Issue no 114

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Issue No : 114 23th December , 2014

Palestinian Cultural Organization Malaysia | 1


Palestinian Cultural Organization MalaysiaMalaysiaM

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Palestinian Cultural Organization Malaysia

What it means for Israel to be a Jewish nation-state

European Union removes Hamas from its terrorist list

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FEATURED STORY

Articles & Analyses

Read in This Issue


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EU Parliament backs Palestine statehood

Just 2% of pledges paid for rebuilding Gaza

Israeli plane strikes Gaza for first time since summer war

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Geneva Convention meeting goes ahead, criticises Israeli violations

P12 Israel Insider

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CONTENTS

News of Palestine

European Union removes Hamas from its terrorist list 4

EU Parliament backs Palestine statehood 5

Just 2% of pledges paid for rebuilding Gaza 6

Israeli plane strikes Gaza for first time since summer war 7

Calls for international community to save jailed Palestinian MPs 8

Israeli court extends detention of 7 Palestinians for Facebook posts 9

Geneva Convention meeting goes ahead, criticises Israeli violations 10

Meshaal: ‘We will achieve honourable prisoners’ swap’ 11

Israel Insider

Most Israelis still do not want Netanyahu as next PM 12

Articles & Analyses

What it means for Israel to be a Jewish nation-state 13

Palestinian Cultural

Organization Malaysia

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News of Palestine

A European Union court has removed the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas from its terrorist list, it was announced on Wednesday.

Hamas appealed a 2001 decision by the E.U. to place it on the list which followed similar actions by the United States and Israel.

The EU’s General Court found the decision was “based not on acts examined and confirmed in decisions of competent authorities but on factual imputations derived from the press and the internet.”

Hamas won Palestinian parliamentary elections in 2006 and has been in control of the Gaza Strip since 2007.

Hamas’ lawyer, Liliane Glock, told the AFP news agency: “Every decision since 2001 imposing restrictive measures, including on the armed wing, have been annulled. I believe that this judgement shows the whole world that it exists and is legal.”

19/12/2014 Source: Time + BBC

European Union removes Hamas from its terrorist list

The Palestinian organisation has been on the list since 2001

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EU Parliament backs Palestine statehoodThe European Parliament voted Wednesday for a nonbinding reso-lution calling for recognition of Pal-estinian statehood to take place as a result of peace talks with Israel.

The resolution was approved by a vote of 498 to 88, with 111 absten-tions.

The joint resolution backs “in prin-ciple” the recognition of Palestinian statehood and the two-state solu-tion to the Palestine-Israeli conflict.

The European Parliament sup-ports “in principle recognition of Palestinian statehood and the two state solution, and believes these should go hand in hand with the development of peace talks, which should be advanced”, reads the resolution.

The original text, submitted by the Green Party, the Socialists and other groups, had urged EU coun-tries to recognize a Palestinian state without conditions.

However, members of the Euro-pean Parliament failed to agree on a joint text, and the resolution that passed Wednesday calls for rec-ognition as a result of peace talks.

The European Parliament sup-ports “in principle recognition of Palestinian statehood and the two state solution, and believes these should go hand in hand with the development of peace talks, which should be advanced”, it says in a resolution passed on Wednesday.

The resolution also reiterates that Israeli settlements “ are illegal un-der international law” , calling on the EU to become a “ genuine facil-

itator in the Mid-dle East peace process and asks the EU’s foreign policy High Represen-tative to facilitate a common EU position to this end.”

MEPs also an-nounced to launching a “ Parlia-mentarians for Peace” initiative to bring together MEPs and mem-bers of Palestinian and Israeli Parliaments, “to help advance an agenda for peace and to comple-ment EU diplomatic efforts.”

Wave of recognition in Europe

Europe has been swept lately by a wave of support for Palestinian statehood, as the peace process between Palestinian and Israeli sides remains deadlocked.

In October, Sweden became the first EU country to recognize Pal-estine.

