Reply #2: It seems popular, in certain circles, [View All]

[eyl]

to compare sanctions against Israel to sanctions against apartheid SA. There ase several other point proponents of sanctions might want to consider:

1) While sanctions are often touted as the force which led to reform in SA, that's not neccessarily true - I've seen claims that sanctions, rather than accelerating reforms, undermined them.
2) Even if sanctions did bring about the end of apartheid SA, that seems to be more the exception then the rule. How effective were the sanctions against Iraq, or the US embargo of Cuba, in bringing about any sort of reform?
3) Without getting into the argument of whether Israeli policy amounts to apartheid or not, there are other problems with the comparison - because the political situation in Israel is not reminiscent of SA. Apartheid SA was, for all intents and purposes, a one-party state. The checks against government power (namely the courts) were largely ineffective, and the state employed political repression not only toward blacks, but also toward its white citizens. There was little political scope for a backlash to sanctions, because the hardliners were already in power.

In Israel, OTOH, the situation is much different. The courts have and do oppose govenment policy when it seems warrented, there's a free press, and a wide spread of views, not only in the public, but also in the Knesset. Factor in also the fact that most Israelis tend to view international organs with a degree of suspicion.

Now, let's imagine sanctions are imposed. Tanya Reinhart and Ilan Pappe aside, I think I can confidently assume that the result will not be to thank the international community and start chanting ashamnu, bagadnu*. Instead, we'll see it as confirming the international community's bias against us (especially considering its refusal to take any action against far more serious violators than Israel) - and validating, at least to some extent, the far right's view, bringing them to power (hell, we might do that just to stick a figure in the international community's eye). And even without that, it will probably lead to greater hardships for the Palestinians, and greater casualties on the battlefield (consider, for example, what would happen if shortages of funds forced the IDF to replace air strikes with artillery barrages). Far more importantly, it will discredit most of the left - part of whose collective security plans rest on international guarantees**.

*Part of the Yom Kippur "confessional" prayer - "we are guilty, we have betrayed" and so on in (Hebrew) alphabetical order.
**Of course, the extent of this discrediting depends on the timing. For example, had the last academic boycott - which came right after Israel had withdrawn from Gaza - stood, it would have done a lot more damage to the left than a boycott now would (though it would still cause a lot of damage)