| PALESTINE: Declaration of Independence ~ UNGA + UNSC, 18 Nov 1988.

| PALESTINE: Declaration of Independence ~ ANNEX III, Agenda item 37, QUESTION OF PALESTINE, UNITED NATIONS, General Assembly & Security Council, A/43/827, S/20278, 18 November 1988.

On the same terrain as God’s apostolic missions to mankind and in the land of Palestine was the Palestinian Arab people brought forth. There it grew and developed, and there it created its unique human and national mode of existence in an organic, indissoluble and unbroken relationship among people, land and history.

With epic tenaciousness in terms of place and time, the people of Palestine fashioned its national identity. Its steadfast endurance in its own defence rose to preternatural levels, for despite the ambitions, covetousness and armed invasions which deprived that people of an opportunity to achieve political independence, and which were prompted by the allure of this ancient land and its crucial position on the intersecting boundaries of powerful nations and civilizations, it was the constancy with which the people adhered to the land that gave that land its identity and which imbued its people with the national spirit.

Nourished by many strains of civilizations and a multitude of cultures and finding inspiration in the texts of its spiritual and historical heritage, the Palestinian Arab people has, throughout history, continued to develop its identity in an integral unity of land and people and in the footsteps of the prophets throughout this Holy Land, the invocation of praise for the Creator high atop every minaret while hymns of mercy and peace have rung out with the bells of every church and temple.

From generation unto generation, the Palestinian Arab people has not ceased its valiant defence of its homeland, and the successive rebellions of our people have been a heroic embodiment of its desire for national independence.

At a time when the modern world was fashioning its new system of values, the prevailing balance of power in the local and international arenas excluded the Palestinians from the common destiny, and it was shown once more that it was not justice alone that turned the wheels of history.

The deep injury already done the Palestinian people and therefore aggravated when a painful differentiation was made: a people deprived of independence, and one whose homeland was subjected to a new kind of foreign occupation, was exposed to an attempt to give general currency to the falsehood that Palestine was “a land without a people”. Despite this falsification of history, the international community, in article 22 of the Covenant of the League of Nations of 1919 and in the Lausanne Treaty of 1923, recognized that the Palestinian Arab people was no different from the other Arab peoples detached from the Ottoman State and was a free and independent people.

Despite the historical injustice done to the Palestinian Arab people in its displacement and in being deprived of the right to self-determination following the adoption of General Assembly resolution 181 (II) of 1947, which partitioned Palestine into an Arab and a Jewish State, that resolution nevertheless continues to attach conditions to international legitimacy that guarantee the Palestinian Arab people the right to sovereignty and national independence.

The occupation of Palestinian territory and parts of other Arab territory by Israeli forces, the uprooting of the majority of Palestinians and their displacement from their homes by means of organized intimidation, and the subjection of the remainder to occupation, oppression and the destruction of the distinctive features of their national life, are a flagrant violation of the principle of legitimacy and of the Charter of the United Nations and its resolutions recognizing the national rights of the Palestinian people, including the right to return and the right to self-determination, independence and sovereignty over the territory of its homeland.

In the heart of its homeland and on its periphery, in its places of exile near and far, the Palestinian Arab people has not lost its unwavering faith in its right to return nor its firm belief in its right to independence. Occupation, carnage and displacement have been unable to dispossess the Palestinians of their consciousness and their identity – their epic struggle has endured, and the formation of their national character has continued with the growing escalation of the struggle. The national will has established its political framework; and that is the Palestine Liberation Organization, the sole, legitimate representative of the Palestinian people, as recognized by the international community and represented in the United Nations and its institutions and in other international and regional organizations. Founding itself on a belief in inalienable rights, on the Arab national consensus and on international legitimacy, the Palestine Liberation Organization has assumed leadership in the battles of a great people fused in an exemplary national unity and in a legendary and steadfast resistance to carnage and encirclement within its homeland and outside. To the Arab national consciousness and to that of the entire world, the epic of the Palestinian resistance has manifested itself as one of the most conspicuous national liberation movements of the age.

The great popular uprising now mounting in the occupied territories, together with the legendary steadfastness of the camps within and outside the homeland, have raised mankind’s grasp of the true nature of the Palestinian issue and of Palestinian national rights to a level higher than that of full and mature comprehension, have brought down the final curtain on an entire epoch of falsification and conscientious indifference and have beleaguered the official Israeli mentality, prone as it is to appeal to arguments based on mythology and to resort to intimidation in its denial of Palestinian existence.

With the uprising, with the escalation of the revolutionary struggle and with the accumulation of revolutionary experience wherever the struggle is in progress, the Palestinian conjuncture reaches a sharp historical turning point. The Palestinian Arab people asserts once more its inalienable rights and its demand to exercise those rights in its Palestinian homeland.

By virtue of the natural, historical and legal right of the Palestinian Arab people to its homeland, Palestine, and of the sacrifices of its succeeding generations in defence of the freedom and independence of that homeland,

Pursuant to the resolutions of the Arab Summit Conferences and on the basis of the international legitimacy embodied in the resolutions of the United Nations since 1947, and

Through the exercise by the Palestinian Arab people of its right to self-determination, political independence and sovereignty over its territory:

The Palestine National Council hereby declares, in the Name of God and on behalf of the Palestinian Arab people, the establishment of the State of Palestine in the land of Palestine with its capital at Jerusalem.

The State of Palestine shall be for Palestinians, wherever they may be therein to develop their national and cultural identity and therein to enjoy full equality of rights. Their religious and political beliefs and human dignity shall therein be safeguarded under a democratic parliamentary system based on freedom of opinion and the freedom to form parties, on the heed of the majority for minority rights and the respect of minorities for majority decisions, on social justice and equality, and on non-discrimination in civil rights on grounds of race, religion or colour or as between men and women, under a Constitution ensuring the rule of law and an independent judiciary and on the basis of true fidelity to the age-old spiritual and cultural heritage of Palestine with respect to mutual tolerance, coexistence and magnanimity among religions.

