Thursday, March 23: Apartheid Out in the Open
Throwing tax dollars to an apartheid state is as American as apple pie
For three months now, Israelis have been protesting in the streets in the hundreds of thousands, on a weekly basis, to fight what they see as the far-right government’s abuse of power. The legislative plan aims to subordinate the judicial system and change the system of governance to the point that any semblance of checks and balances on those in power are removed altogether.
But what is the value of the rule of law in an apartheid state that has fabricated its own rule of law for decades by creating a separate system of military law to maintain control and oppression over millions of stateless Palestinians? What good are these protests when they’re calling for a return to the normalcy of occupation, discrimination, and oppression of Palestinians? How can any protesting Israeli expect to be taken seriously?
The current plan is led by a prime minister on trial for corruption in three separate cases, while the settler-colonial nation continues to hold millions of Palestinians under occupation with an explicit agenda to further entrench its control. Netanyahu wants to expand illegal settlements, while also assuming enough control over the courts to evade conviction for his crimes.
Israel’s lengthy military occupation has systematically disregarded the principles of democracy and equality that these protesters claim to be fighting for. While protesters march in the streets demanding the “rule of law” and “democracy,” Israeli forces are actively demolishing Palestinian homes, standing alongside racist settlers who are terrorizing Palestinians, denying freedom of movement and assembly, holding people in prolonged detention without trial, killing unarmed protesters, carrying out torture, deporting Palestinian activists; the list goes on and on.
But this process of creating new laws in order to serve its own interests is precisely what Israel has been doing since its founding as an occupying power. Ever since the land grab of the West Bank, Golan Heights, East Jerusalem, and Gaza Strip in 1967, the apartheid government, through its military and legal experts, has created an entirely novel and distinct legal framework to implement long-term military rule over an occupied population. What we’re seeing today is simply a byproduct of decades of corruption and a lack of consequences.
Side Items
A Star is (Re)Born: Ja Morant returned to the hardwood yesterday in a victory for the Memphis Grizzlies. Morant was serving an 8-game suspension handed down by the NBA for waving around a gun on his Instagram Live earlier this month. After a few weeks of therapy and reiki treatment down in Florida, the young superstar is back to embarrassing defenders and throwing down high-flying acrobatic dunks. Personally, I’m rooting for the kid
Mississippi Water Problems: As residents of Jackson, MS were forced to boil their tap water and businesses were closed due to their faucets running dry, a burst pipe at the “Colonial Country Club” was leaking an estimated five million gallons of drinking water a day. All this in a city that had none to spare. This is enough water to serve the daily needs of 50,000 people, or about a third of the city residents who were instead forced to conserve their water usage and boil whatever they wanted to consume
New COINTELPRO Just Dropped: The FBI used an undercover cop to spy on racial justice activists and literally manufacture crimes. The young woman, whose real name is April Rogers, is a detective at the Colorado Springs Police Department. The FBI enlisted her to infiltrate and spy on racial justice groups during the summer of 2020. You’d think there are better things the FBI could be doing with its resources, but you’d be mistaken