Dear Friend of Israel,
This week, an astonishing event has been taking place in universities around the world. “Israel Apartheid Week,” sponsored by various Palestinian groups, purports to be an event to show solidarity with Palestinians. But, like so many of these events, it is in fact little more than an excuse to harshly and unfairly criticize Israel and express anti-Semitic diatribes.
The organizers of “Israel Apartheid Week” decry what they call Israel’s “barbaric” and “brutal military assault” on Gaza, accuse Israel of “massacres” of Palestinians, and call on Israel to stop the “colonization of all Arab lands.” And, as its name implies, they also promote the idea that Israel subjects Palestinians to apartheid -- the oppressive legal system once used in South Africa that institutionalized segregation, discrimination, and domination based on race.
But does Israel really deserve to be compared to apartheid-era South Africa? The comparison is so inapt that it would be laughable were it not so insulting. In apartheid-era South Africa, black citizens were totally disenfranchised, subject to oppressive laws that controlled every aspect of their behavior, and completely segregated from the ruling white minority. In Israel, on the other hand, both Jewish and Arab citizens have equal protection under the law, enjoy freedom of religion and speech, and full voting rights. In fact, Israel’s 120-member parliament, the Knesset, includes 12 Arab Israeli members.
What could be the possible motivation of those who apply this word, which has such evil connotations, to the Middle East’s only democracy? Benjamin Pogrund, a South African Jew now living in Israel who saw firsthand the horrible oppression and misery caused by the apartheid system in his native country, sums it up like this: “’Apartheid’ is used in this case and elsewhere because it comes easily to hand: it is a lazy label for the complexities of the Middle East conflict. It is also used because, if it can be made to stick, then Israel can be made to appear to be as vile as was apartheid South Africa and seeking its destruction can be presented to the world as an equally moral cause.”
Pogrund also sums up the vast difference between apartheid-era South Africa and Israel in human terms.
“Two years ago I had major surgery in a Jerusalem hospital,” he says. “The surgeon was Jewish, the anesthetist was Arab, the doctors and nurses who looked after me were Jews and Arabs. Jews and Arabs share meals in restaurants and travel on the same trains, buses and taxis, and visit each other’s homes. Could any of this possibly have happened under apartheid? Of course not.”
If they chose to do so, the “Israel apartheid” protesters could refocus their indignation on other countries and regions where real human rights violations are all too common.
In Saudi Arabia, for example, there is no such thing as freedom of religion, freedom of speech, or freedom of assembly, and women are second-class citizens under the law. In Iran, politically motivated killings and kidnappings are common, ethnic and religious minorities are harshly repressed, and freedom of the press is nonexistent. In Zimbabwe, government security forces regularly kill, unlawfully imprison, and torture opponents in order to suppress dissent.
In Hamas-controlled Gaza, as well as parts of the West Bank controlled by the Palestinian Authority, a small remaining population of Christians is regularly harassed, intimidated, and even murdered by radical Islamists.
Yet, the “Israel Apartheid Week” protesters have nothing to say about the gross human rights abuses that routinely occur elsewhere. Why? Because their real agenda is not to improve the plight of Palestinians, but to attack Israel. The “apartheid” slur is just another way for Israel’s enemies to try to delegitimize and undermine the Jewish state by comparing its self-defense measures to the brutal discrimination of an evil regime. The comparison is false. Those who make it reveal their own dishonesty, hatreds, and biases ... and nothing about Israel.
With prayers for shalom, peace,
Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein
President
This week, an astonishing event has been taking place in universities around the world. “Israel Apartheid Week,” sponsored by various Palestinian groups, purports to be an event to show solidarity with Palestinians. But, like so many of these events, it is in fact little more than an excuse to harshly and unfairly criticize Israel and express anti-Semitic diatribes.
The organizers of “Israel Apartheid Week” decry what they call Israel’s “barbaric” and “brutal military assault” on Gaza, accuse Israel of “massacres” of Palestinians, and call on Israel to stop the “colonization of all Arab lands.” And, as its name implies, they also promote the idea that Israel subjects Palestinians to apartheid -- the oppressive legal system once used in South Africa that institutionalized segregation, discrimination, and domination based on race.
But does Israel really deserve to be compared to apartheid-era South Africa? The comparison is so inapt that it would be laughable were it not so insulting. In apartheid-era South Africa, black citizens were totally disenfranchised, subject to oppressive laws that controlled every aspect of their behavior, and completely segregated from the ruling white minority. In Israel, on the other hand, both Jewish and Arab citizens have equal protection under the law, enjoy freedom of religion and speech, and full voting rights. In fact, Israel’s 120-member parliament, the Knesset, includes 12 Arab Israeli members.
What could be the possible motivation of those who apply this word, which has such evil connotations, to the Middle East’s only democracy? Benjamin Pogrund, a South African Jew now living in Israel who saw firsthand the horrible oppression and misery caused by the apartheid system in his native country, sums it up like this: “’Apartheid’ is used in this case and elsewhere because it comes easily to hand: it is a lazy label for the complexities of the Middle East conflict. It is also used because, if it can be made to stick, then Israel can be made to appear to be as vile as was apartheid South Africa and seeking its destruction can be presented to the world as an equally moral cause.”
Pogrund also sums up the vast difference between apartheid-era South Africa and Israel in human terms.
“Two years ago I had major surgery in a Jerusalem hospital,” he says. “The surgeon was Jewish, the anesthetist was Arab, the doctors and nurses who looked after me were Jews and Arabs. Jews and Arabs share meals in restaurants and travel on the same trains, buses and taxis, and visit each other’s homes. Could any of this possibly have happened under apartheid? Of course not.”
If they chose to do so, the “Israel apartheid” protesters could refocus their indignation on other countries and regions where real human rights violations are all too common.
In Saudi Arabia, for example, there is no such thing as freedom of religion, freedom of speech, or freedom of assembly, and women are second-class citizens under the law. In Iran, politically motivated killings and kidnappings are common, ethnic and religious minorities are harshly repressed, and freedom of the press is nonexistent. In Zimbabwe, government security forces regularly kill, unlawfully imprison, and torture opponents in order to suppress dissent.
In Hamas-controlled Gaza, as well as parts of the West Bank controlled by the Palestinian Authority, a small remaining population of Christians is regularly harassed, intimidated, and even murdered by radical Islamists.
Yet, the “Israel Apartheid Week” protesters have nothing to say about the gross human rights abuses that routinely occur elsewhere. Why? Because their real agenda is not to improve the plight of Palestinians, but to attack Israel. The “apartheid” slur is just another way for Israel’s enemies to try to delegitimize and undermine the Jewish state by comparing its self-defense measures to the brutal discrimination of an evil regime. The comparison is false. Those who make it reveal their own dishonesty, hatreds, and biases ... and nothing about Israel.
With prayers for shalom, peace,
Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein
President
Source: IFCJ
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