Israel/Palestine post 10/7 - follow-on events/thoughts as relate to other countries

You said hierarchy, which implies races, plural.

You're saying it's Israeli laws singling out Arab citizens of Israel and constructing their identity in terms of race?

I'm genuinely asking because apartheid has a lot of shock value.

Friend wrote this piece for the Nation. Well worth reading.

Why is it not enough for culture workers to condemn the war in high-profile venues? Measuring public opinion alone, the movement against the war on Gaza is highly popular, but deeply disempowered. A 70 percent supermajority of the US supports a cease-fire, including a majority of both Republican and Democratic voters. But the US government still foots the multibillion-dollar bill for Israel’s war crimes—which include the intentional targeting of civilian infrastructure, launching airstrikes at schools, invading Al-Shifa Hospital under the false claim that it hosted a military base, and repeatedly bombing the Al-Jabalia refugee camp. A small, though growing, minority of democratically elected representatives at the federal level—the actual decision-makers whose votes secure or prohibit military aid to Israel—have publicly called for a permanent cease-fire. In other words, while people who oppose war and genocide need to hold the line, we don’t actually need to win the battle for public opinion against the war—that is already decisively on our side. Instead, we need to understand the power structure that makes a small number of decision makers decide to facilitate the war in Gaza and that insulates them from the consequences of their actions. And then we need to use that knowledge to cause a greater crisis for them than the one they fear from our opponents.

Do people think Jewish is a race when they say this?

I'd say race is a more modern construct than judaism, which has very deep roots in the much older identity of tribalism. According to modern racial categories, the diaspora has tended to deracinate judaism, but the fact of jewish identity being maintained for a couple millennia, always as a minority within other nations, cultures and ethnicities, has led to a dynamic that duplicates racial dynamics fairly closely.

"You said hierarchy, which implies races, plural."

When two groups are constructed such that one is racialised and the other not, that is a hierarchy.

I'm not sure how you think that the term apartheid has shock value in this context, could you unpack that?

Those Israelis who don't want Jews to live beside Arabs, or don't want Jews to have relationships with Arabs, or don't want Arabs to have the same rights as Jews, I wonder what they consider the Palestinians to be.

What I am trying to get at is that "one is racialised and the other is not" - is that written in Israeli law somewhere? I hadn't read that. Who is doing this racializing?

Regarding shock value, Apartheid seems to define the Israel/Palestine conflict in terms of skin color - for want of a better word. That has shocking connotations in the US for several reasons. It seems to go along with "racist project" and other charged terms.

I said earlier I think a comparison is valid. I wasn't sure if you were saying it literally is "apartheid."

This convo has me wondering about the origin of matrilineal descent in Judaism, and I found this wiki, which was surprising in the extent of its detail and I’m glad I read it!

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Who_is_a_Jew

Also I was interested in possible US/UK differences.

In the US I don't think I hear Jewishness expressed as a race except maybe by white supremacists. It has bad connotations for me because of Hitler. In the US I believe Jewishness is considered more like national origin, religion, or ethnic protected groups. It struck me as weird reading people from the UK expressing discrimination against Jewish people as a form of racism. Maybe I get more used to it the more I read ILX.

fgti, that's a very nice link.

I feel like it fits in with an article addressing the fracture on the far left with left or liberal Jewish people due to misunderstandings over terminology and symbols.

Yeah that makes sense. I think racism can be defined as “prejudice against an ethnic group” without necessarily defining the ethnic group as a race

fgti, that's a very nice link.

Isn’t it? I was blown away by the amount of info there. Interesting to read that matrilineal descent has its roots in scripture, too.

Apartheid seems to define the Israel/Palestine conflict in terms of skin color

I haven't seen this. What I have seen are (for example) accounts from people visiting Israel who were asked by IDF soldiers what their religion was, because the answer to that question determined whether or not they were allowed to walk down a particular street. Thus it seems to me that when people use the term "apartheid state" to describe Israel, they are using it to mean "government which grants one group (Jews) more legal rights than another group (Arabs)". And that there are equivalencies in the way Palestinians are required to pass through military checkpoints to get from one place to another, and the areas in which they live can be sealed off at any time, the same way black citizens had to present papers to go places in apartheid South Africa and their townships could be closed off or raided by the military at any time. It's an apartheid system both in terms of one group being legally superior to another, and in the concrete details of how the oppression of the legally inferior group is conducted.

