[NYTr] 60th Anniv of UN Partition of Palestine; Issa Nakhleh (1915-2003)

[All the News That Doesn't Fit]

My Dear Palestinian Friends:


On this the Sixtieth Anniversary of the adoption of the infamous
Partition Resolution by the United Nations General Assembly,  let us
never forget the heroic efforts by my colleague, friend and fellow
attorney Issa Nakhleh to prevent it-- and  to preserve and protect  and
defend his beloved Palestine.

May God hold Issa in the Palm of His Hand!

Professor Francis A. Boyle

                              ***

Issa Nakhleh  (1915-2003)

Senior Advisor UN Palestinian Delegation
the Arab Higher Committee for Palestine
(December 14, 1915 - March 29, 2003)

Biographical Scetch

ISSA NAKHLEH was a Palestinian Christian, born in the Shepherd's Field
in Palestine. He was a graduate of the London University (LL.B. ) and a
Barrister at Law of the on our able Society of Lincoln's Inn, London. He
was a member of the Palestine Bar and a member of many Bar associations
in the Arab World.

He represented the Arab Higher Committee for Palestine in New York City
1947-1948. He was a Representative of The League of Arab States in
Latiin America, with an office in Buenos Aires, Argentina 1956-1957,
with the rank of Minister Plenipotentiary.

For the last 40 years Issa Nakhleh was representing the Arab Higher
Committee for Palestine in New York City. He attended more than forty
sessions of the United Nations General Assembly and made more than fifty
speeches in the Special Political Committee of the United Nations on the
Problem of Palestine.

Issa Nakhleh is the author of the Encyclopedia of the Palestine Problem
in two volumes which is the subject of this website. It has 41 Chapters
and 1091 pages, with voluminous footnotes and 60 pages of photos. It
deals with the ancient and modern history of Palestine, the political
and religious questions and all United Nations Resolutions and the
Principles of International Law and Justice relating to the Palestine
Question.

He was a member of ASIL (American Society of International Law) and the
International Law Association of London. He was a Panelist about Self
-Determination in the Case of Palestine in the 82nd Annual Meeting of
ASIL, April 30-23, 1988. He took part in a panel about the Israeli -
Palestinian Dispute in the Annual Conference of the American Bar
Association held in Chicago in August, 1990. 

Issa Nakhleh was a Legal Advisor to a number of Arab Delegations to the
United Nations. 

                            ***

Palestine Encyclopedia
http://www.palestine-encyclopedia.com/EPP/Start.htm

Foreword

by Francis A. Boyle (email: fboyle (at) law.uiuc.edu)
Professor of International Law
University of Illinois College of Law 

[Publisher's note: the reader may be interested in professor Boyle's
2003 book "Palestine, Palestinians, and International Law." SEE:
http://www.bookmasters.com/clarity/b0021.htm ]

The December 1987 beginning of the massive uprising or Intifada by
Palestinian youths on what heretofore had been called the West Bank,
Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem, as well as in Israel itself, was a
natural reaction to what they perceived to be the tragic plight of
hopelessness, oppression, desperation and injustice that bas been
inflicted upon the Palestinian people since at least 1947. It is the
generation of the sons who had been born and grown up during Israeli
occupation that decided to discard the seemingly collaborationist
policies of their fathers by rising up to cast off Israeli oppression.
The entire world has now witnessed the awesome manifestation of their
justifiable rage. 

According to the Chicago based Human Rights Research and Education
Foundation, from December 9, 1987 through December 8, 1989, the first
two years of the Intifada, 824 Palestinians were killed by Israeli
soldiers and/or Jewish settlers. Of these 176 were children under
sixteen years of age, and 71 of them were women and girls. 598 of them
were shot, including 121 children under sixteen years of age and 29
women and girls. 55 Palestinians were killed by beating, burning or
stoning, 84 were killed by teargas, and 87 by other means. Several
hundred women have suffered fetal deaths and miscarriages caused by
Israeli teargas and beatings. In addition 13 men died while being
tortured in prison. 80,000 Palestinians were seriously injured. 

More than 50,000 Palestinians have been arrested, over 1,000 of them
women, and at least 14,000 Palestinians are being held in Israeli
prisons and concentration camps. 8,500 Palestinians have been
administratively detained. 55 Palestinians were placed under town
arrests. 58 Palestinian leaders, journalists and professionals were
expelled. 6,237 curfew days have been imposed on Palestinian towns and
villages in the West Bank and Gaza. 1,225 Palestinian homes have been
demolished or sealed, leaving 11,000 people homeless. 77,698 mature
olive and fruit trees have been uprooted. 

The Intifada has been a time of terrible tragedy and great suffering for
the Palestinian people. And yet, paradoxically, it has also proven to be
the time of their greatest glory, an affirmation of their essential
dignity as an independent people. As a result of these elemental
processes, the United Leadership of the Intifada requested the Palestine
Liberation Organization (PLO) to proclaim the existence of a new state
of Palestine in recognition of the courage, suffering and bravery of the
Palestinian people living under Israeli occupation. On July 31, 1988,
the creation of a Palestinian state became an inevitability when King
Hussein of Jordan announced that he was terminating all forms of
administrative and legal ties with what he called the West Bank.If the
PLO had not then acceded to the Intifada's request for statehood, the
PLO would have forfeited the moral and legal right to lead the
Palestinian people as their sole and legitimate representative.

On November 15, 1988, the independent state of Palestine was proclaimed
by the Palestine National Council, meeting in Algiers, by avote of 253
to 46, as well as in front of Al-Aksa Mosque in Jerusalem, the capital
of the new state, after the close of prayers. I will not bother here to
discuss at great length the legal basis for the Palestinian people to
proclaim their own state. However, there are four elements constituent
of a state: territory, population, government, and the capacity to enter
into relations with other states. All four characteristics have been
satisfied by the newly proclaimed independent state of Palestine. 

Indeed, as long ago as 1919 the Palestinian people were provisionally
recognized as an independent nation by the League of Nations in League
Covenant article 22(4) as well as by the 1922 Mandate for Palestine that
was awarded to Great Britain. This provisional recognition continues
into effect until today because of the conservatory clause found in
article 80(1) of the United Nations Charter. Pursuant to the basic right
of selfdetermination of peoples as recognized by U.N. Charter article
1(2) as well as by the International Court of Justice in the Namibia and
Western Sahara Advisory Opinions, the Palestinian people have proceeded
to proclaim their own independent state in the land they have
continuously occupied for thousands of years.

1. Territory. The territory of a state does not have to be fixed and
determinate. Thus, the state of Palestine does not have to have declared
borders. 

2. Population. In occupied Palestine, there lives the population of the
Palestinian people; they have lived there forever, since time
immemorial. They are the original inhabitants and occupants of this
territory. They are fixed and determinate and so they definitely
constitute a distinguishable population. They have always been in
possession of their land and are therefore entitled to create a state
therein. 

3. Government. During the course of his various public pronouncements at
Geneva in December of 1988, Yasir Arafat stated that currently the PLO
is serving as the Provisional Government of the state of Palestine.
Acting in conjunction with the United Leadership of the Intifada, this
Provisional Government already controls substantial sections of occupied
Palestine as well as the entire populace of occupied Palestine. It is
thus already exercising effective control over large amounts of
territory and people, and is providing basic administrative functions
and social services to the Palestinian people living in occupied
Palestine and abroad. This is all that is required for there to be a
fulfillment of this criterion for statehood under international law.