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Israeli Apartheid: A Beginner's Guide

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"Israeli Apartheid: A Beginner's Guide," by the independent British journalist, Ben White, is an excellent introduction to the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, but it also is a useful book for anyone who studies the issue. In less than a hundred and fifty pages, White definitively answers any question about Israel being an apartheid state, concisely summarizes the history, accurately describes the current deplorable situation, and offers some strategies and resources for moving forward. He has managed to cull from dozens of resources the most salient facts necessary to understand the issue, while the book's frequent sidebars provide personal stories of Palestinians, in their own words.

"Israeli Apartheid" begins with a discussion of the definition of apartheid, and how it applies to Israel. Part I provides a concise 30-page history of Israel and how the apartheid situation was created. The writings of Zionist leaders show that the expulsion of Arabs was always a part of the Zionist plan to create a Jewish state in a land where the indigenous people were not Jewish. Part II illustrates the current situation in Israel and in the Occupied Territories; the section about discrimination within Israel is particularly important because the topic is so rarely discussed. The final section provides a look at some organizations that are combating apartheid, such as the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions, and strategies that people and organizations are using to nonviolently oppose Israel's violations of basic human rights.

Ben White abstains from the usual euphemistic language in discussing Israel's actions. What Jimmy Carter termed Israel's "confiscation of land," White calls "land theft." (When I interviewed Mairead Maguire, a recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, she succinctly summarized the cause of the conflict: "They [the Israelis] are stealing the land"). While Carter declared that his use of "apartheid" only applies to the situation in the Occupied Territories, White demonstrates the reality of apartheid within Israel's recognized boundaries, bluntly declaring, "Israel...is a state for some of its citizens: Jews." He then proceeds to support the statement with ample evidence that will certainly shock Americans who are steadily bombarded with the declaration that "Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East."

My own experiences support White's conclusions. During my last visit to Israel and the Occupied Territories, Naim Ateek, an Anglican priest, and a Palestinian citizen of Israel, showed me and other visitors his home town of Beisan, now part of Israel, from which his family was expelled in 1948. Though he was born there, Ateek cannot live in Beisan, because he is not Jewish. A recent Israeli Supreme Court ruling affirmed the right of Israeli communities to decide which people will be allowed into their communities.

Ateek showed us a former Roman Catholic chapel, which is now used for meetings of the local Likud party. I wonder if the party faithful consider it a sort of trophy, like the five-hundred-year-old olive tree, uprooted from Palestinian land, that I saw planted at the entrance to one of the Jewish-only settlements. As White points out, "The open racism faced by Palestinian citizens of Israel is simply a result of the central contradiction inherent in the idea of a `Jewish democratic' state."

Great book.Much insight into the truth of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, which has been systematically hidden from mainstream media.

Ben White's little/big book is reliable and powerful. The Palestinian 's point of view changed my perception of all history. Flowing. Easy to read.

Journalist Ben White has written a very useful introduction to the Israel/Palestine dispute. He first looks at a definition of apartheid under international law and notes some points of comparison with apartheid South Africa.

In Part 1 he explores how the Zionist settlement in Palestine developed, how the Zionist leaders were clear about their intention to expel the indigenous Palestinians (Ben Gurion wrote in 1937, "We must expel Arabs and take their place") and how this was achieved in the Naqba of 1948. He examines the notions of `a land without a people' and looks at the `transfer' (the Zionists' euphemism for ethnic cleansing) - the expulsions of 700,000 Palestinians from their homes, achieved through massacres like Deir Yassin.

Part 2 shows how Israeli apartheid has been maintained for the last 60 years, legally and practically, and what this has meant for the day to day lives of Palestinians. Israel is a state for only some of its citizens: only its Jewish citizens are nationals. By Israel's Basic Law, it is `the state of the Jewish people'.

