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Israel Follows Its Own Law, Not Bigoted Hague Court Decision (Alan Dershowitz Nails It!)
Jerusalem Post ^ | 07/11/04 | Alan Dershowitz

Posted on 07/10/2004 4:43:08 PM PDT by goldstategop

Israel follows its own law, not bigoted Hague decision By ALAN DERSHOWITZ

The Israeli government has both a legal and a moral obligation to comply with the Israeli Supreme Court's decision regarding the security fence.

After all, the Supreme Court is a creation of the Knesset and is therefore representative of all of the people – Jews, Muslims, and Christians alike. Moreover, the Supreme Court has a real stake in both sides of the fence dispute. Its job is to balance the security needs of its citizens against the humanitarian concerns of West Bank Palestinians. It tried to strike that balance by upholding the concept of a security fence while insisting that the Israeli military authorities give due weight to the needs of the Palestinians, even if that requires some compromise on the security of Israelis.

Contrast this with the questionable status of the International Court of Justice in The Hague. No Israeli judge may serve on that court as a permanent member, while sworn enemies of Israel serve among its judges, several of whom represent countries that do not abide by the rule of law. Virtually every democracy voted against that court's taking jurisdiction over the fence case, while nearly every country that voted to take jurisdiction was a tyranny. Israel owes the International Court absolutely no deference. It is under neither a moral nor a legal obligation to give any weight to its predetermined decision.

The Supreme Court of Israel recognized the unquestionable reality that the security fence has saved numerous lives and promises to save more, but it also recognized that this benefit must be weighed against the material disadvantages to West Bank Palestinians. The International Court, on the other hand, discounted the saving of lives and focused only on the Palestinian interests. By showing its preference for Palestinian property rights over the lives of Jews, the International Court displayed its bigotry.

The International Court of Justice is much like a Mississippi court in the 1930s. The all-white Mississippi court, which excluded blacks from serving on it, could do justice in disputes between whites, but it was incapable of doing justice in cases between a white and a black. It would always favor white litigants. So, too, the International Court. It is perfectly capable of resolving disputes between Sweden and Norway, but it is incapable of doing justice where Israel is involved, because Israel is the excluded black when it comes to that court – indeed when it comes to most United Nations organs.

A judicial decision can have no legitimacy when rendered against a nation that is willfully excluded from the court's membership by bigotry.

Just as the world should have disregarded any decision against blacks rendered by a Mississippi court in the 1930s, so too should all decent people contemptuously disregard the bigoted decisions of the International Court of Justice when it comes to Israel. To give any credence to the decisions of that court is to legitimize bigotry.

The International Court of Justice should be a court of last resort to which aggrieved litigants can appeal when their own country's domestic courts are closed to them. The Israeli Supreme Court is not only open to all Israeli Arabs, but also to all West Bank and Gaza Arabs. Israel's Supreme Court is the only court in the Middle East where an Arab can actually win a case against his government.

The decision of the International Court of Justice against Israel should harm the reputation of that court in the minds of objective observers rather than damage the credibility of Israel. The Israeli government will comply with the rule of law by following the decision of its own Supreme Court.

If the International Court of Justice were itself to apply the rule of law instead of the calculus of politics, it might deserve respect. Now – like the general assembly of which it's a creation and the Mississippi courts of the 1930s of which it's a clone – all it deserves is the contempt of decent people for its bigoted processes and its predetermined partisan result.

Prof. Dershowitz wrote this article the day before the International Court rendered this opinion because he was certain – based on the composition of the court – that its verdict would be against Israel. Following the decision he did not have to change a single word.

Alan Dershowitz is a professor of law at Harvard.


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Crime/Corruption; Editorial; Foreign Affairs; Government; Israel; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: alandershowitz; antisemitism; bigotry; dershowitz; icj; israel; ruleoflaw; securityfence
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Alan Dershowitz argues the International Court Of Justice's ruling on the security fence is illegitimate due to the composition of the court - no Israelis have ever been allowed to serve upon it, its deliberations are in the service of a predetermined outcome, and it has no jurisdiction since Israel doesn't deny Arabs a hearing before its OWN courts. In other woeds, yes, the ICJ is a band of Jew-haters acting to further a bigoted agenda against the Jewish State. Dershowitz had written his article a day before he submitted his article to the Jerusalem Post and sure enough didn't have to change a single word of it. Israel as a country can't expect to find justice in a UN permeated through and through by anti-semitism manifested both in the organization's attitude as well as in the exclusion of Jews, not just Israelis, from serving in any of its organs. The ICJ's decision is more a verdict on the bias of the world than it is a judgment on the short-comings of Israel.
1 posted on 07/10/2004 4:43:09 PM PDT by goldstategop
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To: goldstategop

The serving members of the World Court should be required to take up residence in the area when the barrier is removed!


2 posted on 07/10/2004 5:02:17 PM PDT by dvan
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To: goldstategop

A better argument is that:

1. National courts are organs of sovereign governments.

2. The UN is not sovereign

3. UN or supernational courts then are really arbitration not courts of a sovereign entity.

4. Arbitration is a voluntary situation. Israel did not submit this to or agree to arbitration and is thus not bound.


3 posted on 07/10/2004 5:02:20 PM PDT by JLS
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To: dvan

And on the front line~!