Recently, both French Assembly and Senate have adopted resolu-tions calling French government to recognize Palestinian State.

The U.K. , Spanish, Portuguese parliaments, as well as the Irish Senate, have also all delivered non-binding endorsements, re-flecting growing frustration with the sputtering Israel-Palestine peace process.

Italian and Slovenian parliaments are expected to vote on similar resolutions in the coming weeks.

More than 130 countries have now

recognized Palestine as a state.

UN resolution ending the Israeli occupation

Meanwhile, Palestine is preparing to present, through Jordan, a Se-curity Council resolution setting a two-year deadline to return the ter-ritory taken by Israel in 1967. The resolution could be put to a vote as early as Wednesday.

Peace talks between Israeli and Palestinian negotiators broke down in April over Israel’s refusal to release a group of Palestinian prisoners despite earlier pledges to do so.

The talks were aimed at finding a solution to the perennial Pales-tinian-Israeli conflict, the roots of which date back to 1917, when the British government called for “the establishment in Palestine of a na-tional home for the Jewish people.”

Israel occupied East Jerusalem and the West Bank during the 1967 Middle East War. It later annexed the holy city in 1980, claiming it as the capital of the self-proclaimed Jewish state in a move never rec-ognized by the international com-munity.

19/12/2014

Source: Alanadolu Agency

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Just 2% of pledges paid for rebuilding Gaza

Palestinian and international officials have revealed that only 2 per cent of the pledges made by donor states to rebuild the Gaza Strip have actually been paid. The pledges were made in a donor conference in Egypt two months ago. A total of $5.4 billion was pledged for the reconstruction of the beleaguered ter-ritory after it was destroyed during Israel’s latest war against the civilians of Gaza during the summer. Of the major donors, Qatar pledged $1 billion, Saudi Arabia $500 million and the EU $780 million.

It was expected that half of these pledges would have been spent on rebuilding houses and infrastructure in the Gaza Strip and the remainder would boost the Palestinian Authority’s budget. According to UN of-ficials, just $100 million has been handed over from donors.

“We received funds and pledges worth about $100 million for shelters and house renovation,” said Robert Turner, the Director of UNRWA Operations in Gaza. “This money will run out in December in the middle of a harsh winter.” The shortfall, he added, is $620 million.

Palestinian Housing Minister Mofeed Al-Hasayneh said that the Arab states did not pay anything from their pledges for this month. The Europeans, however, have paid “a few millions”.

20/12/2014 Source: MEMO

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The Israeli military has attacked targets in the Gaza Strip in response to alleged rocket launched from the Palestinian territory.

Friday’s air strikes were the first since the 50-day war this summer.

A spokesman for Gaza’s health ministry said there were no casualties in the air attack.

Palestinian faction Hamas on Saturday said that Israel’s “daily violations” in the Gaza Strip are viola-tions of a cease-fire agreement with resistance fac-tions.

“Israeli airstrikes this morning and the continu-ous targeting of fishermen and farmers infringe the cease-fire agreement,” Hamas leader Salah Bardawil said in a statement.

“The daily violations [by Israel] and the delay in the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip are clear violations of the truce,” Bardawil said.

He also warned that recent Israeli escalation could be part of the electoral campaign of Israeli Prime

Israeli plane strikes Gaza for first time since summer war

Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ahead of the March election to make up for his “defeat” in Gaza.

Israeli warplanes staged two airstrikes on empty lands in southern Gaza Strip late Friday – the first such strikes since August 26, eyewitnesses said.

The airstrikes caused power outage in the nearby res-idential areas as well as a wide state of panic among Palestinian civilians, they said.

On July 7, Israel launched a 51-day offensive on the Gaza Strip with the stated aim of halting rocket fire from the Gaza Strip.

By the time the offensive ended on August 26 – with the signing of an Egyptian-sponsored cease-fire deal between Israel and Palestinian resistance factions – more than 2,160 Gazans had been killed, mostly civil-ians, and nearly 11,000 others injured.

