The Apartheid Charge

Yesterday I was thinking of coming up with a stock standard answer that should be used by defenders of Israel whenever they face the monstrous "Israeli apartheid" accusation. Lo and behold, today the Jerusalem Post have an op-ed piece on this topic.

Abusing 'apartheid' for the Palestinian cause

Although the comparison between Israel and the apartheid regime that ruled South Africa is entirely fictitious, demonization efforts that repeat this analogy are the embodiment of the new anti-Semitism that seeks to deny the Jewish people the right of equality and self-determination among the nations.

Zionism and the revival of national sovereignty in the Jewish homeland are not manifestations of European colonialism, in contrast to the white settlers who created Johannesburg and Pretoria.

While Black labor was exploited in slavery-like conditions under apartheid, in contrast, Palestinians were dependent on Israeli employment due to their own internal corruption and economic failures.

While South African apartheid was based on denial of sovereignty for the Black population, Israelis accepted the "two-state solution" from the beginning, including the 1947 UN partition plan.

Arab citizens of Israel have the same democratic rights as Israelis, including full parliamentary representation and free speech - in sharp contrast to the Blacks under apartheid, or minorities in most Arab countries.

The racism and denial of legitimacy characteristic of apartheid are actually applicable to Arab and Islamic rejection of Jewish rights. In the Middle East, Jews are a tiny and oppressed minority, struggling to maintain cultural identity and survive in a hostile and violent environment.

By screaming "apartheid" at every opportunity, the leaders of this campaign have succeeded in burying data showing that this barrier has saved the lives of many Israelis. In today's immoral political doublespeak, protecting Israelis from terror has become "apartheid."

It is necessary to expose the big lie at the center of the apartheid campaign. Beyond exposing the absurdity of the charges against Israel, it is time to put Arab and Islamic racism – as shown in Sudan and elsewhere – at the center of the international agenda. In political warfare just as on the military battlefield, the best defense is a good offense.

I have created an "Apartheid" category (link on the left) which can be used to view all apartheid related posts on Almost Supernatural. There are not many yet, but I want to try and build up a large collection. So please, whenever you come across a decent apartheid related article on Israel...send it my way.

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[Anti-UN]

From Salim Mansur---(London Free Press-Canada)
http://www.canoe.ca/NewsStand/Columnists/London/Salim_Mansur/2004/08/18/588133.html

The one constant in the history of Arab states over the past five decades is the abuse of people by power-holders in a part of the world where regimes rule without popular legitimacy. It is understandable, though inexcusable, that there are no demonstrations anywhere in the wider Arab-Muslim world denouncing the Khartoum regime for its crimes in Darfur.

Arabs and Muslims now live in growing numbers in cosmopolitan centers of the West, and enjoy freedoms denied their people elsewhere. Here they came out in unprecedented numbers, protesting American-led wars to liberate Afghans and Iraqis from despots, but in their unconscionable silence over Darfur, they disclose how selective is their outrage.

Blacks are viewed by Arabs as racially inferior, and Arab violence against blacks has a long, turbulent record. The Arabic word for blacks ('abed) is a derivative of the word slave ('abd), and the role of Arabs in the history of slavery is a subject rarely discussed publicly. Here, the contrast between the Arab treatment of blacks and the Israeli assimilation of black Jews of Ethiopia cannot go unnoticed.