The Green Line

This section is focused on the ‘Green Line’, the armistice line agreed in 1949 and in force until 4 June 1967.  It has come to mean very different things to Israelis and Palestinians and affects their lives in significantly different ways. Well over half a million Israeli citizens now live beyond the Green Line, connected seamlessly to Israel proper, travelling without impediment and generally unaware of the fact when they cross the Green Line. Indeed, it is excluded from most maps, particularly those used in the Israeli education system.

In December 1967 the Israeli military government started using the term “Judea and Samaria region” as a synonym for the West Bank region (excluding what had been annexed as East Jerusalem) but it was not until 1977 and the Begin government that this description came into common use. Later on, the terms “occupied territory” or “West Bank” were to be forbidden in news reports. The reference to the ancient Jewish Kingdoms of Judea and Samaria was clearly intended to legitimise an Israeli claim to these territories (a claim accepted by no other state or international body).

For West Bank Palestinians (and many East Jerusalemites) the Green Line represents the border beyond which they cannot go freely – if they can go at all. In its advisory opinion on 9 July 2004, the International Court of Justice upheld the significance of the Green Line, confirming all territory beyond it over which Israel has jurisdiction, as occupied.
“Israel Green Lines” from Wikipedia user, Ynhockey (licensed under Creative Commons)

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Articles and analyses

1. The Green line is a Red Line: the 1967 border and the two-state solution
PLO,  Negotiations Affairs Department, nd.

A useful and wide-ranging question-and-answer presentation of issues surrounding the Green Line, resolution 242, East Jerusalem etc. “The June 4, 1967 borders represent the internationally recognized boundary between Israel and the occupied Palestinian territory. It also represents the historic Palestinian compromise of 1988 when the PLO limited its claim to 22 percent of historic Palestine.”

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2. International Court of Justice finds Israeli barrier in Palestinian territory is illegal
UN News Centre, 9 Jul 2004

On 9 July 2004, by a majority of 14 to 1, the International Court of Justice found that the so-called Separation Wall’s construction breaches international law. It violates principles outlined in the UN Charter and long-standing global conventions that prohibit the threat or use of force and the acquisition of territory that way, as well as principles upholding the right of peoples to self-determination. In the course of its findings the Court upheld the importance of the Green Line: “The Court concludes that all these territories (including East Jerusalem) remain occupied territories and that Israel has continued to have the status of occupying Power.” See the Summary of the Advisory Opinion here.

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3. Borderline Views: Putting the Green Line on the Map
David Newman, Jerusalem Post, 24 Feb 2014

A good overview of the history of the Green Line and the realities of life it represents.

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4. Elusive Line Defines Lives in Israel and the West Bank
Isabel Kerchner, New York Times, 6 Sep 2011

Despite attempts to blur it physically, and even deny its existence on maps, Israel has carefully preserved the Green Line in legal and administrative terms, and it defines lives on both sides.

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