New York-based Human Rights Watch says “Israeli authorities have deprived millions of people of their basic rights by virtue of their identity as Palestinians”. Conversely they “methodically privilege” Jewish Israelis, including settlers on the West Bank.
And so Israel has violated both the 1973 International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid (“Apartheid Convention”) and the 1998 Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, Human Rights Watch concludes in a detailed 217-page report, titled A Threshold Crossed; Israeli Authorities and the Crimes of Apartheid and Persecution.
Many of Israel’s critics, including some in South Africa, label it as an “apartheid state”. But Human Rights Watch explains that “the report does not set out to compare Israel with South Africa under apartheid or to determine whether Israel is an ‘apartheid state’ a concept that is not defined in international law”.
Author
Palestinian protester on the border between Gaza and Israel. August 30, 2019. Photo by Abed Rahim Khatb / Shutterstock
The past several years have seen a chorus of demands for decolonization coming from various movements, giving new life to the term. The challenge to colonial power structures today ranges from contestation over public monuments, museums and school curricula, to the struggles for the recognition and reclamation of the stolen lands on which many modern capitalist power centers have been built.
At the heart of these matters are questions over how history is framed and colonial dynamics and regimes are maintained in the present. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is one microcosm of this, and a key site of struggle against global racial capitalism.
1. What is the crime against humanity of apartheid?
Apartheid is a crime against humanity, defined in the International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid and the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. It consists of three primary elements:
An intent to maintain the
domination by one group over another.
A context of
An
act or acts.
Crimes against humanity consist of specific criminal acts – the Rome Statute identifies 11 such acts, including apartheid and persecution – committed as part of a widespread or systematic attack, or acts committed pursuant to a state or organizational policy, directed against a civilian population. They are among the most odious crimes in international law.
Palestinian political prisoners, a crucial part of our national struggle – PLO wrp.org.uk - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from wrp.org.uk Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
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