Syria drubs Israel’s ‘racist’ Negev plan

The Syrian foreign ministry has condemned as “racist” an Israeli plan to regulate Bedouin settlements in the south of Israel and accused the Jewish state of committing “ethnic cleansing” against Palestinians.

“Syria condemns in the strongest terms the racist Prawer-Begin plan that would lead to the confiscation of 800,000 dunams of land and forced displacement of 40,000 Palestinians in Negev, in addition to the destruction of 36 villages,” a statement released to Syrian state-run media said.

The “dangerous” plan “to build settlements” is a sign that Israel is “going too far in the process of ethnic cleansing against our Palestinian Arab people,” a strategy designed to “Judaize the land and put an end to what is left of [the] Palestine cause,” a Syrian foreign ministry spokesman added.

The “racist, Zionist measures” pose a threat to regional security, and therefore “Syria demands that the international community moves immediately to stop this plan and deter the occupation forces and hold them accountable for their unilateral violations of the international law,” the spokesman said.

The Bill on the Arrangement of Bedouin Settlement in the Negev, also known as the Prawer-Begin Plan, drawn up by former Likud minister Benny Begin and approved by the cabinet in January, calls for the country to officially recognize and register the vast majority of Bedouin settlements throughout the south of Israel and to compensate the residents of 35 unrecognized villages who are to be moved off state-owned land.

The divisive plan narrowly passed its first Knesset reading in June by a vote of 43 to 40, but will need to pass two more readings to become law.

Syria is embroiled in a nearly three-year civil war that has caused upwards of 100,000 deaths, and, according to UN figures, around 1.5 million Syrians have fled the fighting to neighboring countries. In contrast to the Syrian position on internal Israeli decision, Bashar Assad’s government has not yet called for international intervention in its affairs, nor have there been any references on potential compensation for those who have suffered or become refugees as a result of the violence.