Spring is coming, and so is Israel Apartheid Week to campuses across the country.Here in Boston, Harvard students already got an “eviction notice” pasted on their doors by the Palestine Solidarity Committee who likened the notices to the “Illegal displacement of Palestinians” in Israel. At Northeastern University a full week of activities, films, an “apartheid wall,” etc. is being planned starting next week. At Boston University, an “academic” panel on “Right of Return” is being set up.What can our side do?Tell the truth: that this is a lie and that the real apartheid in the Middle East is Arab Apartheid, where women, gays, Christians, Jews and other minorities are subjugated, humiliated, raped, and slaughtered.We need the Jewish students on campus to use THIS argument – not to say, as some of our feckless leaders are telling them to say: “We are not so bad as they say we are.”You can help make Arab Apartheid a meme (an idea that spreads). Here’s how:Read this wonderful article by Professor Ephraim Karsh that explains it all very simply and with easily remembered facts and arguments.Then spread it around to everyone you know. Charles Jacobs
http://www.meforum.org/3186/middle-east-apartheid
In light of Israel Apartheid Week, which hit cities and campuses throughout the world recently, supporters of the Jewish state find it difficult to agree on the best response to this hate fest. Some suggest emphasizing Israel’s peacemaking efforts, others propose rebranding the country by highlighting its numerous achievements and success stories. Still others advocate reminding the world of “what Zionism is – a movement of Jewish national liberation – and what it isn’t – racist.” Each of these approaches has its merits yet none will do the trick.
Peace seeking and/or prosperity are no proof of domestic benevolence and equality. The most brutal regimes have peacefully coexisted with their neighbors while repressing their own populations; the most prosperous societies have discriminated against vulnerable minorities. South Africa was hardly impoverished and technologically backward; the United States, probably the most successful and affluent nation in recent times was largely segregated not that long ago.
Nor for that matter is the apartheid libel driven by forgetfulness of Zionism’s true nature. It is driven by rejection of Israel’s very existence. No sooner had the dust settled on the Nazi extermination camps than the Arabs and their western champions equated the Jewish victims with their tormentors.
