Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.3 alpha 4/15/85; site ubvax.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!bonnie!akgua!gatech!seismo!lll-crg!lll-lcc!vecpyr!amd!amdcad!cae780!ubvax!tonyw From: tonyw@ubvax.UUCP (Tony Wuersch) Newsgroups: net.politics,net.religion.jewish,net.nlang.africa Subject: Re: Apartheid on the West Bank Message-ID: <365@ubvax.UUCP> Date: Fri, 22-Nov-85 15:10:45 EST Article-I.D.: ubvax.365 Posted: Fri Nov 22 15:10:45 1985 Date-Received: Mon, 25-Nov-85 07:55:38 EST References: <4188@topaz.RUTGERS.EDU> <360@ubvax.UUCP> <1448@ihlpg.UUCP> Reply-To: tonyw@ubvax.UUCP (Tony Wuersch) Organization: Ungermann-Bass, Inc., Santa Clara, Ca. Lines: 105 Xref: watmath net.politics:12147 net.religion.jewish:2739 net.nlang.africa:148 Before replying to Bill Tanenbaum's reply, I realized reading it that I didn't lay out my own point of view well. I believe the proper solution to the West Bank is either for Israel to give it over to a Palestinian state demilitarized by treaty and UN observers (this I don't expect to occur), or for Israel to annex the territory. Practically, to me this means annexation, since the first alternative seems politically impossible to achieve, in my judgment. My main general point is that Israel is a Jewish state whose policy has a goal of maintaining Jewishness (among other goals). A plain result of this is that Arabs are second-class citizens, not in law, perhaps, but in fact. Sometimes in law too -- I remember a case where Bedouins were evicted from Gaza by the Knesset passing a law stripping the Bedouins from access to the courts for legal relief. Now it could be that Arabs would be a minority in Israel like any other minority in, say, the US. But the US is not set up by its history so that occupation of, say, the Presidency, by a Black, say, would amount to a violation of the goals of the Founding Fathers or anything. Israel is set up that way; only Jews, for all intents and purposes, may occupy important positions. The question to me, then, is if Israel cares more about remaining Jewish than about building a liberal ethnic state where groups treat each other as equals all deserving respect. Today I see these loony KKK-like groups like Kach, or mystical groups like the Gush Emunim who let the Israeli Army do their dirty work as they look to the Torahs for prophetic vindications of plain military abuse, under a Likud which nourishs groups and sentiments who really want apartheid in Israel. Likud rhetoric is meant to fuel resentment of Sephardics against Ashkenazim; a politics of resentment can easily degenerate into plain ethnic domination. Has anyone heard about "AshkenNAZI" graffiti? Likud wants to show its constituency that it has power, so it uses that power against the institutionalized second class, Arabs, and then says it's all in support of "Jews" (read: Likud supporters). There's just so much muck there now, and the West Bank is hostage to it, a testbed for the right wing. In article <1448@ihlpg.UUCP> tan@ihlpg.UUCP (Bill Tanenbaum) writes: >> 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. >----- >More baloney. It IS policy in Israel to encourage Jews to emigrate >to Israel, but it is NOT policy to encourage Arabs to leave. As >a matter of fact, the Arab population of Israel has been growing >rapidly due to a very high birth rate. Not baloney. Other nations do this all the time -- fixing their immigration laws to favor some groups and restrict others. Israel has a policy of restricting non-Jewish immigration just as it has a policy to encourage Jewish immigration. The two fit together. They have demographic goals. They do not involve encouraging Arabs to leave. >----- >> 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. >----- >I don't understand what you mean. Are you saying that you WANT >Israel to formally annex the West Bank and Gaza and thereby give >all Arabs the vote? >----- Yes. Again I must apologize for not being clear before. >> 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. >----- >At last you say something that makes sense. If Israel annexes the >West Bank, it will have to make a devastating choice between >democracy and remaining a Jewish state. Either way, it's a disaster >for Israel. That's why Peres wants to make the West Bank Arabs >Jordanians again. Not a bad solution, if only he can pull it off. >The Arabs of the West Bank and Gaza return to Arab rule, Jordan >wins, Israel wins. If only Likud sees the light, and if only the >Arab world lets King Hussein do it. Two very big ifs, I'm afraid. > >-- >Bill Tanenbaum - AT&T Bell Labs - Naperville IL ihnp4!ihlpg!tan It may be that Bill and I agree on most of these things, though I wouldn't ever want to say that for him.