Letters: Propaganda war is designed to silence critics of Israel

It is a crime to transfer the protected residents of an occupied territory from their homes, regardless of whether the transfer is accomplished by brute force or by making residents’ lives so unbearable that they leave, ostensibly of their own accord. Forcible transfer is prohibited and constitutes a war crime.

Israel’s strategy is to forbid Palestinian construction of either private or public buildings. It also denies them the option of connecting to running water and electricity, and keeps them from paving roads. In some communities, Israel has demolished homes as well as infrastructure set up by the residents – such as solar panels for generating power, water cisterns and access roads. In addition, the military holds training exercises on the pastureland and farmland of some communities, and even in the midst of the residential area.

Israel’s goal is to make more land available for settlements and to achieve conditions that will make it easier to officially annex Area C (unilaterally or in a future agreement) and until then annex the land de facto. To that end, Israel wants to take over as much as possible of these communities’ land.

Until it manages to do so, Israel is putting life there on hold. Officially, it is using the pretext of “enforcing building and planning laws”: demolishing what it terms “unlawful construction” and removing residents from land it has unilaterally declared as “firing zones”. All this is a blatant lie: the state knows full well that it has ensured that Palestinians in Area C are barred from any possibility of legally building or laying infrastructure.

Israel is focusing efforts on three areas in the West Bank:

1) The South Hebron Hills: Some 1,000 people, about half of them minors, live in this area. The military began transferring out local residents in late 1999, arguing that the land had been declared a “firing zone” as far back as the 1980s.

2) The Ma’ale Adumim area: In the 1980s and 1990s, the Civil Administration expelled hundreds of Bedouins of the Jahalin tribe in order to establish and later expand the settlement of Ma’ale Adumim. The residents were transferred to a permanent site created for them near the Abu Dis garbage dump, losing access to the pastureland that was their livelihood. Now, another 3,000 or so local residents are facing imminent expulsion. This number include about 1,400 who live in an area that Israel has designated E1 and earmarked for expanding Ma’ale Adumim, to create a contiguous urban bloc between the settlement and Jerusalem.

3) The Jordan Valley: Some 2,700 Palestinians live in this area, in about 20 shepherding communities. The military has declared much of the land on which they live “firing zones” and conducts training exercises near their homes. In some communities, residents are repeatedly forced to vacate their homes so soldiers can train nearby. When the residents build homes, public structures and infrastructure Israel threatens demolition on grounds of “illegal construction”, and in some cases makes good on the threat.

Israel has created a bureaucratic bind which effectively denies these communities any possibility of legal construction or development. The reality of life in the West Bank is one of systematic violations of the law by Israel, aided by various laws and military orders the state set out without involving the Palestinians living there. Now Israel is waging a propaganda war so that any criticism of Israeli policies can be branded as anti-Semitism.

B McKenna
Dumbarton

CAT Boyd’s article (I have to speak out against the Israeli state ... I can’t stay silent on slaughter, The National, April 3) was a timely response at this sensitive time that we must not allow opposition to anti-Semitism (an urgent priority, as with any form of racism or Islamophobia) to be conveniently coupled with a fundamental criticism of the past and present policies of the state of Israel.

It is a hopeful sign that there are Jewish groups in England who distance themselves from the unabated campaign against Jeremy Corbyn. Here the organisation Scottish Jews For A Just Peace are to be found in support of demonstrations against Israeli policy, and members are active in organisations campaigning for the rights of Palestinians and against the occupation.

At the weekend I received an email from a good friend and devout Christian who, since his expulsion from his home as a young boy 70 years ago, has worked tirelessly to give hope to young people of all backgrounds in Gaza. He is angry and saddened once again by what he describes as the “racist and discriminatory policies and excessive use of force against civilians demonstrating to mark the Land Day”.

My friend has not a racist bone in his body and has friends from all creeds and ethnic backgrounds. It would be as ridiculous to charge him with “anti-Semitism” as to charge Nelson Mandela, Mahatma Ghandi, or Martin Luther King – all of whom fought racial oppression by those in power – with being anti-white.

Iain Whyte
North Queensferry