No Law, No Morals, No Sense

The rule of law is once again being flouted in Israel

Two weeks ago now the Israeli Supreme Court ordered the state to evacuate Jewish squatters from a disputed building in the West Bank town of Hebron. The case has been winding its way through the courts since 2006. Jewish settlers claim they bought the land and the house from its Arab owner. The original Arab owner claims he did negotiate with the settlers, but never concluded a deal. He filed his complaint the day after the Jews forcibly occupied the property. The police have investigated, and have concluded that some of the documents of sale presented by the Jewish settlers are forgeries. Now the court has ordered that the state evacuate the squatters – as soon as possible.

But two weeks have passed, and neither the army nor the police have moved to act yet. The settlers, for their part, have promised to resist violently. Last weekend 20,000 right wing supporters descended on Hebron to express solidarity with the squatters. When asked how they could flout the ruling of the high court, one settler leader replied: “Sodom also had its judges.” At same time Jewish demonstrators (rioters is probably more apt) vandalized a local Muslim cemetery – see the photo above – and sprayed anti Muslim slogans on walls of local mosques including “Mohamed is a pig” in English and Hebrew. (You can see some of the "demonstrations" in the video here"

Still the police and army do nothing. Who are the Sodomites here?

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In the meantime, polls show that the Likud – lead by Bibi Netanyahu – is poised to win the upcoming elections. Everyone knows that a vote for Bibi is a vote against compromise, against justice, and (if they thought about it) against peace. It is a vote to continue the status quo. The status quo seems to suit most Israelis fine. Violence is confined to the occupied territories, and in any case is mostly happening to the Palestinians. What Israelis want is not peace and justice, just peace and quiet. What they forget is that they cannot have it – for long – without giving up their oppressive policies in the West Bank and Gaza. At a time when the U.S. is moving forward to a period of hope, openness and multilateralism, Israelis are regressing to a hard, closed and unilateral posture.

God’s irony knows no bounds. Either that or he is just giving us enough rope to hang ourselves.