From lock down inside of Hebron Badia Dwaik writes, “While we do not know when Netanyahu will resume his annexation bid, our crisis is not over.”
Anyone who thinks that stopping the next Israeli annexation of additional parts of the West Bank would bring peace closer would be well-advised to peel away the veneer of democratic façade, one that covers an Israeli plan with only one goal in mind—completing the campaign of ethnically cleansing Palestinians—on both sides of the Green Line—that started with the creation of the State of Israel.
The threat of political disaster and an uncontrollable outbreak are pulling ordinary Palestinian citizens in different directions, with little guidance from the government and leaders as to what the near future might look like.
James Klutznick, chair of Americans for Peace Now, criticizes Zionism in context of Netanyahu’s annexation plans: “It would be remiss if I didn’t say this unilateralism wasn’t actually rooted in the history of the Zionist movement. From the very begining we had our Jabotinskys and I think they were pretty singleminded in their purpose of a greater Israel, which included all that territory.” Now American Jews have to “weigh” their relationship to Israel and say firmly, “No to any form of annexation. Not a scintilla of property.”
As annexation day approaches, Palestinians on the ground are gearing up for a new reality, one they say they’ve been forced to get ready for for years. Zayd Sawafta, a farmer and mayor of the small village of Bardala, tells Mondoweiss that even when annexation does go through, Palestinians aren’t leaving. “We have learned from experience,” Sawafta says. “They will do everything they can to kick us off this land and take it for themselves, but this time, we are not leaving.”
Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Pramila Jayapal, Betty McCollum, and Rashida Tlaib call for conditioning US aid to Israel if the country moves forward with annexation.
Until the Palestinian Authority hands over the keys to the PLO, Benjamin Netanyahu will, tragically, remain the only relevant party determining the fate of Palestine and her people.
Artist Jérémie Pujau re-conceptualizes Israel’s national anthem as a sonata for concrete mixers, which puts the song “in direct confrontation with one of the tools of its implementation, namely the concrete of colonization.”
All 15 members of the Israeli Knesset’s Joint List have sent a letter to congressional Democrats, calling on them to oppose annexation. “Democrats have a decision to make,” JVP Action’s Beth Miller tells Mondoweiss. “Will they keep wringing their hands and expressing ‘concern,’ or are they going to do something about it?”
Annexation will cast Israel as an “ethnonationalist country” that practices apartheid in the West Bank and Israel will become a “wedge issue” in the 2020 election, Jonathan Greenblatt of the ADL says. Yes but what about the downside?