Eretz Israel is our unforgettable historic homeland...The Jews who will it shall achieve their State...And whatever we attempt there for our own benefit will redound mightily and beneficially to the good of all mankind. (Theodor Herzl, DerJudenstaat, 1896)

We offer peace and amity to all the neighbouring states and their peoples, and invite them to cooperate with the independent Jewish nation for the common good of all. The State of Israel is ready to contribute its full share to the peaceful progress and development of the Middle East.
(From Proclamation of the State of Israel, 5 Iyar 5708; 14 May 1948)

With a liberal democratic political system operating under the rule of law, a flourishing market economy producing technological innovation to the benefit of the wider world, and a population as educated and cultured as anywhere in Europe or North America, Israel is a normal Western country with a right to be treated as such in the community of nations.... For the global jihad, Israel may be the first objective. But it will not be the last. (Friends of Israel Initiative)

Sunday 10 April 2011

Black Students Blast the "Israeli Apartheid" Slur

"This action is in response to Palestinian Civil Society's call for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions against Israel until it begins to abide by international law," runs the leaflet thrust into my hand recently by the elderly stalwart of the local Palestine Solidarity Campaign branch who was picketing a neighbourhood supermarket and demanding that it stops stocking Israeli produce and that customers give that produce a miss.

"For decades it has  ignored all appeals to stop its illegal unjust and inhumane treatment of Palestinians both within Israel and the Occupied Territories," continues the leaflet.'As the South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu has said, Israel is practising apartheid in its policies towards the Palestinians. "It reminds me so much of what happened to us black people in South Africa."
Economic pressure might be the only thing left to persuade Israel to change.  By refusing to buy Israeli goods and services, millions of ordinary people around the world might together succeed where politicians have failed.  It worked once with apartheid South Africa.  We must try and make it work with Israel.'
That sort of talk, also of course encountered on numerous high streets and campuses during the recent "Israel Apartheid Week," cuts no ice with a number of African-American students attending historically black colleges who belong to an initiative called the Vanguard Leadership Group.  Many have been to Israel, and they know that the analogy between that country and South Africa during the apartheid era is an unwarranted slur. 

Full-page advertisements entitled “Words Matter” that appeared on 7 April, signed by members of the Vanguard Leadership Group, accused Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) of a "false and deeply offensive" depiction of Israel.

Declared the advertisements:
"SJP has chosen to manipulate rather than inform with this illegitimate analogy. We request that you immediately stop referring to Israel as an apartheid society and to acknowledge that the Arab minority in Israel enjoys full citizenship with voting rights and representation in the government."
For more details: http://www.jpost.com/International/Article.aspx?id=215811
and see also: http://israelmatzav.blogspot.com/2011/04/black-students-diss-students-for.html

As Canadian Danielle Kubes has observed:
"First off, most people don’t realize that Israel is extremely multicultural. Downtown Tel-Aviv you’ll find Black Christian Sudanese drinking coffee alongside Thai women shouting Hebrew, beside religious Jewish men wearing tall black hats who dart their eyes to the ground as scantily-clad young Israeli women saunter by with their Ethiopian boyfriends to buy soda from Arab-Israeli vendors. To assume Israel has a single ethnic identity, or that its goal is such, is a joke. True, Israel was founded primarily as a Jewish state — but not to the exclusion of others. The purpose was to ensure that Jews always have a safe place to go whenever they face persecution, certainly not because Israel seeks an entirely Jewish population run according to Biblical laws. Israel could not create a single identity even if it tried because Jews are too diverse in race, observance and opinion.
Moreover, every citizen of Israel’s democracy has exactly the same rights. Arab Israelis — who make up roughly one fifth of the country’s six million people — vote, worship whomever they want, volunteer for the army and even make up roughly one-tenth of parliament. Sure, prejudice and discrimination exists in Israel. And in Canada. And in every country in the world. To be an apartheid state, the discrimination must be sanctioned and enforced by the government on the basis of race. Israel’s government often condemns prejudiced individuals and constantly denounces extremists. It cannot be held responsible for the actions of racist individuals.
But what about the checkpoints, fences and separate roads the government placed in the West Bank? Are they proof the government is inherently racist against Palestinians? Or did Israel create them to protect its citizens from a very real terrorism threat funded and encouraged by Iran and Syria? Security, not racism, is the motivation behind Israel’s policies in the West Bank.
Separate roads for Israelis and Palestinians exist because tensions are so intense that an Israeli found on Palestinian property is likely to be assaulted or killed, and vice versa.
Racism didn’t fuel the recent offensive in Gaza either; Israel’s government was taking military action against the nearly 3,500 rockets it says have been launched against Israel from the Gaza Strip since Israeli forces withdrew from the region in August 2005. Feel free to criticize Israel’s defence policies, but don’t be fooled into thinking the core of the conflict is institutional racism. Not only is there little evidence for that, but it also oversimplifies the conflict thereby drawing attention away from the real issues at hand such as water rights, demographic issues and extremism.

