Prof Omar Dajani at 'Oslo at 25: A Legacy of Broken Promises

Address by Prof Omar Dajani at MEMO’s ‘Oslo at 25: A Legacy of Broken Promises’ conference held in London on September 29, 2018.

Prof Omar Dajani is a Professor of Law at the University of the Pacific, McGeorge School of Law, where he also serves as Co-Director of the Global Center for Business & Development. A specialist in legal aspects of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, Dajani previously served on the Negotiations Support Unit (NSU) as legal adviser to the Palestinian negotiating team in peace talks with Israel from 1999 to 2001. He then joined the office of the United Nations Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process (UNSCO), where he worked on peacebuilding initiatives and played a lead role in marshalling and organising international efforts to support Palestinian legal and political reforms.

PANEL: Oslo and the Negation of International Law

Although the process was based on the formula of ‘land for peace’, it was clear Israel was not prepared to withdraw from the territories occupied in 1967. Because none of the documents referred to Israel as the occupying power, or the applicability of international humanitarian laws to the territories, Oslo’s approach to the permanent status issues were based on Israeli imperatives.