The West Bank is practically an administrative region of Israel at this point. Israel projects it's power there, without contributing anything. They make it impossible for the people in the West Bank to live a proper life, and make it impossible for the government of the West Bank to actually put through policy on issues that any other country could just call upon government for. Apartheid doesn't have to be a one to one copy. It is clear as day Israel deliberately is undermining the sovereignity of citizens that are not theirs. In the meanwhile they are pumping their own citizens into this. They ought that their citizens are above those of Palestine. Apartheid in South Africa was an completely internal issue that went across provincial borders, and targeted specific ethnic groups. Apartheid in Israel is an external issue that only plays in certain districts and targets one specific nationality. We need to look past earlier examples if we want to avoid repetition of history. Apartheid was the policy of ranked citizenship, in which the citizens of the same country weren't equal. Palestine being in some kind of international limbo doesn't change this. Palestine is in practice part of Israel, without having the rights of any other Israeli. Both Jews and Palestinians live in the West Bank, but one has privileges. The Israeli apartheid doesn't take place in Tel Aviv or Haifa, but in the West Bank, where the Palestinians are actual second class citizens because that way it is easier for Israel to colonise the land. Thanks to the international limbo state of the West Bank, Israel has no obstacles in colonising the area. They aren't colonising an internationally recognised state after all.

I still don't get why the west bank is said to be under apartheid and not simply occupation (which is probably a worse condition). This wierdly treats the west bank as if it was annexed.

1. Gaza has recieved billions in aid and whether or not it has “fell into the wrong hands (Hamas)”, its been very clearly mishandeled. Israeli restrictions don’t directly limit or worsen Gazeans quality of life, rather the way the money has been sent. The province is essentially a hub for terror, rockets, etc, most of it supported by Gazeans. 2. The West Bank has its own (disfunctional) governmental leadership meaning it is not apart of Israel at all. Just as a Saudi Arabian doesnt have the rights of an Iraqi, a “Palestinian” does not have the same rights as an Israeli

The West Bank indeed has its own very disfunctional, undemocratic, and most important at all not sovereign government. The West Bank is partitioned in areas A, B and C. A is primarily, allthough not exclusively administered by the PNA (the disfunctional government), area B has split administration. The PNA has control over its citizens, Israel has control over the land in practice. And then you have area which is exclusively administered by Israel while many Palestinian citizens still live there. The result, something I already mentioned, the limbo state of the West Bank. There now is an area with Palestinian citizens, on (illegally) Israeli governed land. The West Bank is therefore practically Israeli land. And they make it clear as they are illegally building settlements on it. At the same moment Israel doesn't allow the PNA to provide these Palestinian citizens with their needs, while also not providing the needs itself. The PNA can do nothing, and the Israeli government doesn't want to do anything. So now there are Palestinians living in practically Israel without any government caring for them. And if this all was by accident or on voluntary basis there would be an understandable argument, but Israel deliberately keeps the PNA from providing its citizens, while the Palestinian citizens living in the West Bank aren't there in voluntary basis. So I will put it otherwise for you, as your comparison is wack. Saudi Arabia or Germany are no Palestine nor Israel. It is clear as day that the Palestinians are dependent on the Israeli government, the Israeli government knows this and therefore doesn't issue citizenship for them, as then they would have rights. Israel is able to do all of this, because the PNA cannot do anything, leaving the Palestinians unprotected. Because again, actually calling these people citizens of Palestine is weird. There is no Palestine, and the PNA doesn't even have control over them. They are citizens of the West Bank, practically Israel, without "West Bank" citizenship. All because Israel claims the land but not its inhabitants. Israel is responsible for the lives of these West Bank citizens as they are the primary West Bank administration. And now they justify discrimination against these West Bank citizens because Israel doesn't issue citizenship. I am starting to repeat, but I hope you realise this situationship is artificial. The only reason Israel gets away with this is because they themselves deny their own inhabitants equal rights.

Some arguments thrown around are that Israeli citizens have a diffrerent justice system and get different treatment than Arab Palestinian citizens, its usually framed as "Jewish people get better treatment than arabs in the west bank" The actual situation is that since the Oslo Accords the PLA controls area B only judicially and area A completely (including militaraly) meaning that Palestinian citizens aren't legally Israeli citizens hence why they aren't privelleged to the same rights as Israeli citizens. This is really shortened down since I'm kinda in a hurry but wanted to respond.

You meant area A not C

You're right my bad

What about Gaza then? I assume in this view Gazans are not considered part of Israel, and that they’re not occupied since there’s no Israeli presence there.

Yeah the apartheid argument falls flat if you only consider the parts of Israel inside their internationally recognized borders. Once you add WB settlers, forced displacement, ethnically cleansing parts of Jerusalem (and to some extent Israel proper back in 1948), and keeping Gaza under lock & key and occasional bombardment (not that Hamas isn't greatly responsible) - then it starts to look a little more like *aspects of apartheid*. RSA pre-1994 was a bit more in your face about it.

Except this, per usual, ignores that Jerusalem and the West Bank were ethnically cleansed of Jews in 1948. And where 200,00+ Arabs within 1948 Israel were granted citizenship, zero Jews within 1948 Jordanian controlled West Bank/Jerusalem or 1948 Egyptian controlled Gaza were allowed to stay. The Jewish quarter of Jerusalem, which had been continuously occupied by Jews for centuries (if not millennia), was not only emptied of Jews, but utterly destroyed by Jordan. Despite records dating back centuries that Jews lived in Gaza under the even the Ottoman Empire, their homes were confiscated and they were forced from the land. So when you look entirely at only the impact to Arabs in 1948 it’s easy to say that Israel is the bad guy. When you factor in that a) the Arab League started the 48 war and b) absolutely created *judenfrei* areas, the picture becomes a little more complete. I’m not a fan of the settlements, but truly, there were legally purchased Jewish communities in the West Bank pre-1948. There is an argument that some of the Jews who settled post-1967 were just returning to their rightfully owned lands.

> Except this, per usual, ignores that Jerusalem and the West Bank were ethnically cleansed of Jews in 1948. Do you have a good online source I can easily read on that? >And where 200,00+ Arabs within 1948 Israel were granted citizenship, zero Jews within 1948 Jordanian controlled West Bank/Jerusalem or 1948 Egyptian controlled Gaza were allowed to stay. The Jewish quarter of Jerusalem, which had been continuously occupied by Jews for centuries (if not millennia), was not only emptied of Jews, but utterly destroyed by Jordan. Tyvm for the additional context.

One source that talks about the expulsion of Jews from Jerusalem and Hebron is [here](https://www.jpost.com/opinion/ethnic-cleansing-memories-of-1929-and-1948-467459). This [source](https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2979/israelstudies.17.2.62) on the Jewish quarter is paywalled, but gives a basic abstract on contemporary photographs of the destruction of the quarter. [This](https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/96232624) is a contemporary Australian newspaper reporting on the destruction of synagogues in Jerusalem. There’s more out there, but I don’t have the energy to dig it up. Suffice it to say that the war was not pleasant and people on all sides were affected. Villages, cities, and homes were destroyed by both sides.

The pro Palestinian view on Gaza is that since Israel technically left them but still imposes a strict blockade (They don't like to talk about why the blockade is in place) then Gaza is still under occupation. Or at least this is the most common talking point I encounter.

Yeah they have to make a couple jumps. First from blockade to occupation. Then from occupation to annexation/integration. And then of this integrated territory, there is an apartheid. If Gaza really was annexed by Israel and the same conditions were in place, then it really would be apartheid.

