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Women’s Rights in the MENA Region: Progress & Obstacles

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Women's Rights in the MENA Region - Progresses & Obstacles

A Background to Women’s Rights in the MENA Region

Gender equality is a fundamental human right and an imperative foundation which lays the groundwork for a peaceful, prosperous and sustainable world. The development of women’s rights in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region has seen much progress and obstacles over the past decade. However, the unequal status of women stands out as a particularly challenging problem.

Following “International Women’s Day” last month, this article provides a snapshot of the development of women’s rights in the MENA region as of April 2023. MENA countries include Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Tunisia, United Arab Emirates and Yemen.

The MENA region has a reputation for struggling with gender equality. Therefore, this article focuses on this region. However, it is important to emphasize that the MENA region is not the only place women experience inequality. Gender inequality is also seen in Asia, Africa, Latin America, Europe, and North America. Undoubtedly, women continue to face discrimination and significant barriers to fully realizing their rights worldwide.

Any Progress in the MENA Region?

Governments are developing stronger laws and policies to support women’s rights.

Significant laws, policies, and programming developments have focused on gender equality within the MENA region. Moreover, women’s representation in government has increased.

Many countries in the region have established “national women’s machinery”. This machinery is used in government offices, departments, commissions, or ministries. All these provide government leadership and support in achieving gender equality.

Furthermore, there have been notable improvements in education and health within gender-related indices. There has been an increase in specialized programming to support women’s rights and empowerment in this region.

Women struggle to uphold their rights in places like Palestine. It is international human rights laws and conventions which are helping women in advocating for and strengthening their fight. Since the ratification of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) by the State of Palestine in March 2014, civil society organizations and women human rights defenders have publicly advocated for the implementation of the Convention and the passing of a Family Protection Bill, pending since the early 2000s, which would specifically address gender-based discrimination and violence. In turn, this will help to edge women closer towards gender equality in the occupied Palestinian territory.

Women are increasing their role in civil society and advocating their rights

Women are increasing their engagement in civil society. Women’s and youth feminist civil society has started to dominate the political scene in advocating for and securing gains. In Iran, millions of young women took to the street following Mahsa Amini’s death in police custody for improperly wearing her hijab. These women risked their lives to change the system. Many were arrested and beaten and now face the death penalty for speaking out. This demonstrates women’s power in standing up against authoritarian regimes and fighting oppression.

Women's Rights in the MENA Region: Progres & Obstacles - Masha Amini
Caption: Thousands walk to the cemetery of Masha Amini’s funeral in Iran supporting women’s rights in September 2022.

The Iranian government is brutally repressing women’s voices who courageously stand up for their freedom. The UN has called Iran a “gender apartheid” on women.

Read more: Mahsa Amini: Iranian Women Are Leading an Extraordinary Revolution.

Women’s civil society actively engages internationally with the “Women’s Peace and Security” agenda. Remarkably, women activists have testified before the United Nations Security Council. The UN Women highlighted the gender impact of conflict and occupation on women’s rights.

What Obstacles Hinder the Development of Women’s Rights in the MENA Region?

Women face many inequalities within the MENA society, correlating them as second-class citizens with little to no protection from violence. The COVID-19 pandemic has compounded existing inequalities. Moreover, factors significantly reducing space for constructive civil society engagement with governments include ongoing conflict, the revival of extremist religious groups, and increased political turmoil. These international crises created many setbacks in passing long-term legal change.

Poverty & gender-based violence

The 2022 global poverty update from the World Bank reports that the MENA region is the only place worldwide where the extreme poverty rate increased between 2010 and 2020. Poverty has a detrimental impact on women’s rights.

Gender-based violence is also one of the main challenges facing women in the region today, with devastating effects on their health and well-being and their economic and civic participation.

Women protest for the development of women's rights in the MENA region.
Caption: Egyptian women in Cairo protest against violence against women [EPA].

Read more: Female Genital Mutilation in Somalia Reflects Deep-Rooted Gender Inequality.

