The Last Fig Leaf Hiding the Nakedness of Israeli Democracy Has Been Stripped Away

The very idea of a Jewish state is a violation of the rights of its non-Jewish citizens

One of the few things that Zionists use to uphold the pretence that Israel is a democracy is the fact that the Arabs/Palestinians can vote in elections for the Knesset.  Now even this is no longer true.

it all began with this book published in 1896

 And it is true.  At the May 2015 elections the Joint Arab List which included the Communist Party (Khadash) and Balad the secular Arab Nationalist Party gained 13 seats making it the 3^rd largest party in Israel’s Knesset.

There is just one problem.  In Israel’s nearly 70 years of existence no Arab party has ever been part of the Israeli government.  The only Arabs to become Ministers are seen as collaborators in their own communities.  It is an unwritten rule in Israeli politics that no government must rely on the votes of the Arab parties.  It was this that most incensed the Zionists when Yitzhak Rabin relied on Israeli Arab votes, who were not of course coalition partners, to defeat the right-wing parties led by Netanyahu.  This more than anything else was the cause of his assassination.

Now however even the fig leaf is being stripped away.  Hot on the heels of the Expulsion Bill passed last year which allows 90 MKs to expel another MK, something already being used to try and expel Basel Ghattas, a Balad MK, who apparently committed the heinous offence of passing mobile phones to Palestinian prisoners serving 30+ years in Israeli prisons.  No Jewish MK, however racist ever stands a chance of being disciplined.  All 3 Balad MKs last year were suspended by the Zionist Jewish majority for visiting the relatives of Palestinians who had been killed after attacking Israelis.  A particular target has  been Haneen Zoabi, a secular woman Palestinian Israeli MK who went on the Mava Marmari ship which tried to break the blockade of Gaza.  She has been subject to a tirade of hate and vitriol.  [See Haneen Zoabi: 'Israel is the only country not shocked by or afraid of Trump']

In an ethnocracy, which Israel is, where people vote according to whether they are Jewish or Arab, the power to expel the representatives from the minority can only be symptomatic of a dictatorship for that minority.  Israel doesn’t have class parties of  both Arabs and Jews.  The Labour Party is a racist part for Zionists.  Indeed it was the original party of Zionist racism.

Israel already has the attributes of a police state as far as Arabs are concerned – censorship, overt discrimination in every area of life, segregation in schools, towns –[the Access to Communities Bill overturned the decision of the Supreme Court in Kadan that it was forbidden to discriminate in land allocation policies and that the Israeli Land Authority and the Jewish National Fund could not refuse to sell land to Arabs].  Arabs are regularly arrested and gaoled under incitement to hatred laws.  Jews never are.  We even had the spectacle of Palestinian poet Dareen Tatour being jailed for putting poetry on social media talking about resistance to Israeli racism. Dareen Tatour, Palestinian poet imprisoned by Israel for social media posts, shares her story

despite the headline Gopstein was not arrested whereas Sheikh Raeed Salah of the Northern Islamic Leagues has been gaoled for 10 months for defending the Mosque of Al Aqsa and the Golden Dome

However the fascist Lehava organisation whose leader Benzi Gopstein justified setting fire to churches and mosques is at liberty.  There is no attempt to arrest or gaol him because he used a religious justification for setting fire to non-Jewish religious institutions and that is an exemption in Israel’s anti-racist laws.  Burning of Christian churches in Israel justified, far-Right Jewish leader says

I have also included a very interesting article by Joseph Levine on questioning the Jewish State.  It is published in the New York Times of all papers.

I agree with it almost in its entirety.  Perhaps the only lacuna is that  Levine doesn’t mention that there is no Israeli nationality, just a Jewish nationality and a myriad of other, quite nonsensical nationalities in Israel.  In other words there is only one important nationality, that of the dominant ethnic group or race – those who are Jewish.

But his main thesis, that a Jewish state in which nationality and self-determination pertains only to one ethnicity in a state is bound to be racist is correct.  Britain is a Christian state but it is a state of all its peoples.  Christianity is a constitutional adornment, it has no effect on my rights as a Jewish citizen of Britain.  But in Israel being Jewish means real privileges – access to land, the best schools, grants to universities, better employment, political privileges etc.  That is why a Jewish state must be an apartheid state.

Tony Greenstein

Knesset Votes to Ban Palestinian Parties, Destroy Israeli Democracy

March 16, 2017 By Richard Silverstein 13 Comments

MK Basel Ghattas speaking in the Knesset, a body from which he may soon be expelled by his Jewish rightist colleagues  (Hadas Parush/Flash90)

Yesterday, the Israeli Knesset voted to ban Israeli Palestinian political parties from participating in future elections.  It accomplished this evisceration of Israeli democracy in the dead of night with only 29 members voting in favor (20 brave souls voted against, the rest were apparently asleep at the switch).  The means used was quite ingenious: the Basic Law was amended to read that no MK could sit in Knesset unless he or she affirmed that Israel was both a “Jewish and democratic state.”  Jewish MKs have no trouble affirming both of these claims.  But Palestinian MKs believe that Israel is not democratic and that it shouldn’t be Jewish (alone).

