's Letter to the Jews April 20,, 1799 - TO THE RIGHTFUL HEIRS OF PALESTINE.- The Jewish People- Draiman

Napoleon Bonaparte's Letter to the Jews April 20,, 1799 - TO THE RIGHTFUL HEIRS OF PALESTINE. The Jewish People

Napoleon Bonaparte's Letter to the Jews
April 20,, 1799

Introduction

In 1799, the French armies under Napoleon were camped outside of Acre. Napoleon issued a letter offering Palestine as a homeland to the Jews under French protection. The project was stillborn because Napoleon was defeated and was forced to withdraw from the Near East. The letter is remarkable because it marks the coming of age of enlightenment philosophy, making it respectable at last to integrate Jews as equal citizens in Europe and because it marked the beginning of nineteenth century projects for Jewish autonomy in Palestine under a colonial protectorate. After the defeat of Napoleon, it was largely the British who carried forward these projects, which have in hindsight been given the somewhat misleading name of "British Zionism."

Letter to the Jewish Nation from the French Commander-in-Chief Buonaparte
(translated from the Original, 1799)
General Headquarters, Jerusalem 1st Floreal, April 20th, 1799,
in the year of 7 of the French Republic

BUONAPARTE, COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF OF THE ARMIES OF THE FRENCH REPUBLIC IN AFRICA AND ASIA, TO THE RIGHTFUL HEIRS OF PALESTINE. The Jewish People

Napoleon Bonaparte's Letter to the Jews April 20,, 1799 - TO THE RIGHTFUL HEIRS OF PALESTINE

Napoleon Bonaparte's Letter to the Jews
April 20,, 1799

Introduction

In 1799, the French armies under Napoleon were camped outside of Acre. Napoleon issued a letter offering Palestine as a homeland to the Jews under French protection. The project was stillborn because Napoleon was defeated and was forced to withdraw from the Near East. The letter is remarkable because it marks the coming of age of enlightenment philosophy, making it respectable at last to integrate Jews as equal citizens in Europe and because it marked the beginning of nineteenth century projects for Jewish autonomy in Palestine under a colonial protectorate. After the defeat of Napoleon, it was largely the British who carried forward these projects, which have in hindsight been given the somewhat misleading name of "British Zionism."

Letter to the Jewish Nation from the French Commander-in-Chief Buonaparte
(translated from the Original, 1799)

General Headquarters, Jerusalem 1st Floreal, April 20th, 1799, 
in the year of 7 of the French Republic

BUONAPARTE, COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF OF THE ARMIES OF THE FRENCH REPUBLIC
IN AFRICA AND ASIA, TO THE RIGHTFUL HEIRS OF PALESTINE.

Israelites, unique nation, whom, in thousands of years, lust of conquest and tyranny have been able to be deprived of their ancestral lands, but not of name and national existence !

Attentive and impartial observers of the destinies of nations, even though not endowed with the gifts of seers like Isaiah and Joel, have long since also felt what these, with beautiful and uplifting faith, have foretold when they saw the approaching destruction of their kingdom and fatherland: And the ransomed of the Lord shall return, and come to Zion with songs and everlasting joy upon their heads; they shall obtain joy and gladness and sorrow and sighing shall flee away. (Isaiah 35,10)

Arise then, with gladness, ye exiled ! A war unexampled In the annals of history, waged in self-defense by a nation whose hereditary lands were regarded by its enemies as plunder to be divided, arbitrarily and at their convenience, by a stroke of the pen of Cabinets, avenges its own shame and the shame of the remotest nations, long forgotten under the yoke of slavery, and also, the almost two-thousand-year-old ignominy put upon you; and, while time and circumstances would seem to be least favourable to a restatement of your claims or even to their expression ,and indeed to be compelling their complet abandonment, it offers to you at this very time, and contrary to all expectations, Israel's patrimony !

The young army with which Providence has sent me hither, let by justice and accompanied by victory, has made Jerusalem my head-quarters and will, within a few days, transfer them to Damascus, a proximity which is no longer terrifying to David's city.

Rightful heirs of Palestine !

The great nation which does not trade in men and countries as did those which sold your ancestors unto all people (Joel,4,6) herewith calls on you not indeed to conquer your patrimony ;nay, only to take over that which has been conquered and, with that nation's warranty and support, to remain master of it to maintain it against all comers.

Arise ! Show that the former overwhelming might of your oppressors has but repressed the courage of the descendants of those heroes who alliance of brothers would have done honour even to Sparta and Rome (Maccabees 12, 15) but that the two thousand years of treatment as slaves have not succeeded in stifling it.

Hasten !, Now is the moment, which may not return for thousands of years, to claim the restoration of civic rights among the population of the universe which had been shamefully withheld from you for thousands of years, your political existence as a nation among the nations, and the unlimited natural right to worship Jehovah in accordance with your faith, publicly and most probably forever (JoeI 4,20).

