The LA Times gave op-ed space to Professor Saree Makdisi (pictured), who wonders why the newspaper, or anyone else, should recognize Israel. This convoluted mix of legal jargon and sheer stupidity seeks to muddy the waters:
First, the formal diplomatic language of “recognition” is traditionally used by one state with respect to another state. It is literally meaningless for a non-state to “recognize” a state. Moreover, in diplomacy, such recognition is supposed to be mutual. In order to earn its own recognition, Israel would have to simultaneously recognize the state of Palestine. This it steadfastly refuses to do (and for some reason, there are no high-minded newspaper editorials demanding that it do so).
Second, which Israel, precisely, are the Palestinians being asked to “recognize?” Israel has stubbornly refused to declare its own borders. So, territorially speaking, “Israel” is an open-ended concept. Are the Palestinians to recognize the Israel that ends at the lines proposed by the 1947 U.N. Partition Plan? Or the one that extends to the 1949 Armistice Line (the de facto border that resulted from the 1948 war)? Or does Israel include the West Bank and East Jerusalem, which it has occupied in violation of international law for 40 years — and which maps in its school textbooks show as part of “Israel”?
Israel’s borders don’t need to be defined as a pre-condition for recognition. Israel and the Palestinians recognized each other by signing the Oslo accords. A peace process was supposed to lead to final borders afterwards.
For more on Professor Makdisi, a UCLA professor and nephew of the late Professor Edward Said, see our colleagues at CAMERA.