The State of Palestine shall be an Arab State and shall be an integral part of the Arab nation, of its heritage and civilization and of its present endeavour for the achievement of the goals of liberation, development, democracy and unity. In affirming its commitment to the Pact of the League of Arab States and its concern for the strengthening of joint Arab action, the State of Palestine calls upon the members of the Arab nation for their assistance in achieving its de facto emergence by mobilizing their capacities and intensifying the efforts made to bring the Israeli occupation to an end.

The State of Palestine declares its commitment to the purposes and principles of the United Nations, to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and to the policy and principles of non-alignment.

The State of Palestine, in declaring that it is a peace-loving State committed to the principles of peaceful coexistence, shall strive, together with all other States and peoples, for the achievement of a lasting peace based on justice and respect for rights, under which the human potential for constructive activity may flourish, mutual competition may centre on life-sustaining innovation and there is no fear for the future, since the future bears only assurance for those who have acted justly or made amends to justice.

In the context of its struggle to bring peace to a land of peace and love, the State of Palestine calls upon the United Nations, which bears a special responsibility towards the Palestinian Arab people and its homeland, and upon the peace-loving States and peoples of the world and those that cherish freedom to assist it in achieving its goals, in bringing the plight of its people to an end, in ensuring the safety and security of that people and in endeavouring to end the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territory.

The State of Palestine further declares, in that connection, that it believes in the solution of international and regional problems by peaceful means in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations and the resolutions adopted by it, and that, without prejudice to its natural right to defend itself, it rejects the threat or use of force, violence and intimidation against its territorial integrity and political independence or those of any other State.

On this momentous day, the fifteenth day of November 1988, as we stand on the threshold of a new era, we bow our heads in deference and humility to the departed souls of our martyrs and the martyrs of the Arab nation who, by virtue of the pure blood shed by them, have lit the glimmer of this auspicious dawn and who have died so that the homeland might live. We lift up our hearts so that they may be filled with light from the radiance of the hallowed uprising, of the epic resistance of those in the camps, in the dispersion and in exile, and of those who have borne the manner of freedom: our children, our elders and our youth; our prisoners, detainees and wounded based on the hallowed soil and in every camp, village and city; the valiant Palestinian women, the guardians of our life and our survival and keepers of our eternal flame. To the spirits of our righteous martyrs, to the masses of our Palestinian Arab people and our Arab nation and to all free and honourable men, we give our solemn pledge to continue the struggle for an end to the occupation and the establishment of sovereignty and independence. We call upon our great people to rally to the Palestinian flag, to take pride in it and to defend it so that it shall remain forever a symbol of our freedom and dignity in a homeland that shall be forever free and the abode of a people of free men.

In the name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate“Say: ‘O God, Master of the Kingdom, Thou givest the Kingdom
to whom Thou wilt, and seizest the Kingdom from whom Thou wilt,
Thou exaltest whom Thou wilt, and Thou abasest whom Thou wilt;
in Thy hand is the good; Thou art powerful over everything …”

Almighty God has spoken the truth—–

ALSO SEE:

Palestinian Declaration of Independence ~ Wiki.

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| Egypt ‘must be one body’ – new Egyptian ‘leader!’

Egypt ‘must be one body’ – new Egyptian leader ~ Jon Snow, Channel 4 News.

In a world in which a quarter of all the Arabs on earth live in Egypt, what’s happening in that country tonight is of critical interest. Krishnan will be anchoring, Foreign Affairs Correspondent Jonathan Rugman reporting – and he has the first foreign interview with the country’s interim president Adly Mansour, who told Channel 4 News that the Egyptian people have “had enough of division” and must be “one body” to build a democratic nation. The military, which has a huge interest in the country’s economy, ranging from the ownership of tourist hotels, to brickworks, now have their hands around the throat of the Egyptian constitution. They also have the erstwhile president Mr Morsi under arrest.The new president, who is the head of the constitutional court, only became a member of it four days ago – it has all the ring of even tighter military control. No-one ever thought the army would relinquish its controlling interest in the economy for long. The question now is whether they continue to sustain what is clearly a military coup, even if dressed in constitutional clothing. We will be reporting on the latest, the scenes on the streets, attempting to analyse who supports and who rejects what has happened, and discussing the recent importance of the street in the Arab Spring.

Watch the first foreign interview with Egypt’s new interim president>

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| Nizar Tawfiq Qabbani: ‘Jerusalem! My Love, My Town!’

“Jerusalem! My Love, My Town

I wept until my tears were dry
I prayed until the candles flickered
I knelt until the floor creaked
I asked about Mohammed and Christ
Oh Jerusalem, the fragrance of prophets
The shortest path between earth and sky
Oh Jerusalem, the citadel of laws
A beautiful child with fingers charred
and downcast eyes

You are the shady oasis passed by the Prophet
Your streets are melancholy
Your minarets are mourning
You, the young maiden dressed in black
Who rings the bells at the Nativity Church,
On sunday morning?
Who brings toys for the children
On Christmas eve?

Oh Jerusalem, the city of sorrow
A big tear wandering in the eye
Who will halt the aggression
On you, the pearl of religions?
Who will wash your bloody walls?
Who will safeguard the Bible?
Who will rescue the Quran?
Who will save Christ, From those who have killed Christ?
Who will save man?

يا قدسُ، يا مدينةَ الأحزان
يا دمعةً كبيرةً تجولُ في الأجفان
من يوقفُ العدوان؟
عليكِ، يا لؤلؤةَ الأديان
من يغسل الدماءَ عن حجارةِ الجدران؟
من ينقذُ الإنجيل؟
من ينقذُ القرآن؟
من ينقذُ المسيحَ ممن قتلوا المسيح؟
من ينقذُ الإنسان؟”

Oh Jerusalem my town
Oh Jerusalem my love
Tomorrow the lemon trees will blossom
And the olive trees will rejoice
Your eyes will dance
The migrant pigeons will return
To your sacred roofs
And your children will play again
And fathers and sons will meet
On your rosy hills
My town
The town of peace and olives.”

~ Nizar Tawfiq Qabbani
(Arabic: نزار توفيق قباني‎, Nizār Tawfīq Qabbānī) (21 March 1923 – 30 April 1998) was a Syrian diplomat, poet and publisher . His poetic style combines simplicity and elegance in exploring themes of love, eroticism, feminism, religion, and Arab nationalism. Qabbani is one of the most revered contemporary poets in the Arab world.

