Part 9. Ten Myths on Israel: Not how a “Democratic State” should behave (by Ian Pappe)
Posted by: adonis49 on: July 21, 2018
Part 9. Ten Myths on Israel: Not how a “Democratic State” behave (by Ian Pappe)
No, Israel Is Not a Democracy
Destroying Palestinians’ Houses Is Not Democratic
Imprisoning Palestinians Without Trial Is Not Democratic (A mandated British law of administrative detention applied by Israel since its inception)
By lan Pappe
From Ten Myths About Israel, out now from Verso Books.
June 12, 2018 “Information Clearing House” – Israel is not the only democracy in the Middle East. In fact, it’s not a democracy at all.
In the eyes of many Israelis and their supporters worldwide — even those who might criticize some of its policies — Israel is, at the end of the day, a benign democratic state, seeking peace with its neighbors, and guaranteeing equality to all its citizens.
Those who do criticize Israel assume that, if anything went wrong in this democracy, then it was due to the 1967 war.
Imprisoning Palestinians Without Trial Is Not Democratic
Another feature of the “enlightened occupation” is imprisonment without trial. Every fifth Palestinian in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip has undergone such an experience.
(Actually 60% of youths have gone through this humiliating revolving prison door. As most Black people in the USA can testify to this apartheid treatment)
It is interesting to compare this Israeli practice with similar American policies in the past and the present, as critics of the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement claim that US practices are far worse.
In fact, the worst American example was the imprisonment without trial of one hundred thousand Japanese citizens during World War II, with thirty thousand later detained under the so-called “war on terror.”
(In Israel, it is a systematic practice. Every night, a dozen Palestinian youths are hoarded out of their bed)
Neither of these numbers comes even close to the number of Palestinians who have experienced such a process: including the very young, the old, as well as the long-term incarcerated.
Arrest without trial is a traumatic experience.
Not knowing the charges against you, having no contact with a lawyer and hardly any contact with your family are only some of the concerns that will affect you as a prisoner.
More brutally, many of these arrests are used as means to pressure people into collaboration.
Spreading rumors or shaming people for their alleged or real sexual orientation are also frequently used as methods for leveraging complicity.
As for torture, the reliable website Middle East Monitor published a harrowing article describing the 200 methods used by the Israelis to torture Palestinians. The list is based on a UN report and a report from the Israeli human rights organization B’Tselem.
Among other methods it includes beatings, chaining prisoners to doors or chairs for hours, pouring cold and hot water on them, pulling fingers apart, and twisting testicles.
(Actually, the majority of these torture techniques were borrowed from the British mandated power that applied them during the first Palestinian civil disobedience (Intifada) in 1935 and that lasted 3 years. The Palestinians have been demanding democratic elections in municipalities. Britain had to dispatch 100,000 troops and enlisted the Jews in that horror campaign)
Adonis Diaries 
Leave a Reply