In the US I don't think I hear Jewishness expressed as a race except maybe by white supremacists. It has bad connotations for me because of Hitler. In the US I believe Jewishness is considered more like national origin, religion, or ethnic protected groups. It struck me as weird reading people from the UK expressing discrimination against Jewish people as a form of racism. Maybe I get more used to it the more I read ILX.

Corbyn was constantly called a racist by people attacking him for being antisemitic. I lost count of the number of times I heard rightwing public figures saying "Why is antisemitism the only acceptable form of racism?" Mostly Jewish rightwingers or right wing Jewish publications btw. It took me two seconds to google this...

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/05/17/going-london-shows-anti-semitism-still-acceptable-form-racism/

Apartheid seems to define the Israel/Palestine conflict in terms of skin color

No it doesn't.

(xp) ... that's from two years ago btw!

I haven't seen this. What I have seen are (for example) accounts from people visiting Israel who were asked by IDF soldiers what their religion was, because the answer to that question determined whether or not they were allowed to walk down a particular street.

― Tahuti Watches L&O:SVU Reruns Without His Ape (unperson), Saturday, December 16, 2023 1:18 PM (five minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

Are you sure this wasn't in the West Bank? I am not aware of any "Jewish only" streets in Israel proper. There is not de jure segregation within the '48 borders. There is discrimination, but there is not systematic segregation. Also I think even in the West Bank, whether you can drive on certain roads is, at least legally, defined by whether you have Israeli citizenship rather than ethnicity/religion.

The nazis constructed a racial hierarchy that marked jewish people as a racialised other. They developed eugenic typologies that encompassed physical, intellectual and moral characteristics and designated them a 'subrace' as part of their campaign of genocide. It didn't matter whether or not jewish people constitute a race as this did not impede the development of this way of constructing them as such.

Within the context of international law, the court that responded to the Rwandan genocide stated in its rulings that "conventional definition of racial group is based on the hereditary physical traits often identified with a geographical region, irrespective of linguistic, cultural, national or religious factors". (Race as a category is largely undefined in HR conventions). I'm not sure that I've ever encountered any sustained attempt to understand race/racism that defines it simplistically as 'skin colour'.

To be clear, the understanding of Israel as an Apartheid state is not mine but one supported by many, including Israeli civil society organisations (B'Tselem), international humanitarian organisations (Amnesty international), and various agencies of the UN. A key document is the ESCWA report "Israeli Practices towards the Palestinian People and the Question of Apartheid" https://aardi.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/ESCWA-2017-Richard-Falk-Apartheid.pdf

there's several xposts that should be in there so it doesn't make that much sense in the context of the conversation that developed while i was typing it.

Thus it seems to me that when people use the term "apartheid state" to describe Israel, they are using it to mean "government which grants one group (Jews) more legal rights than another group (Arabs)".

People say things like "gender apartheid." In the latter case I didn't think it carried the strong implication of racism. Maybe I am wrong.

I believe you when you say there are Jewish rightwingers in the UK who introduced conflations of race into certain UK discussions. I wonder if that was that always the case, if it's more recent. Horrific event that article is reporting on, btw.

xp to Tom

Are you sure this wasn't in the West Bank? I am not aware of any "Jewish only" streets in Israel proper.

I am not sure. I could be misremembering.

i want to just say I think these are good healthy discussions to have (about race, ethnicity, etc) and I'm glad they are happening here on ILX so I can read them, rather than on some godawful place like twitter. It underscores why ethnic studies is an important discipline and also makes clear why the right wing would like to eliminate it.

I'm not sure that I've ever encountered any sustained attempt to understand race/racism that defines it simplistically as 'skin colour'.

You introduced the term

Apartheid is institutionalised racial hierarchical segregation.

I certainly hope you're not going to try to shame me for your introduction of the term Apartheid or trying to guess what you mean by "racial"

Excuse me?

For what? You have done nothing to be excused for.