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| No rogue, criminal, pirate state is worth the trouble it causes!

| No rogue, criminal, pirate state is worth the trouble it causes!

Americans really should now give their heads a wobble and demand to cut the ziocolony loose to sink or swim as a well-behaved neighbour instead of funding more ethnic-cleansing and land-thievery with yet more impunity like a pandering parent with it’s spoilt brat.

European post-war holocaust guilt is no excuse to still raid the meddle-east or dispossess Semite Palestinians, whatever emotional-blackmail hissy-fit the Jewish lobby throws up.

Apathy is shameful, willful ignorance is worse.

The goals of the Palestinian Boycott, Divest & Sanction [BDS] campaign are crystal clear – to simply :

{1} End Israel’s occupation & colonisation of all Arab lands + Dismantle the Apartheid Wall;

{2} Engage & Secure the basic Human Rights of the Palestinian-Arab citizens of israel to Full Equality; Respect, protect & promote the inalienable Rights of Palestinian refugees to Return to their homes and properties & to ensure Full compliance with all UN Resolutions.

MORE HERE:
http://bdsmovement.net/?q=node%2F9 
http://www.inminds.co.uk/boycott-brands.html 
http://www.boycotisrael.info/
http://www.mylinkspage.com/israel.html 
http://www.monabaker.com/
boycottisraeliproducts.h…

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| Nakba + settler ethnic cleansing: Mass Palestinian grave found in Tel Aviv!

Mass Palestinian grave found in Tel Aviv ~ Al Jazeera.

Skeletal remains of dozens of Palestinians killed by Israelis during 1948 have been found in a mass grave in Tel Aviv.

 

The remains of dozens of Palestinians killed by Israelis in fighting during the war of 1948 which led to the creation of the state of Israel have been found in a mass grave in Tel Aviv’s Jaffa district. An official at the Muslim cemetery there told AFP news agency that the grisly find occurred on Wednesday when ground subsided as workers carried out renovations, revealing six chambers full of skeletons. Jaffa fisherman Atar Zeinab, 80, says that as a teenager during the final months of fighting in 1948, he helped to collect the Arab dead in the area south of Jaffa and bring them for hasty burial in the cemetery, the area’s main graveyard. “I carried to the cemetery 60 bodies during a period of three or four months,” he told AFP. “We used to find the people in the street and most of the time we didn’t know who they were.” He said that the danger of being hit by flying bullets or grenade fragments was such that bodies were dumped one on top of the other in existing family crypts in the cemetery, contrary to Muslim custom. “We carried them early in the morning or in the night,” he added. “We put women, children and men in the same place…nobody prayed for these people.” Jaffa was at the time a Palestinian town, but there was a forced exodus of most of its Arab population when it fell to the fledgling Israeli army and rightwing Jewish armed gangs. In 1950 it was incorporated into the city of Tel Aviv which was renamed Tel Aviv-Jaffa. Today it has a mixed Arab and Jewish population. Around 760,000 Palestinians fled or were forced from their homes in what they call the “Nakba” or “catastrophe” of 1948.

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The cemetery in the Jaffa district of Tel Aviv contains six mass graves.

The remains are thought to be Palestinians killed during the Israeli-Arab war of 1948.

Estimates are that the six mass graves could contain the bodies of around 600 people.

Human skeletons are clearly visible in a mass grave found at a cemetery in the Jaffa district of Tel Aviv, Israel.

 

The grisly find occurred on Wednesday when ground subsided as workers carried out renovations.

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| Palestinian [Israeli-Arab] student explains why he heckled Obama in Jerusalem!

Arab Student Explains Why He Heckled Obama in Jerusalem ~ ROBERT MACKEY, NYT.

A 24-year-old Arab-Israeli student who interrupted President Obama’s speech in Jerusalem on Thursday explained his comments and why he made them in an interview with The Lede on Friday.

The heckler, Rabbea Eid, a political science student, said by telephone that he did not plan the outburst but was offended by Mr. Obama’s remarks, which seemed to rule out the solution that he favors: a single, binational state to be shared by Israelis and Palestinians:

I was listening to the speech of Obama and he said a lot of things that made me upset so I just stood up and shouted. He was talking about democracy and justice and at the same time he said he supports Israel as a Jewish country. So, from my perspective and that of a lot of people, Arab people, Palestinians who were in the building listening to the speech … the Arabs, the minority in Israel are also against a Jewish country because it’s not a democratic country. It’s against us, so how can Mr. Obama be democratic and in the same time support an ethnic country?

 

So I stood up and I told him, “President Obama, did you come to make peace or to support Israel and the Israeli occupation?” Then I asked him about this thing, “How can you be democratic and support a Jewish country?” And I asked him also, “Who killed Rachel Corrie?” The last question was, “Did you see the apartheid wall when you came from Ramallah?”

 

And then the security guys came and took me out, the Israeli security guys, and they told me that I’m arrested and they threatened me and they used, at first, a little bit of violence with me. But after that there was a journalist, from Fox News, I think, came out and followed me … She started taking my details and pictures, while I was stopped by the Israeli security guys … One of the security guys, I think the boss of them, told his team, “Deal with him easy. I don’t want to make a big story now. There is media so just let him go.” Then they walked me outside.

Doug Mills/The New York TimesRabbea Eid, an Arab-Israeli student, was removed by security after interrupting President Obama’s speech in Jerusalem on Thursday.

Footage of Mr. Eid after he was removed from the hall by security was broadcast by Israel’s Channel 2.

 

Mr. Eid, an activist with the Balad Party, which represents Arab citizens of Israel, also said, “I don’t think Obama can solve the problem, because he’s as I see it, he’s part of the problem because he supports Israel and gives Israel weapons and money without saying they shouldn’t be killing the Palestinian people.”

He added:

I believe if he’s from a real democratic party, he should support a country for all its citizens and end the occupation, not to support a Jewish country and to support the Israeli army. He didn’t talk that much about the settlements. He talked about the violence from settlers but he didn’t say very clearly that something against settlements is that they are built on occupied land. He didn’t talk about the apartheid wall. And many things.

