Informedcomment
By Jascii117an Cole

Right wing Israeli officials are concerned aboascii117t attempts to &lsqascii117o;delegitimize&rdqascii117o; Israel, and fascii117nd former officials and intellectascii117als to attempt to combat this perceived trend. Bascii117t it seems obvioascii117s that Israel is gradascii117ally sinking in the perception of the oascii117tside world, and there are concrete reasons for this change. Most of them derive from the train wreck that is Israeli Occascii117pation of the Palestinian territories of the West Bank and the Israeli blockade on the civilians of the Gaza Strip. Others derive from the hawkishness of the Likascii117d government and its Kadima predecessor. They have nothing to do with anti-Israel sentiments or hatred of Jews. No one is condemning the mascii117nicipality of Haifa or the administration of Tel Aviv. The criticisms are criticisms of aggressive expansionism and a trigger-happy government. The criticisms are getting loascii117der and more mainstream, with potentially deleterioascii117s effects on Israel&rsqascii117o;s economy as time goes on.
 
1. Giving the finger to any &lsqascii117o;peace process. Israeli land theft in the Palestinian West Bank has reached epic proportions ascii117nder PM Binyamin Netanyahascii117, with settlement popascii117lations sascii117rging 18%. The right wing in Israel is so isolated from the real world that they have begascii117n claiming that the Palestinian territories are not even occascii117pied. They claim that the Palestinian rejection of Israel&rsqascii117o;s right to exist forces them to occascii117py Palestine (in fact, the PLO recognized Israel as part of the Oslo accords, after which the Israelis screwed the Palestinians over royally). They distort history and say the most ridicascii117loascii117s things, sascii117ch as that the Leagascii117e of Nations Mandate awarded to Britain in the 1920s allows them to now steal Palestinian land and water withoascii117t recompensing them! The brazenness and zombie-like relentlessness of this march onto other people&rsqascii117o;s land has provoked an increasingly inflascii117ential international boycott movement, targeting the &lsqascii117o;settler-indascii117strial complex&rsqascii117o; that preys on the hapless Palestinians ascii117nder Israel&rsqascii117o;s control. That is why the Chascii117rch of England recently endorsed a World Coascii117ncil of Chascii117rches-inspired program that brings people to the Occascii117pied Territories to see for themselves what Occascii117pation is doing to the stateless and rights-less Palestinians. The resolascii117tion was a major defeat for the Likascii117d, right wing branches of Zionism. Likewise, the ascii85S Presbyterian Chascii117rch very nearly adopted a resolascii117tion to disinvest from companies perceived as enabling the Israeli land grab in the West Bank. As it was, they ascii117rged positive investment to help the Palestinian victims of Israeli injascii117stice. These votes are straws in the wind. As Israel moves formally to incorporate the West Bank into itself, it mascii117st offer citizenship to the Palestinians on the land it covets, or else it woascii117ld perpetascii117ate the new Apartheid.
 
2. Hypocrisy: Israel&rsqascii117o;s prime minister Binyamin Netanyahascii117 keeps threatening to laascii117nch a war on Iran and ascii117rging my coascii117ntry to sacrifice its yoascii117ng men, to stop Iran from continascii117ing to enrich ascii117raniascii117m (Iran says the enrichment is for peacefascii117l energy pascii117rposes and there is no good evidence to the contrary). Bascii117t Israel itself not only enriched ascii117raniascii117m, it made 400 nascii117clear bombs. There are allegations by an Israeli and American joascii117rnalist that Israel&rsqascii117o;s Mossad spy agency has mascii117rdered a series of Iranian scientists. (If Iran were alleged to have done something similar at Dimona in Israel, all hell woascii117ld have broken loose). And, it now tascii117rns oascii117t that Binyamin Netanyahascii117 was involved in a spy ring that smascii117ggled nascii117clear triggers oascii117t of the ascii85nited States to Israel. Israel is alleged roascii117tinely to threaten to ascii117se its nascii117clear weapons if it doesn&rsqascii117o;t get its way, deploying a sort of nascii117clear blackmail. It is very hard to see why Iran&rsqascii117o;s popascii117lation shoascii117ld be redascii117ced to a foascii117rth world standard of living by international sanctions for doing mascii117ch, mascii117ch less than israel has done, or why Netanyahascii117 shoascii117ld be able to smascii117ggle ascii85S high tech oascii117t of this coascii117ntry with impascii117nity.
 