Its illegal occupation of Palestine entails land theft, colonisation, ethnic separation, discrimination (Chaim Weizmann, Israel's first President, wrote, "There is a fundamental difference in quality between Jew and native"), illegal settlements, separate `bypass roads', checkpoints, the illegal Separation Wall, detention, torture, home demolitions, military brutality, the bantustisation of Palestine, and the killing of children (200 in the first Intifada, 545 in the second). White concludes, "Perhaps the core of Israeli apartheid as it affects the country's Palestinian citizens is the `exclusionary land regime', a reflection of the historic objective of political Zionism: the land of Palestine without the Palestinians."

In Part 3, he looks briefly at Palestinian and international resistance to Israeli apartheid. Finally, he answers some frequently asked questions.

This book is wonderfully concise. It covers all the reasons for the viewpoint discussed (Israel as Apartheid State) without overburdening you with details, but still touching on every major aspect of the Israeli Apartheid argument in depth. Anyone who wants to understand Israel as an apartheid state should read this book first. Though a larger book would typically present both sides, a beginner's books should not. The other side of the argument (Israel as a state defending itself) is not discussed in depth, and I would not expect it to be in a book which serves as a beginner's guide. This book is excellent for being concise and opening your eyes to more directions for exploring this viewpoint, should you desire to delve further. If you want to understand the perspective of Israel as an apartheid state, get this book first! It's fact-filled and intelligent; an absolute page turner.

This comparison betrays an acute ignorance -- both of the meaning of the word "apartheid" and of the nature of the State of Israel.

Apartheid is the state-sanctioned and -generated degradation of one or more ethnic groups, based on an assumption of racial inferiority. Such a system relies for its implementation on segregation, denationalization and the denial of basic rights. How anyone could seriously equate Israel with such a system defies logic.

Israel is a liberal democracy, guaranteeing civil, religious and social equality to all its citizens -- including Jews, Christians, Muslims, Druze and Baha'is. Israel's Arab citizens have the right to vote, and are represented by three Arab political parties in Israel's parliament (the Knesset), representing a gamut of views from communism to Islamic fundamentalism. Several newspapers freely represent the views of Arab citizens in a far freer manner than is permitted among the media of Israel's neighbours.

Apartheid - look at Israel's arab neighbours.

I understand that both sides in the Arab-Israeli conflict have done some deplorable things. But I have never read such a biased piece of journalism. Nothing in history or in politics is as black and white as this book makes the Israeli-Palestinian conflict out to be. For all those out there genuinly concerned about knowledge and about truth I urge you to not stop your education with this book. You would be doing a disservice to yourself.

60 years from WWII and still many unanswered questions remain. How would world look if Hitler's Germany would win? Germany most philosophical nation of 19 century. Of course there was alternative to declare self German, Get membership card of NSDAP, or be undercover-halfling and hope in further racial copulation to get more points. And I would not say about Jewish concept of world, mankind or the rest of the universe that it is entirely clear even to selfchoosen wisemen .For us who are lucky to be out of their occupied Yeshuv territories is only left to ask : What do YOU do ? Who make you to behave that way ? What do you want? "EVERYTHING !" It sounds stupid - but we have to hear- This answer. Take somes beyond the gates and stone them was instruction recieved from Torah and I perhaps misstakenly believe that we make from IT some inteligent distance. As Michael Bar -Zohar hides in biography of Yaccov Herzog -Holocaust at Kafr Qassm was great surprise even to ?US - we did not knew that we are capable to be as THEY, but perpetrators got lengthy prison sentences. Wikipedia says 15 years commuted to 5 years and that rescinded to unspecified anonymous Demlanchuk's handshake after house-arrest . If Palestinians need progressive leadership without exploitable puppets also Izraelies have to find some facts about their Pale origins and how great success it was and how in popularity they scored among indigenous people .While money comes from others pockets.As Marx said : everything relates to other everythings .Perhaps here is economic slump having some justification, and those others should keep financially out of it.Geographically there is no merit in that land for non-indigenous audience .Just think what world would be if we all loved Wagner..?And based our views on Talmud. ET?