All froth and foam – latest Board of Deputies statement
JVL Introduction
The Board of Deputies urges those who read the article below to “Tell the world: share this article…”
We are only too happy to oblige.
In an evidence-free statement, it calls the Amnesty International Report “completely biased”, calling Israel an apartheid society “a preposterous slur”, and says it is “demonising the one Jewish state, holding it to clear double standards”.
You wonder if anyone even read the report before writing this statement.
In response let us cite Gideon Levy’s queries, posted on our website here:
- What, precisely, is incorrect in the apartheid report?
- Was Israel not founded on an explicit policy of maintaining Jewish demographic hegemony, while reducing the number of Palestinians within its boundaries? Yes or no? True or false?
- Does this policy not exist to this day? Yes or no? True or false?
- Does Israel not maintain a regime of oppression and control of Palestinians in Israel and in the occupied territories for the benefit of Israeli Jews? Yes or no? True or false?
- Do the rules of engagement with Palestinians not reflect a policy of shoot to kill, or at least maim? Yes or no? True or false?
- Are the evictions of Palestinians from their homes and the denial of construction permits not part of Israeli policy? Yes or no? True or false?
- Is Sheikh Jarrah not apartheid? Is the nation-state law not apartheid? And the denial of family reunification? And the unrecognized villages? And the “Judaization”? Is there a single sphere, in Israel or the territories, in which there is true, absolute equality, except in name?
The Board answers none of these questions or others you might like to pose. You wonder if it even understands them.
You can read the Amnesty press release and the report here.
This article was originally published by Board of Deputies of British Jews webpage on Mon 31 Jan 2022. Read the original here.
Jewish community condemns biased Amnesty “apartheid” slur against Israel
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This predictable, weak and unsubstantiated criticism cites “The lack of democracy in the West Bank and Gaza, as well as the conflict between the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank and the terrorist Hamas control in Gaza”. Whose fault is that? Since when has Israel allowed democratic elections in Palestine? How can they divide the West Bank from Gaza and then complain they are divided? And how can an occupied people even hold democratic elections?
The BoD bemoans the lack of democracy for Palestinians and claims to support a return to negotiations. One might ask what such negotiations would be about with the Israeli govt having explicitly rejected both one and two state solutions. I dread to think what feeble concessions “improving standards” might mean to them.
Nevertheless there must be a return to negotiations and for that there must be Palestinian democracy. This, I believe, should be the next focus for Palestinians and their supporters. We should be campaigning for a freely elected Palestinian Parliament to represent the interests and desires of the people.
Not that I think there is much chance of success in the near term. Israel and its supporters would prefer to negotiate with the utterly compromised PA, apparently supported by less than 20% of Palestinians, and an elected Prime Minister would be a legitimate spokesperson in the international arena, anathema to Israel and the BoD.
However demanding Palestinian democracy would force Israel and its supporters into a difficult choice: support it and risk the emergence of a legitimate voice both internally and externally or reject it and expose their hypocrisy on democracy and any real solution.
I wonder how the BoD would respond to Chris McGreal’s (the Guardian’s former Jerusalem and Jo’burg correspondent) article in Saturday’s Guardian.
In it he points out that not only does the UN, Amnesty, B’Tselem and other organisations agree that Israel practices apartheid, so do several prominent Israelis.
Former PMs Ehud Olmert and Ehud Barak have come to the same conclusion. McGreal goes on to list many other senior figures who also agree, including: a former Attorney General of Israel, a former ambassador to South Africa and even the former head of Shin Bet.
Are these very senior figures who have given years of loyal service to Israel, including putting their own lives on the line, antisemites too?
Such an allegation is patently ludicrous and should be called out as such.
As expected from the BoD. Many of us have been saying this for years and at last some of the human rights groups are saying the same.
The Amnesty Report which condemns the Apartheid nature of the State of Israel is a valuable and welcome endorsement of criticisms of the State by other respected Human Rights Organisations
It is sad, but predictable, that the BOD chooses once again the position itself on the wrong side of history – with the oppressor and against the oppressed.
I’ve lost count of the number of Jewish representatives over the past few years (usually in relation to the IHRA definition etc) who have said that legitimate criticism of Israel is entirely acceptable……
In the Jewish State the African Hebrew Community has been stripped of their rights to citizenship and are in the process of being removed
What say you
BOD
The article from BoD contains a clear contradiction:
“Israel is a vibrant democracy and a state for all its citizens…”
But near the end it talks of Israel as:
“…the one Jewish state”
How can it be both of these?
Re my previous post, it would be interesting to ask them all what THEY think legitimate criticisms of Israel ARE.
Israel is a world leader in targeted assassination. Mossad uses hit squads with false passports as in the attempt by Netanjahu to kill Khaled Mishal with fentanyl in Jordan in 1997.