I believe you when you say there are Jewish rightwingers in the UK who introduced conflations of race into certain UK discussions. I wonder if that was that always the case, if it's more recent. Horrific event that article is reporting on, btw.

It's true that the prospect of an actual socialist being elected Prime Minister focused their minds somewhat.

I realize it gets complicated, but understanding the legal regime in Israel/Palestine requires understanding of the different geographic areas, the history, and the definition of who is Jewish. There are a bunch of different overlapping concepts. Among non-Jewish Arabs, the main distinction is whether someone is descended from the people who were not forced out or did not leave in '48 or those who were forced out or left. Those Arabs who remained were given full citizenship in Israel and they and their descendants make up about 20% of the population. They include Arab Muslims, Bedouins, Druze, and Christians. Some of them prefer to call themselves Palestinians, others less so. They may face discrimination, mostly de facto but some de jure, but there is not a national regime of formal segregation. They can vote, serve in government, attend universities, etc. Housing discrimination and employment discrimination exist and there is less of a legal regime to address them than in the US. On the other hand, they are exempt from mandatory military service.

Palestinians in the West Bank (which has been under military occupation since 1967) face something closer to Apartheid. Gaza has not been militarily occupied since Israel pulled out its troops and the 8000 or so Jewish residents in the mid 2000s, however Israel blockaded Gaza after Hamas (which is openly hostile to Israel) won elections, so (along with Egypt) it has had considerable control over the flow of goods and people over the borders.

I can understand why activists might prefer the shorthand of "Israel's regime is apartheid" for communications purposes. But if the entire area had the same legal regime as within the '48 borders, I don't think you would be able to call it apartheid.

I did not introduce the term apartheid to the discussion of Israel and the situation in the oPt, this has a long history. I did not introduce it to this thread, you mentioned it twice before I did and I responded to you. You do not have to guess what I mean by racial because that is not relevant, what is important is what is meant by racial in the context of international law which defines the crime of apartheid. It is true that this is not straightforward (despite its invokation in key human rights law for decades, it is not until the Rwandan genocide that the concept was clarified by a court, as I mentioned above). The ESCWA report I linked above "sets out to demonstrate how Israel has imposed such a system on the Palestinians in order to maintain the domination of one racial group over others." (my emphasis)

mqny xps racism has never been about strictly defined "races" (despite its own insistence) and racial categories have never been stable or coherent - Jewish people definitely have been and are racialised in various ways in various times and places - the existence of the term antisemitism (pseudoscientific/linguisitic euphemism for Jew-hatred based on the notion of an inherently foreign/devious "semitic race") is testament to that even though racialisation (and race) has changed shape a lot since then

A clear articulation of the position is made in "Occupation, Colonialism, Apartheid" a legal analysis commissioned by the South African Human Sciences research council (quoted in many subsequent UN documents).

"[...] this study finds that Jewish and Palestinian identities function as racial identities in the sense provided by ICERD, the Apartheid Convention, and the jurisprudence of the International Criminal Tribunals for Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia. Israel’s status as a ‘Jewish State’ is inscribed in its Basic Law and it has developed legal and institutional mechanisms by which the State seeks to ensure its enduring Jewish character. These laws and institutions are channelled into the OPT to convey privileges to Jewish settlers and disadvantage Palestinians on the basis of their respective group identities. This domination is associated principally with transferring control over land in the OPT to exclusively Jewish use, thus also altering the demographic status of the territory. This discriminatory treatment cannot be explained or excused on grounds of citizenship, both because it goes beyond what is permitted by ICERD and because certain provisions in Israeli civil and military law provide that Jews present in the OPT who are not citizens of Israel also enjoy privileges conferred on Jewish-Israeli citizens in the OPT by virtue of being Jews. Consequently, this study finds that the State of Israel exercises control in the OPT with the purpose of maintaining a system of domination by Jews over Palestinians and that this system constitutes a breach of the prohibition of apartheid."

https://www.palestineportal.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/Occupation-Colonialism-Apartheid_Exec-Summary.pdf

To be clear the designation of Israel as an apartheid state is not an activist comms strategy but a position with strong roots in analysis of international human rights law.

if many people who lived through apartheid are happy calling the situation for Palestinians apartheid I don't see the need to quibble too much about how similar or different it is in which places for which Palestinians

I did not introduce the term apartheid to the discussion of Israel and the situation in the oPt

You are right. The term has been here for a while. And anvil was asking other people about it before. I don't want to punish you for answering. Your definition caught my eye because of the inclusion "racial."