4 posted on 07/10/2004 5:05:12 PM PDT by Kackikat
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To: Kackikat

How about moving the World Court to Gaza? Or perhaps to a Jerusalem bus?


5 posted on 07/10/2004 5:12:39 PM PDT by Slings and Arrows (Am Yisrael Chai!)
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To: goldstategop

Dershowitz is a nut on just about every US domestic matter, but he nails it here!


6 posted on 07/10/2004 5:20:25 PM PDT by wagglebee
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To: zip

ing


7 posted on 07/10/2004 5:32:52 PM PDT by Mrs Zip
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To: goldstategop

And this from the people who still have a Magino line operating and the Great Wall of China as a cultural epithet at the Mongols and the 3 Gorges Dam as a symbol of their ideological dam against truth - ready to burst.


8 posted on 07/10/2004 6:21:24 PM PDT by JudgemAll
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To: Slings and Arrows
"How about moving the World Court to Gaza? Or perhaps to a Jerusalem bus?"

I have long advocated moving the UNHQ and World Court to Mogadishu.

9 posted on 07/10/2004 6:25:34 PM PDT by Joe 6-pack ("We deal in hard calibers and hot lead." - Roland Deschaines)
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To: wagglebee

What is scary is that Dersh is actualy asking for Israel to participate in that court. That would be subsidising the court's legitimacy while it could still continue as a Soviet type court, making Jews equal but Zionism forbiden, as a catch 22.


10 posted on 07/10/2004 6:27:14 PM PDT by JudgemAll
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To: goldstategop

dersh does good!


11 posted on 07/10/2004 6:29:38 PM PDT by dennisw (Once is Happenstance. Twice is Coincidence. The third time is Enemy action. - Ian Fleming)
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To: goldstategop

Dershowitz is right about the World Court but I disagree about the Israeli Supreme Court. Like our courts Israel's courts frequently overstep their authority.


12 posted on 07/10/2004 6:40:41 PM PDT by Honestfreedom
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To: Mrs Zip
P

I found this on the floor. Did you drop it?

13 posted on 07/10/2004 6:45:10 PM PDT by LuigiBasco (It's past time to restart The Crusades.)
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To: dvan


2000 years ago a homeless, terroist entered Jerusalem to tell all fellow Jews, who had ears, that God was going to simplify the process of evolving into a real, humane being (Mench).

All previouse commandments seemed beyond the capabilities of the Isrealites. He made a new covenant with God on behalf of all people. The new, SINGLE comandment was indeed very difficult to follow, but it IS truley simple: Love thy neighbour as you love thyself.

The man was confined, humiliated, tortured, and killed. His church was destroyed, and is lost to the ages, and to this day no-one preaches or follows this man.

Not one single Jew or Gentile is able to follow this simple commandment further than his front door. Perhaps it is not as simple as he thought.

Love,
Brian


14 posted on 07/10/2004 6:53:25 PM PDT by The Maanagement
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To: goldstategop

Hey Alan, who you gonna vote for?


15 posted on 07/10/2004 6:59:05 PM PDT by aculeus
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To: JLS

I agree with your analysis. Dershowitz does not because he maintains the socialist yearning for a super-national authority which can impose the elite's agenda over an unwilling population with a patina of legitimacy (much as the EU Parliament and bureaucracy is now doing).


16 posted on 07/10/2004 6:59:43 PM PDT by Faraday
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To: goldstategop

Then I guess it is okay for the US to follow our own law and let's get out of the UN NOW...I happen to agree with the Dersh on this one...now we should go and do likewise


17 posted on 07/10/2004 7:15:14 PM PDT by jnarcus
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To: JLS

Let the world court go and live with the wild terrorists.
They need a good dose of it.


18 posted on 07/10/2004 7:20:21 PM PDT by tessalu
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To: Faraday

Yeah, certainly Dershowitz is a traditional lefty suffering right now with how to remain a lefty yet not see another Holocaust that will make the previous one look tame and as you say maintain his belief in International Organizations.

Now sovereignty and who has it is somewhat arbitrary. But I guess the UN does not have it because the people did not grant it to the UN. Anyway Dershowitz seems close to what some have called for here, a supernation organization of free peoples.

This seems like a good idea. Restrict the membership to those who have some kind of representative government? But does a one party state like Mexico get included? Is this used to undermine the US Electoral College systems as unrepresentative????


19 posted on 07/10/2004 7:49:05 PM PDT by JLS
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To: goldstategop
If the International Court of Justice were itself to apply the rule of law instead of the calculus of politics, it might deserve respect. Now – like the general assembly of which it's a creation and the Mississippi courts of the 1930s of which it's a clone – all it deserves is the contempt of decent people for its bigoted processes and its predetermined partisan result.

Precisely.
20 posted on 07/10/2004 7:58:26 PM PDT by KangarooJacqui (Free Republic = FRiends around America, and FRiends across the world!)
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