The amendment passed also notes that MKs may be found to have violated it not only by their deeds, but by their public statements.  This means that if a Palestinian MK exercises his right to free speech, he may be expelled from the Knesset.

So with a few strokes of a fountain pen or keyboard, the most extremist of Israeli governments has effectively destroyed Israeli democracy.  No self-respecting Israeli-Palestinian would be willing to affirm that Israel is and should be a Jewish state.  It’s the equivalent of an American Jew affirming the U.S. should be a Christian nation; or an African-American affirming the U.S. should be based on Christian white supremacy.  And without Palestinian representatives, the Knesset will become a Jewish-only body.

In the past, every single Palestinian MK has been subjected to criminal investigation or other form of persecution by the Knesset itself.  So the new law is further evidence of the Israeli Jewish campaign to render Israeli politics Arab-rein.  It is part of a longer term initiative to “disappear” Palestinians both physically and politically from Israel.

One must ask why only 20 MKs voted against this travesty?  Their number included the Joint List and Meretz.  Notably, it excluded virtually every other Jewish MK, including those from the supposedly liberal Labor Party.  Do I hear the “A-word,” anyone?

Coincidentally, today a UN body issued a report finding that Israel had become an apartheid state.  It further urged that the UN reactivate the methods, resolutions and commissions it used to ostracize South Africa, when it too faced international opprobrium for its racist policies.  The new version of the Basic Law further strengthens such findings.

In truth, this is all a bit of political theater, since the Israeli elections commission decisions to expel Party lists or individual MKs must be ratified by the Supreme Court.  This body, which has grown increasingly rightist, has in the past routinely overturned such rulings by the commission.  It’s likely it will continue to do so.  But as settlers are added to the Court it becomes increasingly likely it will eventually rubber stamp the anti-democratic racism of the legislative body.

On Questioning the Jewish State

By Joseph Levine 

NY Times

March 9, 2013 7:30 pm

Joseph Levine

I was raised in a religious Jewish environment, and though we were not strongly Zionist, I always took it to be self-evident that “Israel has a right to exist.” Now anyone who has debated the Israeli-Palestinian conflict will have encountered this phrase often. Defenders of Israeli policies routinely accuse Israel’s critics of denying her right to exist, while the critics (outside of a small group on the left, where I now find myself) bend over backward to insist that, despite their criticisms, of course they affirm it. The general mainstream consensus seems to be that to deny Israel’s right to exist is a clear indication of anti-Semitism (a charge Jews like myself are not immune to), and therefore not an option for people of conscience.

What does it mean for a people to have a state “of their own”?

Over the years I came to question this consensus and to see that the general fealty to it has seriously constrained open debate on the issue, one of vital importance not just to the people directly involved — Israelis and Palestinians — but to the conduct of our own foreign policy and, more important, to the safety of the world at large. My view is that one really ought to question Israel’s right to exist and that doing so does not manifest anti-Semitism. The first step in questioning the principle, however, is to figure out what it means.

One problem with talking about this question calmly and rationally is that the phrase “right to exist” sounds awfully close to “right to life,” so denying Israel its right to exist sounds awfully close to permitting the extermination of its people. In light of the history of Jewish persecution, and the fact that Israel was created immediately after and largely as a consequence of the Holocaust, it isn’t surprising that the phrase “Israel’s right to exist” should have this emotional impact. But as even those who insist on the principle will admit, they aren’t claiming merely the impermissibility of exterminating Israelis. So what is this “right” that many uphold as so basic that to question it reflects anti-Semitism and yet is one that I claim ought to be questioned?

The key to the interpretation is found in the crucial four words that are often tacked on to the phrase “Israel’s right to exist” — namely, “… as a Jewish state.” As I understand it, the principle that Israel has a right to exist as a Jewish state has three parts: first, that Jews, as a collective, constitute a people in the sense that they possess a right to self-determination; second, that a people’s right to self-determination entails the right to erect a state of their own, a state that is their particular people’s state; and finally, that for the Jewish people the geographical area of the former Mandatory Palestine, their ancestral homeland, is the proper place for them to exercise this right to self-determination.

The claim then is that anyone who denies Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state is guilty of anti-Semitism because they are refusing to grant Jews the same rights as other peoples possess. If indeed this were true, if Jews were being singled out in the way many allege, I would agree that it manifests anti-Jewish bias. But the charge that denying Jews a right to a Jewish state amounts to treating the Jewish people differently from other peoples cannot be sustained.

To begin, since the principle has three parts, it follows that it can be challenged in (at least) three different ways: either deny that Jews constitute “a people” in the relevant sense, deny that the right to self-determination really involves what advocates of the principle claim it does, or deny that Jews have the requisite claim on the geographical area in question.

