It's tough being an anti-Zionist. Palestine's allies are either spineless, or they're racist. The EU has decided not to issue a report critical of Israel's policy in East Jerusalem. Their own research has shown Israel's apartheid 'security wall' is being used to isolate the largely Palestinian population in East Jerusalem, encircling and cutting them off from nearby Palestinian towns. This allows the Israeli state to a) annex Palestinian land, and b) render a future Palestinian state, with Jerusalem as its capital, impossible: "This de facto annexation of Palestinian land will be irreversible without very large-scale forced evacuations of settlers and the rerouting of the barrier."


Anyone who's been following the progress of the wall has known this for years. Check out www.stopthewall.org for more info on this tool of racist colonialism - colonialism because it's a land & resource grab, racist because if these were white people being surrounded, there'd be a much louder hue and cry. But the EU has decided the 'timing' is off:

"The political landscape has altered within Israel - there is a general election in a few months time," [Jack Straw, British foreign minister] said of Ariel Sharon's decision to form a new political party ahead of elections on March 28. "So we thought it was appropriate not to endorse or to publish the document, but instead to continue to make representations about our concerns in the normal way."

So Sharon, the very man who oversaw the wall's construction, has been outflanked by even more extremist Zionists, which suddenly makes him a reasonable option, because... well, no one can say, exactly, because at this stage, the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians is just a matter of speed & degree. "Normal" diplomatic channels have had zero impact on Israel's decisions. But any criticism must be muted, because the alternative could be worse. You have to give Sharon credit: he's playing a smart game, posing as the moderate. And the EU is cravenly following him.

"The fence is a temporary security measure is [sic] not intended to annex territory or to predetermine the political border of Israel." - from "Summary of Israel's Response Regarding the Security Fence"

Then we move to the other extreme. The Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is defending Palestinians in the same language as neo-Nazis:

`If the killing of Jews in Europe is true,'' the Web site quoted Ahmadinejad as saying during a speech at an Islamic conference in Tehran, `and the Zionists are being supported because of this excuse, why should the Palestinian nation pay the price?'

Denying the Holocaust is morally repugnant. And it plays right into the Zionist discourse that to be anti-Zionist is to be anti-Semitic. The Israeli government responded in heroically muted terms:

The real problem with the repeated statements of the Iranian president is that they correctly represent the mind-set of the Iranian leadership, and they accurately articulate the policies of that extremist regime."

Why yes - I'm a friend of the Palestinian people...

I'd have trouble being that subdued about it. But now the Israelis get to appear moderate in the eyes of the West, and in fact, Ahmadinejad's racism justifies everything they're doing. Of course they need a wall. Of course they need to invade refugee camps, flatten villages, turn the Occupied Territories into an armed camp - look what they're up against.

And let's be clear: Ahmadinejad is simply mobilizing rhetoric used by all right-wing leaders of the middle east, Arab and non-Arab. Problems at home? Corruption, dictatorship, the mass destruction of leftist and popular movements? The rise of support for fundamentalism? Hey, look what Israel's doing! Not that these leaders have lifted a finger to help the Palestinians politically, because of the depth of feeling among the region's working classes for the Palestinian plight. As Azmi Bishara points out, "The legitimacy of the rhetoric of the Palestinian cause... enabled governments to export domestic contradictions." Mobilizing that sentiment, in any more than token gestures, would rebound on those corrupt governments themselves.


The Zionists have cowed their critics. They have cartoon, racist opponents who aid their agenda, and use the issue to their own ends. In the middle of it, the wall continues to eat up land, and Palestinians continue to suffer. And we wonder at the depth of their frustration and despair, when their foes are emboldened, and their friends turn into their enemies.