“More than 14 million people, about half of whom are Jews and the other half Palestinians, live between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean under one rule,” B’Tselem said in a new analysis entitled: “A regime of Jewish supremacy from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean: this is apartheid. ‘
The human rights group says that the traditional view of Israel as a democracy working side by side with a temporary Israeli occupation in the territories “imposed on five million Palestinian subjects has been separated from reality.”
“The most important thing is that the distinction promotes and confirms the fact that the whole area between the Mediterranean and the Jordan River is organized under a single principle: the supremacy of one group – Jews – above another – Palestinians”, ‘B’ Tselem said in his controversial analysis.
Years of injustice against Palestinians, culminating in laws that entrenched discrimination, mean that “the criterion for labeling the Israeli regime as apartheid has been met,” B’Tselem said.
The claim that Israel is an ‘apartheid state’ is often dismissed by right-wing Israelis and their support groups as anti-Semitic. But it would be more difficult to make this argument now that Israel has been so labeled by such a respected Israelite institution, even though one enjoys only minority support in its homeland.
Israel’s embassy in London dismissed the report as ‘not based on reality, but on a distorted ideological view’.
“The fact that B’Tselem chose not to submit the report to the Israeli government for comment proves that it is nothing more than a propaganda tool. Israel rejects the false allegations in the so-called report … Israel is a strong and vibrant democracy that grants full rights to all its citizens, regardless of religion, race or gender.The Arab citizens of Israel are represented in all branches of government – in the Israeli parliament, in the courts (including the Supreme Court), in the civil service, and even in the diplomatic corps where they represent the State of Israel around the world. ‘
Over the past decade, there has been growing concern among Israel’s traditional allies, especially in Europe, that the relentless loss of Palestinian territory to Jewish settlements on the West Bank, which is illegal under international law, is not merely undermining a long-term peace process. but Israel’s moral position.
These concerns are sharply focused with the adoption of the ‘Basic Law: Israel – the Nation State of the Jewish People’ in 2018 – which included Israel permanently as a Jewish state in its constitution – and reinforced by promises from Israel’s politicians. , especially Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, to unilaterally annex large parts of the West Bank.
Israel conquered and occupied the West Bank and Gaza in 1967. The Oslo Accords between Israel and the Palestinian Liberation Organization, the first of which was signed in 1993, were intended to lead to a “two-state solution” that would establish an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel.
Twenty-eight years later, there are no signs of the outcome.
B’Tselem argues that Israel rather has entrenched discrimination against non-Jews in the territories under its control.
This includes fewer rights for Palestinians living in Israel with Israeli citizenship (17% of the population). The clearest example, says B’Tselem, is the fact that non-Jews cannot emigrate to Israel. Palestinians marrying an Israelite need Israeli official permission to move to Israel.
On the West Bank, Jewish settlements are being built continuously, while the building permit for Palestinians in areas that are officially under Israeli security control is almost impossible to obtain, and that ‘illegal’ structures are regularly pushed.
Freedom of assembly and expression are also severely curtailed for Palestinians on the West Bank, the human rights group claims, while for Jews it is largely unrestricted.
B’Tselem Executive Director Hagai El-Ad: ‘Israel is not a democracy with a temporary occupation; it is one regime between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean, and we need to look at the whole picture and see what it is: apartheid. This sobering view of reality does not have to lead to despair, but rather to the opposite. This is a call for change. After all, humans have created this regime and humans can change it. ”
Between 1948 and 1994, South Africa’s apartheid system of racial segregation and ‘separate development’ was designed to restrict non-Whites to ‘self-governing Bantustans’, depriving them of their citizenship and placing them under the administration of puppet regimes, which seemed like discontinuous spots. has. on a map.
The Palestinian Authority, established under Oslo, administers the majority of Palestinians on the West Bank, but they are largely confined to urban areas separated by Israel from Israel, and are mostly prevented from traveling on roads, mainly isolated from Jewish settlers and other Israelites.
B’Tselem officials have said they want the international community to “take action” on Israel’s policy toward the Palestinians.
But they refused to consider whether ‘action’ calls for international economic and cultural sanctions of the kind imposed on apartheid by South Africa before gaining freedom with a series of steps leading up to the election of Nelson Mandela in 1994.