A striking example of gender-based violence was in 2022 when the Israeli forces shot dead Al Jazeera’s journalist Shireen Abu Akleh in the occupied West Bank. Abu Akleh, a longtime TV correspondent for Al Jazeera Arabic, was killed on the 11th of May 2022 while covering Israeli army raids in Jenin in the northern occupied West Bank.

Read more: Who is Shireen Abu Akleh?

Women have no right to nationality in the MENA region

The MENA region has the highest concentration of gender-discriminatory nationality laws. An estimated 50% of the 25 countries in MENA deny women equal rights to pass nationality to their children.

Algeria is the only country in the region with nationality laws upholding complete gender equality, including women’s right to confer nationality on their children and noncitizen spouse on an equal basis with men. Thus, gender discrimination in nationality laws is one of the primary causes of statelessness in the MENA region, in addition to causing several other human rights violations.

Lebanon, Kuwait, and Qatar deny women the right to confer nationality to their children and spouses in all circumstances. Other States, including Bahrain, Jordan, Libya, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Syria and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), deny women the right to confer their nationality to children in most circumstances.

Read more: World Leaders Remain Silent Over Human Rights Violations in the UAE.

Malnutrition in women and girls increases by 25%

Malnutrition in women and girls increased by 25% in crisis-hit countries in the MENA region between 2020-2022. Over a billion women and adolescent girls are malnourished in the world. This has detrimental health, economic and well-being impacts. Most women and girls affected by this statistic live in the MENA region. Both local and global crises in 2023 could exacerbate the development of women and girls living there. Rising poverty and inequities increase the chances that people will turn to cheap, ultra-processed, unhealthy foods.

“Addressing malnutrition in women and girls is essential to reduce the gender health gap”

Amira Ghouaibi, Project Lead, Women’s Health Initiative, Shaping the Future of Health and Healthcare, World Economic Forum.

Therefore, the world is making slow progress. Issues like soaring food prices, climate change and the lasting impact of the COVID-19 pandemic risk making the nutrition crisis an even more significant problem in 2023. Nutrition is a widely overlooked issue; coordinated access and policy intervention are urgently needed.

Read more: Children’s Rights in Yemen Are Teetering on the Edge of A Catastrophe.

Survey Findings Provide Unprecedented Insights into Gender Attitudes in MENA Region

Despite incremental progress and the advancements mentioned above, gender attitudes across the region continue to fall behind internationally recognized standards.

The opinions and attitudes of citizens across the MENA region were recorded in the latest Arab Barometer survey from October 2021 to July 2022. This is the largest publically available survey published since the onset of COVID. Its results were shocking across 12 MENA countries, which collectively are home to 80 per cent of the citizen population in the Arab world. The findings give an unprecedented insight into the everyday lives of these citizens.

The survey showed a plurality of citizens either agree or strongly agree with the following statement:

“In general, men are better at political leadership than women.”

More than three-quarters of Algerians (76%) support this view, as do majorities of respondents in:

  • Libya (69%),
  • Iraq (69%),
  • Jordan (66%),
  • Egypt (66%),
  • Palestine (65%), and
  • Kuwait (65%).

Surprisingly, only in Lebanon and Tunisia do most of the population disagree or strongly disagree with the above statement.

Moreover, governments’ patriarchal character has effectively prevented efforts to address negative cultural and social constructs against women meaningfully. This limits the ability to change prevailing gender power relations and social roles qualitatively.

Concluding Thoughts

The development of women’s rights in the MENA region remains unresolved.

It does not reflect the commitments to the Agenda 2030 and the Sustainable Development Goals. Incremental progress has been documented, yet the pace is slow. Recent survey results showing gender discriminatory ideologies across the region show we still have much work to do to educate developing countries on gender equality.

Gender-based violence, lack of equal opportunities for economic activities or fundamental rights, and deprivation from political participation and representation have been the challenges facing this region.

Women are rising across the MENA region and fighting for their rights to be heard and implemented. Remarkably, women are igniting a powerful revolution against many corrupt governments, and their strength and courage are both admirable and breathtaking.

