Apartheid in the State of Israel?

Intially written on April 9 as comment #6806 in response to a Reports post by Norman Solomon, "Foreclosing a Media Debate on U.S. Policies Toward Israel", on truthdig.com.

Also, read comment #6818 by "Frank - an american Patriot".

Well, here goes!

But seeing as how I am already retired, 67, and with a chronic life-threatening illness ... I am not too worried about the backlash from the Israeli cheering section. In fact, they will probably understand that a little notoriety will merely provide welcome attention at my stage of life, get the blood flowing and prolong my existence.

I read the “working paper by professors John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt that was excerpted last month in the London Review of Books.” It made a lot of sense to me and fit my take on the news from the Middle East and elsewhere during my lifetime.

Granted, I’m not a Middle East Scholar. I’m a member of the working class, born a Swedish-American farm boy in Duluth, Minnesota back before World War II and raised by a mother who firmly believed that the establishment of the State of Israel was a sign of the imminent Second Coming of Jesus.

But I’ve read the newspapers all my life and I can’t escape the similarities between the modern State of Israel and the recent history of apartheid in South Africa. And whenever the issue of apartheid is brought up as a yardstick, there doesn’t seem to be a consistent rational discussion from the “Israeli” side of the issue relative to the facts. Rather there seems to be a lot of agitation and yelling of slurs at the person who has the temerity to suggest that we examine the facts. Isn’t that in itself a sure sign that argument is on target and has hit a sore spot? Why don’t those who disagree simply refute the argument?

Another big point to this little ol’ farm boy ... how come we get so excited about everyone having “the bomb” except when Israel got it?

I mean, I am sure the deterence effect of Israel having “the bomb” hasn’t escaped the notice of others in the region. I mean, the deterence effect of North Korea having “the bomb” certainly hasn’t escaped anyone’s notice.

Note: And now we want to toss the nonproliferation treaty overboard for India’s sake?

Somehow this idea of Chosen People of God (the Judaic-Christian God, by the way) having a Manifest Destiny has gone far enough. (Like watching children starve to death as we impose globalization on the world is not exactly my idea of Jesus’s message.)

The message behind the showdown in the Middle East was given by the same God (earlier phase of development?) through Joshua at Jericho:

Joshua 6:21 (King James Version) “And they utterly destroyed all that was in the city, both man and woman, young and old, and ox, and sheep, and ass, with the edge of the sword”