Today is al-Quds Day, the day on which the anti-Israel rejectionist front hopes for the destruction of Israel and the liberation of Jerusalem. On this day, Mahmood Ahmadinejad gave a speech in celebration of al-Quds Day declaring that “the Zionists are groups of hypocrite racists who have been operating under the pretext of following Jewish religion principles.”
I wonder if The Washington Post realized the significance of this day, because today The Post ran a column by Professor George Bisharat also calling Israelis hypocrite racists and calling for the destruction of the Jewish state.
While everyone recognizes Ahmadinejad for who he is, few WaPo readers likely recognized Bisharat.
I have addressed Bisharat before.
Bisharat is a law professor who has built a career around demonizing and seeking to delegitimize Israel. Bisharat frequently uses a grossly exaggerated narrative of the loss of his family home in Jerusalem as part of his presentations. (Bisharat’s father was a Christian Arab whose family was not indigenous to any part of what now is Israel.)
Now Bisharat is at it again today, falsely comparing majority Jewish rule in Israel to minority white rule in South Africa as a justification for the destruction of Israel as a Jewish state.
Bisharat and others in the Islamist-Leftist coalition understand that bombs and missiles will not destroy Israel (although an Iranian nuke could change that), so ostracizing Israel as an apartheid state is the weapon of choice. Here is how Bisharat presents the problem in his column:
“Where is the Palestinian Mandela?” pundits occasionally ask. But after these latest Israeli-Palestinian peace talks in Washington fail — as they inevitably will — the more pressing question may be: “Where is the Israeli de Klerk?” Will an Israeli leader emerge with the former South African president’s moral courage and foresight to dismantle a discriminatory regime and foster democracy based on equal rights?
Bisharat’s column reads like the usual tired screed against Israel, seeking to blame the Jews for everything that has gone wrong in the Middle East, and painting a false picture of a bright and happy future for the Jews in a new Palestine:
I suppose that Bisharat will next seek to end Islamic rule throughout the Middle East.
How about this, the day after the Arab world and Iran do away with Islamic rule, Israel does away with Jewish rule?
Bisharat is not hopelessly idealistic. Bisharat is ruthless in his hostility towards Israel, and should be recognized as such.
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Related Posts:
What If Palestinians Were Settlers?
Law Professor Continues His Personal Intifada
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Comments
Bisharat's argument rests on his a priori assumption that because Israel is a "Jewish state," democracy or civil rights for Arabs in Israel must be a sham and Israelis hypocrites. But Israel's Jewish character is a function of its 80% Jewish population, not any repression of Arabs. The other 20% of Israel's population is Arab and mostly Muslim. Israeli Arabs have full and equal social and political rights, making the comparison to South African apartheidboth obscene and ludicrous. Arabs have been elected to serve in every Knesset since Israel's founding. I don't know what laws Bisharet refers to when he says Israeli Arabs have to endure de jure discrimination, but I suspect they are either laws applying to Arab residents of East Jeruselem and the Golan who have rejected the offer of Israeli citizenship or to post-1948 security measures. Arabs also serve in many public offices; in fact, one of the Justices of Israel's Supreme Court is an Arab, as are a couple of IDF generals.
In any case, why should Israel not be able to be a "Jewish state" when the constitution of Jordan describes that state as Arab and erects Islam as the established religion (remember, Jordan at the time this constitution was adopted had many Christian and Jewish residents). The same holds true of Morocco's constitution. Even the "revolutionary" 1963 constituion of Algeria — which had millions of Jewish and French Christian citiznes at the time — made Islam the state religion and adopted a flag with the Arab Crescent.
The Professor is right: let's see just ONE predominantly Muslim state in the region afford full rights to Jews and other non-Muslims.
I would kinda like to see them fight it out for Israel and Jerusalem. you know, draw a big circle in the sand and go at it…. last one standing gets the prize. I'm not an advocate of violence but it seems the only way to deal with the Muslims. One good butt whooping would have them "allahu akbaring" east into the "istans" faster than Shultzies panties get in a wad.
Even if you posit all of Bisharat's arguments to be true (and they are not), so what?
In essence the Arab argument is we are not bound to live in accordance of the principles we demand of you. To paraphrase the old line from the show Baretta "if you can't do the time, don't do the crime' if the Israeli's are going to do the time (boycotts, opprobrium etc) they might as well do the crime and expel the Arabs from the West Bank and turn Gaza and southern Lebanon in to a free fire zones next time rockets are launched from those areas. It's not as if they are going to hated any worse by those who hate them already. To use an American analogy, Israel should simply use eminent domain with respects to Jerusalem and the West Bank. Total up the putative value of the land and from that subtract the costs of more than sixty years of war perpetuated by the Arab States and send the Muslims a bill for the deficiency.
It's deju vu all over again.