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Israeli apartheid

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Template:POV-title 'The phrase Israeli apartheid' (or the terming of Israel an apartheid state) is a pejorative political epithet used by some Palestinian-rights activists[1], South Africans, some neo-Nazi and anti-Semitic individuals groups such as David Duke and Jew Watch, and some anti-Zionists to criticize Israel's policies by drawing an analogy between the policies of the Israeli government towards both Palestinians and Arab citizens of Israel to those of the apartheid-era South African government towards its Black and mixed-race populations. Critics of the term argue that it is historically inaccurate, offensive, antisemitic, and is used as justification for terrorist attacks against Israel.

Origins

The analogy was used as early as 1987 by Uri Davis, an Israeli-born academic and Jewish member of the Palestine Liberation Organization, in his book Israel: An Apartheid State (ISBN 0862323177) which provided a detailed comparison of Israel and South Africa. The highly controversial World Conference against Racism in Durban, South Africa adopted resolutions describing Israel as an "apartheid state" [2]. The term was subsequently used by the South African cleric Desmond Tutu in the articles he published following his visit to Israel. [3].

Analogy

Proponents of this term argue that while Israel grants some rights to Arabs living in Israel within its pre-1967 borders, its policies towards Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip are analogous to the Apartheid policies of South Africa towards blacks, for the following reasons:

  • Palestinians who live in Israeli-occupied territories do not have Israeli citizenship or voting rights in Israel, but they are under Israeli occupation and subject to the policies of the Israeli government and its military. [4]
  • Israel has constructed "Jewish-only" [5] settlements in the West Bank, which preclude "some of the most fertile land and richest water resources in the West Bank" from the "indigenous population" [6]. [7]
  • Israel has created roads and checkpoints that isolate Palestinian communities [8], which is seen as a parallel to Apartheid South Africa's Bantustans.(Ibid)
  • Israel is constructing the Israeli West Bank barrier which some detractors have termed the Apartheid Wall for its alleged impact on Palestinians in the West Bank.
  • Proponents of the term argue the Israeli policy of demolishing homes is an example of apartheid[9].
  • The government of Israel has termed its policy of disengagement Hafrada which literally means "separation". Some translate this word as apartheid as that word literally means "apartness".[10][11][12]

Proponents of this term often claim discrimination against Israeli Arabs. [13]

  • Jews can easily gain Israeli citizenship under the Law of Return, yet Palestinians who fled or were driven out, may not have the Right of return.[14]
  • Arab municipalities receive less than one fifth the funding that is given to their Jewish counterparts.[15][16]
  • The government of Israel often refuses to grant permits to build or repair homes, and fails to provide electricity, water, health services, education, roads, or any other infrastructure. [17]One of the consequences is that 70% of Negev Desert Bedouin (Arab) infants are not fully immunized and one third are hospitalized within their first year of life.[18]

And in a recent article ("Sharon and the Future of Palestine," NY Review of Books, 12/2/04, Henry Siegman quotes Nahum Barnea, Israel's most respected political commentator: "[Israel] is not yet the South Africa of apartheid, but is definitely from the same family."

Usage

The term "Israeli apartheid" has been used by groups protesting the Israeli government, particularly student groups in Britain, the United States and Canada, where "Israeli apartheid week" is held on many campuses [19][20][21]. It has been widely used by Palestinian rights advocates and also by some on the Israeli Jewish left. It has also been used by neo-Nazi and anti-Semitic groups such as David Duke and Jew Watch.

