Palestinians Say US Is “Normalizing Apartheid” by Hosting Israeli President

As President Biden meets with Israeli President Isaac Herzog on the White Home at the moment, a number of progressive Democrats have introduced plans to boycott Herzog’s deal with to a joint session of Congress. This comes after Biden invited Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to go to america this 12 months regardless of just lately criticizing the make-up of Netanyahu’s far-right Cupboard as “probably the most extremist” he has seen. The visits from Israeli management are an try to “normalize apartheid,” says Palestinian human rights lawyer Noura Erakat, who compares at the moment’s U.S. assist of Israel to the nation’s assist for South African apartheid. “The USA is complicit and a pillar of Israeli apartheid in its provision of unequivocal monetary, diplomatic and army assist.” Erakat additionally applauds the efforts of activists and politicians who’ve shifted Democrats’ sympathies extra towards Palestine than Israel, in line with a latest Gallup ballot.

TRANSCRIPT

It is a rush transcript. Copy is probably not in its ultimate kind.

AMY GOODMAN: President Biden is assembly Israeli President Isaac Herzog on the White Home at the moment. On Wednesday, Herzog will deal with a joint session of Congress, although a number of progressive Democrats have introduced plans to boycott his speech. The group consists of Congressmembers Rashida Tlaib, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Cori Bush, Ilhan Omar and Jamaal Bowman. Cori Bush wrote, “The Israeli authorities is answerable for implementing an apartheid state and rampantly abusing the rights of Palestinians. Congress shouldn’t be giving a platform to the President of a rustic that reveals no respect for human rights. I cannot be attending his joint deal with,” unquote.

On Monday, President Biden spoke with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and invited him for a gathering in america this 12 months. Biden just lately criticized the make-up of Netanyahu’s far-right Cupboard, describing it as, quote, “probably the most extremist” he’s ever seen in Israel.

Israeli President Herzog’s go to to the White Home comes simply weeks after the Israeli army attacked the Jenin refugee camp, killing at the very least 12 Palestinians in Israel’s largest army operation within the occupied West Financial institution in 20 years.

We start at the moment’s present with Noura Erakat. She’s a Palestinian human rights lawyer and affiliate professor at Rutgers College. She’s the creator of Justice for Some: Legislation and the Query of Palestine.

Let’s start with Herzog’s go to, the Israeli president, to Biden, the deal with, joint session of Congress, after which, yesterday, President Biden talking personally on the cellphone with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, inviting him to america. Your response, Noura Erakat?

NOURA ERAKAT: So, let’s simply start by establishing the context, that that is 2023, within the aftermath of the legacy human rights organizations, Israeli human rights organizations, U.N. committees, U.N. businesses, in addition to a number of students and impartial investigations have all concluded that Israel oversees an apartheid regime. That is additionally in a context the place, for the reason that collapse of the peace course of in 2000, Israel has made clear that there shall be no Palestinian state, there shall be no such factor as binationalism, that they’ll catalyze and improve their takeover of Palestinian lands and their removing. They’ve shifted from occupation to warfare.

It is a utterly totally different universe than the one existed in 2000, and but the rhetoric and the suggestions surrounding Isaac Herzog’s invitation and speech is one which utterly ignores all of that. So, it’s necessary to emphasise that this effort inside Congress, particularly amongst a mainstream Democratic aspect, is supposed to normalize apartheid. It’s not simply saying that they wish to defend Israel. They’re saying that if that is in actual fact apartheid, as all of those luminaries and specialists have concluded, then on this case it’s OK, it must be an exception, and it must be exemplary for others to observe.

And so, I applaud the progressive members of Congress who’re skipping this deal with. I encourage different members of Congress to do the identical and proceed — proceed to construct the momentum amongst a progressive base that sees Palestine squarely inside a social justice agenda. That is already manifest in social justice actions, resembling Black-Palestinian transnational solidarity, that has centered that it is a joint battle, that has endorsed BDS, and that, in actual fact, catapulted many of those progressive Democrats into workplace. That is additionally evident amongst the Democrats themselves. Not solely has Israel develop into a bipartisan subject, however for the primary time ever, extra Palestinian — extra Democrats sympathize with Palestinians than they do with Israelis, in line with a 2023 Gallup ballot. Proceed to construct that momentum. Resist this motion to normalize apartheid.

What the members of Congress are doing with the invitation, what they did in response to Consultant Jayapal’s very correct assertion that Israel is a racist state, is akin to gaslighting, for lack of a greater phrase, however actually is normalization that’s responding to the truth that they’ve misplaced the battle on the grassroots degree and are attempting to stem, from the highest down, what they couldn’t defeat from the underside up. And we see this not solely on this normalization, however we additionally see it within the passage of anti-BDS resolutions, in addition to the adoption of the Israel Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition that desires to equate criticism of Israel with antisemitism.

AMY GOODMAN: Noura, I needed to play the clip you had been simply referring to, to the Progressive Caucus chair, Congressmember Pramila Jayapal, who made headlines this weekend after she referred to as Israel a “racist state” whereas talking on the Netroots Nation convention in Chicago Saturday.

REP. PRAMILA JAYAPAL: I need you to know that we now have been combating to make it clear that Israel is a racist state, that the Palestinian folks deserve self-determination and autonomy, that the dream — that the dream of a two-state resolution is slipping away from us.

