TheWeekInCongress

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Week Ending July 16, 2004

House Resolution 713 deploring the misuse of the International Criminal Court of Justice by Plurality of the UN General Assembly for narrow political purposes.

BRIEF

The Resolution concerns itself with the Israel / Palestinian ‘conflict’ by first establishing that President Bush has anointed Israel with the right to defend itself “Israel must not feel constrained in terms of defending the homeland.” (October 2003). The Resolution also notes the UN charter recognizing the inherent right of all nations to self-defense and other UN resolutions regarding countries defending themselves against terrorism.

That having been established the Resolution holds that the ‘barrier’ Israel has built between territories it occupies and those occupied by Palestinians is one that can be ‘modified or removed’, is in response to ‘an ongoing campaign of terror’ and has ‘resulted in a dramatic decline in the number of successful terrorist attacks.’

The Resolution says that ‘Whereas on December 8, 2003, the United Nations General Assembly adopted, through a plurality rather than a majority vote of member nations, Resolution ES-10/14 which requested the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to render an

opinion on the legality of the security barrier’ and that 23 nations objected to the ICJ hearing the case. Then, about 6 months later the Israeli Supreme Court called on the Government of Israel to ‘take Palestinian humanitarian concerns further into account in the construction of the barrier, even if doing so resulted in greater security risk to Israeli citizens, and accordingly required the Government to alter the route of a specific portion of the barrier near Jerusalem in order to accommodate Palestinian humanitarian concerns;.’ The Resolution says that Israel ‘immediately stated that it would respect the decision…and has taken action to implement that decision.’

Less than one month later the ICJ decided that the ‘barrier’ was built outside the pre-June 1967 boundaries establishing the extent to which Israel could expand and therefore is illegal.

The Resolution gets a little vague at this point, but goes on to note that two days after the ICJ decision some Israelis were killed by Palestinians and then says that Palestinians are attempting to use the ICJ advisory judgment (it is non-binding, just advisory) to

‘advance their positions on issues committed to negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians by advancing resolutions in the UN General Assembly, the Security Council or elsewhere for the removal of the barrier and for the imposition of sanctions to force Israel to comply with the advisory judgment.’

Considering that President Bush said the ICJ should not have agreed to decide a ‘political issue…that should, rather, be resolved between Israel and the Palestinians’ the House resolves to continue its steadfast commitment to the security of Israel and its right to self-defense and condemns the Palestinian leadership for ‘failing to carry out its responsibilities under the Roadmap and under other obligations it has assumed to engage in sustained fight against terrorism…’

The House calls on Palestinians and all states in the region and beyond to join together to fight terrorism and dismantle terrorist organizations,

Sponsor: Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN-6^th)

Vote: Passed House 36 to 45 with 13 voting Present (RC 378) (July 15, 2004)