CONFLICTING ARAB AND JEWISH RESPONSES TO THE BALFOUR DECLARATION

CONFLICTING ARAB AND JEWISH RESPONSES TO THE BALFOUR DECLARATION

On 2nd November 1917, one month before British troops under General Allenby entered Jerusalem, the British Government made the following declaration in a letter from Lord Balfour, the British Foreign Secretary, to Lord Rothschild, President of the British Zionist Federation:

 Lord Balfour
Foreign Office
November 2nd, 1917

Dear Lord Rothschild,

I have much pleasure in conveying to you, on behalf of His Majesty's Government, the following declaration of sympathy with Jewish Zionist aspirations which has been submitted to, and approved by, the Cabinet.

"His Majesty's Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country."

I should be grateful if you would bring this declaration to the knowledge of the Zionist Federation.

Yours sincerely,

Arthur James Balfour

A leading figure in seeking the Declaration was Chaim Weizmann, a Jewish research chemist from Russia who had represented the British Zionist Federation in the negotiations. As chief scientist working for the British Admiralty, Weizmann had invented a process for synthesizing acetone, an essential component in the production of cordite for munitions. As a result he had the opportunity to personally convey the intensity and urgency of Jewish feeling on the issue to Prime Minister Lloyd George and Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour, both of whom were men with a knowledge of the Biblical history, and essentially in sympathy with the Zionist cause.

Most importantly, the British government saw the Balfour Declaration as providing a legitimate basis for a British protectorate over Palestine after the War. However they also sought support for the Allies among the five million Jews of Russia after the Social Democratic February revolution of 1917; as well as the Jews of the United States.

(As it happened, the Bolshevik revolution of 7 November 1917 came five days after the Balfour Declaration, and Soviet Russia unilaterally ceased hostilities against Germany almost immediately.)

The Initial Arab Response

In December 1918 Weizmann met the Emir Faisal, the leader of the Arab forces in the war and the son of Hussein, the Sherif of Mecca, at Ma'an in southern Transjordan. Weizmann and Faisal reached an agreement. The document written in January 1919 contained the following preamble:

“mindful of the racial kinship and ancient bonds existing between the Arabs and the Jewish people, and realising that the surest means of working out the consummation of their national aspirations, is through the closest possible collaboration in the development of the Arab State and Palestine, and being desirous further of confirming the good understanding which exists between them, have agreed upon the following articles:”

The agreement contemplated the drawing of new national boundaries between Palestine and “the Arab State” which would be negotiated as part of the post-war settlement. At the Paris Peace Conference in 1919 Faisal conveyed the spirit of the agreement in a letter which he sent to United States Justice Frankfurter, leader of the American Zionist delegation: “The Jewish movement is national and not imperialist, and there is room in Syria for us both...We shall welcome the Jews back home.”  

Nevertheless, in March 1920, a Syrian congress held in Damascus rejected the Balfour Declaration and elected Faisal King of a united Syria which was to include Palestine. The French then deposed Faisal in July 1920, and he later became King of Iraq under a British mandate.

1920 The Treaty of San Remo and the Palestine Mandate

At the allied conference at San Remo, in April 1920, at which the Allied Powers determined the fate of the former Turkish possessions, the Balfour Declaration was approved, and it was agreed that a mandate to Britain should be formally given by the League of Nations over the area which now comprises Israel, Jordan and the Golan Heights, which was to be called the "Mandate of Palestine". The Balfour Declaration was to apply to the whole of the mandated territory. The Treaty also contemplated an “appropriate Jewish agency” to represent the Jewish population and this was established as the elected Jewish authority in Palestine under the title of “the Jewish Agency”.   

Britain and the Hashemite dynasty

Meanwhile, the Hashemite dynasty of Hussein of Mecca faced difficulties in Arabia. Between 1919 and 1925 King Ibn Sa'ud recovered his ancient family kingdom in Riyadh in central Arabia, defeated the Hashemites and annexed their kingdom of the Hejaz on the Western coast. The newly created Kingdom of Sa’udi Arabia opened its doors to the American oil companies and developed a close relationship with the United States.
      
Unable to fulfil their commitments to the Hashemites on the Arabian Peninsula, the British decided to divide the area of the Palestine Mandate in 1922 by establishing a Hashemite Emirate of Transjordan on the eastern bank of the Jordan under the Emir Abdullah, a son of the Sherif Hussain of Mecca. At the same time his brother Faisal was to become King of Iraq under another British Mandate

The treaty of San Remo which was ratified by the League of Nations in July 1922 was therefore amended in September 1922. The British Mandate still extended over the whole of Palestine on both sides of the Jordan River, but a clause was added excluding Transjordan from the operation of the Balfour Declaration, which was therefore now limited to the western side of the river. The British then installed the Emir Abdullah as ruler of Transjordan under British tutelage.¹ In 1946 Transjordan gained its independence as "The Hashemite Kingdom of Transjordan"

In 1923 the Golan Heights was ceded by Britain from Palestine to the French Mandate of Syria, in exchange for an adjacent region on what was to become the Lebanese border.