In fact, I think there is a basis to challenge all three, but for present purposes I will focus on the question of whether a people’s right to self-determination entails their right to a state of their own, and set aside whether Jews count as a people and whether Jews have a claim on that particular land. I do so partly for reasons of space, but mainly because these questions have largely (though not completely) lost their importance. 

The fact is that today millions of Jews live in Israel and, ancestral homeland or not, this is their home now. As for whether Jews constitute a people, this is a vexed question given the lack of consensus in general about what it takes for any particular group of people to count as “a people.” The notion of “a people” can be interpreted in different ways, with different consequences for the rights that they possess. My point is that even if we grant Jews their peoplehood and their right to live in that land, there is still no consequent right to a Jewish state.

However, I do think that it’s worth noting the historical irony in insisting that it is anti-Semitic to deny that Jews constitute a people. The 18th and 19th centuries were the period of Jewish “emancipation” in Western Europe, when the ghetto walls were torn down and Jews were granted the full rights of citizenship in the states within which they resided. The anti-Semitic forces in those days, those opposing emancipation, were associated not with denying Jewish peoplehood but with emphatically insisting on it! The idea was that since Jews constituted a nation of their own, they could not be loyal citizens of any European state. The liberals who strongly opposed anti-Semitism insisted that Jews could both practice their religion and uphold their cultural traditions while maintaining full citizenship in the various nation-states in which they resided.

But, as I said, let’s grant that Jews are a people. Well, if they are, and if with the status of a people comes the right to self-determination, why wouldn’t they have a right to live under a Jewish state in their homeland? The simple answer is because many non-Jews (rightfully) live there too. But this needs unpacking.

First, it’s important to note, as mentioned above, that the term “a people” can be used in different ways, and sometimes they get confused. In particular, there is a distinction to be made between a people in the ethnic sense and a people in the civic sense. Though there is no general consensus on this, a group counts as a people in the ethnic sense by virtue of common language, common culture, common history and attachment to a common territory. One can easily see why Jews, scattered across the globe, speaking many different languages and defined largely by religion, present a difficult case. But, as I said above, for my purposes it doesn’t really matter, and I will just assume the Jewish people qualify.

The other sense is the civic one, which applies to a people by virtue of their common citizenship in a nation-state or, alternatively, by virtue of their common residence within relatively defined geographic borders. So whereas there is both an ethnic and a civic sense to be made of the term “French people,” the term “Jewish people” has only an ethnic sense. This can easily be seen by noting that the Jewish people is not the same group as the Israeli people. About 20 percent of Israeli citizens are non-Jewish Palestinians, while the vast majority of the Jewish people are not citizens of Israel and do not live within any particular geographic area. “Israeli people,” on the other hand, has only a civic sense. (Of course often the term “Israelis” is used as if it applies only to Jewish Israelis, but this is part of the problem. More on this below.)

So, when we consider whether or not a people has a right to a state of their own, are we speaking of a people in the ethnic sense or the civic one? I contend that insofar as the principle that all peoples have the right to self-determination entails the right to a state of their own, it can apply to peoples only in the civic sense.

After all, what is it for a people to have a state “of their own”? Here’s a rough characterization: the formal institutions and legal framework of the state serves to express, encourage and favor that people’s identity. The distinctive position of that people would be manifested in a number of ways, from the largely symbolic to the more substantive: for example, it would be reflected in the name of the state, the nature of its flag and other symbols, its national holidays, its education system, its immigration rules, the extent to which membership in the people in question is a factor in official planning, how resources are distributed, etc. If the people being favored in this way are just the state’s citizens, it is not a problem. (Of course those who are supercosmopolitan, denying any legitimacy to the borders of nation-states, will disagree. But they aren’t a party to this debate.)

But if the people who “own” the state in question are an ethnic sub-group of the citizenry, even if the vast majority, it constitutes a serious problem indeed, and this is precisely the situation of Israel as the Jewish state. Far from being a natural expression of the Jewish people’s right to self-determination, it is in fact a violation of the right to self-determination of its non-Jewish (mainly Palestinian) citizens. It is a violation of a people’s right to self-determination to exclude them — whether by virtue of their ethnic membership, or for any other reason — from full political participation in the state under whose sovereignty they fall. Of course Jews have a right to self-determination in this sense as well — this is what emancipation was all about. But so do non-Jewish peoples living in the same state.

Any state that “belongs” to one ethnic group within it violates the core democratic principle of equality, and the self-determination rights of the non-members of that group. 

If the institutions of a state favor one ethnic group among its citizenry in this way, then only the members of that group will feel themselves fully a part of the life of the state. True equality, therefore, is only realizable in a state that is based on civic peoplehood. As formulated by both Jewish- and Palestinian-Israeli activists on this issue, a truly democratic state that fully respects the self-determination rights of everyone under its sovereignty must be a “state of all its citizens.”

This fundamental point exposes the fallacy behind the common analogy, drawn by defenders of Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state, between Israel’s right to be Jewish and France’s right to be French. The appropriate analogy would instead be between France’s right to be French (in the civic sense) and Israel’s right to be Israeli. 

