Thank you for your courage Lamis. The very idea that Israelis consider a fifth of their population to be a demographic threat in itself exposes the big lie of Israel's so called ``democracy''.

How come the Arabs and Muslims always complain about Israel (Palestine), Russia (Chechnya) and India (Kashmir), but never about the systemic destruction of my ancestral homeland of India (including Pakistan and Bangladesh) over 100s of years by Muslims?

It is important for the journalists to be neutral and today's journalists do not have that integrity. When Isreal asks for Jewish state, you must understand the reasons: 1. Arabs do not practice family planning and have many wives and therefore produce too many kids and they increase the population beyond imagination and they become majority. it has happened in countries like Malaysia where muslims became majority and took over the country. Therefore, I understand that Isreal wants to maintain the jewesh state. Palestinians are good people and they need to understand the predicament of Isreal too. It is important for each other to see what others are thinking rather than stick to their own views and also that of dumb journalists views. Palestinians need their own state which they never had under Arab rule (Jordan) and they need to know their leaders are very corrupt. The only way a two state solution happen is when Palestinians and Isrealis exhibit moderate views on religion and not become mired with too much conservative religious system. Think Palestinians and Isrealis - are you all ready for moderate states on each side?

Excellent response and analysis from academic sympathizers.But why are the chosen people charging 1,000.00 U$D for every truck bringing in Humanitarian supplies.There is no response for the conduct of the ashkenazim/Sephardim we are all prisoners to this ongoing escalation of Dehumanization that numbs the sensibilities of altruists world wide.What will the chosen do for their ordained Biblical encore?

The concerted Arab effort to label the Israeli state as racist prior to the upcoming Durban Conference is appalling.

The Arab block is very seductive in its criticism of Israel, but doesn't stand the test of its own accusations. The Muslim Koran doesn't allow a Democratic state either. Nor does it allow for a Jewish State in Historical Israel. NOWHERE do you see any suggestion of democratic, equal rights for Jews in Arab lands. Simply accusing Jews of impropriety doesn't absolve Muslim countries from the same test.

The travesty of Durban I "Conference on Racisim," aka "Zionism is Racisim," was the lead-in for the terrorist attack on the Twin Towers in New York. It will be a test for the racists in the Islamic world to do better after Durban II.

According to Ms. Andoni, the systematic expulsion (of Arabs) and ethnic cleansing... continues inside Israel proper and the occupied West Bank.

This will no doubt be a shocking surprise to Ali Yihye, an Israeli Arab, who was appointed ambassador to Greece in 2006. He also served in that capacity in Helsinki from 1995 to 1999.

Has a loyal Jewish citizen of Qatar or any other Muslim country (if any is permitted to live there) ever been elevated to the rank of ambassador?

I am glad to see that so far NLKATZ has not thought to contradict any of my posts, because his (hers?) are narrowly drawn and carefully written, avoid generalizations, and seem to have the ring of accuracy, though I have not specifically vetted them as yet

"One of the biggest ironies of the current system of Israeli government is that Israeli Arabs are represented in the Israeli parliament but are never allowed to join the government".

This is yet another patch in the "narrative" woven by Arabs and their supporters abroad in the fabric of total fabrications that they present to the world, including by otherwise respectable people.

Arabs in Israel have served in Israel's government, both in a ministerial and deputy ministerial positions. Indeed, presently Israel's minister of Science, Culture and Sports is an Arab. And of course Arabs serve in both the legislative and judicial branches of government.

Parties that by choice tend to be "apartheid" parties, set up by and for Arabs alone and whose members have not accepted Israel's right to exist as the nation-state of a people, of the Jewish people, as Israel was proclaimed based on UN resolutions have not been invited to be part of government coalitions.

But Arabs in Israel are welcome to vote and be elected for and by any general Israeli party – left, right and center – and they do.

"… (the Palestinian Arabs) indigenous people…"

Since the term "indigenous people" continue to come up often at these threads, it should be clear what it is about which we talk. Following is a definition of the term:

"Indigenous people - A term which describes any ethnic group of people who inhabit a geographic region with which they have the earliest known historical connection".

