ORGANISATION FOR CONFLICT MANAGEMENT AND RECONSTRUCTION
Laying the foundation for state building, repatriation and law post-conflict
Filling the Gap Before the Two State Solution:
Territorial Administration by the United Nations in Palestine
The conflict between Israel and Palestine has led to American leaders posing the question 'what happens the day after'? The call for a humanitarian ceasefire has been rejected by Israel on the basis that Hamas, an Islamist militant movement and one of the Palestinian territories' two major political parties which it labels a terrorist organisation, will be afforded an opportunity to regroup and rearm.
There is therefore one single issue that arises from the current state of affairs: How can a permanent cessation of hostilities be achieved which allows Israel to be assured of its security and which also preserves the Palestinian territories for the Palestinian people given that Hamas is the de facto governing authority in Gaza.
The United Nations has previously exercised the principle of International Territorial Administration ("ITA"). In simplest terms, ITA enables the UN to take control of and administer a territory by providing for the administration of hospitals, civil and social services, schools, law and order and even garbage collection. The UN performed these tasks under the enterprise of ITA in East Timor, in Cambodia, and in Kosovo. In East Timor, for example, the territory had sought independence from its status as an Indonesian occupied Portuguese colony and the UN's presence enabled the process of a plebiscite, formal UN administration, and the transition to statehood. These steps were achieved through several stages. The ballot was held under the supervision of the United Nations Assistance Mission in East Timor, the violent aftermath was dealt with by the International Force in East Timor to restore order and the United Nations Transitional Administration in East Timor was charged with the transitional authority to administer the former colony into a new state with a functional system of government.
UNTAET's Mandate was to: provide security and maintain law and order; establish an administration; develop civil and social services; co-ordinate humanitarian assistance, foster rehabilitation and development; establish conditions of sustainable development; support capacity building for self-government; build local capacity for public works; draft and enforce laws; run schools, banks, and public utilities; provide policing, including border patrol, intelligence, surveillance and special police units; and establish a judicial system, fiscal authority, a tax regime. a civil service and currency.
Hamas took control of Gaza from the Palestinian Authority in 2007 after being blocked from exercising power despite winning a parliamentary election. Any suggestion of ITA by the UN in the Palestinian territories will therefore require the co-operation of Hamas as the de facto governing authority in Gaza. How can this be achieved? Through the concept of a Trust: where Hamas is recognised as a joint co-trustee with the UN (or alternatively a beneficiary) of the administration of the territory by the UN. This is what has been termed the "Collective Trust" and a diagram of the model can be seen in the PDF copy of the book on Trusteeship in the Publications section which is available to download for free.
If the UN is formally involved in the territorial administration of Gaza with the co-operation of Hamas, then this should provide Israel with the assurance it is seeking for its security whilst maintaining the territories of Palestine for the Palestinian people. If the underlying concern is whether it is possible to work with a group that has been labelled as a terrorist organisation one need look no further than ITA by the UN in Cambodia which involved working with, amongst others, the Khmer Rouge who were responsible for genocide.