What is the legal basis for the State of Israel?

What is the legal basis for the State of Israel?


Some ask the question, “Does Israel have a right to exist?” That is not a properquestion since Israel does exist, is recognized by the United Nations and many other countries, and isno more subject to being so questioned than is the United States, Japan, or any othercountry. Anyone who persists with the question of Israel’s right to exist is one whoseagenda is to eliminate Israel and its Jewish inhabitants.

But there is a legal background to the State of Israel. The Declaration of Israel’s Independence, issued at Tel Aviv on May 14, 1948, recites the legal historythat led to the founding of Israel as an internationally recognized sovereign state:

The land of Israel was the birthplace of the Jewish people. Here their spiritual, religious and national identity was formed. Here they achieved independence and created a culture of national and universal significance. Here they wrote and gave the Bible to the world.

In the year 1897 the First Zionist Congress, inspired by Theodor Herzl’s vision of the Jewish State, proclaimed the right of the Jewish people to national revival in their own country.

This right was acknowledged by the Balfour Declaration of November 2, 1917, and re-affirmed by the Mandate of the League of Nations, which gave explicit international recognition to the historic connection of the Jewish people with Palestine and their right to reconstitute their National Home.

On November 29, 1947, the General Assembly of the United Nations adopted a Resolution for the establishment of an independent Jewish State in Palestine, and called upon the inhabitants of the country to take such steps as may be necessary on their part to put the plan into effect. This recognition by the United Nations of the right of the Jewish people to establish their independent State may not be revoked. It is, moreover, the self-evident right of the Jewish people to be a nation, as all other nations, in its own sovereign State.

ACCORDINGLY, WE, the members of the National Council, representing the Jewish people in Palestine and the Zionist movement of the world, met together in solemn assembly today, the day of the termination of the British mandate for Palestine, by virtue of the natural and historic right of the Jewish and of the Resolution of the General Assembly of the United Nations, HEREBY PROCLAIM the establishment of the Jewish State in Palestine, to be called ISRAEL.

At that point, the State of Israel came into existence. The United States recognized the provisional Jewish government as de facto authority of the Jewish state within minutes. The Soviet Union granted de jure recognition almost immediately in 1948 along with seven other states within the next five days (Guatemala, Byelorussia, the Ukraine, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Uruguay, and Yugoslavia).

Since the League of Nations was formally terminated in April 1946, there was a specific UN resolution that preserved the rights of the Jewish people in Palestine (and in Jerusalem particularly). The United Nations, as the successor organization to the League of Nations, adopted Article 80 of the UN Charter, which negated efforts “to alter in any manner the rights whatsoever of any states or any peoples (emphasis added) or the terms of existing international instruments” at the time of the UN’s creation. This provision carried the British Mandate granted by the League of Nations, includingall of its committments to a homeland for the Jewish people, into the framework ofinternational law at the United Nations.

Israel’s success in defending its territory against the invading Arab armies in 1948made the country an established reality. General elections were held on January 25, 1949: the provisional State Council was replaced by an elected Parliament (Knesset) and the Provisional Government by a regular parliamentary Government.De jure recognition by the United States was extended on January 31, 1949 after the permanent government was sworn in.On January 29, 1949, the former Mandatory Power, Britain, recognized the state of Israel, a step that also recognized the end of British efforts to affect the course of the region?s politics.

In the fall of 1948, Israel had applied for membership in the United Nations but failed to win the necessary majority in the Security Council. In February 1949, Israel renewed its application for membership in the United Nations. On March 4, 1949, the Security Council recommended to the General Assembly that it be admitted. On May 11, Israel was admitted, to become the 59th member. Between January 1, 1949 and May 11. 1949, Israel was recognised by 32 States, in addition to the 20 that had accorded it recognition prior to December 31, 1948. Today Israel has fulldiplomatic relations with most countries of the world, except portions of the Islamic/Arab blockthat continue to believe that Israel can somehow be eliminated.



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§ 9 Responses to Legal Basis of the State of Israel

Gamaliel T Gumba
September 6, 2011 at 2:40 pm
Israel is a name coined by The Almighty during the entreaty of Jacob as he wrestle with an angel till daylight breaks. Jacob become IshRaEL. Jews understand this much better. The house of Jacob ( as Israel) is planted by the Almighty as His vineyard at which all nations of the world can nourish from its sustenance. Israel cannot be obliterated because as if The Almighty can be demolished too. It will be futile for any nation to try to do it. They shall be repulsed and obliterated instead. Better bless Israel and pray its peace and prosperity. So the Almighty will be blessed and He will glorify us i n the midst of these trying times. Shalom Shalom Ysrael. Yahweh Elohim Adonai be with you and richly bless you. Halleluiah

Reply
ronald locke
September 23, 2011 at 7:47 pm
I read this whole thing, I am now convinced, (once a skeptic on the issue of the right for Ireals ixistance) that they have every right to exist. Just on the fact that they had been buying the land ever since the 1800′s long before the UN declaired Isreal an independant state. Pre WW2 the Jewish settlers did the land good and to it’s peoples. However one can see how after WW2 millions flooded the land all at once in an area where most of the inhabitants are un educated and probably never even heard of the United Nations. It is no wonder why these inhabitants, otherwise known as Palistinians got upset and grew in opposition. Becouse they are Muslim all the other Muslim nations backed them up to the point of war.

Today, My feeling are bias, The UN recognized Isreal after WW2 and made them a state. I dont see why they would deny the Palastinians the same thing. Besides, lets get a move on with the peace process as so we can go on to the second coming as it has been prophesized.

Reply
Jewish613
October 2, 2011 at 6:24 pm
Thy themselves are acting in such a way as to make it impossible for them to achieve recognition as a prper, independant state.
Basing the application on UN General Assembly Resolution 181(11) of 29 November 1947 is meaningless since this Resolution was rejected in1947 and has become extant. General Assembly resolutions in any event are not binding in international law.

They themselves rejected the UN Resolution by declaring war on the nascent Israel.

As Chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) – Mr Abbas is committed to maintaining the territorial indivisibility of Israel, Gaza, the West Bank and Jordan under Article 2 of the PLO Charter. The current application contains no mention of his intention to revoke this provision in the Charter or to forgo any claims to any other parts of this territory from either Israel or Jordan.

Claiming that the application is based on international law and all relevant UN resolutions is contradicted by the fact that the PLO considers all such law null and void under article 20 of the PLO Charter which states:

“The Balfour Declaration, the Mandate for Palestine, and everything that has been based upon them, are deemed null and void.“

No commitment has been made by Chairman Abbas to revoke this provision of the PLO Charter as a condition of the UN approving his application for membership.



http://www.palestinefacts.org/pf_independence_israel_legal.php