 

Most of his speech was to me, and to a lot of others, a Zionist speech. He talked about the historical Zionist story about the Jewish people, starting from 2,000 years ago till today and the right of the Jewish people to have their own country, but he didn’t say that there are millions of refugees, Palestinian refugees that were expelled in 1948, just before 65 years ago.

 

To me, I believe in one state for two people — one democratic state. There could be a special national thing for the Jewish or the Arab people, you know, but it could be one country. We need justice, you know. I actually don’t care what the name of this state is, but what I care is for there to be justice for two peoples in the state and to end this conflict.

Before hanging up, Mr. Eid said, “It is important for us that the American people know what is happening here, and to know that the money from their taxes is going for the weapons for Israel and different places.”

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| Quintessential Question: Does Israel even have the legal Right to exist in International Law? No – here’s why:

Mohamed Khodr: Does Israel Have the Legal Right to Exist? ~ Sabbah Report.

Palestine: 12 Districts Map (1946) (Source: PalestineRemembered.com)

“We Jews forced the Arabs to leave….Here was a people who lived on its own land for 1,300 years. We came and turned the native Arabs into tragic refugees. And still we dare to slander and malign them, to besmirch their name. Instead of being deeply ashamed of what we did and of trying to undo some of the evil we committed by helping these unfortunate refugees, we justify our terrible acts and even attempt to glorify them”
–Nathan Chofshi, in Jewish Newsletter, February 9, 1959

Why do They Hate Us?

It is decisions like these by the United States that enrage the entire world, especially the Muslim World.

BREAKING NEWS:

From the Israeli paper Haaretz (12/11/12)

“U.S. to sell Israel munitions to RENEW STOCK after Operation Pillar of Defense”

“The United States will sell Israel munitions worth $647 million, in order to renew the inventory of the Israel Defense Forces following the massive bombings in Gaza during Operation Pillar of Defense.”

Has the U.S. totally lost its mind and soul to Israel and its Jewish Lobby? Has it become incapable of reason or independent thought? Has the superpower become Israel’s brainwashed lapdog?

My God, my God, America is replacing Israel’s weapons that it used in massacringinnocent civilians and children in Gaza during its eight-day massive assault last November.

America will replace the naval missile that killed a 13-year-old girl and her uncle who were simply sitting on a beach in Gaza.

America will replace the rocket fired by an Israeli jet that bombed a United Nations (UNRWA) school killing 2 girls and injuring six. Israel has a long history of bombing UNRWA schools including a School for the Blind.

America will replace the bomb that killed an entire family, the Al-Dalu family, killing 11 people, nine of his family members, including 4 children, an elderly woman, and two of his family’s neighbors.

America has lost its sanity and moral compass, yet continues to prosecute a “war on terror” to spread freedom in the Muslim world one Israeli bullet, rocket, missile, bomb, and assassination at a time.

By divine and international law America is just as guilty as Israel in the commission of these war crimes and all such crimes Israel has committed since 1947-1949 till this day.

It’s American money, American weapons, American provided intelligence, and American vetoes that have provided the cover and impunity for Israel to commit countless war crimes.

But neither Israel, the U.S., Britain, or any western nation will ever be held accountable for their relentless war crimes against the Palestinians or Muslims worldwide.

Israel, a small yet powerful nation, has the America’s political, economic, military, intelligence, and industrial institutions so tied up in knots and webs of money bribes, media smears if necessary, lies, myths, and propaganda that anytime an American politician opens his mouth on the Middle East be assured that those talking points were rammed down his/her throat by AIPAC, Israel’s most powerful lobby and the real power in Washington D.C.

One can only stand back in awe, total amazement, wonder, and I must admit, jealousy, of the Zionist’s sheer genius, short and long term strategic thinking, single minded obsessive determination and focus to achieve their goals, political economic, media,public relations, and most of all their military prowess.

In fact, it was Sigmund Freud’s nephew, Edward Bernays (Jewish), who invented the art of public relations, powerful media and advertising techniques, and the rapid use of press releases utilizing much of the psychological techniques learned from his famous uncle.

The Zionists perfected his techniques to a most extraordinary level especially in the fields of media and public relations. Israel employs a world wide range of media outlets, journalists, and public relations firms to get its message out early and repeated frequently that the western politicians and populations simply and unconsciously digest and parrot the information.

Such powerful propaganda in support of the Zionist cause and Israel began in the late 19^th Century and continues till this day.

Case in point:

Important to read to understand Israel’s lies that survive till this day.

Read this speech delivered on November 17, 1957 at the United Nations by Abba Eban, Israeli’s representative to the United Nations for his repeated use of the lies that Israel was attacked in 1947 by the Arabs and it was the Arabs fault that created the problem of the Palestinian refugees.

Then read this excellent rebuttal of Eban’s lies and Israel’s myths that continue to this day written by the Irish journalist, Erskine Childers titled: “The Other Exodus” published in 1961.

Does Israel Have an International Legal Basis to Exist?

No, for two reasons as outlined below.

1. General Assembly has no legal right or basis to Partition any land, especially against the wishes of the majority population.
2. U.N. General Assembly Resolution 273 on Israel’s “conditional” admission to the U.N. as a member

Based on a British recommendation to the General Assembly that a committee be established to study the conflict in Palestine, the General Assembly on May 15, 1947 created the “United Nations Special Committee on Palestine “, or (UNSCOP). After traveling to Israel and meeting with Zionist organizations it recommended the Partition of Palestine into two states, Jewish and Palestinian.

After UNSCOP issued its recommendation the General Assembly formed an Ad Hoc Committee on the Palestinian Question to further study the UNSCOP report and make further recommendations to the General Assembly.

The Ad Hoc Committee further created a Sub Committee to study the legal basis of General Assembly Resolution 181 to Partition Palestine.

Sponsored by:

 
Shrinking Map of Palestine – New Tees by hsabbah
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It concluded that the United Nations has no legal foundation based on its Charter or anyInternational Law to issue such a resolution and to gift a land inhabited by a large majority of peoples who oppose, and rightly so, the loss of their land to a foreign peoples, European Jews.