The British Mandate 1922 - 1948

Great Britain's Division of the Mandated Area,
1921 - 1923Notes:
This is the territory held by Britain under the Mandate agreed upon in the Treaty of San Remo in 1920 and formally granted by the League of Nations in 1922. The Mandate incorporated the provisions of the Balfour Declaration, “the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people.”
In 1922 Trans-Jordan was separated from the Jewish national home. In 1946, the Kingdom of Trans-Jordan gained its independence, and Israel became independent in 1948.
The Golan was ceded to the French Mandate of Syria in 1923 in exchange for a smaller adjacent area on the Lebanese border.

The Jewish Response to the Balfour Declaration – Immigration to Palestine

Between 1919 and 1923, some 40,000 Jews, mainly from Eastern Europe, arrived in Palestine. Many had been trained in agriculture in the European Zionist movements and established settlements of the type pioneered by the early arrivals, and on land purchased with funds raised by Jewish communities throughout the world.²  The dominant ideology was socialist, and this found expression in the development of unique social and economic enterprises, such as the Kibbutzim³, the Moshavim⁴ and the Histadrut.⁵ During this period malarial swamps were drained and converted to agricultural use, and national institutions such as an elected Jewish assembly and the Haganah voluntry defence force were established.
       
Between 1924 and 1929, 82,000 Jews arrived, mainly as a result of anti-semitic outbreaks in Poland and Hungary, and at a time when the immigration quotas of the United States kept Jews out. This group contained many middle class families who moved to the growing towns, establishing small businesses and light industry. Of these approximately 23,000 left the country to escape the harsh economic conditions.

Between 1929 and 1939, with the rise of Nazism in Germany, a new wave of some 250,000 immigrants arrived. Of these about 174,000 arrived between 1933 and 1936, after which the British imposed increasing restrictions on Jewish immigration. Many of those who fled from Germany as Nazi racial laws were introduced, were qualified professionals. Refugee architects introduced the “modern” style which characterised Tel Aviv as it rose from the sand dunes, and refugee musicians founded the Palestine Philharmonic Orchestra. The port at Haifa and its oil refineries were completed and new industrial development transformed the economy.
      
The Jewish population in Palestine thus increased from about 85,000 in 1919 to 678,000 by 1946.  uring the same period, the development of the country attracted substantial Arab immigration, and the Arab population doubled from about 600,000 to 1,269,000.

1920 -1939 The Arab Response to Jewish Immigration

In April 1920, during the British Military Occupation which preceded the Mandate, the Arabs of Palestine rioted in protest against Jewish settlement. In Jerusalem the riots took the form of violent attacks on the Jewish population. In Galilee, armed groups attacked Jewish settlers.
       
On 1 May 1921 a Jewish Labour Day march was attacked and 47 Jews were killed.
       
In August 1929 a dispute at the Western Wall⁶ in Jerusalem flared into riots which spread throughout the country. The Jewish community in Hebron (the burial place of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob) was wiped out. In all 133 Jews were killed and many hundreds were wounded.

In December 1931 a Muslim Conference in Jerusalem attended by 22 countries denounced Zionism, and in 1933 a boycott of British and Zionist goods was proclaimed.
       
In April 1936 the Arab political parties formed an Arab Higher Committee under the presidency of Haj Amin El Husseini, the Mufti [7] of Jerusalem and head of the influential Husseini clan.  A general strike was proclaimed, which lasted for six months. Armed groups were again organised to attack Jewish settlements, and the violence developed into revolt against the British and a war against the Jews which became known as the "Great Uprising" of 1936-1939.
        
In 1937, when the British outlawed the Arab Higher Committee, the Mufti fled from Palestine to Nazi Germany where he established close relations with the government. Here he endorsed and offered assistance in Hitler's "final solution" of the Jewish problem.

(See The Mufti in Berlin for the official record of a conversation with Adolf Hitler). 

1920-1939 The British reaction

The emergence of the economic centrality of oil in the 1920’s, and the discovery of vast oil fields in the Persian Gulf area, added a further crucial dimension to the strategic significance of the Middle East as a whole.  From now on, the maintenance of an economic and military presence in the area became even more essential to British policy. This required both friendly relations with the Arab world and the maintenance of strategic bases in the Middle East.

In Palestine this strategic necessity was translated by the Mandatory administration into a need to find a balance between maintaining good relations with the Arab world and at the same time continuing the Mandate on the basis of the Balfour Declaration.
         
