Month: December 2023

By Michael Rubin

AEIdeas

Though the eyes of the world have been focused on the war in Gaza, Jerusalem has witnessed a real estate dispute over the past month that could have grave consequences for coexistence between the city’s religious groups.

A coveted plot of land inside the Armenian Quarter of Jerusalem’s Old City has become the focus of a legal controversy between the Armenian community and an Australian-Israeli developer who intends to build a luxury hotel complex on the property. In recent weeks, the dispute over the property has escalated.

The neighborhood is home to about 2,000 Armenian Christians, a tight-knit community whose presence dates back 1,600 years — the oldest Armenian diaspora in the world.

In April of this year, following a surprise visit by Israeli land surveyors, residents discovered that a land lease deal signed in 2021 by the head of the community, Patriarch Nourhan Manougian, had a much larger scope than initially announced.

It emerged that the 98-year lease included an area known as the Cows’ Garden, a plot of land used in ancient times to keep cattle and which now houses a seminary and cultural halls for the community, as well as the patriarch’s own garden and the homes of five Armenian families.

The deal, which entails over 11,500 square meters — about 25% of the overall surface of the Armenian Quarter — was concluded with Xana Capital, a hotel company owned by Israeli-Australian businessman Danny Rothman.

The patriarch denied knowing the exact terms of the lease, and claimed that a local priest, Baret Yeretsian, signed the contract on his behalf. The clergyman in question has in the meantime been defrocked and has reportedly sought refuge in Pasadena, near Los Angeles.

In an interview with the Associated Press in June, Yeretsian said that Rothman plans to develop a high-end resort in the Armenian Quarter, which would be managed by the One&Only hotel company based in Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates, which established diplomatic relations with Israel in 2020.

Yeretsian dismissed fears of an Israeli takeover of the Armenian Quarter as “propaganda” based solely on Rothman’s Jewish identity. “The intention was never to Judaize the place,” he said, claiming that Rothman has no political agenda. He insisted that the Armenian patriarch was fully engaged in the long-running negotiations and personally signed off on the contract.

In an interview with The Times of Israel, Hagop Djernazian, an activist from the Armenian Quarter, said that the Armenian community was supposed to earn a yearly $300,000 rent from the deal, “which is laughable for this plot of land, located on the highest point in the Old City on Mount Zion, the biggest open space in the Old City. You can’t find open spaces like this in other quarters,” Djernazian explained.

The area abuts the Jewish Quarter and is a short walk away from the Western Wall.

Jewish investors in Israel and abroad have long sought to buy properties in the Old City and East Jerusalem, in a bid to cement Israeli control over parts of the city claimed by Palestinians as their capital. For Jews, Jerusalem, its Old City and the Temple Mount it contains have been a centerpiece of national identity for 3,000 years and Israel sees the united city as its capital.

Scandals involving land sales to Jewish groups have previously embroiled the Greek Orthodox Church, the custodian of many Christian sites in the region. Two decades ago, the Greek Church sold two Palestinian-run hotels in the Old City to foreign companies acting as fronts for a Jewish group. The secretive deals led to the downfall of the Greek patriarch and prompted international uproar.

When the Armenian community learned that the terms of the deal diverged substantially from the preliminary information they had received, protests broke out. A first rally was organized on May 12.

Community leaders demanded that the contract be canceled, claiming that it violated the Constitution of the Patriarchate, which does not allow leasing lands for such lengths of time. The patriarch himself was apparently not aware that his own private garden was included in the lease.

The contract, however, was signed and is now legally in force, and while the community is readying to challenge its validity in court, the standoff on the ground has escalated.

On October 26, a bulldozer appeared at the large parking lot of the Cows’ Garden, Djernazian recounted, and tore down a wall separating the lot from the Armenian Seminary. It also destroyed sections of pavement, chunks of which are now piled up in a mound, with an Armenian flag planted on top.

On the same day, the Patriarchate sent a letter to Xana Capital requesting the cancellation of the land lease.

“This deal puts the integrity of the Armenian quarter in danger and therefore puts the Armenian presence and Christian presence in Jerusalem in danger, because losing this land will cut us off from the Christian quarter,” Djernazian explained.