I conclude, then, that the very idea of a Jewish state is undemocratic, a violation of the self-determination rights of its non-Jewish citizens, and therefore morally problematic. But the harm doesn’t stop with the inherently undemocratic character of the state. For if an ethnic national state is established in a territory that contains a significant number of non-members of that ethnic group, it will inevitably face resistance from the land’s other inhabitants. This will force the ethnic nation controlling the state to resort to further undemocratic means to maintain their hegemony. Three strategies to deal with resistance are common: expulsion, occupation and institutional marginalization. Interestingly, all three strategies have been employed by the Zionist movement: expulsion in 1948 (and, to a lesser extent, in 1967), occupation of the territories conquered in 1967 and institution of a complex web of laws that prevent Israel’s Palestinian citizens from mounting an internal challenge to the Jewish character of the state. (The recent outrage in Israel over a proposed exclusion of ultra-Orthodox parties from the governing coalition, for example, failed to note that no Arab political party has ever been invited to join the government.) In other words, the wrong of ethnic hegemony within the state leads to the further wrong of repression against the Other within its midst.

There is an unavoidable conflict between being a Jewish state and a democratic state. I want to emphasize that there’s nothing anti-Semitic in pointing this out, and it’s time the question was discussed openly on its merits, without the charge of anti-Semitism hovering in the background.

Joseph Levine is a professor of philosophy at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, where he teaches and writes on philosophy of mind, metaphysics and political philosophy. He is the author of “Purple Haze: The Puzzle of Consciousness.”  

Israeli Labour Party Supports Netanyahu's Attempt to Expel an Arab MK, Basel Ghattas

 

Basel Ghattas is the latest Arab member of the Knesset to come under attack from the Jewish majority 

It is one of the boasts of Israel that it is the ‘only democracy in the Middle East’.  Arabs can vote goes the narrative, therefore we are a democracy.

Of course the idea that a democracy is defined by the ability to put one’s cross on a ballot box once every 3-4 years is a pretty weak argument.  By this logic Hitler's government was democratic.  A state that tortures its citizens, especially if they are part of the minority population, that has a pervasive censorship, which consistently discriminates against one section of its citizens, that embeds racism within the very definition of the state as a State of the Jews, that doesn't even 'recognise' the right of non-Jews to live on their land is only democratic in the most formal of senses. 

Aryhe Deri - leader of Shas, jailed for corruption is now Interior Minister

However even the ability to choose their representatives is becoming irksome to the Zionists.  Balad, a radical nationalist party that wants to see Israel as a state of all its citizens rather than a State of the Jewish People has been under severe attack recently with its premises raided, its activists arrested on bogus charges of money laundering and its representatives under continuing harassment.  [Balad condemns unprecedented Israeli arrests of senior officials]

Israel is a state where corruption is epidemic amongst the Zionist political class.  Prime Minister Netanyahu has received hundreds of thousands of shekels of cigars and champagne from business associates and has been recorded offering favours for favourable coverage from the Yediot Aharanot newspaper.  The Interior Minister, Aryeh Deri of the Shas Party served nearly three years in prison for corruption when last in office.  Netanyahu's predecessor Ehud Olmert is still in prison for corruption yet there has never been a time when the Likud party offices have been raided by the Police.  Likewise, when Labour was in power, corruption was rife.  Ehud Barak managed to become wealthy overnight when Prime Minister.

Balad MKs have been under consistent attack.  Haneen Zoabi, a secular Arab woman who has been on a speaking tour of Britain, has been the subject of unheard of villification by Zionist MKs including physical attacks inside the Knesset building.  She was herself suspended for 6 months for making the unremarkable observation that 3 settler teenagers killed in the West Bank weren't the victims of terrorism.

Racism against the Palestinians is no offence - Bezalel Smotrich MK

On no occasion has any Jewish MK, e.g. its most notorious racist Bezalel Smotrich been expelled or suspended from the Knesset despite for example arguing that Jewish women should be able to give birth in hospital in segregated wards (in fact such wards exist in practice anyway!).  Racism against Palestinians is not a crime.  After all this is a state where it is legitimate to steal and confiscate the land of the indigenous population without any penalty.

In July 2016, Israel passed a bill allowing 90 members of the Knesset to expel another member.  We were told that this Bill would rarely if ever be used.  It was attacked as a naked attempt to expel Palestinian Israeli members of the Knesset who wouldn’t accept working within the Zionist consensus.  Like all racist legislation it doesn't explicitly mention that only Arab MKs will be subject to its provisions.  In theory Smotrich or Uri Ariel or even Netanyahu could be a victim of the Expulsion Bill, but as with so many things in the 'Jewish' state, in practice only Arabs are the victim.