The British therefore responded to the Arab riots of 1921, 1929 and 1936-8 by instituting commissions of inquiry, holding Royal Commissions and issuing policy statements in the form of “White Papers”, which gradually and progressively closed the gates of Palestine to Jewish immigration and settlement. The 1922 Churchill White Paper limited immigration to the “economic absorptive capacity of the country”. The 1930 policy statement restricted the transfer of land to Jews.
         
In 1937 the Royal Commission presided over by Lord Peel came to the conclusion that the Mandate was unworkable, and proposed a partition plan. The plan proposed that the cities of Tel Aviv, Jaffa and Jerusalem and the corridor between them (including the Arab towns of Lod and Ramle) should remain under British control, that the remaining area should be divided between Arab and Jewish states, and that Jewish immigration should be strictly limited. The Jewish reaction to the plan was ambivalent. The Arabs were strongly opposed and stepped up their revolt.

Peel Commission Partition Plan 1937

©Martin Gilbert, from The Arab-Israel Conflict - Its History in Maps

FOOTNOTES

[1] The background negotiation was very complicated. The Hashemites claimed Syria (including Palestine and Lebanon) and Iraq as independent Arab Kingdoms. The allies had agreed that Britain would take mandates over Palestine and Iraq, and that France would have a mandate over Syria. Matters were resolved at meeting between Abdullah and the British in March 1921 in Cairo, at which it was agreed that Faisal would rule Iraq, and Abdullah would take Transjordan, both under British tutelage, and that Abdullah would receive a regular “subsidy”.

[2]. In 1900 the World Zionist Organisation had created the Jewish National Fund which raised money for the purchase and development of land, mainly from blue coin boxes found in most Jewish homes.

[3]. Plural of Kibbutz. Communal agricultural settlements based on pure socialist principles ("to each according to need; from each according to capacity”)

[4] Plural of Moshav. Co-operative villages with varying degrees of communal ownership.

[5] The trade union movement, both protecting workers and actively engaged in large-scale industrial enterprise, for which capital could not otherwise be raised.

[6] The only remnant of the destroyed Jewish Temple.

[7] The official Muslim religious leader, as approved by the Mandatory authority.

International Law and Israel

International Law and Israel

Anti-Israel activists regularly accuse Israel of being in defiance of one or another articles of what they call "International Law." These people are not lawyers but believe they know what they are talking about; and their claims are reported and believed.
Jaques Gauthier is a lawyer and has specialised in studying all the actual International Law that applies to Israel and the territory it holds.
This he has carefully collected into a large volume that proves Israel is not in violation of International law, as he explained to the audience at the ICEJ Feast of Tabernacles in September 2010.
CD available from ICEJ Resources.
On the same subject, Roy Thurley has given a presentation entitled, "ISRAEL: THE TWICE PROMISED LAND" talk with PowerPoint slides and this is available from CFI-UK and Hatikvah.
The issues are summarised in a video below.
The issue is largely a matter of ownership of the Land.

Jaques Gautier pictured with his document weighing 10 pounds and running to 1400 pages.

Many arguments depend on an accurate version of History and Geography.
This web page is based on the C.D. of the address plus screen shots of documents referred to.
Also highly recommended is the article "According to International Law: Is Israel Illegal?" by Shira Sorko Ram. This article will be available long term in the archive of Maoz Israel website – look always for the Maoz Report, then go to archive. You are welcome to use the article for educational purposes.

Courts of nations don’t use the language of scripture. We know what scripture says but to withstand arguments about "International Law" we have to listen to Politics and Law.

Who has title to Jerusalem?

We must deal with the Old City.
Positions of claimants
Israel - West and East Jerusalem and Old City
Arabs - East Jerusalem and Old City
(or they may speak of East Jerusalem or Arab Jerusalem – (but they are including the Old City))
We are making the point that Jews are there not as settlers but of right under International law. We are not talking pragmatics or negotiations. The argument is over who has title.
East Jerusalem's Jewish neighbourhoods have become “illegal settlements” because USA wants East Jerusalem to be the capital of a new Palestinian state. They are working backwards from a desired outcome.
Important distinction
“The West Bank is occupied territory” is accurate. “The West Bank is occupied Palestinian territory” is not accurate.
It is important to accept this fact about “occupation”. In a state of war, occupation is a legal term but it has been made negative and nasty. West Bank was occupied by the British until the treaty of Lusanne was signed. (from taking over until legal determination of status.)
The West Bank is occupied Jewish territory.
The UN can make Resolutions etc, but it can not change legal status.
Look at a map of the boundaries in 1967 and you will see the “Green Line”. The Green Line is not sacred; it is an armistice line - where fighting stopped.

GENERAL ARMISTICE AGREEMENT BETWEEN ISRAEL AND JORDAN - APRIL 3, 1949
2. It is also recognized that no provision of this agreement shall in any way prejudice the rights, claims and positions of either party hereto in the ultimate peaceful settlement of the Palestine question, the provision of the Agreement being dedicated exclusively by the military considerations.

