U.S. President Donald Trump differs from his predecessors only in that the mask of civility maintained by the others has been removed, says a radio host and journalist.
BP: Under the plan, the majority Arab population of historic Palestine is crammed into 15% of the land. How does this impact the lives of Palestinians?
Jeffrey Blankfort: From the time of Israel’s seizure of the West Bank and Gaza in 1967 to the present, Israel has been a de facto apartheid state from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean. The Israelis have continued to expand Jewish “settlements,” some of which are small towns, at the expense of Palestinian villages and their supply of water, as well as increasing the number of Jews in those settlements, regardless of which party was in power and this has continued, virtually without interruption, post-Oslo.
That the international community considers them illegal has not stood in the way of the Treasury Dept. allowing tax exempt American Jewish organizations from continuing to pour hundreds of thousands of dollars into the settlements with no requirements that the money be accounted for. Under the circumstances, life for most Palestinians has steadily worsened over the years and this will, no doubt, continue whatever decision Netanyahu or his successors make. More