For decades, Israel enforced a racist law. But to the media, rescinding it is racist. Make it make sense. ~ Elder Of Ziyon

Tuesday, February 10, 2026

For decades, Israel enforced a racist law. But to the media, rescinding it is racist. Make it make sense.

Israel’s government has taken unilateral steps to give itself greater control over the occupied West Bank, challenging President Trump’s opposition to Israeli annexation of the territory in a move widely considered a violation of international law.

...The new actions mainly ease the way for land purchases by Jewish settlers, beginning with the repeal of a pre-1967 law banning the sale of West Bank property except to local, meaning Palestinian, residents.

Um, no. The "pre-1967 law" was Jordan Law No. 40 of 1953 that restricted sales of land to Jordanians (with limited exceptions.) It wasn't only for the West Bank - it was for Jordan.

And who could be a Jordanian citizen? Well, not Jews.

Any person who, not being Jewish, possessed Palestinian nationality before 15 May 1948 and was a regular resident in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan between 20 December 1949 and 16 February 1954.

So for nearly sixty years, Israel enforced a Jordanian law that was explicitly racist and antisemitic. No one seemed to have a problem with that.

But now that Israel has rescinded a racist law, and the NYT is very upset:

The measures, which make it easier for Jewish settlers to buy land and undercut the Palestinian Authority in parts of the West Bank that it administers, appear to flout important agreements that Israel signed under the Oslo peace process decades ago.

Hmmm, very interesting. Because in 1973, Jordan strengthened the law to say that anyone who sold land to a Jew (they used a euphemism) would get the death penalty. Israel never applied that law because it already controlled the territory, but when then PA gained autonomy, it eagerly adapted the Jordanian law to extend the death penalty to anyone who sells land to a Jew.

And only a Jew, not an Israeli. Israeli Arabs buy land and homes in PA-controlled areas.

Now, this is a violation of the Oslo Accords. Specifically, Article XVI, paragraph 2 of Oslo 2 requires that Palestinians who have “maintained contact with the Israeli authorities” will not on this account be subject to “harassment, violence, retribution or prosecution.”

When Israel takes away an antisemitic law, the New York Times says it is a violation of the Oslo Accords, meaning it is defending the racist law. When the PA adopts an explicitly antisemitic law that really is in violation of the Oslo Accord, the NYT has noting bad to say about it.

Apparently, the New York Times rejects bigotry on principle - unless it is against Jews, when it justifies it.