The injustice perpetrated by the Zionist Israeli regime has been going on for more than seven decades.
In the process of creating the state of Israel in 1948, nearly 800,000 Palestinians were forced to leave their homes and become refugees.
Thousands were killed, hundreds of villages were wiped out and tens of thousands of homes were destroyed. Yet, to this day, the international community still allows this injustice to continue.
What's saddening, some Arab countries have decided to normalise relations with Israel. Meanwhile, the approach taken by the international community, including Malaysia, is to emphasise the need to implement the "two-state solution" in line with the Oslo agreement signed in 1993.
But developments since then clearly show that Israel is not at all interested in allowing a Palestinian state to exist. Much evidence can be presented regarding this fact, including the increase in illegal settlements in the West Bank built by the Israeli government.
In fact, the "two-state solution" approach has given Israel more opportunities to brutally kill Palestinians, seize their land, demolish their homes and drive them from their hometowns.
Realising this and the fact that governments of the world, especially the United States and European governments, could not be expected to help in the struggle to liberate Palestine, the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement was started in 2005.
The movement decided to garner support from ordinary people of conscience from all over the world who are determined to stop the atrocities being committed against Palestinians.
The BDS movement calls on the world community to boycott Israel as long as it continues to practice apartheid policies towards Palestinians. The BDS movement is inspired by the success of the international boycott movement in ending apartheid practices in South Africa in 1993.
There is overwhelming evidence that Israel practices apartheid. The most obvious is the Nation-State Bill passed by the Israeli Knesset in July 2018.
Among other things, the law states that:
1. Israel is a national homeland for Jews only, where it fulfils the natural, cultural, religious and historical Jewish right to self-determination;
2. The right to exercise national self-determination in Israel applies only to Jews; and,
3. The general policy of the state of Israel is that Jewish settlements in the West Bank, which are considered illegal by the international community, are instead considered valuable national assets by the state of Israel. Israel will therefore continue to promote the growth of the settlements.
All of the above elements in the Nation-State Bill prove that Israel is not interested in giving equal rights to Palestinians, whether in Gaza, the West Bank or even within historic Palestine (i.e. the current state of Israel).
That Israel is an apartheid state is further proven in studies by three authoritative organisations: the Economic and Social Commission for West Asia (ESCWA), B'Tselem and Human Rights Watch (HRW).
ESCWA is a body under the United Nations. It released a report in March 2017 which emphatically concluded that Israel is a racist state implementing an apartheid regime in the form of racial discrimination against Palestinians. This is the first time a body under the UN made such a declaration.
B'Tselem is a well-known Israeli human rights organisation. In January this year, it released a report which also states that Israel is an "apartheid regime" that cannot claim to be a democracy when it is occupying Palestinian territories in the West Bank.
HRW is a respected international organisation. In April this year, it released a report titled "A Threshold Crossed" which denounced Israel for committing apartheid crimes.
The apartheid policies of Israel deserve to be categorised as crimes against humanity, as enshrined in the 1973 Apartheid Convention, which defines apartheid as "inhumane acts committed for the purpose of creating and maintaining domination by one racial group of people over another racial group and oppress them systematically ".
What Malaysia needs to do now is raise awareness among the international community regarding the apartheid nature of the state of Israel. The world community needs to be reminded that Israel deserves to be boycotted, just as South Africa was once boycotted, for practicing apartheid policies.
South Africa was not even allowed to participate in international sporting events, including the Olympics. This comprehensive boycott was instrumental in ending its apartheid policies.
This comprehensive boycott action is needed too against Israel.
Though we are a small country, if Malaysia can convince the international community, especially Arab and Islamic countries, to boycott Israel over its apartheid policy against Palestinians, then all Malaysians can be proud to be involved in the noble fight against injustice in Palestine.
The writer is a professor at the Faculty of Business and Accounting at Universiti Malaya and chairman of BDS Malaysia
The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect those of the New Straits Times
