Opuscula Apartheid, Arab style

APARTHEID, according to the dictionary¹ is defined as:

: racial segregation specifically: a former policy of segregation and political and economic discrimination against non-European groups in the Republic of South Africa


2 : separation, segregation cultural apartheid gender apartheid

Given that there is no government sponsored, or even encouraged, racial or religious segregation in Israel, apartheid cannot be applied to Israel.

ON THE OTHER HAND, apartheid CAN be applied to the PLO-controlled areas and to Jordan where Jews (of any hue) cannot reside.

It also can be applied to several cities in Saudi Arabia were only Muslims are allowed to enter.

Alan Dershowitz, with whom I do not always agree, wrote a book, The Case for Israel^{2, 3}. It has been sitting on the shelf for some time, unopened.

Saturday, looking for something to read I pulled it down and commenced reading.

To his credit, Dershowitz cites his sources. I am “very big” about citing sources.

On Page 37 of the book, in Chapter 4, Was the Balfour Declaration Binding on Internationals Law? Dershowitz writes:

The first state established in (English-ruled) Palestine was thus an emirate with a large Palestinian majority. Abdullah, the brother of neighboring Iraq’s new ruler, would rule it. Many of the Jews who lived in what became Transjordan (now Jordan) — some of whom had lived there for generations — had been forced because of episodic outbreaks of violence and, by law, the few remaining Jews were forbidden from living in Transjordan. (Emphasis mine.)

Dershowitz’ source: Jordanian nationality law, Article 3(3) of Law No. 6 and Official Gazette No. 1171, Feb. 6, 1954.

THAT is apartheid.

While an Arab — Muslim, Christian, Druze, etc. — may buy land in “apartheid “ Israel, according to Wikipedia.org⁴,

Palestinian land laws refer to ownership of land under the Palestinian Authority (PA). These laws prohibit Palestinians from selling Palestinian-owned lands to "any man or judicial body corporation of Israeli citizenship, living in Israel or acting on its behalf." These land laws were originally enacted during the Jordanian rule of the West Bank (1948–1967). Land sales to Israelis are considered treason by the Palestinians because they threaten the founding of a future state and to "halt the spread of moral, political and security corruption". Palestinians who sell land to Israelis can be sentenced to death, although death penalties are seldom carried out; a death sentence has to be approved by the Palestinian Authority President.

THAT is apartheid.

The Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement IS apartheid within the dictionary definition (ibid.) as it forces Jewish-owned companies away from Palestinian (PLO)-controlled areas.

SodaStream is a prime example.

SodaStream employed both Israeli Jews and Arabs from PLO-controlled areas until BDS forced SodaStream to relocate. It relocated to southern Israel where it employs Jews and Bedouins.

Equal pay for equal work.

SodaStream was busing in workers from the PLO-controlled areas at its expense and paying them higher salaries than they could receive at home.

Bottom line: BDS hurts the PLO more than Israel, but the BDSers apparently don’t care.

A major — and growing — supermarket chain, Rami Levy, employs both Israelis (Arabs, Christians, and Jews) and some Arabs from the PLO-controlled areas at equal pay in its stores.

Hundreds of Arabs from the PLO-area enter Israel on a daily basis and work for salaries above anything they could earn at home.

Caveat: I hold dual citizenship, Israel and U.S. I lived in Israel and visit often. I see first hand Arabs at work in Israel.

There ARE places in Israel where Arabs — even Israeli Arabs — are less than welcome. These areas usually are populated by refugees or descendants of refugees from Muslim countries.

There also are Arab communities in Israel that discourage Israeli Jews from being part of the community. Affinity communities are common worldwide.

BOTTOM LINE

To claim that Israel is an apartheid state is a sign of ignorance. Most of the people making this blatantly untrue claim never have been to Israel (or the PLO-controlled areas) or, for that matter, any apartheid country (e.g., Jordan, Saudi Arabia).

Apartheid in the PLO-controlled areas is a fact. Apartheid hurts the Arabs living under PLO domination — or Hamas domination in Gaza — more than it hurts the people it seems to segregate, people — Israeli Arabs, Christians, and Jews who could provide jobs, health care, and education (sans the politics of hate taught in United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) schools) if the Arabs of Gaza and the PLO-controlled areas would abandon THEIR apartheid practices.

A quick comment on peace

Most “official” Israelis have been willing to have a “two-state” solution since 1947.

(Actually, there already IS a “two-state” solution; the other state is Jordan.)

Can there be peace with a “Palestinian” state controlled by the PLO and by Hamas?

Not until the PLO and Hamas give up their pledges to drive the Jews to the sea.

On the other hand, Israel HAS long-lasting treaties with Egypt and with Jordan. All parties benefit from these agreements.

Today, Arab physicians come from PLO-controlled areas to study and work in Israeli hospitals. Arabs from the PLO areas are treated at Israeli hospitals with the same level of care as Israeli patients.

There are extra-governmental groups of Israelis and PLO-area Arabs working to train those under PLO control to work in a high tech industry that, unfortunately, is not available in the PLO-controlled areas.

If the PLO and Hamas want peace, Israel is prepared to work toward that end.

Final question

If the PLO and Hamas are really peaceful pseudo-governments, why don’t Egypt and Jordan want to accept these peoples into their countries?

Jordan doesn’t want them because they will try, once again, to over-throw the crown. Egypt doesn’t want them because Hamas is a terror organization that works against Egypt as much as Israel. (Begin tried to give Sadat Gaza; Sadat was a better negotiator and refused Begin’s offer.)

