A practical line: The line of withdrawal from Lebanon and its potential applicability to the Golan heights

Middle East Journal

Volumn 55, Issue 1, 2001, Pages 23-39

  Hof, Frederic C ^a  

^a NONE

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EID: 0035649368     PISSN: 00263141     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: None     Document Type: Article

References (54)

1. For a history of security and water-related controversies in the Lebanon-Israel frontier, see Frederic C. Hof, Galilee Divided: The Israel-Lebanon Frontier, 1916-1984 (Boulder: Westview Press, 1985).
2. "There were very few points of contention between Lebanon and Israel and hardly any disagreements as to the character of the desired settlement. Both agreed that the international border should serve as the armistice line, and that with the signing of the agreement, Israel would withdraw from Lebanese territory." Yemima Rosenthal, ed., Documents on the Foreign Policy of Israel, Volume 3 (Jerusalem: State of Israel, 1983), p. XXII-XXIII.
3. The text of the General Armistice Agreement is found in United Nations Security Council Document S/1296/Rev. 1.
4. The full text of resolution 425 and related resolutions 426 and 427 may be found at the United Nations website: www.un.org/documents.
5. Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs web site: www.mfa.gov.il/mfa.
6. The Secretary-General reported, in paragraph 22 of U.N. Security Council Document S/12620/ ADD.5 of 13 June 13 1978, that "On 13 June, the Israeli forces withdrew from the remaining occupied areas in Southern Lebanon. The withdrawal process was verified by six teams of United Nations military observers." On the following day the Secretary-General, as reported in Security Council Document S/12738 of 14 June 1978, would complain to the Israeli Minister of Foreign Affairs that Israeli forces had not turned over the evacuated areas to UNIFIL. A review of UN reporting pertaining to the transfer of authority in the southern Lebanese security zone from Israeli forces to an Israeli surrogate Lebanese militia yields the conclusion that the precise trace of the ADL was not, in 1978, an issue.
7. Interview with the author, UN Headquarters, New York, 30 August 2000.
8. Ze'ev Schiff, "Thin Blue Line," Ha'aretz (internet edition), 23 June 2000.
9. Schiff, "Thin Blue Line."
10. An English language text of the National Reconciliation (Ta'if) Accord may be found in Habib C. Malik, Between Damascus and Jerusalem: Lebanon and the Middle East (Washington: The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, 1997), p. 113-123.
11. Interview with the author, 30 August 2000.
12. Security Council Document S/2000/460, "Report of the Secretary-General on the Implementation of Security Council Resolutions 425 (1978) and 426 (1978)," 22 May 2000.
13. "Report of the Secretary-General."
14. "Report of the Secretary-General."
15. "Report of the Secretary-General."
16. "Report of the Secretary-General."
17. "Report of the Secretary-General."
18. Rosalyn Higgins, United Nations Peacekeeping, 1946-1967: Documents and Commentary (London: Royal Institute of International Affairs, 1969), p. 176-177.
19. Interview with the author. There was also a detailed Anglo-French demarcation in 1940-1941. Pinther stated that he visited the archives in both countries, but that neither he nor his hosts had been aware of this demarcation, a partial report of which may be found in Patricia Toye, ed., Palestine Boundaries 1833-1947 (Oxford: University of Durham Press, 1983), p. 584-591. Although the Secretary-General would tell the Security Council on May 22, 2000 that "The parties have cooperated with the United Nations in the process of gathering cartographic information . . . . ," Pinther affirmed during the author's interview that, "Except for the case of Al-Ghajar and a 1:50,000 UNIFIL map on which they used satellite imagery to block out and highlight their version of the Israel-Lebanon boundary, we received no documentary or cartographic material from Israel."
20. United Nations Security Council Document S/2000/718, "Report of the Secretary-General on the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (for the period from 17 January to 17 July 2000)," 20 July 2000.
21. See, for example, Boaz Bismut, Itamar Eichner and Amir Rappoport, "Israel and UN to Delineate Border with Lebanon," Yedioth Ahronoth, 21 April 2000, p. 3. According to this report, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak directed his "special aide" Moshe Kochanovski "to head a committee which would determine the international border. The committee, in which senior military officers also participated, traveled the 120 kilometers of the Israel-Lebanon border and mapped the area." According to a security establishment source, "it is practically impossible to determine where exactly the border passes according to the original 1923 maps, since the line was demarcated in thick pencil, covering, in the field, dozens of meters." According to the authors' sources, "44 kilometers of the [1923] border are being disputed."