And what about the actions of Israel’s neighbours? Why didn’t people protest when Lebanon’s army killed hundreds of Palestinians in 2007 while fighting militants in a refugee camp? And why don’t people cry out when Syrian homosexuals have to flee into Israel to escape death? Perhaps Canadians don’t care when Arabs kill other Arabs. We must take care not to apply a different standard to Israel, which possibly has the best human rights record in the region."
http://www.shalomlife.com/eng/14808/The_Hypocrisy_of_Israel_Apartheid_Week/
(hat tip: reader Shirlee)
See also http://palestinesentinel.wordpress.com/2010/03/05/the-gross-lie-of-israel-apartheid-from-one-who-experienced-the-real-thing/

1 comment:

  1. ARAB-NAZISM & GENOCIDE = ROOTS OF 'APARTHEID-COMPARISON' THESIS

    Ahmad shukairy Arab-nazi has invented the apartheid slur (upon pluralistic democratic Israel, six years before the so-called "occupation" excuse came about) in 1961 ["Politics, lies, and videotape: 3,000 questions and answers on the Mideast crisis" - Page 392 – Yitschak Ben Gad - SP Books, 1991 – 479 pages], he helped the (ally of Adolf Hitler, al-Husseini, better known as the) Mufti and aided in extermination of Jews in WW2, according to testimony in Congress. [Congressional record: proceedings and debates of the United States Congress: Volume 113, Part 12 - United States. Congress - Govt. Print. Off., 1967 - Page A-525]. The same Shukairy admitted in 1956 that so-called "Palestine" is NOTHING but a part of Syria... [United Nations review: Volume 3 - United Nations. Dept. of Public Information, United Nations. Office of Public Information - 1957 - Page 8] Then, in 1963, he changed his mind, and the 'new nationalism' is 'conveniently' used -since then- by Arab immigrants' children who call themselves as "Palestinians" since 1963. He's more famous for coining the Palestine Liberation Organization's genocide slogan 'Drive the Jews into the Sea' [America's Two Holy Wars - John Tyler - Page 246].



    ARAB MUSLIM APARTHEID



    All the while the Arab world and the Muslim world are the largest practitioners of racial and religious apartheid. Where not one minority has equal rights with the governing power. Not to mention the still-practiced racist slavery on Asians and on blacks by Arabs. And the ethnic cleansing by the Arab world including by anti-Christian, anti-Jewish Arab-Islamic-Apartheid-Palestine.
    To quote from books: The Islamic world "the world's largest practitioner of both religious and gender apartheid." [Israel: And the Palestinian Nightmare - Page 158 - Ze'ev Shemer - 2010 - 244 pages] "The Islamic culture of "religious intolerance, economic backwardness, gender apartheid, muzzled press, militarism, terrorism." [A theory of international terrorism: understanding Islamic militancy - Page 153 - L. Ali Khan - 2006 - 371 pages] The "antisemitism of the Arab world and the Muslim world." The racist "long history of oppression against minorities in Arab countries." [U.S. news & world report: Volume 131, Issues 8-18 - U.S. News Pub. Corp., 2001 - Page 120]



    PALLYWOOD



    The lying Arab-Palestinian Goliath machine not only lies and denies Israel's extending more rights to Arabs than to Jews (like favortism in court, affirmative action and exemption from military service), but also fabricates "memorandums" like a supposed speech by N. Mandela which was actually written by an Arab residing in the Netherland... The Arab lobby also aided J. Carter (the one who wrote a hate book in 2006 with almost an exact title of that by Palestinian-Arab M. Bishara in 2002), who uttered anti-Jewish bigoted statements like: 'stating Freeman's recommendations for council board members contained "too many Jews."' [Living in the Times of the Signs - Page 219 - David R. Barnhart - 2007 - 492 pages]



    AIM



    The racist Arab "apartheid" slander campaign (like infamous 'apartheid week') has been rocked by usual anti-Jewish hatred outbursts, including calls to kill Jews, Swastikas, etc. [M. Ignatieff: Israel Apartheid Week and CUPE Ontario's anti-Israel posturing should be condemned." National Post, March 05, 2009] ["Swastikas and Ku Klux Klan Symbols during 'Apartheid Week..." Israel National News, 3 Mar 2010]

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