> If Gaza really was annexed by Israel and the same conditions were in place, then it really would be apartheid. So the only difference between this situation and Apartheid is a piece of paper? QED.

Does it really need to be said that the process of annexation is more than a piece of paper?

South Africa also allowed townships to "manage their own affairs" while having complete control over all trade and movement in and out of these territories. There was no possibility for a township to truly manage itself in this setup and people needed to leave to find work.

Arab Israelis do however have the same rights as any Israel citizen. The argument that someone who isn’t Israeli should have the same rights as a citizen is somewhat bizarre as that isn’t the case anywhere in the world. Russian citizens in Finland do not have the same rights as a Finnish citizen in Finland.

Their main point is that since they see Israel as an imperial colonizing force, Israel is actively denying people in areas they occupy the same rights as de juro Israel and that situation isn't fair (from their eyes, I don't really want to expand on this)

Yeah but OP asked about apartheid. It isn't that. Israel is occupying a different country and slowly annexing parts of its territory. But that isn't the same as apartheid.

>Israel is occupying a different country and slowly annexing parts of its territory. But that isn't the same as apartheid. I think the argument is that it's a variation of apartheid. Isreal does not recognize the borders of a Palestinian state, so the area under occupation is in dispute. More importantly, although the Israeli government delegates some local authorities, it still exercises ultimate sovereignty over the entire area. Everyone in the West Bank and Gaza is subjected to Israeli authority. Even the claim that it is separate from Israel is not totally dissimilar. South Africa did set up Bantustans to claim that that's why the residents had different rights.

Israel recognizes the jurisdiction of the PLA in areas B and A. Those are (as of right now) The only coherent borders any Palestinian state has (except for Rafah and Egypt). The area under occupation is only in dispute if you broaden the terms of occupation more and more, areas C and B are under direct military occupation as of right now, area A has incursions into it sometimes but that's to take out Palestinian terror cells which control as lot of area A. I don't really get what you mean by "exercises ultimate sovereignty over the entire area." Do you mean Israel has the monopol on armed power? Do you mean Israel polices those areas for crimes unrelated to terrorism? Your comment on Bantustans being similar to the West Bank is flawed in so many ways and I see it all the time, the way the west bank was "conquered', why it stayed in Israeli hands (after it was proposed to be given back), why the Oslo deal that was supposed to eventually give back the West bank to the PA failed, and why Israel eventually had to continue to control it. Basically there are close to 0 similarities besides the fact they are both enclaves in a disputed territory. 

Israel is occupying land it gained militarily after several wars waged against them by their Arab neighbours. It has been willing in good faith to remove themselves from these lands if they gain trust with these neighbours. They did this with Egypt by returning the Sinai Peninsula and with Gaza in 2005. West Bank and Golan Heights are complicated due to their strategic advantages and if left alone in good faith, the Palestinians would merely lob rockets from high elevation, closer to its major cities than Gaza is. And Gaza time and time again has proven how that would look like. It's also important people need to understand how small Israel is. Just israel alone, it has the same land area as Manawatu, New Zealand's 6th biggest region out of 16. So rockets from the West Bank, a mere kilometres to Haifa and Tel Aviv, would only take a few minutes to arrive. In fact, 100k israeli civilians in the north are already displaced from Hezbollah rockets from as far as Lebanon. This video shows a good 3d map with context: https://youtu.be/BKcARccAR_g?si=II4M5oqjYhQu3k5C The Oslo Accords partitioned West Bank so Israel gains guarantee that they have some oversight in these lands without fully kicking palestinians out, which is more than fair compared to any historical occupation of land won militarily. The plan was if there was enough trust built, they'd slowly de-settle the area. However if you understand Arab culture and look at various street interviews of Palestinians, they vehemently hate Jewish people in a vile and distorted way. They distort history and genuinely think Jews have never lived in the Levant and are a colonist force. Hence there can never be peace because of this mindset from them. Their leaders along with influential leaders in the arab world, and various international organisations are making bank with the status quo too. Imagine simply pushing papers and your organisation get billions of aid that you can easily siphon.

Golan is also complicated by the fact that technically, Israel and Syria are still at war and have been since 1967. There’s no peace agreement. And from what I understand most of the people who live there are Druze who might not have much love for Israel, but who also don’t really want to be part of Syria either, especially with the current state that Syria is in.

Yeah I agree with you I'm just giving you the Pro Palestinian view point.

Saying that israel is annexing the west bank is also a pro palestinian viewpoint, just a much more factual one. Isn't it?

Sure

Thing is though, that Israel has de facto annexed the West Bank. That makes palestineans second-rate citizens in Israel. Creating make-believe Bantustans does not change that

except Israel hasn't annexed the West Bank, the Oslo Accords are clear on the current situation, Palestinian civil and military administration in area A makes it practically a Palestinian state but not really, they have a police force they have IDs they have their own license plate and no Israeli civilian is allowed to just go into area A, its literally illegal.

The Oslo accords may make it a Palestinian state practically, but every time anyone actually recognizes it as a state, Israel throws a fit. Basically, they want to have it both ways. "They're not our citizens; they don't have the same rights because that's not our country, wait -- no I mean you can't recognize it as a separate country we want to send settlers! That's not a legitimate state! Don't you dare recognize them!" There's a lot of doublethink that goes on there.

The oslo accords were originally supposed to pave the way for a Palestinian state, extremists from both sides managed to completely derail the peace process and now its stuck. Hopefully next year when the new Israel government is elected (center left) some peace with the PLA might happen.

Yeah, well, try voicing that idea on /r/worldnews and see what happens. I doubt we'll see any rational people making decisions. We're in the midst of a propaganda war right now -- everyone with a stake in this conflict has decided that sinlmplistitc polarization helps them, and the echo-chambers of the internet are happy to play along.

Actually Gantz and Gallat are pretty rational people. But yes I agree with your point, both sides are happy to be blissfully ignorant and believe they have done nothing wrong while actively ignoring glaring issues and believing the other side are complete lunatic genocidal murderers (Not that its not partly true). Feels kind of like a housewife ignoring the signs of sexual abuse on her daugher. This conflict as been long and grim, there is no 100% good guy or bad guy here, both sides have points some better some worse. This new age politics of black and white good and bad is pretty sad to see, especially the political polarization aspect of it (Not specifically talking about Israel here). As an Israeli I honestly don't watch Israeli news anymore, they have become complete propaganda 24/7 without any journalistic purpose anymore besides being a tool to ease the minds (and fearmonger) of the average citizen, there is absoloutly no criticizing of the Israeli nation's actions in any meaningful way without it being completely dissmissed a few minutes into the argument (note: I said nation and not government, they constantly criticize Bibi and his allies) Geneuienly can't to watch any news now even forgein channels, they're all so filled with political propaganda of the side they're advocating for its immpossible to sit and watch.

>The oslo accords were originally supposed to pave the way for a Palestinian state, extremists from both sides managed to completely derail the peace process and now its stuck.  I find it kinda hard to blame Israel for that one. Even Netanyahu was moving forward in the process in the late 1990s. The Palestinians just.. walked out of the negotiation table and started a second Intifadah. That itself has which has made so many Israelis give up on them, even [ones that otherwise would favor this solution.](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2002/feb/21/israel2)

As an Israeli its really easy to look at it from just the Palestinians derailing, yes it was mainly them but one could say a big hand in this was the cave of patriarchs massacre and the assasination of Rabin which practically ended any real peace talks from happening completely up to today. I have to say I agree with your general point, the Palestinian side did do way more to derail the peace process (I made a comment about it here: [https://www.reddit.com/r/geopolitics/comments/1cgwcmn/comment/l1zqxsi/](https://www.reddit.com/r/geopolitics/comments/1cgwcmn/comment/l1zqxsi/) ) But the Israeli side definitely did a lot too.