On November 5, Rothman turned up, accompanied by his Arab Israeli business partner and a group of about 15 armed Israelis with two attack dogs seeking to “threaten and harm the community,” who had organized a protest sit-in.

“They work like the mafia, they sent a mob to confront us,” Djernazian said. The confrontation required the intervention of the police.

Danny Rothman did not respond to a request for comment.

According to the New Arab news website, among those who took part in the confrontation was an American-Israeli West Bank settler named Saadia Hershkop, a self-described “hilltop settlement activist.”

In 2005, Hershkop was deported to the US for 40 days for fear he would participate in acts of violence to disrupt the Gaza disengagement process.

He seems to still have run-ins with the law, and recently held a crowdfunding campaign to cover legal costs for what he describes as a “serious indictment issued against me in revenge for my activism.”

The confrontation prompted the Armenian community to set up a protest tent, manned day and night by residents, to guard against new incursions by outsiders. The community also set up a barricade with barbed wire to block access to the site.

On November 15, a group of people showed up and encroached upon the premises. The community claimed the intruders had been sent from Xana Capital. When the police arrived on the scene, most of the trespassers scattered. The community lamented that those who remained were not arrested, but that police detained three Armenians.

Djernazian accused police of cooperating with the company to assist it in taking possession of the land.

In response to a request for comment, the police said that “it is not a party to civil or contractual disputes… Upon receiving reports or complaints on suspicion of  a criminal offense, they are dealt with by the police accordingly, as is done in cases in which mutual complaints about assault and/or threats were received.”

The next day, the Armenian Patriarchate of Jerusalem released an urgent communique, saying that the community “is under possibly the greatest existential threat of its 16-century history,” which “fully extends to all the Christian communities of Jerusalem.”

In solidarity, the heads of the other Christian denominations in Jerusalem issued a joint statement two days later, saying that the recent escalation could “potentially endanger the Armenian presence in the area, weakening and endangering the Christian presence in the Holy Land,” and calling to handle the dispute solely through legal avenues.

Djernazian noted that the community has received the backing of other groups in the city in its effort to reassert control over its quarter, including from Jews. “Both Israelis and Palestinians have been supporting us, which is much needed because in the end, this plan will erase the Armenian presence in Jerusalem, and also the Christian presence. People will emigrate, we will lose our institutions,” he said.

“The real estate company is using the timing of the war [in Gaza] against us. They thought that no one would pay attention, neither journalists nor the international community. But it turns out that the opposite happened, and we received attention from local and international journalists and support from local diplomatic missions and the international community.

“Different institutions and officials have had their eyes on this property since 1967, but it’s next to our school, next to our church and convent,” Djernazian said. “We will not give it up.”

Agencies contributed to this report.

United Nations, Dec 9 (SocialNews.XYZ) UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has welcomed the agreement between Armenia and Azerbaijan to improve their relations, said his spokesman.

"The Secretary-General welcomes the joint statement issued by Armenia and Azerbaijan announcing a series of confidence-building measures and reaffirming their commitment to normalise bilateral relations," said Stephane Dujarric, the UN spokesman, on Friday.

The United Nations encourages the parties to build on the agreement to advance mutual confidence and secure long-term peace for the benefit of their population and the region, Dujarric told a daily press briefing.

Armenia and Azerbaijan said on Thursday that they have reached an agreement on taking confidence-building steps by releasing prisoners of war following their first-ever direct negotiations with no mediators involved, Xinhua news agency reported.

The two countries said they intend to normalise relations and reach a peace treaty.

Armenia and Azerbaijan have been at loggerheads over the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh, internationally recognised as part of Azerbaijan, since 1988. Peace talks have been going on since 1994 when a ceasefire was agreed on, despite sporadic clashes since then.

Source: IANS

https://www.socialnews.xyz/2023/12/08/un-chief-welcomes-armenia-azerbaijan-agreement-to-improve-ties/

In a dramatic development, the leaders of Armenia and Azerbaijan issued a surprise joint statement on 7 December, outlining a prisoner exchange and mutual confidence-building measures, while committing to continue negotiations on normalizing relations and reaching a long-elusive peace treaty.

