Why is Israel Considered a "Rogue" State?

There are a number of issues concerning Israel's commitment to adhere to international law. The jurisdiction of these concerns fall beyond Israel's own foreign policy and what it interprets as justified. Since the surrounding Palestinian Territories are not actually part of Israel's sovereignty, the international community has the authority to determine whether or not Israel is defying international law, regardless of what Israel defines for its own rules of engagement.

There are a number of concerns that the international community have raised, which Israel has ignored or refuses to take part in, which is why many deem Israel a "rogue" state.

Currently, Israel undergoes what is considered illegal settlement expansion in the territories it has occupied since 1967. These areas are found in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Occupation itself is not illegal, however the means in which Israel conducts its occupation of these territories has been deemed illegal based on the Fourth Geneva Convention.

There are currently about 500,000 Jewish colonists living in approximately 200 colonies in the West Bank. During the seven years of the Oslo peace process, the number of Israeli colonizers in the Occupied Territories increased by more than 50 percent. (AL Sep. 8. 2003. MDE 15/085/2003)

Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention states:

‘. . The Occupying Power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population in the territory it occupies.’

The UN Committee on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination in 1998 reiterated its view that "Israeli settlement in the Occupied Palestinian Territories are not only illegal under contemporary international law but are an obstacle to peace and to the enjoyment of human rights by the whole population in the region."

According to Amnesty International. "the Israeli Army has destroyed some 4,000 Palestinian homes in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, as well as vast area of cultivated land, hundreds of factories and other commercial properties. roads and public buildings.” (MDE 15/091/2003)

Article 53, Fourth Geneva Convention states:

‘Any destruction by the Occupying Power of real or personal property belonging individually or collectively to private persons... is prohibited.

Employees and mobile units of the PRCS and ICRC are regularly detained and harassed. Noteworthy violations include: A PRCS ambulance used as an assault shield by the IDF (Jan. 8, 2004): A tank assault on a PRCS ambulance, shattering the front windshield and injuring the driver (Jan. 28, 2004): During the destruction of the Jenin Refugee Camp in April, 2002. the ICRC was prevented from offering services to the injured and dying for six days.

Article 19 of the First Geneva Convention states:

'...Mobile medical units of the Medical Service may in no circumstances be attacked. . .'

Article 24 of the First Geneva Convention states:

'Medical personnel exclusively engaged in the search for, or the collection, transport or treatment of the wounded or sick... shall be respected and protected in all circumstances…'

More notably, Israel is one of only four states in the world who refuse to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

The reason Israel refuse to be part in this treaty is because it has an undeclared arsenal of an estimated 80 nuclear weapons. The fact that the US Congress and Netanyahu refuses to address this issue while trying to punish Iran who is part of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and is developing legitimate civilian nuclear energy under this signed treaty is hugely hypocritical.

In 1965, Israel stole over 200-600 pounds of weapons-grade uranium from the United States.

Recently revealed documents prove not only that Israel has nuclear weapons, but actually tried to sell some to Apartheid South Africa. Who else Israel approached to sell nuclear weapons remains an unasked question.

Is the theory of the Nile to the Euphrates a realistic possibility?

Regarding a recent article called In defense of reason, not Israel by Amr Yossef, an Adjunct Professor of Political Science, there are a few points that can be made about his comments.

Most of his article is very well written and provides a realistic perspective of the situation between Israel and Egypt especially when considering that there are many conspiracy theories regarding the two nations that provide an inaccurate outlook on their relationship. That is because they are exactly what the name suggests: "theories" without tangible evidence or without factual analysis to support any of the accusations mentioned.

However, there is one vital note that Amy Yossef makes that needs to be examined carefully.

"Israel is not interested in a territorial expansion that would go far beyond its capabilities."

This statement is absolutely correct, and as the world witnessed in the events after the six day invasion of 1967, Israel clearly could not defend and maintain the newly occupied territories. The reality is that it wasn't ready to occupy Egypt's Sinai, Lebanon's south, Syria's Golan Heights, and the entire Palestinian territories comprising of the West Bank, Gaza strip, and East Jerusalem because it provided an economic strain on the state especially at such an early stage of its establishment. .

The problem with this statement though is that it does not rule out the fact that the region is actually witnessing territorial expansion and annexation within East Jerusalem and the West Bank today that has not ceased since those six critical days.

One can safely say that almost 45 years on, East Jerusalem and the West Bank are definitely within Israel's capability to annex, otherwise current settlement constructions would not be occurring.

While the quick adolescent approach to occupation proved to be a failure, the more mature and steady approach to increasing the Israeli Empire has proven to be extremely successful, especially when, as Amr Yossef put it, "Israel is satisfied with the current status-quo", and no peace with the Palestinians will help Israel continuously expand.

What no one has asked is whether or not Israel has actually defined a limit to the ever-growing expanding territory. There is no evidence to suggest that Israel will stop at the West Bank and East Jerusalem especially when the state has been internationally condemned for annexing regions within these territories in the first place.

If the Israeli government simply cannot abide by International Law to halt the current illegal activity of expanding its territory, there is no evidence to suggest that there is any limit at all. This raises issues on whether or not a reason to prove the theory of the Greater Israel being from the Nile to the Euphrates is relevant, but rather that a counter to this theory is necessary when considering Israel's current behaviour.

As Israel's economy grows and their military strength increases, there is nothing to suggest they wouldn't try to continue to expand on more Arab land within their "capabilities" so long as they have the ability to do so.


