Desmond Tutu was wrong about Israel, and so is letter-writer Martin Hird (“Desmond Tutu Was Not Wrong About Israel,” October 2).
Hird wrote: “I don’t believe anyone can argue that if not for the Holocaust the State of Israel would exist today.” A more accurate statement about the Holocaust would be that were it not for the Holocaust, 6 million Jews would not have been slaughtered. Israel is the birthplace of our people, and its rebirth was inevitable.
Hird also needs a history lesson about South Africa. The Afrikaners, the white colonial minority, had a distinctly racist philosophy. They believed that black Africans were inferior, and that precluded mixing of black and white populations.
Apartheid was enforced with a lot more than checkpoints. Police, the military and paramilitary groups used the most heinous methods, with governmental approval, to control the black majority. The South African regime created black “homelands,” black-only ghettos. They used every device, including murder. Tutu should know better than to compare that to Israel.
Unfortunately for the Palestinians, their “leadership” has long been infected with hatred for Jews that began long before Israel became a state. Until that changes, there can be no real peace.
Alexander Diamond
Wiscasset, Maine
Gal Beckerman’s September 25 article “Palestinian-Led Movement To Boycott Israel Is Gaining Support” sent me back five years when “Divestment-Is-on-the-March” stories were appearing in papers as frequently as divestment petitions were cropping up on American college campuses. The Presbyterian Church-USA had just voted to explore “phased selective divestment” in the Jewish state, and it seemed just a matter of time before other churches would join the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) bandwagon.
What a difference five years makes! In 2009, the number of American schools that have divested their endowments in protest of Israeli policies stands at zero. And two years after choosing to explore divestment, the Presbyterians rejected that course by a margin of 95% to 5%, a decision that led the Mainline Protestant community to distance itself from BDS.
That may be why attempts to resurrect BDS in 2009 have seemed so desperate and bizarre. Throughout the years when divestment activists were protesting companies like Africa-Israel, international investors took no notice. But once Africa-Israel’s financial difficulties caused investors to flee, there was the BDS crew claiming that investors like TIAA-CREF had responded to their boycott calls (something the allegedly divesting organization then publicly and vehemently denied).
Earlier this year, a similar hoax took place at Hampshire College, which featured the bizarre spectacle of Hampshire students sending out press releases claiming the college had divested from Israel and the administration sending out competing (accurate) statements saying that Hampshire had done nothing of the kind.
While inflating small victories to help build momentum for a political project is a reasonable practice, building a movement on fraud is not.
Jon Haber
Lexington, Mass.
Nope, Israel is an apartheid state. The settlers have a racist philosophy. They believe that Arabs are inferior. On the West Bank, they preclude mixing of Jews and Palestinian populations in housing or highways. Settler apartheid is enforced with more than checkpoints. As Amnesty International reports, the Shin Bet tortures Palestinians, for example in Moskovaya Prison. "Barak's generous offer" was a Palestinian "homeland" of fragmented Palestinian-only ghettos. The settlers used every device to suppress the Palestinians, including murders, which the Israeli government has never prosecuted.
Unfortunately for the Israelis, their "leadership" has moved steadily towards racism and colonial exploitation. Unfortunately for the Jews, our American "leadership" has fallen under the sickness of Israeli nationalism, and accepted this uncritically.
The leadership that I follow is Hillel, who said, "That which is hateful to you, do not do unto others." The Jews I follow, who observe that commandment, are in B'Tselem, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and now J Street.
I look forward to the day when Israel will follow South Africa and abandon apartheid, and we can say, "Heimat du bist wieder mein!"
How ironic that Norman's anti-Israel diatribe, complete with stereotyping Jewish settlers as racists, ends with a German quote. He could have added, wenn du bist Judenrein. That would have made it a perfect rant.
Israel is an apartheid state. Norman doesn't control the narrative anymore. Different licence plates in Israel? The reason for the violence is because the Pals do not have parity in income and jobs in Israel. I want to see a multi-cultural-racial-religious Israel where all are equal. End the kvethcing and Apartheid now Israel.
I assume Alexander Diamond doesn't know that Theodor Herzl wrote in German. Or maybe he doesn't know who Theodor Herzl is.
Israel has no laws that distinguish on the basis of race, unlike Apartheid South Africa which had a set of laws called "Apartheid". All Israeli citizens have equal rights regardless of race or religion.
However, Israel has been plagued since before 1948 by wars and killings by nations and groups hostile to the presence of a large number of Jews (many of whom were forced from their original homes). Because of the implacable hatred of these people (cf. >70% of Palestinians support suicide bombing, Hamas's charter, Fatah's charter, denial of Israel's right to the Temple Mount and Western Wall), they are an external enemy and Israel cannot allow them to be incorporated into itself. Although Israel has an obligation to respect the individual rights of Palestinians, it has no obligation to respect their political wishes (which is the destruction of Israel). Incorporating the people of Hamas and Fatah into Israel would be a calamity to the Jewish population of Israel, and since Israel has a primary responsibility to its own citizens it cannot allow this.
Norman,
J Street does not describe Israel as an Apartheid state and is a supporter of a 2-state solution, not a 1-state solution.
The founder of Human Rights Watch recently complained that the organization has deviated from its original goal and has become much too focused on Israel.