Thousands of Palestinians gathered after the Friday noon prayer in Um al-Hiran to bury Yacoub Abu al-Qiyan, but the police refused to hand over his body to his family [Jonathan Cook/Al Jazeera]

Sure enough Basel Ghattas, a member of Balad, has been stripped of his immunity and now there are proposals to expel him from the Knesset.  The allegations against him, which he denies and of which he hasn’t even been convicted, was passing mobile phones to Palestinian prisoners locked up for up to 37 years for killing an Israeli soldier.   Even were he 'guilty' so what?  He however denies he passed anything more than printed materials.

One should note that Zionist killer Elor Azaria, who deliberately shot and murdered an Arab lying severely on the ground, although he has been convicted of manslaughter is unlikely to serve any time in gaol.  Instead he has become an Israeli national hero, with the Prime Minister ringing up his parents to reassure them and members of the Israeli cabinet, such as Miri Regev and Naftali Bennett calling for him to be pardoned.

The killing of Palestinians in Israel by the Police or Army is only a crime in theory.  Last week Yacoub Abu al-Qiyan was murdered in Umm al-Hiran, a village demolished in the Negev in order to make way for a Jewish town, by the Police who opened fire on his car.  There was justice of sorts as he then lost control of the car, which went out of control and killed one of his killers.  For this he was branded, without any evidence whatsoever, by the racist public order Minister, Gilad Erdan, a member of ISIS and until a court order, the Police refused even to hand over the body.

We shouldn’t be surprised at the hypocrisy of Israel which fetes its killers but damns Palestinian killers of Israeli soldiers.  The Israeli Labour Party (Zionist Union plus a few independents) which opposed the original Expulsion Bill is now giving its MKs a green light to support Netanyahu’s attempt to expel Basel Ghattas.

See the article in Ha’aretz below.

Tony Greenstein 

Editorial: Zionist Union’s Shame

By allowing its lawmakers to raise their hands in favor of the law and bring about Basel Ghattas’ ouster, the faction has brought upon itself a shame that will never be forgotten.

Haaretz Editorial Jan 18, 2017 

Zionist Union leaders Tzipi Livni and Isaac Herzog at the Knesset, January 16, 2017. Olivier Fitoussi

 One of the most shameful laws the Knesset has ever enacted is now about to be implemented: For the first time in Israel’s history, there’s a real possibility that a sitting Knesset member will be ousted by a vote of his fellow legislators.

Seventy MKs have already signed on in support of expelling their colleague Basel Ghattas (Joint List) after he was charged with smuggling cell phones to imprisoned terrorists. If Ghattas is ousted, the decision will have been made possible by the votes of members of the Zionist Union faction, which decided on Monday to allow its MKs to vote in favor of his expulsion if they so choose.

The ouster law, which was enacted last summer, states that the Knesset can expel an MK for incitement to racism or support for armed struggle against Israel. Thus, based on the wording of the law itself, it shouldn’t apply to Ghattas: He hasn’t yet been convicted, and it’s doubtful that the charges against him meet the criteria set in the law.

It’s no surprise that the right-wing parties support Ghattas’ expulsion. They enacted the law precisely for this purpose: to eject Arab legislators from the Knesset. Nor should the Yesh Atid party’s support for his ouster surprise anyone: Party chairman Yair Lapid has been paving his political ascent with base incitement against Arabs for a long time now, since this is well known as the most effective weapon for gathering votes in Israel.

When it comes to incitement, Lapid doesn’t fall one whit short of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the greatest of anti-Arab inciters. And Lapid’s party colleagues have long since lost both their shame and their independence; they blindly, automatically obey their leader’s cynical decisions. Some of them know quite well how dangerous the ouster law is, and how contemptible it is to expel a Knesset member who hasn’t yet been convicted in court, but they have fallen silent out of fear of their leader.

Now, Zionist Union is following in Yesh Atid’s footsteps. And even from Zionist Union, such wretched behavior was hard to foresee. Not even chairman Isaac Herzog’s denunciation of the law after it passed as “an ugly stain on the face of this government of hate” deterred him from announcing Monday that he approves of the stain, in the form of Ghattas’ ouster. And a few other MKs from his faction hastened to announce that they, too, would vote for the expulsion.

This ugly stain is now defacing Zionist Union in its entirety. By allowing its MKs to raise their hands in favor of the law and bring about Ghattas’ ouster – which requires the support of 90 of the Knesset’s 120 MKs – the faction has brought upon itself a shame that will never be forgotten. This isn’t the first time the faction has been dragged after the radical right and the populist center; it isn’t the first time it has betrayed its trust as the largest opposition party; and it isn’t the first time we’ve been given proof that Zionist Union under Herzog’s leadership has completely lost its way.

This is Zionism - The Demolition of Umm al-Hiran

Umm al-Hiran on the morning before the bulldozers moved in for a spot of ethnic cleansing

Racism and Zionism are like Siamese Twins

Shami Chakrabarti, who was enlisted by Jeremy Corbyn to write a report on racism and anti-Semitism spouted a load of nonsense about Zionism, the racist ideology and movement that gave birth to the State of Israel.