If anyone knows anything about the history of South West Asia (Middle East) in general and the history of Eretz Israel (Land of Israel/Palestine) in particular, it is very clear that this definition does not apply to the "Palestinian people".

The history of the region is one that can be characterized by the constant movement of peoples, cultures and conquerors since pre-historic period and part of this constant movement of people – due to the particular geographic location and configuration of the country being a narrow land passage between north and south, east and west – the "peoples" found here are amalgamations or mixtures of all those who have ever passed through the country.

The only culture, the only civilization that has been constant to the country – although it too of course has been influenced by the movement of peoples and cultures – and has remained in tact for thousands of years, including the affinity of its members to the Land for all these years, and not to any other land on earth, is the Jewish civilization.

To negate this fact for political expediency; in order to clearly advance a very definite political gain is simply an intellectually dishonest thing to do, and should be treated as such.

P.S. The origin of the use of the term Palestinian Arabs is not of any poster here but rather that of those who founded Fatah in 1957 and in their Charter made use of the term, so as to distinguish this organization from the main-stream thinking at the time among the Arabs of Eretz Israel (Land of Israel/Palestine) as strictly Arabs. The founding leader of the Fatah of course no other than Yasser Arafat.

"You want to tell me more about this ethnic cleansing?"

The ethnic cleansing of Palestinians? Plan Dalet.

The ethnic cleansing of Jews? Aliyah.

One of the biggest ironies of the current system of Israeli government is that Israeli Arabs are represented in the Israeli parliament but are never allowed to join the government. There are more Israeli Arab delegates than there are members of a few smaller fringe parties that have previously been allowed in the government. The US should pressure Israel to allow these Arab representatives into the government in order to form a parliamentary majority which is interested in a peace process.

Many of the posters here say they are not racists and then do their best to show that they are. Their racist word? "Arab". The trouble is that Arabs are not a race or a nationality.

Israeli propaganda would have you believe the Palestinians are not indigenous people but are, that dirty word, Arabs and all the Arabs are the same people, a race.

Palestinians are not the descendants of invaders but are the native people who have lived in Palestine long before the term Arab existed, long before Islam existed and before Christianity existed.

Israel has to pretend they are not so they call the natives "Arabs" and those within Israel "Arab-Israelis". To call them Palestinian-Israelis would be to give Palestinians a legitimacy of being a people.

Propaganda is the use of words to create labels and the labels have both connotations and denotations. The denotation of Arab is “people who speak Arabic”. The connotation Israelis wish to create is “murderous invading Muslims”.

The native people of the area called Palestine have chosen to call themselves Palestinians. They are not Turkish, Syrian, Lebanese, or Egyptian. Palestinian is as good a name as any but you could just as well call them the "people of David" since they are found in the area that was once the kingdom of David.

What really disturbs Israelis is that the Palestinians are more "Jewish" than they are, not in a religious sense but in their genetics. The Palestinians of today are the people that didn't disperse but stayed put. When the Romans forced Jews out many stayed and became Christians. Later, when invading armies passed through, many converted to Islam. The Palestinians were not wiped out and replaced with the fictional people, "Arabs".

The Israeli geneticists know this and so do many of the Palestinian and Israeli populations. It is the elephant in the room - Palestinians have better genetic roots to Jewish patriarchs than modern Jews. Israelis want to place religious roots to the land over genetic roots and they will do everything they can to cloud the difference.

AFREUND said: "America gets something for its money". This is an understatement. The Anglo-American elites and bankers created the state of Israel just as the Philipines was seized as a coaling station vis-à-vis Japan. Israel is an outpost in the land of oil (the greater Middle East).

Ronald Storrs, Military Governor of Jerusalem in the 1920's said in his book _Orientations_ about why the British were supporting the Zionists, that in Palestine they would create "A Jewish State [which] will be for England a little, loyal Ulster in a sea of potentially hostile Arabism."

I guess, "original sin" of Israel, in your view, is that it exists.
Israel has to be democracy for Jews, because Arabs, like you, do not tolerate Jews and expell them when they are in majority. How many Jews are left in Arab countries? Jewish state has right to exist. Whether Arabs like it or not.