At least 73 Israelis – 68 soldiers and five civilians – were also killed during the seven-week-long conflict.

20/12/2014 Source: Agencies

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Ahrar Centre for Prisoners Studies and Human Rights renewed its calls for international or-ganisations and governments to save 22 Palestinian MPs and two ministers who have been detained by Israel, statement said on Thursday.

All the MPs, including parliamentary speaker Aziz Duwaik, were arrested without having charge.

The MPs, who are affiliate to a number of Palestinian factions including Fatah, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and Hamas, were freely elected in 2006.

Former Minister of Prisoners’ Affairs Wasfi Qabha is among the group being held by Israel. While others, including Fatah’s Marwan Barghouti and Popular Front for the Liberation of Pales-tine’s Ahmed Sa’adat, have been in Israeli jails since before they were elected.

The Ahrar centre’s Director Fu’ad Al-Khuffash said Israel is using the ministers are a means of pressure on certain political parties. He considered this part of a campaign to deplete the MPs’ power.

“And this is what the Israeli occupation is doing with all the Palestinian prisoners,” Al-Khuffash said.

18/12/2014 Source: MEMO

Calls for international community to save jailed Palestinian MPs

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An Israeli court extended the detention of seven Palestinians from Jerusalem for “incite-ment” via Facebook for at least three more days on Friday.

The head of a committee for the families of prisoners in Jerusalem, Amjad Abu Asab, identified the seven prisoners being held by Israeli authorities as Omar al-Shalabi, Uday Sunuqrut, Tareq al-Kurd, Sami Ideis, Ibrahim Abdeen, Nasser al-Hidmi, and Fouad Ruwei-di.

The seven were detained last Monday, appar-ently as a result of Facebook posts that au-thorities found to contain messages of “incite-ment” to violence.

Israeli court extends detention of 7 Palestinians for Facebook posts

Israeli authorities have in recent years detained numerous Palestinians inside Israel and Jerusa-lem for posting comments or statuses on Face-book they said somehow praised violence against Israel.

Reporters Without Borders ranked Israel 112th in the world for press freedom in its 2013 report, ar-guing that while Israeli journalists enjoy freedom of expression, there are major structural barriers related to military control and security issues that prevent a free press more generally.

The limitations imposed against Palestinian citi-zens of Israel and residents of East Jerusalem are generally much higher than those against Jewish citizens of Israel.

20/12/2014 Source: Ma’an

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Geneva Convention meeting goes ahead, criticises Israeli violations

The High Contracting Parties to the Fourth Geneva Convention urged an end to violations of international law in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT) following a confer-ence Wednesday.

The special Geneva meeting, host-ed by the Swiss government, saw representatives from 126 state par-ties adopt a ten-point declaration that reaffirmed international hu-manitarian law and the applicability of the Fourth Geneva Convention in the OPT, something that Israel denies.

The declaration urges Israel “to fully and effectively respect the Fourth Geneva Convention in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem”, and stresses its “obligation” to adminis-ter the OPT “in a way which fully takes into account the needs of the civilian population.”

The parties went on to express “deep concern about the impact of the continued occupation”, specifi-cally singling out Israel’s Wall and associated regime as “contrary to international humanitarian law”, along with “the closure of the Gaza Strip”.

The declaration also affirmed “the illegality of the settlements in the said territory and of the expansion thereof and of related unlawful sei-zure of property as well as of the transfer of prisoners into the terri-tory of the Occupying Power.”

Speaking after the meeting, Swiss ambassador Paul Fivat hailed the

declaration as “unprecedented”, and a “signal which is being sent to conflicting parties and especially to the civilian populations that there is a law, international, which is protecting their interests.”

Fivat clarified that “the declaration binds only the parties who were [present]”, with Israel, the U.S., and Canada, examples of “a small of number of High Contracting Parties” who “expressed their opposition and did not attend the Conference.”

