Ha’aretz Creates Non-Existent Apartheid State
October 23, 2012 17:02 by Simon Plosker
Gideon Levy
Ha’aretz is a major source of critical and anti-Israel stories for the international media. In the latest example, Ha’aretz’s radical left-wing commentator Gideon Levy has deliberately fed the international media a skewed and biased reading of a poll that claims “Most Israeli Jews would support apartheid regime in Israel“.
Gideon Levy regularly demonizes the Jewish state to foreign audiences and in his own newspaper columns. He regularly goes beyond legitimate criticism of Israel, crossing red lines and allying himself with those who refer to Israel as a racist “apartheid state”, promote boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) and wish to see the very destruction of Israel.
On the basis that Levy promotes the canard of Israeli “apartheid”, he is the last journalist who could give an objective analysis of this polls results.
His article opens with the following premise:
Most of the Jewish public in Israel supports the establishment of an apartheid regime in Israel if it formally annexes the West Bank.
But let’s take a look at the findings:
Gideon Levy’s entire premise is based on a hypothetical situation where Israel annexes the West Bank. However, perhaps the real story here is that a plurality of the Israeli public does not favor annexing West Bank settlements let alone the West Bank in its entirety.
This makes the question of voting rights for Palestinians in an annexed West Bank entirely moot. That such a large majority of the Israeli public would deny such a right to Palestinians is unsurprising given that this would effectively lead to the end of Israel as a Jewish state if it allowed Palestinians to vote as equal citizens or the end of Israel as a democratic state if it denied Palestinians those rights.
Which is exactly why the Israeli public does not support such a policy, precisely because the majority of Israelis do not want to be associated with apartheid.
Other statistics are casually tossed in by Levy to support his view of Israel as an apartheid state:
A sweeping 74 percent majority is in favor of separate roads for Israelis and Palestinians in the West Bank. A quarter – 24 percent – believe separate roads are “a good situation” and 50 percent believe they are “a necessary situation.”
What Levy fails to clarify is that this form of separation is not done on a racial basis but solely on citizenship. Israeli Arabs have as much right as Israeli Jews to travel on any roads they so wish. Any separation on the West Bank road system (and there are plenty of shared roads) is solely due to security and has nothing whatsoever to do with claims of apartheid.
Levy chooses to highlight significant minority opinions where it suits him. For example:
This article is continued on Page 2
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5:45 pm
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Haaretz it seems is doubling down in the faint hope the New York Times corporation buys them.
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EthanP
7:18 pm
Oct 23, 2012
With any luck they’ll join the other leftist “news” outlets in the extinct catagory.
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Ed Frias
6:05 pm
Oct 23, 2012
Did Gideon Levy forget about the 22,000 Arab terrrorist attacks against Israel in the last 12 years.
2nd, Jews are barred from living in practically all the Arab countries.
The majority of Arab countries have a death penalty to any Arab who sells land to a Jew.
Someone said it best to me, Haaretz should change its name to Gazaretz.
Why doesn’t Gideon decry the murder of innocent Israeli children and adults by Palestinian Homicide bombers.
The murder of Israeli’s observing Passover, in restaurants, hotels, disco’s and the hell the surviving victims of these acts of Palestinian terror face for the rest of there lives.
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SRB
8:26 pm
Oct 23, 2012
Can someone please explain to me where the fine line between “freedom of speech” and “treason” passes?
If Mr. Levy in effect advocates the destruction of Israel as a Jewish state is considered “freedom of speech”, why if one were to call for his removal from the face of the earth it would be considered a “hate crime”??
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EthanP
8:34 pm
Oct 23, 2012
Mr. Levy has (as far as I’m concerned) the freedom to say whatever he wishes. And Ha’aretz has the right to publish him. And I have the right to condemn them both. And I do.
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Ed Frias
6:06 pm
Oct 23, 2012
It should be pointed out, Gideon Levy supported the Palestinian massacre of the Dolphinarium disco in 2001.
Read the article Under the volcano (HA’ARETZ, 10 June 2001)
Do a google search of Under the volcano Gideon Levy
We now know Gideon is no different then an Arab terrorist.
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Ed Frias
6:06 pm
Oct 23, 2012
Gideon, Suicide bombers target anybody. They target people with nothing to do with anything.
Israelis target those who fund and carry out suicide bombers.
There is a difference between terrorism and defense of innocents.
Israel targets terrorists, Israeli civilian deaths are the Palestinians goal.
Big difference
To imply a moral equivalence between the two, is an insult to the intelligence.
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Ed Frias
6:07 pm
Oct 23, 2012
The Palestinians deliberately fire from civilian areas and hide among civilians. This death cult tactic was brilliantly described by Alan Dershowitz. I advise Levy to read this article. Then again, Palestinian child abuse is a topic Levy will always avoid.
DERSHOWITZ: Hamas’ dead baby strategy
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/jan/16/hamas-dead-baby-strategy
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Ed Frias
6:08 pm
Oct 23, 2012
Frimet Roth who lost her daughter in the Sbarros massacre in 2001.
Read what she wrote about Gideon and Amira Hass
She hits it right on the head.
http://web.israelinsider.com/Views/9961.htm
Gideon Levy, who writes for Israel`s pre-eminent daily, Haaretz, fancies himself a champion of the weak and vulnerable. The day after my child`s cold-blooded murder by a Hamas bomber, Levy wrote the following in his weekly piece detailing Palestinian suffering:
“These children, every child in the world should have protection as though he were a VIP. Every child in the world is a VIP”
Levy did not mention the seven Jewish children whose graves were dug that day because he did not mean those children. He never does.
