Jerusalem
The findings from an Arab-led group were not cleared or fully backed by U.N. leadership and does not set new policies toward Israel. Yet it reflects another attempt to use a U.N. forum to denounce Israel and seek to put its Western allies on the defensive at a time when some have questioned Israel’s hard-line approach, including expansion of settlements in the West Bank.
Apartheid was a term once associated with South Africa’s white-rule system, but now represents a broad term for crimes against humanity under international law and the Rome Statute that set up the International Criminal Court, said the report in its executive summary made public on Wednesday.
Israelis, who find the term apartheid inaccurate and inflammatory when applied to their conflict with the Palestinians, immediately slammed the report. One government spokesman even compared it to Nazi tabloid Der Sturmer, which promoted Nazi propaganda and was virulently anti-Semitic.
The report, published by the U.N.’s Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia, also drew sharp criticism from the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley, who called it “anti-Israel propaganda.”
U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres distanced himself from the findings, with spokesman Stephane Dujarric saying the report was published without any prior consultation with the U.N. secretariat.
“The report as it stands does not reflect the views of the secretary general,” Dujarric said.
Headquartered in Beirut, ESCWA’s membership comprises 18 Arab states, two of which — Jordan and Egypt — have peace treaties with Israel.
A statement released by Rima Khalaf, a U.N. undersecretary general and executive secretary of the committee, said concluding that a state has established an apartheid regime “is not an easy matter for a United Nations entity.”
“In recent years, some have labeled Israeli practices as racist, while others have warned that Israel risks becoming an apartheid state. A few have raised the question as to whether in fact it already has,” she said.
Entitled “Israeli Practices toward the Palestinian People and the Question of Apartheid,” the report was authored by Richard Falk, a former U.N. special rapporteur to the Palestinian territories known for harsh criticisms of both Israel and America, and Virginia Tilley, professor of political science at Southern Illinois University.
The two concluded that Israel has indeed established an apartheid regime aimed at dominating the Palestinians. Their recommendations include reviving the U.N. Center against Apartheid, which closed in 1994 after South Africa ended its apartheid practices. It also urges support for a boycott, divestment and sanctions campaign against Israel.
Dividing the Palestinian people into four distinct groups, the authors write that although they are treated differently by Israel they all face “the racial oppression that results from the apartheid regime.”
The first group identified is the roughly 1.7 million Palestinians who are full citizens of Israel, but who, the report found, live under “martial law” and are subjected to oppression because they are not Jewish.
The second group highlighted in the report is the estimated 300,000 Palestinians who live in East Jerusalem, a mostly Arab area. The report said these Palestinians “experience discrimination in access to education, health care, employment, residency and building rights.”
Thirdly are the 4.6 million Palestinians who live in the West Bank and Gaza. In the West Bank, the Jewish residents known as settlers are governed by Israeli civil law, while Palestinians live under military rule.
“This dual legal system, problematic in itself, is indicative of an apartheid regime,” said the authors.
The final group discussed in the report are the millions of Palestinian refugees who live outside Israeli territory and who are prohibited from returning to their homes in Israel or the occupied Palestinian territory.