Dora McPhee (VIC) responds to Koutsoukis article “Israelis snub US on East Jerusalem The Age 21 July 09 July 21, 2009
The Age: “Israelis snub US on East Jerusalem” by Jason Koutsoukis
http://www.theage.com.au/world/israelis-snub-us-on-east-jerusalem-20090720-dqrk.html
Israel’s defiance of the US demand to halt all settlements is finally showing the world that Israel has always considered all of Palestine its sovereign territory. While this stand off is currently being played out in East Jerusalem, for years the colonisation of the occupied Palestinian territories was tolerated and even financed by the US, allowing Israel to demolish an estimated 24,000 Palestinian homes since it conquered the territory in 1967. None of this was legal, yet the Palestinians were unable to stop the theft of their land either through peaceful demonstrations, armed resistance or appeals to have Israel brought to account for violating the binding UN resolutions to stop this ongoing colonisation of their land.
Through the use of occupier laws, town planning regulations and military force Israel has illegally annexed East Jerusalem and since 1991 has used a system of discriminatory permits to increasingly limit access for Palestinians to what was their cultural, economic and political centre of life. The building of illegal Jewish settlements and the denial of building permits to Palestinians have both been used to deliberately alter the demographics of East Jerusalem in order to weaken Palestinians’ ties and claims to their land. This has been cemented by 168 kilometres of the Wall within the Jerusalem area, where only 5 kilometres actually follows the
Green Line – the internationally accepted Israeli border. It now blocks access to the city for Palestinians even for some who hold residence identity cards. This is not about the right of Jews to live in Jerusalem but much more about denying that right to, and slowly ethnically cleansing, Palestinians from East Jerusalem. This is a system of apartheid.
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