Over 1,000 academics, public figures say Israel judicial overhaul about ethnically cleansing Palestinians

More than 1,000 academics and other public figures have said the "ultimate purpose" of the Israeli government's judicial overhaul is to ethnically cleanse Palestinians.

Figures including prominent Israeli scholars Ilan Pappe and Benny Morris and former Knesset speaker Avrum Burg signed an open letter titled "The Elephant in the Room", which also calls on North American Jewish leaders to commit to changing education on Israel.

"There cannot be democracy for Jews in Israel as long as Palestinians live under a regime of apartheid, as Israeli legal experts have described it," the letter reads.

"Indeed, the ultimate purpose of the judicial overhaul is to tighten restrictions on Gaza, deprive Palestinians of equal rights both beyond the Green Line and within it, annex more land, and ethnically cleanse all territories under Israeli rule of their Palestinian population.

"The problems did not start with the current radical government: Jewish supremacism has been growing for years and was enshrined in law by the 2018 Nation-State Law."

The judicial overhaul is an effort by the Israeli government to limit the power of judges and strengthen its own authority.

The Knesset approved a bill in July removing the ability of the Supreme Court to overrule government decisions on the basis of "reasonableness".

The same court will consider appeals against the law – the first one passed as part of the reform package – in September.

The judicial overhaul could also pave the way for authorities to take increasingly harsh measures against Palestinians, though this issue has largely been neglected.

But Lior Sternfeld, associate professor of history and Jewish studies and press contact for the open letter, said activists like the "bloc against the occupation" have been participating in protests against the reforms from the start.

"The insights, however, didn't cross to the American and Jewish-American conversation, and we thought it should be crucial for Americans and American Jews to see the situation without the regular masks," he told The New Arab.

The academics' letter argues that the issue of occupation has been overlooked by American Jews.

"American Jews have long been at the forefront of social justice causes, from racial equality to abortion rights, but have paid insufficient attention to the elephant in the room: Israel's long-standing occupation that, we repeat, has yielded a regime of apartheid," the letter reads.

It urges North American Jewish leaders to commit to take action, including by committing to change education on Israel for Jewish children and youth to give a "more honest appraisal" of Israel's past and present.

The letter also calls on them to demand from elected leaders in the US the restriction of American military aid from use in occupied Palestinian territory.

Academics from Israel's Tel Aviv University, Hebrew University of Jerusalem and Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, as well from international institutions including Harvard and Princeton, have signed the letter.