My Column at the Arab News: Israel’s dual justice
By Ray Hanania
Israel has a dual system of justice that is based on racism. One system is for Jews and the other system is for non-Jews.
A good example of the disparity is in the different ways Israel’s government handled the prosecutions of two people, a Jewish soldiers who murdered an injured Palestinian civilian in cold blood and an Arab Israeli “citizen” and member of the Knesset who helped Palestinian political prisoners who were denied access to their family members.
Here are the stories of Israeli soldier Elor Azaria who murdered, in cold blood, a Palestinian civilian accused of a crime but never given the right of judicial review by Israel. And, Israeli Arab Knesset member Basel Ghattas (Jittas) who was accused of helping Palestinian political prisoners who were being denied the right to communicate with their families.
You can click here to read the column in the Arab News where I wrote every week addressing civil rights issues in Israel and the Arab World, and discrimination against Arabs in America.
Palestinian Israeli Knesset Member Basel Ghattas (Jitas), targeted in racist attack by Israeli extremists
What many people hate to hear is that Israel’s government imposes a system of racist justice against non-Jews, who are Muslim and Christian. Ghattas is a Christian from the Israeli occupied city of Nazareth where Christians are persecuted.
It’s amazing to me that Christians in America are so silent and uneducated about the continued suffering of Christians in the Holy Land imposed by violence from Israel’s racist settlers and military.
It’s not all Israelis or Israeli Jews who engage in racism. But the country’s government applies a dual system of justice based on racism. Racism by a government is called “Apartheid.”
Israelis hate that word but if they don’t want to hear it, stop using it!
(Ray Hanania writes each week in the Arab News in Jeddah Saudi Arabia. Visit ArabNews.com for more columns. Email Ray at rghanania@gmail.com.)
Ray Hanania is an award winning political and humor columnist who analyzes American and Middle East politics, and life in general. He is an author of several books.
Hanania covered Chicago Politics and Chicago City Hall from 1976 through 1992 at the Daily Southtown and the Chicago Sun-Times. He began writing in 1975 publishing The Middle Eastern Voice newspaper in Chicago (1975-1977). He later published “The National Arab American Times” newspaper (2004-2007).
Hanania writes weekly columns on Middle East and American Arab issues as Special US Correspondent for the Arab News ArabNews.com, at TheArabDailyNews.com, and at SuburbanChicagoland.com. He has published weekly columns in the Jerusalem Post newspaper, YNetNews.com, Newsday, the Orlando Sentinel, Houston Chronical, and Arlington Heights Daily Herald.
Hanania is the recipient of four (4) Chicago Headline Club “Peter Lisagor Awards” for Column writing. In November 2006, he was named “Best Ethnic American Columnist” by the New American Media. In 2009, Hanania received the prestigious Sigma Delta Chi Award for Writing from the Society of Professional Journalists. He is the recipient of the MT Mehdi Courage in Journalism Award. He was honored for his writing skills with two (2) Chicago Stick-o-Type awards from the Chicago Newspaper Guild. In 1990, Hanania was nominated by the Chicago Sun-Times editors for a Pulitzer Prize for his four-part series on the Palestinian Intifada.
His writings have also been honored by two national Awards from ADC for his writing, and from the National Arab American Journalists Association.
Hanania is the US Special Correspondent for the Arab News Newspaper, covering Middle East and Arab American issues. He writes for the Southwest News newspaper group writing on mainstream American issues.
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