I think it's worth interrogating in a serious way. Just so you understand, there are various statutes in the US that refer to color or pigmentation in efforts to describe protected classes. My use of one dimension is imperfect, not an effort to simplify. I realize it doesn't map perfectly to other parts of the world, just as I think there are things about South Africa or Rwanda that don't map perfectly to Israel or the occupied lands.

I do think it is fair to ask what you mean when you introduce a particular definition. Just as you asked me challenging questions back. Referring to an external report is fine, if that describes your understanding. The UN says and does (or doesn't do) a lot of things I don't agree with. It's ok to disagree.

if many people who lived through apartheid are happy calling the situation for Palestinians apartheid I don't see the need to quibble too much about how similar or different it is in which places for which Palestinians

― Left, Saturday, December 16, 2023 11:21 AM bookmarkflaglink

By that logic, if some people who lived through apartheid are not happy with that, then we should find more precise language. I didn't live under Apartheid. I don't consider it my call to make.

if those people are around I haven't heard from them

I'm not sure what this is actually about though - the problem with reality is none of our concepts totally fit so the arguments about which concepts are appropriate to apply to which situations can go on forever and at a certain point seem to leave the supposed topic of discussion behind completely in favour of signalling group identity by using or not using certain words - this seems unhelpful but I don't have a solution to it

I assume citing the UN was more in the spirit of "it's not an extreme position- even the closest thing to a global liberal mainstream consensus claims that..." rather than the UN being any sort of final authority on anything (I hope)

I've heard liberal Zionists describe the situation as apartheid many times so I didn't think it was this controversial among people who object to the treatment of Palestinians

I learned a lot, and appreciated the discussions.

I appreciated the empathy that some ILXors expressed for our different connections to the situation in 10/7 as well.

Others, I have been around ILX a long time, and I appreciate them too.

are you leaving? that would be a shame but do whatever you need to do

But to the original question -- the document ico links, or at least the quote posted here, is careful to make clear that it concerns the occupied territories (OPT), which is where the checkpoints, illegal land grabs, etc., are taking place. I don't think anybody is saying that the situation of Arab Israelis, who face racism but who live, work, and vote alongside Jewish Israelis, is morally comparable to the situation of black South Africans under apartheid!

I've heard liberal Zionists describe the situation as apartheid many times so I didn't think it was this controversial among people who object to the treatment of Palestinians

― Left, Saturday, December 16, 2023 12:17 PM bookmarkflaglink

They have. I've also heard the "Z-word" used countless times in a negative way in connection Israel and "racist project."

It's tricky because if people want to describe themselves as "liberal Zionists" I don't want to stop those people from self-determining the system they think is most just. Whether it involves a state or all, and where.

Terminology can be used to obscure and exclude, as well as explain and include.

You can object to Israel's treatment of Palestinian people and also want to know exactly what form the mistreatment makes. That seems essential for stopping or reversing the mistreatment.

are you leaving? that would be a shame but do whatever you need to do

― Left, Saturday, December 16, 2023 12:19 PM bookmarkflaglink

Am I? lol no, I meant I can get a lot out of debating people even if I think they are being mischievous or whatever

It seems to me the problem isn't that Israel is applying apartheid or apartheid-like conditions in two territories it occupies, its that its occupying two territories. This still seems more like Russia than SA

Unless its also doing differential systems within Israel itself, but these two things seem to be getting conflated and I think it muddies things

*I get that since mid 2000s only WB is occupied and Gaza technically only blockaded not occupied, but thats functionally kind of an occupation still

lol no

sorry I misread your post! that's good

the situation in Israel is "like" a lot of other things in many ways (Ireland, Cyprus, Kashmir, Algeria) while being very much its own unique thing and ymmv which of these comparisons (if any) is most helpful or relevant for illuminating the situation

part of me feels that arguing over these descriptions and comparisons is missing the point somewhat and part of me feels like there is something important at stake but idk what exactly

I think what's at stake for me personally is to find ways for left leaning or liberal Jewish people to reconcile with aspects of the left wing from which they have become alienated. Some of that has to do with language, and ideas and why they can be hurtful, and what could be done better.