The only thing that has in fact changed since 1967 is that Israel has learnt that conquering its surrounding land in only six days is simply not a sustainably reality.

Is Israel truly an apartheid state?

The following article may shed some light on the current situation within Israeli territory, and one can make up their own mind.

"Israel’s apartheid policies can best be exemplified by its treatment of the Palestinians living within Israel proper. Israel discriminates against its Palestinian minority—20 percent of the total population—by corralling them in ghettos, tying social benefits to military service in the Israel Defense Force, denying jobs to those without military ID, allowing landlords to rent to Jews only, effecting unequal marriage laws, and denying certain purchasing rights of property in the country to non-Jews. Furthermore, municipal services such as street lighting and trash collection are only provided in Jewish areas, and Jewish schools receive four times as much federal funding as Arab schools, which are often kept segregated. According to Amnesty International, 8,000 Palestinians are held in Israeli jails, which is made possible by Israel’s 1979 Emergency Law that states individuals can be held without charge “if the Israeli police or army find that ‘reasons of state security or public security require that a particular person be detained.’” Even Israel’s identification card system is segregated, as markers are used to distinguish Jewish citizens of Israel from Palestinian, Christian, or Muslim citizens. Most recently, Israeli legislators are working to remove Arabic as one of its official national languages, even though it is the native language of the land. They are also trying to pass a law that criminalizes Israeli citizens for supporting the Palestinian Civil Society call for Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions against Israel and speaking out against apartheid.

Israel is an apartheid state according to legal definition, but it doesn’t take legal expertise of international law to understand that what is happening to the Palestinians is anything but apartheid­—it just takes a simple examination of the situation. Hoping to blur the lines of ethics, some might like to call the conditions complicated... Racism, colonialism, and settler-states are not complicated and in fact have existed systematically for many years."

[http://www.columbiaspectator.com/2011/02/27/israel-practices-apartheid]

Another report describes a specific Arab village in Israel as follows:

Baqa al-Gharbiyya, Israel – This sleepy agricultural village, an hour’s drive northeast from Tel Aviv, feels worlds apart from Israel’s commercial capital. Garbage lines many of the narrow, rutted streets, symptoms of the lower level of government funding bestowed upon the town; unemployed men mill about, complaining that Israel’s policies have hurt the local economy.
Avigdor Lieberman, Israel’s hard-right foreign minister, has proposed annexing this and other Arab villages to a future Palestinian state. Their inhabitants would be stripped of their Israeli citizenship unless they were willing to leave their land and swear a “loyalty oath” to the state.

His plan is deeply unpopular here and in nearby villages.

[http://english.aljazeera.net/palestinepapers/2011/01/2011124105622779946.html]

Another Al-Jazeera report talks about the Arab village, stating the following:

Baqa al-Gharbiyya used to be just Baqa, a name still used by many residents. The creation of the state of Israel split the village in half, with Baqa al-Gharbiyya on the west side of the 1948 armistice line and Baqa al-Sharqiyya on the east.

Residents regularly travelled back and forth between the two until six years ago, when the Israeli separation barrier was built. Several streets in the villages now dead-end at an eight-metre-high concrete wall topped with barbed wire.

Those who live in Baqa al-Gharbiyya face what they, and many Israeli and international human rights groups, describe as systemic prejudice. Israeli Arabs routinely face discrimination when applying for jobs, and their towns and villages often receive a lower level of government funding than Jewish communities.

In its 2009 report, the Association for Civil Rights in Israel described the discrimination faced by Arabs as "open and explicit", and warned that the government is threatening "their most basic rights – to equality, education and employment – as well as their very citizenship".

Moreover, Arabic is planned to be removed from schools, different funding schemes are provided for Arab populated villages compared to Jewish ones, and transport to and from Israel and the West Bank provides Jewish-only buses on Jewish-only highways to Jewish-only settlements.

Israel introduces 'Palestinian only' bus lines, following complaints from Jewish settlers - National

Restaurants don't allow Arabic, and indeed two Arabs were fired for speaking the language.
McDonald's Confirms 'No Arabic' policy at its restaurants in Israel

The Soho restaurant in Rishon Letzion have a no Arabs policy.
No Arabs Allowed

Then there is the Law of Return, that only gives Jews the right of return and the right to live in Israel and to gain citizenship. This can only be extended to non-Jews with a Jewish grandparent.

There is also the Marriage Laws in Israel that provides no option for civil marriage or interfaith marriage, only those who are recognized as Jews according to Orthodox Jewish law can get married in Israel, and members of other religions can only marry spouses of the same religion.
Israel's "Jews-Only" Marriage Laws Explained

Despite this blatant ethnic discrimination, Israelis still use a lot of syntactic ambiguity to deny the apartheid regime that exists in their very own country. They will go as far as diverting the argument by mentioning Arab representatives in the Knesset.

But the real question is, could an Arab ever be elected Prime Minister of Israel if Zionism enforces the demographics to maintain the "Jewishness" of the state? Arab minority is deliberately invoked which is why Israel doesn't want to recognize the Right of Return of displaced Arabs as part of the UN Resolution 194 which would naturally change that demographics of the country.
So much for democracy if the rights of people in the region are denied because of their ethnicity.

Ultimately this mistreatment and discrimination falls under the meaning of apartheid. By definition it is the minority ruling over the majority based on race and ethnicity without the opportunity of equal rights. That is exactly the system Israel adopts.

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