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“The Kerela Story” Controversy in India

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A recent Indian movie- The Kerela Story has stirred a huge controversy in India. The film professes to portray the tale of Hindu and Christian women who were persuaded to join the Islamic State (IS) organisation has caused a huge uproar in India. Many opposition leaders have denounced the film The Kerala Story, which is based in the southern state of Kerala. Some have referred to it as propaganda and an effort to sabotage religious harmony of India. The Kerala Story is the most talked-about movie right now, followed by The Kashmir Files. The movie is being viewed through many different lenses; where some people want it to be banned, while others want it to be promoted across all of India.

Also, read UN Defender Demands End to Crackdown on Kashmiri Activists

The Kerela Story Controversy Over Misrepresentation of Facts

The Kerela Story, which was released on May 5, has become embroiled in controversy over misinterpretation of facts. Months before it was released, The Kerala Story started to cause controversy. When the preview of the movie claimed it presented the “heart-breaking and gut-wrenching stories of 32,000 females” from Kerala who had joined the IS, some legislators from that state urged for its ban in November. This was refuted by the fact-checking website Alt News after a thorough investigation that found “no evidence” to support the claimed number.

Women who converted to Islam are the main subject of the movie. As the film’s release date approached in April, it was confronted with legal issues and growing criticism. The Kerala High Court declined to block the distribution, but the film’s producers agreed to take out the controversial 32,000 women number from the teaser. “The compilation of the true stories of three young girls from different parts of Kerala” was added to the description of the video on YouTube. This sparked numerous complaints from online users over claimed misinterpretations. Now that these facts have been brought forth, producer Vipul Shah has responded by saying that they are irrelevant and that these figures don’t matter.

Many acts of violence, including rape culture, hand-chopping, beheading, and trauma perpetrated to defenceless women, are graphically depicted in the film in the context of the Muslim culture and promotes islamophobia.

The film, according to a number of politicians in Kerela and Muslim leaders, would jeopardise religious harmony, demonise Muslims, promote Islamophobia, and might also humiliate the southern state.

Read also, Muslim OBC Reservation scrapped by BJP government of Karnataka

The Kerela Story Receives Both Criticism and Praise

According to analyst Taran Adarsh, the film’s box office success has been “extraordinary” for a low-budget production without any major performers. He thinks that it has made more than 560 million rupees ($6.8 million, £5.4 million) in five days, which he describes as “a feat for any new release”. On the other hand, many mainstream critics have criticised the movie for its performances and “lack of nuance”. One of the critics said that the movie’s ideas about Islam and [religious] conversion appeared to have come from hate-filled WhatsApp groups.

Audiences of The Kerela Story have praised and criticised the film, respectively, from various social groups. The “Kerala Story” has now sparked a major political uproar throughout the nation. While some states have made the movie tax-free, others have outrightly condemned it and proposed to ban it. It appears to be a point of disagreement between the states governed by the BJP and the opposition parties. A number of political organisations and parties, including the TMC, INC, and DMK, as well as some Muslim political groups, have been condemning the release of the film.

Also, Read Israeli Filmmaker Nadav Lapid Sparks Outrage in India after calling <em>The Kashmir Files</em> “Vulgar Propaganda”

West Bengal on The Kerela Story

West Bengal is one of the first states that has banned the controversial movie. It is West Bengal Chief Minister Mamta Banerjee herself that has imposed a ban on the Sudipto Sen-directed movie “The Kerala Story.” “This is to avoid any incident of hatred and violence, and to maintain peace in the state. What is ‘The Kashmir Files?’ it is to humiliate one section. What is ‘The Kerala Story? It is a distorted story,” Banerjee said.

However, The Kerala Story is currently playing across the nation without incident, thus the Supreme Court today demanded to know why film was being banned in West Bengal.

The West Bengal government responded to the Supreme Court’s order banning the screening of the movie “The Kerala Story” in the state on Tuesday. The government defended themselves by claiming that the movie contains hate speech and is based on fabricated information, which may cause racial strife and problems with law and order in the state.