Jews at this time only owned <7% of the land in Palestine yet Resolution 181 gifted them the majority land of Palestine, 56%

It observed that the UNSCOP report had accepted a basic premise “that the claims to Palestine of the Arabs and Jews both possess validity”, which was “not supported by any cogent reasons and is demonstrably against the weight of all available evidence.”

It concluded that the U.N. has no legal right to:

“Deprive the majority of the people of Palestine of their territory and transfer it to the exclusive use of a minority in the country…. The United Nations Organization has no power to create a new State. Such a decision can only be taken by the free will of the people of the territories in question. That condition is not fulfilled in the case of the majority proposal, as it involves the establishment of a Jewish State in complete disregard of the wishes and interests of the Arabs of Palestine”.

Thus this conclusion clearly states that Israel has no legal basis to exist.

Nevertheless, the U.N. General Assembly on November 29, 1947 passed U.N. Resolution 181, the so called ‘Partition Plan” due to the powerful political and economic pressure of the United States on Latin American, African nations (Liberia), and the Philippines tovote in favor of the resolution. Nothing in the U.N. Charter allows for such an illegal Resolution.

Additionally, under the U.N. Charter General Assembly Resolutions are Non-Binding and have No enforcement mechanism. They are generally defined as “recommendations”.

As per U.N. protocol the General Assembly forwarded the Resolution to the Security Council for “implementation.” But under U.S pressure the Council postponed discussion of the Resolution indefinitely and thus never voted for the implementation of the Resolution.

Conclusion:

U.N.G.A. Resolution 181 is null and void thereby the Partition of Palestine is illegal and all lands Israel acquired by “force” and “ethnic cleansing” is inadmissible and must be returned to it original owners, the Palestinians.

The second reason Israel’s existence and thus admission to the United Nations as a member state is illegal is U.N. General Assembly Resolution 273 (May 11, 1949) that dealt with Israel’s conditional admission to the U.N. based on Israel’s acceptance of:

1. U.N.G.A Resolution 181: “Partition Plan” of Palestine

-By 1949 Israel had expelled 800,000 Palestinians from their homes and acquired an additional 22% of Palestine by force beyond the 56% of Palestine allocated by U.N.G.A. 181. Thus the Resolution required Israel to return the additional 22% of land it acquired by force.

2. U.N.G.A. Resolution 194: “Right of Return” of Palestinian Refugees or their Compensation.

Israel rejected the Resolution but inexplicably was still admitted to the U.N.

Given that Israel did not meet Resolution 273′s “conditional” requirements for admission, its membership in the U.N. is illegal.

President Truman and the United Nations tried again to get Israel to abide by its conditional admission to the U.N., i.e. to implement both Resolutions 181 and 194, by convening a conference in the summer of 1949 in Lausanne, Switzerland. It became known as the Lausanne Conference. The U.S., U.N., Arab States, and Israel met for five months during that summer with the sole purpose of getting Israel to return additional Palestinian land acquired by force and allow for the “right of return” of Palestinian refugees or their compensation…

Naturally, Israel rejected the plan while the Arabs accepted it.

Truman was furious with Israel and threatened to reassess U.S. relations with it and withhold the $100 Million in aid already promised to Israel if it does not change course and accept the agenda of the Lausanne Conference.

As with all Presidents since then Truman capitulated on his “threats” and sent the money anyway. Nothing has changed since then and Israel learned that America is “easily moved” as Netanyahu recently said and all its threats are as hollow as the souls of Congressmen. America is paralyzed to act against Israel even when Israel kills American citizens.

Such has been the story of Israel. An illegally created state that thrives on military force to complete its Zionist “Greater Israel” expansionism from the Nile to the Euphrates while the world turns a blind eye to the death and suffering of millions of Palestinian families made refugees by the sons of western colonialism, imperialism, and racism.

According to Israel it is always seeking peace but it’s the Palestinians who refuse to make peace.

But, from the mouth of David Ben Gurion, Israel’s founding father and first Prime Minister.

“We do not seek an agreement with the [Palestinian] Arabs in order to secure the peace. Of course we regard peace as an essential thing. It is impossible to build up the country in a state of permanent warfare. But peace for us is a mean, and not an end. The end is the fulfillment of Zionismin its maximum scope. Only for this reason do we need peace, and do we need an agreement.”
–(Shabtai Teveth, p. 168)

More posts by Mohamed Khodr

• Mohamed Khodr: US and Israel Faced The Greatest Slap Heard Around the World
• November 29, 1947 – November 29, 2012 Palestine’s Infant Step to Statehood
• The Jewish Oligarchy: Running and Ruining America
• Muhammad: The Prophet of Mercy For Our Time
• President Ali Saleh: A Yemenie War Criminal in Obama’s Court

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KEY ARTICLES:

The Real Story of How Israel Was Created ~ Alison Weir, AntiWar.com.

The Myth of the U.N. Creation of Israel ~ Foreign Policy Journal, Jeremy Hammond. 

Does Israel’s “right to exist” actually exist? ~ SCOTT BURCHILL, LECTURER IN INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS AT DEAKIN UNIVERSITY.

ZIONISM UNMASKED: A fairy tale that’s become a terrible nightmare ~ Alan Hart.

The truth of the time was that the Zionist state had no right to exist and, more to the point, could have no right to exist UNLESS … Unless it was recognised and legitimized by those Zionism had dispossessed of their land and their rights. In international law only the Palestinians could give Israel the legitimacy it craved.

Does Israel Have a Right to Exist? ~ Mark A. Goldman, CounterPunch.

[Detailed citations for the above information are available at “The History of Israel-U.S. Relations, Part One.”]

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Related articles

• US Dutifully Offers to Replace Israeli Munitions Spent on Gaza (news.antiwar.com)
• In International Law Does Israel Have the Legal Right to Exist? (salem-news.com)
• After Deadly Siege in Gaza, U.S. to Re-Stalk Israel Munitions (commondreams.org)
• Israel spends $647 million to load up on US munitions following Gaza war (rt.com)

 

| Five ways to effectively support Gaza through Boycotts, Divestment and Sanctions!

Five ways to effectively support Gaza through Boycotts, Divestment and Sanctions ~ Palestinian BDS National Committee.

As this new aggression on the people of Gaza shows, Israel will continue its belligerence and state terrorism unless it is made to pay a heavy price for its crimes against the Palestinian, Lebanese and other Arab peoples.

