No, Kerry, ‘Apartheid’ Isn’t On Israel’s Agenda

Palestinian supporters of Hamas attend a rally in the West Bank / Getty Images
Employing the term “apartheid” — a word that conjures up the evils of both colonialism and racism in South Africa — to describe Israel’s future if peace with the Palestinians isn’t reached is nothing but a canard.
Within the 1967 lines, Israel is a working democracy in which minorities have equal rights. But even when applied to the West Bank, it is a complete misnomer. So long as Gaza remains an independent Palestinian state in all but name, Jews will remain the majority between the Jordan and the Mediterranean for the foreseeable future. And that’s not even taking into account that the assumption that the Arab birthrate will always overwhelm that of the Jews is probably a mistake.
More to the point, the standoff over the West Bank that leaves most Arabs living under Israeli security but administered by the Palestinian Authority has nothing to do with an apartheid-style desire by a minority to rule a majority. After torpedoing the peace talks by making a deal with Hamas, Fatah has effectively turned down a fourth chance for independence to go along with its previous rejections in 2000, 2001 and 2008.
The continued Palestinian refusal to recognize the legitimacy of a Jewish state no matter where its borders are drawn is a product of a political culture that still links national identity to the war on Zionism. That creates an unfortunate stalemate that isn’t satisfactory to either side.
But the notion that Israel must repeat its 2005 Gaza mistake in the West Bank in order to avoid being smeared as a new South Africa is unpersuasive. Any use of the apartheid canard to describe Israel, whether employed by Secretary of State John Kerry or by the BDS anti-Zionists, only serves to make a Palestinian decision to make peace less, rather than more, likely.
Jonathan S. Tobin is the senior online editor and chief political blogger of Commentary magazine. Follow him on Twitter, @TobinCommentary.
The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.
Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism you rely on. Make a gift today!
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
Most Popular
- 1
Opinion The dangerous Nazi legend behind Trump’s ruthless grab for power
- 2
Opinion A Holocaust perpetrator was just celebrated on US soil. I think I know why no one objected.
- 3
Culture Did this Jewish literary titan have the right idea about Harry Potter and J.K. Rowling after all?
- 4
Opinion I first met Netanyahu in 1988. Here’s how he became the most destructive leader in Israel’s history.
In Case You Missed It
-
Culture Trump wants to honor Hannah Arendt in a ‘Garden of American Heroes.’ Is this a joke?
-
Opinion Gaza and Trump have left the Jewish community at war with itself — and me with a bad case of alienation
-
Fast Forward Trump administration restores student visas, but impact on pro-Palestinian protesters is unclear
-
Fast Forward Deborah Lipstadt says Trump’s campus antisemitism crackdown has ‘gone way too far’
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
Republish This Story
Please read before republishing
We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines.
You must comply with the following:
- Credit the Forward
- Retain our pixel
- Preserve our canonical link in Google search
- Add a noindex tag in Google search
See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.
To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.