[edanm]

1. That's just one interview, I'm not sure it's actually representative.

2. Even if you think it is, that's just the US media specifically. I agree that they tend to be relatively pro-Israel, especially compared to other countries, but there are other countries.

3. If we accept that this is representative, can we also consider Ta-Nehisi Coates's book itself to be representative of the attitude of "intellectuals" in the US on Israel? As he himself said, he came into the topic biased against Israel, went to the West Bank to "study" the issue for 10 days only, chose not to talk to any Israeli at all to get any other side of the issue, and wrote what is likely to be the highest-selling book this year about the topic.

Not exactly a great example of journalistic rigor, IMO.

[nielsbot]

Sorry—I was focusing on bias in US media. (I live in the US)

> As he himself said, he came into the topic biased against Israel, went to the West Bank to "study" the issue for 10 days only, chose not to talk to any Israeli at all to get any other side of the issue

What is the other side of the issue? He and actually experts who study Israel call it apartheid. Is it not? If it is, is there a justification for implementing it? Or maybe I’m missing your point.

[edanm]

Some experts call it apartheid, most Israelis disagree (and Israel officially disagrees). [1]

> If it is, is there a justification for implementing it? Or maybe I’m missing your point.

Well, yes. That's exactly the other side of the issue, and is exactly what a real journalist talking about the Israel/Palestine situation should ideally explore.

This is an HN comment, not exactly the place for the history of the relations between the West Bank and Israel, but the short version is - most of the measures taking place in the WB are a direct result of terror attacks committed by the Palestinians, as a means of securing Israel from future attacks. You can see that relations were much better 40 years ago, it's not like Israel set out to have some kind of apartheid regime over the WB - people from Israel used to go far more freely into the WB, Palestinians used to work far more freely in Israel.

But as more and more attacks happened, Israel implemented various measures to stop terror - including the infamous checkpoints, including various border walls, including limiting work permits for Palestinians.

Looking at a snapshot of the WB now is looking at the end result of worsening relations over many years, with many of the things that seem "cruel" being direct measures to prevent terror attacks; and to prevent things like October 7th happening on a far larger scale, as would happen if it happened from the WB.

Most Israelis believe, probably correctly, that without these security measures, tens of thousands of Israelis would be killed. That would cause almost any country to do whatever it can to secure its "border".

[1] I personally don't care much for battles over semantics; if people agree on what is actually happening in the WB, then whether to call it apartheid or not seems irrelevant to me. There are lots of differences from the situation in South Africa, and lots of similarities.

I think it's worth keeping in mind that Palestinians are not Israeli citizens, and ostensibly the leadership of the Palestinians, which has a limited government role over the WB, is aiming to become a separate state; those circumstances make it seem, to me, that wondering why Palestinians don't have the same rights as Israelis is a category error, like wondering why Mexicans don't have the same rights as Americans.

Then again, it's also worth keeping in mind that whatever the goals of the Palestinians, in some respects Israel does, in fact, have control over the people of the WB, so in practice there are real problems here.

[runarberg]

Finding justifications for apartheid will only be an exercise in racism.

Apartheid is a crime against humanity, illegal under international law, and countries have an obligation to prevent apartheid policies from persisting.

Israel’s policies in the West Bank has been ruled to be an apartheid by the ICJ, and Israel has been ordered (non-binding though) to stop apartheid practices, reverse the damage and pay reparations.

[vladgur]

The accusation of apartheid against Israel makes no sense because of what Apartheid means -- institutionalized racism against country's own citizens.

If non-jewish citizens of Israel(that as you know DOES NOT include West Bank or Gaza) had different rights than jewish citizens, than you could argue Apartheid.

Again we are talking about Israel proper, not Westbank(controlled by Fatah) or Gaza(formerly controlled by Hamas).

Please tell me which rights do non-jewish citizens of Israel lack institutionally within Israel that Jewish citizens have?

[aguaviva]

Please tell us about the JNF, and what happens when non-Jewish citizens attempt to purchase or lease land from it.

After that, please tell us what happens when a non-Jewish citizen seeks to marry and obtain citizenship and residency rights for their spouse, and how this differs when a Jewish citizen makes the same application.

After that you can tell us about the Nation State Law, and the not-so symbolic language it contains.

And after that you can tell us about the 14,000 Palestinians annexed into Israel after the latter's illegal annexation of East Jerusalem, who were then forcibly expelled according to criteria determined by the occupying regime. If there's no apartheid in Israel, why weren't their rights protected?

[runarberg]

Apartheid has a legal definition which does not include provision about citizenship. See the Rome Statute Article 7. Paragraph 2 (h): https://legal.un.org/icc/statute/99_corr/cstatute.htm#art.7

> "The crime of apartheid" means inhumane acts of a character similar to those referred to in paragraph 1, committed in the context of an institutionalized regime of systematic oppression and domination by one racial group over any other racial group or groups and committed with the intention of maintaining that regime;

The word apartheid in popular discourse is not this clearly defined, but I’ve personally never heard this provision. After all, the prototypical case of Apartheid in South Africa insisted that their victims were actually citizens of independent Bantustans and thus not subject to equality under South African laws.

But even so, countries occupying territories have an obligation to protect the people of that territory, subjugating them to apartheid policies under such occupation is at best failure to protect them from apartheid, which is still a crime under international law, and has been ruled as such by the ICJ, which actually goes much further.

> Please tell me which rights do non-jewish citizens of Israel lack institutionally within Israel that Jewish citizens have?

Irrelevant, but I’ll do it anyway: https://www.adalah.org/en/law/index

[cutler]

> Looking at a snapshot of the WB now is looking at the end result of worsening relations over many years

Including the Nakba?