General Assembly Topic A

Welcome to SUNS 2008!

Topic: Measures to achieve the lasting peace in the Middle East

Committee: General Assembly

Director: Laura Alejandra Ortiz Arizmendi

What does our committee stand for?

The General Assembly is the main organ of the United Nations, every country is part of the UN, each one of the members has the same importance that the other. The GA controls the budget of the UN, so it gives the money for the works that the UN needs to do in the entire world.

All the elected members of the UN discuss about important issues involving the UN, their members, and the countries. The GA gives some recommendations to committees as the IAEA and Human Rights, thinking in the best ways to end hostilities and global problems around the world.

Description of the topic:

As you might know the Middle East conflict isn’t a problem that’s new. The problem has originated hostilities to innocent civilians and produced the decreasing of the security, not only in the countries affected or the location of it, but all the countries.

The problem started after World War II, the UN gave some parts of land to the Jewish people, some parts of that land given to the Jewish people was sacred for the Muslims; they believe they should own those parts because of religious reasons.

One of the solutions of the UN was the Partition Plan #181 accepted by the General Assembly that established the creation of two states one Jewish and one Arab. The plan was approved with 33 votes in favor, 13 against and 10 abstentions. This plan was accepted by Jews but rejected by Arabs as well as the governments of Egypt, Jordan, Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon who claimed that the UN had no authority to make such decision and pass that resolution because of the territory issue. The effects of this solution were the Arabs fighting for the sacred territories that the plan established as Jewish and the attacks between the Middle East countries that disagree with the solution.

Palestinian Muslims think that if they do not own the land there will be no peace agreement.

Because of this problem, the Palestinians constructed a terrorist web, a big one, to attack the Israelis and defend their land and their people. Israelis defend them- selves from these terrorist attacks by attacking the Palestinian people. One way they do this is taking the Palestinians and putting them into refugee camps, more than 2000 Palestinians are in those refugee camps.

Palestinians feel ashamed by the Israelis and they do not feel like they are free people. They sometimes aren’t allowed to go to see their families or even to work, when a terrorist attack happens (very often) they are not allowed to go anywhere.

They demand certain things in order to have peace with the Israelis, some of them are:

A separate Palestinian state

Palestinian control of east Jerusalem

Israelis need to end the occupation of Palestinian lands

Freedom of Palestinians from the refugees to be available of coming back to their homeland.

Israelis view Palestinian militants as terrorists that do not want peace. Palestinians do have been involved inside the terrorist attacks against Israel civilians when the peace negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians seemed to be for the Israelis going fairly well. Because of the Palestinian attacks Israeli leaders have been replaced by extreme Israeli leaders. The Israeli leaders do not trust in the Palestinian leaders to negotiate peace, so they do not feel safe enough to take away some of the control inside the Palestinian territories.

As well as the Palestinians, Israel has its own conditions for peace:

Palestinian borders that ensure the security for Israel controlling Palestinian attacks.

· Israeli control of all Jerusalem

· Israeli control inside Palestinian territories for Israel to be able to destroy terrorist networks.

Prevention of Palestinian refugees from returning to their homeland.

By comparing the Israeli demands and the Palestinian demands you might notice that both parts are unlikely to find peace. Their conditions are completely contradictory; many Israelis think that Israel owns all of the Palestinian territories, so every time an agreement is reached Palestinian and Israeli extremists work against it, often with violence.

War in Iraq started in 2003 as the USA said that the nation was suspected to be producing weapons of mass destruction and wanted to prevent them from attacking. The USA and some allies started attacking and the situation got worse. The USA also tried to establish that Saddam Hussein was helping terrorist groups with weapons. One of those terrorist groups was Al Qaeda. This dictator, Saddam Hussein, was one of the worst inside the Middle East so the United States helped in the capture and his execution in December 30 of 2006.

The United States didn’t find any proof of the reason the they were supposed to be there (weapons) , but they helped in the capture and execution of one of the most dangerous and violent dictators in the Middle East, helping this way for the countries to be safer.

Iran also is in a deplorable situation and right now the problem is that there is a belief of them trying to have nuclear weapons. Iran says that it isn’t true, but after they said that Israel should be erased from the map there are some doubts. Because of this, the situation in Iran isn’t very good either, so the only ones suffering are the innocent people inside the country.

The USA is the most hated country in the Middle East. The USA is involved all over the Middle East right know and many believe they are only making the people to suffer. The only country that does support them is Israel because of its logical position of giving and taking back.