The joint statement by the offices of the Armenian Prime Minister and Azerbaijani President opens the path to a full-fledged peace treaty, as European and American diplomats have indicated.

Most notably, “for humanitarian reasons” and as a “gesture of goodwill,” Azerbaijan agreed to release 32 Armenian military personnel, while Armenia will free two Azerbaijanis. This will be the first mass prisoner-of-war exchange in years, especially on terms so favorable to Armenia.

The countries also concurred on reciprocal symbolic gestures. Yerevan will withdraw its bid to host the next UN Climate Change Conference (COP29) in favor of Baku, and even calls on other Eastern European states to back Azerbaijan’s application. In return, Baku endorses Armenia’s candidacy for membership in the COP Eastern European States Bureau.

This agreement was a sensation, as just days prior there was no indication of such a breakthrough in relations. On the contrary, there were good reasons to expect a sharp deterioration of relations and intensified fighting on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border. The “one-day war” of 19 September that allowed Baku to regain control of Nagorno-Karabakh had nearly buried peace talks between the countries, according to European Pravda editor Yuriy Panchenko.

For years since the war in Nagorno-Karabakh, a region with a predominantly ethnic Armenian population but located within Azerbaijan, ended in a precarious ceasefire in 1994, negotiations occurred simultaneously in two formats: Western and Russian.

The Western dialogue was important for Baku since Yerevan, which gained control of Nagorno- Karabakh, had to recognize Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity. It was also important for Yerevan as security guarantees for Karabakh Armenians were discussed.

Russia, meanwhile, proposed postponing Karabakh status issues (ideal for Armenia but unacceptable to Azerbaijan) while raising the issue of a transport corridor through Armenia (favorable to Baku but completely unacceptable to Yerevan).

Regaining Karabakh completely changed these dynamics.

Now, the Russian track lost all value for Yerevan – one reason for the current freeze in Armenia-Russia relations. Meanwhile, Azerbaijan lost interest in Western mediation, especially amidst accusations of “ethnic cleansing in Karabakh.” As a result, Baku’s statements became increasingly aggressive, raising the likelihood of a new regional conflict.

So why did Baku pivot from bellicose rhetoric towards conciliation? American pressure seems the impetus. Recent weeks saw multiple forceful warnings from Washington about the unacceptability of coercion toward Armenia. Significantly, US State Department sanctions coordinator Jim O’Brien visited Baku the very day this statement emerged, later tweeting about resumed Armenia-Azerbaijan peace talks.

The text itself also spotlights “discussions regarding the implementation of more confidence building measures.” Both sides call for international backing to build “mutual trust” and “positively impact the entire South Caucasus region.”

This likely constitutes the key passage, with adversaries confirming readiness to restart dialogue. The immediate result is drastically reduced regional war risks.

But the omission of Moscow from this significant process, despite decades of Russian mediation attempts, constitutes the developments’ sharpest rebuke for the Kremlin. Perhaps consequently, initial official Russian reactions to the agreed statement proved remarkably restrained and understated, with Foreign Ministry representative Maria Zakharova offering routine approval of progress while insisting upon Russia’s past useless “assistance” contributions regarding negotiations.

“We are ready to continue providing all possible assistance in unblocking transport communications, border delimitation, conclusion of a peace treaty, and contacts along the line of civil society,” she claimed.

However, Russia’s mediation appears no longer necessary – further peace talks will occur under EU and US auspices. A signed peace agreement will end Russia’s South Caucasus influence.

Theoretically, the Kremlin can still sabotage talks, given its military presence in both countries. But without political backing in either Armenia or Azerbaijan this is clearly insufficient to change the course of the countries, Panchenko stresses.

“So, if the West is persistent, signing a peace agreement in the coming months-by the middle of next year-is a very realistic scenario, snd this will be a foreign policy disaster for Russia. Hopefully, not the last,” Panchenko sums up.

Why has an act of blatant ethnic cleansing been widely ignored?

“Who, after all, speaks today of the annihilation of the Armenians?”
— Adolf Hitler, 22 August 1939

December 9th is the International Day of the Convention for the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide. Article II of that Convention defines the crime of genocide as “the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial, or religious group”. Unfortunately, defining it has not prevented a single genocide since 1948.