AMY GOODMAN: After going through criticism, Congressmember Jayapal later clarified her feedback, writing, quote, “I don’t imagine the concept of Israel as a nation is racist. I do, nevertheless, imagine that Netanyahu’s excessive right-wing authorities has engaged in discriminatory and outright racist insurance policies and that there are excessive racists driving that coverage throughout the management of the present authorities. … We all know that the established order is unacceptable, untenable, and unjust,” Pramila Jayapal stated. Your response to that, Noura Erakat?

NOURA ERAKAT: One, I wish to level out that nothing that she stated was controversial. If Consultant Jayapal is flawed, then so are all of the specialists and the advocates that examine this subject and that apply it throughout the globe. So, the assault on her is definitely a bullying and harassment assault that’s meant to scare everybody else from even having a dialog and acknowledging this actuality on the bottom, and, most significantly, taking accountability for it.

The USA isn’t just a bystander right here. The USA is complicit and a pillar of Israeli apartheid in its provision on unequivocal monetary, diplomatic and army assist, that, however for that assist, Israel couldn’t maintain this regime, which isn’t stunning, which isn’t stunning in any respect, as a result of the U.S. was the final pillar to fall, the final domino to fall, in sustaining apartheid in South Africa, the place it needed to fall according to everybody else. However throughout apartheid South Africa and the worldwide marketing campaign towards it throughout that regime’s tenure, america issued essentially the most vetoes throughout the Safety Council to guard apartheid there, simply — to guard apartheid in Namibia and South Africa, and right here we’re seeing the same sample.

As to the best way that Consultant Jayapal amended her assertion, be aware that she didn’t stroll it again. She didn’t say that Israel is a racist state. She needed to make a distinction between Israeli folks and the Israeli authorities. However what we have to perceive right here — and that is necessary for the viewers to know — that she used the time period “Israeli nation,” and there’s no such factor as an Israeli nationwide inside Israel’s regulation.

And that is the crux of the matter. Israel bifurcates Jewish nationality from Israeli residents in order that it might probably stream all the possessory rights to land, to employment, to housing, to the proper to life via Jewish nationality in a method that it’s extraterritorialized, so {that a} pubescent Jewish teen, who doesn’t even know the place Israel is on the map, ostensibly has extra declare than a Palestinian grandma who’s 80 years previous, who was born earlier than the state of Israel was established in 1948, has to these rights. Underneath any state of affairs, we’d decry this technique as being discriminatory, contravening liberal norms of democracy. However on this state of affairs, the worldwide group, particularly america and Western governments, wish to insist that this exception is appropriate and exemplary.

And what I wish to emphasize is that it really isn’t just dangerous to Palestinians, as evidenced by the systematic killing of Palestinians, the removing and the hurt inflicted upon them, however that these concepts aren’t contained simply to Israel-Palestine, however in actual fact are exported. These concepts of what sovereignty ought to appear to be are exported the world over. We see it embodied by the Hindutva motion in India and its reigning authorities. We additionally see it embodied even in america by European supremacists resembling Richard Spencer, who says that he envisions that the way forward for European sovereignty must be modeled upon Israel’s mannequin of sovereignty. These concepts are harmful. And it’s not that we wish to make an exception right here. We wish to really make it clear that there must be no state of affairs the place states aren’t states that belong to all people who’s there, reasonably than to a nationality that exists extraterritorially.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Noura Erakat, I needed to ask you — President Biden’s announcement that he has invited Prime Minister Netanyahu additionally to go to america, after months of claiming that he had no plans to take action, particularly in gentle of the big settlement enlargement that the Netanyahu authorities has been concerned in — I feel the group, the watchdog group, Peace Now has stated that 12,800 settlements throughout the West Financial institution have been established since January by the Netanyahu authorities. Your response to this, the Biden presidency simply saying, “Nicely, we’re inviting Netanyahu to return to the U.S. once more”?

NOURA ERAKAT: Pay attention, the 13,000-some settlements are simply the tip of the iceberg. Israel has really transferred authority of the West Financial institution from army supervision to civilian oversight. They’ve principally taken the fig leaf off, that this isn’t a brief state of affairs, however that it is a everlasting situation, they usually’re planning for annexation. This contravenes the diplomatic consensus on the two-state resolution, which is fraught by itself.

However much more than that, this contravenes even the U.S. and this U.S. administration, particularly the Biden administration. They didn’t wish to invite Netanyahu not simply due to his contravention and violations towards Palestinians — I feel that that will be fairly formidable on our half — however, in actual fact, it was Netanyahu who undermined a sitting president in making an attempt to ascertain Iranian nuclear rapprochement. It was Netanyahu who got here to Congress to deal with a joint session to really torpedo President Obama’s try to ascertain an Iran nuclear settlement, and acquired a number of standing ovations. That is the Biden administration’s legacy.

So, the truth that not solely has this been overturned, however now they’re going to ask Netanyahu however with out stepping again any of these missteps, any of that betrayal, is an about-face and says quite a bit in regards to the Democratic administration and the place Israel suits, whereby so far as america is worried, they’ve thrown up their fingers, that they’ll proceed to offer unequivocal assist and place completely no situations on Israel’s habits, on Israel’s participation, even in furtherance of the U.S.’s nationwide pursuits within the area.