Choosing your language

[loic]

I overhear a lot of discussion in the Palestinian human rights community about using the Afrikaans word apartheid to describe the Israeli government's (and the international community's) policy that the predominantly Jewish Israeli population should be separated from the Palestinian Arab population. The South African idea of apartheid (a word

Comments

[xaosenkosmos]

There's another word that could be used, too: "containment." At least a part of the official story is containing a violent enemy such that they're not able to inflict harm on your people

[loic]

I guess I'm more familiar with the term containment referring to countries, not people.

[xaosenkosmos]

Hamas is the duly-elected government of the Gaza Strip. That makes them an awful lot like a country.

[caladri]

It's an idea that's still popular when it comes to dealing with Roma in Eastern Europe.

[loic]

It's also why we build housing projects in Hunters Point :-/

[_bigjobbies_]

I recently finished Susan Nathan's The Other Side of Israel which is an excellent, personal account of Israel's policies towards the Palestian-Israelis who live within Israel proper.

[tcpip]

I use "hafrada".

[_bigjobbies_]

Amusingly, google checks to see if you meant Hafada...

[tcpip]

There's something terribly wrong and appropriate at the same time about that..

Citizens

[anonymous]

You do realise that 20% of the Israeli voting population are Arab.

Re: Citizens

[loic]

You do realise that there are 4 million Arabs under Israeli control with no representation (250k in East Jerusalem - completely annexed, 2.4 million in the West Bank under IDF control, 1.4 in Gaza effectively under IDF control).