UN court verdict is clear: Occupation of Palestinian territories must end

The International Court of Justice has delivered a stern scolding to the international community, especially Western countries, with its unambiguous ruling that Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories is illegal. In response to a simple and long-overdue request for an opinion by the UN General Assembly, the ICJ ruled that Israel has been violating international law for 57 years and that the global community, specifically the UN General Assembly and the UN Security Council, must do something about it.
Continued illegal settlements are a violation of international law, the ICJ ruled, and, therefore, at a minimum, Israel must suspend any new settlements. This is not a suggestion, but an order from the world’s top court. Countries and businesses that support Israel’s occupation — the UN issued a database of those companies — must stop enabling this violation of international law. As is the case with a drug addict, the only way to heal is to stop providing the resources that keep the addict hooked. It might be painful, but it has to be done. Some call such medicine “tough love,” but whatever you call it, there is no place in today’s rule-based world if one country is allowed to continuously flout international law.
Israel rejected the ICJ ruling even before it was announced when its parliament, the Knesset, voted to dismiss the idea of a Palestinian state. Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu insists that Jews cannot occupy their own homeland. The ICJ, an arm of the UN, did not refer to violation by a religion, but instead to violation by a UN member state. If Netanyahu and his ideologues want to use religious belief to defend their policies, they need to withdraw from the UN, whose charter they agreed to respect. Similarly, the international community cannot continue to fund, provide political and military support, and maintain diplomatic relations with a country that is publicly flouting international law. The world community cannot criticize the Russian occupation of Ukraine and, at the same time, give Israeli occupation a waiver. Sanctions should be based not on political expediency, but on the rule of law.

Continued illegal settlements are a violation of international law. 

Daoud Kuttab

At the same time, the world community has an obligation to right the wrongs it has perpetrated over decades. By enabling a violator of international law, the UN Security Council has failed to carry out its responsibility for world peace and stability. The council’s permanent members, especially, have an obligation to do what is right. At least three permanent members, the US, UK, and France, have not even signed on to support a UN General Assembly decision to recognize Palestine as a permanent member of the UN. It is true that such recognition will not end the illegal Israeli occupation overnight, but it will go a long way toward clarifying the legal status of Palestine, and will put into action calls by the same countries for a two-state solution.
Some countries, especially the US, believe that the two-state solution should be born out of negotiations. But what if one side refuses to negotiate, as Israel has done for the past 10 years, and continues to ignore such calls while illegally occupying Palestinian territory, illegally building housing for its own citizens in occupied lands, and applying an apartheid system that disenfranchises the Palestinian people who are the land’s legitimate owners?
Much has been said and can be said about the need for the Palestinian government to be reformed and for proper elections to take place, and that is a legitimate call, but it certainly is not a prerequisite for being free of an illegal occupation. The very idea of democratic elections under occupation when the occupying power can limit this practice, as in preventing those in east Jerusalem from participating, or arresting leaders it does not like, makes no sense.
Recognizing Palestine as a full member of the UN will allow legitimate Palestinian leaders to negotiate the modalities of its relations with its neighbors, including Israel. A process needs to be immediately implemented that will allow Palestine to decouple from its dependence on its occupier, and to pursue the means of an independent economy in which it controls its land and what is below and above the land, as well as controlling its borders and having the freedom to move people and goods within the Palestinian state based on the 1967 borders, and with its eastern and southern neighbors, Jordan and Egypt.
The ICJ was clear and straightforward in its ruling. The West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip, are occupied Palestinian territory. The time has come for the world community to accept this ruling and apply all means at its disposal to ensure the end of this illegal occupation and grant the Palestinian people the inalienable right of self-determination, including the creation of their own independent state in all the Palestinian areas occupied in June 1967.

• Daoud Kuttab, an award-winning Palestinian journalist, is a director of Community Media Network. X: @daoudkuttab