The PLO's Red Lines for a Palestinian state, from the Palestine Papers, part 5: Security arrangements, water and other issues ~ Elder Of Ziyon

Monday, November 16, 2020

The PLO's Red Lines for a Palestinian state, from the Palestine Papers, part 5: Security arrangements, water and other issues

Concluding the full text of the PLO's NSU Negotiation Principles Matrix. The previous articles show how impossible the PLO's minimal demands are and how peace is impossible. I will comment on select parts of the remainder of the document.

ISSUE

CORE PRINCIPLES

POSSIBLE FLEXIBILITY

WATER AND OTHER NATURAL RESOURCES

General principles: International watercourses

· Water rights over watercourses that cross international borders – all major shared water sources between Palestine and Israel – must conform to the principle of equitable utilization under international law

· Agree on the allocation of the shared water resources based on the principle of equitable utilization (mainly the Jordan river basin, the West Bank aquifers basins and the Coastal Aquifer Basin)

· Equal per capita approach in determining equitable.

· Agree to transition period of no longer than five years to implement new allocation.

· Trade of water and exchange of water supply

· Third Party Compliance Mechanism

· Agree on the joint management of the shared water resources

· Ensure that persons in its control take no action harming the quality of water or damaging to aquifers

· Right of Palestine to capture its equitable share of watercourses and transport it to and within its territory

· Ability to construct, maintain and operate water installations and water pipelines to transport water through Israel to Palestine

General principles: Natural resources

· The principle of permanent sovereignty over natural resources. Parties shall each enjoy sovereignty over natural resources that are located entirely within its respective international borders

Since this was written, Israel has greatly increased the proportion of fresh water that it gets from desalination, so this is not nearly as big a difficulty as it would have been when written. Notice however that the PLO is insisting on per-capita calculations to determine how to allocate shared water resources, which means that if their population grows the total amount of water available to Israel would decrease.

SECURITY:

Military withdrawal

· Full military withdrawal from Palestinian territory including airspace and territorial waters.

· Withdrawal according to clear timelines to be phased and coordinated with Palestinian security forces and international monitors.

· CAVEAT: In negotiating security demands by Israel, the details are critical. That is, an agreement at the political level that does not cover technical details leaves open a range of contentious issues that must still be carefully negotiated. Not addressing the details risks granting Israel the effective capability to assert a substantial and permanent military presence on

· May choose to agree to limited, temporary, and specific arrangements to meet clearly defined and legitimate security concerns of Israel. (e.g. early warning station, arrangements for deployment in emergency situations – see below.)

Limits on Palestinian military capacity

Early Warning Stations

Israeli presence in the Jordan Valley

Palestinian territory.

· Palestine not seeking to be a military state (no offensive military capability); however, it requires a small adequately equipped army for defensive purposes including ground, air and maritime components.

· No need for EWS on Palestinian territory.

· Palestine will have full sovereignty over Jordan Valley; no Israeli presence.

· Prepared to negotiate specific restrictions on types of permissible military equipment (based on international standards).

· RED LINE: Will not agree to “dual use” equipment defined as such by Israel. May consider certain limited restrictions, but only based on international standards and practice.

· In past negotiations agreed to EWS in principle – but no more than 2, and subject to detailed arrangements: use and access, leasing, time limits, international presence, inspection.

· Note: Due to developments in technology there are other alternatives that adequately meet Israeli concerns(detecting a threat from the East) , therefore EWS are technically not needed

· This is a red line. As an alternative, Palestine could welcome a strong

Emergency deployment of Israeli forces on Palestinian territory

Airspace

Security Cooperation

· Palestine will not agree to Israeli military presence on its territory under any circumstances.

· Palestine will have full sovereignty over its airspace.

· No military use for training or otherwise.

· Civilian flights will be regulated by the Chicago Convention and applicable international norms of civil aviation.

Agree to bilateral and regional security cooperation

international presence in the Jordan Valley.

· Applicable standard should be international law (law of armed conflict) that regulates the deployment of forces on foreign territory.

· In case of decision to agree to emergency deployment, it is critical to have detailed and specific agreement on such issues as: what constitutes emergency, duration, liability and compensation, restriction on areas of deployment etc…)

· May agree to full coordination and cooperation in management and air traffic control for civil aviation; subject, however, to sovereignty of each state over its respective airspace.

The military demands are the ones that would never be acceptable to Israel.

These demands would mean that any terrorists that attack Israelis and then withdraw to Palestinian territory are immune from IDF pursuit. It means that Israel is returning to a nine-mile wide nation that is indefensible. It means that any terrorists who build rockets in the West Bank can easily reach every Israeli population center with cheap home-grown rockets and Israel has no recourse.

This would be a return to the unacceptable situation that Israel had to live under before 1967 where "fedayeen" - a word that Palestinians regard with respect and awe - would sneak into Israel, wreak havoc, and then return to Gaza or Jordan or Syria, and any Israeli response would be an international incident.

Except now they have rockets.

Palestinian leaders would have every incentive to allow terror groups to flourish as long as they are not threats to their own leadership but to Israel alone.