She talked of ‘some people personally redefining their Zionism in ways that appear to grant less support to the State of Israel and more solidarity to fellow Jewish people the world over.’

It’s like saying that some people redefined their fascism to be less racist.  She then went on to say that ‘My advice to critics of the Israeli State and/or Government is to use the term "Zionist" advisedly, carefully and never euphemistically or as part of personal abuse.’  This was in response to the attempt of the Zionists and the Jewish Labour Movement to outlaw the use of the term ‘Zionist’ as being a term of abuse.  My response is simply that Zionism is abusive so of course it will be perceived by some as being perjorative.

Joint Arab-Jewish demonstration in Tel-Aviv

But what has happened this week at the Bedouin village of Umm al-Hiran is a classic example of Zionism in action.  As Moshe Dayan once said:

‘During the last 100 years our people have been in a process of building up the country and the nation, of expansion, of getting additional Jews and additional settlements in order to expand the borders here. Let no Jew say that the process has ended. Let no Jew say that we are near the end of the road

Women weep outside the demolished home of Yaqub Musa Abu al-Qian, who was shot dead by police. The Israeli authorities claim that Qian deliberately ran over a police officer with his car, killing him, while eyewitnesses say that police opened fire on the car before it sped up — a version that appears to be supported by police aerial footage of the  incident. Umm el-Hiran, January 18, 2017. (Faiz Abu Rmeleh/Activestills)

Umm al-Hiran, with the JNF bulldozers, was a classic example of Zionism, which has always meant the dispossession of the indigenous Arab to make way for the Jewish settler.  Those, like the Jewish Labour Movement who pretend that Zionism is some kind of national liberation movement are no different from those who held that Nazism was the genuine national expression of the German people.

Umm el-Hiran before and after Israeli bulldozers carried out demolitions, January 18, 2017. (Keren Manor/Activestills)

There isn’t a single occasion when there has been a conflict between the testimony of the Israeli Police and their victims that the former have been proven, when video evidence has emerged, to be telling the truth.  It was no different in Umm al-Hiran yesterday.

lying police tweet

Add caption

The Police alleged that the attack on the leader of the Arab opposition in the Knesset, Ayman Odeh, was a stray stone that was thrown.  It is obvious to anyone that his injuries weren’t caused  by a solitary stone.  What is also evident is that if he had been the leader of a Jewish/Zionist party then he would not have been injured.

Police began violently dispersing those present, using shock grenades, pepper spray and sponge-tipped bullets. Among those injured by the latter was Joint List head Ayman Odeh, who was allegedly struck in the head and back. Police assert that Odeh was struck with a stone thrown by protesters, but eyewitnesses dispute this claim. Umm el-Hiran, January 18, 2017. (Keren Manor/Activestills)

Aymen Odeh lying on the floor

But on the basis of Police lies Aymen is already being attacked as a terrorist supporter in the Knesset.  Already one of the Joint List MKs, Basel Ghattas of Balad is set to be expelled from the Knesset after the passage 3 months ago of an Expulsion Bill.  Although of course its text was neutral it was obvious that its intended target were the Arab MKs.  Disgracefully the Israeli Labour Party is supporting or not opposing it.  Whereas the vilest of Jewish racists in the Knesset like Bezalel Smotrich of Jewish Home remain untouched.

police guard car

Yesterday a Palestinian was shot dead in his car.  By good fortune the car then went out of control and killed one of his murderers, an Israeli policeman.  Immediately the Police echoed by Netanyahu and also the President Reuben Rivlin, took up the theme that the Arab was a member of ISIS.  Not a shred of evidence was produced or will be produced.  This is another racist meme which basically says that opposition to the demolition of an Arab village to make way for a Jewish town is the work of ‘terrorists’.  If you oppose the demolition of your home and demonstrate against it then you will be classified as a ‘terrorist.’

What is also disgraceful is the silence of British politicians who are quick to condemn the death of Israeli military.  Last week the killing of 4 Israeli soldiers in Jerusalem by a lorry was condemned in the Western media and by western politicians but the demolition of an Arab village and the attack on the leader of the Arab opposition merits no comment.

Below is a quite detailed video of the murder of the Palestinian which leaves no doubt that the Israeli Police were lying.  There is also a story about a radio host who expressed sympathy with the dead Bedouin driver being sacked.  Being sympathetic to an Arab in Israel today is a risky business.

Hundreds of Israeli police officers arrived in Umm el-Hiran at around 5.30am, running towards the mosque where residents and activists had gathered, ahead of planned demolitions in the unrecognized village. Shortly after a few rounds of live fire were heard, followed by a burst of shots and shouts that people had been killed. (Keren Manor/Activestills)

Palestinian MK injured ahead of home demolitions: 'The police are liars'

Although all evidence points to wounds from sponge-tipped bullets, police claim Joint List head Ayman Odeh was hit by stones thrown by Bedouin protesters in Umm el-Hiran. If the police are proven wrong, it means they shot the leader of the third-largest party in Israel in the face without any justification. 

