Israeli apartheid

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It has been suggested that this article be merged into Apartheid outside South Africa. (Discuss)

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Israeli apartheid (or the terming of Israel an apartheid state) is a term used by some Palestinian-rights activists, South Africans, and some anti-Zionists to criticize Israel's policies by drawing an analogy between the policies of various Israeli governments towards the Palestinians to those of the apartheid-era South African government towards its Black and mixed-race populations. Pro-Israel groups consider objectionable the use of this term to describe the State of Israel or its policies.

Origins

The origins of linking Israel and Zionism with apartheid go back to the UN General Assembly Resolution 3379 equating Zionism and racism. The text of the UNGA R/3379 states: "the Organization of African Unity... considered "that the racist regime in occupied Palestine and the racist regime in Zimbabwe and South Africa have a common imperialist origin, forming a whole and having the same racist structure..." The Resolution 3379 was revoked in 1991 by the Resolution 4686.

Analogy

File:Israelwall.jpg

Wall between Jewish and Palestinian sectors in West Bank

Proponents of this term argue that while Israel grants some rights to its Arab citizens, its policies towards Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip are (or were, in case of Gaza) analogous to the Apartheid policies of South Africa towards blacks, for the following reasons:

Israel has created roads and checkpoints that isolate Palestinian communities , which is seen as a parallel to Apartheid South Africa's Bantustans.
The government of Israel has termed its policy of disengagement Hafrada which literally means "separation".
93% of the land inside the Green Line is owned by the Jewish National Fund and the Israeli Lands Authority and isreserved for Jews.
The Israeli West Bank barrier is referred to by detractors as the Apartheid Wall for its impact on the Palestinian population in the West Bank.

Usage

The analogy was used in 1984 Syrian letter to the UN Security Council that stated in part: "...Zionist Israeli institutional terrorism in no way differs from the terrorism pursued by the apartheid regime against millions of Africans in South Africa and Namibia..., just as it in no way differs in essense and nature from the Nazi terrorism which shed European blood and visited ruin and destruction upon the peoples of Europe"

In 1987 Uri Davis, an Israeli-born academic and Jewish member of the Palestine Liberation Organization, wrote a book Israel: An Apartheid State, which provided a detailed comparison of Israel and South Africa.

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. It has been widely used by Palestinian rights advocates and also by some on the Israeli Jewish left.

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."

The term has also been used by three prominent South African Anti-Apartheid activists such as Archbishop Desmond Tutu in the articles he published following his visit to Israel.

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:

With the exception of Arabs residing in East Jerusalem , the Israeli Arab minority have 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.
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.
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.
The analogy "demean(s) Black victims of the real apartheid regime in South Africa."
Zionism is not a manifestation of European colonialism.
Black labor was exploited in slavery-like conditions under apartheid whilst Palestinians rely on employment in Israel due to the economic failures and corruption of the Palestinain Authority.
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".
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.
According to Fred Taub, the President of Boycott Watch, "The assertion ... that Israel is practicing apartheid is not only false, but may be considered libelous. ... The fact is that it is the Arabs who are discriminating against non-Muslims, especially Jews."

References

^ Forbidden Checkpoints and Roads at B'Tselem
^ Worlds apart at The Guardian
UN Doc S/16520 at 2 (1984), quoting from Israel Yearbook on Human Rights 1987. Edited by Y. Dinstein, M. Tabory. (Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 1987) ISBN 9024736463 p.36
Uri Davis, Israel: An Apartheid State (1987) ISBN 0862323177
"Oxford holds 'Apartheid Israel' week" at Jerusalem Post by Jonny Paul
Left appalled by citizenship ruling at Jerusalem Post by Sheera Claire Frenkel
Apartheid in the Holy Land in The Guardian, by Desmond Tutu
^ Israel Is Not An Apartheid State at Jewish Virtual Library
^ Abusing 'Apartheid' for the Palestinian Cause Jerusalem Post op-ed by Gerald M. Steinberg (hosted in full at http://www.ngo-monitor.org)
Is it Apartheid? at Jewish Voice for Peace by Moshe Machover published 10 November 2004
Presbyterian Church Violates US Antiboycott Laws. General Assembly of Presbyterian Church, USA, votes For Illegal Action at Convention August 1, 2004 (Boycott Watch)

External links

"Brothers in Arms - Israel's secret pact with Pretoria", in The Guardian, February 7, 2006
"Worlds Apart" in The Guardian, February 6, 2006
"Israel: an Apartheid State?" in Le Monde diplomatique, November 2003
Battling Israeli 'apartheid' BBC article on Adel Kaadan's legal battle for the right to live in a Jewish town.
Israeli Apartheid - Time for the South African Treatment by Omar Barghouti

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