In his Time Magazine op-ed, “Let’s Talk About a One-State Solution Where Israelis and Palestinians Are Equal,” Yousef Munayyer doesn’t express his own opinion so much as he expresses his own (incorrect) facts, and advocates for…
In his Time Magazine op-ed, “Let’s Talk About a One-State Solution Where Israelis and Palestinians Are Equal,” Yousef Munayyer doesn’t express his own opinion so much as he expresses his own (incorrect) facts, and advocates for an end to the Jewish state, in any borders at all.
Time Magazine breaches its journalistic obligations by allowing Munayyer’s gross misstatements of fact to go uncorrected, and letting his opposition to Jewish statehood go unchallenged.
Zionism is Racism
Munayyer is executive director of the U.S. Campaign for Palestinian Rights, an organization dedicated to BDS (boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel), to the idea that Israel is an apartheid state, and to an end to US support for Israel.
In addition to basing his day job on an utterly imaginary reality, Munayyer does the same in his op-ed, saying:
Yousef Munayyer
…the GOP base has a strong affinity with Zionism including xenophobia, nativism, racism and, in many corners, a belief that the state exists to protect the dominance of one ethno-religious group.
Did Munayyer just call Zionism racism?
Is he saying that Zionism is the same thing as American white-supremacism?
This idea has already been overwhelmingly rejected by the United Nations and the international community.
In fact, Zionism is the exact opposite of racism: it is the idea that Jews should be equal to all other peoples and nations by enjoying, for the first time in 2,000 years, the universal human right to self-determination.
Of course Arabs deserve self-determination as well, which is why there are no less than 23 separate Arab countries, and why Palestinians have been offered statehood and independence in a 24th such Arab country on nine separate occasions since 1937.
Yet Munayyer does not advocate for Palestinian self-determination, he instead advocates for an end to Jewish self-determination, within any borders at all.
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False “facts”
Other examples of Munayyer’s entirely incorrect “facts” include:
… the Israeli government and Benjamin Netanyahu…want to retain all the land [in the West Bank].
The Israelis conjuring up such apartheid nightmares never stopped to think about the consent of Palestinians and Arabs.
Referring to Israel as “apartheid” is a long disproved libel. Yet just as strange is Munayyer’s claim that Israel has no concern for consent of Palestinians with regard to a future Palestinian state. In fact, Israel’s participation in no less than eight separate peace conferences has been entirely focused on trying to obtain Palestinian consent for statehood and independence.
Ending the Jewish State
Yousef Munayyer is actually advocating for a one-state solution to the Israel-Palestinian conflict, safe in the knowledge that it means the end of Israel as a Jewish state and an opportunity to promote his false “apartheid” label.
It can't be a Jewish state and provide full equality to Palestinian citizens of Israel
Throwing around words like “equality,” Munayyer hides from his readers that 57 Muslim countries make up 99.8% of the Middle East and that most of these states have ethnically cleansed their entire Jewish populations.
Yet ending the world’s only Jewish state is Munayyer’s idea of “equality.”
His organization, US Campaign for Palestinian Rights, does very little actual campaigning for Palestinian rights, but instead focuses on campaigning against Israel, including: opposing US support, advocating for boycotts and opposing Israel’s Jewish character as “apartheid.”
In his public conversations Munayyer surreally criticizes the fact that Arab Israelis are allowed to vote in Israel as an example of “apartheid,” calls Israel a “state sponsor of terror” and excuses internationally recognized Palestinian terror groups (such as Hamas) as being mere “resistance factions.”
Can Gaza 2014 have the same impact on Hamas and other resistance factions as Karameh did for the Fatah and the PLO in 1968?
Yousef Munayyer has to twist reality and even resort to outright fabrication in order to support his opinions. Time Magazine has an ethical obligation to its readers to either reject his op-ed or to challenge its inaccuracies.
As to Munayyer’s opposition to a Jewish state, Time absolutely must provide an opposing voice.
In this case, Time Magazine has done none of those things.
Please share your considered comments with Time Magazine via a thoughtful letter to the editor by clicking HERE.
Former CEO of HonestReporting, Daniel managed the entire organization, its staff and programming. He began his career as an attorney in the United States where he worked for high profile law firms in New York and Chicago before starting his own law practice, and later moving to Israel.