Facts:
1947 -- Jews in areas called East Jerusalem and West Bank -- thousands
1949 -- Jews in East Jerusalem and West Bank: ZERO

1947 -- Arabs in lands to become Israel -- Thousands
1949 -- Arabs in lands now Israel -- Thousands

You want to tell me more about this ethnic cleansing?

"Only a few months ago, Israeli foreign minister Tzipi Livni - a member of the "centrist" Kadima Party -- also implied that she preferred the transfer of what Arabs call the Palestinians of 1948 to areas under the jurisdiction of the Palestinian Authority".

Again, not so!!!

Ms. Livni clearly stated, over and over again over a course of a number of years, that she is in favour of the existence of two nation-states: an Arab and a Jewish. In this sense once again she expressed the precise principle expressed in UN Resolutions

She also stated that the Arab citizens of Israel will continue to reside in Israel as full citizens whose "national affinity will be expressed" in their nation-state. She did not suggest, explicitly or implicitly, the transfer of any Arab.

To even suggest it here without any evidence what-so-ever and contrary to real evidence is libellous and make one question the intellectual honesty of this writer.

"Only a few months ago, Israeli foreign minister Tzipi Livni - a member of the "centrist" Kadima Party -- also implied that she preferred the transfer of what Arabs call the Palestinians of 1948 to areas under the jurisdiction of the Palestinian Authority".

Again, not so!!!

Ms. Livni clearly stated, over and over again over a course of a number of years, that she is in favour of the existence of two nation-states: an Arab and a Jewish. In this sense once again she expressed the precise principle expressed in UN Resolutions

She also stated that the Arab citizens of Israel will continue to reside in Israel as full citizens whose "national affinity will be expressed" in their nation-state. She did not suggest, explicitly or implicitly, the transfer of any Arab.

To even suggest it here without any evidence what-so-ever and contrary to real evidence is libellous and make one question the intellectual honesty of this writer.

"The real threat is Israel's racist insistence on maintaining the Jewishness of the state by any means".

Not so!!!

Israel is Jewish because it was established on the basis of a UN Resolution calling for the establishment of "a Jewish state".

Israel is Jewish because it is the nation-state of a people, of the Jewish people. In this sense Israel is as "racist" as any "Arab" state, and there are more than 20 of them. In that sense Israel is as "racist" as Greece is racist for being the nation-state of the Greek people and as "racist" as Denmark is racist for being the nation-state of the Danish people.

But unlike some nation-states, Israel considers all its citizens, Arab and Jew alike, equal before the law, and in this sense all citizens of Israel are eligible to have the same rights as all other citizens, although there are differences with regard to obligations, e.g. most Arabs are not required to do military or police service.

I will not answer all the people calling me racist: it is the typical leftist/ arab BS argument, that refuses to examine the facts of history, and simply calls people names when they don't agree.

Israel was given by God to the Jews, and if you don't like it, though luck. You just cannot stomach that the Jews, after 2000 years of exile , CAME HOME. WE ARE HERE TO STAY, and if it hurts your delicate feelings, so be it: why should we care? Let God decide who Israel belongs to ( and we already know the outcome, even if YOU don't).You want to fight God's choice, go ahead, but I warn you, it won't work: look what happened to Pharaoh when he tried to oppose God's will: he ended up in the bottom of the sea; all the Jews had to do is watch it happen, not a finger was lifted. Let this be a lesson for you: you want to oppose God, you will pay the price.

Mostly desert and without a drop of oil, the modern state of Israel is not the most desirable piece of real estate but - as the remaining temple wall in Jerusalem attests - it is the Hebrews' traditional homeland; Jews are not just alien occupiers. Unfortunately, the Arabs who lived there and left never even attempted to live in peace with the Jews and to this day many only wish to provoke and do them violence. How does one forge a common society out of that?

As to the 'billions in US aid', it might be good to point out that it is mostly funding for joint research and development, much of it military - not a charitable donation. America gets something for its money. Then again, perhaps the fact that Israel teaches its children to become scientists and not to hate, demonize or physically attack Americans has something to do with that.

