I would hardly be the first to describe Israel's atrocities in the occupied Palestinian territories as fascist or Nazi-like crimes. Indeed, many writers and intellectuals around the world have made the same comparison, including Israelis.
Despite Israel's many attempts to present itself as a paragon of justice and modernity, its crimes have become too blatant and odious for the world to ignore them. From its racist rhetoric to its militancy, to its campaigns of ethnic cleansing, Israel's government has increasingly come to resemble the very same Nazi regime whose horrors prompted the founding of the Jewish state.
Most obviously, Israel shares with fascist regimes a policy of racial segregation, enforced through deportations, legal discrimination and collective punishment. Israel's policy towards the Palestinians has often been compared to that of the former apartheid regime of South Africa, both in its actions and in its justifications. Miguel D'Escoto Brockman, president of the UN General Assembly, has described the Israeli policy in Palestine as racist.
The world, according to Brockman, must consider imposing against Israel punishments similar to those South Africa faced during apartheid. Even the architect of apartheid, former South African prime minister Hendrik F. Verwoerd, said: "Like South Africa, Israel is an apartheid state where Jews have taken Palestine from the Arabs, who have lived there for 1,000 years."
Outgoing Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert was right to express concern that Israel may become an apartheid state; many would say it is already there.
Another link between Israel and fascism lies in the ideological premises on which it justifies its actions. Israel's right to exist is ideologically based in the notion that the Jews, as God's 'chosen people', are uniquely entitled to the 'promised land' of Israel, a right that overrides that of any other people, regardless of their own historical attachments to the same 'promised land'.
This premise echoes the link between people and land espoused by national socialism. Likewise, fascism has historically been born out of a sense of insecurity and inferiority. It is ironic that Zionism, a movement created in opposition to anti-Jewish racism, genocide and discrimination, has moved on to inflict the same upon another people.
Perhaps the most striking similarities between Israel's government and that of fascist regimes lies in what it says, and how. When the new right-wing government came to power in Israel early this year, some of its members made statements eerily reminiscent of those of Adolf Hitler when he came to power through elections, using the façade of democracy to annul all prior agreements and treaties.
Avigdor Lieberman, head of the right-wing ultra-nationalist party Yisrael Beitenu, declared immediately after assuming office as foreign minister that the 2007 Annapolis agreements were not binding on Israel. Lieberman, who has been described as a fascist by the Israeli left, said the principle of a Palestinian state had never been recognised by the Israeli government or voted on in the Knesset.
He further argued that 'concessions' made by Israel in past agreements were harmful to the state's security, and blamed these 'concessions' for precipitating the second war against Lebanon and the recent assault on Gaza. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in a speech before the Knesset, ignored mentioning the two-state solution, referring only to a final status agreement in which Palestinians might manage their civil affairs.
This enraged the Palestinian president, who said that "Netanyahu neither believes in peace nor in the two-state solution. He has no respect for signed agreements and he does not wish to halt colony construction. This is clear."
The Israeli government's consistent obstruction of the peace process has furthermore been bolstered by Israeli writers, who disparage the two-state solution agreed upon by the rest of the world and reject any solution that does not categorically deny the Palestinians their right to self-determination.
Giora Eiland, former head of Israel's National Security Council, wrote of the two state solution: "Not only is it far from being the single solution, it's a bad solution, and will likely never be achieved." Eiland believes the evacuation of certain colonies "would be extremely difficult, likely generating resistance beyond anything experienced to date". Yakov Katz, leader of the extremist right-wing National Union Party, and a member of the present government, put it this way: "With the help of the Lord, in a few years to come, there will be one state, the State of Israel [after the annexation of the West Bank, at minimum]."
On the other hand, many Israelis and advocates of Israel abroad ardently oppose the dangerous rhetoric of figures as Lieberman and Katz. J Street, a US based group that promotes American leadership to end Arab-Israeli conflict, is soliciting signatures for an open letter denouncing Lieberman's anti-peace statements.
Former foreign minister and current opposition leader in the Knesset Tzipi Livni has strongly attacked Lieberman for the same reason. The Israeli media have also come down hard on Lieberman, with the left-wing daily Haaretz saying in an editorial that Israel would pay a high price for his mistakes, while Yedioth Ahronoth asked the foreign minister to take "private lessons in the art of diplomacy in order to get acquainted with basic facts before making foolish statements".
Dr As'ad Abdul Rahman is the chairman of the Palestinian Encyclopedia.
