Richard Cohen says that Israel has its faults but apartheid isn’t one of them– and wishes away the complete denial of rights to Palestinians in the occupied territories that even Ehud Olmert and Ehud Barak have characterized as apartheid (emphasis mine):
The Israel of today and the South Africa of yesterday have almost nothing in common. In South Africa, the minority white population harshly ruled the majority black population. Nonwhites were denied civil rights, and in 1958, they were even deprived of citizenship. In contrast, Israeli Arabs, about one-fifth of the country, have the same civil and political rights as do Israeli Jews. Arabs sit in the Knesset and serve in the military, although most are exempt from the draft. Whatever this is — and it looks suspiciously like a liberal democracy — it cannot be apartheid.
The West Bank, more or less under Israeli military rule, is a different matter. But it is not part of Israel proper, and under every conceivable peace plan — including those proposed by Israeli governments — almost all of it will revert to the Palestinian Authority and become the heartland of a Palestinian state.
This is denial masquerading as prophecy. It is the same tactic that Clyde Haberman employed a few years back at Yivo when he was questioned about how much power Jewish journalists have and said, that this is "a function of a generation or two, I don’t think it’s going to remain that way forever." Is it journalism to predict a more equitable future so as not to talk about today? Here is Israeli poet Yitzhak Laor, in his book The Myths of Liberal Zionism, which will never be picked up by the Post, speaking about r e a l i t y:
Close to 4 million people are currently living under the longest military occupation in modern times, stripped of the right to vote on the laws that have governed their lives for more than four decades… They are not allowed to ride on the same roads that Israel’s citizens ride on, not even in "their own" territory, let alone through "ours."…[T]he infant mortality rate among Arab citizens of Israel is double the rate among the Jewish population–8 per 1,000 live births compared with 4 per 1,000 live births. What is the infant mortality rate in the occupied territories? In 2006 it was 25.3 per 1,000 live births.
Another aspect of this magic wand that makes current oppression go away by simply saying that all will be well when peace breaks out (“fortunate is he who believes”, as the Hebrew expression goes) is the justification of settlement expansion within Israel’s self-declared “settlement blocs”, because “they will remain within Israel when peace is achieved”.
Today, BYahoo repeated Olmert’s assertion that Israel would never cede the Jordan Valley, from which it has been ethnic-cleansing the Palestinians who lived there.
That alone is, what? 20% of the 22% of historical Palestine?
According to statistics from the Israeli Central Bureau of Statistics, employed Palestinian citizens of Israel pay 11% of the total tax revenue in the state, but their municipalities receive only 3% of the annual budget from the Israeli government.
This results in a great disparity in municipal services, infrastructure development, education, social and medical services and transportation.
And while there are Arab representatives in the Knesset, no Arab party was ever included in a government coalition. This political marginalization of an entire group pales in comparison to those laws that are blatantly discriminatory, such as the law of return.
Furthermore, Palestinians in Israel are not recognized as a national minority, the state refuses to grant them collective minority rights.
As a result, while Israel operates an apartheid system in the occupied territories of the West Bank and Gaza, it is in effect an ethnocratic state within its 1948 borders.
To characterize Israel as a democratic state, even without taking into account the occupied territories, is categorically false.
My recommendation is that if you want a complete picture of the apartheid situation, inside of Israel, is that you look at an organization that has been quoted by many of the International Human Rights organizations for the information and accuracy -
ARAB HUMAN RIGHTS INSIDE OF ISRAEL
The information in my post above does not even begin to demonstrate the ethnocratic nature of the Israeli system of governance.
Consider the confiscation of thousands of acres of farm land from the Bedouin in the Negev. In addition, projects like the Judaization of the Galilee result in the confiscation of thousands of acres of residential and non-residential land from Palestinian villages and towns in the upper Galilee. House demolitions are not uncommon.
Avi: Consider the confiscation of thousands of acres of farm land from the Bedouin in the Negev … thousands of acres of residential and non-residential land from Palestinian villages and towns in the upper Galilee.
An extremely important point, Avi, as Land Day approaches. Land expropriation and allocation by ethnicity is a trump card when arguing with the “Israel is a liberal democracy” crowd.
The Adalah website is an excellent resource for information on discrimination against Israel’s Palestinian citizens.
That’s a poignant point, Shmuel. Thank you for chiming in.
I think we can also include the Arab Association for Human Rights in Israel as a valuable resource for those interested in reading more:
link to arabhra.org
We should flood the Washington Post with letters to the editor.
Here’s talking points and tips: link to endtheoccupation.org
The article Cohen op-ed also appeared in the NY Daily News, so responses can be directed there as well: link to nydailynews.com
It seems that Glenn Greenwald has read Cohen’s Op-Ed., as well.
I don’t have an account on Salon.com, but I would like to make one small adjustment to Glenn’s article.
In the paragraph labeled “Update”, he wrote that some in Israel consider the Palestinian citizens to be a “demographic threat”.
But, it’s actually more than a mere “some”. In its 2004 report to the prime minister, the Israeli National Security Council (the Israeli equivalent to the Joint Chiefs of Staff in the US) indicated that Arab (Palestinian) citizens of Israel constitute a demographic bomb that needs to be dealt with through various legislative policies.
Even if Cohen chooses to debate the status of the Palestinians in the occupied territories, he sure has no leg to stand on in his argument about equal rights for Palestinians in Israel.
The nature of Israeli apartheid can be judged not only by its treatment of Palestinians within the unofficial Israeli borders but within those parts of the territories that Israel considers Israeli and plans to annex. Are the Palestinian residents of these areas given citizenship? Are they given the same rights as Israelis, even Arab Israelis?
No, they are being subjected to an intense campaign of ethnic cleansing, meant to drive them out and leave the regions Arabenrein.
There are two other groups within historical Palestine who can be classified as 4th or even 5th class citizens; those two groups are Palestinian residents of occupied East Jerusalem and the Arab (Syrian) residents of the occupied Golan.
In East Jerusalem, Palestinians hold blue ID cards (Israeli), but are not considered citizens of Israel and cannot vote in the mayoral elections of the city.
Yet another response to Cohen: link to endtheoccupationblog.blogspot.com
The apologists for Israel always counter (when you say Israel is not-democratic” or feint by saying, “Israel is the only democractic state in the Middle East.” If they are brighter than most US congress people addressing the issue, they toss in some facts about Persia, or especially the Arab states, especially Saudi Arabia, or Egypt.
Pingback: 50 Powerful Tips on Using Social Media for Your Business | JT Marketing