The fight for a Free Palestine is your fight too (Deep Dive)

Usually I don’t really get into politics. As an anarchist thinker it just doesn’t interest me. After losing faith in politicians when I was still a kid, my opinion never changed. But, even though people keep saying the Palestine issue is political, I strongly disagree. In reality this conflict is over territory. And it’s between a nation state, Israel, with one of the world’s most powerful and well funded militaries, and an indigenous population of Palestinians that has been occupied, displaced, and exiled for decades.

The word Palestine originally derives from the Greek word Philistia which is the name mentioned in descriptions of the region in the 12th century B.C. Since the fall of the Ottoman Empire, Palestine typically refers to the geographic region located between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River. Arab people who call this territory home are called Palestinians since the early 20th century. Over 135 United Nations member countries officially recognize Palestine as an independent state, but Israel and some other countries, including the United States, don’t make this distinction.

The “Occupation of Palestine” usually refers to the lands captured by Israel during the 1967 war that currently remain under Israeli military control, including the West Bank, East Jerusalem, the Golan Heights and Gaza. Despite the partitioning of the West Bank into areas A, B and C after the Oslo accords, to give some credibility to the Palestinian Authority, Israel has full military control. While settlers withdrew from Gaza in 2005, the army strictly manages the borders and airspace of the territory. They decide what is allowed in and out, and they periodically engage militarily in the territory. The “Occupation” can be understood as a system of military rule under which Palestinians are denied civil, political and economic rights and they are subjected to systematic discrimination and denial of basic freedom and dignity.

Yes, Palestinian citizens are entitled to vote and participate in political life and several Palestinians are members of the Knesset (the parliament of Israel), but they do not receive the same treatment as the Jewish citizens by the government. Israel still applies over 50 laws that privilege Jews over Arabs. For example, the 1950 Law of Return grants automatic citizenship rights to Jews from anywhere in the world upon request, while denying that same right to Palestinians. Government resources, meanwhile, are disproportionately directed to Jews and not to Arabs. This is one factor in causing the Palestinians to suffer the lowest living standards in Israeli society by all economic indicators.

Israel continues to discriminate against Palestinian citizens of Israel in areas of planning, budget allocation, policing and political participation. According to the Adalah-The Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, Israel maintains over 65 laws that discriminate against Palestinians. For exampe, Israel continues to deny Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza married to Palestinian citizens of Israel the right to nationality by enforcing the discriminatory “Entry to Israel” Law. And in December, the magistrate court in Krayot, near Haifa, rejected a petition for access to education by Palestinian citizens of Israel living in Karmiel, citing the discriminatory Nation State Law. The decision said that establishing an Arabic school in the town or funding transport for its Palestinian residents to study in Arabic schools in nearby communities would undermine the town’s “Jewish character”.

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http://marklubbers.com/make-no-mistake-the-fight-for-a-free-palestine-is-your-fight-too/