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From: tonyw@ubvax.UUCP (Tony Wuersch)
Newsgroups: net.politics,net.religion.jewish,net.nlang.africa
Subject: Apartheid on the West Bank
Message-ID: <360@ubvax.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 14-Nov-85 16:29:43 EST
Article-I.D.: ubvax.360
Posted: Thu Nov 14 16:29:43 1985
Date-Received: Mon, 18-Nov-85 07:38:58 EST
References: <4188@topaz.RUTGERS.EDU>
Reply-To: tonyw@ubvax.UUCP (Tony Wuersch)
Organization: Ungermann-Bass, Inc., Santa Clara, Ca.
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Xref: watmath net.politics:12023 net.religion.jewish:2694 net.nlang.africa:138

In article <4188@topaz.RUTGERS.EDU> version B 2.10.3 alpha 4/15/85; site ubvax.UUCP version B 2.10.3 4.3bsd-beta 6/6/85; site topaz.RUTGERS.EDU ubvax!cae780!amdcad!amd!pesnta!greipa!decwrl!pyramid!pyrnj!topaz!steinber steinber@topaz.RUTGERS.EDU (Louis Steinberg) writes:
>No, Arabs who live in Israel proper ARE INDEED CITIZENS, with civil
>rights, the right to vote, etc.  The Knesset (Israeli parliament) has
>a number of Arab members.  Arab citizens of Israel have more freedom
>than WHITE South Africans (e.g. of speech and of the press).
>
>**** side note for those who care about fighting apartheid:  notice the
>danger TO THE ANTI-APARTHEID FIGHT of the Zionism-is-racism lie.  To
>link Israel and South Africa is to radically minimize the oppression and 
>suffering of the Blacks, and waters down the term "apartheid" from a specific
>and real evil into meaning, essentially, "something I don't like".
>
>		Lou Steinberg

I'm sure the side note is intended to further the pursuit of truth.

The link between Israel and South Africa has no relationship whatever
to zionism-is-racism trash.  My recall is that that debate concerned the
Law of Return which lets any Jew to emigrate to Israel (a moot point
today, since more people leave than arrive right now), claiming that
a law which favored Jews over other peoples in immigration constituted
racism.  Many countries have those kinds of laws and escape criticism,
so the special laying on of attack on Israel there was unfair.

The issue in South Africa is NOT the oppression and suffering of blacks.
It is the system of rule which makes them suffer that's under attack.

That system has a number of cornerstones:  denial of citizenship,
institutionalized work rules restricting access to occupations,
forced resettlement of populations, an extensive internal passport
system, and denial of access to courts.

Much of the system is justified by bringing up the issue of
appropriate homelands, via a "homelands" policy that defines what
groups can live in what areas.  The potential for a policy of expulsion
of unfavored populations should keep them more moderate in their dissent.

This system doesn't depend on freedom of the press, although the state
varies freedom of the press and assembly without constitutional
restriction for its own defensive ends.

If we look at this system as a general type applicable to other
societies and situations than South Africa, an area at this time
of history which fits it like a glove is the West Bank.  The only
difference is that some Arabs have Israeli citizenship, whereas
no Blacks have South African citizenship.

But the policy in Israel to keep the number of voting Jews much higher
than the number of voting non-Jews is in part so that the Arabs voting
in Israel can have no democratic influence on the policy in the West Bank.

If in South Africa, some blacks were allowed to vote as black
"representatives", say (which is what Israeli Arabs must be now --
representatives for all the Arabs under Israeli government), such
that they could never vote with more power than whites, this would
deserve a judgment of irrelevance as far as the system of apartheid
was concerned, since it couldn't abolish or reform it.  The whites
would just form an anti-black bloc and vote any reform down.

The same logic applies to Arabs voting in Israel.  That some of them
can vote is irrelevant to West Bank policy.  Why else do so many of
them vote Communist?   (to be pedantic, they must think their vote
for Labor would have no value at all)

Israelis see these issues plainly.  Leon Wieseltier
in a recent New Republic article talks about settlers on the West Bank
who DO understand that if the West Bank is Eretz Israel, then the
Arabs on the West Bank will have to become voting citizens of Israel.
These settlers see a time in the future when expulsion of the Arab
population might come up as a platform.  Meir Kahane's gutter rhetoric
might be new to them, but his policy ideas aren't.

Tony Wuersch
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