Levy`s colleague, Amira Hass, the only Israeli journalist who lives in a Palestinian town, Ramallah, was equally indifferent to my child`s murder. The first piece she published in Haaretz after the Sbarro massacre made no mention of the fifteen victims. Instead, it was an emotive tirade about the Palestinian right of return, reminding her readers of two major Jewish settlements close to Jerusalem that she fears “won`t be evacuated”: the city of Maaleh Adumim and the Jerusalem satellite community of Givat Ze`ev.
Murdered Jewish children do not move Hass either.
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Ha’aretz Creates Non-Existent Apartheid State | Blogs about Israel aggregation
6:14 pm
Oct 23, 2012
[...] This article is continued on Page 2 [...]
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judith cummings
6:49 pm
Oct 23, 2012
Ha’aretz criticises the ‘Apartheid State’ or words to that effect. I accept your comments about foreign media bias, but you cannot complain when a leading newspaper, in a free and democratic state such as Israel, chooses to criticise the actions and choices of people in that state. It’s called free speech.
Not everyone has to agree with you in order to be loyal to the state of Israel. It seems that Bibi wants war with Iran, against all the advice of his generals, members of his own party and even Ehud Barak, his deputy. Are they all enemies of the state too, or are they simply more wise?
Hot debate. What do you think?
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EthanP
7:13 pm
Oct 23, 2012
Judith; Haaretz is a far left paper that never allows facts to effect it’s bias. And if you follow it, you could be excused for thinking Bibi’s last name was Arafat.
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Alan Johnson
7:02 pm
Oct 23, 2012
I have a post about this poll at Harry’s Place.
http://hurryupharry.org/2012/10/23/do-israelis-really-want-to-live-in-an-apartheid-state/
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ralph
7:04 pm
Oct 23, 2012
The worst of Israel’s ennemies are some Israeli and Jews like Mr Levy,Amira Hass
( Hatred inGerman ) Avraham Burg, Shlomo Sand , Norman Finkelstein, Noam Chomsky,
Richrd Falk . The list is far from being exhaustive!
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EthanP
7:10 pm
Oct 23, 2012
I had a comment but ralph beat me to it. Rat!
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steve mann
7:12 pm
Oct 23, 2012
This “Communist” is still pissed off that Israel allied itself to the USA instead of the old USSR.!
His “Fiddle” would be playing an entirely different tune otherwise. It falls in line with the likes of Norman Finklestien, Chomskey, Pipes and the such like.
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David Gordon
7:48 pm
Oct 23, 2012
I am a subscriber of “Haaretz” for a long time. I liked the newspaper because the news and the comments could easily be separated. I never read the comments – the least those from Gideon Levy. This is the first time, that I met an article which is written by distorting the results of a search, written by the most extremist journalist that appears in the headlines. I have to reconsider, weather I wish to remain a subscriber
Hot debate. What do you think?
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Gábor Fränkl
9:00 pm
Oct 23, 2012
No surprise from a sma–minded racist “man” who imbibed Nazi-mentality from his father who for 7 years actively collaborated with them in Germany *after* 1933.
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Elle
9:02 pm
Oct 23, 2012
Suggest that Gideon Levy build himself and oven and turn it on from the inside since he is so eager for the small global community of Jews to be destroyed by the glorious Left and their Muslim pals.
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EthanP
9:09 pm
Oct 23, 2012
Elle; There is NEVER an excuse for such hatred. Don’t sink to “their” level. It deminishes us all.
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Metatron
9:05 pm
Oct 23, 2012
Gideon Levy needs psychiatric care! I’m sure he knows it! More to be pitied than censured! Poor man!
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martin
9:19 pm
Oct 23, 2012
It is only the enemies of Israel and Jewish leftwing liberals who will willingly subscribe to this.
Ha Aretz manages a mere 7% share of the market. When one considers other papers with a more right or centre right slant, their readership is on the increase.
Israel HaYom is the perfect example. Agree it is a freebie, but then again. leftwing papers also had freebies and they had to stop,.
I am sure this is due partly to those Jewish immigrants who have actually lived under the communist ruled Soviet Union that appreciate the life style in Israel. Unlike the early Marxist pioneers who escaped from eastern Europe and still only saw a communist paradise in the Soviet Union.
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EthanP
9:41 pm
Oct 23, 2012
martin; Well said. Newsweek just went under as a print entity. We keep hearing that it’s “just” print media on the decline. Yet conservative print seems to continue to thrive. Hmmm. Yet the people who run them, (and the TV and cable news) can’t seem to accept that just maybe, it’s their outlook being rejected. Slightly right of center Fox News dominates the ratings. The only reason it’s not more dominant is that most of us like local news. I wonder how a Teaparty News Channel would do? And I never hear anti-semitic/Israel comments from the Teaparty. OWS and Move on are another matter. And forget BBC.
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IDNS: Hamas and Gaza Jubilant Over Royal Visit | Blogs about Israel aggregation
10:29 pm
Oct 23, 2012
[...] Gideon Levy skews the results of a poll to back his politicized agenda as Haaretz Creates a Non-Existent Apartheid State. Unfortunately, Western papers are already picking up on [...]
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Amit
11:09 pm
Oct 23, 2012
Referring to ” A third of the Jewish public wants a law barring Israeli Arabs from voting for the Knesset”: I believe these numbers would have been much smaller if only the Arab MKs, e.g. Hanin Zo’aby, Mohammad Baraka and others., represented Arab Israelis and not Hamas and the Assad regime.
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