The legal basis is Article 2 of the Agreement between Israel and Jordan – it specifies there is no provision to prejudice the claims of either party. It is only relevant to war and where they stopped fighting. Look at the map to see what would be Jewish if the Green Line was used to delineate a Jewish state; Jerusalem would be completely cut off and surrounded.
1988 Jordan abandoned claims
1949 Jordan annexed the West Bank as “belligerent occupants”
Looking at maps down through the centuries reveals hardly any change until the early 20 th century when some buildings appear outside the walls.
Anyone who claims there never was a Temple should look to the Romans – pictured on Titus’ Arch.

Key events in History

To Jewish People, before there was a Jewish State there was Zionism – asking for recognition of the Jewish people and, ultimately a Jewish State.

A JEWISH PALESTINE: THE JEWISH CASE FOR A BRITISH TRUSTEESHIP BY H SACHER - 1919
4) The Peace Conference may decree that some one power be the mandatory of the humanity for supervising the rise of a Jewish Palestine.
That single mandatory may be either Great Britain or some other power.
If we Jews ask that Great Britain be appointed the trustee for a Jewish Palestine, that is a demand which the Peace Conference would find irresistable and that is a title which could not be impeached.
Selection by the Jewish people alone can be given the indispensible moral sanction to a trustee for a Jewish Palestine.
As we understand the matter, the British Government has no desire to establish sovereignty over Palestine in any imperialistic spirit or for any imperialistic purposes.
But it is ready to assume at the request of the Jewish people, and with the authority of the Peace Conference, the high mission of trustee to watch over and aid in the establishment of a Jewish Palestine.

CONDITIONS INCLUDED IN THE ZIONIST ORGANIZATION CLAIMS
1 The contracting parties shall recognize the historic title of the Jewish people to Palestine and the right of the Jews to reconstitute their National Home in Palestine.
. The frontiers of Palestine shall be as those indicated in the exposure annexed hereto.
. The sovereignty of Palestine shall be vested in the League of Nations, and Government will be entrusted to Great Britain acting as mandatory of the League.
. The Mandate shall be subject to these considerations.
Palestine must be given to political, administrative and economic conditions that will ensure the establishment of the Jewish National Home and ultimately render possible the creation of an autonumous "Commonwealth". It is clearly understood that nothing must be done that might prejudice the civil and religious rights of the non-Jewish communities at present established in Palestine, nor the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in other countries".

This is not a matter of scripture – it is a matter of justice – not to take away from Jewish people what they have been given. The objective is to show what was given.
Basel – strategy for a Jewish State. Weisman took over from Herzl
Balfour Declaration – was the pledge of the war government of Lloyd George – It was binding on Britain but not on any other nations. Don’t claim too much for the Balfour Declaration or our claims will fall when it is shown to be not binding.
Turning point (in law) came in the Paris Peace Conference at the Quai D’Orsay.
Parties claimed their territorial rights – Jews under Wiezman and Arabs under Faisal.
They were in agreement that the two movements complete one another – the Jewish movement is national; not imperialist. There is room for us both.
The Arabs want a large independent state; not a group of little ones. Realising they were asking so much they needed the support of the Zionists.
There was no Palestinian delegation – no Palestinian people – only Arabs. (never united – warring tribes and clans)
The Allied Powers were meeting to decide the states that would exist after the war. Five men – Wilson -USA, Lloyd George - Britain, Orlando - Italy, Clemenceau - France, and Japan. 1919
Jews needed a nation to support them until a state could be set up – until sufficient immigration had taken place.
As in a court, parties brought statements of claim. Until a claim is accepted by a group that has the power of disposition, you have nothing.
This body had that power and the Jews were asking to reconstitute their state based on historic title. Asking to be recognized as a people and then asking for Jerusalem and Israel to be recognized.

ARTICLE 22 OF THE COVENANT OF THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS
To those colonies and territories which as a consequence of the later war have ceased to be under the sovereignty of the States which formerly governed them and which are inhabited by people not yet able to stand by themselves under the strenuous conditions of the modern world, there should be applied the principle that the well-being and development of such peoples form a sacred trust of civilisation and that securities for the performance of this trust should be embodied in this Covenant.
The best method of giving practical effect to this principle is that the tutelage of such peoples should be entrusted to advanced nations who by reason of their resources their experience or their geographical position can best undertake this responsibility, and who are willing to accept it, and that this tutelage should be exercised by them as Mandatories on behalf of the League.

In Article 22 of the League of Nations we see the principle of sacred trustee nations to take over for somebody else the territory left over from war.
The Sacred Trust of Civilisation is still in effect and binding; it still calls on nations to look after the Jewish people.
Treaty of Neuilly - 1919
At Neuliiy-sur-Seinne, 27 November 1919 US, Britain, France, Italy, Japan were the powers. that drew up the arrangements for settling borders in Europe following the War. In this section they dealt with Bulgaria.

