We can already hear the calls for beatifying Sanders & Warren for their grandstanding, election year stunt of introducing a non-binding resolution in the US Senate supporting a two-state solution & against Israeli annexation of any parts of the West Bank. But what a stinking, unimpressive resolution it is warranting scorn more than praise:
“Unilateral annexation of portions of the West Bank would jeopardize prospects for a two-state solution, harm Israel’s relationship with its Arab neighbors, threaten Israel’s Jewish & democratic identity, & undermine Israel’s security.”
“Jeopardize” the bantustate solution? Do they mean the one already dead in the water from provisions of the Oslo Accords? “Harm Israel’s relationship with its Arab neighbors”? Do they mean the autocratic regimes long since bought off (in the Camp David Accords) by US military equipment to keep down their own citizens? “Threaten Israel’s Jewish & democratic identity”? Really!? Sanders & Warren, the vaunted champions of US democracy, accept the validity of a colonial, apartheid, theocratic Israeli state? “Undermine Israel’s security”? Do they mean those unarmed protesters in Gaza getting shot at by Israeli snipers or protesters in the West Bank standing against the razing of whole villages by Israeli bulldozers are a threat to Israel’s security?
You can’t have it both ways in politics, not even in election year showboating. Either you stand unequivocally with the Palestinian struggle against colonialism, apartheid, genocide or you come up with drivel like this resolution that makes an ass out of all who support it.
(Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)