NZ Friends of Israel Association Inc
Fighting racial intolerance in New Zealand and beyond
In a critical blow to Prime Minister Naftali Bennett‘s government late Monday, the coalition failed to pass a directive giving Israel legal jurisdiction over Israelis living in the West Bank that has been approved every five years since 1967.
Opposition MKs applauded following the announcement of the results that the vote fell with 52 votes for it and 58 against it. Failure of the bill led to immediate speculation that the government will soon fall and Israel will head to a new election.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
22 November 2019 CHRISTCHURCH, NEW ZEALAND — NZ Friends of Israel welcomes the US announcement on Monday November 18, that acknowledges that Israel’s settlements in Judea and Samaria (also known as the West Bank) are not illegal.
Most international law opinions that suggest otherwise are based on a misapplication of the Fourth Geneva Convention which was never written with the Middle Eastern situation in mind. The original convention expected that the land of a sovereign state was being occupied by another sovereign state.
This is not the case with the lands of the Middle East. Following the fall of the Ottoman Empire and the end of the Second World War, there was no legitimate sovereign over the disputed lands.
The US announcement affirms the fact that Jews have always been indigenous to the region and are not foreign colonizers.
With the resurgence of anti-Semitism in many countries of the world, the foresight and wisdom of the League of Nations in mandating the establishment of a Jewish homeland, is unfortunately being vindicated.
NZ Friends of Israel (www.nzfoi.org, contact@nzfoi.org, ph 027 433 9745) is a registered charity that fights racial prejudice and intolerance by raising awareness of Jewish history and culture.
ENDS
In remarks to reporters at the State Department, he said the administration was overturning actions taken late in the Obama administration, which for the first time declined to veto a United Nations resolution calling for the dismantlement of West Bank settlements.
Instead, Pompeo said, the administration said it was returning to policy under the administration of Ronald Reagan, who declined to characterize settlements as illegal but called them “ill-advised” and an obstacle to peace.
Benjamin Netanyahu
…To our shame, New Zealand has fallen into line with the anti-Israel bloc. Last year, we supported 16 of the 19 UN resolutions that condemned the Jewish state.
This is perplexing, because according to the international Democracy Index compiled by the British magazine The Economist, Israel remains the only democracy in the Middle East.
The same UN is often strangely silent when it comes to atrocities perpetrated by Arabs, but that’s international diplomacy for you. Diplomats, including our own, do whatever political self-interest dictates.
Protesters oppose the evacuation and deconstruction of the Netiv HaAvot settlement outpost
JERUSALEM (AP) — Israeli police on Tuesday evicted Jewish settlers from 15 homes built illegally on private Palestinian land in the West Bank.
Police said some 500 protesters demonstrated against the eviction, with some throwing stones and bottles at police and several dozen barricading themselves in one house. Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said six officers were wounded in the scuffles and that police arrested three protesters.
After the eviction, Israeli forces are expected to demolish the structures in the Netiv HaAvot unauthorized outpost. The government says it will compensate the residents and rebuild their homes on nearby lands that are not privately owned.
Israel’s Supreme Court ordered the eviction in 2016, saying the homes were illegally built on private Palestinian land while not determining the precise ownership of the land. A law passed last year legalizing dozens of settler outposts in the West Bank is currently being challenged at the High Court.
JERUSALEM (AP) — Israeli banks are helping build West Bank settlements in violation of international law by providing financial services to home buyers and local councils, Human Rights Watch said in a new report published Tuesday.
The report said that bank activities in or with settlements have helped encourage settlement growth and “contribute to rights abuses” against Palestinians. It added that Israeli banks, and international banks doing business with them, may be engaging in pillage, by acquiring ownership interests in housing projects on seized land.
Because of an Israeli law limiting the amount of money developers can collect from buyers in advance, banks often become direct partners in settlement projects, Human Rights Watch says.