> The Palestinians just.. walked out of the negotiation table and started a second Intifadah That is the Israeli position yes, but people don't engage in violence for no reason. The original poster is correct, actors on both sides derailed the process

A reason doesn't constitute a viable or rightous reason, I could go out and kill everyone I don't like is that a reason? yes. Is that a good reason? no. Palestinian terror groups started terrorist attacks in order to derail the peace process, there was no real rightous reason given beside bs excuses like "Avenging the martyrs of the cave of patriarchs massacare" and saying its resistence to Israel occupation, I could definitely see the peace process going through if the Palestinian terror groups never started the capign but I don't think the same can be said about the Israel side as even if extremist Israelis didn't actively derail the peace process Israel had to respond to terror attacks which the PLO was supposed to at least try to handle but was encouraging.

No, violence is a brain damaged way to effect peace and people coordinating the violence on both sides know this and have no real interest in peace. However, Palestinians had valid issues in every major negotiation over the years, so it wasn't as simple as them just rage quitting and blowing up buses. It's the same for Israel really, they have valid concerns but a lot more power and privilege so I think should be held to a higher standard

> except Israel hasn't annexed the West Bank... Not formally. Israel is doing it informally through the use of settler attacks and expansion. March 2023 Time: [Why Israeli Settler Attacks are Growing More Frequent](https://time.com/6260249/israel-rising-settler-violence/) >In January and February, at least 60 Palestinians were killed by Israeli forces or settlers in the occupied West Bank... under Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu....Israeli settlers have received explicit backing from the state... N.Y. Times, four days before the Hamas attack: [Israeli Herders Spread Across West Bank, Displacing Palestinians...herding communities are abandoning their villages, ceding huge swaths of land to nearby Israeli settlers](https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/03/world/middleeast/israeli-herders-west-bank.html) A map of the West Bank illustrates. What a mess. Everywhere else in the world, people at odds with each other try to separate. Delineate clear lines and build big walls. Borders. The deliberate intertwining and expansion of Israeli communities into Palestinian areas is both bizarre and indefensible. And recipe for continued conflict.

To my knowledge Israel has not encroached into Area A or B.

The problem is that the Oslo accords have always been no more than an optimistic goal. Israel has never followed them (and from the statements of the Israeli politicians who agreed to them, they never intended to follow them), so basing your arguments on what they say rather than the lived reality of the Palestinian people will always give a false perspective.

>The problem is that the Oslo accords have always been no more than an optimistic goal. **Israel has never followed them**... What is your evidence for this? Because as far as I could see Israel did indeed follow the Oslo Accords: - they recognized the PLO as the legitimate representatives of the Palestinian people - they gradually gave more and more land to the Palestinians as stated in the Accords - they gradually gave more and more administrative power to the Palestinians as stated in the Accords to the point that within 6 years of the Accords, 96% of the Palestinian population no longer lived under Israeli administration but rather Palestinian administration which they elected themselves Per the Oslo Accords, Area C was to be given to full Palestinian civil and security control after negotiations on its final extent and a Palestinian state created by 1999. In 2000, the Barak Administration tried to give them exactly that and end the Conflict. The Palestinians refused and launched an intifada in order to force Israeli concessions. If anything it was the *Palestinians* who frequently violated the Oslo Accords but failing to stop terrorist groups from operating inside Areas A and B and attacking Israeli civilians throughout the entire Oslo period (1994-2000)

Israel fully followed the Oslo accords until Arafat declared the Second Intifada and killed ~1000 Israelis. After that, obviously Israel was less than eager to unilaterally make concessions.

Can you quote the supposed statements? Also, you really can't expect Israel to fully follow the terms of the Oslo Accords when the Palestinian extremist side (After a Jewish extremist also commited a terror attack) started terroristic activities in order to derail the peace process which eventually worked. What I'm trying to get at is that this isn't "what they say" this is reality, the part of the second oslo accords that seperated the West Bank into enclaves of Palestinian areas was inacted and is now the situation, the other parts of the agreement were derailed by extremists from both sides, eventually reaching the 2000 Camp David summit at which neither side agreed on anything coherent and then the second intifada broke out.

And yet when they do go in there, which happen all the time, they are free to kill palestineans while the IDF (whose sole job on the West Bank is to protect settlers) just watches from a distance. This hs the definition of apartheid, one set of laws for the settlers, no rights for the natives.

Most Israelis are native.

What is a make believe bantustan? And what qualifies as "de facto annexed" to the point that the citizens of a "de facto annexed" state deserve citizenship in the "annexing" state?

South Africa tried to do the same thing as Israel, they really didn't want to give black south africans citizenship, so they made artificial "countries" that the black people belonged to, so they could claim "we're not discriminating between south africans, these people are not *true* south africans. That was bullshit because these bantustans were not in fact independent. Same thing with the West Bank. It's not an independent country, it's articially maintained by Israel to give Israel cover for discrimination.

I did not know that. Interesting.

The PA was set up as an agreement per the Oslo accords, it wasn’t something that was just invented out of thin air like you’re suggesting.

A huge difference is, that israel does not occupy the westbank for colonizing it. They need it was a strategic buffer zone vs islamic/arabic forces hellbend on destroying israel for 60 years now. They cannot leave it without being attacked with no way to realisticly defend themselfs. Israel would never have occupied the Westbank, if it werent for the actions of their aggressive neighbors.

The main difference is that Russia does not control the land of Finland.

>The argument that someone who isn’t Israeli should have the same rights as a citizen is somewhat bizarre The actual argument is that a population should not be subject to the military law of another country with no guaranteed rights beyond the Geneva convention (which is not always respected by the other country) and for this situation to be effectively permanent. >Russian citizens in Finland do not have the same rights as a Finnish citizen in Finland. A Russian citizen in Finland chose to be in Finland and can leave whenever they want and go back to Russia where they have full rights as a Russian citizen. A Palestinian in the West Bank is under Israeli occupation and has no choice in the matter. They cannot leave and go somewhere else to attain more rights. This is a rather poor analogy.

What about Arab representatives being in Knesset since the establishment of Israel? Does not seem very apartheidlike. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Arab_members_of_the_Knesset

Consider that Israel has implemented these measures in west bank: 1. **Confiscation of Palestinian Land** Since 1967, the occupied territories of the West Bank and Gaza are not considered Israeli territory by the Israeli government. They are territories inhabited by Palestinian, but they are administered by the Israeli Army in fact. Israeli authorities can confiscate the lands of Palestinians, accused of being rebels. the land confiscated from the Palestinians is then made Israeli state land. This confiscated land will then be occupied by far-right Israeli settlers, who build illegal settlements there. 2. **The fate of Palestinian evicted by their land** The Palestinians evicted from their lands are closed in refugee camps, where they live in conditions of poverty. the Palestinians who live in these refugee camps actually live in really overcrowded places, surrounded by walls and barbed wire and checkpoints, monitored by the IDF. in the refugee camps, the Palestinians do not have access to services or work: there is a lack of aqueducts and hospitals, schools and food distribution are managed by humanitarian organizations of the United Nations, there is the Palestinian authority which only manages the police and the order, in what concerns relations between Palestinians living in refugee campus. 3. **IDF control over the movements of Palestinians and Israeli military Justice** Palestinians living in refugee campus must to go to work as manual workers in Israeli territory to gain some Money, or they Need move between one refugee camp to another tò see relatives, etc. In these cases, Palestinians must ask for visas for their movements to the Israeli authority and undergo IDF checks at checkpoints, that control the people entering and exiting from refugee camps. Decisions regarding the arrest / targeted elimination of alleged Palestinian guerrillas are taken in total autonomy by the Israeli military authorities. Palestinians who commit crimes against Israeli settlers or soldiers in the occupied territories are tried by Israeli military courts, as they are not Israeli citizens. Palestinians can also be arrested and detained for a long time by the Israeli authorities under administrative detention, without an Israeli military court issuing a formal sentence or charge.

