I wrote this piece for the March-April 1988 issue of Palestine Focus. It was reprinted all over the world, including by the PLO in Tunis, though they did not include my name as the author. Note that I have never seen the Israeli document with the same title. I have very slightly edited it for clarity. You can see the original at https://digicoll.lib.berkeley.edu/record/277043?v=pdfUn
Ten Ways Israel Is Different from South Africa
By Steve Goldfield
The New York Times recently reported that the Israeli Foreign Ministry had issued an internal briefing paper entitled “Ten Ways Israel is Different from South Africa.” The Times did not publish the content of that paper. The Israelis were, apparently, hurt by increasingly widespread comparisons, such as by ABC News, between their military occupation over Palestinians and the apartheid system in South Africa. A list of such differences is not easy to compile, but the Palestine Solidarity Committee has risen to the challenge.
In South Africa, people can be held without charge under administrative detention for fourteen days without seeing a lawyer. Under Israeli occupation, it is eighteen days. More than three-quarters of African men have been imprisoned, many for pass violations. More than half of Palestinian men have been imprisoned, many for identity card violations.
Although in both Israel and South Africa there are both town and house arrest, South Africa has no refugee-camp arrest: it has no refugee camps. To be fair, Israel has no Bantustans.
In South Africa, 87 percent of the land is reserved for whites. In Israel, 92 percent of the land is reserved for Jews. In the West Bank and Gaza, more than half the land has been taken from Palestinians … so far.
In South Africa, green, black, and gold—the colors of the African National Congress—are illegal. Blacks use it anyway. The African National Congress was banned in 1960; it is illegal to quote ANC leaders. Under Israeli law, red, black, green, and white—the colors of the Palestinian flag—are illegal. Palestinians ignore that law, too. The Palestine Liberation Organization is, of course, banned, and Palestinian newspapers have been closed for publishing interviews with PLO leaders.
South Africa has the death penalty and has put many activists to death. Many, such as Steve Biko, have died while in custody. Israel does not have the death penalty, but Palestinians seem to die anyway from beatings and other forms of torture in detention and from shootings on the streets. Photographs published in Israeli and U.S. Newspapers have documented Palestinians entering custody in good condition and leaving Israeli prisons in shrouds.
South African Blacks carry passbooks and are punished if they are in the wrong place or do not have a passbook. Palestinians instead have identity cards which they must show to soldiers and police. One form of punishment is to confiscate an identity card, which can lead to immediate deportation and is thus a form of house arrest. Palestinians in the West Bank (except in Jerusalem) and Gaza are also issued different-colored license plates from the ones Israeli citizens receive.
African workers cross into white areas to work but are forbidden to sleep there, and many must return to homelands or racially segregated suburbs at night. Working in white-run factories, farms, and mines for very low wages is virtually the only means to earn a livelihood. Palestinians who cross over into Israel to work are also forbidden to sleep there and must return to the West Bank and Gaza at night. Working in Israeli factories, farms, construction, hospitals, or sweeping streets is virtually the only means available to them to earn a livelihood.
South African Blacks have no vote, though so-called Coloureds and others have token representation but no real power. West Bank and Gaza Palestinians have no vote, though Palestinians with Israeli citizenship have token representation, virtually no government funds are spent on their needs, and they have no real power.
South Africa is a settler state in which the indigenous people greatly outnumber those of European descent. The same was true for Palestine before 1948. Israel is a settler state from which the indigenous people were driven out so that today Israeli Jews outnumber Palestinians.
South Africa calls its suppression of the majority of African descent: “Apartheid.” Apartheid is based on a system of privileges granted to those declared “white.” South Africans of Asian and mixed ancestry are second-class citizens. Blacks are not considered citizens and have no rights whatsoever. Israel calls its suppression of Palestinians: “Military Occupation.” Israel's system of privileges, based on its Zionist ideology, gives privileges first to those descended from European Jews, second to Jews from other places, and last and least to Palestinians with Israeli citizenship. Other Palestinians are not considered citizens and have no rights whatsoever.
WOULDN'T YOU RISE UP?
The above are some of the “differences.” A list of similarities between Israel and South Africa and of the longstanding and very close military, political, and economic ties between the two countries (an Israeli journalist described South Africa as “Israel's best ally after the United Statess”) would be very long, indeed. Consider the comments of Raphael Eitan, chief of staff of the Israeli army during the 1982 invasion of Lebanon and currently a member of the Israeli Knesset.
I don't understand this comparison between us and South Africa. What is similar here and there is that both they and we must prevent others from taking us over. Anyone who says that the Blacks are oppressed in South Africa—is a liar. The Blacks there want to gain control of the White majority just like the Arabs here want to gain control over us. And we, too, like the White minority in South Africa, must act to prevent them from taking us over. I was in a gold mine there and I saw what excellent conditions the Black workers there have. So there are separate elevators for Whites and Blacks, so what? That's the way they like it.--Guest lecture at School of Law, Tel Aviv University, December 14, 1987 in Yediot Ahranot, December 25, 1987
Americans oppose apartheid in South Africa. Isn't it about time we stopped our government from supporting and funding the Israeli form of apartheid?
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