Read here, India- The Killing of Gangster-Turned-Politician Atiq Ahmad

Tamil Nadu on The Kerela Story

In the state of Tamil Nadu, The Tamil Nadu Theatre and Multiplex Owners Association decided to halt the film’s screening on Sunday as “a precautionary measure”. The action has been taken to uphold law and order and safeguard their properties against forces opposed to the movie’s subject. Tamil Nadu Theatre and Multiplex Owners’ Association president Tiruppur M. Subramaniam said, “The film has been taken out of almost all theatres. The film was screened only in the cities. Since it is a Hindi film and has no recognisable faces, it will not have patronage.”

Also, read UN Defender Demands End to Crackdown on Kashmiri Activists

Madhya Pradesh and Kerela on The Kerela Story

On the other hand, the state of the BJP-ruled state of Madhya Pradesh has made the film tax-free. Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan said “The film shows how the (life of) daughters who get entangled in the trap of love jihad gets destroyed. It also exposes the design of terrorism. While we have already brought a law against (forced) conversion, the film creates awareness about the issue. This film should be watched by all and that’s why the Madhya Pradesh government is declaring the film tax-free.”

Moreover, the Kerala High Court has refused to ban the release of the movie stating that the film is “inspired by true events”.

Therefore, it should come as no surprise that The Kerela Story has gained the support of senior members of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who gave it a favourable review at a recent political rally. Additionally, some party members have held screenings and given away free tickets.

Read here, The Saudi-Iran Deal and its Implications

What the Filmmakers of The Kerela Story Have to Say?

Sudipto Sen, the Kerala Story’s director, claimed that the film’s objective goes beyond the purview of traditional cinematic creativity. Additionally, he claimed that the nation had long been in denial about the long-running Kerala problem. Sen told a group of Indian American reporters during a virtual news conference that “The country was in denial of the long-existing issue in the state of Kerala. The Kerala Story is a mission which is beyond the creative boundaries of cinema, a movement that should reach the masses all over the world and raise awareness,”.

“The film’s subject was hidden from the masses and deserved to be told. We made the film to initiate deliberation worldwide,” said the producer of the film, Vipul Shah.

“This is a very bold, honest and true film which in the beginning got no support, today stands at the point of releasing worldwide with a spectacular box office success in just 6 days,” added Vipul Shah.

Also, read Festival turns bloody after Hindutva Mob Burnt Centennial Mosque

The Kerela Story draws Parallels with The Kashmir Files

The Kashmir Files, another controversial film with deep polarising representation of Kashmiri Muslims, that became one of last year’s biggest hits from Bollywood, has been compared to The Kerala Story. That movie, which focused on the 1990s exodus of Hindus from Kashmir, had a small production cost and no big actors, and was praised by Mr. Modi and other BJP leaders despite receiving mixed reviews.

Read here, Dehumanizing Representation of Tribals and Muslims in the Oscar fame RRR

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Zionist hate march in Arab East-Jerusalem  Reminiscent of the Skokie Nazi march- 1978

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Zionist Hate March

I am not particularly infatuated with holding comparisons between religious Zionism and Nazi ideology.  However, When I see with my eyes and hear with my ears thousands of religious Zionists who claim to be followers of Moses (peace upon him)  shout in a hate march “death to Arabs” in the streets of an Arab-Muslim town, then I must call the spade a spade.

What is more outrageous is that the Israeli political establishment tolerates and tacitly encourages this hatred which reminds us of Kristallnacht.

I know such comparisons are annoying for many Jews.  But is this my fault? Should I compare this repulsive racism and hateful incitement to Mother Teresa’s charitable work in India?

Skokie-1978    

In July 1978, the American Social Nationalist party (the Nazi party) announced it would organize a march of several hundred members to the small predominantly Jewish town of Skokie in the suburbs of Chicago.
The planned march was widely seen as a brazen provocation. Not the least by Skokie’s Jewish inhabitants, many of them are Holocaust survivors.

