The quote “Repeat a lie often enough and it becomes the truth,” attributed to Adolf Hitler’s propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels, sums up what modern psychology has proven: that repetitive statements can dominate our critical thinking to the point of ‘accept lies for granted. truths. In other words, the brainwashing works.

The idea that “Israel has the right to exist” is a good example. This is a statement made so often by leaders and the media, mainly Western, that it seems accurate. And if it is a “right”, it must be anchored in law.

Thus, when French President Emmanuel Macron reportedly declared during a cabinet meeting on October 15 that “Mr. Netanyahu must not forget that his country was created by a UN decision” in reference to Resolution 181( II) of the 1947 United Nations General Assembly, he suggested that: Israel’s existence derives from an international legal act which therefore gives it legitimacy – the so-called “right to exist”. This often shared misconception constitutes a distortion of historical and legal realities.

To begin with, the idea of ​​an inherent “right to exist” in a state is fallacious. Conceptually or legally, no such natural or legal right exists – for Israel or any other state – as the creation of nation-states is not anchored in international law. Nation states are the result, ultimately, of a proclamation by those who claim to represent the newly formed state.

Once declared, the new state and its government may (or may not) be formally recognized by other states and governments. The new State therefore exists because of a political fact and not a legal act – that is to say, not because it has the “right” to exist.

While the “constitutive” legal theory considers that a state exists only if it is recognized by other states, the “declaratory” theory considers that a state exists even in the absence of diplomatic recognition. In practice, however, broad diplomatic recognition remains necessary for a proclaimed state to function as a legal and political entity in its own right, even if the exceptional case of Taiwan appears to contradict this premise.

In this sense, UN Resolution 181(II) “Future Government of Palestine” did not create the State of Israel. Instead, he proposed a plan to divide British-occupied Palestine into three entities: a “Jewish state,” an “Arab state,” and Jerusalem under a special international regime.

Before the vote, the United States put intense pressure on some developing countries as well as France to vote in favor of the resolution. But remarkably, the United States itself was also threatened, as President Harry Truman recalled in his memoir: “I don’t think I’ve ever had as much pressure and propaganda directed against the White House as in this this case. The persistence of a few extremist Zionist leaders – politically motivated and making political threats – disturbed and annoyed me. »

After delaying the vote for a few days to gain the necessary support, the General Assembly adopted the resolution by a slim margin of two votes on November 29, 1947. The UN partition plan for Palestine, which it had introduced, was never approved by the Security Council. Council and has therefore never become binding under international law. But even if that were the case, the Security Council – like the General Assembly – could not have created Israel because the UN Charter also does not have the legal competence to “create” a state.

Six months after the vote on the partition plan, the State of Israel was proclaimed by David Ben-Gurion, head of the Jewish Agency for Palestine. This political act was the culmination of Jewish migration to Palestine before and after World War II, as well as ethnic cleansing and a violent land-grabbing campaign carried out by Zionist militias, including the Haganah, the Gang Stern (Lehi) and the Irgun, which Albert Einstein had launched. described in a 1948 letter as a “terrorist, right-wing and chauvinistic organization”. They all acted in tandem to implement the Dalet Plan, designed by the Jewish Agency for Palestine and which Israeli historian Ilan Pappé calls a “plan of ethnic cleansing.”

The partition plan was rejected by the five Arab states that were then members of the UN and other governments, primarily because it was seen as violating the inalienable rights of Palestinians (of all faiths) to self-determination in under Article 55 of the Charter of the United Nations. .

Legally, this view is true today because the right to self-determination of colonial peoples is a peremptory norm of customary international law accepted by the international community as a fundamental legal principle from which no derogation is permitted. This is a fundamental legal norm stipulated in Article 1 of the Charter, which defines the purposes of the United Nations.

On the eve of the vote, the Iraqi Minister of Foreign Affairs, Fadhel al-Jamali, signatory of the charter, declared before the General Assembly: “A partition imposed against the will of the majority of the people will jeopardize peace and harmony in the Middle East. Not only is the uprising of the Arabs of Palestine to be expected, but the masses of the Arab world cannot be subdued. Arab-Jewish relations in the Arab world will deteriorate considerably. There are more Jews in the Arab world outside of Palestine than in Palestine. …In short, anyone who thinks that the partition of Palestine will solve the Palestine problem is wrong. Partition will create a dozen new problems dangerous for peace and international relations. It is much better to leave Palestine alone than to try to impose a solution that will bear bitter fruit. »

Al-Jamali’s words were prescient. Although Israel was not created by the UN as Macron believes, the international community is still reeling from a historic injustice done to Palestinians of all faiths, including Jewish Palestinians. Before and after the Holocaust, Zionists had promised European and North American Jewish settlers a safe haven in Palestine, but this promise proved in vain.

Since its creation, the State of Israel has been hypermilitarized and in a constant state of war. It will have no prospect of peace until its occupation of the Palestinian, Syrian and Lebanese territories ends, its borders are demarcated and it seeks a biblical solution.Greater Israel» be formally abandoned.

Repeated propaganda does not overturn international law, according to which no state has an inherent “right” to exist, but people have an inalienable right to self-determination. An occupying power does not have an inherent right of self-defense against the peoples it enslaves, but peoples under occupation have an inherent right of self-defense against their occupiers, as the International Court of Justice has ruled.

The powers that could make the difference, first and foremost the United States, seem incapable or unwilling to right a historic wrong and to consider these principles of international law lucidly.

Even in the face of an ongoing genocide that they enable, both militarily and diplomatically, they are unable or unwilling to remove their political blinders and even listen to their own public opinions. Worse still, they now prefer to risk a regional conflagration, or even a nuclear strike from a genocidal Israeli regime. Hoping it will never come to this is not a convincing strategy.

The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of Al Jazeera.