TREATY OF NEUILLY
Treaty of peace between the Allied and Associated Powers and Bulgaria and Protocol and Declaration signed at Neuliiy-sur-Seinne, 27 November 1919.
TREATY OF NEUILLY AND PROTOCOLS, THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, THE BRITISH EMPIRE, FRANCE, ITALY AND JAPAN.
These Powers consulting with the Principle Treaty as the principle ......
BELGIUM, CHINA, CUBA, GREECE, THE HEDJAZ, POLAND, PORTUGAL, ROUMANIA, THE SERBO-CROAT-SLOVENE STATE, SIAM AND CZECHO-SLOVAKIA.
These Powers constituting with the Principle Powers mentioned above, the Allied and Associated Powers.
SECTION III
THRACE
ARTICLE 48
Bulgaria renounces in favour of the Principle Allied and Associated Powers all rights and title under the ...... in Thrace which belonged to the Bulgarian Monarchy and which, being situated outside the new fronteirs of Bulgaria as described in Article 27 ??? Part ii (Fronteirs of Bulgaria have not been at present assigned to any state.
Bulgaria undertakes to accept the settlelemt made by the Principlal Allied and Associated Powers in regard to these territories, particularly in so far as the concerns the nationality of the inhabitants.
The Principal Allied and Associated Powers undertake to ensure the economic outlets of Bulgaria to the Aegean Sea.

In Article 48 we see Bulgaria conveying all rights and the rights go to the Principal Allied Powers.
The Jews left Paris without any decision having been made. The conference was to reconven to deliberate, having heard the Zionist and Arab cases.
1920 The process reconvened on April 25, 1920,at VILLA DeVACHAN, San Remo where decisions were made. There followed the Treaty of Serves (10 August 1920) that was the peace treaty between the Ottoman Empire and Allies at the end of World War I.

MEETING MINUTES OF THE SUPREME COUNCIL OF THE PRINCIPAL ALLIED POWERS, SAN REMO AT THE VILLA DeVACHAN, APRIL 25, 1920
"The high contracting parties agree to entrust by application of the provisions of article 22, the administration of Palestine, within such boundaries as may be determined by the Principal Allied Powers, to a mandatory, to be selected by said Powers.
The Mandatory will be responsible for putting into effect the declaration originally made on the 8th [2nd] November, 1917, by the British Government, and adopted by the other Allied Powers, in favour of the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed the Jews in any other country."

Arabs were given territory – Mesopotamia to become Iraq, Syria and Lebanon. Four Mandates were established; British Mandate for Mesopotamia - creating Iraq, French Mandate for Lebanon, French Mandate for Syria and British Mandate for Palestine. The first three appear to have been forgotten!
Map showing the territory mandated by the League of Nations at San Remo. The map shows the British, French and Russian mandates from which several modern states were created, including Israel, from the old Ottoman Empire after WW1.

Jews were to be provided for by honouring the commitments of the Balfour Declaration. (it was not previously a document with legal status but this decision made it legal)
San Remo has become undervalued, but Weizman rated it to be the most important thing since the Exiles.
Presumably the same conditions about the rights of other faiths within the land were applied to the other mandates [ French & British] for Arab nations – but these nations did not honour them and dispossessed the Jews and expelled them.
Israel did not expel Arabs (as is often claimed) – Arab leaders ordered their people out (1948) before attacking Israel to destroy the new state.

THE INTERNATIONAL LAW IMPLICATIONS OF THE SAN REMO DECISIONS PERTAINING TO PALESTINE
Chaim Weitzman, who was in San Remo believed that the decisions of the Supreme Council in San Remo had introduced rights under international law for the Jewish people:
The San Remo decision has come. That recognition of our rights in Palestine is embodied in the Treaty with Turkey. (Treaty of Sevres), and has become part of International Law, this is the most momentous political event in the whole history of our movement (Zionist movement), and, it is perhaps, no exaggeration to say in the whole history of our people since the Exiles.
As a result of the declaration of the Supreme Council in San Remo, the claim of the Zionist Organisation which, prior to the Conference, was a non-legal claim (essentially an historic claim), evolved into a legal claim which was consolidated later by the approval of the Mandate of Palestine by the Council of the League of Nations.

1921 Churchill agreed to partition Palestine and give 78% to Arab, Hashemites. (Transjordan)
Today the Jews are fighting to retain their 28%, but the leaders of Jordan agreed to the deal; The Arab part of the deal was to support the creation of the Jewish state in West Palestine.
Nothing since San Remo has taken away the rights and responsibilities decided there.

