Israel is holding its fifth election in three years and there’s a growing fear among American supporters of the country that Benjamin Netanyahu will get back into the highest office with the help of the openly racist Jewish Power party. Jewish Power is surging in the polls because its leader Itamar Ben Gvir runs around waving guns at Palestinians and calling for expelling “disloyal” Palestinians.
As Democratic politicians Bob Menendez and Brad Sherman have warned, Having an unapologetic hater in the Israeli government would make it a lot harder to sell Israel in the United States. There are even calls to boycott the clothes designer Zara because the owner of its Israeli franchise hosted Ben Gvir.
It is easy to pin the blame on Itamar Ben Gvir, though, for a society that has lost all ability to deal with its Palestinian subjects except by military force and persecution. This week the U.N. special rapporteur for Palestine said that Israel is practicing “persecution” and “apartheid,” and called for “dismantling” the occupation.
And the Israeli prime minister Yair Lapid– who is beloved by the Biden administration and liberal Zionists because he is Not Netanyahu– condemned the report as antisemitic. It doesn’t matter who is prime minister, they are all for persecution. Lapid has embraced the same racist policy in the occupied territories as every other government– “maximum Jews on maximum land with maximum security and minimum Palestinians,” Lapid put it. And he’s the good guy!
As we have documented tirelessly, the occupation depends on brutal force. Israel has killed 175 Palestinians so far this year. and Operation “Break the Wave” is killing children up and down the West Bank.
And the real power behind that brutal force is the United States. Our tear gas canisters. Our military aid. Our political support in international forums.
That is the ultimate scandal, of course. The Ethnic cleansing is “made in the U.S.A.,” as a young Palestinian wrote for us this week.
Our political class is incapable of making Israeli ethnic cleansing an urgent issue. But They are all more concerned about Iranian drones going to Russia in the occupation of Ukraine. And they can’t stop praising the normalization deals between Israel and Arab monarchies, started under Trump, and hailed by Biden, as if that’s an answer to apartheid in Israel and Palestine.
Israel supporters will always change the subject from the crimes before our eyes. Like the man said– “Maximum Jews on maximum land with maximum security and minimum Palestinians.”
Have a good week! Best, Phil |