Following in the footsteps of Ehud Ohlmert nearly 3 years ago, Defense Minister Ehud Barak warns that apartheid is coming (no it’s already here, but let’s not quibble). Then strikes a blow for the idea that Israel is actually accountable to world opinion: "the reality of standing on the stage of history in realistic terms requires us to pay attention to international constraints." From the Guardian:
a peace agreement with the Palestinians was the only way to secure Israel’s future as a "Zionist, Jewish, democratic state".
"As long as in this territory west of the Jordan river there is only one political entity called Israel it is going to be either non-Jewish, or non-democratic," Barak said. "If this bloc of millions of Palestinians cannot vote, that will be an apartheid state."
He described Israel and the Palestinian territories as the historic "land of Israel" to which Israelis had a right.
"We have to demarcate a border within the land of Israel," he said.
"We have a linkage, we have a right, but the reality of standing on the stage of history in realistic terms requires us to pay attention to international constraints."