In the lead up to Wednesday’s gathering, Israel tried to persuade the parties to the Convention from convening the summit at all, even sending officials several times to Bern and Geneva.

In response to the conference yesterday, Israel’s UN mission claimed that “it confers legitimacy on terrorist organizations and dictatorial re-gimes wherever they are, while condemning a democratic country fighting terrorism in accordance with international law.”

Palestine’s Permanent Mission in Switzerland, meanwhile, praised the declaration, stating that “legal actions, including through universal jurisdiction and international criminal justice mechanisms” are neces-sary to hold Israel “accountable for its decades of violations of inter-national law.”

Israeli human rights NGO B’Tselem described the declaration as a reflection of “the illegality of the ongoing occupation and its attendant human rights violations”, the “baselessness of Israel’s claims of com-pliance with the Fourth Geneva Convention”, and of “Israel’s ever deteriorating international status as the violations persist.”

Source: MEMO

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Meshaal: ‘We will achieve honourable prisoners’ swap’

Head of Hamas Political Bureau Khaled Meshaal reiterated that his movement runs the file on the “Israeli prisoners arrested in Gaza during the summer’s war in a special way”, local Palestinian news agency Safa reported.

Speaking to Al-Aqsa Radio in Gaza, Me-shaal said that “talks on the issue of the pris-oners are very sensitive”, noting that what his movement hope to “achieve an honour-able prisoner swap”.

During Israel’s most recent assault on the Gaza Strip, Hamas’s military wing an-nounced that it had captured an Israeli sol-dier called Shaul Aron in Gaza city, but said nothing about his fate or whereabouts. Israel announced it lost another soldier in Rafah; however Hamas has neither confirmed nor denied that he is in its custody.

Regarding Hamas’ relationship with Iran, Meshaal said that they have been shaken up in recent years, but issues were recon-ciled recently. He said that the latest visit by

a Hamas delegation to Iran were part of efforts to reconcile relations.

Meanwhile, he stressed that Hamas has no relationship with the ongoing Syrian regime. “We found the circumstances are unsuitable so we left the country,” he said, stressing his movement did not maintain any kind of relationship with the Assad regime.

Meshaal reiterated that his movement does not interfere with the internal affairs of any country, especially Egypt. He said that there is no proof that any Palestinian has taken part in the terror attacks in Egypt, stressing that his movement co-operated with the Egyptian security in this regard.

He called for the Rafah Crossing to be opened.

Meshaal said that the unity government is responsible for the salaries of Gaza’s employees. He said that the reconciliation would succeed when all agreed terms were implemented.

The top Hamas leader stressed that a return to internal divi-sions would be “disastrous” and all external parties interfer-ing in this issue should stop.

He blamed the unity government and the international com-munity for the delay in the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip.

Source: MEMO

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The results of a public poll has shown that the majority of Israe-lis still do not want Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to continue to serve as prime minis-ter and form the next government after the elections scheduled to be held on March 17.

According to the poll published by Maariv on Friday, 58 per cent of those polled said that they do not want Benjamin Netanyahu to lead the next government. How-ever, this percentage is lower than a previous poll whose results were published on December 4, which showed that 60 per cent did not want Netanyahu to lead the next government. While on December 11, 66 per cent did not want him to head a new government.

In response to the question regard-ing Netanyahu’s successor, 28 per cent said they wanted leader of the Labour Party Isaac Herzog to take his place, while 26 per cent said they did not want any of those listed to take his place.

Jewish Home party leader Naftali Bennett received ten per cent of the votes, as did leader of the Hat-nuah Party Tzipi Livni. Meanwhile, nine per cent said they would like Yesh Atid leader Yair Lapid to take Netanyahu’s place, six per cent chose leader of Yisrael Beiteinu Avigdor Lieberman, and five per cent chose Moshe Kahlon, leader

Most Israelis still do not want Netanyahu as next PM

Israel Insider

of the Kulanu party.