Many non-Jewish people from all over the United States voiced their solidarity with the town. Their solidarity came as vociferous demonstrations were held in Chicago and other places in protest against the despicable Nazi feat. 

Despite the negative publicity and widespread opposition to the planned march, a Federal District judge allowed the march to proceed if certain conditions and restrictions were met. Moreover, the American Civil Liberty Union (ACLU) voiced its strong support for the march on the basis of the freedom of speech guaranteed by the First Amendment of the US constitution.

 Eventually, the US Supreme Court declined to stay the order of Federal District Judge George N. Leighton,  allowing the Nazis to demonstrate at Skokie. This, coupled with other factors. The factors including imposing a hefty fee on the organizers led to the cancellation of the march in Skokie.

This really brought a sigh of relief to anti-fascism forces, not only in the US but all over the world.

Hate March in Jerusalem: “death to Arabs

I was still a sophomore at the University of Oklahoma when the Skokie story dominated Prime-time newscasts on the three major American TV networks namely ABC, CBS and NBC.
In class discussion, I remember I expressed my complete solidarity with the people of Skokie, especially its estimated 700 Holocaust survivors. After all, the Nazis were behaving beyond Chutzpah and adding insult to injury towards these people, who had survived despite history.

“Death to Arabs” means “death to Arabs,”  not “death to Martians.”

Today, we are once again being affronted by another Skokie-style hate march. Last week, an Israeli court allowed extremist Jewish fanatics to hold a provocative rally in Arab-East Jerusalem, still under the Israel military occupation since 1967.

Last year, participants in the annual so-called “Jerusalem Day,”/a hate march marking the annual anniversary of the occupation of the Arab-Islamic holy city, cursed the Prophet of Islam (may peace be upon him), shouted “mavet le Arabim” or death to the Arabs, and called for the expulsion of Muslims and Christians from Palestine. 

Read More: Israel is and will always be a crime against humanity

God knows that using epithets like fanatics and extremists to describe these haters is a serious understatement and a scandalous trivialization of reality.

However, we all must understand that there are limits to the use of euphemisms to communicate an otherwise ugly reality.

The world didn’t lecture Jews on how to relate to their tormenters and grave-diggers. Likewise, we will not allow anyone to dictate to us how we should relate to our own tormentors and grave-diggers. After all, death to the Arabs means death to the Arabs, not death to Martians.   

Government of settlers, for settlers, and by settlers

  The Israeli government thinks twice before upsetting these fanatics/religious Zionists who adopt a decidedly toxic ideology, based on a venomous combination of racism, bigotry, hatred, violence, vindictiveness, and ethno-religious superiority against Arabs.

Many of them are graduates of Talmudic schools known as “Yeshivot” which indoctrinates them in the genocidal, racist ideology of religious Zionism.

Interestingly, these extremists/ religious-Zionist constitute the main electoral base for right-wing Israeli parties, including Yamina, the party of Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennet.

Hence, Bennet is very careful not to alienate them.

Read: RABBIS WHO BRING SHAME TO JUDAISM

Toxic theology

   The ideology of Religious Zionism (RZ), the official ideology of Prime Minister Naftali Bennet,  has been dominant in Israel ever since the Likud reached power for the first time in 1977. It is much more than just racist against non-Jews. It is actually more or less genocidal. I wouldn’t go that far if I didn’t know what I was talking about. 

In May 2007,  Mordechai  Elyahu, a former Chief Rabbi of  Israel, issued an edict that would permit the Israeli army to murder hundreds of thousands of Palestinians and Arabs.

“If they don’t stop after we kill 100, then we must kill a thousand. And if they don’t stop after 1,000, then we must kill 10,000.  If they still don’t stop we must kill 100,000. Even a million. Whatever it takes to make them stop.”

Also Read: Israel has killed 55 Palestinian journalists since 2000

Humane Jewish traditions

I don’t believe that this repulsive extremism represents true Judaism, the Judaism that is based on the Ten Commandments.

