Amnesty International’s Problematic Israel Report

Calling Israel an apartheid state is not legally accurate, but it’s strategically useful for Israel’s enemies.

By
14

The term “apartheid” evokes horrific images from nearly half a century of South African oppression. Given how charged a word it is, it’s imperative that those applying it to other contexts substantiate the allegation with solid evidence. A recent report from Amnesty International fails in that regard. 

“Crime of Apartheid: The Government of Israel’s System of Oppression Against Palestinians” clocks in at 280 pages and is full of biased analysis that does not reflect reality on the ground. Still, it’s worth considering how this report fits into the ecosystem of anti-Israel ideas and activism.

Jonathan Schanzer, senior vice president for research at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, calls the report “antisemitic at its core. It absolutely meets the IHRA definition [of antisemitism], holds Israel to a different standard, twists Israel’s history, and mischaracterizes last May, a defensive war where Israel responded. There’s so much in there, it’s almost hard to unpack all of it.”

Among those problems, Amnesty’s report uses the phrase “Palestinian citizens of Israel,” disregarding that only 7 percent of Israel’s Arab population would describe themselves as Palestinian. The wars of 1948 and 1967 are written about as if Israel had been the aggressor. The Oslo Accords are conspiratorially described as “fragmenting and segregating Palestinians even further to Israel’s benefit.” Just after acknowledging that Israel left Gaza in 2005, the report claims the “Gaza Strip remains under Israeli military occupation,” which would be news to Hamas. 

Create a free account
Access additional articles and newsletters for no cost, no credit card information needed. Continue ALREADY HAVE AN ACCOUNT? SIGN IN
14
By
Comments (14)
Join The Dispatch to participate in the comments.
 
  1. Kurt Von Fuchs

    Although you make some very good points I find it interesting and bizarre that you never mentioned any of the UN resolution which he is really government has repeatedly violated. I expect a more nuanced and balanced reporting from the dispatch and I'm somewhat disappointed

    Collapse
  2. Eric L.

    It didn't take very long for Ted, through his "thought experiments," to reveal what he really felt about Israel.

    The fact is that the Jewish community in Israel, pre-1948, often lived in circumscribed circumstances that limited their basic rights, whether the British, or the Ottomans before them, were in charge. ( After the Six-Day War in 1967, when the Jordanians occupied East Jerusalem and the Western Wall area, Jews were forbidden entrance to the entire area, an example few choose to remember.)

    The fact also is that Israel continues to be the only country that constantly has to defend its very right to exist. Most, including our own, came into being through war, conquest, and brute force; Israel tried another approach - purchasing of land, negotiations with neighboring countries and peoples, and granting of sovereignty through the British when they established their mandate in 1917. In 1948, 1967, and 1973 it fought, and won, defensive wars not of its choosing.(There was also the fact that a sizable Jewish community always existed in that land, from biblical days on, and despite inquisitions and massacres.) I can think of no other county, including our own, that so consistently finds its motives and morality questioned. ( Europe has a lot to answer for, to take one example.)

    I'm a proud and patriotic American, but until the day that we cede New Mexico, Arizona, and California back to Mexico and Spain, respectively, and until the day that we undo what was done to the American Indians, Mormons, and Japanese-Americans, among others (not to mention the depredations of slavery and Jim Crow), I'll take all this hairsplitting about Israel with the gallon of salt it deserves.

    Collapse
    1. Avatar photo
      Paul Reichardt

      You’ve illustrated Ted’s original point for him.

      Collapse
  3. Avatar photo
    Barry Alexander

    I'm glad Biden rejoined the "Human Rights" Commission so we can now co-sponsor its jihad against Israel. 🙄

    Collapse
  4. Ted

    This is a topic that few people can write about dispassionately. I haven't read the Amnesty report but I did read this article and dispassionate does not describe this article (or, I gather, the Amnesty report). It would be great if once, just once, there could be a discussion of the actual legal framework -- combined with facts on the ground -- under which the Palestinians live and the morality of that situation. In reading this, I gather that Israel and the settler population are all awaiting sainthood (wrong metaphor but you get the idea) and that the Palestinians are all under the thumb of terrorists (no sainthood for them). It is easy to say that Palestinians do not live under South African Apartheid because there is not a legal framework in Israel that parallels the framework that existed in South Africa. But maybe, just maybe, there was an opportunity here to take the time to discuss the moral complexity of the situation and whether there might be even a thimble full of culpability on the part of Israel regarding difficult lives Palestinians live.

    Collapse
    1. Avatar photo
      Something Borrowed

      I also feel that it's a shame we don't have more nuanced reporting on this that feels less propaganda-y. I'm not sure what the solution to this would be, since I think what defines "dispassionate" reporting in this arena so often is in the eye of the beholder. For instance, I personally find a lot of Times of Israel's reporting to be relatively dispassionate, but I imagine most people who consider themselves anti-Zionist would not.

      I would argue that it's easy to say that Palestinians do not live under South-African-style Apartheid because they simply don't, and any argument that they do involves a lot of double-standards, changing definitions, and hand-waving. Conditions can be very bad for Palestinians without it being apartheid, and the insistence that Israel is practicing "Apartheid" or "Genocide" is more often an attempt at avoiding argument than an actual argument in and of itself.

      I agree that there should be more discussion (and more honest discussion) about culpability and morality, but I don't think that an article about the Amnesty report is the best place for that discussion. The questions of what the situation is on the ground for Palestinian refugees living in the West Bank and Gaza (setting aside, of course, life for Palestinian refugees living in Lebanon, Syria, Egypt, etc.) and what constructive international policy to help them would look like is not the same as the discussion about whether or not the charges leveled against Israel by the international community are made in good faith (although they may sometimes overlap). They each deserve their own analysis, in my opinion, and I would be happy to see The Dispatch do an update on the reporting from last summer regarding the former if they wanted to.

      Collapse
    2. Ted

      There is also a simple thought experiment the author should try: imagine Palestinians controlled Israel and it was the Jewish people in the West Bank and Gaza under the exact same conditions. Would you hold the same views or would you think that perhaps the Jewish people were being treated unfairly?

      Collapse
  5. Avatar photo
    Show Jay Janney the 🚪!

    The Palestinians has as much right to the Israeli land as American Indians have to the United States. When the apartheid people begin paying rent to local tribes for the land they stole from them, lemme know.

    Collapse
    1. Mathew A

      "The Palestinians has as much right to the Israeli land as American Indians have to the United States."

      So none then

      Collapse
    2. Avatar photo
      Paul Reichardt

      Do you really think it is the Palestinians who should bear the burden of accountability for US/European hypocrisy on the morally-checkered foundational history of those countries or for their colonial or expansionist pasts?

      Collapse
      1. Avatar photo
        Show Jay Janney the 🚪!

        I think we need to hold ourselves accountable before we whine about the accountability of others. Focus on what you can control.

        Collapse
        1. Avatar photo
          Paul Reichardt

          Maybe, but we’re talking about NGOs like Amnesty International and UN-affiliated councils—-it’s their job to be up in everyone’s business on such matters.

          Collapse
          1. Avatar photo
            Show Jay Janney the 🚪!

            Assuming they have credibility. Reports like this, meh.

            Collapse
  6. Eric L.

    Well done, but it's not enough to say that the apartheid label is "inaccurate"; "untrue" would be more like it.

    Collapse