Re: International law support for Israel's boundaries

On Jun 1, 2025 at 10:19:02 AM PDT, ""Adam H. Kerman"" <ahk@chinet.com> wrote:

I have very limited understanding of the status of Israel's boundaries
in international law. I've done basic reading; I know how and when
specific boundaries were drawn. But their legal status?
 
There are two ways an international boundary gets international
recognition at the time of declaration of a state, either by bi-lateral
or multi-lateral treaty in which the boundary is demarcated, or by
international custom.

Well, there's a third way: you enforce the borders ruthlessly against anyone
who attacks you and tries to cross them. If you can hold the territory by
force, it becomes yours.

In the surrender of the Ottoman Empire (or whatever country it was) in
WWI, Turkey no longer claimed control of the Middle East and French and
British Mandates carved up massive amounts of territory.
 
Legally, the Mandate was not colonization nor occupation. It was
administration intended to lead to new states. But the Mandate --
created as part of the multi-lateral peace treaty ending World War One
-- has international legal recognition long predating the United
Nations.
 
The British drew a variety of borders for administrative purposes.
Pre-WWI, when there were various powers occupying Egypt over the
centuries, Turkey, France during the Napoleonic wars, and the British,
the line was drawn in 1906 between Britain and the Ottoman Empire
through unpopulated desert that wouldn't be disputed. Egypt wasn't a
country but had plenty of autonomy.
 
This boundary became one of the boundaries of Mandatory Palestine. The
boundary between Israel and Jordan was based on the 1920 demarcation of
the eastern boundary of mandatory Palestine, although Transjordan was
added to the British, er, mandate/occupation/administration in 1921 but
administered separately.
 
So various peace treaties Israel is party to incorporate these British
drawn administrative lines by reference as international boundaries.
 
This is international boundary BY CUSTOM, not by treaty, for it is
CUSTOMARY to recognize the boundaries of a state at time of declaration
as having been created within existing territory without a treaty to the
contrary.

Is this how CHAZ managed to establish it's own state in the heart of Seattle
during the Summer of Love?