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Israel is Trapped, and the Chance of Peace is Ever More Remote
While the West is preoccupied with a crisis, a tragedy is unfolding. The world's financial system will recover. On the Israel/Palestine peace process, there can be no comparable optimism, for it is not clear whether such a process still exists. No process, no peace; a settlement is further away now than at any time since 1967. Israel seems bent on a course which will lead to its eventual destruction.
There is a hideous irony. The way that events are unfolding is a posthumous triumph for Adolf Hitler. With the winding-up of the Soviet Union, the last of the poisons created by the Second World War could be eliminated from the European bloodstream. Not the Middle Eastern one. It is easy to understand why the Israelis reacted as they did. Once you have suffered a Holocaust at the hands of the race which produced Beethoven, Goethe and Mozart, you lose trust in mankind's benevolence: lose faith in everything except your own soldiers and weaponry.
It is equally easy to understand why the Palestinians reacted as they did. Those who are driven into exile and refugeedom do not feel well-disposed towards their oppressors. The Palestinians felt no linguistic inhibitions, and why should they? They bore no guilt for the Holocaust. In the grip of - understandable - rage, some Palestinian rhetoric developed Nazi resonances. That was a mistake. It aroused every Israeli trauma. We have been here before, many Israelis concluded. This time, no one is going to herd us to our death like cattle. This time, we will get our retaliation in first.
Because of the circumstances in which their Jewish state was created, most Israelis believe that they have two existential necessities, and entitlements. They want to enjoy security and they insist that their neighbours recognise their rights to do so. That does not seem unreasonable. But it is. It fails the highest test of political rationality. It is not realistic.
This does not mean that Israelis should have to live in bomb shelters under constant risk of attack. But they have chosen to live in a dangerous neighbourhood, so there must be compromises. Instead of the delusion of absolute security by imposing a humiliating peace on crushed opponents, Israel should understand the need for a modus vivendi.
Israelis are proud of their achievements over the past 60 years, and rightly so. But most of them are guilty of a crass failure of moral sensitivity leading to an equally crass strategic misjudgment. They fail to understand that their security will always be under threat from their neighbours' misery. Above all, their leaders lack the political wisdom and the moral courage to tell Israelis something which most probably know in their hearts: that to make peace, they will have to take risks.
The first act of the current tragedy began in 1967, after the Six-Day War. Plucky little Israel was master of the battlefield. She had overrun a vast acreage of Arab territory. Almost immediately, even by those who had never been enthusiastic about the State of Israel, distinctions began to be drawn between the pre-'67 boundaries and the 1967 conquests. Israel had a tremendous hand of cards, strategic and moral. There was never a better moment for "in victory, magnanimity".
Israel should have announced that unlike almost every previous military victor, she did not seek territorial gains; her sole war aims were peace and justice. To secure them, she was prepared to trade her conquests, with the obvious exception of the Holy Places in old Jerusalem. On such a basis, and with huge international support, a deal would have been possible. But there were problems. At its narrowest point, pre-'67 Israel was only 12 miles wide. A tank thrust from the West Bank could have cut the country in two. Although the generals cannot be blamed for failing to predict the era of asymmetric warfare in which tank thrusts would only occur in war movies, their insistence on a demilitarised West Bank complicated matters. Then a temptation emerged, like the serpent in the Garden of Eden.
Israel was short of land. Much of the West Bank seemed to be inhabited by raggedy goatherds, primevally picturesque, poor and unproductive. Israeli agriculture would soon have the place flowing with milk and honey, while Israeli architects built new homes for a growing population. So the settlements began. The temptation to colonise the occupied territories was abetted by theology. Under the Jehovah declaration, somewhat preceding the Balfour one and also somewhat more extensive, historic Israel was said to include the West Bank. Israel ate the apple.
In order for Israel's pre-'67 Promised Land to be secure, most of the settlements would have to be evacuated, so that a viable Palestinian state could come into existence. It would always have been virtually impossible to generate the political will for this in Israel. Last week's election results eliminated the "virtually".
Even if it wished to do so, which seems unlikely, the new Israeli government could make no progress towards a Palestinian state. Because of its rigidly proportional electoral system, Israel will be condemned to weak governments blackmailed by extremist parties. The imperative to reach a just peace with Palestine will have no leverage on Israeli domestic politics.A prosperous Palestinian state would not guarantee Israel's safety. Some young men would still be enticed by fanaticism and violence. But the problem would be much more manageable. If most Palestinians had a stake in a decent future, there would be many fewer suicide bombers - and the '67 vintage Israeli generals were right on one point. Theirs is a tiny country. The first WMD suicide bomber would do terrible damage.
Over the years, Israel has proved that it can deal with conventional threats. Like the rest of us, it is now working out how to cope with terrorism and asymmetric warfare. Israeli opinion would angrily reject any answers that smacked of appeasement. But a Palestinian state is justice, not appeasement. There are alternatives. Israel could abandon the pretence of a two-state solution and offer the Palestinians Israeli citizenship: the end of the Jewish state. Or she could try ethnic cleansing: drive the Palestinians into Jordan. That would be the end of the Jewish state as a moral entity.
