Notes on Resistance by Chomsky Noam & Barsamian David

Author:Chomsky, Noam & Barsamian, David [Chomsky, Noam & Barsamian, David]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Politics, History
ISBN: 9781642596984
Amazon: 1642596981
Goodreads: 61680070
Publisher: Haymarket Books
Published: 2022-09-27T07:00:00+00:00

What hope is there for the Palestinians, a people that you have been in solidarity with for decades, at what seems to be the bleakest moment in their history, when more and more land and water is being annexed by Israel and the possibility of a viable, independent Palestinian state recedes?

It is a grim moment in the history of the Palestinians. And anyone concerned with their rights and prospects has to be extremely careful about two things. One, being clear about what the actual situation is. Two, being clear about the kinds of action can be taken to try to improve, overcome, at least mitigate the crisis in which they live.

Those two things require serious clear thought, and I don’t think it’s being done. So, on the issue of what the circumstances are, almost all discussion these days that you see is about two options. One is a two-state settlement of some sort. There has been a general international consensus on that since the 1970s, so something like that. The other option that’s considered is one state. Israel takes over the West Bank, and then an anti-apartheid struggle ensues. That’s the second option.

But that’s missing the third and crucial option, the one that is in fact being implemented before our eyes, which has been the major guideline for Israeli policies for fifty years. That’s a “Greater Israel,” in which Israel takes over whatever is of value to it in the West Bank—formerly it was Gaza, but now it’s the West Bank—but evades Palestinian population concentrations. Israel does not want Nablus, doesn’t want Tulkarm. Israel doesn’t want Palestinians.

This is nothing like the anti-apartheid struggle. In South Africa, the white population needed the Black population, and in fact tried to subsidize the Bantustans, tried to make them look decent to the international community. This is quite different. Israel just wants the Palestinians out. It does use them for cheap labor, but they can get cheap exploited labor from Thailand or other places—and do, in fact.

They just want the Palestinians out. What they’ve been doing for fifty years—and what you see before your eyes if you drive around the West Bank—is to build a greater Israel, in which Israel takes over all the valuable areas, the Jordan Valley, about a third of the territory, fertile land, and kick out the population on one or another pretext.

Take greater Jerusalem, a huge area about five times the size of what Jerusalem ever was, or take the city of Ma’ale Adumim, east of Jerusalem, built up mostly in the Clinton years. The corridor to it pretty much bisects the West Bank. Same to the north with the town of Ariel and the town of Kedumim. Leave out the Palestinian population concentrations until we finally manage to get rid of them.

The rest of the Palestinians who live in the areas that Israel is taking over, are in isolated enclaves, separated from their olive groves, agricultural areas, and herds, with checkpoints that occasionally are open at the will of Israeli soldiers.

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