ARTICLE 2 OF THE MANDATE FOR PALESTINE
"The Mandatory shall be responsible for placing the country under such political, administrative and economic conditions as will secure the establishment of the Jewish national home, as laid down in the preamble, and the development of self-governing institutions, and also for safeguarding the civil and religious rights of all the inhabitants of Palestine, irrespective of race or religion".

1924 - The dissolution of the League of Nations did not change anything since it was only there to supervise rights already given.
When the United Nations was set up, its Charter (signed by all the nations), in Article 80, specified, “Nothing in any manner is to change the rights already given to any peoples.”
1947 – the Resolution of the General Assembly – the Partition Plan - was not binding. It was accepted by the Jews but rejected by the Arabs. Had both sides accepted it in a treaty it would have become a legal position.
1950, 1955 and 1966 decisions by the International Court of Justice made it clear that the dissolution of the League of Nations did not take away from rights given under these Mandates.
The Jewish people have never renounced their rights to the Old City or any part of Jerusalem; never abandoned title or sovereignty.
Present day politicians are opposing the title of Israel by going against these requirements in terms like the Principle of Self Determination. But you can not retroactively apply legal principles.
Jews have the LEGAL right to remain in Mandated Territory.
Jews have the right to give up what is theirs but they cannot be pushed out.
Nations have renaged on obligations they embraced under the League of Nations in 1922.

The above could allow one to think that the Arabs had the land given away from under their feet by a club of nations. This is also a false view since the land was purchased at inflated prices by the Zionists. See Did the Jews Steal the Land from the Arabs?
These arguments are summed up in this excellent video.

Looking at it another way

Professor, Judge Schwebel, former president of the International Court of Justice in the Hague   writing in What Weight to Conquest [1994]:

No legal right shall spring from a wrong and Palestinian Arabs illegal aggression against the territorial integrity and political independence of Israel, cannot and should not be rewarded.
International law make it clear: All of Israel's wars with its Arab neighbors were in self-defence.
(a) a state [Israel] acting in lawful exercise of its right of self-defense may seize and occupy foreign territory as long as such seizure and occupation are necessary to its self-defense;
(b) as a condition of its withdrawal from such territory, that State may require the institution of security measures reasonably designed to ensure that that territory shall not again be used to mount a threat or use of force against it of such a nature as to justify exercise of self-defense;
(c) Where the prior holder of territory had seized that territory unlawfully [Jordan], the state which subsequently takes that territory in the lawful exercise of self-defense [Israel] has, against that prior holder, better title.
"As between Israel, acting defensively in 1948 and 1967, on the one hand, and her Arab neighbors, acting aggressively, in 1948 and 1967, on the other, Israel has the better title in the territory of what was Palestine, including the whole of Jerusalem.

To view this article on the original page, please click here.

   

Is Obama Above the Law?

Ignoring International Law

May 20, 2011  |  Eli E. Hertz

No legal right shall spring from a wrong and Palestinian Arabs illegal aggression against the territorial integrity and political independence of Israel, cannot and should not be rewarded.

International law make it clear: All of Israel's wars with its Arab neighbors were in self-defence.

Professor, Judge Schwebel, former president of the International Court of Justice in the Hague writing in What Weight to Conquest [1994]:

"(a) a state [Israel] acting in lawful exercise of its right of self-defense may seize and occupy foreign territory as long as such seizure and occupation are necessary to its self-defense;

"(b) as a condition of its withdrawal from such territory, that State may require the institution of security measures reasonably designed to ensure that that territory shall not again be used to mount a threat or use of force against it of such a nature as to justify exercise of self-defense;

"(c) Where the prior holder of territory had seized that territory unlawfully [Jordan], the state which subsequently takes that territory in the lawful exercise of self-defense [Israel] has, against that prior holder, better title."

"As between Israel, acting defensively in 1948 and 1967, on the one hand, and her Arab neighbors, acting aggressively, in 1948 and 1967, on the other, Israel has the better title in the territory of what was Palestine, including the whole of Jerusalem."

International Law on supporting terrorists

Concerning the Palestinian demand for Israel to free terrorists, and the US support for this demand.
Binding UN Security Council resolution 1373 requires all states to “Deny safe haven to those who finance, plan, support, or commit terrorist acts, or provide safe havens.”
So by sheltering terrorists the Palestinian Authority stands in breach of binding international law. And by supporting the PA ’s sheltering of those terrorists, by coercing Israel into releasing them, the US has placed itself in a deeply problematic position in relation to international law. It has also forced Israel into a deeply problematic position by bowing to the US demand to release them.
PMW regularly reports stories such as this
As the US pledged $148 million to the PA,  the PA pledged $15 million to released prisoners
PA Dignified Life Grant, primarily to freed terrorists, will be "15 million American dollars" in 2013 but is conditioned on "availability of funds"

http://palwatch.org/main.aspx?fi=157&doc_id=9675

Did the Jews Steal the Land from the Arabs?

