PA daily op-ed: “Israel is not a democratic state… [it] was established in accordance with a racist colonialist decision… [which] invented a different people… which it says is the Jewish people”

Excerpt of an op-ed by Bassem Barhoum, regular columnist for the official PA daily

Headline: “Democracy in the swamp of racism”

“We did not need new evidence in order to discover that Israel is not a democratic state. This entity was established in accordance with a racist colonialist decision – the Balfour Promise (i.e., Declaration) – which cancelled the existence of the Palestinian people and on the other hand invented a different people on its ruins, which it says is the Jewish people. Israel, as the state occupying the land of another people, cannot be defined as democratic. Therefore, we were not surprised when Israel prevented the entry of American Congresswomen Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar (in August 2019 due to their promotion of the BDS movement to boycott Israel –Ed.).”

The Balfour Declaration of Nov. 2, 1917 was a letter from British Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour to Baron Rothschild stating that "His Majesty's government views with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people." In 1922, the League of Nations adopted this and made the British Mandate "responsible for putting into effect the declaration," which led to the UN vote in favor of partitioning Mandatory Palestine into a Jewish state and an Arab state in 1947. In response, Britain ended its mandate on May 15, 1948, and the Palestinian Jews, who accepted the Partition Plan, declared the independent State of Israel. The Palestinian Arabs rejected the plan and together with 7 Arab states attacked Israel, in what is now known as Israel's War of Independence.