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Sources

1. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/apartheid

2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Case_for_Israel

3. https://electronicintifada.net/content/case-israel-critical-review/5629

4. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_land_laws

PLAGIARISM is the act of appropriating the literary composition of another, or parts or passages of his writings, or the ideas or language of the same, and passing them off as the product of one’s own mind.

Truth is an absolute defense to defamation. Defamation is a false statement of fact. If the statement was accurate, then by definition it wasn’t defamatory.

Comments on Apartheid, Arab style

Opuscula Leftists, Indians, And the PLO

WHY IS IT LEFTISTS IN THE U.S. tell Israel to let the PLO terrorists return to Israel yet they say nothing about American Indians.

*   The United States stole land from the American Indians.

*   The United States repeatedly lied to the American Indians.

*   The United States forced the American Indians into ghettos.

*   The United States forced the American Indians to give up their languages.

By contrast, MOST of the so-called “Palestinians” left Israel on instruction from their religious leadership and Muslim politicians. (True, some were forced out in fear they would be a “fifth column” within Israel.)

With the exception of Manhattan New York, allegedly “sold” to the Europeans for a bunch of trinkets, all the land on which the American Indians lived was taken from them by force.

One of the worst cases was the forced relocation of Cherokee Indians from their ancestral home in Georgia and force marched to the west.

The Cherokee had an established government, a written language – yet, because some European though there was gold under the land, the U.S. Army marched men, women, and children across the country.^{1, 2}

 


Partial Trail of Tears Map Source: Britannica.com http://tinyurl.com/y638ppdy

 

This was in preparation for Democrat Franklin Roosevelt’s forced internment of Japanese-Americans and a few Germans and Italians during World War 2.

American Indians in the western states were promised land where they could live and hunt in exchange for being pushed off their ancestral lands so Europeans could build cities and fence off land for their own use.

Not only were the Indians driven off their lands, but the settlers hated the people from whom they stole the land. Because they were not Europeans, the native Americans were considered savages and sub-human to be killed as animals.

Unfortunately for the Indians, wealth was discovered on the land the U.S. promised them and they were forced to move again, this time to smaller reservations. Good Christians forced the Indians to abandon their religion and language in favor of the invaders’ religion and language. The government also forced the Indians to go on the dole, and then often cheated them of what little the government had promised.

The American Indians did not provoke war with the Europeans until the Europeans attempted to deprive them of their land.

 

BY COMPARISON

 

In Israel, Jews, and non-Jews, i.e. Muslims, Christians, and sundry others, have equal freedom. While there ARE communities based on religion or ethnicity, these primarily are voluntarily populated by like-minded people. That is human nature.

The Muslims living under PLO rule are taught to hate Israelis specifically and Jews generally, and to a lesser extant, anyone who is not Muslim. PLO Muslims face the death penalaty for selling land to a Jew; not so in Israel. Jews in Israel are not taught hatred, at least not by the government.

I briefly taught school in Zefat in northern Israel.
Some Muslims who fled Israel, due to fear or by encouragement from Muslim religious or political leaders, ended up in UN-sponsored welfare camps. Muslims who wanted to leave a camp, could leave a camp, unlike the American Indians who were hunted down if they escaped from the reservation.

PLO Muslims can travel wherever they are welcome, via Israel air and sea ports or via Jordan or Egypt — when Egypt allows Muslims in Gaza to cross its border, closed more often to them that Israel’s border.

Most American Indians, contrary to tv westerns, did not attack European settlers, unlike the Muslims of the PLO and Gaza who believe dying while killing a Jew will gain for them 70 virgins. (I never figured out what a female martyr can expect.)

 

TIME FOR LEFTIST TO LOOK INWARD

 

It’s time for America’s leftists to look at their own country.

Is everything so perfect here that they have to demonize Israel?

And why only Israel? The rest of the world if fine? What about Somalia (and Boko Haram). What about ISIS (by any name) and the Islamic Brotherhood that attack indiscriminately around the world? What about the lack of freedoms in Saudi Arabia, China, and North Korea, to name just three countries notorious for their abuse of American-style civil rights?

America’s liberals can’t see because of the mote in one eye and myopia in the other.

Leftists — work to make America a better country for ALL Americans.

Take time out from bashing Israel and Donald Trump.

If you want to live in America, work to improve life for all Americans; once America is perfected, THEN go on to other countries.

On the other hand, if you don’t CARE about America, leave.

Move to a country where the PLO is in charge. Move to Saudi Arabia or China or even North Korea. You can emigrate to Europe for socialized medicine (and take Bernie Sanders with you, he is, after all, a socialist).

The border is open for all leftists who loudly bawled “If Trump is elected, I’ll leave the country.” No one is stopping you.

The Democrat darling with feet of clay, John Kennedy, admonished Americans to ask what they could do for their country.

His call for action is valid even today.

What I fail to comprehend is why the leftists prefer to attack Israel and, with the likes of Ilhan Omar in Congress, American Jews.

First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist.
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out— because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me. Martin Niemöller (http://tinyurl.com/yaj53q57)

 


Trail of Tears Map Source: Britannica.com http://tinyurl.com/y638ppdy

 

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Sources

1. A Brief History of the Trail of Tears
http://tinyurl.com/y2qt8o7y

2. Trail of Tears http://tinyurl.com/yasfag62

PLAGIARISM is the act of appropriating the literary composition of another, or parts or passages of his writings, or the ideas or language of the same, and passing them off as the product of one’s own mind.

Truth is an absolute defense to defamation. Defamation is a false statement of fact. If the statement was accurate, then by definition it wasn’t defamatory.

Comments on Leftists