UPDATE: This post was updated with a photo of Ayman Odeh’s back showing his injury to be consistent with that of a wound from a sponge-tipped bullet, and that he is filing a complaint with the Department of Internal Police Investigations.

MK Ayman Odeh holding the sponge bullet he says was shot at him by Israeli forces in Umm el-Hiran. (Photo: Joint List)

Where Aymen Odeh had been shot - that was clearly no stone

The debate continues to rage over the killing of an Israeli police officer and a Bedouin man in Umm el-Hiran on Wednesday, when Israeli forces turned up to begin demolishing the Bedouin village in order for it to be replaced with a Jewish town. Police and much of the media have the incident down as a car-ramming attack, while residents and eyewitnesses say that police opened fire at the car before it sped up and hit officers — a version that appears to be supported by police aerial footage. But another contested event, involving the injuring of Joint List head and Knesset member Ayman Odeh, flew largely under the radar.

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Police claim that Odeh was hit by rocks thrown by the Bedouin residents he was with, and police spokesperson Micky Rosenfeld insisted to +972 that Odeh’s injuries were caused by stones. Yet Odeh and the people who were beside him all say he was shot by black sponge-tipped bullets. A report in the Ma’ariv newspaper on Thursday morning cited police as saying that Odeh’s injuries could not have been caused by these projectiles as they aren’t in possession of such weapons. But police use of black-sponged tipped bullets against Palestinian youth is widely documented — particularly in East Jerusalem, where they have resulted in at least one death. On the other hand, the injuries Odeh suffered were relatively minor, which is unusual for this kind of bullet, but it also depends on the exact distance and angle it was shot from, which is unclear.

MK Ayman Odeh with blood dripping down his face from what he claims is a sponge-tipped bullet wound and police claim is a stone. (Photo: Joint List)

There were no firsthand reports of any rocks being thrown when Odeh was allegedly attacked by police, and none of the injuries at the scene were reported as having been caused by stones. You can hear bullets being fired in the video shot by Activestills that was broadcast all over the Israeli media. There are photos of Odeh holding the bullet that he says hit him and plenty more of the bullets lying around at the scene. All the people I spoke with who were there deny that any stones were thrown at the time that Odeh was apparently shot. The only mention of stones at all in Israeli media reports are from the police account about Odeh specifically.

“There were no rocks. None. Zero. The police are liars,” Odeh told +972, adding that the police first sprayed his face with pepper spray and after that fired at him, hitting his head and his back. “Who sprayed me? Was that the protesters too?” Odeh said. “The security forces are hostile towards Arabs, that is what they are programmed to do. They are liars.”

The Soroka Medical Center report of his treatment does not determine what caused the injury and only states that the patient, Odeh, claims it was caused by bullets. This is standard, as hospital policies are to not get involved in the cause of injury. According to a few doctors I consulted there is no way, medically-speaking, for the physicians who treated Odeh to definitively differentiate between a wound from a stone and a wound from a bullet. The only way to start to uncover the cause of injury is to do a forensics exam. So for now, it’s the police’s word against that of Odeh and at least half a dozen witnesses.

UPDATE, Thursday, 8:30PM: Ayman Odeh underwent a forensic exam today, as part of a complaint he is filing with the Department of Internal Police Investigations, accusing the police of aggravated assault and unlawful use of weapon. The findings of the exam are still not out, however Odeh provided +972 with this photo of the wound on his back, whose round shape and bruising is consistent with wounds from sponge-tipped bullets. The complaint is being filed by attorneys with Adalah and the Public Committee Against Torture.

Joint List MK Ayman Odeh’s back, showing round bruising that is consistent with an injury caused by a sponge-tipped bullet. (Joint List)

I don’t find the police version credible, to say the least, but I cannot disprove it at this time. However, the recent allegations by police, government and media of an “arson intifada” by Arab citizens following the fires in Haifa, despite there being no evidence or a single charge made, are a good reflection of their disingenuous conduct.

Either way, this is an incident of critical importance. If, as suspected, Odeh was in fact shot in the face and back by police, it means the head of Israel’s third-largest party was shot by his own police force for absolutely no reason. One of the videos from the scene shows Odeh talking with police and explaining that he is a Knesset member and is of course not armed.

When is the last time (if ever) that a Knesset member was shot by security forces? In 2006, rightwing Knesset members Effie Eitam and Aryeh Eldad were wounded by border police officers during the evacuation of Amona. But having a gun pointed at you is substantially different, and while Odeh is fighting for the rights of Palestinian citizens of Israel, Eitam and Eldad were fighting for the rights of illegal settlers in occupied territory.

The police shoot Palestinian youth in East Jerusalem with the same potentially-lethal black sponge-tipped bullets — and in the West Bank with rubber bullets — on a regular basis with impunity, but what could possibly be their excuse for shooting a public servant who posed no threat? They have to stick to the stone story, otherwise they’d have a lot more explaining to do.

