In an article by Rolene Marks of “Lay of the Land” she writes: “Foreign Minister Yair Lapid warns that Israel will face intense pressure in 2022 over accusations that it is an “apartheid state.”
The expletive “apartheid” directed at Israel is a political ploy used as a hatchet job to denigrate the country despite its impressive achievements and performance as a moral, caring society that holds life dear. It is easily demonstrated that millions of lives throughout the world have been saved and positively affected by Israel’s ethical predominance, technological achievements in many fields, including medical, health, water management and IT, and that the country shows an open willingness to share its knowledge and achievements with the world.
Like all societies and countries, Israel is not perfect and makes mistakes. It is these errors of judgment and the decisions on which they are based that are turned against Israel, and only Israel. Gleefully her enemies seek them out, often embellish them with invention, and use them to berate her in international forums. Allegations are not made on the basis of the facts. Instead the facts are distorted to suit preconceived accusations.
These critics can be found in organisations such as the various bodies that make up the United Nations, especially the UN Human Rights Council and the skewed representation of Israel’s enemies in the General Assembly. Weighed in the balance of humanity and performance, Israel is far from being found wanting and is streets ahead of her accusers.
Those ostensibly supporting Palestinians, devalue their cause by quoting from propaganda and not from independent sources. One such independent source is Freedom House, which evaluates countries throughout the world and apportions a percentage score dependent on each country’s human rights performance. Israel scores 79% despite facing constant terrorism and ranks above every country in the Middle East and North Africa, with Syria scoring a low of minus-one and Jordan a high of 37%. Israel’s record is better than South Africa’s 78% and just behind the USA at 86%.
Out of this international campaign against Israel, have come disparate bodies from both the extreme left and right such as BDS and neo-Nazi groups that operate on the fringes of normal society. Their mutual target is the State of Israel, and their coin is distortion, exaggeration and outright lies.
To the above can be added a truly hostile mainstream and mainly left-leaning Press, TV and radio where the concept of fairness and balance in reporting has been discarded. Also, in academia an assortment of vocal, but by no means a majority, of professors and other academics have turned against Israel jettisoning balance, critical thought and context in their support for the Palestinian cause.
Organisations such as BDS and Palestinian Solidarity Committee have trampled over facts in their rush to condemn Israel and to destroy it. They unblushingly employ distortion, lies and invention to delegitimise the Jewish state reawakening the ancient blood libels and dusting off the discredited fraud, the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. They do not hesitate to disrupt meetings and cultural events to promote their ends.
Added to this motley assortment of critics, must be international political leaders, mainly dictators, all of whom wage or have waged an unrelenting campaign against Israel.
There is an ongoing, distorted depiction of the non-existence of Israel in schools and among the young from an early age. This denial serves only to raise conviction among Israelis that the Palestinians and what they say are not to be trusted, and serves only to prepare a growing Palestinian population for hatred of Jews, ongoing terrorism, and unrelenting war. To compound this perception are the Hamas and PA charters that call for, inter-alia, death to Jews and the destruction of Israel. Iran calls for Israel to be wiped off the map.
It is extremely difficult for rational people who value personal freedom to understand the motivations of those who live comfortably in the West and yet embrace monstrous dictators, ideologies, and policies that leave only death and destruction in their wake. They seem to turn against the concept of fairness and equality to embrace the toxic beliefs and contorted thought processes that would allow them to destroy the very freedoms they and their families enjoy. They turn to support totalitarian ideologies such as Marxism, Nazism, and now, radical Islam.
Equally notable and deplorable is the double standard applied by some media who avoid any use of the term ‘racism’ regarding bigoted invective and attacks leveled by Arabs against Israel and Jews. I do not know of a single case in which any of these critics directly labeled Palestinians or Arabs racists notwithstanding the many documented examples of anti-Semitic media broadcasts and bigoted political and religious statements from Arab sources.
Why is it the Western Media all but ignores anti-Jewish bigotry while volubly, publicly, and without cause, denounces Israelis as bigots?
There is a growing antipathy for the Israeli people. Wherever Jews turn they are met by rent-a-mobs of ignorant, hullabalooing know-alls, howling their anthems of hatred. Chief among this crowd are the most redundant, evil, conceited, and dim-witted politicians around levelling accusations of Israel being an apartheid state.