Several left wing Members of the Knesset (MKs) have also drawn an analogy between Israeli policies and apartheid, such as Zehava Gal-On of the Meretz party who said of an Israeli Supreme Court ruling upholding the country's controversial citizenship law "The Supreme Court could have taken a braver decision and not relegated us to the level of an apartheid state."[22] Similarly, Shulamit Aloni, a former Meretz leader and Israeli Education Minister has said "If we are not already an apartheid state, we are getting much, much closer to it."[23]

The term has also been used by three prominent South African Anti-Apartheid activists: Archbishop Desmond Tutu"Apartheid in the Holy Land"; Mahatma Ghandi's grandson, Arun Ghandi who grew up in Durban, SA and now runs the MK Institute for nonviolence Apartheid reference; and Christopher Brown, with the Christian Peacemaker Teams Apartheid reference.

The term is often appropriated by those attempting to advance political goals, such as sanctions against Israel or disinvestment in Israel. It is meant to establish a link between political anti-Israel campaigns, on the one hand, and human-rights campaigns against apartheid-era South Africa, on the other.[24]

Criticism

Critics of the phrase argue that calling the country an "apartheid state" or referring to "Israeli apartheid" is incorrect for a number of reasons [25].

  • The Israeli Arab minority have full and equal voting rights and are represented in the Knesset (Israel's legislature) whilst in apartheid South Africa, Blacks could not vote and had no representation in the South African parliament.[26]
  • Israeli law is identical to that of most countries in the world, regarding the rights of Palestinians who live outside Israel and are not Israeli citizens. International law does not reqire an occupying power to grant citizen rights to people living on occupied territory, and this is seldom, if ever, done in practice.
  • Israel's security situation has forced it to impose restrictions on Palestinians living in the West Bank and Gaza. However, these conditions are not imposed on Israeli Arabs (that is, Palestinians who are residents of Israel living within the state's pre-1967 borders).
  • The features of legal petty apartheid do not exist in Israel. Jews and Arabs use the same hospitals, Jewish and Arab babies are born in the same delivery room, Jews and Arabs eat in the same restaurants, and Jews and Arabs travel in the same buses, trains and taxis without being segregated.[27].
  • Apartheid South Africa strictly denied Blacks their legal rights, in contrast to Israeli law, which upholds Israeli Arabs' rights. Israeli courts have ruled against practices that exclude Israeli Arabs from leasing property. Arabs are being hired in increasing (though still disproprtionately low) numbers in the civil service and government owned agencies. Israeli Arabs also serve as judges in Israeli courts. [28].
  • Bantustans were created as resevoirs for Black labour to be utilised by South Africa whilst providing a legal means to strip Blacks of their South African citizenship. Israel's policy towards the West Bank and Gaza are quite different, to keep Palestinian residents of these territories out of Israel and exclude as many as possible from working within Israel[29].
  • Jews constitute a majority of the Israeli population while the situation in South Africa was one of minority rule.
  • The claim that the Israeli government refuses to grant permits to build or repair homes, and fails to provide electricity, water, health services, education, roads, or any other infrastructure is simply false. Studies have shown that the Arab population receives as many, if not more, building permits as demographically equivalent groups of Israeli Jews[30].
  • The comparison between Israel and South Africa is fictitious and is made in an attempt to demonize Israel as a prelude to an international boycott campaign. The long term goal is to pressure the United Nations to impose economic sanctions against Israel.[31]
  • The analogy "demean(s) Black victims of the real apartheid regime in South Africa." [32]
  • Zionism is not a manifestation of European colonialism.[33]
  • Black labor was exploited in slavery-like conditions under apartheid whilst Palestinians rely on employment in Israel do to the economic failures and corruption of the Palestinain Authority.[34]
  • Equating Zionism with apartheid is propaganda used to justify Palestinian terrorist attacks and deny Israelis the right of self-defence by demonizing the construction of the West Bank security barrier with the name "Apartheid wall".[35]

Some critics of the term such as Dr. Moshe Machover, professor of philosophy in London and co-founder of Matzpen, argues against the use of the term on the basis that the situation in Israel is worse than apartheid. Machover points out some significant differences between the policy of the Israeli government and the apartheid model. According to Machover, drawing a close analogy between Israel and South Africa is both a theoretical and political mistake. [36]

See also

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