via The Guardian: I have long rejected claims that Israel is an apartheid state. Now I believe that is where it is heading
By Benjamin Pogrund
Israel 2023, South Africa 1948. I’ve lived through it before: power grabbing, fascism and racism – the destruction of democracy. Israel is going where South Africa was 75 years ago. It’s like watching the replay of a horror movie.
In 1948, as a teenager in Cape Town, I followed the results of the 26 May election on a giant board on a newspaper building. The winner-takes-all electoral system produced distorted results: the Afrikaner Nationalist party, with its smaller partner, won 79 parliamentary seats against 74 for the United party and its smaller partner.
But the Nats, as they were called, in fact won only 37.7% of the vote against the opposition’s 49.2%. Although the opposition received more votes, the Nats said they had a majority and could do what they wanted.
In the Israel of 2023, I’m reliving some of these same experiences. Our proportional election system can distort results as well: last November, Likud, with its smaller partners, won 64 seats against 56 for the opposition. In fact, the rightwing bloc won by only 0.6% of the vote. The 0.6% government says it represents the will of the majority and can do whatever it wants. South Africa enjoyed democracy – that is, among the whites who made up 20% of the population. Black people had no right to vote; only some so-called Coloureds and Asian South Africans could vote. Those who were not white suffered heavy racial discrimination in every part of their lives.
In Israel, Arabs, who form about 21% of the population, can vote. But they suffer discrimination: Muslims and Christians are not drafted, and those who do not do army service lose out on benefits. The Jewish National Fund owns about 13% of Israel’s land and bars non-Jews – that is, Arabs – from owning or renting it. The coalition promises to deepen the discrimination. It has already threatened to withdraw millions of shekels meant for upgrading poor Arab living conditions.
In South Africa, the Nationalist victory meant apartheid, which intensified and institutionalised the existing discrimination against people of colour.
In 2001, I joined Israel’s government delegation to the world conference against racism in Durban. The government of Ariel Sharon invited me because of my expertise after a quarter-century as a journalist in South Africa; my specialty was reporting on apartheid close up.
At the conference, I was disturbed and angered by the multitude of lies and exaggerations about Israel. During the years since, I have argued with all my might against the accusation that Israel is an apartheid state – in lectures, newspaper articles, on TV and in a book.
However, the accusation is becoming fact. First, the nation-state law elevates Jews above fellow citizens who are Arab – Muslim, Druze, Bedouin and Christian. Every day sees government ministers and their allies venting racism and following up with discriminatory actions. There is no mercy even for the Druze, who, like Jews, have been conscripted into the military since 1956.
Second, Israel can no longer claim security as the reason for our behaviour in the West Bank and the siege of Gaza. After 56 years, our occupation can no longer be explained as temporary, pending a solution to the conflict with Palestinians. We are heading toward annexation, with calls to double the population of Jewish settlers in the West Bank, which currently stands at around 500,000.
The army is fully complicit in the illegal seizure of land and the creation of settlement outposts. The government misuses many millions of shekels for settlers. It abuses its own laws. Settlers kill Palestinians and destroy houses and cars. The courts seldom intervene. Soldiers stand by and watch.
We deny Palestinians any hope of freedom or normal lives. We believe our own propaganda that a few million people will meekly accept perpetual inferiority and oppression. The government is driving Israel deeper and deeper into inhuman, cruel behaviour beyond any defence. I don’t have to be religious to know that this is a shameful betrayal of Jewish morality and history.