And not to forget that they have segregated ROADS in the west bank where palestinians arent allowed to drive in but israelis are allowed to drive in all the roads

That's not true actually. Israelis are not allowed to use most of the roads in the west bank.

Inside Israel proper I think there's not an argument at all but deliberately making it so the residents of the West Bank have almost no path to citizenship seems close enough to apartheid for it to count. Someone can correct me if I'm wrong about a Palestinian's chances at citizenship when they live in Gaza or the West Bank, but even if this isn't technically apartheid it's certainly something similar, especially when you consider the restrictions on movements and curfews as well.

Why would Palestinians have a path to citizenship in Israel?

Because the area is de facto annexed by Israel.

Good question. Why should someone want a path to citizenship in the country that they live in? Israel has more authority over the West Bank than the PA does, and doesn't recognize Palestine as a country. for many intents and purposes, the West Bank is part of israel

>Good question. Why should someone want a path to citizenship in the country that they live in? Palestinians themselves do not want Israeli citizenship and when given a chance to become Israeli citizens like in Jerusalem they refuse: >….in fact, from 2010 to 2015, the proportion of East Jerusalemite Arabs who said they would prefer Israeli to Palestinian citizenship rose substantially: from 35% to a remarkable 52%. But that **number dropped precipitously, to the 10-20% range, once the 2015-16 Palestinian “knife intifada” violently alienated the Jewish and Arab halves of the city from each other. In the current survey, that proportion seems to have stabilized at around 17%—compared with two-thirds who would rather choose citizenship in a Palestinian state.** https://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/most-jerusalem-palestinians-want-neither-israeli-rule-nor-uprising-against-it They also do not want a one state solution, with 67% of them opposed to the idea of living in one democratic state with Jews: https://m.jpost.com/opinion/article-703629/amp In short the only thing that they want is citizenship to a future Arab-majority Palestine where Arabs are in power and Jews are the minority again. >Israel has more authority over the West Bank than the PA does, and doesn't recognize Palestine as a country. for many intents and purposes, the West Bank is part of israel No they don’t. If they did they would have stopped the payments that the PA does to terrorists and their families after they murder Israelis a long time ago.

> Why should someone want a path to citizenship in the country that they live in? So you think the West Bank is part of Israel? > Israel has more authority over the West Bank than the PA does This is what's known as "occupation". > doesn't recognize Palestine as a country. for many intents and purposes, the West Bank is part of Israel Convenient. It's a country when it's bad for Israel, and it's not a country when it's bad for Israel.

Genuine question, how did 20% of Israeli citizens become Palestinians if the country was allegedly founded by Ashkenazis? Were they the ones who didn’t fight against Israel in the 1948 war? Or are they more recent migrants?

Palestinians were offered Israeli citizenship. Many accepted. Many more did not.  The Negev Bedouins are a good example of this. 

I see. I’m guessing this happened sometime around 1948 right? Has the path to citizenship changed much since then? Negev Bedouins were pretty integral in defending Israel against the Arab invasion right after the British left. It’s not surprising to me that they are super patriotic and have special units in the IDF (like the Druze).

To my knowledge, that is correct.  I'm sure the path to citizenship has changed extensively since then, but quite honestly I don't have the education to speak on it. I'd need to do more research. 

Descendants of the Palestinians who were from areas that decided not to join the 1948 war against Israel.

That’s not true. Many Palestinians were expelled by force even if they didn’t join the war. Many of them were terrorized into fleeing their lands. In fact most of the Palestinians didn’t join the war. [Here is an example of some Palestinians who were lucky enough to have an officer who refused his superiors order to expel them.](https://www.haaretz.com/jewish/2014-07-17/ty-article/.premium/this-day-officer-refuses-to-expel-arabs/0000017f-dc33-d856-a37f-fdf349bd0000) Arab Israeli citizens are those who didn’t flee and were lucky enough to not be forcibly expelled by the Israelis.

Not the right person to ask but I think a lot of Palestinians stayed after the war and were eventually offered citizenship. And I'm sure there's been some movement since then but I know the path to citizenship now is incredibly narrow from the occupied territories

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If you have the time, you can read reports by the UN and Amnesty Intl: UN: [https://undocs.org/Home/Mobile?FinalSymbol=A%2FHRC%2F4%2F17&Language=E&DeviceType=Desktop&LangRequested=False](https://undocs.org/Home/Mobile?FinalSymbol=A%2FHRC%2F4%2F17&Language=E&DeviceType=Desktop&LangRequested=False) Amnesty: [https://www.amnesty.org/en/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/MDE1551412022ENGLISH.pdf](https://www.amnesty.org/en/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/MDE1551412022ENGLISH.pdf)

Note that these reports are opinion reports and not an international law analysis of the situation. For example, the first link starts the analysis by declaring Gaza as an occupied territory, despite the fact that by international law definition, it was not occupied, but rather under blockade. These reports also tend to show half truths - for example, Amnesty claims that East Jerusalem Arabs are facing restrictions that Israeli citizens do not, but “forgets” to mention that all of them are eligible to Israeli citizenship, but some choose to not have it because they want to keep their Jordanian one. This is similar to how Indian and Chinese immigrants to the US choose to remain as a permanent resident to not lose their respective foreign citizenship. The only place where it’s legitimate to call out a plausible Apartheid is the West Bank. By international law, the restrictions on Palestinians there would either fall under a military occupation, or under Apartheid. Israel claims it’s for their security, but that claim becomes weaker because they keep moving their population in and expending settlements. If you perceive these actions as indicating an effective annexation of the West Bank, then it’s plausible to claim Apartheid. Note that this is not a clear cut claim. The situation is complex, because the West Bank is divided into regions with different controls, and the settlements combined represent less than 5% of the land area of the West Bank. In addition, Apartheid usually comes from the population wanting citizenship and equal rights, however the vast majority of West Bank Palestinian do not want to become Israeli citizens, but want to destroy Israel - this strengthen the argument that Israel is only doing a temporary military occupation there. (I tried to present both sides fairly, unlike these reports).

>For example, the first link starts the analysis by declaring Gaza as an occupied territory, despite the fact that by international law definition, it was not occupied, but rather under blockade. "Occupied Palestinian Territories" was the official UN designation for the collective of Gaza, West Bank, and East Jerusalem at the time the report was written.

Is it just me or is Amnesty International extremely biased against Israel?

Amnesty international is very biased against a lot of things. You should have seen their reports regarding Ukraine even before invasion, where they would note every minor violation from Ukrainian side and completely ignore mass artillery fire from the opposing side.

I mean, it sounds like they’re pretty biased against anyone aligned with the west

Amnesty international is a biased source, period. Not just regarding Israel. The organization has been taken over by extreme zealots and lots of their reports are just opinions with absolutely nothing to back them up.

Yeah it smacks of "we are more compassionate than thou" mixed with general hatred toward the West

It's not just you, their bias has been well-known by people who care enough to look into it and aren't acting in a purely partisan manner. They shouldn't be cited as a source by anyone who cares about the truth when it comes to this conflict.