With the driver, the police can at least claim there was the threat of a ramming attack. But with Odeh I don’t believe they have any excuse. Which is why the Israeli authorities and media are pushing hard the line that Odeh and other members of the Joint List are inciting the Arab public. They are victimizing and vilifying him.

Odeh told +972 that negotiations between the Bedouin residents of Umm el-Hiran and authorities to settle their relocation had reached a breakthrough Tuesday night and they were close to reaching an agreement, when things suddenly changed at midnight, and a decision was clearly made by someone in the government to scrap the agreement and instead go in full force to demolish the village. According to Odeh, “It was possible to prevent the spilling of blood…Prime Minister Netanyahu is responsible for the blood spilled.”

MKs Dov Henin and Issawi Freij: "The deeper the corruption investigation of Netanyahu – the wider his inflammatory incitement the Arab citizens of Israel”

Knesset Member Dov Khenin of Hadash charged Prime Minister Netanyahu with deliberately inciting against the country’s Arab citizens and setting the police to brutal raids – with the deliberate intention of distracting attention from the ongoing police investigation into charges of corruption against the PM. “The deeper the police investigation of Netanyahu, the wider the flames of his incitement”.

Khenin was speaking at a protest rally held on King George Street in Tel Aviv, in the aftermath of  widespread police violence, bloodshed and demolition of homes at the Bedouin village of Um al-Hiran in the Negev. Khenin noted that there was a visible direct relation between the intensification of the PM’s investigation on charges of corruption and the intensification of home demolitions and police violence against Arab residents in such places as Qalansawa and Umm al-Hiran.

MK Issawi Freij of Meretz spoke in a similar vein and said, 

"Today there was a completely unwarranted police offensive against the residents of Umm al-Hiran. Two people paid with their lives, a civilian and a police officer. Two people paid with their lives, two families became bereaved, two sets of children were orphaned. Two people were killed needlessly, with no justification and no reason for their deaths. It happened only and solely because the Prime Minister wants to distract attention from the steady supply of expensive cigars and champagne which he allegedly got from an American billionaire. The Prime Minister wants to mark out an enemy on whom his voters can vent their anger. This enemy which the PM has targeted and marked out is me -  an Arab citizen of the State of Israel and a Member of Israel’s Parliament, along with all my Arab fellow citizens, a full twenty percent of Israel’s citizen body. We are to be the scapegoats! I declare it loud and clear: we who stand here and at other protests around the country, Jews and Arabs united in voicing our protest, will not let Netanyahu succeed in this filthy design!”

The hundreds of demonstrators, who listened to the speeches on King George Street in downtown Tel Aviv, responded by chanting: "Netanyahu is dangerous – both corrupt and a racist!" and “Jews and Arabs refuse to be enemies!”

Other demonstrations took place at Jaffa’s Clock Square, in front of the Prime Minister’s residence  in Jerusalem, in Haifa, at intersections near Acre, Shfaram, Umm al-Fahm and Klaonsooh – as well as by Jewish and Arab students at the universities of Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, Haifa and Beersheba.  

"The direct responsibility for today’s  dangerous escalation and bloodshed at the village of Um al-Hiran in the Negev rests upon those who took the decision to destroy a Bedouin village which had existed for decades, completely raze and wipe it off the face of the earth, to expel the residents and establish a Jewish ‘community’  in its place. In recent days, government officials arrived at the village, bluntly threatened its residents, and demanded that they move immediately to the town of Hura where there is no residence available to them. Those who initiated and implemented such brutal measures  against Bedouin villagers (who happen to be citizens of Israel) are directly responsible for the terrible events that took place today in the village" say the organizers of the demonstrations, peace and civil rights groups  such as the Negev Coexistence and Civil Equality Forum, Coaltion of Women for Peace and the Recognition Forum (i.e., recognition  of the so-called “unrecognized villages” of which Um al-Hiran is one.

Protesters call for a comprehensive and impartial investigation of the circumstances which led to the death of a of Umm al-Hiran resident Yacoub Musa Abu Alkian and police officer Erez Levy. They call upon the communications  media not to repeat uncritical the highly tendentious and inflammatory accounts disseminated by police and government speakers - which are contrary to the eyewitness testimonies of Jews and Arabs present on the scene.

The terrible bloodshed was the culmination of a day of violence which  began in the morning when massive demolition crews arrived at the village, accompanied by large forces of the Yoav unit of the police (created specifically for such anti-Bedouin actions). They had specifically declared intention of  expelling  the residents and demolishing  their homes, in order to make place for construction of the purely Jewish “community” of Hiran. The police used live ammunition and well as rubber bullets and  tear gas. Villagers - men, women and children – were injured in the police shooting, as were many of the Jewish and Arab supporters who came to offer solidarity with them.

Biased and tendentious media reports, couched in inciting and inflammatory tones – refusing  to recognize that   the residents were protesting the destruction of their village and homes, and labeling them as “terrorists " - are a direct continuation of the police violence on the ground.