Jewish traditions relate the story of a heathen who came to Shammai with the request to be accepted as a convert on the condition that he was taught the whole Torah while he stood on one foot. Shammai drove him away with the yard-stick he was holding. Then the man went to  Hillel with the same request. Hillel told the man “what is hateful to yourself don’t do to your fellow human being. That is the whole of the Torah and the rest is commentary.”

Unfortunately, the rabbis of religious Zionism, including the so-called Chabadim who have effectively replaced the Torah with a notoriously racist manual called “Hatanya,”  pay no attention to such traditions.  And when they are reminded of them, they arrogantly claim that words such as  “man” or “human being” refer solely  and exclusively to the “Jew.”

Recalcitrance

Earlier this week, the Bennet government refused an American request to reconsider the route of the planned March. One Palestinian official commented on this matter, saying “If Israel could say “No” to its guardian-ally, on such a small and trivial matter,  and with the utmost contempt, it should be absolutely futile to expect the US to pressure Israel to end the occupation and allow for the establishment of a sovereign and independent Palestinian state.

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Israel is and will always be a crime against humanity

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Israel is a crime against humanity

Israel, the misbegotten Zionist entity,  on Wednesday, May 5  celebrated the 74th anniversary of its birthday,  an allusion to the usurpation by brutal military force of the Arab-Muslim land of Palestine.

In the process, Zionist gangs, armed and funded by wealthy Jews and colonialist Western powers, such as the UK, carried out a well-devised terrorist campaign of indiscriminate murder and violence against the virtually-unarmed and defenseless  Palestinian community, during which dozens of hideous massacres, like Dir Yasin, were perpetrated by Zionist gangs, like the Hagana, Irgun, Stern, and others.

Also Read: The most brutal massacres of the “Zionist gangs” in Palestine in 1948

 The grisly atrocities forced the vast majority of Palestine’s population at that time, in 1948, to flee their villages lest they face the same fate that the people of Dir Yasin, Tantura, Dawaymeh, and many other hamlets and villages had just faced.

The Deir Yassin massacre took place on April 9, 1948, when 130 Jewish terrorists from the paramilitary terror groups of Irgun and Lehi stormed Dir Yasin near Jerusalem and murdered 107  Palestinian civilians. Other sources, like New York Times, put the number of victims at 200.

Also Read: Israel having free season on Palestinian civilians including Children and Journalists

In his Memoirs,  the Rvolt, Menachem Begin, the head of the Irgun terror group, who eventually became Israel’s Prime minister,  described the Dir Yasin massacre as a  real miracle because it cast terror in the hearts of the Palestinian populace, prompting them to leave. Even before Dir Yasin, Begin was branded by the British government as “leader of the notorious terrorist organization and banned from entering the UK.”

Since Dir Yasin  74  years ago, Zionist massacres of Palestinians have never really stopped as successive Zionist governments retained and maintained the original Zionist strategy toward the people of Palestine. This genocidal strategy was aimed at achieving three main goals: Expulsion of the bulk of Palestinians.  (There are 7 million Palestinian refugees today), enslaving Palestinians as as “water carriers and wood hewers,”   (apartheid),  or outright physical extermination. This is not propaganda or media hypes. This is the un-official but authentic ideology of the ruling Zionist establishment, even today.

Also Read: Religious Fascism in India & Israel: Tweedledum and Tweedledee

In 1967, Israel launched the 6-days war, during which it seized the rest of mandatory Palestine, namely the West Bank which was under the Jordanian rule, and the Gaza Strip, under the Egyptian rule. Thus, Islam’s first Qibla and third holiest religious place,  al-Aqsqa, fell under the Zionist occupation. 

When East Jerusalem was seized from Jordan, the Israeli army’s rabbi Moshe Goren, strongly advised army generals to blow up the gold-gilded Dome of the Rock, which is part of the Aqsa Mosque. However, a prominent general refused to heed Goren’s exhortations.

Ever since that time, Israel transferred hundreds of thousands of its citizens into the West Bank to live on land that belongs to another people. The purpose of this criminal act is to re-enact the White settlements of the defunct apartheid regime in South Africa and former Rhodesia as well as the Russian demographic presence in the Donbas region in eastern Ukraine, pending the annexation of the territory and possible expulsion and ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians.

