ACTIONS BULLETIN - July 2021 * Read Jeff Halper’s new article on how Israel has weaponized antisemitism for its own purposes and in so doing has put Jews worldwide in harm's way * Study the June Demolition and Displacement Report * See the update on our NSPCC campaign * Use the Save the Children report to pressure political representatives * Listen to the podcast ‘Between the River and the Sea – One State?' * Support Palestinians in Hebron struggling against settler violence * Sign the petition about the Jewish National Fund and COP26
The Zionist Assault on Judaism
By Jeff Halper
Photo: Menahem Kahana / AFP / Getty Images
Zionism has not yet murdered Judaism but it has undermined its moral and historical integrity. By intentionally fanning antisemitism, Israel is a major contributor to Jewish insecurity.
If we take the straightforward dictionary definition of antisemitism rather than the tendentious IHRA one, we find that Zionism itself exhibits signs of anti-Jewish ideology.
Merriam-Webster defines antisemitism as “hostility toward or discrimination against Jews as a religious, ethnic, or racial group.” On this score, Zionism minced no words. In its foundational doctrine “the negation of the Exile,” Zionism, of course, did not discriminate per se against Jews as a religious, ethnic or racial group. It did, however, express hostility towards them, particularly in its devalorization of Jewish life and culture abroad over the past two millennia – often encapsulated in the dismissal and ridicule of “galut (exilic) mentality.” While targeting Jewish communities for the purpose of recruiting them to its settler project, Zionism repudiated them, denying their very validity, akin to conceptually eliminating the Palestinians as “natives” with no national existence or rights. It did so by defining Jews exclusively as a national group, a claim that annulled Jewish ethnicity, Jews’ ability to live among other peoples, and refashioned Jewish religion as an organ of the st ate – “Constantinian Judaism” as the anti-Zionist theologian Marc Ellis puts it. (Neither Diaspora Jews nor Zionists ever claimed that Jews are a race.)
wind in the world carries us. We in ourselves are almost non-existent, so of course we are nothing in the eyes of other people either.” This view of Jews as a parasitic people resembles, the Israeli historian Zeev Sternhell notes in his book, The Founding Myths of Zionism, modern European antisemitism. Indeed, Sternhell observes (p. 49), “A hatred of the diaspora and a rejection of Jewish life there were a kind of methodological necessity for Zionism…. Not only was Jewish history in exile deemed to be unimportant, but the value of living Jews, Jews of flesh and blood, depended entirely on their use as raw material for national revival.” Read the full article here... June's Demolition and Displacement Report Photo: Aref Dagharmeh, B'Tselem, 24 June 2021
Our reportfor June reveals the demolition of a total of 88 structures in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. These demolitions actually displaced 108 people, but also affected the lives of 2649 others, perhaps reflecting the fact that many of the demolitions was not of residential structures but, rather, those related to livelihoods, agriculture etc.
We also report the latest two demolitions of Al-Araqib, the Bedouin village in the Naqab in southern Israel. These bring the total number of demolitions of the village to 189 which, combined with raids, arrests, and interrogations, confiscation of equipment etc, comprises the nonstop harassment of the villagers by the Israeli state which has taken place since July 2010.
Al-Araqib is one of the 37 unrecognised Bedouin villages in the Naqab. After every demolition, the villagers rebuild their tents and shacks. As a result, Al Araqib has become a symbol of Palestinian steadfastness (sumud) as they continue to resist the attempts of the Israeli state to expel the Bedouin people from their land.
There are four different categories of home demolitions as defined by the Israeli state: Punitive, Administrative, Land clearing operations/Military and undefined. In June, all demolitions came under the ‘Administrative’ heading (lack of Israeli issued building permit). As Israel has been under international scrutiny in recent months, it may have decided to hold back on more brutal and outrageous land grabs in order to avoid too much international attention. It will be interesting to see how their programme of dispossession progresses over the next few months.
The latest NGO to castigate Israel’s actions is Save the Children UK. Its report shows the devastating effects of the long-term violence on children, both physical and psychological. House demolitions are mentioned specifically. “When violence escalated in 2021, thousands of children’s lives were at risk. Houses were turned to rubble, schools and hospitals damaged and thousands of families ripped apart.”
This follows last year’s UN identification of JCB as only one of three British companies profiting from Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestinian land. A group of lawyers successfully brought JCB to the attention of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) which is investigating the company for possible involvement in war crimes.
Campaigners have presented all the evidence to the NSPCC which has accepted at least £5 million from the company. They continue to press the point that a charity which is devoted to the welfare of children has no business accepting money made by traumatising children in another country. The coalition – which includes Protecting Palestinian Families, ICAHD UK, Social Work Action Network, the British Association of Social Workers, the Shoal Collective, the Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC) and Scottish PSC – awaits a response. Hope under the Rubble: The Impact of Israel's Home Demolition Policy on Palestinian Children and their Families
The charity Save the Children exists to support children so that they can learn, grow, and become who they want to be. It offers a variety of programmes and often responds to emergencies. Save the Children works in 122 countries, including the Occupied Palestinian Territory. At the end of June, it launched its latest report entitled ‘Hope Under the Rubble’ which states that four out of five Palestinian children whose homes were demolished by the Israeli authorities in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem ‘feel abandoned by the world’.