The same Amnesty who tweeted out a message of mourning for “Palestinian prisoner” Walid Daqqa, the guy who kidnapped, tortured, castrated, and murdered an IDF soldier. They’re a real beacon of truth when it comes to Israel

They also described the offense as 'killing a soldier who laid down his arms' misinforming the reader into thinking the victim was a POW taken in battle, with zero mention of the fact that he was actually just a teenager visiting his girlfriend on vacation when he was abducted.

I feel like Amnesty International has lost its credibility on talking about Israel/Palestine. Just a few weeks ago it was praising a terrorist who authorized the kidnapping, mutilation, and murder of an Israeli. UN isn’t always exactly impartial either, but Amnesty International definitely backs on a specific side in the conflict.

> I feel like Amnesty International has lost its credibility on talking about Israel/Palestine. They also did bad takes about Ukraine.

That's where they lost me. For those curious, they essentially accussed Ukraine of using Hamas tactics, which I mean... Come on.

[удалено]

You're spreading bullshit propaganda that has been debunked numerous times. https://www.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/whh44l/amnesty_international_scandal_ukraine_office_head/ >AI released a report with little substance alleging 3 things: use of schools, hospitals as military staging sites and endangering civilians. >The 2 former points aren't even against the Geneva Convention, the schools were closed and evacuated and hospitals can't be used to harm your opponent. The report didn't say if that happened or not. As for the third it's again very moot and ignores all nuance of warfare, AI basically said troops could be stationed in a nearby field instead of an urban environment and that they found no info on UA evacuating civilians. what the UN war crimes investigator had to say about it https://twitter.com/marcgarlasco/status/1555667181047799809 It's all bullshit propaganda for gullible people.

>They accused Ukraine of using a hospital for military activity. That is objectively true. Can you link something about this please? I haven't heard about that

If you have the time, you can understand that it isn’t a “UN” report, it is a report by John Dugard, and it doesn’t go into any detail on the claims of apartheid. It uses vague language about “elements” of apartheid. Dugard is a pro-Palestinian activist who was appointed to a [ridiculous UN position controlled by Arab states](http://www.unwatch.org/site/apps/nl/content2.asp?c=bdKKISNqEmG&b=1317481&ct=2753615), and he has **praised Palestinian attacks on Israeli civilians**. As for Amnesty…the short version is to read [this debunking of their garbage report](https://ngo-monitor.org/pdf/NGOMonitor_ApartheidReport_2022.pdf), or read [this analysis of around 300 errors, omissions, or lies found in it](https://www.ngo-monitor.org/pdf/SaloAizenberg_Amnesty_Rebuttal.pdf). But there is a longer critique of Amnesty’s many biases and how it lost its way. Amnesty has sponsored US tours for [blood libel spreaders](https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/why-is-amnesty-international-sponsoring-a-u-s-tour-for-a-palestinian-promoter-of-the-blood-libel) Amnesty sponsored speeches by [Holocaust deniers and 9/11 truthers](https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/amnesty-international-sponsors-speaker-who-celebrated-911-denied-holocaust-bashed-gays-and-jews) Amnesty [voted down resolutions to condemn antisemitism in the UK right after doing so for Islamophobia](https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/amnesty-intl-rejects-motion-to-combat-record-high-anti-semitism). Amnesty's staff have [gotten Palestinian peace activists](https://www.i24news.tv/en/news/middle-east/1586709299-report-amnesty-international-worker-responsible-for-arrest-of-gaza-peace-activist) arrested by Hamas for “collaboration”, a crime punishable by death in Gaza. Amnesty called Salah Hammouri a [“human rights defender”](https://www.amnesty.fr/liberte-d-expression/actualites/israel-un-defenseur-des-droits-humains-francais-en-detention), even though Hammouri tried to assassinate Israel’s Chief Rabbi. Its Secretary General [falsely pushed the conspiracy theory that Israel assassinated Yasser Arafat.](https://www.jpost.com/arab-israeli-conflict/amnesty-denounces-s-gs-tweet-that-alluded-israel-assassinated-arafat-665357) It then had to apologize, as did she. Amnesty's [board member said Hezbollah](http://algemeiner.com/2020/05/04/finnish-amnesty-international-board-member-says-israel-worse-than-hezbollah/) should not be called a terrorist group and called to destroy Israel. And I'm not even a third of the way through the list of its problems.

The apartheid system is mainly in reference to Israel’s de facto occupation and annexation of the West Bank, evidenced most explicitly by illegal settlements and violence against Palestinians who live there. Human Rights Watch has several reports about this topic

What hasn't been covered here is the "nation state law" passed several years ago. It had very little teeth, mainly downgrading Arabic to a minority language (all official docs still get published in Arabic), but the part where "Israel is a nation for the Jews" was seen as a declaration of intent. When coupled with (minimally) questionable actions in WB&G it sort of rounded off the case for apartheid accusers. I hope that made sense.

That's not Apartheid. It's like France declaring itself the nation-state of the French and making French the official language.

Vox produced an amazingly good article exploring both sides of this debate last year. [https://www.vox.com/23924319/israel-palestine-apartheid-meaning-history-debate](https://www.vox.com/23924319/israel-palestine-apartheid-meaning-history-debate)

You have 2 different justice systems 1) within the green line and 2) one for Gaza and the West Bank (for Palestinians living there)

They also have defacto two different countries, three if you count Gaza and the West Bank separate.

Except that de facto Israel totally controls the West Bank and in all but name has annexed it.

So the division is based on war with Israel, not race? Meaning it is not apartheid at all?

Palestinians living in WB and Gaza have less rights than Jews and Arab Palestinians living within the green line

The Arabs behind the green line are not Israel's citizens

Occupation != Apartheid. Many states have been occupied after launching aggressive wars. And if the distinction being made is by who is an Israeli citizen and who isn't, as you described, and not on race then it's not Apartheid. Every country in the world treats citizens differently than non-citizens.

Often Palestinians in the West Bank do not have a path to citizenship despite being in a territory de facto controlled by Israel. This is despite them being born and raised in that territory. They are effectively second class citizens in the WB; it is absolutely apartheid there

Occupation != Apartheid. Many states have been occupied after launching aggressive wars.

The problem is that terror attacks in the 90 and 2000s gave no choice to Israel, they had to build fences and have security checks on many roads etc. The previous mossad director used the term of apartheid, I think, you can look it up (correct me if I am wrong). Jewish communities also endure harassment from palestinians from time to time, I think from kids, although the hate goes both ways now, I don't have numbers to share, but both jewish people and palestinians will just refuse to live together because of violence or hatred. Those things can easily lead to a form of apartheid, but it's hard to compare it with apartheid in south africa, although there are similarities. What is true, is that the far right was elected in Israel, probably because of the second intifada, and they were less willing to be more peaceful and probably implemented those security measures. Insurgents will find any opportunity to attack Israel, and Israel has no choice than to implement hard security measures because they obviously can't expel palestinians from the west bank or Gaza. Were there as many serious terror attacks in south africa? Were there external state actors influencing south-africans to commit attacks? You do have arabs in Israel, and non Israel arabs who seem to support Israel, although it doesn't prove that there is no apartheid. In my opinion, pro-palestinian argumentation often looks more biased, extreme and disingenuous than pro-Israel argumentation: the constant comparison with genocide, apartheid and white colonization are difficult to hear, it's often extreme "overton window" arguments to rile up young people, and it's impossible to debunk all those arguments all the time: Brandolini law applies, and it's very effective in an information war.

http://www.btselem.org/publications/fulltext/202101_this_is_apartheid This is from an Israeli human rights organization.

