July 18, 2012

EDITOR: Israel moves inexorably towards full annexation of the West Bank

Through a range of ‘legal’ illegal means, Israel has been quietly moving towards annexation of the West Bank areas under its control. The granting of university status to the Ariel College is just the latest of such moves. It seems clear now that the Netanyahu regime has taken a long-term decision to make the de-facto, illegal occupation of the West Bank into a de jura reality. While this will not change the situation on the ground, it will further facilitate the stealing of land, the the rule of the Wild West of settler’s jungle, the daily oppression and deprivations of ordinary Palestinians – it will make the occupation into permanent annexation. This is only likely to harden positions in Palestine, and to drive most Palestinians away from the PA and its collaborationist politics.

In Israel, also, this will further divide the already deeply divided society, riven by social injustice and inequality. A gain for the settlers is a loss for all other Israelis, and this will feed into the fractious politics of Israel, in all probability further strengthening the right. Not a nice prediction for the immediate future, of course, but the most likely to take place. With the Haredi conscription controversy serving Netanyahu as a perfect decoy, taking the national debate away from the occupation and social justice, and sapping the protest movement of any ounce of energy it still has, he is in perfect control of this deeply divided society.

News elsewhere is little better – in Terri Ginsberg’s article below, you can read of the ‘faustian pact’ between US universities and Zionism, with the support of the US administration. While this is a shameful narrative indeed, the forces against this are now moving, at last. The successes of the boycott campaign are clear evidence for the change in international opinion. So, while governments in the west are totally committed to Israeli aggressive politics, the public sphere is undergoing a deep sea change.

Israel’s first settlement university stirs controversy: BBC

By Yolande Knell, BBC News, Jerusalem

Ariel University Centre of Samaria

Israeli officials have taken the highly controversial step of creating the first university in a settlement in the West Bank.

A higher education council for the occupied territory decided in favour of the upgrade for the college in Ariel, after it was recommended by Israel’s education minister.

It is being seen as a significant victory for the settler movement.

However many Israeli academics and the Palestinians have condemned the move.

Settlements are considered illegal under international law although Israel disputes this. Ariel is one of the largest settlements in the West Bank.

The change in status for Ariel University Centre of Samaria is seen as giving it greater legitimacy and further permanence.

“Today should be a celebration day,” the mayor and founder of Ariel, Ron Nachman, told the BBC. “Another university is born. Thirteen-thousand students will become students of a new university. Ariel is a university city.”

“I hope our battle will be finished by this victory,” he added.

The Council of Presidents of Israeli Universities had opposed the change in status for the Ariel institution.

More than 1,000 Israeli academics also signed a petition against it.

“We are against the attempt by the government of Israel to use academic institutions to further a political agenda which we are very much against, which is the establishment of the settlements and the occupation as a permanent thing in Israel,” said Nir Gov of the Weizmann Institute of Science, who launched the initiative.

He fears that creating a university in Ariel could lead to new academic boycotts and jeopardise international funding and research cooperation.

Difficult decision-making

Earlier this month the planning and budget committee of the regular Higher Education Council voted not to grant the existing Ariel college university status.

It cited academic reasons saying that there was no justification for creating a new university in Israel while existing ones were suffering from insufficient resources.

Ariel construction
Ariel is one of the largest settlements Israel has built in the West Bank

However Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz then pledged to earmark special funds for the institution on top of the existing budget for universities.

Education Minister Gideon Saar also declared his support for a university in Ariel to the Higher Education Council for Judea and Samaria [the West Bank].

This body has jurisdiction in the territory because it is under military control. On Tuesday, it voted in favour of the change.

Israel’s military commander for the region will be the final authority to sign off on the decision.

Speaking to the BBC, the Israeli Nobel Laureate Robert Aumann stated that there was “a really strong need” for an upgraded institution in Ariel.

He was a member of a committee that evaluated the performance of the Ariel University Centre.

“I was very impressed by the quality of the place as an academic institution and I think Israel needs another university,” said Mr Aumann, a mathematician.

“The last time when an additional university was added to the roster of Israeli universities was in 1972. At the time the population was three and a quarter million. The population of Israel today is almost eight million.”

‘Obstacle to peace’

The Palestinians view the Israeli decision to create a university in Ariel as a significant setback.

They want the West Bank to be part of their future state and consider the settlements as an obstacle to peace.

“Unfortunately Israel is making it clear that it’s not interested in ending the occupation. By continuing these trends it is making it almost impossible to get to a two-state solution,” said Xavier Abu Eid of the PLO Negotiations Affairs Department.

“It’s also important to say that while Israel is building a new institution for students in the West Bank, there are Palestinian students from Gaza who are not allowed to study in the West Bank.”

“West Bank students cannot study in Jerusalem and students all over the occupied territories face increasing problems getting to their educational sites,” Mr Abu Eid said.

The Ariel institution is open to all Israel citizens including Arabs. However like other Israeli universities, it closes admissions to Palestinians in the West Bank.