Palestinian civil society has called for a campaign of boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) as the most effective way for international civil society and people of conscience around the world to show solidarity with the Palestinian struggle and hold Israel – and all complicit institutions — accountable for its occupation, colonization and apartheid. The global, Palestinian-led BDS movement has achieved inspiring and spectacular success, causing economic damage to companies that support Israel’s crimes, persuading artists not to perform in Israel, winning support from major churches, trade unions and social movements, as well as pressuring governments to take action.

Here are five BDS ways to effectively express solidarity with the Palestinian people in Gaza and elsewhere:

1. Boycott Israel! Don’t buy Israeli goods!

Profits from exports from Israel help to fund the Israeli government and its crimes against the Palestinian people. Refuse to buy Israeli goods and tell retailers that you are doing it. Persuade friends and family to stop buying any Israeli products too!

Brands to avoid include Ahava, Jaffa oranges, Sabra and Tribe hummus and SodaStream.

2. Join an active BDS campaign or start a new one

Initiate action in your institution, union, group, etc., against the companies and organisations that support and profit from Israel’s system of oppression over the Palestinian people.

For example, in the US, campaigners have pressured major pension funds to divest from Caterpillar, a company that provides bulldozers used to destroy Palestinian homes.

Public bodies across the world have been successfully pressured to stop awarding contracts for public services to Veolia, a company that provides infrastructure to illegal Israeli settlements. Veolia has lost contracts worth more than $14bn following BDS campaigns.

Campaigners recently persuaded a major bank to divest from G4S, a private security firm involved in Israel’s crimes against Palestinian prisoners, including children.

You can find out more about campaigns taking place in your area by contacting your local Palestine solidarity organisation. There’s a great online database of Palestine solidarity groupshere or contact us for advice on whom to contact or on how to start a new BDS campaign.

3. Organise a BDS protest action

Demonstrations, banner drops and flashmobs are great ways to raise awareness of the boycott of Israel. Some actions target particular products, like the actions against Israeli cosmetics companyAhava, while others take place in supermarkets and remind shoppers not to buy Israeli goods or totarget complicit companies.

There’s a useful guide to planning a BDS action here. The guide is written specifically for the Ahava campaign, but it’s full of useful ideas for similar campaigns too.

4. Urge organisations that you are a member of to divest from Israel

Trade unions, student unions, faith groups and other organisations all over the world have passed BDS-related resolutions calling for divesting from companies profiting from Israel’s occupation.

The US Quakers’ investment entity recently sold its shares in Hewlett Packard and Veolia, two companies supporting and profiting from Israeli violations of international law, after having divested from Caterpillar a few months ago for the same reasons.

Student unions around the world have voted to support divestment and have successfully campaigned to have companies like Sabra Hummus and Eden Springs removed from their campuses.

Trade unions can participate in BDS campaigns and sell any investments they may hold in Israeli companies or raise rank-and-file awareness about Israeli products to boycott.

Ask organisations that you’re a member of to hold a meeting to discuss education about and support for the BDS campaign, and find out if it’s possible to pass a resolution to support BDS when the time is right.

5. Pressure your elected officials to impose a military embargo on Israel

Military ties with Israel feed and encourage further Israeli violence. Israel wouldn’t be able to maintain its occupation and apartheid system over the Palestinian people if it wasn’t for the military aid it receives from the US or the military trade it conducts with countries around the world. Urge your government and elected representatives to support a military embargo on Israel.

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Related articles

• Stop a New Israeli Massacre in Gaza: Boycott Israel Now! (bdsmovement.net)
• BDS Movement: Stop a new Israeli massacre in Gaza – boycott Israel now! (mondoweiss.net)
• Stop new massacre in Gaza: boycott Israel now! (windowintopalestine.blogspot.com)
• Occupied Borders: Israeli activist for Palestine visits Tohono O’odham land (bsnorrell.blogspot.com)
• ‘Israeli attack threatens wider war’ (rt.com)
• Gazans Dying Quietly for Netanyahu’s Re-election (desertpeace.wordpress.com)

| Palestine: A Story of Betrayal!

A Story of Betrayal – 1 ~ Stuart Littlewood, Veteran News Now.

Editor’s note : This article, the second in a series of seven articles, is dedicated to all the willing tools of Zionism in Washington, Westminster and Brussells who distort the biblical message of love and peace, support Israel’s lawless occupation, condemn Christians and Muslims in the Holy Land to endless injustice, and urge perpetual war in the Middle East… and beyond.

“Americans aren’t alone in their ignorance. British people too seem largely unaware of how tragedy was allowed to overtake the Palestinians, and how this once-peaceful province of the Ottoman Empire, renowned for its antiquities and culture, became a land scarred by conflict…”

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A seventeen-year-old girl trembling with grief and rage told me how she witnessed her teenage cousin being shot through the head by Israeli soldiers. They had been walking to school together and the soldiers were taunting him. In response he had picked up a rock. She accused me and all Americans of knowing about these daily abuses against Palestinians but not caring. I tried to tell her that most Americans do not know about these tragedies, and that we would never support those who perpetrate them. But her belief that the average American is savvy about international politics was as strong as it was naive. “Of course Americans know we’re suffering over here,” she retorted.“ You’re the most powerful nation on earth. And everyone has a television. I know you know.”

These words are borrowed from David Hazard’s excellent book Blood Bothers, which charts the life of Father Elias Chacour, a remarkable Christian Palestinian who grew up on the shores of Galilee and saw his beautiful world shattered by the Israeli occupation.

Like countless others he was made a refugee in his own country.

The beautiful shores of Galilee: a land of milk and honey, now with a bitter taste. (photo: Stuart Littlewood).

Americans aren’t alone in their ignorance. British people too seem largely unaware of how tragedy was allowed to overtake the Palestinians, and how this once-peaceful province of the Ottoman Empire, renowned for its antiquities and culture, became a land scarred by conflict, where everyday humiliation stokes the fires of hatred. You cannot get in or out, or move around, without running the gauntlet of Israeli customs, baggage searches, roadblocks and checkpoints under the sneer of contemptuous, sunglassed troops. Even in remote countryside you’ll run into one of 700 armed checkpoints.

