The Reality of Israeli Apartheid Must Be Recognized
An op-ed by Jason Horowitz headlined “Stop Calling Israel Apartheid” appeared in the Times of Israel blog section today. This is my response.
While discussing the recent Human Rights Watch (HRW) report concluding that Israeli policy constitutes the crime of apartheid, Jason Horowitz never articulates a strong personal position on whether he agrees with this assessment. The closest he comes to a judgement on this controversial term is in his last paragraph, which could be interpreted as a denial that apartheid exists in the West Bank. However, the time period he references was before two major reports were released. Furthermore, Horowitz and the friend he mentions (both of whom visited the West Bank and expressed skepticism at the “apartheid” label) likely didn’t possess the tools to accurately assess the situation, while organizations like the United Nations (U.N.) and HRW likely did.
Therefore, due to these small details, we can surmise that Horowitz is not necessarily denying the claims of apartheid made by more recent reports (such as the HRW report he references). Given this context, let’s assume that with the new HRW report and the previous report by Richard Falk Virginia Tilley of the U.N., the evidence for Israeli apartheid is now overwhelming (I believe it is). His issue seems to be with the term itself being a distraction…