In total, the minimal Palestinian demands are unacceptable for Israel to remain a strong and secure state. This is the entire point. These demands are meant to weaken Israel financially, militarily, spiritually and demographically with the goal of an eventual destruction of Israel - where Israel would be forced to agree to its own destruction.

Here is the rest of the document:

RELATIONS BETWEEN PALESTINE AND ISRAEL
DIPLOMATIC RELATIONS	· Full diplomatic relations both between Palestine	·

	and Israel and between Arab States and Israel shall not be instated until full implementation of the comprehensive agreement
ECONOMIC RELATIONS	· Trade Relations based on free trade and preferential treatment principles. · Removal of all tariffs and non tariff barriers, national and most favored nation treatment for both industrial and agricultural products. · Free trade in services, investments and free movement of labour. · Transit arrangements based on international standards.	· Trade regime should preferably be based on a Free Trade Area model but can also be based on Most Favored Nation model with sectoral agreements. · Trade in services, investments and labour can be freed gradually. · Transit should preferably be based on door to door movement but can also be based on a modern and efficient back to back system.
SECURITY RELATIONS	· See security above	· See security above
BORDER REGIME	· Palestinians must ensure control over their own border regime.	· Border regime will depend greatly on the security and economic regimes agreed. The preference from the perspective of many files is a more open border regime.
CIVIL AVIATION	· Must comply with Chicago Convention and the 1944 International Air Services Transit Agreement. Palestine will have control of its air traffic.	· Possible joint air traffic control.
ELECTROMAGNETIC SPHERE	· Palestine will have sovereignty and control over the Electromagnetic Sphere (“EMS”) covering OPT/Palestine as this is an essential and non- negotiable element of sovereignty. Any	· Very little room to negotiate limited frequency use by Israel for security purposes. Palestine will consider Israel’s requests and allocate the necessary

	interference re: frequencies will be dealt with at the International Telecommunications Union	frequencies (which will be time limited). Any use will be charged at commercial rates and/or exchanged for use of Israel’s EMS.
OTHER AREAS OF STATE TO STATE RELATIONS	· Please see State-to-State Memorandum	· Flexibility is required in negotiations with respect to tourism, religious sites, archaeological artifacts, monetary affairs, etc.
PRISONERS AND DETAINEES	· Release of all Palestinian detainees and prisoners immediately.	·
IMPLEMENTATION MATTERS
TRANSITIONAL ARRANGEMENTS	· Israel shall continue to provide services to the Palestinian population consistent with its obligations under international law until the end of occupation. · Palestinian Jerusalemites shall receive Palestinian citizenship once Palestine takes control of the area they reside in, and upon full implementation of the Treaty. · All rights and monetary and other benefits accrued under Israel shall be preserved.	·
INFRASTRUCTURE	· Palestine shall have all right, title, interest and control to all water, sewage, electricity and communications installations and equipment in Palestinian territory.	·
INTERNATIONAL ENDORSEMENT AND	· Endorsement of the agreement by the United Nations Security Council	· The precise role and composition of the presence can be agreed in many

SUPERVISION

· International monitoring, verification and supervision needed of most elements of both FAPS and CAPS.

· All international involvement must be coordinated and agreed.

· Guarantees should be built in to the mechanism to ensure Israeli implementation of the agreements, and guard against another Oslo situation.

· An independent commission(s) must be established for dealing with claims by both refugees and those Palestinians who suffered losses due to Israel’s occupation. Details can be set in Treaty.

permutations. Core point is that the presence monitors and guarantees compliance with and implementation of the agreements.

· Similarly, details of the independent commission(s) can be agreed in the CAPS, but Israel’s agreement to their establishment must be secured in the FAPS.

SETTLEMENT OF DISPUTES

· Palestine seeks robust mechanism for settlement of any disputes arising from interpretation and implementation of the FAPS or the Treaty.

· Decisions made in this process must be binding and enforceable.

FINAL CLAUSES

· Israel must not initiate or take any steps that will change the status of the West Bank, including Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip or violate international law.

· All interim or other agreements between the PLO and Israel shall remain in effect until the signature of the CAPS, insofar as they do not contradict the FAPS.

· Parties shall share maps data and other

information relevant to the negotiations.

The PLO demands that Israel release thousands of convicted terrorists to become heroes in a Palestinian state - and that could quickly rebuild terror networks that the PLO can turn a blind eye to, just as they did in the past.

The PLO reiterates that they demand all infrastructure remain intact, including communications. This means that Iran would have easy access to eavesdrop on Israeli wireless communications.

Many of these demands have nothing to do with building an independent, sovereign state - but to hurt Israel. There is essentially no attempt to come up with a solution that would be acceptable to both parties. This third column, on "possible flexibility," says all you need to know about how little the Palestinians truly want peace.

This document proves that peace is not the goal, and it never was. Any US or international pressure on Israel to give up more for "peace" would have the opposite effect because the Palestinian position spelled out here is not to create a strong, viable Palestinian state but to fatally wound the world's only Jewish state.

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