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19 Jul, 2014

How language changes views of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict

Self-defence. Occupation. Apartheid. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is as much a struggle over language as it is a battle over land.

Military might has always relied on an effective propaganda campaign to distinguish aggressor from victim. When Alice asks Humpty Dumpty whether words can mean so many different things he answers, ‘‘the question is … which is to be master’’.

For Western nations, including Australia, Israel’s narrative dominates as master. Palestinians who resist are ‘‘terrorists’’; Israel’s policies are not ‘‘apartheid’’; boycotts are ‘‘anti-Semitic’’.

Yet the purported moral force that drives Israel’s occupation machinery is eroding, exposing the disingenuous language deployed by Israel and its supporters to advance Israeli occupation and colonisation.

Read the rest: How language changes views of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict over Gaza.