Refer to this report when contacting your political representative and include quotations from it. However, it is important to add that the demolitions and displacements are part of Israel’s colonial agenda to displace the indigenous Palestinians with a Jewish population settling in their place. The demolitions of Palestinian homes also illustrate that Israel has different laws for the Palestinians compared to the Jews and these have been highlighted in the reports published this year by B’Tselem and Human Rights Watch which have defined these as apartheid policies. Words of condemnation are not enough. Criticism without consequences doesn’t work.
Michael Lynk, UN Special Rapporteur for Human Rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, said on 12^th July regarding Israel’s demolition of Palestinian homes in the Jordan Valley, “Accountability has to rise to the top of the international community’s agenda. Only by imposing an escalating cost to Israel’s illegal occupation will there be the prospect that these injustices will end.” Podcast with Jeff Halper Photo: Jeff Halper briefing internationals during study tour Between the River and the Sea - One State? Listen to a presentation given by Jeff Halper to Sarum Concern for Israel/Palestine in Salisbury on 29 April 2021 (33 mins, audio only). Defund the Hebron Fund Photo: Wisam Hashlamoun / Flash90 Palestinian organizations in Hebron and across the West Bank have joined together to ask its allies to help halt the flow of money to illegal Jewish settlement in Hebron by calling on the New York State Attorney General, Letitia James, to strip the Hebron Fund of its charitable status.
Contrary to US tax law, the Hebron Fund sponsors:
1) Violence, through the financing of military and paramilitary activity 2) Intimidation of the indigenous community through criminal activity, such as vandalism, including assault and battery 3) Racial, religious, and ethnic discrimination in housing, freedom of movement, and education—in violation of US clearly defined public policy
Sign hereto raise your voice and take a stand against injustice: #FreeHebron#IsThisaCharity
Many thanks for your ongoing support. If you're not already a member of ICAHD UK, please consider joining us to enable our campaign to spread at this critical time in history. From all at ICAHD UK. https://www.facebook.com/pages/Israeli-Committee-Against-House-Demolitions-UK/366423593418140 Facebook https://www.twitter.com/ICAHDUK/ Twitter http://icahduk.org Website mailto:info@icahduk.org Email
Negation of the Exile
“Negation of the Exile” began as an assertion that Jewish life in the “Diaspora” was untenable, either in terms of the persecution generated by one nation inhabiting the lands of other nations and its opposite, the existential danger of assimilation, or both, as in the US today. If diasporic Jews would only grasp the fact of Exile, they would see themselves in their proper historical and political light: as proto-Israelis whose life abroad is ephemeral and can only be redeemed by settlement in the national and spiritual center of the Jewish nation, the Land – and State – of Israel. In this view Jews had become parasitic on other peoples. As the early Zionist ideologue A.D. Gordon put it: “We are a parasitic people. We have no roots in the soil, there is no ground beneath our feet. And we are parasites not only in an economic sense, but in spirit, in thought, in poetry, in literature, and in our virtues, our ideals, our higher human aspirations. Every alien movement sweeps us along, every
Monica Wusteman, Chair, ICAHD UK
Pressure on the NSPCC Continues ICAHD UK Executive Committee member Sharen Green who is also part of Protecting Palestinian Families reports that pressure continues to mount on the NSPCC to sever its link with JCB, a company whose bulldozers have demolished hundreds of Palestinian homes in the West Bank.
Download the full report here.
For the report, 217 Palestinian families across the West Bank and East Jerusalem, were interviewed because each of them had had their homes demolished by Israeli authorities in the past ten years. It includes an introduction, case studies, statistics, conclusions and recommendations. The majority of children interviewed indicated high rates of distress, including feelings of sadness, fear, depression and anxiety. Children reported having nightmares, no motivation for school achievement and feel there is no longer a place of safety for them. Most parents felt powerless and unable to protect their children after losing their home. The report concludes with recommendations to the Israeli government, the Palestine Authority, and the international community.
Read more4) Propaganda activities with no educational benefits
Despite this non-charitable work, the Hebron Fund continues to enjoy its charitable status in the US, using the tax-deductible donations it receives to fund illegal Israeli settlement in the heart of Hebron.
Keep the JNF Out of COP26 - Sign the Petition
The Jewish National Fund (JNF) has had a place at previous Cop events but now there is a move to prohibit it from participating in Cop26 which is scheduled for November in Glasgow. The JNF portrays itself as an environmental establishment because it creates parks, plants trees, and builds reservoirs. However, it was set up in 1901 to obtain land in Palestine exclusively for the Jewish population therefore it is responsible for the ongoing ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian people. Read about its history and then sign the petition here (https://www.stopthejnf.org/keep-the-jnf-out-of-cop-26) .