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Israel Will Never Be an Apartheid State

(Los Angeles Times) Michael Oren - Apartheid imposed strict legal barriers between South African whites and all black people. It was synonymous with undiluted racism. The word "apartheid" is wielded by Israel's enemies to delegitimize the Jewish state. Yet the situation in Israel does not even remotely resemble apartheid. The vast majority of Jews and Palestinians in the West Bank choose to live apart because of cultural and historical differences, not segregation, though thousands of them do work side by side. Separate roads were created in response to terrorist attacks - not to segregate Palestinians but to save Jewish lives. And Israeli roads are used by Israeli Jews and Arabs alike. The separation of schools is, again, a cultural choice similar to that made by secular and Orthodox Jews and Muslim and Christian Palestinians. Many Palestinians, however, study in Israeli institutions such as Ariel University, located in a settlement. Thousands of Palestinians, many from Hamas-controlled Gaza, are treated at Israeli hospitals. The security barrier is no more an apartheid wall than the fence between the United States and Mexico. Palestinian leaders aspire to create a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza from which all Jews have been expelled. That is truly apartheid. In Jerusalem and elsewhere in Israel, Jews and Arabs mix freely and increasingly live in the same neighborhoods. There is no imposed segregation. Go to any Israeli mall, any restaurant or hospital, and you will see Arabs and Jews interacting. The writer was Israel's ambassador to the U.S. from 2009 to 2013.
2014-05-20 00:00:00
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