Eloquent journalists such as Ms. Landoni could use their talent to do a great service for their people by reminding them that borders all over the world have shifted many times over the centuries and people went on to new lives. If Palestinian Arabs truly want a better future there should be plenty of inspiration in their own traditions; they could reignite their natural creative genius (we still use the mathematical symbols Arabs invented) instead of teaching their children to become human bombs or career victims. Never has that led to greatness or prosperity.

I will define apartheid for Ms. Andoni. It is the Palestinian state proposed in the two-state solution between the Palestinians and Israel. It will have no Jews and already has a law preventing Jews from owning property within its borders.

What are the "liberals" thinking?

The cold facts of history as recounted by Prof. Pappe from the very archives of the Israeli government itself are not Antisemitic.

But they say very nasty things about Zionism.

This is the worst kind of anti-Semitic ranting usually found only on neo-Nazi and far-left sites. The Washington Post has lost its credibility totally by publishing this trash.

What racist muslim state has been less insistant
on maintaining a muslim state?
All the surrounding muslim lands and peoples would not integrate these "Palestinian" refugees.
They could easily go to countries of like mindedness and like faith. Do you expect France to stop being french or Mexico to give more land to Texas because they did not take enough the first time? Give them your land, Ms.Lamis Andoni
Your home and your culture or all your years. Let your children be taught their mantras ; eventhough they are different than your own.
It is fair and socialist to give them what you have worked for, then you and your family can suffer from the Palestinian driveness to take
what someone else rightfully owns for nothing,
In any other part of the world the Palestinians
would be squatters and theives of delusional proportions, But they have been smart, They have convinced people to take up their cause and publish their cries to the ends of the earth.
If this situation had never been inflated beyond the borders of the battles themselves - It would be long over. The media paints with a twisted brush the heros and villians that it chooses. Where are your cries for displaced Africans ? The Falon Gong and so many others?
The long fought Northern Ireland conflict did
not receive so much attention and interference.
Racist ? or Defense of the homeland.
We get pretty serious about defending our soil.
We may sell it all to a foreign country - but we
wouldn't let someone take it either. So if France
wants Louisiana back it is just too bad!

This is a typical ignorant propaganda piece. I am surprised that the 'Post' publishes these pieces in batches. The fact is that Israel's Arabs have made greater progress in every realm in life than their Arab compatriots in most Arab countries. They are privileged in some ways over the majority Jewish citizens of Israel. They do not have the major obligation of serving the country either through the military, or through some civilian service. The fact is also that their political leadership is damaging to them. There are Arab members of the Knesset who have encouraged Israel's enemies in times of war, and even transmitted information to them.
This article is another instance of Ignorance which once would not have passed the threshold of editorial scrutiny at the Post.

First of all, thank you Washington Post to publish an article that is not bias to Israel or Jewish people. This does not mean that we should be only publishing pro Palestinian articles. The problem right now is that articles that are published in the western world must be pro Israel or else they are considered anti-semitic or written by terrorist. It is time for us to be able to talk or write about a subject without being accused of racism.
We call Muslims terrorist for doing one thing and we sell bunker busting bomb to Israel for doing the same thing. Let us not forget that it was the Jews that blew up bombs in public places and murdered civilians before the creation of Israel in 1948. So why is that we consider one terrorist and not the other one?
Israel's action in Middle East is not any better than Hamas. Israel has killed about 3,000 Muslims (mostly civilians) in the past 3 years. Why are we giving them money and selling them weapons? We would not do that for any Muslim country (and we should not).
USA is the champion of individual freedom and can not continue in the current path of supporting Israel with its racist and inhumane actions.

Nekamelek: Your comments shows that you are a man with full of hate and have a racist soul. You lack the knowledge and the education to understand that all Arabs are not the same. And in Dubai not one Jews was killed unlike the 1000s of Palestinians that died in Gaza by Israeli's bombs just few weeks ago. And just to refresh your mind, Jews are Semites just like Arabs. Jews and Arabs are the same just divided by religion. So don't hate your brothers and sisters.

Dr. Pappe's endnotes for these
paragraphs are:

3: One historian, Meir Pail, claims the orders were sent a week
later (Meir Pail, From Hagana to the IDF, p. 307).

