Israel is based on a system of apartheid, in which the Palestinian part of the population has fewer rights. That writes human rights organization Amnesty International in a Tuesday published report. Israel has reacted furiously.
Amnesty says Israel has set up a system that oppresses and controls Palestinians with the aim of benefiting Jewish Israelis. Legislation and policy aim in theory and practice to exert “cruel” control over Palestinians, who have become geographically and politically divided, Amnesty said. Moreover, according to the NGO, the Palestinian part of the population often lives in poverty and in constant fear and insecurity.
The international human rights organization denounces “responsible and powerful” governments of other countries for refusing to hold Israel to account. Amnesty describes the peace process between the Israelis and the Palestinians as “dying”, and calls on Israel to end the system of apartheid, “an international crime”.
The Israeli government has furious responded, calling the report false, biased and anti-Semitic. “Israel isn’t perfect,” Foreign Secretary Yair Lapid said, “but it is a democracy committed to international law and open to critical assessment.”
Sheikh Jarrah
Violence between Israel and the Palestinians flared up again in May 2021, after several families in Sheikh Jarrah, a Palestinian neighborhood in East Jerusalem, rebelled against a decision by an Israeli court. He had ordered them to leave their homes to make way for Jewish settlers. Amnesty International’s new investigation examines the situation surrounding last year’s violence, but also examines the broader context in which Palestinians live.
Human Rights Watch, another human rights organization, stated in 2021 that Israel is conducting an apartheid regime. In doing so, it sided with Palestinian and Israeli organizations such as B’Tselem and Yesh Din Israel, which have long accused the country of apartheid. Apartheid, where different population groups are not equal before the law, is a crime against humanity under international law.
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