EU hardly surprised by Israel demolition drive: Activist

Press TV has interviewed Mick Napier, from the Scottish Palestine Solidarity Campaign in Edinburgh, about the European Union censuring the Israeli settlement expansion in the occupied West Bank, calling on the Tel Aviv regime to stop demolition of Palestinian homes, some of which were funded by the EU.

The following is a rough transcription of the interview.

Press TV: Give us your thoughts on the recent comments and criticism made by the EU regarding Israel’s demolition drive and settlement expansion plans on occupied Palestinian land? Many are seeing these comments as mere platitude.   

Napier: Well they can hardly be surprised because the demolition drive, the construction of Jewish-only, exclusively Jewish settlements and colonies and the demolition and destruction of Palestinian communities has been continuing everyday for almost 70 years now.  

There is an orgy of destruction of Palestinian homes, construction of Jewish-only homes and communities all across occupied Palestine and it has been going on without a break. So that for example when the Zionists conquered 78 percent of the Palestine in 48, they had by force or by fraud obtained 6 percent of the lands of the properties there. Now they own 94 percent and the Palestinians have been pushed into 6 percent and that process is ongoing.

I myself have seen Palestinian homes in Jerusalem where the Palestinian family has been forced out of their home. They live and sleep and attend in their garden while Zionists from New York, from Brooklyn live in their homes and sneer and insult them at every opportunity.  

So this process can hardly be a surprise to the European community. There is a system in Israel whereby if you can prove that at any time in the past a property has possibly been owned by a Jewish family, then the Palestinians can be dispossessed but Palestinians who have title deeds to their homes, who have been driven into refugee camps and whose land is now controlled by Zionist institutions can never regain their property. It is a very unambiguous apartheid system.

So I do not think the EU can be surprised. They have intelligence agencies, they have people reporting on the ground from across the whole of occupied Palestine and so I think we should take this outrage with a pinch of salt.  

Press TV: The United Nations has condemned the settlement expansion policies of the Israeli regime, the EU, the United States, the international community on widespread occasions basically has slammed the Israeli settlement expansions, it has been deemed as illegal throughout the board. My question is when will we see tangible solid action against the Israelis to get them to put a halt to these settlement expansions?  

Napier: Well my own government- the Scottish government - does not have the power but it has called for an arms embargo against Israel because of the crimes and massacres it has committed against the Palestinian people. And I think that Israel is now very, very worried indeed. In fact they have set up a special organization in their ministries with a budget of one hundred million shekels to deal with and try to defeat the growing international boycott movement against Israel because of its crimes.

So the Israelis express serious concern about popular opinion around the world but you know sir, if I commit a crime and you condemn me but you keep giving me money, if you condemn me and you keep giving me the weapons and the guns to commit the crime, and if you condemn me incessantly for 60 years but you continue to give me privilege, the economic access to the EU, sweetheart deals,  and if you continue to sell me weapons and buy my weapons, then you know everybody knows that these condemnations do not amount to very much.

I think they amount to something but not very much and the reason why Israel is concerned was summed up by a past Israeli ambassador to Britain who when he left for the UN said the dissonance between public opinion and government policy is now very extreme and if this gulf between the public sentiment which is very hostile to Israel and the government’s support for Israel, if this were to continue he said it would cause serious problems for the Israeli state. Well that will continue for sure but we hope to intensify that tension between public opinion and government’s complicity in the crimes of the Israelis.

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