Turkey on Cyprus: Sidelining the E.U.

Imagine if Japan had invaded and claimed (and successfully held) an island of Hawaii as a protectorate and a separate country due to the number of Japanese living there, and thus not as a part of Hawaii even though the U.S. recognizes all of Hawaii as a member state.  Let’s say furthermore that the UN has proposed the unification of Hawaii as a republic composed of two federated states. Hawaii would be akin to Belgium in the E.U.—a federated state of two sub-states in a federal union. This arrangement would fit with Althusius’ early seventeenth-century theory of federalism based on the Holy Roman Empire: each level of political organization is a federation. While this exists in the E.U., none of the U.S. states is itself a federation of states. So, the UN’s proposal that Cyprus be united politically and be composed of two states even as the E.U. already recognizes the entire island as an E.U. state is not outlandish to a European eye. The problem with the proposal lies instead in Turkey, and this in itself can be interpreted as an argument against Turkey’s accession to E.U. statehood.

“Speaking at an event in the north [part of the island in 2024] to mark the 50^th anniversary of the Turkish invasion that [had] split the island along ethnic lines, [Turkey’s President] Erdogan ruled out resuming talks based on the Annan Plan which proposed the establishment of a United Republic of Cyprus.”[1] In rejecting the proposal, he was ignoring the fact that the E.U. recognized the entire island of Cyprus as a state in that union. He was thus unwittingly undermining the E.U. even as Turkey was still technically seeking statehood. I submit that this undermines Turkey’s chances of accession, and furthermore, that Turkey should not become a state. For at the very least, an aspiring state should respect the E.U., even and especially on matters that touch on that potential state. The case of the E.U. state of Hungary being found in wanton violation of E.U. law by the E.U.’s supreme court, the European Court of Justice, demonstrates just how harmful a disrespectful state government can be within a federal union.

Erdogan’s establishment of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, which is only recognized by Turkey’s government and was rejected in a 2004 referendum by more than 75% of the Greek Cypriots in the south, would, if accepted by the E.U., limit the E.U.’s common market to the south and thus create the need for customs checkpoints inside the island. While not as complicated as the case of Northern Ireland, which is part of the U.K. and yet also part of the Irish island—Ireland being an E.U. state—politically splitting the island of Cyprus permanently would make things more difficult for the E.U. with respect to its state of Cyprus in the south. Again, it would be a case of Turkey making things more difficult for the E.U., and yet presumably also wanting to become a state to enjoy the economic advantages of the union’s unfettered interstate commerce. This combo must surely strike Europeans as unsavory and thus as a de facto argument against Turkey joining the union. In other words, the way Erdogan was playing his hand politically with respect to Cyprus showed the Europeans that they had been right to hold off on accession talks with Turkey because its government would not make a very good state government in the union. Already Hungary was enough of a problem. That 90% of Turkey is not in Europe and the culture is not European may be what is behind not only the tension in Cyprus, but also why Turkey would be a problematic state in the European Union.

Lastly, Erdogan’s insistence on a “two state” solution for Cyprus, as if the difference between the north and south were as great as those between the Palestinians and Israelis in Israel, discounts or even perhaps dismisses the mollifying effect that Cyprus being a state in a union would have on the tensions on the island, and thus shows a lack of confidence in the E.U. in its mission to forestall war in Europe. In other words, the president of Turkey didn’t seem to have much faith in the federal institutions, including the E.U.’s court of justice, to protect minorities within the union and assuage tensions domestically, by which I mean within the union. Just as the rationale of the U.S. as a federal union of dual sovereignty was in part to use federal power to step in to stop Shay’s Rebellion in Massachusetts and the Whiskey Rebellion in western Pennsylvania, so too the E.U. has the means at its federal level mediate any excitements within the state of Cyprus. Yet Erdogan did not seem to trust Brussels enough to recognize the entire island of Cyprus as an E.U. state.

Brussels already had Viktor Orbán of Hungary distrusting the federal institutions in 2024 and actively working at odds with E.U. foreign policy on Russia even as he held the presidency of the Council of the E.U. during the last six months of 2024. Taking note of the 50^th anniversary of Turkey’s invasion of Cyprus then, Brussels could have done worse than formally end Turkey’s proposed accession. A house divided cannot long stand, or at least cannot prosper and thrive as it could otherwise. With Russia belligerently knocking down Ukraine, Europeans could surely have benefitted at the time from a basic or fundamental unity that at the very least includes respect for and confidence in the European Union, given its rationale bearing on protecting Europe from war within.

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1. “Erdogan Dismisses UN Plan for Federated Cyprus, Reaffirms Commitment to Two-State Peace Deal,” Euronews, July 21, 2024.

Unenforced Law: The International Court of Justice Declares Israeli Occupation Illegal

On July 19, 2024, the UN’s court rendered an opinion to the UN’s General Assembly on the legality of Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories including East Jerusalem. The Israeli government wasted no time in publicly dismissing the International Court of Justice even though the UN had created Israel. As if the creature is greater than its creator, which is a rather unbiblical view, Israel’s prime minister had dismissed two earlier verdicts of that court against Israel’s military incursion into Gaza, which resulted in the deaths of more than 35,000 and displaced over a million Palestinian residents. What are we to make of international law itself? Can we rightly call it law even though no enforcement mechanism necessarily exists for it? By necessarily, I mean something more than a voluntary coalition of willing countries, which of course cannot be counted upon.

