Kamal Mitra Chenoy analyzes Modi's Visit to Israel

Modi in Israel: I am aghast as an Indian, ashamed as a secular Jew*. This is
not foreign policy, but a continuation of the communal marginalisation of
minorities.* - Writes Chenoy
 
04-07-2017
 
Kamal Mitra Chenoy
 
There has been a long-standing demand among Zionists, Jews dedicated to a
homeland for the Jews scattered throughout the world. After World War I,
the British government sent Lord Balfour in 1917 to grant the Zionists a
part of Palestine as the holy land of the Jews.
 
Lord Balfour gave the Balfour declaration to the Jewish banker Lord
Rothschild to pass it on to the Zionist leadership. However, this action
had no ratification from the League of Nations.
 
Britain had no right to give the land to the Zionists who themselves had no
right to it. Interestingly, the Balfour declaration stated that there
should be no violation of the religious or civil rights of the non-Jewish
peoples. The Zionists violated that condition, as they violated virtually
all agreements they were party to.
 
In 1947, there was the UN Partition Plan dividing Palestine between Israel
and Palestine. There were few decolonised countries who were members of the
UN. India opposed the UN Partition Plan and did not accept the creation of
Israel.
 
This was followed by the ethnic cleansing of Palestine in 1948, where the
“Nakba” or terrible disaster led to the expulsion of over 7,00,000
Palestinians from Palestine. They and their ancestors were never allowed to
return to their homeland.
 
Also in 1948, the Zionist gangs including the Irgun and Stern gangs
attacked friendly Palestinian villages like Deir Yassin in which hundreds
were killed. The Zionist gangs and their underground army, Haganah, bombed
the King David Hotel in Palestine, killing the UN envoy Count Bernadotte.
 
From 1948 to the attack on the Suez Canal in 1956, to the 1967
Palestine-Israel war, then the 1973 war, and finally the assault on Gaza by
Israel some years ago, in which 2,200 Palestinians were killed including
550 children, the imperial wars have continued. More than $1 billion of
damages including the destruction of Gaza resulted.
 
These wars are punctuated by a serious of assaults on Palestinian civilians
as the Zionist machine occupies more and more Palestinian land.
 
Lately, an extreme right-wing Zionist Knesset (Parliament) member Yehuda
Glick has warned the Palestinians that their actions could lead to the
destruction of the holy Al-Aqsa mosque. This has led to a series of knife
attacks by Palestinians incensed by the threat to the holy shrine. Many of
the Palestinian revolting have been shot dead.
 
The world has not stood still. As many as 78 resolutions have been passed
by the UN on the Palestine-Israel question. They have been vetoed by the US
and its allies. There are many more Jews in the US than in Israel. The
occupation of Jerusalem continues. Palestinian civilians continue to die.
There are few secrets the world over about this occupied land.
 
So why is Prime Minister Narendra Modi going to this brutal and criminal
country? Why is he becoming the first Indian PM to visit this racist and
imperial country?
 
There are many Jews like the linguist and scholar Noam Chomsky, the famous
international jurist Richard Falk, and Israeli historian Ilan Pappe (who
had to leave Israel in 2008 and is teaching in the US) - all of them reject
the Zionist and racist creation of Israel.
 
Therefore, why is our Prime Minister so keen to go to Israel? In the last
important Israeli visit to India by former president and veteran leader
Shimon Peres, senior BJP leader LK Advani reportedly asked Peres for
suggestions on how to deal with Kashmir. Peres, a very wily leader,
suggested that India should populate the Kashmir valley with non-Kashmiris.
 
The increasing tempo of attacks and lynchings shows the Prime Minister’s
inadequate response to rising communalism. What better exposure than Israel
for the BJP to show the way to suppress minorities and all those who do not
accept the diktats of the NDA?
 
This is not foreign policy, but a continuation of the communal
marginalisation of minorities. As an Indian citizen I am aghast. As a
secular Jew, I am deeply ashamed.
 
http://www.dailyo.in/voices/modi-in-israel-palestine-
netanyahu-jews-nakba-shimon-peres-kashmir/story/1/18175.html
 
*Also read: Modi’s visit to Israel is an extension of his anti-Muslim
politics
<http://www.dailyo.in/politics/india-israel-ties-palestine-modi-netanyahu-anti-muslim-politics-moshe/story/1/18156.html>*

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