Arab residents of Israel (more than two million out of a population of nine million) have the same rights as Jewish residents of Israel. They serve in the Israeli army and sometimes lead many Jewish Israelis there. They can study, have the right to vote, and participate in politics. Arab Israelis sit in both parliament and (recently) in the government. In Israel, it is even possible for Arabs who want to destroy the State of Israel to sit in parliament and the government! There are also more Arab women in politics than ever before. There are Arab judges; Arabs serve on the Supreme Court and other important bodies. Hospitals have many Arab doctors, and half of the patients are Arab. Arab Israelis serve the country as ambassadors, play on national sports teams, and have their own media. Freedom of speech and freedom of religion apply to both Jewish and Arab residents.
Anyone who has visited Israel has been able to see with their own eyes that Jews and Arabs live together peacefully in the vast majority of situations. When people join me on a group tour to Israel, they are sometimes surprised that we often have a Jewish guide and an Arab bus driver, who almost always interact with each other in a very friendly manner, with respect and humor.
Freedom in Israel
You encounter many mosques in Israel. But where are the synagogues in the Palestinian territories? How is it possible that Israel is accused of an apartheid regime, while Arab Muslims in Israel are completely free to practice their faith, but Jews and Christians in the surrounding Muslim countries are not? Everyone is allowed to come to the Western Wall to pray. It is the holiest place on earth for Jews to pray, closest to where the temple used to stand, yet anyone else is allowed to pray there too. No apartheid for non-Jews. But the management of the Temple Mount is in the hands of an Islamic organization, and apartheid does apply there, because non-Muslims are not allowed to pray there.
Area without Jews
At the market in Nazareth, you hear both Hebrew and Arabic. Israeli society is a mosaic of population groups, different religious groups, and people from all kinds of countries. But in the market in Ramallah, Nablus, or Bethlehem, you hear nothing but Arabic. In fact, not a single Jew lives in the Palestinian territories anymore. If you enter those areas, you encounter signs stating that Israelis are not allowed to enter. All the areas from which Israel has withdrawn have become ‘Jew-free’; a terrible word, but I use it to indicate what the Arab-Palestinian leaders and population want: there should be no Jew there anymore, let alone live there. That looks suspiciously like apartheid. There is also no freedom of speech there, nor of all those other rights that Arabs in Israel do have.
How is it possible, then, that Israel is called a racist apartheid state? That is because people are inclined to parrot one another, even when it involves lies. It is a completely false perception that does not correspond with reality. We are dealing here with the modern blood libel, and that is serious.