Also Read: Palestine-Vs. Ukraine: Stark Western hypocrisy  on Palestine and  Ukraine

Numerous UN resolutions were issued, ruling that the settlements were illegal and in a brazen violation of international law. Furthermore, Israel consistently refused to consider the West Bank as an occupied territory, insisting that the region was a “disputed” rather than “occupied” land. The Israeli defiance of the UN and its Security Council’s resolutions is attributed to the almost total American submission to the Zionist entity.

A few years ago during a televised debate with an Israeli official,  I confronted him with the settlements problem as he claimed that it was Israel that really wanted peace and that the Palestinians were the party that displayed intransigence. I asked him rather tersely if he thought that a peace-loving country would build 300 colonies on occupied territories and transfer hundreds of thousands of its citizens to live on land that didn’t belong to them. He was dumbfounded.

Clearly, the brazen Israeli insolence and arrogance of power stem from the absolute, unlimited, and total backing the Jewish state receives from the United States due to the overwhelming influence of American Jewry on the US government, congress, and political life in America.

Also Read: “Jewish State”: A Nazi Concept Implying another final Nakba

I remember one American writer saying half-jokingly that the Palestinians will not be liberated from the Israeli occupation until America is freed from Zionist domination. The Zionist stranglehold on the American government was described amply and analyzed elaborately by the late Jewish intellectual Alfred Lilienthal in his monumental  book “The Zionist Connection: What price peace.”

The Palestinians remain the ultimate reversioner

Despite its military might, economic prosperity, and international connections, Israel still lacks the legal and moral legitimacy.

In ancient times and the Middle  Ages, military conquests gave conquerors sovereignty over occupied territories. However, in the modern era, sovereignty, especially de jure sovereignty, can not be acquired or gained through war. Otherwise, the occupation by Nazi Germany of 8 European states would have been perfectly legal and compatible with international law. The same thing applies to the Iraqi invasion and occupation of Kuwait nearly 30 years ago. The same thing can be said about the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine.

So what makes the Israeli occupation of Palestine, both in 1948 and 1967, different from the Nazi occupation of Europe, the Iraqi occupation of Kuwait, and the Russian occupation of Ukraine. In truth, Israel and the Zionist movement have no convincing answer for this crucial question. Instead, they indulge in legalistic sophistry, historical prevarication, and verbal juggling

Also Read: Israel should stop trying to force-feed the Holocaust down people’s throats  as bloody repression of Palestinians  goes on unabated

 Some Zionist apologists try to outsmart themselves by arguing that Israel came under attack and that the occupied territory were won in a  war of self-defense.

However, international law experts make it very clear that coming under attack gives a country the right to repel the attack, but not occupy territories. Thus, the acquisition of territory by military force is absolutely illegal under the international law. This is the reason most countries don’t recognize Israeli sovereignty over both East and West Jerusalem as the city, indeed the entirety of Palestine was conquered by military force, which gave Israel only a de facto sovereignty, but no de Jure sovereign whatsoever.

Needless to say, authentic de jure sovereignty would require all the normal qualifications of sovereignty, which Israel obviously lacks.

Hence, Israel should be viewed as a belligerent occupying power, irrespective of how many countries recognize it and have diplomatic and economic relations with it.

According to Hal Draper ” At the present time Israel is a belligerent occupant of the city (Jerusalem) and is bound by the laws governing such occupation.”

Headly Cook,  an international law expert believes that Israel among all countries of the world possesses not a single inch of territory which she could assuredly proclaim to be her own in perpetuity.(2)

This is why, Palestinians, and Muslims in general, are strongly advised not to ascribe any legal or moral legitimacy to Israel, an entity that has been and continues to be a crime against humanity. (end)

(1)  Draper, Hal.  the Status of Jerusalem,  p. 163

(2)” (Cook, Headly,  Israel: A  blessing and Curse, London 1960, p. 168)

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