I agree about the sloppy and bigoted ways people use the Z word and I try to use it only to specifically describe the movement that calls itself that - dividing people prima facie into "Zionist" and "anti-Zionist" camps is a big mistake the left has been making on this issue and shuts down a lot of potential dialogue (it goes both ways and some will be beyond dialogue but there are so many people who aren't necessarily "anti-zionist" who hate what's happening and shutting them out of left spaces for not passing a test doesn't always leave them with many other options)

But to the original question -- the document ico links, or at least the quote posted here, is careful to make clear that it concerns the occupied territories (OPT), which is where the checkpoints, illegal land grabs, etc., are taking place. I don't think anybody is saying that the situation of Arab Israelis, who face racism but who live, work, and vote alongside Jewish Israelis, is morally comparable to the situation of black South Africans under apartheid!

― Guayaquil (eephus!), Saturday, 16 December 2023 20:29 (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

This is true of one of the documents I linked but the ECSWA report (the more consequential one) considers the unequal legal status of Arabs in Israel as a core aspect of its designation of Israel as an apartheid state:

"Effectively interchangeable under international law, the terms “citizenship” (ezrahut) as “nationality” (/e’um) have distinct meanings in Israel, where citizenship rights and national rights are not the same thing. Any citizen enjoys the former, but only Jews enjoy the latter, as only Jewish nationality is recognized under Israeli law. These and other laws comprise a regime of systematic racial discrimination that imposes second-class citizenship on Palestinian citizens of Israel.®® The broad impact is confirmed even by Israeli data, which detail, for instance, inferior funding for Palestinian schools, businesses, agriculture and health care, as well as limits on access to jobs and freedom of residence. Thus, domain 1 sustains the myth that one portion of the Palestinian people enjoys the full benefits of democracy, while at the same strengthening the apartheid
regime that serves to preserve Israel as a Jewish State. Israel uses the trappings of token universal democracy to lead many observers astray and deflect international opprobrium. The success of this approach depends on limiting Palestinian citizens to a politically ineffectual minority. However, it is impossible to fully appreciate this outcome without examining Israeli policies and practices in the other three domains. Indeed, the success of domain 1[apartheid enacted through civil law in Israel] depends on the workings of the other three. " [Apartheid enacted against Palestinians in the ot, East Jerusalem and Palestinian refugees]

The apartheid label, along with the genocide label, will prompt semantic arguments that never end well. From a political standpoint, pro Palestinian activists are using the term apartheid to connect Israel to South Africa. This emphasizes the settler colonialism narrative, which was exceptionally clear cut in South Africa, but is more complicated in terms of Israel. It also makes a stronger argument for the BDS campaign, which is routinely compared to the historical campaign in South Africa.

The apartheid label is used in part because the Israeli state claims it's not an occupying force (despite the Red Cross, UN, EU, etc. pretty much every important body describing the Gaza situation pre-October as a de facto occupation). If Israel wants to play semantic games, other parties might as well do so.

If it makes uncomfortable those who are still looking for the defensible aspects of Israel's actions and occupation, so much the better.

The apartheid label, along with the genocide label, will prompt semantic arguments that never end well.

I think it only prompts arguments that end badly if people are entrenched and unpersuadable, and I think while it seems that on most issues (and especially this one) that this is the case, I don't think thats actually true - and there are also probably more "I'm not sure"s on this than most issues too.

I think its more than just semantics, I think having a clear message on what the issue is helps. Right now I feel there's a conflation of "Israel is conceptually bad and it shouldn't exist" and "Israel is doing something bad and should stop doing it".

And while the former isn't as clear cut as with SA, and I think probably doesnt have much consensus behind it, the latter surely is much more clear cut? Israel should stop occupying territories, just as Russia should stop occupying territories.

I also think there's a deeper thing here, unrelated to Israel, which is that we tend to act as though people are more fixed and rigid in their positions than they actually are - when what is more likely is louder people tend to be more rigid, creating the impression that everyone else also is