"study showed that significant critical research on the Palestinian exodus was undertaken by Jewish scholars outside Israel in the 1950s, three decades before the emergence of the New Historians. In effect, this early use of the critical narrative led to the declassification of archival materials, the sources that were then used in books by Segev, Morris and others.
The study refutes the widespread claim that until the 1980s the Jewish-Israeli media were entirely beholden to the Zionist narrative. The paper shows that the vast majority of studies recognized that Israel had expelled Palestinians in 1948. [xxxvii]
Defenders of the Jewish State's policies and treatment of the Palestinians do not want to discuss these questions and in an aggressive manner accuse Israel's critics and critics of Zionism as being anti-Semites and try to silence any debate on these issues. The charge of anti-Semitism against critics is the preferred weapon, and perhaps the only weapon, as the evidence does not support the Zionist argument. Many prominent Israelis [xxxviii] and many others have raised the specter of Apartheid to describe Israel's treatment of the Palestinians. [xxxix]
Here is how Richard Falk describes the issue of Apartheid in relation to the Jewish State's treatment of the Palestinians. Falk is professor emeritus of international law at Princeton University, where he taught for forty years. He is also the author of 20 books on International law and human rights. From 2008 to 2014 Falk served as United Nations special rapporteur on human rights in the occupied Palestinian territoriesThe following is taken from an article based on a talk given by Professor Falk.
"it is only correct to look at the Palestinians as a coherent people, wherever they live, and not provide tacit consent to the fragmentation both geographical and political to which Israel has subjected them. Viewed in those terms, ending the Occupation alone, without addressing the larger issue afflicting the Palestinian nation, is "a misunderstood pragmatism."
That larger issue""is the structure of oppression itself, including physical displacement and all the policies and practices Israel promotes toward the Palestinian people. "The conflict is not purely territorial," Falk says. The UN report that he co-authored with Virginia Tilley, professor of political science at Southern Illinois University, names that structure "apartheid," meaning "separation" in Afrikaans.
The 1973 International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid does not speak only of South Africa. There the term is defined as "inhuman acts committed for the purpose of establishing and maintaining domination by one racial group of persons over any other racial group of persons and systematically oppressing them." [xl]
In his capacity of special rapporteur for the Palestinian occupied territories Falk co-authored a report on the question of Israel's treatment of the Palestinians with Professor Virginia Tilley. The following is an excerpt from the article.The Falk-Tilley report, "Israeli Practices towards the Palestinian People and the Question of Apartheid," was released March 15, 2017, under the aegis of the UN Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA). Its release caused an immediate firestorm, raising accusations of anti-Semitism against the authors (Falk is Jewish incidentally), and providing space for more UN-bashing especially on the part of Israel and the United States. Although the ESCWA countries unanimously endorsed the report, and although the report was issued as representing the view of the authors alone and not the UN per se, it was removed from the UN website under threat of U.S. withdrawal of UN funding; however, it is otherwise available.
Defenders of Israel are particularly sensitive about the word "apartheid," citing factors that existed in South Africa but which do not exist in Israel, such as separate park benches and Arab representation in the Knesset. But as anyone who follows Israeli politics knows, leading figures in Israeli life, including prime ministers, writers and journalists from both the left and the right, have consistently used this word in Hebrew, addressing fellow Israelis, warning of the consequences of a failure to make peace leading to permanent apartheid. It's when the word gets uttered in public forums in English that Israelis and their supporters hear the whole Zionist project being attacked. Jimmy Carter and John Kerry are only
two American statesmen who have felt the brunt of Israel's condemnation. In many other ways Israel has flouted the international community, for example, by referring to the occupied West Bank territories as "Judea and Samaria," ancient Biblical terms which international law does not recognize as legitimate; and insisting on calling the Palestinians "Arabs," as if to say they belong in other homelands, not in the Jewish state. [xli]
Falk went on to say and is quoted in the article:
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