Young guns : Tasked with dispossessing Palestinians and expanding the Jewish State… Israeli troops: They call themselves “the most moral army in the world”.

The Israeli Defence Force is largely made up of National Servicemen and women – teenagers drafted in and trained to use lethal force. They have a reputation for being trigger-happy. On the other hand they don’t all wish to play the ‘heavy’ or necessarily agree with their orders. The two pictured here were likable lads and cracked a smile for the camera. But all the time I was aware of a third guard nearby with a gun on my back.

The truth about Palestine doesn’t sit well with Britain’s now crumbling reputation for fair play. Its name has been airbrushed from maps and purged, like a dirty word, from diplomatic lexicons. Even today the subject is only haphazardly taught in our schools. For older generations like mine it was never on the curriculum.

To understand why, one must at least dip a toe into the complicated history of the last 90 years. To help readers over this hurdle, I offer this ‘potted’ version. At least it will explain why I grabbed my camera and went to see Palestine for myself.

For centuries long our land enslaved

by Turkish kings with sharpened blade.

 

We prayed to end the Sultan’s curse,

the British came and spoke a verse.

 

“It’s World War One, if you agree

to fight with us we’ll set you free.”

 

The war we fought at Britain’s side,

our blood was shed for Arab pride.

 

At war’s end Turks were smitten,

our only gain, the lies of Britain.

Stephen Ostrander’s simple verse manages to cut through mountains of rhetoric to the root cause of the Arab-Israeli conflict.

There was a Jewish state in the Holy Land some 3,000 years ago, but the Canaanites and Philistines were there first. The Jews, one of several invading groups, left and returned several times, and were expelled by the Roman occupation in 70AD and again in 135AD. Since the 7th century Palestine has been mainly Arabic. During the First World War the country was ‘liberated’ from Turkish Ottoman rule after the Allied Powers, in correspondence between Sir Henry McMahon and Sharif Hussein ibn Ali of Mecca in 1915, promised independence to Arab leaders in return for their help in defeating Germany’s ally.

However, a new-Jewish political movement called Zionism was finding favour among the ruling elite in London, and the British Government was persuaded by the Zionists’ chief spokesman, Chaim Weizman, to surrender Palestine for their new Jewish homeland. Hardly a thought, it seems, was given to the earlier pledge to the Arabs, who had occupied and owned the land for 1,500 years – longer, say some scholars, than the Jews ever did.

Arthur Balfour (left) and Lord Rothschild conspired to betray Britain’s guarantees to the Arabs who fought alongside us in the First World War

The Zionists, fuelled by the notion that an ancient Biblical prophecy gave them the title deeds, aimed to push the Arabs out by populating the area with millions of Eastern European Jews. They had already set up farm communities and founded a new city, Tel Aviv, but by 1914 Jews numbered only 85,000 to the Arabs’ 615,000. The infamous Balfour Declaration of 1917  – actually a letter from the British foreign secretary, Lord Balfour, to the most senior Jew in England, Lord Rothschild – pledged assistance for the Zionist cause with apparent disregard for the consequences to the native majority. Calling itself a “declaration of sympathy with Jewish Zionist aspirations”, it said:

His Majesty’s Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing and non-Jewish communities….

But Balfour, a Zionist convert, later wrote:

In Palestine we do not propose even to go through the form of consulting the wishes of the present inhabitants of the country. The four powers are committed to Zionism and Zionism, be it right or wrong, good or bad, is rooted in age-long tradition, in present needs, in future hopes, of far profounder import than the desires and prejudices of the 700,000 Arabs who now occupy that land.

Charles Poulett Thomson, 1st Baron Sydenham

There was opposition, of course. Lord Sydenham warned: “The harm done by dumping down an alien population upon an Arab country may never be remedied. What we have done, by concessions not to the Jewish people but to a Zionist extreme section, is to start a running sore in the East, and no-one can tell how far that sore will extend.”

The American King-Crane Commission of1919 thought it a gross violation of principle. “No British officers consulted by the Commissioners believed that the Zionist programme could be carried out except by force of arms. That, of itself, is evidence of a strong sense of the injustice of the Zionist programme.”

There were other reasons why the British were courting disaster. A secret deal, called the Sykes-Picot Agreement, had been concluded in 1916 between France and Britain, in consultation with Russia, to re-draw the map of the Middle Eastern territories won from Turkey. Britain was to take Jordan, Iraq and Haifa. The area now referred to as Palestine was declared an international zone. The Sykes-Picot Agreement, the Balfour Declaration and the promises made earlier in the McMahon-Hussein letters all cut across each other. It seems to have been a case of the left hand not knowing what the right was doing in the confusion of war.

After the Russian Revolution of 1917 Lenin released a copy of the confidential Sykes-Picot Agreement into the public domain, sowing seeds of distrust among the Arabs. Thus the unfolding story had all the makings of a major tragedy. Subsequent crimes – on both sides – flow from this triple-cross. The Zionist organization asked to submit its proposal for Palestine to the 1919 Paris Peace Conference, hitching a ride on the British request to be granted a mandate over Palestine in order to implement the Balfour Declaration. The Zionist case included the statement that “the land itself needs redemption. Much of it is left desolate. Its present condition is a standing reproach. Two things are necessary for that redemption – a stable and enlightened government, and an addition to the present population which shall be energetic, intelligent, devoted to the country, and backed by the large financial resources that are indispensable for development. Such a population the Jews alone can supply.”

Prominent US Jews opposed to this move handed President Woodrow Wilson a counter-statement objecting to the Zionists’ plan, and asked him to submit it to the peace conference. It said the scheme to reorganise the Jews as a national unit with territorial sovereignty in Palestine “not only misrepresents the trend of the history of the Jews, who ceased to be a nation 2000 years ago, but involves the limitation and possible annulment of the larger claims of Jews for full citizenship and human rights in all lands in which those rights are not yet secure. For the very reason that the new era upon which the world is entering aims to establish government everywhere on principles of true democracy, we reject the Zionistic project of a national home for the Jewish people in Palestine.”

These teenage gunslingers are sometimes friendly, sometimes not. (photo: Stuart Littlewood).

