"Apartheid" - Once more for the record.

in israel •  4 years ago 

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"Apartheid" is an Africaans word that denotes official government policy, that of separation of races in society. There is only one nation that SPEAKS Africaans, and one nation that has had an official government policy of separation of races within my lifetime, and that is, of course, South Africa. Apartheid was ended in 1994, as I recall, so it's been almost thirty years since there has BEEN an official government policy to keep whites and blacks separated in society. And that policy was in only one government, at least as far as the first world is concerned.

"Apartheid", which in English is best rendered "separation", is not a synonym for racism or any kind of separate social treatment in general. It's a title for a former government policy in South Africa. One can compare it, in those terms, with "nondiscrimination" as official government policy in America since 1964. Of course, there was no policy that preceded it, called "discrimination" or "racism" or anything else. What was cultural in some areas does not add up to official government policy. The closest I can manage to discover in official policy is the law against whites and blacks getting married, which was ruled (in "Loving vs. Virginia" by the Supreme Court) unconstitutional in 1967.

Israel is not an apartheid nation. There is no government policy dictating separation between Israeli Arabs and Jews. Israeli Arabs have full civil rights, and can even vote for representatives in the Knesset, of which there are 14 seated today.

If you can vote for your tribe/race/creed to sit in the LEGISLATURE, you are not living in "apartheid".

To the extent that Israel regards certain Arabs with the side eye, it's because that group keeps ATTACKING them and swearing into microphones in public that their goal is to destroy Israel and kill all the Jews.

And in SPITE of that, Gaza has electricity and water because of Israel, who DONATES those things, along with lots of other life necessities.

If that's apartheid, Israel SUCKS at it.

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