The Article in international law that matters for current victims of genocidal projects in Europe (Armenia and Ukraine) is Article 5 of NATO membership — “each member state to consider an armed attack against one member state…to be an armed attack against them all” and not Article II of the Genocide Convention. 

When Hitler evoked the memory of the Turkish “atrocities” against the Armenians in his 1939 speech (the word genocide was not coined until 1944), he was highlighting that massacres in the East in times of war could be committed with impunity and the perpetrators would escape justice. 

Raphael Lemkin helped create the Genocide Convention to remove that impunity and so prevent acts of genocide. Since  some hopeful developments at the turn of the 21st century, this legal project to end genocide has entirely failed. The only thing that prevents genocide is collective security. 

The international human rights industry will use the 9th December to celebrate the elaborate legal processes that have grown up since 1948. There will rightly be much debate about if the Hamas attack on Israel was or was not part of an overall genocidal project: the annihilation of the state of Israel and the Jewish people that live from the River to the Sea. Short answer: it is and should be treated as such, but non-state actors are not covered by the Convention. 

There will be even more focus on if Israel’s response constitutes a programme of genocide against the Palestinian people of Gaza. Short answer: it doesn’t but the IDF is inevitably committing crimes against humanity and war crimes in the manner of its operations given the density of population and the way Hamas is embedded in civilian infrastructure, exactly as Hamas intended.

There will be little discussion of the most blatant genocidal acts committed over the last two years: the full-scale invasion of Ukraine and the many crimes that occurred consequently, including the forced transferring of up to 20,000 Ukrainian Children to Russia from Ukraine, and the destruction “in whole or in part” of the Armenian population of Nagorno-Karabakh by the Azerbaijani state. 

Given the Crime of Aggression perpetrated in the original 2014 invasion, repeated in February 2022, states that are party to the convention have clearly not done what they can to defend Ukraine from Russian genocide as it has unfolded over nine years. Moreover, these acts have been accompanied by actions that meet the 5 Ds framework of incitement to acts of genocide — dehumanisation, demonisation, delegitimisation, disinformation, and the denial of past atrocities perpetrated against the target.

A similar case can be made for Nagorno-Karabakh. It has been a project that has taken place in stages, with military dimensions, cultural dimensions and finally the ethnic cleansing of 120,000 Armenians from their homes in September 2023. It is a war against the Armenian people in revenge for Armenia’s original seizure of contested territory. 

The origin of the conflict is hotly debated. There is little to debate about the actions of Azerbaijan in the war of 2020, the subsequent and previous destruction of Christian sites and the ethnic cleansing of 2023. Together they constitute genocide. The speeches of Aliyev and surrounding propaganda meet the test of the 5 Ds. 

Armenia’s ratification of the Rome Statute demonstrates its intention to make a referral of Azerbaijan to the ICC. 39 states have made that referral on behalf of Ukraine against Putin. The ICC and the Convention on Genocide having done nothing to prevent Aliyev or Putin, the purpose must now be punishment. The chances of punishment are less than zero. The most that might be achieved is that judgment will provide some kind of symbolic justice.

Both the perpetrating states and their dictators must be found guilty of the Crime of Aggression (for stating wars) and the Crimes of Genocide (Article II and the 5 Ds) so that the international legal judgment is unambiguous. Judgment matters to history but also shapes that which is possible in terms of collective and individual redress, supports the enactment of the ICC files already open and provides ballast to international political support for judicial processes. It is not therefore irrelevant. 

The recurrence of Genocide since 1948, with ever greater regularity, shows that the reality is that the Convention on the Prevention on Genocide does not prevent Genocide. The record of prosecution by courts and tribunals shows that it will not punish any sitting Head of State, though it might facilitate them being judged, and it will only ever bring to justice a fraction of the perpetrators who escape state level judicial processes. 

The fact is: the only thing that can prevent Genocide is collective security. The only guarantee of collective security in Europe is full NATO membership. The only thing that can punish Heads of State that perpetrate wars of aggression accompanied by acts of Genocide, is defeat.