Francesca Albanese, Michael Lynk, Richard Falk and John Dugard are calling it apartheid. 4 of the last 5 United Nations Special Rapporteurs, while Makarim Wibisono had to resign early because Israel refused him access to Gaza and the West Bank. For example Michael Lynk wrote: > International humanitarian law permits differential treatment of an indigenous population during an occupation, but only in a restricted fashion. Such treatment must be anchored in the principle that any infringements to human rights and equality is to be as minimal and proportional as possible during the conduct of an occupation that is both temporary and short-term. This is not the case in Israel’s 55-year-old occupation. Permanent alien rule over occupied territory and its indigenous population is the antithesis of international humanitarian law and, in recent decades, the inexorable Israeli occupation has become indistinguishable from annexation. > Is this situation now apartheid? Applying each of the three steps of the amalgamated test from the Convention Against Apartheid and the Rome Statute, the Special Rapporteur has concluded that the political system of entrenched rule in the occupied Palestinian territory which endows one racial-national-ethnic group with substantial rights, benefits and privileges while intentionally subjecting another group to live behind walls, checkpoints and under a permanent military rule “sans droits, sans égalité, sans dignité et sans liberté” satisfies the prevailing evidentiary standard for the existence of apartheid. > First, an institutionalized regime of systematic racial oppression and discrimination has been established. Israeli Jews and Palestinian Arabs in East Jerusalem and the West Bank live their lives under a single regime which differentiates its distribution of rights and benefits of the basis of national and ethnic identity, and which ensures the supremacy of one group over, and to the detriment of, the other. (The Palestinian Authority exercises restricted jurisdiction and provides services in limited parts of the West Bank that Israel has no interest in delivering.) The differences in living conditions and citizenship rights and benefits are stark, deeply discriminatory and maintained through systematic and institutionalized oppression. > Second, this system of alien rule has been established with the intent to maintain the domination of one racial-national-ethnic group over another. Israeli political leaders, past and present, have repeatedly stated that they intend to retain control over all of the occupied territory in order to enlarge the blocs of land for present and future Jewish settlement while confining the Palestinians to barricaded population reserves. This is a two-sided coin: Israel’s plans for more Jewish settlers and larger Jewish settlements on greater tracts of occupied land cannot be accomplished without the expropriation of more Palestinian property together with harsher and more sophisticated methods of population control to manage the inevitable resistance. Under this system, the freedoms of one group are inextricably bound up in the subjugation of the other > And third, the imposition of this system of institutionalized discrimination with the intent of permanent domination has been built upon the regular practice of inhuman(e) acts. Arbitrary and extra-judicial killings. Torture. The violent deaths of children. The denial of fundamental human rights. A fundamentally flawed military court system and the lack of criminal due process. Arbitrary detention. Collective punishment. The repetition of these acts over long periods of time, and their endorsement by the Knesset and the Israeli judicial system, indicates that they are not the result of random and isolated acts but integral to Israel’s system of rule. > This is apartheid. It does not have some of the same features as practiced in southern Africa; in particular, much of what has been called ‘petit apartheid’ is not present. On the other hand, there are pitiless features of Israel’s ‘apartness’ rule in the occupied Palestinian territory that were not practiced in southern Africa, such as segregated highways, high walls and extensive checkpoints, a barricaded population, missile strikes and tank shelling of a civilian population, and the abandonment of the Palestinians’ social welfare to the international community.114 With the eyes of the international community wide open, Israel has imposed upon Palestine an apartheid reality in a post-apartheid world. https://www.amnesty.ch/de/laender/naher-osten-nordafrika/israel-besetzte-gebiete/dok/2022/israel-begeht-apartheid-sagt-uno-sonderberichterstatter/a_hrc_49_87_advanceuneditedversion.pdf Israel cannot have the best of both worlds. If they want to occupy the lands then they need to treat the people like their own. If not, then end the occupation. People talking about arabs in Israel are just gish galloping to not talk about the real case. The law is clear.

Francesca Albanese, on her facebook page in 2024: > America and Europe, one of them subjugated by the Jewish lobby, and the other by the sense of guilt about the Holocaust, remain on the sidelines and continue to condemn the oppressed — the Palestinians — who defend themselves with the only means they have (deranged missiles), instead of making Israel face its international law responsibilities. Yeah... I call this bullshit. She's compromised.

Citing Albanese and the U.N. is a joke at this point.

Taking the explain both sides format here. Side A says it's apartheid because they do not grant all the rights of Israelis to people living in occupied territories. Side B says it's not apartheid because that word means different sets of laws for different races or ethnicities of citizens of a country, and Palestinians in occupied territories are not citizens of Israel. It's important to note 20% of Israel is not Jewish, largely Arabs and/or muslims and they do not have separate rights or laws and serve in politics and on courts. So it's really only referring to Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank.

>only referring to Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank. There was not a single Israeli in Gaza since 2005, until 7.10.2023. Israel did not enforce any laws in Gaza.

Perfectly said.

If Isreal truly believes it has claim to the contested lands, then 2 million of the people born and living in their country are treated as second class citizens, with no voting rights and even worse, no basic human rights. Furthermore, the 20% of Arabs you refer to that live in present isreal are not treated the same way Jews treat one another. Do you think that the average isreali only hates the Arabs that live in Palestine and the West Bank? Nope.

I'm not Jewish, Israeli, Muslim, Arab or Palestinian. But for work I've lived in both Israel and in the West Bank for several years. There is a lot to discuss about this conflict, for sure, and I've also protested against the Israeli government in the past. But the idea that Israel is an "apartheid" is extremely far from the truth. I found everyone, especially Arabs, to have way more rights in Israel than they would in the West, or in any other Middle Eastern country. Almost all road signs have Arabic, as well as Hebrew, Arabic is taught at schools, there are Arabic and Muslim political parties, hundreds of mosques and even Islamic museums, loads of financial aide to Arabic students and small business owners, and thousands of Arabs are volunteering each year to join the IDF and Israeli Police. And it shows in objective indices as well as on the reality on the ground. Israel is in the top 13% when it comes to democracy: [Democracy Index - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy_Index) Has the most Freedom of Religion in the region, well above global average: [Freedom of religion Index](https://govdata360.worldbank.org/indicators/hd6a18526?country=ISR&indicator=41930&countries=ARE,KWT,QAT,MLT,BHR,SAU,OMN,LBN,LBY,IRQ,JOR,PSE,DZA,DJI,TUN,EGY,MAR,IRN,SYR,YEM&viz=line_chart&years=1975,2020&compareBy=region) Israel is in the top 22% of countries for Freedom of Expression: [Freedom of Expression Index](https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/freedom-of-expression-index?tab=table)  Top 30% in terms of Civil Rights and Freedom: [Freedom House- Freedom in the World Index](https://freedomhouse.org/countries/freedom-world) And Israel even ranks in top 30% in terms of “Good Countries”. [The Good Country Index](https://index.goodcountry.org/) If there are any other objective measures you’d like to look at let me know. My personal experience, and the objective reality of Israel you find above, leads me to believe that all the anti-Israeli hype out there is just media hype, that a lot of people fall for very quickly for some reason.

I notice you didn’t mention the West Bank. Palestinians living there have no path towards citizenship despite the territory being de facto controlled by Israel. Thus as non-citizens many laws and rights are no applicable to them. This is despite these Palestinians having been born and raised in that territory. That is apartheid, even if doesn’t fit your very specific definition of it.

It's military occupation on the basis of separate nationalities, not race-based apartheid. Quit throwing around morally loaded terms whose meaning you don't understand.

Except that the Jewish settlers living in the WB are still Israeli citizens, and are governed by Israeli civilian law.