These are some peace proposals that ask for actions for the countries to establish a lasting peace leading to a better future.

1ªOslo peace process: this peace proposal was a peaceful solution in 1993 led by Yitzhak Rabin and Palestinian leaders from the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) led by Yasser Arafat. Israeli leaders Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres and Arafat were awarded the 1994 Nobel Peace Prize for their efforts. Rabin was assassinated in 1995 by an Israeli extremist opposed to the peace process with the Palestinians.

2ª Camp David 2000 summit: in the 2000 president Clinton from USA convened a peace summit between Palestinian president Yasser Arafat and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak. In this agreement Barak offered over 95% of the West Bank and Gaza strip, Palestinians control over east Jerusalem and 69 Jewish settlements. But President Arafat rejected the offer.

3ªroad map for peace: presented by the quarter of the European Union, Russia, the United Nations and the United States on September 17 2002, was the road map for peace. This proposal wanted to re-establish the Middle East peace, but not solve problems as the refugees or occupations of east Jerusalem.

4ª Arab peace initiative: the peace initiative is a proposed solution to the Arab Israeli conflict as a whole, and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in particular. But Israel rejected the proposal in 2002.

None of these worked, leading the conflict to the actual situation, lack of services and excess of violence that don’t lead any of the countries involved to any good improvement for the country or security where the only affected ones are the innocent people living between the problem unable to stop or try to be secure.

Terrorism in the Middle East:

The terrorist attacks in the Middle East aren’t controlled leading to the death of a lot of the people inside the region.

The terrorists are a very important topic to discuss because if the committee wants to get to a peaceful agreement and to more measures to achieve a lasting peace, because maybe the agreements can be achieved but it doesn’t means the terrorist attacks will stop inside and outside the Middle East countries.

Background history:

The big problem started around 1948 when the Jewish settlers proclaim Israel in May, a fierce struggle break put between the Jewish and the Arab neighbors ending until 1949.then Jordan and Egypt stay with west bank and Gaza strip, so Israel separates from Jordan.

The 6 days war take place in June 5 of 1967: in this war Egypt captured Sinai Peninsula and Gaza Strip. Syria captures the Golan Heights and Jordan West Bank and East Jerusalem. By the Israelis success in this war they doubled the size of land they controlled.

In March of June of 1978 Israel invades south Lebanon.

September of 1978 Egypt, Israel, and the United States signed Camp David Accords sponsored by US President Jimmy Carter, and Israel agrees in returning Sinai to Egypt for all to be in peace and the things get back to normal. Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli leader Menachem Begin share the 1978 Nobel Peace Prize. Egypt was expelled from the Arab League in 1979 for recognizing Israel’s right to exist and Sadat was assassinated in 1981 after a “fatwa” (holy decree) was issued for his death by radical Muslim clerics.

6 of June 1982 Israel re-invades Lebanon in an attempt of removing Yasser Arafat's Palestinian Liberation Organization.

14 December of 1988 Yasser Arafat condemns all forms of terrorism and recognizes the state of Israel.

25 July 1993 Israel launches Operation Accountability, they carried the best artillery since 1982, about 30000 Lebanon civilians move to the north part during the assault.

13 September 1993 Yasser Arafat and Israeli PM Yitzhak Rabin sign Declaration of Principles in Washington; Israeli gives the autonomy to the PLO to try to give peace into the country.

26 October 1994 Israel-Jordan peace treaty is signed. Israel agrees to respect the role of the Hashemite Kingdom over Muslim holy shrines in Jerusalem.

28 September 1995 Taba agreement is sign by Yasser Arafat and Rabin establishing that the Palestinians have more power over the West Bank.

4 November 1995 Prime Minister Rabin is murdered by Yigal Amir, Shimon Peres becomes prime minister.

February-march 1996 Hamas suicide bombs kill about 60 Israelis, Peres decide after this to cut out the Syrian negotiations.

11 April 1996 Israel begins a 17-day bombardment of Lebanon "Operation Grapes of Wrath". Lebanese Hezbollah guerrillas fire Katyusha rockets at populated areas of northern Israel. On 18 April Israel bombs a UN base at Qana killing about one hundred of 800 civilians sheltering there. A later UN report implies the attack was intentional, though Israel denies this. Violence ends with an unwritten agreement to avoid future civilian casualties but this is regularly broken by both sides.

12 August 1996 the first steps toward the four-year freeze on Jewish settlements in the West Bank and Gaza Strip are achieved.