4. The documents from the meeting are summarized in the IDF Archives, GHQ/Operations branch, 10 March 1948, File 922/75/595 and in the Hagana Archives, 73/94. The meeting is reported by lsrael Galili in the Mapai center meeting, 4 April 1948, which is to be found in the Hagana Archives 80/50/18. The composition of the group and its discussions are the product of a mosaic reconstruction of several documents as will be explained in the next chapters. ln chapter four the messages that went out on March 10 and the meetings prior to the finalizing of the plan, are also documented. For a similar interpretation of Plan Dalet, which was adopted a few weeks before that meeting, see Uri Ben Eliezer,The Emergence of Israeli Militarism, 1936-1956 , p. 253; he writes: 'Plan Dalet aimed at cleansing of villages, expulsion of Arabs from mixed towns'. For the dispatch of the orders see also Meir Pail, p. 307 and Gershon Rivlin and Elhanan Oren, The War of Independence: Ben-Gurion's Diary, vol 1, p. 147. The orders dispatched can be found in the Hagana Archives 73/94, for each of the units: orders to the brigades to move to Position D — Mazav Dalet — and from the brigade to the Battalions, 16 April 1948.

5. Simcha Flapan, The Birth of Israel: Myths and Realities, p. 93.

I'm not exclusively in favor of either Israel OR the Palestinians, but it's not hard to see that this article is biased. "Ethnic cleansing", "apartheid", "racial policies"... do you know what any of this actually means? The only term that has some truth to it may be "occupation", and only in Gaza.

Let's put things in proportion, shall we?

1) Israelis are not trying to "cleanse" Arabs from their country or keep a Jewish majority, at least, not by force. The problem is that Palestinians call the building of Jewish settlements "expropiation" and "colonisation" even when the land was acquired legally. Yes, the Israeli army does keep outposts there, but this has become necessary because of the violence these settlements are subjected to (which, BTW, existed even before the war in 1948).

2) "Ethnic cleansing" is the systematic killing of a specific race WITH THE PURPOSE OF EXTERMINATING THEM from a specific area. Does anyone see Israel killing Arabs on its own side of the border? Israel has a 20% Arab population, so maybe the "cleansing" has not worked too well, not to mention the privileges Arabs claim to, like exemption from military service.

I agree that the IDF are not the saintly bunch they claim to be... Israel killed many more people than it needed to in Gaza and has displayed a "THEIR fault" attitude when dealing with civilian casualties ever since. It does not mean they would have gone in there if there were no rockets.

Most Jews today accept that the two-state solution is the best way to go. It's groups like Hamas, etc. that are still stuck in 1948.

The fact is, eleven men, now the heroes and patriarchs of the State of Israel, sat at a table
in Tel Aviv, in The Red House (so called because it had formerly been the
headquarters of the Israeli Labour Movement — ie., Socialist, now taken over by the Zionists). Here is a quote from Ilan Pappe's The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine:

In this building, on a cold Wednesday afternoon, 10 March 1948, a group of eleven men, veteran Zionist leaders together with young military Jewish officers, put the final touches to a plan for the ethnic cleansing of Palestine.

That same evening, military orders were dispatched to the units on the ground to prepare for the systematic expulsion of the Palestinians from vast areas of the country.(3) The orders came with a detailed description of the methods to be employed to forcibly evict the people: large-scale intimidation; laying siege to
and bombarding villages and population centres; setting fire to homes, properties and goods; expulsion; demolition; and, finally, planting mines among the rubble to prevent any of the expelled inhabitants from returning. Each unit was issued with its own list of villages and neighbourhoods as the targets of this master plan. Codenamed Plan D (Dalet in Hebrew), this was the fourth and final version of less substantial plans that outlined the fate the Zionists had in store for Palestine and consequently for its native population. The previous three schemes had articulated only obscurely how the Zionist leadership contemplated dealing with the presence of so many Palestinians living in the land the Jewish national movement coveted as its own. This fourth and last blueprint spelled it out clearly and unambiguously: the Palestinians had to go.(4) In the words of one of the first historians to note the significance of that plan, Simcha Flapan, 'The military campaign against the Arabs, including the "conquest and destruction of the rural areas" was set forth in the Hagana's Plan Dalet'.(5)

Lamis,

C'mon......give us a balanced view.....there are wrongs on both side and you can't look at one without looking at the other. Bad article.....