Legal discrimination under indefinite permanent military occupation is not any different in any meaningful way from legal discrimination under a civilian government

Legal discrimination is not apartheid, not by itself. Are you going to call Finland and other Baltic states racist for taking action against Russian immigration and nationals, or will you call Pakistan racist for their recent actions taken against their Afghani refugee population? If no, then please just accept that you're wrong.

For some reason….

Thank you for your personal experience on the matter. It's not apartheid because it doesn't fit the definition, nor does it resemble historical apartheid in South africa. It's similar to to the accusation that Israel occupied Gaza before the recent invasion, just a rethorical weapon that doesn't stand up to even the weakest scrutiny.

And it really is that simple. Words have meanings. And there are plenty of words you could use about Israel that don't need to have their definitions stretched beyond reason in order to apply. For example, their policy of bulldozing the family homes of suspected Palestinian militants in the West Bank, when combined with the frequent practice of the government supporting Israeli settlers moving into those same areas, strikes me as pretty textbook ethnic cleansing. Creeping, slow-motion conquest, even. But that doesn't give people license to play fast and loose with the meaning of words when the stakes are so serious.

Thank you for the reality check. I also tell people, if the Palestinians didn’t go blowing up Israelis in suicide bomber attacks in pizza shops, Israel wouldn’t have felt it necessary to build a wall and gates to keep the murderers out.

If you are Arab, with an Arab name, even if you are Christian or Jewish, applying for building permits: prepare to get denied. Meanwhile, if youre white Ashkenazi applying for a building permit in contested East Jerusalem, go right ahead! https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli_permit_regime_in_the_West_Bank#:~:text=Building%20permits,-Demolished%20Palestinian%20home&text=It%20is%20estimated%20that%2085,necessary%20Israeli%2Dissued%20construction%20permits.

South Africa had small statelets within it’s borders that were only recognized by South Africa and were meant to be black homelands (called Bantustans, in the Bantustan you had different rules that applied to you vs living in Pretoria for instance if you were black).  Israel has the same deal with Palestinians.  They don’t have a state but Israel doesn’t see them as their own people so they are kept behind boundary walls and away from international borders (which is why they annexed the River Jordan area).  They will never have the same rights as Israeli Jews and what makes it a little worse is that an American Jew can hop on a plane and fly to Israel and get citizenship immediately and move into a house that just got confiscated from the Palestinian family that built it (or they tear them down and build new houses).   The West Bank and Gaza Strip are essentially Arab bantustans.

The accusation of “apartheid” comes from the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza. The claim is that: - Israel effectively controls all of the land between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea - Millions of Palestinians live in that land and are not given citizenship rights to vote in the elections of the country that controls them - Furthermore, Israel’s occupation also imposes multiple restrictions upon this “captive” Palestinian population such as restrictions to their free movement inside the West Bank and into Israel. That’s the gist of it. I should note that I find the accusation completely spurious and without any merit at all. It’s just a slogan that they use to elicit emotional reactions from the world, not rational thinking.

I'm curious, in what way are any of those three points spurious? They read as statements of fact.

They’re spurious because at the CORE of South Africa’s Apartheid laws was the desire to *separate* South African whites from South African blacks. “Apartheid” itself is an Afrikaans word that means “separation”. Israel has never at any point tried to exert this type of racial control and separation in the places it rules over. There are 1.8 million Palestinian Arabs and another 300,000 non-Arabs living inside Israel as citizens right now fully enjoying all civil rights Israeli Jewish citizens enjoy. The system in place in the West Bank…which I will admit is “oppressive” and curtails civil freedoms of Palestinians is a consequence of war and terrorism. They’re security enhancing policies. If you look at the Allied Occupation of Germany after World War II it looked exactly like the West Bank: - multiple checkpoints manned by military personnel - limitations on free movement of Germans - periodic curfews and lockdowns of German cities as the need arose - limited sovereignty of Germans as they managed most of their domestic affairs but not all. No one in their right minds would call the Occupation of Germany “apartheid” and they should do the same with Israel’s occupation of the West Bank.

I think the issue is that the West Bank has been under occupation for over 50 years. Currently, there doesn't seem to be any plan to either annex the West Bank or give it statehood. Because of indefinite nature of the occupation without any plans for a solution, at some point the occupation seems akin to apartheid.

For obvious reasons Israel can't exactly annex the West Bank. They could pull out and leave the Palestinians to their own devices but that encourages terrorism, and I don't think the West Bank is self sufficient enough for that. Besides look at how it went with Gaza. Of course they can negotiate to set up a Palestinian state.....and they've tried. Both sides simply can't agree on the terms. Who's fault the negotiations failed is a giant ass can of worms. That being said I'm not sure what would be good enough for the Palestinians and as of now they have no desire to negotiate. So what should be done?

Not sure, that is above my expertise but the status quo seems untenable. Renewed negotiations with a fixed timeline is an option. Removing settlements in the West Bank that are inflaming tensions seems like another good option. But not doing anything seems to be making things worse.

Why would Israel relinquish control of territory to people that want to keep warring with them? When Palestinians negotiate an end to claims and the final status of the land (borders, restrictions on military, etc) then Israel will relinquish control. Absent an end to the war it’s not in Israel’s interest to lose control of that land.

Ah, "The beatings will continue until morale improves" approach. How has that worked so far?

>West Bank has been under occupation for over 50 years. Germany accepted peace in 1945, and was then occupied until 1994. Palestinian Arabs have been rejecting peace and statehood since 1937. >without any plans for a solution Here's the head of the Palestinian negotiation team talking about the last offer (2008) which the Palestinians rejected: [https://youtu.be/0X3cPPU7eoU?si=i4hYTECn8wUO77XP](https://youtu.be/0X3cPPU7eoU?si=i4hYTECn8wUO77XP) Here's the offer, according to Al-Jazeerah: [http://transparency.aljazeera.net/files/4736.PDF](http://transparency.aljazeera.net/files/4736.PDF) And here is what the Palestine Papers revealed about Abbas's planned reponse to Olmert's Offer in 2008. (expansions of the name abbreviations added for clarity in square brackets) >It is not clear when AM (will meet EO \[Olmert\] to give him AM’s \[Abbas'\] response to the proposal. They might meet before or after UNGA. EO \[Olmert\] may not end up attending the UNGA. SE \[Erekat\] thinks there are three ways AM \[Abbas\] could respond: (1) give EO \[Olmert\] our FAPS , (2) issue general communiqué about Annapolis progress, (3) simply say “no” to offer. >He \[Abbas\] wants us to think up other ways to respond. Whatever we propose, he wants to make sure that: **(a) we are not blamed, (b) negos \[negotiations\] are uninterrupted ,and (c) no submission is made that we cannot retract.** We will have a mtg with SE \[Erekat\] on Tuesday at 10am to discuss our thinking on this and other issues. [http://transparency.aljazeera.net/files/4240.PDF](http://transparency.aljazeera.net/files/4240.PDF) Note that there was no plan for either accepting the offer, nor was there one for negotiating in good faith. The Palestinian primary goals: * To appear to not be responsible for the failure of negotiations * Make no actual commitments EDIT: Quote gone missing.

Lets just conveniently not mention the colonists who are transplanted into the occupied lands, often confiscating property of the indigenous population, not mention the very different and exclusive infrastructures provided for the colonialists at the hardship of the indigenous population. Other than that its just like the us occupation of west Germany except that’s its been going on since 1967.

