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-Caveat Lector-
http://www.jordantimes.com/Thu/opinion/opinion2.htm
Ignoring Israel's abuses
By Michael Jansen
NO ONE should be surprised by the decision taken last weekend by the Israeli
government in support of a bill which bars Palestinian citizens of Israel
from buying houses in Jewish communities and bans them from acquiring
parcels of state-owned land. This practice has existed since the creation of
the state.
Zionist ideology, which conflicts with Israel's laws and with the principles
of democracy, holds that once land becomes �Jewish�, it is inalienably
�Jewish�. The author of the bill, National Religious Party Knesset member
Rabbi Haim Druckman, called the cabinet decision a �victory for Zionism�.
And Education Minister Limor Livnat, who sponsored the resolution in the
cabinet, said that the measure �does not stem at all from discrimination,
but from the main tenet of Zionism � the return of the Jewish people to its
land�.
Denying that the measure is undemocratic, she said that each communal
grouping in Israel should be allowed to live on its own, in other words, in
segregated communities.
Less than 10 per cent of the land in Israel is privately owned. Ninety-three
per cent falls under the Israel Lands Administration (ILA) which either
appropriated state lands or expropriated Palestinian property. Israel was
obliged to take this course because the Jewish community owned only a small
percentage of the land in the 78 per cent of Palestine captured in 1948.
Although the ILA is bound, by law, to allocate this land without
discrimination on the basis of ethnicity or religion, municipalities housing
Palestinian citizens of Israel, 18 per cent of the population, have
jurisdiction over only 2.5 per cent of the land.
Shulamit Aloni, founder of the Citizens Rights Movement in Israel which
became the leftist Meretz Party, summed up the situation by saying that
Israel had become a segregationist state by seizing Arab land, designating
it as �state land� and ruling that it should be exploited solely by Jews.
This task was accomplished largely by the Jewish Agency and the Jewish
National Fund, which are given state land by the ILA for the development of
exclusively Jewish communities. While these Zionist organisations have been
building small Jewish communities in areas thinly settled by Jews, the
government has been squeezing out the �Arabs�.
In the Negev, the government has been demolishing �illegal� communities
built by bedouins who are not granted permission to construct houses, a
discriminatory practice widely used by the Israeli occupation authorities in
the West Bank. Similar Jewish communities are being planted in the Galilee,
where the expansion of Palestinian municipalities is strictly circumscribed.
�Illegal� Arab constructions are bulldozed, illegal Jewish structures remain
in place.
While the declared purpose of the proposed legislation is to prevent
Palestinian citizens from moving into Jewish communities, the adoption of
the bill by the Knesset has far greater import for Israel and its
inhabitants. It could be used on the ground, in the medium- to long-term, to
deprive all of Israel's Palestinian citizens of all their already heavily
infringed land rights.
It is significant that Labour Party ministers absented themselves from the
cabinet session at the time the vote was taken. Labour leader Binyamin
Ben-Eliezer claimed that right-wing ministers waited until the Labourites
had departed before calling for a vote. But this was no excuse: Labour's
ministers had been informed ahead of time that the measure was on the
agenda.
Only one Labour member, Ephraim Sneh, voted against. The attitude of Labour
towards this racist proposal demonstrates that the party has shifted
significantly to the right of the Israeli political spectrum and that it no
longer cares about the reaction of Arab constituents. One Israeli
commentator made the point that since the human rights demonstrations of
October 2000, Palestinian citizens of Israel have come to be regarded as
�the enemy� by many Israelis.
Israeli editorialists and commentators have expressed concern that this
measure will revive the formulation �Zionism is racism�, and about
accusations that Israel is an apartheid state modelled on South Africa
before its racist legislation was repealed. In truth, Zionism is, indeed,
racism and Israel has always been an apartheid state. While many Israeli
analysts recognise these harsh facts, Western commentators shut them out. It
is interesting to note that many quality papers in the US and Europe chose
to bury or ignore the Israeli cabinet decision: clearly their proprietors
and editors do not wish to revive the �Zionism is racism� accusation.
This is a particularly sensitive issue because, in 1975, the UN General
Assembly passed a resolution declaring that �Zionism is a form of racism and
racial discrimination�. It took Israel and its friends and allies six years
to get that resolution rescinded. Meanwhile, on the ground in Israel
�proper� and in the occupied Palestinian territories, Israel continues to
expropriate Palestinian land, discriminate against its Palestinian citizens,
build Jewish settlements, confine Palestinians to shrinking islets of
territory and pass laws for Palestinian inhabitants of these �bantustans�.
Aloni summed up the situation in a few words: �By right of might, we are
acting as a racist nation.�
On the one hand, Israel's deeply entrenched racism has been exacerbated by
the physical presence of the occupation interacting with the growing
political power and influence of ultra-Orthodox religious parties and
ultra-nationalist secular formations. Occupation, involving the rule of one
people over another, always produces a feeling of racial superiority in the
mind of the occupier. He is on top, so he sees himself as a higher being
than the occupied. Ultimately the occupier comes to believe he has the right
to dominate the other. This attitude is rampant in Israel today.
Consequently, in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, Israeli soldiers abuse,
assault and shoot Palestinians with impunity. Recently, five innocent
civilians, including three children, were killed by Israeli troops in Jenin
because the Palestinians mistakenly rushed into the streets believing the
curfew had been lifted. This week, a woman and her two-year-old child
driving in a car in Gaza were murdered because Israeli troops thought the
�profile� the Palestinians presented was threatening. Although the Israeli
army says it investigates such incidents, offending soldiers are never
brought to book.
Since March, Israel has besieged, blockaded and invaded Palestinian towns
and cities, imposed punitive curfews on hundreds of thousands and arrested
thousands of Palestinians. The army's actions are supported by a large
majority of Israelis who have no feelings for the Palestinians and no
comprehension of their sufferings. Most Israelis simply do not want to know,
argues Amira Hass, the Haaretz correspondent most conversant with the plight
of the Palestinians under occupation.
Israel's right-wing government justifies bad behaviour and cruel abuses by
claiming the country is waging a �war against terror�. This endeavour is in
fact a campaign to crush Palestinian resistance to the racist occupation and
the Israeli land grab. Meanwhile, liberal commentators and politicians in
the Western world shut their eyes to unpleasant sights, close their ears to
the cries of the victims of Israel's racist policies and practices, and
purse their lips to prevent the emergence of comments critical of Israel.
Thursday, July 11, 2002
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