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131. Legal Aspects of the Palestinian Refugee Question

Author:
Ruth Lapidoth
Publication Date:
09-2002
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs
Abstract:
Until September 2000, hopes were high that soon an agreement on the final status of the West Bank and Gaza would pave the way for peaceful coexistence between Israel and the Palestinians. These hopes have unfortunately been shattered, as Palestinians violently attacked Israelis in both the administered territories and in Israel proper, provoking violent reactions by Israel. One could wonder what purpose there is in analyzing legal issues related to a peaceful settlement when violence is the order of the day. If we nevertheless examine some of the legal issues, it is because we have not yet lost hope that sooner or later the guns will be silenced and the parties will return to the negotiating table. The underlying conflict is mainly of a political nature. However, for several reasons it should also be analyzed from a legal perspective. First, some of the questions involved are overwhelmingly of a legal nature. Second, the parties base their claims on legal arguments. And, third, if and when a compromise is reached, it will be drafted in legal terms and be included in a legal text. This is also true of the question of Palestinian refugees.
Topic:
Security and Religion
Political Geography:
Middle East, Israel, Palestine, and Arab Countries

132. Understanding American Christian Attitudes Regarding Jerusalem

Author:
David Raab
Publication Date:
08-2002
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs
Abstract:
The unity and control of Jerusalem have been among the most contentious and complex issues in Israel-Arab relations. Until recently, Israel's stance that Jerusalem would remain under its sole sovereignty as its eternal, undivided, and sole capital was not open to compromise. That position enjoyed near-unanimity among Israelis, the international Jewish community, and Congress.
Topic:
Security and Religion
Political Geography:
America, Middle East, Israel, and Arab Countries

133. The Destruction of the Temple Mount Antiquities

Author:
Mark Ami-El
Publication Date:
08-2002
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs
Abstract:
The Temple Mount in Jerusalem represents the greatest point of sanctity for the Jewish people. King Solomon established the Temple, or Beit Ha-Mikdash, on Mt. Moriah. The Temple had a section known as the Holy of Holies, where the Ark of the Covenant, containing the Ten Commandments and the Torah, was housed. While it stood, Jews were required to make a pilgrimage to Jerusalem three times a year. After the First Temple was destroyed in 586 BCE by the Babylonians, Jewish exiles returned to Jerusalem in 538 BCE and completed the construction of the Second Temple in 515 BCE. Even after the Temple's destruction by Roman armies in 70 CE, the site of the Temple remained the direction of Jewish prayer. The purification of the Temple in Jerusalem is the central theme in the holiday of Hanukkah. Thus, according to Jewish tradition, the sanctity of the Temple Mount area remains intact despite the Temple's destruction. Indeed, Rabbi A.I. Kook, the first Ashkenazi chief rabbi of the pre-state Yishuv, confirmed that the eternal sanctity of the Temple Mount continues to exist.
Topic:
Security and Religion
Political Geography:
Middle East, Jerusalem, and Arab Countries

134. Who Killed Muhammad Al-Dura? Blook Libel — Model 2000

Author:
Amnon Lord
Publication Date:
07-2002
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs
Abstract:
The story of the death of the child Muhammad Al-Dura — who, according to reports from world and local media, was shot and killed by IDF soldiers at Netzarim junction — became the symbol of the intifada: the Palestinian martyr whose blood must be avenged by the Muslim and enlightened world. His death turned into a blood libel accompanying the terror and violence, and it became the altar upon which the good name of the people and the State of Israel was sacrificed during the last two years. The world was flooded with pictures of the dead child. As a result of, among other things, world incitement originating with the mantra: "Israel murders Palestinian children," the UN conference in Durban turned into a frightening anti-Semitic crusade.
Topic:
Security and Religion
Political Geography:
Middle East, Israel, Palestine, and Arab Countries

135. Saudi Arabia, Stability, and International Islamic Terror

Author:
Mordechai Abir
Publication Date:
07-2002
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs
Abstract:
The Persian Gulf is a region of outstanding anomalies and immense energy wealth. About two-thirds of the world's proven energy reserves are located in the Gulf States, foremost in Saudi Arabia (25 percent). As long as the rest of the world requires this energy, its dependence on this region will continue. Yet, the evolving U.S. war against terrorism, coupled with the growth of non-OPEC oil output led by the revived energy industry in Russia and other former Soviet republics, is beginning to erode the coercive power of the Gulf states.
Topic:
Security, Islam, Religion, and Terrorism
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, Middle East, Arab Countries, and Saudi Arabia

136. The Islamic Arab Minority in the Jewish State

Author:
Zeidan Atashi
Publication Date:
06-2002
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs
Abstract:
A summit of religious leaders on the Middle East was held in Alexandria, Egypt, on 20-22 January 2002. The summit was held at the initiative of Dr. George Carey, Archbishop of Canterbury, and more than a dozen senior Muslim, Jewish, and Christian leaders from the Middle East attended, among them rabbis from Israel and sheikhs from Egypt and the Palestinian Authority who had received approval from their governments.
Topic:
Security, Government, Islam, and Religion
Political Geography:
Middle East, Palestine, Arab Countries, Egypt, and Alexandria

137. Israeli Arabs: Expectations and Realities

Author:
Gerald B. Bubis
Publication Date:
05-2002
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs
Abstract:
The riots by Israeli Arabs in October 2000, which took place in conjunction with the outbreak of a renewed wave of Palestinian violence against Israeli Jews, resulted in the deaths of 12 Israeli Arabs (and one from the West Bank) in confrontations with the police. The widespread rioting shocked the Israeli Jewish community and the Arabs even more.
Topic:
Security and Religion
Political Geography:
Middle East, Israel, Palestine, and Arab Countries

138. The Broken Promise of the Democratic Peace: Israel and the Palestinian Authority

Publication Date:
05-2002
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs
Abstract:
The idea of the democratic peace, although not explicitly named, was an essential element of the Oslo Accords. The term "democratic peace" is generally understood to have two components: the assertion that democracies are inherently peaceful, and that they do not, as a rule, wage war against other democracies. This ideal would have represented the most desirable type of final arrangement to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict because it predicates an environment of shared values, of political, social, and economic stability. The issue of the democratic peace is also one of security, because the presence or absence of its main components may ultimately represent the essence of success or failure, peace or war.
Topic:
Security, Religion, and War
Political Geography:
Middle East, Israel, Palestine, Arab Countries, and Oslo

139. Poison: The Use of Blood Libel in the War Against Israel

Author:
Raphael Israeli
Publication Date:
04-2002
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs
Abstract:
On the morning of March 21, 1983, one week before Pesach, in a high school in the town of Arrabeh in the Jenin area of the West Bank, Palestinian girls (between the ages of 15 and 17) were sitting in several classrooms when they suddenly began to faint, one after the other. They were taken to hospital and checked, but no medical reason was found for their fainting. Yet they had fainted, so a search began in order to find the reason.
Topic:
Security, Religion, and War
Political Geography:
Middle East, Israel, Palestine, and Arab Countries

140. Europe's Moral Attitudes Toward the Holocaust in Light of the Current Defamation of Israel

Author:
Manfred Gerstenfeld
Publication Date:
04-2002
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs
Abstract:
The moral aspects of Western attitudes toward the Jews and the Holocaust since World War II have not yet been analyzed systematically. However, the current campaign of hatred against Israel and the Jewish people — unprecedented since the end of the war — recalls many elements of the prewar decades. Yet it is too easy to generalize and describe this as one more outburst of the ancient illness of anti-Semitism.
Topic:
Security, Religion, and War
Political Geography:
Europe, Middle East, Israel, and Arab Countries