When the word \u201eapartheid\u201d appears in reports by Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, or the Israeli human rights organization B\u2019Tselem, it is not a political slur, but a very precise legal diagnosis. Under international law, the crime of apartheid is committed when one racial or ethnic group exercises institutionalized oppression and systematic dominance over another group, with the intent of maintaining this regime<\/b>.<\/p>\n
Israel does not operate such a system solely in the occupied territories: Zionist state ideology has created a comprehensive matrix that fragments Palestinians into different legal categories in order to prevent their national unity and maintain the absolute dominance of Jewish sovereignty. This system rests on three main pillars.<\/p>\n
The most common argument used by hasbara is that apartheid cannot exist in Israel, since Palestinian citizens have the right to vote and serve as members of the Knesset (the Israeli parliament). However, this superficial equality masks deeply institutionalized, structural discrimination.<\/p>\n
The Jewish Nation-State Law (2018):<\/b> This legislation, which has the force of a constitutional law, explicitly states that the right to national self-determination in the State of Israel applies exclusively to the Jewish people<\/i>. The law declares the development of Jewish settlements (colonies) to be in the national interest, thereby officially relegating Palestinian citizens to second-class status in their own homeland.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n Land and Housing Apartheid:<\/b> More than 90% of Israel\u2019s land is under the direct control of the state and the Jewish National Fund (JNF). Special \u201eadmission committees\u201d are legally authorized to prevent Palestinian families from moving into small towns and villages with Jewish majorities, citing \u201ecultural incompatibility.\u201d Meanwhile, Palestinian towns are barred from expanding, and homes built without permits are systematically demolished by the state.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n In the West Bank and East Jerusalem, apartheid manifests itself in its rawest, most physical form. Here, two different ethnic groups live in the same geographical area but under completely different legal jurisdictions:<\/p>\n Dual legal system:<\/b> If an illegal Jewish settler commits a crime in the West Bank, he or she is subject to Israeli civil law and the Israeli court system, with all the guarantees of civil law. If a Palestinian does the same thing on that same land, he or she is subject to Israeli military courts<\/b> They present him with a situation where the conviction rate in criminal proceedings exceeds 99%.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n Restrictions on freedom of movement:<\/b> The apartheid wall, the hundreds of military checkpoints, and the segregated \u201esettler roads\u201d\u2014off-limits to Palestinians\u2014all serve the purpose of forcing the Palestinian population into isolated enclaves (Bantustans), while settlers are free to move about.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n The Gaza blockade as collective punishment:<\/b> The comprehensive land, air, and sea blockade of Gaza, which has been in place since 2007, is the most extreme form of apartheid: the isolation of an entire population from the outside world, through strict military control and restrictions on calorie intake, electricity, medicine, and clean water.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n Perhaps the least discussed, yet internationally most heart-wrenching aspect of the Israeli apartheid system is the fate of Palestinian refugees and the diaspora.<\/p>\n Demographic Engineering:<\/b> Israel maintains its Jewish majority by implementing racially based demographic policies. The Repatriation Act<\/i> Under this provision, any person of Jewish descent living anywhere in the world is automatically granted Israeli citizenship and land if they move to Israel.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n The Ban on Palestinians:<\/b> At the same time, Israel continues to categorically deny the rights of the more than 5\u20136 million Palestinian refugees and their descendants\u2014who were expelled during the ethnic cleansings of 1948 (the Nakba) and 1967\u2014 now numbering more than 5\u20136 million Palestinian refugees and their descendants, Israel categorically denies the right of return guaranteed by international law (UN Resolution 194). There is only one reason for this: their return would undermine the exclusive ethnic majority required by the Zionist state.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n Israeli apartheid is a a unified, coherent system<\/b>, which deliberately divides the Palestinians into various groups: Israeli citizens, residents of Jerusalem, those living under occupation in the West Bank, those under siege in Gaza, and refugees living in the diaspora.<\/p>\n Although their legal status and the extent of their daily suffering vary, the essence is the same: they all live under a regime that determines their rights, their freedom of movement, their housing, and their future based on their ethnic affiliation. Stating this is not an opinion, but a statement of facts under international law.<\/p>\n International and Israeli legal reports:<\/b><\/p>\n Amnesty International (2022):<\/span><\/b> Israel\u2019s Apartheid Against Palestinians: A Cruel System of Domination and a Crime Against Humanity.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n Human Rights Watch (2021):<\/span><\/b> \"Threshold Crossed: Israeli Authorities and the Crimes of Apartheid and Persecu\"<\/span>tion.<\/i><\/p>\n B\u2019Tselem (2021):<\/b> A regime of Jewish supremacy stretching from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea: This is apartheid.<\/i><\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n International Conventions:<\/b><\/p>\n The 1973 UN Convention on Apartheid<\/i> (International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid).<\/p>\n<\/li>\n The International Criminal Court (ICC) Statute of Rome<\/i> (Article 7, Crimes Against Humanity).<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Amikor az Amnesty International, a Human Rights Watch vagy az izraeli B’Tselem emberi jogi szervezet jelent\u00e9seiben megjelenik az \u201eapartheid\u201d sz\u00f3, az nem egy politikai s\u00e9rt\u00e9s, hanem egy nagyon prec\u00edz jogi diagn\u00f3zis. A nemzetk\u00f6zi jog szerint az apartheid b\u0171ncselekm\u00e9nye akkor val\u00f3sul meg, ha egy faji vagy etnikai csoport int\u00e9zm\u00e9nyes\u00edtett elnyom\u00e1st \u00e9s szisztematikus dominanci\u00e1t gyakorol egy m\u00e1sik […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2164,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rs_blank_template":"","rs_page_bg_color":"","slide_template_v7":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[100,96,153,155,154,104],"class_list":["post-2163","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-az-izraeli-kormany-politikajanak-kritikaja","tag-hasbara","tag-izrael","tag-kozel-kelet","tag-mediaelemzes","tag-nemzetkozi-kapcsolatok","tag-palesztina"],"modified_by":"Antipropaganda H\u00edrblog","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/antipropaganda.hu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2163","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/antipropaganda.hu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/antipropaganda.hu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/antipropaganda.hu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/antipropaganda.hu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2163"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/antipropaganda.hu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2163\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/antipropaganda.hu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2164"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/antipropaganda.hu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2163"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/antipropaganda.hu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2163"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/antipropaganda.hu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2163"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}2. Apartheid in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (West Bank and Gaza)<\/h2>\n
\n
3. Apartheid in the Diaspora: Denial of the Right of Return<\/h2>\n
\n
Summary from the Perspective of Antipropaganda.hu<\/h2>\n
Fact-based sources for this article:<\/h3>\n
\n
\n
\n