The narrative of Jews /Zionists arriving in Palestine and stealing land from the inhabitants is heard all the time. The fact that the land was purchased never, or seldom, gets mentioned.

Ludwig Schneider tells the story in Israel Today Magazine. November 2010

It is said that during the 1930s, as well as when the State of Israel was established in 1948, the Jews drove the Arabs out of their land. The goal of these allegations is to make anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism socially and politically acceptable. Any factual counter-arguments are dismissed as being biased and are ignored by the media, so only the anti-Israel narrative remains in the public eye. So-called "peace activists" accept the claims of the Palestinians without checking them out, and then condemn Israel.
A reliable account of the situation in Eretz Israel (the Land of Israel), which at that time was called Palestine, can be found in a 1937 report of the British Palestine Royal Commission which, as is well known, was not a friend of the Jews. The report says that the Hula Valley in the north of the country was infested with mosquitoes. The landowners were Syrians in Damascus, who leased out the marshes to Arab or Egyptian peasants (fellahs), who lived in primitive mud huts and inevitably fell sick with malaria.
The first thing the Jewish National Fund did in 1934 was to purchase 51 square miles of this marshland for 900,000 Palestinian pounds ($4.5 million) and set up 20 Jewish settlements on it. These Jews battled malaria, yellow fever and the Middle Eastern sun to drain the swamps and reclaim the land.
What the swamps were in the north, the desert, which had to be artificially irrigated, was in the south; and the center of the country was a stony, desolate wasteland. The Arab landlords, who lived abroad and owned large estates, did nothing to solve these problems.
The Turkish Ottoman Empire was in such a poor state after ruling over the Holy Land for 400 years (1517-1917), that wealthy Arab landowners from Syria, Egypt and Lebanon were able to kick out the fellahs and Bedouins and acquire enormous tracts of real estate. Then they made a huge profit by selling the land to Jews from Europe and America.
According to "Turkish government records, in 1915, 3,130,000 dunams of Palestinian land was owned by 144 Arab landowners; so on average, each family owned 22,000 dunams. From early times, the dunam was the only valid unit for measuring land area in Palestine. One dunam is 1,000 square meters and there are 4 dunams in an acre.
The farmers who leased the properties were forced to pay onerous interest rates to the Arab landlords of up to 60 percent, and many tenants were left destitute, losing both house and home. Ultimately, the Arab landowners drove out their Muslim brothers so that they could sell the land for large amounts of money to the Jews.
The Jewish National Fund set up blue and white (Israel's national colors) collection boxes all over the world and received generous contributions from Jewish patrons, which were used to buy property in the Holy Land. Of the 429,887 dunams that the Palestine Jewish Colonization Association purchased from private owners, 293,54 dunams almost 70 percent-was uncultivated land that Arab proprietors living abroad had sold to Jews.
By 1937, the amount purchased by Jews increased to 579,492 dunams, and by 1948 almost 80 percent of the land available for sale had been bought up by the Jewish people. The rest of the land was ownerless desert, which was taken over by Israel after the establishment of the state.
When the League of Nations handed the mandate over to Britain in 1922, it stipulated firmly in Article 6 that the "Palestine administration should work together with the Jewish Agency to encourage intensive settlement of the land by Jews, which should include the land owned by the state and the uncultivated or waste land, as long as this land is not needed for official purposes."
It is astonishing that nowadays nobody seems to be interested in the facts. While everyone has an opinion about this conflict, few take the trouble to check out how the Land of Israel legally became Jewish property. People prefer to embrace the stereotypical Palestinian lies which accuse the Jewish state of forcibly driving the Palestinians out of their homes, although this was mostly done by Arab landlords who cared nothing about "Palestine." Today, the Arab world is trying to push the "crimes" of their ancestors, who effectively "sold out" Palestine 80 years ago, onto the Jews and the State of Israel.

See also International Law that covers the legal truth about Israel being legally the homeland for the Jews, while Jordan, Iraq, Syria and Lebanon were homelands for the Arabs.

Meanwhile - -

For generations Jews who dreamed of Zion collected their pennies so the Jewish National Fund could purchase land in Israel. Today illegal Arab building on JNF lands goes unchecked by Israel's leaders.
No fewer than 700 illegal housing units have been built by Arabs in the past two years on land purchased for Jews by the JNF in northern Jerusalem.
Arutz Sheva contacted the JNF to ask about the problem. However, JNF officials say the Israel Land Authority is responsible for administering the lands on their behalf. Aryeh King, chairman of the Israel Land Fund, says his organization is conducting a careful survey of the illegal structures using aerial photographs, butadds the problem is exacerbated by the fact that the illegal building occurs beyond Israel's security fence. Lands bought by the JNF are on both sides of the fence.

Reported by Arutz Sheva 21/02/2012