Assuming the alternatives to be unacceptable, there is only justice, or continued muddle, with a sullen, resentful Palestinian population awaiting inflammation. That, alas, is almost a certainty, and who knows how far the flames will spread? Israel is a wonderful place, with landscape, culture, increasingly good wine and as much political argument as you can hold. The country emerged out of tragedy. It would be heart-rending if its heroic journey ended in tragedy. Yet that is the likeliest outcome, and it would be Israel's fault.
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115 Comments so far
Show AllWay long before Anderson was even thinking of writing this puff piece, the theocratic Israeli nation had failed as a moral entity. That happens to all who rely on God as a real estate broker. No surprise there.
Good post. Religion is a mental poison worse than crack or crystal meth.
The author believes that Arabs will be around for a long time. I doubt it. The modern era of independant Arab statehood set itself one task only: to cleanse the middle east of Jews. The Jews are still there, and all of the Arab states are verging on collapse.
That's strange, most historians date Arab nationalism from before the start of WWI. They link it's rise to the influence of T.E. Laurance (although that's not quite right). Thing is, the Arabs have been in that area for as long as the Jews have been. Are they not the children of Abraham?
The prime argument in favor of the emergence of a people, is the emergence of a distinct language. Arabic did not emerge until 1500 years after Hebrew. Anyway, I referred to modern Arab statehood. Which modern Arab state is a success, in your estimation? To me, they all look more-or-less like Somalia.
Joe? Is that you posting under a new name?
Arabic and Hebrew are semitic languages, they come from the same roots.
If you read the article you'd notice that the author is arguing that Israel isn't much of a success either, it's just better at killing people.
Nationalism is a Western European concept anyway. Why judge the Eastern world by a Western concept??? Its the Western powers that drew the world's borders and left ethnic and religious conglomerates of peoples between borders resulting in much of todays modern conflicts.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nationalism
True. Arabic and Hebrew do come from the same roots and are still similar enough that I as an Arabic speaker could follow the proceedings of the Knesset on TV (especially if Shimon Perez was speaking!). But there were also Arabs in the same countries as now. East of the Jordan River and up toward Syria were the Nabataeans. In present day Syria and Lebanon were the Syrians like Na'aman the general who came to visit Elisha, and Zeinab (aka Zenobia) the Empress in Palmyra. And, of course, there were the Bedouin tribes, some of them Jewish and, later, some of them Christian.
Rainborowe
Romanian is a romance language. That does not mean that Paris and Bucharest are interchangeable.
I have no idea what your comment means.
Rainborowe
It means that Arabs habitually claim ownership of the inheritances of other peoples.
But not the homes and farms of other people.
Rainborowe
aaaaah my friend, you may be right - but it took Arab scholars in the middle ages in Spain to re-teach the Jews how to read and write Hebrew after the language became out of use.
Your Zionist arrogance is appalling. Without the indulgences of Muslim leaders in northern Africa and the Ottoman Empire were the only areas that accepted Judaism as an equal belief. Muslims allowed Jewish traditions and beliefs to flourish.
Too bad the Zionists are taking their payback against their treatment under so-called Christianity out on the people who nurtured them.
But I could be wrong !
What Jewish state is a success? To me they all look like nazi germany.
We are not verging on collapse?
this article begins:
"While the West is preoccupied with a crisis, a tragedy is unfolding. The world's financial system will recover."
Oh really, the financial system will recover enough that the USA will continue to give Israel the billions free every year.
When the money is gone, this will change.
The US government cannot hide the fact that we are broke much longer.
Israel will change its policy when America faces the reality that it can't afford to pay for Israel's ethnic cleansing and war crimes.
If there is one thing good that comes from the economic collapse it is this truth... War is expensive and that is where the money went.
The Zionists who run Israel are not even Semites, They are of European ancestry.
Which says it all about the Mossad's motto "By deception we will wage War".
Nor are the Arabs descendants of Shem, because Shem is a fictional character.
The "Three No's of Khartoum" were the Arab League response to the Israeli post-1967 magnanimous peace offer, of which this author is apparently unaware.
Israel is an amoral entity. I am so glad to know they have good wine and I am sure all the dead Gazan children will also celebrate that crucial fact, just do not buy anything from israel, divest now!
This conflict is the root cause of all the worlds terrorism. The rest of the world should intervene and finish it.
Israel must be forced to withdraw to its internationally recognised borders and stop killing people. The Palestinians must recognise israel and stop killing people. Jerusalem should become an international city or a shared capital. Before we have another 9/11 or the terrorists get a nuke.
No gods No masters.
'Israel must be forced to withdraw to its internationally recognised borders and stop killing people. '
Israel is the only country on the planet which has not stated what its borders are. Every other nation on earth has made claims about what it does control. Other than that, I agree with you.
