ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that Israel as a state routinely condones official terrorism even in open debates in the Knesset. Some of Israel's prominent journalists cum historians, like Benny Morris, have propagated a hypothesis explaining the violence and brutality of the Israeli Armed Forces (IDF) during the 1948 War as being simply the result of quick victory on the battle field. One often hears the Israeli claim to legitimacy based on UN General Assembly Resolution 181, but rarely is there a reminder of the prior Palestinian right to statehood, granted by the League of Nations. One could argue as the Israelis have done, that the attachment of the Balfour Declaration to the Leagues Mandate Treaty with Britain has given the Jewish population certain rights. Israel, which has signed but refuses to apply the Fourth Geneva Convention of 1949 and the 1867 Hague Regulations, has made a conscious effort to expand on occupied land ever since the June 1967 War.