Jewish State and Islamic States should both become more tolerant....let's fix this together.

I find it "racist" against Arabs the everyone - including Arabs - only expect "moral" behavior from Israel. Notice the total lack of outrage against longstanding historical racist hatred towards Jews in every Arab country. Racism against Jews in the Middle East predates Israel and is today very similar to the antisemitism popular in medieval Europe.

Such one-sided rants against Israeli "injustice" only show how completely the speaker has forsaken all hope of the possibility of Arab morality.

Nakamalex,

Factually you are incorrect, thousands of Jewish activists have come and gone into the Occupied Territories as part of the International Solidarity Movement (ISM). In fact, there is a substantial number of Jews who were denied entry into Israel precisely because they were in solidarity with the human rights of Palestinians.

Furthermore, I find your statement "should be grateful that any of your people is even allowed to stay alive in Israel", extremely disturbing. You are saying in no uncertain language that the indigenous population of the Holy Land should be grateful that they are not exterminated.

In a vacuum, I would simply think that you have gone mad. But when your language is put within the context of a state ideology which is unambiguously supremacist it demonstrates that it is a fundamental necessity for global civil society to boycott Israel and the Zionist institutions that support it.

Ah what exquisite arrogance. Take a peoples’ land by force and then call them terrorists for fighting back. Now the question is not how to give them back their land but whether to round up the remnants and dump them into someone else’s country.

Given the prior comments, justice is a concept of diminishing balance.

Dear Washington Post:

It's refreshing to read a columnist without Israeli bias and pro-israeli perspective. Many journalists, scholars,and authors--pulitzer winners in facts--who have lived in the Middle East and reported on Israel Palestine and the Middle East for decades do not toe the de facto one state solution line. I'm thankful to read a different perspective. If you don't believe that the Israeli state has created Aparteid in the occupied West Bank you are ill-informed or a propagandist.

Thank you Lamis, for the insight, and thank you to the Washington Post to allow this point of view. As for the other commentators, you are right that many Arab countries do not treat Jews any better than Israel treats its Arabs. But then again, these other countries do not receive the billions in US aid that Israel receives. The US gives Israel twice as much money as it gives to the United Nations. If you want to take US taxpayer dollars then you should and will be held to a different standard.

Nekamalek: the racism that drips from your response is exactly the problem being described here. To you and many zionists, every Arab is the same and should have no rights to private property in Israel since other Arab countries should be just expected to take them in. Since they all have the same color skin and worship the same god and all. By that logic maybe we should just kick out all of the Hispanic looking people in America since any of the Latin American countries should just take them in and they are all the same, right?

Yeah, there go those crazy Jews trying keep the Arab man down.

Gimme a break, lady.

Hello pot, meet kettle.

Arab liberal crybaby.Put your burka back on.

Are there ANY Arab countries that DON'T have a policy of maintaining the unique "Arabness" of their state? Most don't even allow a Jew to set foot in their country! You are a major hypocrite!

Oh Lamis, please spare us; your tendentious and biased article is not fooling anybody. You are complaining about "RACIST POLICIES"of Israel. I beg you please, what exactly happened in Dubai in the tennis championship this month? And HOW MANY JEWS ARE ALLOWED TO LIVE IN RAMALLAH? IN JENIN? OR HOW ABOUT IN GAZA? What would happen to the poor Jew or Israeli who happens to venture into Rafiah; would he or she be blown-up, decapitated, butchered, quartered, stabbed,raped, and/or burnt to death? Our pick I guess. Please spare us the moralizing. You should be grateful that any of your people is even allowed to stay alive in Israel. Thank us for our stupid morality. If it was up to me, I'd send you all packing back to the Arab countries you came from, be it Egypt, Jordan, Iraq, Lebanon, Syria,....no matter, you are all one people, in your 22 Arab countries. So please, don't complain, and be grateful we are so very nice to you... and sooooo stupid. What we REALLY should do is give you all a PROPORTIONATE RESPONSE IN KIND.

Good bye, Ms Al-Jezeera propaganda. And Washington Post, frankly I am very dismayed that you published such a biased article,