Israel's desire to create an Apartheid State - Hamas are the only opposition in Palestine, to this becoming true ....

If you read nothing else about the internal division and current internecine fighting in Gaza, read "The Recognition Trap / Why Hamas May Be Right" by By JONATHAN COOK

Counterpunch December 14, 2006

Jonathan lives in Nazareth and provides an excellent, unique, literate, independent view of events in Israel and the immediate region.

He examines the knee jerk belief, peddled assiduously by the Westerm media that all Hamas has to do is say "We recognise Israel" and supposedly aid and international goodwill will wash over the West Bank and Gaza.

This he points out is a simplistic trap set by the Zionists who subtly use the phrase " Israel's Right to exist" which is, he points out and elaborates, merely the public face of strident apartheid - no less ugly than that of the Boers and Voortrekkers.

The apparent need to, "recognise Israel " which is seen as a synonym or direct equivalent of the Zionists clarion cry for a "Right for Israel to exist", is a seductive argument persistently aired in the Press. It is represented by people like Blair (as he did today in Tel Aviv accompanied by his even handed jewish Middle east expert, and party financier Lord Levy) that the Palestinians' problems started with the election of Hamas - which Abbas now wants to overthrow with another (and illegal) election - a policy supported by Blair, Bush and their cheerleaders.

Read Jonathan's article, and please make sure others read it and pass it on. Pic - AP/BBC Founder of Hamas, Sheikh Yassin's wheelchair after a direct missile strike from an IDF helicopter. الشيخ ياسين قتل بصاروخ اطلقته هليكوبتر اسرائيلية

"The concept of a state having any rights is not only strange but alien to international law. People have rights, not states. And that is precisely the point: when Israel demands that its "right to exist" be recognised, the subtext is that we are not speaking of recognition of Israel as a normal nation state but as the state of a specific people, the Jews.

In demanding recognition of its right to exist, Israel is ensuring that the Palestinians agree to Israel's character being set in stone as an exclusivist Jewish state, one that privileges the rights of Jews over all other ethnic, religious and national groups inside the same territory. The question of what such a state entails is largely glossed over both by Israel and the West."

He also points out that the apparent concern over Iran's nuclear weapons is not military it is social and political. Once the Jews realise that it is unsafe to live in Israel they will emigrate, westwards, to the US, to leave a rump of true believers to be finally overwhelmed.

"Last month, Ephraim Sneh, one of Israel's most distinguished generals and now Olmert's deputy defence minister, revealed that the government's primary concern was not the threat posed by Ahmadinejad firing nuclear missiles at Israel but the effect of Iran's possession of such weapons on Jews who expect Israel to have a monopoly on the nuclear threat.

If Iran got such weapons, "Most Israelis would prefer not to live here; most Jews would prefer not to come here with families, and Israelis who can live abroad will ... I am afraid Ahmadinejad will be able to kill the Zionist dream without pushing a button. That's why we must prevent this regime from obtaining nuclear capability at all costs."

Jonathan concludes that

In other words, the Israeli government is considering either its own pre-emptive strike on Iran or encouraging the United States to undertake such an attack -- despite the terrible consequences for global security -- simply because a nuclear-armed Iran might make Israel a less attractive place for Jews to live, lead to increased emigration and tip the demographic balance in the Palestinians' favour.