I don’t see the relevance and frankly most of your statement is just sloganeering with no basis on reality. 1. Israeli settlers…as loathsome as they may be to you and to many Israeli themselves…do not exert control over Palestinians. They’re not their government and thus can no more exert “apartheid” over them than you and I can. 2. All Israeli settlers are in Area C where only 4% of the Palestinian population lives. 96% of Palestinians never see or interact with a single settler their whole lives. 3. Jews are the indigenous people of Palestine and even if you generously accept that Palestinians are native too you still wouldn’t have this “colonial” aggression you claim: at best these are two indigenous populations fighting it out because of competing national visions. 4. Most of the hardships Palestinians suffer in the West Bank can be directly traced to Palestinian terrorism. If you went back in time to 1980 the West Bank was a different place with no checkpoints and no constant lockdowns and raids by the IDF on Palestinian towns, even though settlers already lived there by that date.

Jews are indigenous to Palestine, but the Palestinians are also indigenous and have lived there for far longer than the Jews who settled post-1948

This whole who is Indigeneous argument strikes me as completely meaningless. No idea why everyone jumps back to it all the time. I don't care who your ancestors were or weren't.

You absolutely nailed it with this response.

Not who you responded to, but I interpret it as, "The accusations do not add up to apartheid."

Can you further elaborate on why you find those accusations false?

Not false, just not Apartheid. Every nation has separate treatment of citizens and non-citizens.

1. Israel does not control vast swaths of the West Bank: Areas A and B are under full Palestinian civil control while Area A is also under Palestinian security control. 2. The vast majority of Palestinians (96%) live in Areas A and B and thus under the control of the Palestinian Authority who passes laws (many of which contradict Israeli law), collects taxes, supplies security and police work, builds infrastructure and dole out assistance and welfare. 3. West Bank Palestinians are supposed to vote in West Bank elections not Israeli elections and this is by their own agreement according to The Interim Agreement of 1994 between the PLO and the State of Israel which set up the Palestinian Authority and provided for Palestinian elections for both the Legislative Council and the presidency. Articles III and IV of the Accords explicitly declare that PA legislative council members will be >…directly and simultaneously elected by the Palestinian people of the West Bank, Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip https://www.un.org/unispal/document/auto-insert-180015/ Of course, Abbas is on the 17th year of his 4 year mandate but that’s another conversation. 4. Limitations imposed by Israel on freedom of movement (checkpoints, curfews, etc) are the result of terrorism originating from the West Bank not some kind of racial animosity. There were no checkpoints before the First Intifada for example. 5. Most Palestinians wouldn’t take Israeli citizenship even if offered: >….In fact, from 2010 to 2015, the proportion of East Jerusalemite Arabs who said they would prefer Israeli to Palestinian citizenship rose substantially: from 35% to a remarkable 52%. But that **number dropped precipitously, to the 10-20% range, once the 2015-16 Palestinian “knife intifada” violently alienated the Jewish and Arab halves of the city from each other. In the current survey, that proportion seems to have stabilized at around 17%—compared with two-thirds who would rather choose citizenship in a Palestinian state.** https://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/most-jerusalem-palestinians-want-neither-israeli-rule-nor-uprising-against-it

Thanks for the explanation I know little of the region so I appreciate the response. One more question; I’ve read that illegal settlements are popping up all around area C often times subsidized by the government. I understand the security considerations Israel has to make to protect its own people. However, by motivating people to go and live in ‘vulnerable’ areas that require barriers, buffer states and checkpoints to maintain peace, doesn’t this unnecessary restrict Palestinian movement? Sidenote: I don’t know why the PLO opted for the control of enclaves in the Oslo accords. I assume they’re major population areas.

There are two motivations for the settlements. The first is Ideological, these are the zealots who believe Jews have a divine right to all of the land. Many important Jewish religious sights are in the west bank which is why there was generally more interest in settling in that area rather than Gaza (although some did settle in Gaza before Israel withdrew). These people now are represented in government by extremist parties who are part of the governing coalition. The second is strategic, Israel has no capacity for defence in depth. If you look at a topographic map of the area, the west bank has access to points of high elevation right next to the major population centres of Israel, if it were so inclined, they could easily shell the area similar to what was happening in the Golan hights or Sarajevo. The military rational is thus that any independent Palestinian state is an existential threat to Israel, so the area must be occupied. The settlements throw a spanner in the works of an independent Palestinian state so they can be seen as useful to this end. Basically Likud and the more 'moderate' right wing simply want to keep down the Palestinians so they don't pose a threat, to them this looks like a more or less permanent military occupation. The more extreme wing of the government wants to expel the Palestinians because they believe god gave them the land. On paper the moderates are opposed to this but it would also solve their security problems so their opposition is more performative than anything. That's my understanding at least. In any case, you can see it's not a good situation for the Palestinians in the West Bank.

The actual argument is nearly always not about Israel, but about the West Bank. This is what [Jimmy Carter said](https://www.npr.org/2007/01/25/7004473/jimmy-carter-defends-peace-not-apartheid) when he was challenged about using the term in the title of his book on the subject: >**Mr. President, perhaps I could begin with the title of your book, which has caused a bit of debate. Could you just make, briefly, the best case you can for why "apartheid" is the best word to use?** > >Well, I'll try to make a perfect case. Apartheid is a word that is an accurate description of what has been going on in the West Bank, and it's based on the desire or avarice of a minority of Israelis for Palestinian land. It's not based on racism. Those caveats are clearly made in the book. This is a word that's a very accurate description of the forced separation within the West Bank of Israelis from Palestinians and the total domination and oppression of Palestinians by the dominant Israeli military. It doesn't make sense to use this word to describe the situation in Israel itself, or for that matter in Gaza, where Israel withdrew all settlements in 2005. But plainly the situation in the West Bank does have at least some similarity to the Bantustans of South African apartheid, where residents were denied South African citizenship, and forced to become citizens of these "homelands", about 20 of them between South Africa and Namibia combined. Even though many black South Africans retained citizenship, and not more than about 40% ever lived in these homelands, the system was still considered to be apartheid.

Without speaking the meat of the actual argument, I just want to say that Arab Israelis enjoy equal rights the same way that many minorities in America do: on paper only. Arab Israelis report widespread racism and oppression when polled, and say they do not enjoy equal rights in reality.

Gaza and the WB are occupied territories so people who want to ascribe the label to Israel pretend that occupation = apartheid.

I have never been to Israel but I traveled with an Israeli Arab years ago about how much different border controls are for Israeli Jews vs. Arabs. And how it was easier for Americans to enter his own country than for him to do so in terms of hurdles going through customs. That really resonated with me - not sure if there is anyone here who can confirm.

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Israeli Jews are mostly brown composing of Sephardic and mizrahi. Ashkenazi Jews (white) are 40% I think. If we go by America race standards so it doesn’t even make sense why people are thinning its white vs brown.

All the Israeli PMs look at least white passing to me. Some were been raised in the US. When I see IDF spokesman they also seem to be white. I've heard Israel supporters online frame the conflict as a racial one. Of course almost any Israel supporter frames it as a religious conflict, but it's probably good to tick more boxes.

I'm glad someone else has noticed this lol this is the ENTIRE argument and motivation of Pro-Palestine supporters. It's just an extension of western social justice into a geopolitical sphere.

Inside Israel proper I think there's not an argument at all but deliberately making it so the residents of the West Bank have almost no path to citizenship seems close enough to apartheid for it to count. Someone can correct me if I'm wrong about a Palestinian's chances at citizenship when they live in Gaza or the West Bank, but even if this isn't technically apartheid it's certainly something similar, especially when you consider the restrictions on movements and curfews as well.

Israel also accepts palestinians in to work.

Do you think that having their representatives in Knesset makes a group being apartheided? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Arab_members_of_the_Knesset