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70 years on, Israel continues to ignore UN partition plan

While Arab countries are willing to recognize Israel and advance toward regional peace, Israel refuses to accept the principle of the 1947 UN Resolution 181 for the partition of the land.
Britain's Prime Minister Theresa May welcomes Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu outside 10 Downing Street in London, Britain, November 2, 2017. REUTERS/Toby Melville - RC1C55270A90
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At the beginning of November, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu traveled all the way to London in order to mark 100 years of the Nov. 2, 1917, Balfour Declaration — the famous letter in which the British foreign secretary committed that his government would support the establishment of a Jewish home for the Jewish people in the Land of Israel/Palestine. Indeed, the Balfour Declaration was a significant road mark in the history of the Zionist enterprise. However, the organization that translated the British document from a general declaration of intentions to practical political language three decades later was the United Nations.

On Nov. 29, 1947, the ears of future citizens of Israel and Jews throughout the world were turned to radio transmitters, counting the votes for and against the establishment of a Hebrew state at the UN General Assembly. When the results of the vote were declared, crowds went out to the streets and celebrated with song and dance until dawn. In his book "A Tale of Love and Darkness," Amos Oz recalls how strangers hugged and kissed each other with tears in the streets, shocked British soldiers were dragged to the dance circles and plied with beer and liquor, and ecstatic celebrators climbed British tanks and waved the flags of the state that hadn’t yet been established.

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