The new university has existed as an educational establishment for some 30 years. In 2005, the government of Ariel Sharon said that it saw national importance in upgrading Ariel college to a university. Its name was then changed to “university centre”.

Kadima quits Israel government over conscription law: BBC

Shaul Mofaz (centre) arrives at a meeting of Kadima MPs (11 July 2012)Shaul Mofaz said there was “no choice” but to end Kadima and Likud’s 70-day partnership

Israel’s Kadima party has left Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government in a dispute over military conscription for ultra-Orthodox Jews.

Kadima, the largest party in the Knesset, had only joined the coalition in May to avoid an early election.

But it failed to reach an agreement with Mr Netanyahu’s Likud on replacing the Tal Law, under which seminary students can defer military service.

In February, the Supreme Court declared that the law was unconstitutional.

‘Deep regret’

The prime minister held meetings with Kadima MPs earlier on Tuesday in an effort to convince them to remain in his governing coalition.

He is reported to have proposed that 50% of ultra-Orthodox Jews, or Haredim, between the ages of 18 and 23 would be drafted by the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) and another 50% would be drafted into operational civil service between the ages of 23 and 26.

But Mr Mofaz rejected the idea and later called a party meeting, where all but three MPs voted to leave the government.

“It is with deep regret that I say that there is no choice but to decide to leave the government,” Mr Mofaz said afterwards.

He added: “Netanyahu’s proposal contradicts the ruling of the Supreme Court of Justice, does not conform to the principle of equality, is disproportionate and does not meet the tests of effectiveness that are set down in the Supreme Court’s ruling, or the principles of the committee on equalising the burden of IDF service.”

An alternative to the Tal Law must be passed by the end of July.

Mr Netanyahu meanwhile denied reports that he would call an early general election once the Knesset returned from its summer recess.

“Since the government was formed, people are always warning that there will be elections,” he said. “There will be elections in the end because the law requires it. You have to be ready because elections could be initiated at any given moment. But wait patiently. They could be held in 2013.”

The end of the Knesset’s current term is in October 2013.

Disney family member renounces her investments in Israel’s Ahava Cosmetics: IOA

16 JULY 2012

By Amira Hass, Haaretz – 16 July 2012
www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/disney-family-member-renounces-her-investments-in-israel-s-ahava-cosmetics.premium-1.451506

Abigail Disney, the granddaughter of Roy O. Disney, who co-founded The Walt Disney Company with his brother Walt, disclaims Ahava investment due to its location in an ‘Israeli settlement in the occupied West Bank.’

Abigail Disney, a descendant of one of the Disney Company founders, said Monday that she is renouncing her share of the family’s profits in the Israeli cosmetics company Ahava, saying it is engaged in the “exploitation of occupied natural resources.”

Disney said she will donate the profits and a sum equal to the worth of her shares to “organizations working to end this illegal exploitation.” Disney, 52, a filmmaker and businesswoman, is the granddaughter of Roy O. Disney, who co-founded The Walt Disney Company with his brother Walt.

Her move, however, has more of a symbolic significance than a financial one. Shamrock Holdings, the family firm in which she is a partner, has invested heavily in Israel, as evidenced by the wide-ranging activity of its Israeli affiliate, Shamrock Israel.

According to various media reports, Shamrock has invested some $400 million in Israeli companies, about a fifth of its capital. Among its holdings is an investment worth at least $12 million in Ahava, which is based in Kibbutz Mitzpe Shalem on the Dead Sea shores, outside Israel’s pre-1967 borders.

“Recent evidence from the Israeli Civil Administration documents that Ahava Dead Sea Laboratories sources mud used in its products from the occupied shores of the Dead Sea, which is in direct contravention to provisions in the Hague Regulations and the Geneva Convention forbidding the exploitation of occupied natural resources,” Disney said in a statement released after informing her family and partners of her decision.

“Because of complicated legal and financial constraints, I am unable to withdraw my investment at this time, but will donate the corpus of the investment as well as the profits accrued to me during the term of my involvement to organizations working to end this illegal exploitation,” she said.

One of Israel’s best known brands overseas, Ahava makes skin care products derived from Dead Sea mud and mineral-based compounds from the Dead Sea. It has stores in Israel, Germany, Hungary, the Philippines and Singapore.

Disney’s reference to “evidence from the Israeli Civil Administration” relates to a letter received from the Civil Administration by the Who Profits From the Occupation research project. In the letter the Civil Administration confirmed that the military government had issued a permit to Ahava allowing it to take mud from the area adjacent to the Dead Sea captured by Israel in 1967. Until two months ago, Disney had been deputy chairman of Shamrock Holdings, which was founded in 1978 by her father Roy E. Disney. The firm bought a 17 percent stake in Ahava in 2008. Ahava representatives said the investment gave them capital to expand overseas, particularly in the United States.