Some 72 per cent said they would certainly vote while 17 per cent they were uncertain.

In the event that elections were held today, according to the poll, the Knesset seats would be distributed as follows: Labour Par-ty led by Herzog and Livni 23 seats, Likud 21 seats, the Jewish Home 16 seats, Yesh Atid 10 seats, Kulanu 10 seats, Yisrael Be-iteinu eight seats, Yahadut Hatorah seven seats, Meretz seven seats, Arab Movement for Renewal and the United Arab List sev-en seats, Shas four seats, while the Shas, led by Eli Yishai, would attain four seats.

Of those who would vote for the Shas, 48 per cent said they would vote for the list led by Yishai, while 46 per cent said they would vote for the list led by Aryeh Deri.

According to this poll, the joint list between Likud and the Jewish Home would gain 38 Knesset seats while the joint list between Lapid, Lieberman, and Kahlon would receive 26. However, the joint list between Herzog and Livni would earn 24 seats.

Source: MEMO

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By: Majed Kayali

In the context of its attempts to legitimise and establish itself as a Jewish nation-state, Israel is seeking to remove the Palestin-ians from place and time and impose its narrative of the area’s history as well as add historical and moral legitimacy for itself.

As for the direct political mean-ings that Israel wants to achieve by means of insisting on de-manding its recognition by oth-ers as a Jewish state, they can be summed up as follows.

First, it establishes the status quo, i.e. its control of Pales-tine’s historical territory from the river to the sea, and therefore imposes its will on the Palestin-ians, and either determines the outcome of negotiations or sets the ceiling in advance to suit its religious and ideological claims.

It is true that we are referring to the idea of “two states for two peoples”, but this is different from the two-state solution. It also means that the establish-ment of the Palestinian state will be done in accordance with the borders imposed or approved by Israel and that the solution will ultimately mean the end of the Palestinians’ rights and de-mands.

Secondly, it imposes an Israeli conviction that historical Pales-tine is “Israeli land”, meaning it is exclusively the property of Jews and is not the subject of dispute

Articles & Analyses

between two peoples or “na-tions” or that it is equally right-ful for both sides. It portrays the Palestinians as by passers or intruders of the time and place. What we can conclude from this is that Israel’s claims make it seem as if it is conceding part of its “right” to Palestine or what it considers to be “Israel’s territory” to the Palestinians in order for them to establish their own state on the condition that they agree to the Israeli narrative or the fact that Israel is the true owner of the land. It is as if Israel is do-ing the Palestinians a favour and portrays itself as being morally superior to the Palestinians.

Thirdly, Israel refuses to take any responsibility for the Nakba and the birth of the Palestinian refugee issue. It refuses this to resolve this matter because, in accordance with its nation state status, it is a state for only Jews;

they are the ones who have the right to determine their fate while the Palestinians can determine their own fate, but only in their state.

Fourthly, Israel is trying to use this project to pressure the Pal-estinians and exploit them in order to subjugate the Palestin-ians and impose their dictations on them by threatening the citi-zenship of Palestinians living in the territories occupied in 1948 and by threatening to revoke the residency permits for those in Jerusalem. In light of such legis-lation, the Palestinians would be residents that have no political or national rights based on the fact that Israel is a Jewish nation state. It is worth noting that Israel continues to treat Palestinian cit-izens as individuals or sects, not as nationals or Arabs. Therefore, Israel will be able, through legal means, to prevent national ex-pressions by Palestinian citizens

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of Israel as well as ban any sort of political relationship with the Israelis by threatening to revoke their citizenship or deport them. This means that “Israelifying” themselves is the only option open to them.

