"Israel's" Intent to Wipe Palestine Off the Map

Maps Used to Brainwash Israelis about the Non-existence of Palestine

... I have come upon a new source for the Israeli popular denial of Palestine and Palestinians which frankly strikes me as symptomatic of a will-to-genocide. Take a look at their maps. Yes, maps! The Israeli government has been playing around with their maps since 1967. The result has been what Professor Oren Yiftachel of Ben-Gurion University, a political-geographer and urban planner from Beer-Sheva, refers to as 'spatial socialization' which is used to buttress Israel's claim to Palestine.

At the "3rd International Conference on An End to Occupation, A Just Peace in Israel-Palestine," recently held in Brussels, Professor Yiftachel displayed Israeli maps that show Israel without any, or often only scant and distorted, indication of the existence of Palestinians and Palestine. Through an analysis of maps, or what he refers to as a geographer as a 'cartographic discourse,' Yiftachel claims that Israeli school children are exposed to maps showing Ramallah and other Palestinian cities within certain Israeli districts.

"Zionists and Jews throughout the world use propaganda maps that instill 'spatial socialization' along with claims to rightful ownership of the entire 'Eretz Yisrael' where Palestinians and Palestine are presented as illegitimate or incidental," Yiftachel said. "These maps are props that pretend to present the objective reality but are actually a form of brainwashing." He cited Israeli policy where in 1967 cartographers were asked not to show the green line; by 1978 it was illegal for Israeli map makers to display the green line. Yiftachel also showed brief examples of Palestinian maps which claim the entire land, causing what he termed 'an asymmetric dialectic' of spatial claims and action, including violence and terror, legitimized on territorial grounds.

Professor Yiftachel has also published "Ethnocracy: The Politics of Judaizing Israel/Palestine" and "From Fragile 'Peace' to Creeping Apartheid: Notes on the Recent Politics of Israel/Palestine." Both articles can be found on the World Wide Web.

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