Tomorrow, the U.N. Security Council, is due to pass a historic resolution that will anchor establishing a Palestinian state in the principles established at the Nov. 2007 Annapolis conference last month’s Sharm el-Sheikh summit.

This will bind the U.N. to compel any future Israeli prime minister to recognize an independent, sovereign Palestinian state.

The policy would also be applied to Likud leader Binyamin Netanyahu, an opponent of establishing a Palestinian state, if he should win the coming elections and become prime minister again.

Mr. Netanyahu’s spokesman told The Bulletin, Mr. Netanyahu vehemently opposes anything except “economic peace” with the Palestinians.

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In countless appearances over the past 25 years, Mr. Netanyahu has warned that an independent Palestinian state would represent an armed threat to all of Israel – even to Israel’s only international airport.

A Palestinian would have a similar striking distance to Israel’s only international airport as to that existing between Gaza and the Israeli cities of Ashkelon or Sderot. The Hamas government in Gaza has used its de facto independence to fire rockets against the two Israeli cities.

In April 2002, after more than 1,000 Israelis were murdered by Palestinian terrorists who infiltrated Israeli cities, the Israeli military launched Operation Defensive Shield. The Israeli army surrounded almost all Palestinian cities and villages in the West Bank and, by 2007, reduced Palestinian terrorist infiltration into Israeli cities to almost zero.

If Israel were to pull its army out of the areas surrounding Palestinian cities and villages and allow for Palestinian independence, the fear of a Palestinian terror threat to all of Israel likely would return.

However, all indications are that the Bush administration intends to make the U.N. resolution for a Palestinian state binding.

President George W. Bush leave office Jan. 20 and pass the reins to his successor, Barack Obama.

Mr. Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice tried to pressure to Israel to agree to recognize an independent Palestinian state by the end of 2008, but without success.

David Bedein can be reached at dbedein@israelbehindthenews.com.

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David Bedein
David Bedein
David Bedein is an MSW community organizer and an investigative journalist.   In 1987, Bedein established the Israel Resource News Agency at Beit Agron to accompany foreign journalists in their coverage of Israel, to balance the media lobbies established by the PLO and their allies.   Mr. Bedein has reported for news outlets such as CNN Radio, Makor Rishon, Philadelphia Inquirer, Los Angeles Times, BBC and The Jerusalem Post, For four years, Mr. Bedein acted as the Middle East correspondent for The Philadelphia Bulletin, writing 1,062 articles until the newspaper ceased operation in 2010. Bedein has covered breaking Middle East negotiations in Oslo, Ottawa, Shepherdstown, The Wye Plantation, Annapolis, Geneva, Nicosia, Washington, D.C., London, Bonn, and Vienna. Bedein has overseen investigative studies of the Palestinian Authority, the Expulsion Process from Gush Katif and Samaria, The Peres Center for Peace, Peace Now, The International Center for Economic Cooperation of Yossi Beilin, the ISM, Adalah, and the New Israel Fund.   Since 2005, Bedein has also served as Director of the Center for Near East Policy Research.   A focus of the center's investigations is The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA). In that context, Bedein authored Roadblock to Peace: How the UN Perpetuates the Arab-Israeli Conflict - UNRWA Policies Reconsidered, which caps Bedein's 28 years of investigations of UNRWA. The Center for Near East Policy Research has been instrumental in reaching elected officials, decision makers and journalists, commissioning studies, reports, news stories and films. In 2009, the center began decided to produce short movies, in addition to monographs, to film every aspect of UNRWA education in a clear and cogent fashion.   The center has so far produced seven short documentary pieces n UNRWA which have received international acclaim and recognition, showing how which UNRWA promotes anti-Semitism and incitement to violence in their education'   In sum, Bedein has pioneered The UNRWA Reform Initiative, a strategy which calls for donor nations to insist on reasonable reforms of UNRWA. Bedein and his team of experts provide timely briefings to members to legislative bodies world wide, bringing the results of his investigations to donor nations, while demanding reforms based on transparency, refugee resettlement and the demand that terrorists be removed from the UNRWA schools and UNRWA payroll.   Bedein's work can be found at: www.IsraelBehindTheNews.com and www.cfnepr.com. A new site,unrwa-monitor.com, will be launched very soon.

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