by Ze'ev Kam, Public "Kan" Radio Commentator and BeSheva Contributor, translated by Hillel Fendel.
Between Declaring Support for Yesha – and Eternalizing it in Israel's Code of Law
This past July, we were witness to an
unusual occurrence in the Israeli Knesset: No fewer than 68 MKs united around
one cause and voted as one in favor of a declaration opposing a Palestinian
state. And this does not mean that "only" 68 MKs feel that way; many
of the other 52 are quite opposed to a Palestinian state, but for political
reasons had to absent themselves for the vote.
Prime Minister Netanyahu has cited this vote since then many times, in announcements that he distributed to the media and also in his speeches. "The Knesset united as one with a great majority," he declared, "against the attempt to dictate to us the establishment of a Palestinian state" – something that would endanger the very existence of the Jewish state.
Behind the scenes, what's fascinating
about this is that the vote has absolutely no legal or practical ramifications.
The declaration against a PLO state is not an official decision by the State of
Israel, and has only symbolic significance. Still, however, it will not be long
before Netanyahu and many others in the coalition government, as well as those
from the opposition who voted for the declaration, will be tested as to how
seriously they meant what they voted for.
Many of are mistakenly inclined believe that if one day, the State of Israel decides to cede parts of Judea and Samaria (Yesha) and give them to an Arab entity, unilaterally or by mutual agreement, the government will be obligated to hold a popular referendum to ascertain if this is the will of the people. After all, it is Israeli law that a referendum must be held in the event that the government wishes to cede territory.
But those many of us are mistaken. This is because the existing law does not
pertain at all to Judea and Samaria, but only to areas that are under total
Israeli sovereignty. Judea and Samaria – as opposed to Jerusalem and the Golan
Heights – are still under IDF administrative control, and have not yet
been upgraded to full Israeli status.
It's true that in the past, the assumption was that any agreement having to do
with Yesha would involve an exchange of territory, meaning that actual parts of
Israel would be given up in exchange for the areas of the Yesha settlement
blocs, and that this would then obligate a referendum.
But there is yet another caveat. As PM Netanyahu explained in 2013 when the Cabinet approved the draft bill, "Any agreement, if it is achieved in negotiations, will be brought as a referendum. It is important that every citizen directly vote on fateful decisions like these." That is, unilateral withdrawals, such as occurred in 2005 from Gush Katif, need not be brought for a referendum.
Who can guarantee that we won't see a
future intiatiative to withdraw unilaterally from some part or other of Yesha?
In such a case, no referendum will be needed! Not to mention areas that are
already under some sort of Palestinian Authority control; ceding them, despite the
tremendous security and other ramifications that will result, will require no
popular vote!
Precisely for that reason, the three
co-chairmen of the Land of Israel lobby in the Knesset – MKs Yuli Edelstein,
Simcha Rotman, and Limor Sohn Har-Melekh – have decided to advance a bill
requiring a referendum in the events listed above. And in order to speed the
process along, they decided not to take the regular, long, winding legislative
route of a "private bill" sponsored by individual MKs. Rather, they arranged
for the the Knesset Law Committee to sponsor it. As such, the Ministerial
Committee for Legislation will not have to review the bill and determine
whether the Government supports it or not, and it can be submitted to the
Knesset immediately for its first reading.
For it is clear that a bill of this
nature will attract unwanted international pressures, just as the bill to
outlaw UNRWA – a full participant in the atrocities of Oct. 7th –
recently did. Although the UNRWA bill passed and is about to be implemented in
full, who's to say that the Yesha referendum bill will have the same success?
Speed is therefore of the essence.
In one of the preparatory Law Committee
sessions for this bill, one of the supportive MKs, Yulia Malinovsky (Yisrael
Beiteinu), said with a sting, "I just hope that the coalition will vote
for this bill, given the people involved. I also hope that the Prime Minister
won't block it, but if he does, he should at least do so in his voice and not
via some emissary." A short time after this session, a senior member of
the coalition announced that certain hareidi party leaders were demanding that
the topic be discussed at the next coalition meeting. This was not the first
time that hareidi representatives take the old Diaspora approach of, "What
will the goyim say?"
But the three Land of Israel heads –
Edelstein, Rotman, and Sohn Har-Melekh – say that they're going ahead with the
bill until someone actively tries to stop them. It's actually a form of a dare,
to see the Prime Minister, or the leader of any coalition party, would be
brazen enough to say that "now is not the time for this bill." This
was actually the very real fear when the above-mentioned declaration against a
PLO state was voted on. Up to the very last hours before the vote, everyone
involved was anxious about some foreign intervention that might suddenly happen
in the form of a phone call from abroad, or that someone from the Prime
Minister's office, or the Prime Minister himself, would abruptly appear saying
that because of Biden, or a feared arms embargo, or the UN Security Council, or
whatever, the vote has to be pushed off.
Of course, in the end, the declaration
passed by a large majority, including even several opposition MKs.
The idea now is to turn that very declaration
into practical law, with real teeth – something that will truly make history.