UN ‘Mandate 3.0’ undermines Palestinian self-determination
While popular support for Palestine has grown to unprecedented levels on the back of the anti-genocide movement, the solidarity movement’s job is not yet done.
Right now, it has to fight for unhindered aid to Gaza, for what South African ex-United Nations official Jonathan Whittall has called “Palestinian-led reconstruction”, for boycott, divestments and sanctions against the settler-colonial state of Israel and, most of all, for Palestinian self-determination.
This is because the imperial institutions with power are aligning more closely to suppress Palestinian sovereignty. The UN Security Council adopted a resolution on November 17 that endorsed United States President Donald Trump’s plan for Gaza.
While the latest plan is not the bizarre “Riviera of the Middle East” proposal, it does include the same billionaire mega-project reconstruction logic that Gaza is “a blank sheet”.
As Tony Karon pointed out, from the colonial-era British Mandate through to the Zionist settler-colonial state of Israel, those in power have always insisted that Palestinians cannot rule themselves.
Jonathan Cook said UN Resolution 2803 makes “Trump the debauched feudal overlord of Gaza”. It means that “oversight of the system of control and abuse Israel has exercised over the territory since the late 1960s — which the International Court of Justice ruled illegal last year — will be transferred to the United States with the Security Council’s blessing”.
Israel’s occupation is now “a joint US-Israeli occupation”.
This is “Mandate 3.0” against Palestinian self-determination.
Palestinians have never passively accepted colonisers’ mandates imposed on them. Now, their civil society, political and resistance organisations have, almost without exception, rejected the UN Security Council decision.
Thirteen of 15 member states voted for the resolution on November 17. Decisively, instead of using their veto power, as the US did to protect Israel, permanent council members China and Russia, abstained.
This reflects the support the US has built for Trump’s plan, including from the Palestinian Authority, which has long been the security accomplice of the Israeli state.
Other supporters include US “security” partners and allies; the titled princelings and uniformed rulers of the Arab states; Türkiye under Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and the West’s supine presidents and prime ministers.
In turn, military, “intelligence” and diplomatic agents of these states — no Palestinians — have already been assembled, alongside Israeli officials in a “Civil-Military Coordination Centre” to prepare the new mandate. Australian military personnel are part of this.
No one should be surprised this centre is based in Israel. But, brazenly, it is housed in the controversial Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, a joint Israel-US “aid” operation that targeted starving Palestinians.
The resolution’s next step for colonial control over Palestinians under US, not UN, control, is the establishment of an “International Stabilization Force” (ISF), in which Egypt is a key collaborator, which has a mandate to operate in collaboration with Israel.
The ISF is a proxy occupation force.
It is directed, in part, to secure the borders in which the Palestinians in Gaza must live, to “stabilise” and demilitarise Palestinian — to suppress resistance to occupation — and to train a Palestinian police force to reimpose this from within.
That is the how the ISF “protects civilians”, assists in the distribution of humanitarian aid and “monitors the ceasefire” — which Israel has repeatedly broken. The ISF seems to only be able to act against Palestinians.
Tellingly, civilian protection and humanitarian aid will be offered through newly created “alternative safe communities”. Gazans must enter these to receive basic services, although people seen to be connected to Hamas will be denied access. This scheme clearly parallels the “strategic hamlets” and similar concentration camps used for anti-resistance suppression in Malaya, Vietnam and Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe).
Finally, the resolution crowned all this with “The Board of Peace”, which will govern a sliver of the Gaza Strip.
Trump will apparently be its chair and Tony Blair, former British prime minister and war criminal, will be his semi-permanent consultant. Sitting atop this, alongside its genocide collaborator, is Israel.
The Israeli military will maintain a directly occupied “red zone”, which covers 58% of Gaza. Within that, it can continue to drive Palestinians from their homes and block whatever food security Gazans obtained for themselves up to 2023.
Beyond that, Cook suggested Israeli-controlled armed gangs of Palestinians will attack any opposition to the occupation.
Meanwhile, Israel continues to deny and delay food, medicines and temporary housing. “The vast majority of Palestinians will struggle to survive the winter without shelter and significant aid, with no hospitals and no schools for their children. All while being indiscriminately bombed by Israel,” writes Cook.
The UN resolution made no mention of Israel’s crimes, making states accountable or obliged them to provide redress to Palestinians.
After two years of livestreamed genocide, the US wants to save Israel and Zionism from itself. Whether that’s possible will depend, in part, on the Palestine solidarity movement continuing to pressure complicit governments, such as Australia’s, to support Palestinian self-determination.
[Jonathan Strauss is a member of the Socialist Alliance National Executive.]