At the end of 2022, the UN’s General Assembly requested that the International Court of Justice (ICJ) “render an advisory opinion” concerning “the legal consequences arising from the ongoing violation by Israel of the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination, from its prolonged occupation, settlement and annexation of the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967, including measures aimed at altering the demographic composition, character and status of the Holy City of Jerusalem, and from its adoption of related discriminatory legislation and measures.”[1] A year and a half later, the ICJ issued its landmark opinion. ICJ President Nawaf Salam said the court had found that Israel’s “continued presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory is illegal. . . . The State of Israel is under the obligation to bring an end to its unlawful presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory as rapidly as possible.”[2] Accordingly, settlement activity should end and existing settlements should be given up in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem. The court also mandated the payment of reparations to Palestinians for damages caused by the occupation. The ICJ indicated that Israel’s “policies and practices amount to annexation of large parts of the Occupied Palestinian Territory,” and that Israel was “not entitled to sovereignty” there.[3] Additionally, according to the BBC, “the court said Israeli restrictions on Palestinians in the occupied territories constituted ‘systemic discrimination based on, inter alia, race, religion or ethnic origin’” and Israel “had illegally exploited the Palestinians’ natural resources and violated their right to self-determination.”[4]

In reaction to the exhaustive opinion on which the court had been engaged since early 2023, Israel’s prime minister called the decision one “of lies.”[5] It is precisely on account of such jejune denial (frankly, that could be expected from a teenager) that international law and courts are necessary. Incidentally, lies, or fabrications, pertain to facts, whereas the court issued an opinion. Netanyahu’s category mistake may be indicative of a knee-jerk reaction. His other category mistake was to reference Jerusalem as the homeland of Jews, whereas the court’s opinion pertains to Israel and thus Israelis. A religious claim is distinct from a political or legal one, and the court (and the General Assembly) were solely concerned with the latter. The court also held that governments helping Israel in its occupation are also culpable, and the United States also promptly criticized the court’s decision, which was, at the very least, inconvenient politically.[6]

In issuing a judicial opinion for the General Assembly, the court noted the nonbinding nature of the decision. But is any international law, even if in the form of a verdict by an international court, binding on any sovereign country?  The nonbinding feature of the court’s opinion is thus a red herring, sidestepping the proverbial invisible elephant in a room. The sheer fecklessness of international law itself begs the question of whether it is indeed law or something less, such as a guideline that governments can take or leave at will. To be sure, even immaturely dismissing a mere guideline as exhaustively undertaken—at least in terms of time—cogently (i.e., internal consistency) reasoned, and complete as that of the ICJ here is (or ought to be) blameworthy. Yet given the severity of the infractions committed by Israel in its longstanding occupation, something stronger than a guideline is warranted. So we have arrived face to face with the question of whether a law that cannot be enforced is nonetheless a law.

Kant refers to the law of reason owing to the necessity of reason. Two plus two simply cannot equal five. That the answer is four has necessity. So too does law, according to Kant. But a law does not have necessity if it cannot be enforced—if people can ignore a law with impunity. It can of course be objected that the kind of necessity that a fact of reason enjoys in the human mind does not apply to the sort of social reality that covers social organization. But it contracts reason to say, we’re passing a law and we know that it cannot and will not be enforced. In other words, to claim that something is a law and furthermore that no enforcement mechanism exists or can be counted on nullifies the something being a law.

Unless or until there is such a thing as international law, governments will be free to accept or reject the opinions of international courts as just that: opinions. Unless or until national sovereignty is qualified rather than absolute, governments will be subject to might, as that of Ukraine has been subject to Russia’s might since Russia began its invasion by taking Crimea in 2014. Indeed, Israel acquired Palestinian land as a result of the 1967 war, and the Israeli government was conveniently taking this result of might not only as right, but also as if it were a fact of reason immune to the error of falsification.

In the want of political development beyond the nation-state, the global system will remain stymied in a Hobbesian state of nature in spite of having an institutional infrastructure. Without international law, it is actually rather amazing that international relations are not more chaotic than they are. Even were there a global federation of nations, Kant claims that peace would merely be possible, rather than probable. I submit that it would be more probable were the federal level of such a federation to have the military (and economic) means to enforce international law. Without any such means, the UN cannot claim to have or much less to enforce international law. Heading into 2024, the governmental heads of Russia and Israel knew this only too well, and thus could exploit the common misconception that there is such a thing as international law.

See: "Israel Legalizes Illegal Settlements on Palestinian Land."

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1. “Request for Advisory Opinion,” General Assembly resolution 77/247 of 30 December 2022.
2. Raffi Berg, “UN Top Court Says Israeli Occupation of Palestinian Territories Is Illegal,” BBC, July 20, 2021.
3. Ibid.
4. Ibid.
5. Ibid.
6. Kanishka Singh, “US Criticizes ICJ Opinion on Israeli Occupation of Palestinian Territories,” Reuters, July 20, 2024.