Shamrock also has a stake in the Teva Naot footwear company, which is located in the Gush Etzion settlement bloc south of Jerusalem, and in the Orad company, which makes, among other things, control and monitoring technology for the separation barrier running through the West Bank.

Disney, who has a Ph.D. in English from Columbia University, began making documentary films in 2007. Together with her husband, Pierre Hauser, Disney is co-founder and co-president of the Daphne Foundation, which makes grants to grassroots, community-based organizations working with low-income communities in New York City and describes itself as “progressive and seeking social change.”

Abir Kopty: Israel’s civil service bill distorts 64 years of Palestinian history: IOA

11 JULY 2012

By Abir Kopty, The National – 11 July 2012
www.thenational.ae/thenationalconversation/comment/israels-civil-service-bill-distorts-64-years-of-palestinian-history

A new bill is being debated in the Israeli Knesset: compulsory civil service for all citizens, including Palestinians and ultra-Orthodox Jews, the two groups that have been exempt. If passed, the bill would force every 18-year-old citizen who is exempted from military service to serve in another public institution for between one and two years.

Recently, the committee appointed by the government to discuss the issue suggested civil service for all. Whether that becomes compulsory will probably be determined this week.In 2008, about 250,000 Palestinian citizens of Israel signed a petition rejecting compulsory civil service, the largest such petition in history, and a wide coalition of youth groups and civil society organisations have campaigned against the service under the motto: “We won’t serve our oppressor.”

As Palestinians and as citizens, we have every reason to revolt against the state. Our tools in the international arena remain limited. Since the Oslo Accords, the PLO stopped advocating for the rights of Palestinian citizens of Israel, and the international community remains incapable of challenging Israel’s “internal affairs”.

For decades, we have conducted our struggle, by ourselves, for the rights of our people: equality, freedom and return. We demonstrate, lobby, campaign, sign petitions, appeal to Israeli courts and produce reports. In the past, we have challenged particular policies within a system that we never believed would treat us equally. This civil service bill might be an opportunity to challenge the whole system.

Israel promotes meaningless soundbites on the issue: “taking equal part in the state’s burden”, or “citizens should volunteer”. But our opposition involves our relationship with the state since its creation, our Nakba in 1948.

Despite 64 years of Israeli attempts to wipe us off the map, to destroy and distort our identity, to erase the history of the land, we managed to remain, maintain our identity, and revive our narrative, culture and unity. Unsurprisingly, this effort has always been seen by the Israeli government as a threat.

Mandatory civil service for Palestinians is a continuation of our longstanding struggle. It is another attempt to remove young people from their identity and bring them closer to the system, and, in the long term, to the military doctrine. Gabi Ashknazi, the former Israeli military chief explained in 2010: he wanted to see “all citizens age 18 coming to one hall” with the military given first choice about who would fit into the army and who would not. Those that didn’t make the cut will be obligated to do other kinds of civil service.

Israel intends to use this project to shift the discussion away from its responsibility to guarantee equality for all citizens. It aims to justify its racist system by putting the onus of 64 years of discrimination on Palestinians for not fulfilling their obligations to the state.

However, there are at least two lingering questions that challenge this claim: how would the government explain that the Druze community in Israel does compulsory military service but does not enjoy full equality with their Jewish military “comrades”? And why have ultra-Orthodox Jews been exempted from military and civil service but receive government funds?

In the liberal democratic concept of citizenship, the rights of citizens are absolute. Obligations according to the same concept are defined mainly as paying taxes and respecting the law. Palestinians fulfil those obligations. However, Israel is now trying to attach rights to only one duty: civil service.

During this discussion on civil service, the Palestinian community was not consulted or involved in decision making on an issue that affects our basic rights, as is required by international law.

At the same time, the civil service campaign has attempted to portray Palestinians as passive citizens who do not want to volunteer and serve our communities.

However, large numbers of Palestinian youth volunteer in numerous civil society organisations where they are welcomed with no loyalty tests, but on the basis of a set of universal values. The challenges we face in promoting volunteerism among young people are similar to those in most societies, especially in an era of wild consumerism and the “NGO-isation” of civil society.

Israel’s patronising attitude that it knows what is best and its claim to care for the Palestinian minority’s interest are ridiculous in light of the continued discrimination in all aspects of life. Israel should be investing the huge civil-service administration budget in our education system, building the missing 8,000 classrooms in Arab schools, as well as investing in industrial zones in Arab cities and developing the 45 unrecognised villages in the Negev. The list goes on and on.

To most Palestinians, compulsory civil service lacks any positive aspect. Based on our long and painful experience with the state, we have all the reasons to refuse this patronising attitude. If the bill passes, it will be a historic opportunity for collective civil disobedience challenging the whole system. Civil service would not be the cause; it would be the straw that breaks the camel’s back.

Abir Kopty is a former city council member of the Nazareth municipality, and the former spokesperson for Mossawa, an advocacy centre for Palestinian citizens in Israel

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