On the Israeli level, this project is in the context of the internal po-litical competition in the country, part of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s attempt to attract and polarise nationalist and reli-gious right-wing trends in order to maximise his chances of winning the next election. He has also described the disputes between the secular and religious trends during debates and conflicts be-tween the secular and religious parties. He also mentioned the relationship between religion and identity and the level of de-mocracy exercised, and such discussions are the basis of the tensions within Israeli society. He cannot cover these tensions up or alleviate their escalation either by drawing attention to the external challenges, which Israel calls the existential danger, and Arab hostility to Israel.

On the other hand, we can date Israel’s demand of its recognition as a Jewish nation-state back to the reservations it had regard-ing the Roadmap for peace proposed by the previous US administration in 2003. Israel’s sixth reservation stated: “In con-nection to both the introductory statements and the final settle-ment, declared references must be made to Israel’s right to ex-ist as a Jewish state and to the waiver of any right of return for Palestinian refugees to the State of Israel.”(Haaretz, 27 May, 2003).

This demand was reiterated dur-

ing a speech made by Ariel Sha-ron in the Aqaba Conference (4 June, 2003) which was attended by the US President at the time, George W. Bush, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, and Pal-estinian Prime Minister Mah-moud Abbas. At the time, Bush endorsed this demand during a statement where he said: “Amer-ica is strongly committed and I am strongly committed to Isra-el’s security as a vibrant Jewish state.”

Tensions between Israel and the Palestinians reached their peak regarding this subject during the Annapolis Conference (27 November, 2007), which was organised by the United States towards the end of Bush’s term. The Israeli Prime Minister at the time, Ehud Olmert, and the Is-raeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni both mentioned this demand during their speeches.

The Israeli side tried to ensure that the “Joint Understanding” document proposed at the start of the Annapolis process used the term “the Jewish state”, but the Palestinian side, supported by the Arab states, strongly re-jected it on the grounds that the requirement was only to recog-nise Israel and not to recognise its nature as a Jewish state. This threatened to blow the entire Annapolis Conference, which resulted in Israel backing down from its demand.

Based on this, the Likud and Kadima party leaders, along with the right-wing extremist parties Shas, Yisrael Beytenu, the Jew-ish Home, and the National Reli-gious Party (NPR), adopted this proposal and added it to the list of Israeli conditions for a settle-ment with the Palestinians. As

America is strongly

committed and I am strongly committed to

Israel’s security as a vibrant

Jewish state.George W. Bush

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It is worth reminding everyone that this project, or bold move, is one of the products of the unfair and incomplete Oslo Accords signed in 1993 which was not based on any resolutions or international conventions related to the Palestinian issue.

for the other parties, Labour, Meretz and later Yesh Atid, they did not care about this condition nor did they rely on it. They con-sidered it to be excessive and unnecessary, especially since others’ recognition of Israel’s nature did not matter as long as Israel determines its nature as a Jewish state. They also believed that proposing such an issue would only provoke trouble and expose Israel’s weaknesses, not strengths.

The point is that the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu did not break new ground when he made this proposal after hav-ing previously focused on the demand of “security first”, i.e. stopping Palestinians from com-mitting all acts of armed resis-tance. He was beat by Sharon, Olmert and Livni (who is now opposed to the current form of the project). Netanyahu shifted towards demanding the recogni-tion of Israel as a Jewish state since he made a speech at Bar-Ilan University in 2009 after the Palestinians, under Abbas’ lead-ership, implemented the condi-tions set out by the Roadmap.

Ben-Gurion was the first Israeli Prime Minister to back down from describing Israel as a Jew-ish state, i.e. the state that all Jews, wherever they are, identi-fy with. According to Yossi Beilin, in an article in Israel Today on 3 December, 2010, “the moment Ben-Gurion began presenting Is-rael as a Jewish state and called on all the Jews of the world to immigrate to Israel” he angered the American Jews at the time and their leader Jacob Blaus-tein, a billionaire who donated to Israel. In addition to this, three leaders of Jewish-American or-ganisations came to Israel in

May 1948 and met with Ben-Gu-rion, telling him “Israel does not have the authority to announce itself as a Jewish state and call on the Jews of the world to immi-grate to it because this will spark implicit hostility against Semites and claims regarding dual loy-alty.” Blaustein even threatened to stop donating to Israel “if its leaders continue to clash with non-Jews regarding the issue of dual loyalty”.

