The nation should determine on its borders or it dangers destruction, Tamir Pardo warns
The remedy of Palestinians within the occupied West Financial institution makes Israel an apartheid state, Tamir Pardo, former head of the nationwide intelligence company Mossad, has claimed.
“There’s an apartheid state right here,” Pardo, who served as Mossad’s chief between 2011 and 2016, mentioned in an interview with the Related Press, performed within the coastal metropolis of Herzliya and revealed on Wednesday.
“In a territory the place two persons are judged underneath two authorized programs, that’s an apartheid state,” he acknowledged.
Apartheid was a system of institutionalized racial segregation in South Africa from 1948 and 1994, wherein the white minority had full political management over the bulk black inhabitants.
The previous Mossad chief mentioned Israeli Jews can journey freely throughout the nation, apart from the blockaded Gaza Strip, whereas Palestinians require permission to enter Israel and are pressured to cross by way of checkpoints contained in the West Financial institution. The time period apartheid is “not excessive, it’s a reality,” he added.
The West Financial institution, a landlocked territory, has been occupied by Israel because the Arab-Israeli Battle of 1967.
Pardo didn’t say whether or not he harbored such views on Israel’s remedy of the Palestinians when he was answerable for Mossad.
Nonetheless, he insisted that whereas in workplace he repeatedly urged Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to decide on Israel’s borders.
The previous spymaster warned that the continued occupation of the West Financial institution creates the chance of the destruction of Israel as a Jewish state. “Israel must determine what it desires. A rustic that has no border has no boundaries,” he mentioned.
In July, a examine by the Aspenai On-line analysis group predicted that Arab residents of Israel will outnumber Jews within the coming many years, calling it a “demographic bomb” that’s tickling.
Netanyahu’s Likud Occasion has lashed out at Pardo over his interview, saying that “as an alternative of defending Israel and the Israeli army, Pardo slanders Israel.” The ex-Mossad chief “ought to be ashamed” of himself, the occasion mentioned in an announcement.
Israel’s remedy of the Palestinians has been in comparison with apartheid on quite a few events, together with by human proper teams, the UN and South Africa itself. Israeli authorities declare that its Jewish and Arab populations get pleasure from equal rights, whereas attributing the cruel safety measures within the West Financial institution to the fixed terrorist risk.
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