22. See Gal Luft, "Securing Northern Israel Following an IDF Withdrawal from Southern Lebanon" in Patrick Clawson and Michael Eisenstadt, eds, The Last Arab-Israeli Battlefield? Implications of an Israeli Withdrawal from Lebanon (Washington: The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, 2000), p. 121.
23. See "Lahoud's Latest Memo to Annan" in The Daily Star (Beirut), Internet edition, 12 June 2000.
24. Interview with the author, 30 August 2000.
25. Interview with the author, 30 August 2000.
26. Interview with the author, 30 August 2000.
27. Mike Ginsberg, originally of Brooklyn, New York. See Arieh O'Sullivan, "Forsaken on the Frontier," The Jerusalem Post (intenet edition), 5 June 2000.
28. According to Akiva Eldar of Ha'aretz, a working paper drafted by Yitzhak Lior, Foreign Ministry Assistant Director-General for International Organizations, implied that Israeli houses in Misgav Am and Manara would have to be destroyed in order to restore the boundary. See Akiva Eldar, Ha'aretz Features (Internet edition), 6 April 2000. According to Amos Harel, "no one in the defense establishment is willing to accept the Lebanese map, certainly not if it means evacuating homes in Misgav Am." Amos Harel, Ha'aretz Features (Internet edition), 29 March 2000. The westward expansion of Misgav Am in Lebanon - "unconfirmed" according to the UN - was an accepted fact in Israel.
29. According to Akiva Eldar of Ha'aretz, a working paper drafted by Yitzhak Lior, Foreign Ministry Assistant Director-General for International Organizations, implied that Israeli houses in Misgav Am and Manara would have to be destroyed in order to restore the boundary. See Akiva Eldar, Ha'aretz Features (Internet edition), 6 April 2000. According to Amos Harel, "no one in the defense establishment is willing to accept the Lebanese map, certainly not if it means evacuating homes in Misgav Am." Amos Harel, Ha'aretz Features (Internet edition), 29 March 2000. The westward expansion of Misgav Am in Lebanon -"unconfirmed" according to the UN - was an accepted fact in Israel.
30. Nicholas Blanford, "UN Line Gives Border Strip to Israel; Kibbutz Violates Frontier - So Annan Moves Frontier," The Daily Star (Internet edition), June 30, 2000.
31. According to Akiva Eldar, "Should Ehud Barak not lose his nerve and go ahead with his delared intention to withdraw IDF troops . . . [m]embers of Kibbutz Manara and Kibbutz Misgav Am will soon be involved in a replay of the 1982 Yamit evacuation drama." Eldar, op. cit.
32. Blanford, "UN Line Gives Border Strip to Israel."
33. The English language text of the Anglo-French Boundary Commission Report, 3 February 1922 may be found in Frederic C. Hof, Line of Battle, Border of Peace? The Line of June 4, 1967 (Washington: Middle East Insight, Inc., 1999), pp. 32-37.
34. Security Council Document S/7440, Annex B, 17 July 1966.
35. S/2000/460.
36. S/2000/460.
37. The author is indebted to Professor Moshe Brawer of Tel Aviv University, who provided him a photocopy of the map in question and a photocopy of a second map, produced in 1945 by the Free French Geographic Service, which places the Shab'a Farms inside Syria. A hypothesis worth exploring is that sometime in the 1930s - perhaps in connection with the abortive independence discussions between France, Lebanon and Syria - the Lebanon-Syria line was adjusted by running it up along the Hasbani River and then to the northeast, leaving Wadi Al-Aasal and the Shab'a Farms completely within Syria. In a telephone conversation with the author on 11 September 2000 UN Chief Cartographer Pinther confirmed that the single map submitted by Lebanon in support of its claim to Shab'a Farms used Wadi Al-Aasal as the boundary and placed Al-Ghajar inside Lebanon.
38. Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA), English language report, 26 July 2000.
39. th General Assembly of the United Nations," The Daily Star (Internet edition), 15 September 2000.
40. UN Press Release SG/SM/7456, "Transcript of Press Conference of Secretary-General Kofi Annan at Headquarters, 16 June," 16 June 2000.
41. Interview with the author, 30 August 2000.
42. UN Security Council Document S/2000/718, "Report of the Secretary-General on the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (for the period from 17 January to 17 July 2000), 20 July 2000.
43. th Meeting, on 27 July 2000," 27 July 2000.
44. Interview with the author, 30 August 2000.
45. Ha'aretz, "Annan: Syria does Want to Hold Talks," Sunday, 3 September 2000.
46. Ata al-Qaymari, "Interview with Major General Uri Sagi, Head of the Israeli Negotiating Team with Syria," Jerusalem Al-Quds, 3 May 2000, p. 16. FBIS-NES-2000-0503, 3 May, 2000.
47. Hof, Line of Battle, p. 35.
48. N. Bar-Yaacov, The Israel-Syrian Armistice (Jerusalem: Magnes Press, 1967), p. 36.
49. For a clarification of the "line of June 4, 1967" controversy, including maps and documents, see Hof, Line of Battle.
50. Hof, Line of Battle, p. 2.
51. Voice of Israel, Jerusalem, in Hebrew, 10 June 2000.
52. Ata Al-Qaymari, "Interview with Major General Uri Sagi".
53. Aluf Benn, "PM: Pullout Won't Spark Flare-up," Ha'aretz (Internet edition), 20 March 2000.
54. Ata al-Qaymari, "Interview with Major General Uri Sagi".