The passage of United Nations (UN) Security Council Resolution 2720 on 22 December signals that the UN and President Biden will not be playing any constructive role in resolving the future of Gaza and its population after the Israel-Gaza War is ended.
After 5 days of deliberation - Resolution 2720 endorsed the UN's continuation of its seven years fruitless pursuit to create a Palestinian Arab State between Israel and Jordan:
Advertisement
Stressing that the Gaza Strip constitutes an integral part of the territory occupied in 1967, and reiterating the vision of the two-State solution, with the Gaza Strip as part of the Palestinian State.
This unilateral declaration by the Security Council on Gaza's future destiny is both arrogant and foolhardy following Gaza's invasion of Israel on October 7 and Israel's subsequent declaration of war on Gaza.
Resolution 2720 fails to acknowledge that during the 1948 War of Independence - over 10000 Jews legally living in Judea and Samaria (West Bank) and the Gaza Strip under articles 6 and 25 of the 1922 Mandate for Palestine and article 80 of the United Nations Charter - were driven out or killed and their properties destroyed or confiscated:
Resolution 2720 makes no mention of Israel's total disengagement from Gaza and North Samaria in 2005 – forcibly evicting 8000 Israelis who had returned to live there after 1967.
Israel's disengagement was made to support President Bush's 24 June 2002 two-state vision - as detailed in letters exchanged between Israel's then Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and President Bush on 14 April 2004.
Advertisement
Israel since that disengagement has been subjected to tens of thousands of missiles fired from Gaza indiscriminately into Israeli population centers as well as incursions and attempted incursions into Israel's sovereign territory from Gaza:
What the UN may have believed to still be achievable on October 6 – encapsulated in Security Council Resolution 2334 passed on 23 December 2016 - was forever ended on October 7.
Amazingly the Biden-Harris administration's abstention on Resolution 2720 has repeated the historic miscalculation made by the Obama-Biden administration when it abstained on Resolution 2334 – allowing that Resolution to pass.
Rather than vetoing Resolution 2720 - Biden's abstention has given the Security Council the cover to continue beating Israel into accepting the failed two-state solution envisioned in Resolution 2334 – which has become ancient history after seven years of going nowhere.
Significantly - an alternative solution shredding Resolution 2334 burst on to the international scene on 8 June 2022 – authored by Ali Shihabi – an advisor to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman – calling for the merger of Jordan, Gaza and part of Judea and Samaria (West Bank) into one territorial entity to be governed by Jordan's current Hashemite rulers: The Hashemite Kingdom of Palestine solution (HKOPS)
HKOPS has been totally ignored by both the UN and serial-abstainer President Biden in the eighteen months since its publication.
Both the UN and Biden must share some responsibility for what might have been avoided on October 7 - had they considered implementing's HKOPS as an alternative solution to replace that laid out in Resolution 2334.
Gaza has flown the HKOPS coop – but Jordan and part of Judea and Samaria (West Bank) can still be merged - with citizenship and voluntary resettlement there being offered to the beleaguered Gazans.
The UN and Biden need to be badgered and hounded by the media to explain why they continue to refuse to consider HKOPS – ex Gaza - to replace their jointly-held failed visions contained in Resolutions 2334 and 2720.
The Jewish people are not going to commit national suicide for nice obituaries expressed in a unanimous Security Council resolution addressed by a sombre President Biden.
Discuss in our Forums
See what other readers are saying about this article!
Click here to read & post comments.
6 posts so far.