September 1996 61 Arabs and 15 Israeli soldiers died after the opening of an archeological tunnel were no Muslims were allowed to enter; violence from their part killed the soldiers.

18 march of 1997 Israel begins constructing the Har Homa settlement on Jabal Abu Ghneim for more Jewish settlements take place in the occupied East Jerusalem.

21 March 1997: a bomb in an Israeli café kills a Palestinian attacker, 3 Israelis, and wounds 42.

25 September 1997 an Israeli agent tried to kill a military Jordan leader, featuring as a Canadian tourist, cutting out the relationship between Canada and Jordan with the Israeli state.

23 October 1998 Wey River memorandum is signed by Netanyahu outlining Israel west bank to pressure the peace time accomplishment.

4 January 1999 Israel suspends the Wey river memorandum time consume consumes.

5 September 1999 Israelis and Palestinians sign an accord to put into work again the time for Middle East peace process.

10 December 2000: a new Prime Minister Prime Minister Ehud Barak in Israel said that he wants to make more actions toward the peace process.

Actual controversy:

As you read in the pages below, there has not been as much advancement as the needed in the conflict, there has always been a type of controversy and the peace process has never accomplished its final goal. The real controversy in this conflict is whether to know which two of the important parts, Palestinians and Israelis, is the one with the right to stay with the east Jerusalem lands, Muslims think that those are sacred lands and that they should protect their own legacy, the others think that the land are theirs legally. Also that if The USA intervention in countries as Iraq should continue or be stopped. Also, what should be the world’s response to a hostile Iran? This controversy brings big problems and the violence to innocent civilians. This is one of the biggest and oldest problems worldwide and it needs serious actions.

Countries inside the problem:

Gaza: The Gaza Strip isn’t recognized as a part of any sovereign country, it’s claimed by the Palestinian national authority as a part of the Palestinian territories actual control of the area is in the hands of the de facto government dominated by Hamas. Israel, which governed the Gaza Strip from 1967-2005, still controls the strip's airspace, territorial water and offshore maritime access, as well as its side of the Gaza-Israeli border. Egypt, which governed the Gaza Strip from 1948-1967 controls the southern border between the Gaza strip and the Sinai desert. Situation in Gaza is very unstable and difficult for their civilians, humanitarian help doesn’t gets into there pretty much and people suffer all the days because of the lack of improvements and security inside the country.

Israel: Israeli people suffer the attacks of the Palestinian people because of the Israeli- Palestinian conflict, the military forces are used too much and the decreasing of the security for innocent civilians has brought more and more conflicts for Israel in the last years. There have been some improvements in the security but it is fundamental for the Israeli government with the international community to try to do more improvements. Israel also fears attacks from Muslim countries in the Middle East.

Jordan: in Jordan the biggest problem is the political violence and the terrorist attacks, current situation is difficult for the people and the government does not take actions that maybe can lead to the country to a better situation and also better relationship with its own people and civilians that suffer the lack of services.

West bank: also referred to in Israel as "Judea and Samaria", is a landlocked territory on the west bank of the Jordan River in the Middle East. It is one of the most affected territories by the Middle East conflict. The situation in the West Bank has not improved fast enough in order for the people to be and feel safe enough, there aren’t much services and the security isn’t satisfactory. Militant Israelis want to colonize the West Bank with Jewish settlements, ignoring previous peace agreements with the Palestinians, while the Israeli government has been active in fighting their own citizens about this issue.

Lebanon: the security situation in Lebanon has been recently been deteriorated as a result of the unusual attacks in the Israeli and Palestinian lands, Israel attacked the Lebanon country because of the Hezbollah attack, because they blamed the Lebanese government.

United States: Ally of Israel, villain to many Arab countries for interference in the region’s conflicts.

UN actions:

The UN gave proposals, such as the road map for peace, but hasn’t gotten any farther into the conflict, UN took actions as humanitarian help and attention to innocent people, but needs to get more into it, the peace proposals need to be achieved and the actions have to be taken in consideration by the Middle East countries governments as a needing of intervention.

Important questions:

What should be done about the Palestinian attacks to Israel?

Should Israel treat the Palestinians the way they do?

Is Israel only defending against the Palestinian actions?

What can be done for the innocent civilians?

Can the US military support continue?

What will be done about the refugee issue?

The land of east Jerusalem and Gaza strip should be owned by whom?

Does the problem need military intervention?

What is your country’s opinion about the problem?

What part will you support?

Is your country willing to help the problem or only a part of it?