When in Israel/Palestine in 2010, I took a video of graffiti on what Israelis call the Separation Wall and what Palestinians call the Apartheid Wall. The “graffiti” is a letter to the Palestinian people from a South African theologian, comparing the South African and Palestinian experience. (See “Esack letter” on YouTube)

As a American Jew, it was really difficult to see institutions in Israel that most Americans would consider apartheid: Jewish-only roads, Jewish-only buses, Israeli settlers walking around openly carrying guns in the West Bank (illegal for Palestinians), ID cards required whenever out of the house, military personnel in uniforms deciding arbitrarily who gets through a checkpoint with absolutely no predictability or concern for medical emergencies.

“Arbitrary” and “unpredictable” are the guiding principles that make a normal life impossible. Palestinians say “just staying is resistance.”

Yes, there are Israeli Arabs in the Knesset (and on the federal bench), but they are tokens compared to treatment of the vast majority. Also, how Palestinians in Israel vs. the West Bank/Gaza are treated differs significantly.

According to the International Criminal Court, “‘apartheid’ means inhumane acts committed in the context of an institutionalized regime of systematic oppression and domination by one racial group over any other racial group.” The U.N. Convention on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination says racial discrimination is “any distinction, exclusion, restriction or preference based on race, color, descent or national or ethnic origin.”

The first writer contended that such a policy was in place, whereas the second writer stated that “to label Israel an apartheid state is false.” Both writers were essentially correct, as they were referring to different political entities.

Within the boundaries that all the world (outside of Israel) accepts as the state of Israel, there reside approximately one million Arab citizens, and these are more or less treated by the state as full citizens, with the rights and protections of citizens. The “West Bank” (of the Jordan River) lies outside the borders of Israel and is viewed by the United Nations, the United States and most of the world as “occupied territory,” since it was taken from Jordan in the 1967 war.

Many Israelis, and successive governments of Israel, view the West Bank as historically belonging to the Jewish people. Within the West Bank, a policy of extreme apartheid has existed for more than 45 years, and that policy is steadily worsening. There are more than 600 checkpoints, which make it difficult and sometimes impossible for Arabs to move about on their own land. Meanwhile, Jewish settlers move on a system of roads from which Arabs are excluded.

My own belief is that the Israeli government is trying to make life so unbearable for Arabs that they will leave the West Bank of their own accord – effectively gradual “ethnic cleansing.”