The Zionist state has always portrayed itself as a country holding civilised western values as the basic code of its behaviour. Yet, the apartheid/colonial reality of the Zionist state contradicts this fabricated image marketed by Zionist propaganda machines in the western world. Indeed, the Zionist state has always aimed to convince western minds that Israel shares the western democratic values of liberty, equality, justice and the rule of law regardless of race, colour, gender or ethnicity. It has also painted itself as an image of a civilised democratic western extension living in the wilderness of a backward and undemocratic Middle East. Indeed, Israel’s aim has always been to convince the West that any attack against it is really directed against the western civilisation because Israel is its representative and guardian in the Middle East. This false image of the Zionist state has finally been shattered into pieces in the western minds by the brutality of the colonial/ apartheid occupation in Palestine. The awareness acquired by the western minds of the colonial/apartheid reality of the Zionist State has raised questions in the western world pertaining to the legitimacy of the Zionist state which is violating, on a daily basis, international law and legitimacy.
Only days before the UN recognised Palestine as a non-member observer state, the Israeli TV channel 10 broadcast a news report prepared by the Israeli foreign ministry, confirming “that the frozen peace process between Israel and the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) has greatly harmed Israel’s reputation and is threatening the very legitimacy of Israel as a State”. The Maariv Hebrew newspaper recently summed up a report prepared by a new department in charge of answering anti-Israeli campaigns around the world, attacking Israel’s colonial and apartheid occupation in Palestine. The newspaper wrote that “freezing the peace process and the opposition to the UN recognition of Palestine as a non-member state, while expanding the settlements [colonies] is undermining Israel’s legitimacy around the world”. An experienced Israeli diplomat and a member of the group that prepared the report commented that “the Israeli negative response to the UN recognition of Palestine as a non-member State has resulted in a negative reaction towards Israel”. Moreover, following Israel’s punitive decision to build thousands of housing units in Israeli colonies, the Financial Times criticised the move saying: “Israel’s decision to build 3,000 new colonial dwellings in the West Bank, as a response to the resounding diplomatic Palestinian victory in the United Nations, has brought to Israel a diplomatic isolation for all to see”. The newspaper further pointed out that only eight states supported Israel out of 193 in the UN, revealing a fact that European countries supported the Palestinian move, despite abstentions of European countries considered as ardent supporters of Israel, like Germany and Holland. France, Spain and Italy supported the Palestinians with the French President saving his most critical comment for Israel: “I preferred not to resort to sanctions against Israel to pressure it to withdraw its decision to build more settlements [colonies]”. Germany’s Chancellor, Angela Merkel, issued a stern warning to Netanyahu, asking him to choose between peace — including the establishment of a Palestinian State — or face international sanction and isolation”.
The Zionist state has stuck its head in the sand in self-denial of the apartheid/colonial reality of its policy, ignoring many Israeli commentators’ warning of its isolation and a steady erosion of its legitimacy as a state in the eyes of world public opinion. Articles in the Israeli media referred to the cause of isolation stemming from policies imposed by Israel on the occupied Palestinian territories by a far-right government headed by Benjamin Netanyahu. Haaretz wrote that “the decision to build new settlements [colonies] to punish the Palestinians for going to the UN and gaining a non-member status has turned to be a decision taken against the world that calls for the establishment of a viable independent Palestinian state, rejecting the Israeli occupation, at the same time”. The newspaper said: “Israel’s refusal of the set principles established by the international community represented by a two-state solution is going to isolate Israel driving it outside international law and legitimacy.” In another article, Haaretz noted that “Netanyahu is unique among all his predecessors who established in his mind the ideology of black and white in which wisdom and justice belong to his side and sees a Palestinian State detrimental to the survival of Israel”. Along the same lines, Yehuda Ben Meir spoke of a “bitter truth” in an article saying: “The vote at the United Nations proved Israel’s complete isolation in the world. It is an isolation seldom seen in Israel since the Sinai operation”. Ari Shivit wrote that Israel’s Foreign Minister, Avigdor Lieberman, has failed in his job and that “he has managed to fool the whole country playing a game of hating the Arabs, along with Heridim at the same time, to wreck our Israeli house in order to build his own ‘House of Israel’”.
There is no doubt that the present condition of the Zionist state has deteriorated to the very low level of a colonial/apartheid status, not only because of the far-right ideology of Likud and Israel Beitouna parties, led by Netanyahu and Lieberman, but also because of the egotistical motto of the so-called “Chosen People of God” that completely negates others and lays the basis for a naked colonial/apartheid pariah.
Professor As’ad Abdul Rahman is the Chairman of the Palestinian Encyclopaedia.