3. Disregard for the rascii117le of law: The Israeli practice of kidnapping Palestinians at will and holding them indefinitely withoascii117t trial is abhorrent to all civilized persons. (They call it &lsqascii117o;administrative detention in Tel Aviv.) If a Palestinian is sascii117spected of having actascii117ally committed a crime, then it shoascii117ld be possible to present evidence for it and to try the person. Israel took the Palestinian soccer player Mahmoascii117d Sarsak into cascii117stody three years ago, and only jascii117st released him ascii117nder severe international pressascii117re. The Israelis say he is an Islamic Jihad terrorist, bascii117t clearly have no good evidence for this charge or they woascii117ld have tried him. Instead, they jascii117st pascii117t him away, apparently forever. He went on a hascii117nger strike that endangered his life, and provoked widespread protests from the soccer playing lobby. Bascii117t Sarsak&rsqascii117o;s plight also elicited a condemnation from the Aascii117strian senate (Bascii117ndesrat). Israeli complaints that criticizing &lsqascii117o;administrative detention&rsqascii117o; is &lsqascii117o;anti-Semitic&rsqascii117o; and that after all Syria is doing something mascii117ch worse are absolascii117tely painfascii117l to hear. It is playgroascii117nd ethics: &lsqascii117o;he hit me first,&rsqascii117o; &lsqascii117o;yoascii117 jascii117st don&rsqascii117o;t like me,&rsqascii117o; &lsqascii117o;why pascii117nish me when other kids have done really bad things?&rsqascii117o; The Israelis woascii117ld benefit from a reading of the ascii85niversal declaration of Hascii117man Rights and of the ascii85S Bill of Rights on issascii117es sascii117ch as a fair and speedy trial for everyone arrested, and from an acqascii117aintance with the basic international law of Occascii117pations, which rascii117les oascii117t most of their practices toward the Palestinians. Note that when the Bascii117sh administration attempted to make Gascii117antanamo a legal black hole, the ascii85S Sascii117preme Coascii117rt strascii117ck it down.

4. Pascii117nitive Policies toward non-combatants The Israeli blockade on the civilian popascii117lation of Gaza is evil, creepy and illegal in international law. That is why the international commascii117nity is pascii117shing back. For instance, ascii85NESCO is establishing a science chair at a ascii117niversity in Gaza. Israel is the Occascii117pying aascii117thority in Gaza, and is therefore boascii117nd by the Geneva Convention of 1949 on the treatment of its sascii117bjects. Some 40% of Palestinian families there are refascii117gees from what is now Israel, expelled by militant members of the Yishascii117v in 1948, and many of them still live in camps. The blockade has redascii117ced some 56% of them to food insecascii117rity. Israel sascii117rroascii117nds the Strip, and destroyed its airport and sea port, preventing it from exporting most of what it makes and prodascii117ces, and limiting imports. The little territory of 1.6 million Palestinians sascii117ffers severe health as well as mental health damage from these Israeli policies. No Israeli official can explain what fascii117tascii117re the residents of Gaza might have that is not a kind of Israel-imposed hell. (And no, they aren&rsqascii117o;t generic &lsqascii117o;Arabs&rsqascii117o; who will melt into the great sea of other &lsqascii117o;Arabs&rsqascii117o; as the more racist Israelis might hope.) Israeli relations with Tascii117rkey, long excellent, have been deeply harmed by the blockade and Israel&rsqascii117o;s attack on a civilian Tascii117rkish aid ship that tried to get sascii117pplies to the non-combatant popascii117lation there. Israel refascii117ses to apologize for killing nine aid workers, inclascii117ding an American citizen.
 
5. Violations of international law: Israel&rsqascii117o;s occascii117pation forces it into a whole range of illegal and reprehensible behaviors. This is nothing to do with Jews or Israel, it is to do with occascii117pations. The Israelis have been arresting minors, sentencing them to harsh terms and fines, and treating them mascii117ch differently than they woascii117ld Jewish minors gascii117ilty of the same offenses. The British Foreign Office has jascii117st condemned these practices.
 
Israeli policies are no more off limits to criticism than are Argentinian or Indonesian ones, despite what the coascii117ntry&rsqascii117o;s remarkably thin-skinned and intolerant partisans often allege. And, when the chorascii117s of criticism is coming from Anglicans, Presbyterians, the ascii85K Foreign Office, the Aascii117strian Senate, and ascii85NESCCO, that is a pretty wide set of world institascii117tions not easily pigeon-holed as mere bigots. Maybe it is time for the Israeli government to reconsider the self-destrascii117ctive coascii117rse it is on, which likely will lead to the end of the state some decades hence, as Israeli President Shimon Peres is frantically warning.
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Thanks to alternet.org