Foreseeing the future with uncanny accuracy, it went on to say, “We rejoice in the avowed proposal of the Peace Congress to put into practical application the fundamental principles of democracy.

That principle, which asserts equal rights for all citizens of a state, irrespective of creed or ethnic descent, should be applied in such a manner as to exclude segregation of any kind, be it nationalistic or other. Such segregation must inevitably create differences among the sections of the population of a country. Any such plan of segregation is necessarily reactionary in its tendency, undemocratic in spirit and totally contrary to the practices of free government, especially as these are exemplified by our own country.”

Their statement quoted Sir George Adam Smith, a noted biblical scholar and the acknowledged expert on the region, who had said: “It is not true that Palestine is the national home of the Jewish people and of no other people… It is not correct to call its non-Jewish inhabitants ‘Arabs’, or to say that they have left no image of their spirit and made no history except in the great Mosque… Nor can we evade the fact that Christian communities have been [there] as long as ever the Jews were… These are legitimate questions stirred up by the claims of Zionism, but the Zionists have not yet fully faced them”.

America, England, France, Italy, Switzerland and all the most advanced nations of the world, it said, are composed of representatives of many races and religions. “Their glory lies in the freedom of conscience and worship, in the liberty of thought and custom which binds the followers of many faiths and varied civilizations in the common bonds of political union.

“A Jewish State involves fundamental limitations as to race and religion, else the term ‘Jewish’ means nothing. To unite Church and State, in any form, as under the old Jewish hierarchy, would be a leap backward of two thousand years.

Hamas Resistance, tasked with defending the Palestinian homeland against illegal occupation by the brutal armed invader Israel. Demonized by the West and branded “terrorists”. Unfriendly if provoked, but good for a laugh here. (photo: Stuart Littlewood).

“We ask that Palestine be constituted as a free and independent state, to be governed under a democratic form of government recognizing no distinctions of creed or race or ethnic descent, and with adequate power to protect the country against oppression of any kind. We do not wish to see Palestine, either now or at any time in the future, organized as a Jewish State.”

But Wilson apparently failed to put the document before the Conference.

In 1922 the League of Nations placed Palestine under British mandate, which incorporated the principles of the Balfour Declaration. Jewish immigration would be facilitated “under suitable conditions” and a nationality law would allow Jews taking up permanent residence to acquire Palestinian citizenship (in sharp contrast to the Jews-only law now operated by a dominant Israel).

But the high commissioner was soon recommending a halt to Jewish immigration for fear that it would create a class of landless Arabs. That same year the British government, aware of Arab concerns that the Balfour Declaration was being interpreted in an “exaggerated” way by Zionists and their sympathisers, issued a White Paper to clarify the position.

“The terms of the Declaration referred to,” it said, “do not contemplate that Palestine as a whole should be converted into a Jewish National Home, but that such a Home should be founded ‘in Palestine’. In this connection it has been observed with satisfaction that at a meeting of the Zionist Congress, the supreme governing body of the Zionist Organization, held at Carlsbad in September, 1921, a resolution was passed expressing as the official statement of Zionist aims the determination of the Jewish people to live with the Arab people on terms of unity and mutual respect, and together with them to make the common home into a flourishing community, the upbuilding of which may assure to each of its peoples an undisturbed national development…

“It is also necessary to point out that the Zionist Commission in Palestine, now termed the Palestine Zionist Executive, has not desired to possess, and does not possess, any share in the general administration of the country. Nor does the special position assigned to the Zionist Organization in Article IV of the Draft Mandate for Palestine imply any such functions. That special position relates to the measures to be taken in Palestine affecting the Jewish population, and contemplates that the organization may assist in the general development of the country, but does not entitle it to share in any degree in its government.

“Further, it is contemplated that the status of all citizens of Palestine in the eyes of the law shall be Palestinian, and it has never been intended that they, or any section of them, should possess any other juridical status.

“It is necessary,” said the White Paper with masterly ambiguity, “that the Jewish community in Palestine should be able to increase its numbers by immigration. This immigration cannot be so great in volume as to exceed whatever may be the economic capacity of the country at the time to absorb new arrivals. It is essential to ensure that the immigrants should not be a burden upon the people of Palestine as a whole, and that they should not deprive any section of the present population of their employment.”

However, the White Paper denied that a promise had been made to the Arabs ahead of the Balfour Declaration. “It is not the case, as has been represented by the Arab Delegation, that during the war His Majesty’s Government gave an undertaking that an independent national government should be at once established in Palestine. This representation mainly rests upon a letter dated the 24th October, 1915, from Sir Henry McMahon, then His Majesty’s High Commissioner in Egypt, to the Sharif of Mecca, now King Hussein of the Kingdom of the Hejaz. That letter is quoted as conveying the promise to the Sharif of Mecca to recognise and support the independence of the Arabs within the territories proposed by him. But this promise was given subject to a reservation made in the same letter, which excluded from its scope, among other territories, the portions of Syria lying to the west of the District of Damascus. This reservation has always been regarded by His Majesty’s Government as covering the vilayet of Beirut and the independent Sanjak of Jerusalem. The whole of Palestine west of the Jordan was thus excluded from Sir Henry McMahon’s pledge.

“Nevertheless, it is the intention of His Majesty’s government to foster the establishment of a full measure of self-government in Palestine. But they are of the opinion that, in the special circumstances of that country, this should be accomplished by gradual stages…”

From this point onwards, the situation would go from bad to worse.

© Stuart Littlewood 2007

Visit: www.radiofreepalestine.org.uk

• A Wake-up Call — Stuart Littlewood

   

Related Posts:

• History of the US-Israel Relationship, Part I
• Are Netanyahu and the Zionist lobby now a threat to the survival of the US-Israel relationship?
• Alan Hart : Is Palestine A Lost Cause?
• AIPAC 101 — What Every American Should Know — Revisited
• U.S. intelligence community draft report says Dump Israel!

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Stuart Littlewood’s articles are published widely on the web. He is author of the book Radio Free Palestine, which tells the plight of the Palestinians under occupation. For further information please visit http://www.radiofreepalestine.org.uk

“Lawlessness must have painful consequences for the lawless, not their victims.” (Stuart Littlewood)

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