Except you ignore what Solana said would be necessary to end the occupation.
Ignore it? Hardly, it’s the entirety of your argument. He makes claims without laying any legal foundation for them and the only authority he speaks from is that he’s a politician who once held political office. I don’t ignore what he said, I
disagree with it, and this entire exchange has been about why.
You ignore the evidence that Israel still retains control in and over Gaza, thus matching the definition of 'occupation' in the Hague convention. It does not say 'absolute authority' it does not say 'control of every aspect of government'.
No, again I don’t ignore it, I disagree that the things you list add up to “control.” I don’t claim that Israel would need to control every aspect of Gaza government for Gaza to be “occupied”, but the reverse claim, that if Israel controls
any aspect of Gaza government then it’s still an “occupier” is also patently false.
You gave some examples yourself of what a government does and Israel does some of those things for Gaza -- like issuing permits. It is responsible for water and electricity, but you pretend that is nothing to do with government. It collects taxes on imports and decides whether to pass those taxes on to the PA/Hamas, but you don't even comment on that.
Water and electricity are provided as per prior agreements between Israel and Palestinians, and I don’t know about where you live, but where I live utilities are the function of private companies.
Taxes on imports? I don’t know about those, but Israel has been responsible for collecting Palestinian sales taxes from the beginning, as per their agreement with Arafat (which is how Arafat got so rich. He insisted the funds go directly to him and he would then distribute them. )
Anyway, congratulations on finding a lawyer who agrees with you. At least until he responds to the first comment, after which he seems less sure.
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But, apparently, this doesn't apply to Israel and Gaza because Israel "can’t reestablish its control over Gaza with ease". Because that's how America re-took Fallujah: with ease?
I’m not aware of anyone making an issue of the US occupying Fallujah during the time when they had to re-take it from insurgents. It’s clear to me the operation was to re-occupy the city from its new occupiers.
Which is along the lines of one of the arguements dismissed by your source earlier in his article. I'll take Solana's word as being more authoritative.
Of course you do, because he starts with the opinion you want.
But let’s be honest. If you took a knock to the head resulting in temporary amnesia and woke up with no memory of any of your own political opinions and not even remembering who the Israelis and Palestinians are and had to make a snap judgment in order to save your own life, would you trust:
1) The guy who’s politics are hard-core
socialist, who’s educational background is in
physics and who went on to a career in
politics,
or…
2) The international attorney who was trained in
international humanitarian law who’s
argued cases before the International Criminal Court and who is to all appearances politically neutral?
The choice seems pretty easy to me.
And that the Israeli government is aware that the arguments come from everybody, not just an online reference and travel advisory.
If “everyone” is defined as the anti-Israel echo-chamber, then yes. Finding actual governments issuing policy statements to the effect is much more difficult. If it were easy, you’d be quoting them instead of travel advisories and reference tools.