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Matthew Shugart's avatar

Alan, thank you for these posts, and for engaging in the comment threads.

Is there anything to the argument that the GC does not apply here because the territories in question were not (legitimately) territory of another state at the time that Israel captured them (in, as you note, a defensive war)? I have seen this argument made by various pro-Israel commentators and it strikes me as highly compelling. But I am an outsider to these issues, so I can't render a judgment (so to speak).

Also, what is the standing of the Oslo Accords under international law? Does the fact that the PLO accepted the division of the territories in to Areas designated A, B, and C matter? Or have the accords effectively expired because they were mean to be transitory?

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C. Clark Kissinger's avatar

This is not an issue that can be resolved by definitions. When people from Europe spread out to take over the rest of the world, they interacted with the indigenous populations in a variety of ways. In Mexico and Central America, they settled and intermarried. In India, they carried out administrative functions for fixed periods and then retired back in England. In the United States and Argentina, they simply exterminated the indigenous peoples.

South Africa and Palestine represented yet another model, where the indigenous population was too large (and too needed) to exterminate, so the settlers took the land and subordinated, isolated and refused social equality with the indigenous population. I suspect that HRW and others have picked up the Apartheid sobriquet because of the similarity of the South African Bantustans and the remaining islands of the Palestinian population.

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