Applying Israeli law to the Golan in 1981 and the West Bank in 2020

When it comes to the Knesset debate, it is unlikely to be completed in one day, but there may be echoes of the kinds of arguments MKs had in 1981.

By LAHAV HARKOV
WIND TURBINES pictured in the Golan Heights. (photo credit: REUTERS)
WIND TURBINES pictured in the Golan Heights.
(photo credit: REUTERS)
With the government discussing the possibility of applying Israeli sovereignty to about 30% of the West Bank as early as July 1, it’s worth taking a look at the last time Israel applied its laws to new territory.
On December 14, 1981, the Knesset approved the Golan Heights Law, passing it in all three readings in one day.
The law is simple and only three sentences long: “The law, jurisdiction and administration of the state shall apply to the Golan Heights, as described in the Appendix. This Law shall become valid on the day of its passage in the Knesset. The Minister of the Interior shall be charged with the implementation of this Law, and he is entitled, in consultation with the Minister of Justice, to enact regulations for its implementation and to formulate in regulations transitional provisions concerning the continued application of regulations, orders, administrative ordered, rights and duties which were in force on the Golan Heights prior to the application of this Law.”
Conservative New York Times columnist William Safire summed up the context of Israel’s move succinctly in an essay three weeks later: “Israel had just placed the Golan Heights under civil rather than military law, a step short of annexation. Since the failure of US diplomacy to induce Syria to remove its Soviet missiles from Lebanon, that was the least violent response Israel could make to Syria’s creeping annexation of Lebanon and buildup of the PLO there.”
Then-prime minister Menachem Begin, confined to a wheelchair after falling and breaking his hip, cited in his address to the Knesset an interview with Assad published the day before, in which he said he would not recognize Israel even if the PLO does.
“How many times did we call for the rulers of Syria to open negotiations for peace with us?” Begin said, according to the Knesset’s protocols from that day. “I repeatedly said that I invite President Assad to Jerusalem, or I am willing to go to Damascus to open peace negotiations... The Syrians rejected our outstretched hand with a total rejection of our right to exist as the Jewish State.”
“The Syrians made the lives of tens of thousands of civilians hell... They would open fire from the [Golan] Heights toward our towns... Could anyone think that Israel would ever agree to renew this situation?”
Begin cited Jewish history in the area, saying: “You will not find anyone in our land or outside it a serious person who learned the history of the Land of Israel who will try to deny that, for many generations, the Golan Heights were an inseparable part of the land... After the Great War, known today as WWI, [the victors] decided otherwise and set the border of the Land of Israel about 10 meters from the shore of the Kinneret. This fact only proves the arbitrariness of the colonial rules at the time that passed. This arbitrariness does not obligate us.”
In a later part of the debate, Begin took issue with his opponents calling the move “annexation,” saying he does not use that word and that the bill calls for an application of law.
“The vast majority of the public is in favor of applying the law to the Golan Heights... We express the will of the public, the will of the majority,” Begin said.
Another reason for the timing, Menachem Begin Heritage Center director Herzl Makov explained on Monday, was due to an ongoing crisis between Poland and the Soviet Union. Warsaw Pact defense ministers held a meeting on the same day that the Knesset vote took place in which they discussed suppressing mass protests and strikes associated with the emerging Solidarity Movement.
Begin hoped the Golan Heights vote “would go quickly and quietly while the world was busy with Poland,” Makov said. “He was in the hospital because he broke his hip, and when he left the hospital, he called a cabinet meeting and then went to the Knesset to pass it in three readings in one day.”
Overall, Makov said, the plan worked: “There was [international] opposition and threats, but it passed very quickly.”
As Safire put it: “World reaction had been ritualistic but mild: France’s [president Francois] Mitterrand did not cancel his plans to visit Israel, and even [UK foreign secretary Peter] Carington of Arabia kept cool.”
But the reaction from Washington was so harsh that Safire said then-president Ronald Reagan “vented his spleen on our minipower ally,” after his administration suspended a recent strategic cooperation agreement with Israel.
Yehuda Avner, who served as an adviser to five Israeli prime ministers, wrote in The Jerusalem Post in 2008 about how Begin responded to the agreement’s suspension in a meeting with then US ambassador to Israel Samuel Lewis.
“What kind of language is this – punishing Israel? Are we a vassal state? Are we a banana republic? Are we 14-year-old boys that have to have knuckles slapped if they misbehave?” Begin asked. “You cannot and will not frighten us with punishments, Mr. Ambassador. Threats will fall on deaf ears... We shall not allow a sword of Damocles to hang over our heads. The people of Israel have lived for 3,700 years without a strategic agreement with America, and it will continue to live without it for another 3,700 years!”
Lewis responded that the US was mainly disappointed that they were not told in advance about the Golan Heights Law, and Begin said: “We did not want to embarrass you by putting you in a predicament vis-a-vis the Arab capitals with which you have ties. Had we told you beforehand what we intended to do, you would have said no. We did not want you to have to say no and then proceed with the legislation, which is what we would have done under all circumstances.”
THIRTY-NINE years later, with Israel considering applying its laws to about 30% of the West Bank, there are many differences, both legal and geopolitical.
One major difference may be the international reaction.
“Now, in theory, the government is acting according to a plan the Americans authorized,” Makov pointed out. “There was no support at all in the world for applying sovereignty to the Golan.”
The world was distracted by the Cold War and the Poles’ struggle for freedom, so while they condemned the move, there were not serious consequences for Israel after it applied its laws to the Golan.
Now, the world may theoretically be very busy with the coronavirus crisis, but leaders from Beijing to Brussels have taken the time to condemn Israel. There is talk in the EU about sanctions against Israel should it take this move. Whether they will follow up with action remains to be seen.
Legally, when Israel won the West Bank and Golan Heights after the Six Day War in 1967, it didn’t consider both to have the same status.
“The Golan wasn’t part of the British Mandate, it belonged to Syria,” Makov explained, making an argument similar to one Begin made in the Knesset. “Judea and Samaria, like Jerusalem, don’t need a law, just a cabinet decision, because the territory is part of the Land of Israel according to international agreements [to establish the British Mandate]. That’s why Begin needed a law in the Knesset.”
Though there is a question of whether West Bank annexation needs a Knesset vote, it will likely go to one, because there is an easier majority for the move there. Another reason is that there will likely be more legal details needed to be worked out, because Israeli law will only apply to parts of the West Bank, which are not contiguous, and because there are hundreds of thousands of Israeli residents, with municipalities and businesses in the West Bank, as opposed to the sparsely populated Golan of 1981.
Domestically, Begin had broad support from the public for applying Israel’s laws to the Golan Heights, and even eight Labor MKs, from the opposition, voted in favor of the move. Today, the move in the West Bank has opponents on the Left and Right, though it seems it would easily get majority support in the Knesset.
When it comes to the Knesset debate, it is unlikely to be completed in one day, but there may be echoes of the kinds of arguments MKs had in 1981. Then Knesset speaker Menachem Savidor reprimanded far-left MK Charlie Biton for calling the opposing side “quislings” and had Hadash MK Tawfik Toubi removed from the plenum for repeated disruptions, including calling a Druze Likud MK a traitor. The Likudnik threw the same accusation back at Toubi.
But when it comes to the ideas behind applying Israeli law to the Golan Heights or parts of the West Bank, Makov posited that the rhetoric then and now are similar: “It’s the same principle of faith in the right of the People of Israel to the entire Land of Israel. The Golan Heights Law has the same ideological roots as what we say today about Judea and Samaria.”


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