INTERNATIONAL LAW AND JERUSALEM - JACQUES PAUL GAUTHIER

INTERNATIONAL LAW AND JERUSALEM - JACQUES PAUL GAUTHIER

Tom's Perspectives

by Thomas Ice

The Bible teaches that God gave to the Jewish people the land of Israel. This is

repeated many times throughout the Bible. God’s viewpoint on this matter is what

ultimately matters since He will at some point in the future implement His will. If God

says something then that settles it, that decree will surely come to pass. However, it is

interesting to note that international law is and has always been on the side of the

reestablishment of the modern state of Israel. Furthermore, the law also supports the

claim that Jerusalem belongs to the Jews and that the Arabs have no legitimate legal

claim upon Judaism’s most holy location.

JACQUES PAUL GAUTHIER

Canadian lawyer Jacques Paul Gauthier recently finished a twenty-year project in

which this Gentile Christian researched at the University of Geneva political science

department and international law school, the legal issues relating to the ownership of

Israel and Jerusalem. Gauthier’s PhD thesis was completed in 2007 and is entitled:

“Sovereignty Over The Old City of Jerusalem.”1 Dr. Gauthier has demonstrated in

painstaking detail in his thesis of over 1,200 pages the following conclusion:

After our examination of the principles of international law pertaining to

belligerent occupation, we have concluded that Israel has the right to occupy

the territories under its control since 1967, including East Jerusalem and its

Old City, until a peace treaty is concluded.2

Since Gauthier’s publication was a PhD thesis, he had to painstakingly document

every opinion or conclusion with legal and historical facts. Had the readers of his thesis

not agreed with the information in his work they would not have accepted Gauthier’s

thesis. This means that Gauthier’s work is the most authoritative opinion covering the

international status of the old city of Jerusalem and the land of Israel. So what is Dr.

Gauthier’s argument?

GREAT BRITAIN’S ROLE

Gauthier notes that the Balfour Declaration of November 2, 1917 did not have the

status of international law, at least not when issued. However, it did become the official

policy of the British government that bound Great Britain to pursue the founding of a

future state of Israel and granting them self-determination. The United Kingdom took

the next step toward founding the Jewish state when General Allenby captured

Jerusalem on December 11, 1917 and then the rest of Palestine (Israel).

On January 3, 1919 Chaim Weizmann, who was the leader and representative of the

Zionist Organization on behalf of the Jewish people, met with Emir Feisal, who

represented the Arab Kingdom of Hedjaz. Included in an agreement that both parties

agreed upon was that the Jewish people should get the land west of the Jordan River

and that the old city of Jerusalem would be under Jewish control.

The Paris Peace Conference began on January 18, 1919 and lasted about six months

in which new borders were decided upon for parts of Europe and the Middle East and

were given the force of international law. The conference was made up of the

victorious Allied powers from World War I. The “Big Four” were made up of the

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United States, Great Britain, France, and Italy. Lord Balfour represented Britain. It was

during the summer of 1919 that Arab opposition began to be voiced against the Feisal-

Weizmann agreement. As a result that aspect of the conference stalled and was never

agreed upon. Nevertheless, Balfour issued the following statement on August 11, 1919:

“The four great powers are committed to Zionism. And Zionism be it right or wrong,

good or bad, is rooted in age long traditions, in present needs in future hopes of far

profounder import than the desire and prejudices of the 700,000 Arabs who now inhabit

that ancient land.”3 The Paris Peace Conference ended without a final solution reached

concerning the status of Palestine, even though there was much discussion about the

matter.

THE SAN REMO CONFERENCE

A meeting to deal specifically with the unfinished business of Palestine, which was

to be seen as an extension of the Paris Peace Conference was commenced on April 19,

1920 in San Remo, Italy. It was attended by the four Principal Allied Powers of World

War I who were represented by the prime ministers of Britain (David Lloyd George),

France (Alexandre Millerand) and Italy (Francesco Nitti) and by Japan's Ambassador K.

Matsui. The San Remo Resolution adopted on April 25, 1920 incorporated the Balfour

Declaration of 1917 issued by the British government. The San Remo resolution and

Article 22 of the Covenant of the League of Nations, which was adopted at the Paris

Peace Conference on April 28, 1919, were the basic documents upon which the British

Mandate for the stewardship of Palestine was constructed. It was at San Remo that the

Balfour Declaration went from being just a statement of British foreign policy to

international law.

