Legal Grounds, a homegrown organization that promotes and defends Israel's legal rights to owning territorial land, has challenged European Union Ambasador Lars Faaborg-Andersen to a debate, following his statements casting doubts on the legality of Israel's settlements. The envoy to Israel had remarked in a conference that the settlements lacked international sanction and were a block to the peace process.
In a report covered by Israel National News, Legal Grounds contested Andersen's expressed opinion as unfounded and uninformed. The organization then laid out a strong invitation for him to engage in public debate Northwestern University professor Eugene Kontorovich, a respected consultant in an Israeli think tank who has also gained prominence for his expertise in international law.
Legal Grounds also took the position that the EU official position on the Israeli settlements that Andersen was espousing contradicted agreements established at the United Nations which recognized Israel's legal rights. It released the following statement: "These rights were recognized unequivocally by the League of Nations, and reaffirmed in Chapter 80 of the UN Charter. Moreover, the EU stance runs contrary to its previous commitment implicit in its having witnessed and signed Oslo II, an agreement based on stipulations by UN resolutions 242 and 338 that Israel is entitled to 'secure and recognized' borders."
In a related report by Israel Today, Harel Amon, another expert on international law, gave the background of Israel's occuption of the Judea and Samaria lands before the Knesset. He said that when Israel occupied these disputed areas in the 1960s, they were "a territory without a sovereign." Under international law and as approved by the Geneva Convention, the Great Britain's turning over of its rights to the United Nations in 1948 was prompted by one motive: to facilitate the rebirth of the Israel homeland. This apparently made the occupation of the Palestinians in the concerned areas illegitimate.
This issue is far from resolved, even if the debate happens. One breaking news reported by the Middle East Monitor has the United Nations Commission on Human Rights' recent investtagiion into the violations committed against Palestinians by Israelis in their supposedly illegal settlements.
