There is no room for doubt – the people of Palestine are living under Israeli apartheid

A new report from Amnesty International details how Israeli government policies towards Palestinians constitute apartheid as a crime against humanity

The Amnesty report does not just detail the legal and policy foundations of Israel’s apartheid; it also provides numerous specific recommendations for how such a system can and must be dismantled

(AFP/Getty Images)

As a teenager in the 1980s, I was indelibly shaped by the injustice of apartheid in South Africa – and powerfully moved by those who courageously resisted it, both on the ground and abroad. History has not looked kindly on those who supported this regime – or were complicit by their silence.

Those growing up today are witnessing a different but grimly familiar struggle: that of the Palestinians, living under what Amnesty International has today described in a historic new report as “an institutionalised regime of systematic oppression and domination” – or, as they describe it, “apartheid”.

Amnesty’s new report – a comprehensive, extensive document – is required reading. Research and expert analysis leaves no room for doubt; Israeli government policies towards Palestinians – including dispossession and forcible transfer – constitute apartheid as a crime against humanity.

This is just the latest example of a growing consensus that Israel is practicing the crime of apartheid. Last year, Human Rights Watch published their own report on the matter, while Israeli human rights group B’Tselem similarly speaks of an apartheid regime.

Many Palestinians have long described their reality as a form of apartheid. The first month of 2022 has already demonstrated the cost for Palestinians of this regime continuing unchecked – from home demolitions in occupied East Jerusalem, to violent attacks against civilians in the occupied West Bank. Hundreds, including vulnerable children, are detained without charge. Illegal settlements, meanwhile, continue to expand.

The Amnesty report does not just detail the legal and policy foundations of Israel’s apartheid; it also provides numerous specific recommendations for how such a system can and must be dismantled. But it is Amnesty’s recommendations for policymakers which are particularly significant, including for our own British government.

Entirely correctly, the UK is urged to pursue a major reassessment of our foreign policy and strategy, commensurate with both our status as a diplomatic ally of Israel and the scale of Israel’s human rights abuses. The British government’s current approach combines mild, pro forma criticism of international law violations, while remaining silent on – or even undermining – efforts at accountability.

This cannot continue. After all, what is the point of diplomatic capital if we fail to use it when needed the most? As Amnesty notes today, if standing for the rule of law means anything, then it must entail consequences for illegal and systematic rights violations.

Specifically, Amnesty recommends that all governments, including our own, take steps such as an import ban on products from Israel’s illegal settlements, ending exports linked to human rights violations, and suspending military and policing assistance to Israel.

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Last May, I wrote about how in the aftermath of every periodic escalation, whether in Jerusalem or Gaza, we always “leave untouched the very root causes that led to violence in the first place”. The crime of Apartheid is a root cause – and denying the facts on the ground is no longer an option.

Israel’s crackdown on Palestinian civil society organisations – smeared as “terrorists” – and the attempts to stifle those who show support for Palestinian rights – smeared as “antisemitic” – are examples of how those who speak out are themselves targeted.

We would do well, then, to recall the famous words of the late Desmond Tutu: “If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality”.

Apartheid is happening on our watch, in our time. We cannot say we did not know or do not know. The time to act is now.

Baroness Warsi PC is a British lawyer and member of the House of Lords who served as co-chair of the Conservative Party from 2010 to 2012