The British Mandate was fully implemented upon approval by the Council of the

League of Nations on September 22, 1922. However, when the parties left San Remo in

April 1919 the future state of Israel was to be made up of what now constitutes the

Kingdom of Jordan, as well as all the land West of the Jordan River. After September

22, 1922 what is now the Kingdom of Jordan was taken away from Palestine and

became another Arab nation. This was the beginning of the trend still operative today

that Israel needs to give up more land in order to be promised peace. The reality is that

every time Israel gives up land, she experiences even less peace.

THE MANDATE

On July 1, 1920 the British military administration, which had controlled Palestine

since December 1917, was replaced by a British civil administration covering all of

Palestine on both sides of the Jordan River, with its headquarters in Jerusalem. The

Mandate instructed Great Britain that she would oversee Palestine with the goal of the

establishment of a national home for the Jewish people in Palestine. At the time of the

issuance of the Mandate, it was believed that there were not enough Jews in the land to

establish a nation. Thus, Great Britain was to oversee the immigration of Jews to the

land and when there were enough then Palestine would become the national homeland

for the Jewish people. However, normally, Britain obstructed the goal of developing a

Jewish homeland in Palestine.

As the League of Nations was dissolved in 1946, the United Nations, which was

founded in 1945, began to deal with the Palestine issue. The UN General Assembly

passed a Partition Resolution (Resolution 181) on November 29, 147. This UN

resolution adopted the necessary legal status from the League of Nations needed for

Israel to declare her independence on May 14, 1948. Under 181, the land of Palestine

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was partitioned and part of Palestine was given to the Arabs and the rest was given to

Israel, except Jerusalem was to become an international city. Gauthier tells us, “The

special international regime for the corpus separatum which was to be established on or

prior to October 1, 1948 was to remain in force for a period of ten years. At the end of

that period, ‘the residents of the City shall be . . . free to express by means of a

referendum their wishes as to possible modifications of the regime of the City.’”4 The

Arabs rejected resolution 181 and attacked the Jews resulting in a larger land area for

Israel when the fighting stopped in 1949. Israel’s war for independence also prevented

Jerusalem from becoming an international city. The promised election by October 1959

to determine to whom Jerusalem belonged never took place. There is no doubt that the

city would have voted for Israel if an election had taken place. Thus, all of the legal

rights to the Old City of Jerusalem belong to Israel and the Jews.

CONCLUSION

Gauthier’s work, which I have only provided a glimpse into, demonstrates that both

the land of Israel and the Old City of Jerusalem belong to Israel and the Jews based

upon the standards of international law. When commentators appear on the media

today and start talking about how Israel is violating international law with their

occupation, they are absolutely without any basis in the truth. These advocates for the

Arab occupation of Jewish land have no legal basis to stand. However, that does not

seem to bother them since they are lawless and many hope through jihad to take over

Israel. Most of these spokesmen really do not care about the law, international or

otherwise.

The facts are that both the Bible and even international law says that the land of

Israel and Jerusalem belong to the Jewish people. The fact that many within the

international community know this information means nothing. Today the Gentile

nations are in an uproar, while increasingly clamoring for the extermination of the

nation and people of Israel. Yet, the hand of God’s providence has restored His people

to their land while still primarily in unbelief. We increasingly see the lawless attitudes

of the nations constantly on display as they certainly do not care about God’s Word, nor

do they heed the clear mandates of man-made international law. So it will be in the end,

as at the beginning and throughout her history, that Israel will have to be saved by the

actual hand of God as He interrupts history in order to save His people. Today’s hatred

toward Israel is just a warm-up for the real heat of the furnace of the tribulation, from

which God will redeem the nation of Israel through the coming of Messiah. Since

mankind does not recognize God and His law, nevertheless, He will impose it upon

humanity one day. Maranatha!

ENDNOTES

1 Jacques Paul Gauthier, “Sovereignty Over The Old City of Jerusalem: A Study of the Historical,

Religious, Political and Legal Aspects of the Question of the Old City,” PhD Thesis, University of Geneva

International Law School, 2007).

2 Gauthier, “Sovereignty Over Jerusalem,” p. 848.

3 Cited by Gauthier, “Sovereignty Over Jerusalem,” p. 356 from Documents on British Foreign Policy, 1919–

1939, vol. IV, No. 242, p. 345.

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4 Gauthier, “Sovereignty Over Jerusalem,” pp. 599–600. Citation by Gauthier is from Article D, Part III of

the Partition Resolution.