He also explained to Ben-Gurion that “the United States is not the Diaspora and is not a place where the Jewish people were stuck. For the American Jews, the United States is their final destination.” Then, according to Beilin, Ben-Gurion stopped describing Israel as a “Jewish state” and declared that “the state of Israel represents its citi-zens alone and speaks on their behalf. It does not seek, in any way, to represent or speak on behalf of the Jewish citizens of other countries.” (The Palestin-ian Forum for Israeli Studies (MADAR), Ramallah).

It is worth reminding everyone that this project, or bold move, is one of the products of the unfair and incomplete Oslo Accords signed in 1993 which was not based on any resolutions or in-ternational conventions related to the Palestinian issue. It is also based on the negotiations on the will or approval of the two con-cerned parties, which was an indirect expression that intended to cover up the fact that Israel, which has full control and which is internationally backed, will be the one to decide the nature of the negotiations, their priorities, their paths, and their results, and this is what happened.

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It is a well-known fact that the Balfour Declaration of 1917 dictated the “establishment of a national state for the Jews in Palestine”, and not the estab-lishment of a state for the Jews or a Jewish state. This was also reiterated in the British Mandate and in the recommendations of the international committees re-garding Palestine before the es-tablishment of Israel.

Also, UN Resolution 273 (1849), in which the nations of the world recognised Israel, made the con-dition that the state stipulated by resolutions 181 (1947) and 194 (1949) be established. The first resolution stipulated the division of Palestine into a Jewish and an Arab state, while the second provides for the right of return for Palestinian refugees. Both of these resolutions were approved by Israel at the time, but they were not implemented.

In this regard, it is worth not-ing that talking about a Jewish state at that time was different from being a Jewish nation-state because the division resolu-tion stipulated that the Palestin-ians remain in the state allotted for the Jews while the Jews re-main in the state allotted to the Arabs. It also stipulated that an economic union be established between the two states and that there would be international management of Jerusalem.

This means that referring to Is-rael as a Jewish nation-state is heresy as is the new emphasis on this fabricated state’s colo-nial and racist nature. In addition to this, talk of a Jewish nation-state today is not limited to the state being a Jewish state for its citizens, but also considering it a state for all Jews around the

world, and that Israel will revoke the nationality of all Palestinian Israeli citizens, or so it is threat-ening, while they are living on their own land.

However, such talk does not mean that Israel isn’t already acting as a Jewish state, regard-less of the legal aspect. Israel defines itself as a Jewish state and it behaves as a nation-state for the Jews across the world, presenting itself as a safe haven for them. Israel also translates this into its laws and guarantees Jews the “Law of Return” accord-ing to which it allows any Jew in the world to come to Israel and get citizenship.

There is also the Israeli state property law which considers all land to be the property of the state and prohibits its sale or the transfer of its ownership. This also includes the state’s sym-bols, including its flag, anthem, the Knesset, and the laws de-rived from the teachings of the Torah. More importantly, Israel’s behaviour towards the Pales-tinians reflects this and this ex-plains their expulsion and the at-tempts to eliminate them from all existence.

Israel’s arrogance and escala-tion stems from a sense of in-feriority and a lack of serenity. Even 60 years later, this state is still searching for its identity and trying to assert itself. This state, which has always lived on the claim that it is an oasis of democ-racy, modernity, and secularism, is now establishing a state based on historical and religious myths and is working on defining itself based on religion. Meanwhile, it is confused about its identity and whether it wants to be a demo-cratic state or a Jewish state, a secular state or a religious state.

There is also the Israeli state

property law which considers

all land to be the property of the state and

prohibits its sale or the transfer of

its ownership.

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Issue no 114