Palestinians slam ‘racist’ Israeli ad campaign

BETHLEHEM: Former senior Israeli defence officials rolled out a massive ad campaign in Israel on Sunday, “warning” Israelis of the likelihood of a single state with a Palestinian majority if the two-state solution was not implemented as the end goal in Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.

The former officials are members of a group known as Commanders for Israel’s Security, “which is made up of about 200 former top officials from the country’s security services and is dedicated to advancing the twostate solution”, according to the Times of Israel.

The ad campaign featured pictures of Palestinian crowds, which the publication referred to as a “Palestinian mob”, overlaid with the caption: “Soon we will be the majority”, written in Arabic, and “Palestine: One state for two people”, in English.

The ads reference the growing Palestinian population, which is projected to reach 7.13 million in 2020, compared with 6.96million Jews in “historical Palestine” – meaning the occupied West Bank, East Jerusalem, the Gaza Strip and Israel.

The campaign featured in fullpage ads in two of Israel’s “most influential newspapers” and billboards across the country, the Times of Israel reported.

Palestinian lawmakers inside Israel slammed the campaign, which was reportedly intended to promote the two-state solution and to oppose right-wing calls to annex large swathes of occupied West Bank, calling it racist.

Ayman Odeh, a member of Israel’s Parliament, posted a statement on Facebook: “This isn’t a peace campaign, but rather a hatred campaign against Arabs. It’s an ugly and and exaggerated campaign, and given the general atmosphere as the (Israeli) prime minister classifies Arab citizens as enemies, this campaign turns dangerous.”

Odeh emphasised that a twostate solution involving the establishment of a Palestinian state next to the state of Israel was “clearly in the interest of both peoples” but, first and foremost, a “legitimate and a just right of the Palestinian people”.