There's a curious irony in modern Israel's "original" borders in that the location of the Biblical "Land of Israel" was actually the present West Bank extended up through Nazareth in the North to the southern shores of Lake Tiberias. The State of Israel declared in 1948--the strip of land west of Jerusalem and north along the Mediterranean littoral--was, in Biblical times, the land of the Philistines (Palestinians) and known as such to the Romans. The Philistines, despite the use of their name to suggest lack of civilization, were a group of people probably originating in the Greek islands, people of such advanced civilization that they brought the use of iron tools to the Middle East and Egypt, which hitherto had only arrived at the bronze age.
Rainborowe
This statement is a lie.
North and South Korea
China
Great Britain
Argentina
Several African Nations
Border disputes are as old as nations.
All the states you've mentioned have indeed made a point of declaring their borders. Even when the borders are in dispute (eg Cyprus) their claims overlap, but the claims are there. Israel has no such document filed. If they do tell me, I'd like to see it.
It seems church and state are always at the root of our common abuse.We are human beings before we are jews christians and muslims or atheist etc. it seems that the bible has been a bill of rights for any fanatic that chooses to use it as such and it will be a script for world wide slaughter.
armageddon = a christian final solution
Good post. In an atheist world these problems would be MUCH reduced for there would be neither the biblical "promise" of a greater Israel to egg on Israelis slaughter of Palestinians nor any promise of eternal reward for suicide bombings. Much human stupidity is traceable to religion.
You miss the reality - religion is not the cause. Land and water theft is. The religious bellicosity is only 'window dressing'.
Without the emotional attachment to the "window dressing" and with the naked truth reveled it would be MUCH harder for land thieves to organize armies. Marx got one thing right religion is the opiate of the masses.
Good news, at least in rhetoric:
Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni told visiting American Jewish leaders on Monday that Israel must give up part of its land "in order to remain a Jewish and democratic state."
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1064591.html
"Part of its land" probably means "land that never actually legally belonged to it" but at least the sentiment (finally in line with the majority of Israeli citizens) is on the right track.
Israel must abide by UNSC Resolution 242 just to be legal.
Peace will depend upon their good behavior after that.
Chances are vanishingly small that any good behavior can ever come from Israelis.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Israel seizes land for settlement expansion
AP - 41 minutes ago
EFRAT, West Bank - Plans to expand a West Bank settlement by up to 2,500 homes drew Palestinian condemnation Monday and presented an early test for President Barack Obama, whose Mideast envoy is well known for opposing such construction.
And so it goes...
The frustrating thing is that the majority of Israeli citizens do not support the settlement "policy" which, if you ask a Palestinian, is a HUGE cause of the conflict.
Hopefully, this is a test and Obama's team will take a stand.
Don't kid yourself. If it weren't that, it would be something else.
The settlement policy is 30 years old. The conflict is (at least) 60 years old. You do the math.
In the ideological universe inhabited by Bruce Anderson, and the British Left in general, Jews are morally responsible for antisemitism. And, when the righteously angry antisemitic hoardes come righteously crashing down on the Jews, it's a bit sad, but not at all evil.
Several thoughts occur: 1)Apart from the omission of the accusation of deicide, how is this different from historic Christian antisemitism? 2)If the Jews deserve antisemitism, then what, if anything, is morally wrong with the Holocaust?
Izak 3:41 -------- Wikipedia states that israel did not offer to return Gaza or the West Bank thus the Three No's. It also states that at least one Jewish analyst interpeted Khartoum resolutions as tacitly supporting the existence of the jewish state. Also there were secret Jordanian/israeli negotiations at the time.
Wikipedia also recently said Ted Kennedy was dead.
Izak. First, I have to say that I detect quite a bit of projection when you say that the author ideologically motivated. Who isn't? We are all biased based on our experiences and claiming that one possesses the objective truth, especially in an issue as complex is to strain credulity.
Second of all, blindly throwing out the term "antisemitism" every time someone criticizes Israel is unfair and dishonest. I live with a Jewish woman and am deeply concerned about the Security for Israel, I just happen to think that episodes such as the monstrously disproportionate bombing response on Gaza will actually decrease Israeli security by creating both a future generation of terrorists and by cementing world opinion firmly against Israel.
Third of all: I understand trauma: I lived in a war Zone as a child, and I understand that there is no explaining the actions of Israel without acknowledging the Crime against Humanity which was the Holocaust. However, my experience as a civilian in a war zone confirms that the military-force-only policy of the Israeli state will create much hatred and anger. the term "collateral damage" should never be used. We're talking about men, women, and children (on both sides) who are blown to pieces. That creates and reproduces trauma, which leads to more fear, more anger, and the cycle continues.
Israel will only find security if it starts to honestly hear principled critics of its actions. If it shuts down all dialogue by the misuse of the term "antisemitism", paradoxically, it will only embolden the real antisemites who will replace dialogue with hatred and racism. People like Jimmy Carter and Desmond Tutu have begun a principled dialogue. I encourage you to hear what they are saying. Believe me: Israel will not find peace through violence. Hope you and yours are well. Peace.
Is antisemitism a moral deformity of Jews or of antisemites?
"Antisemitism" is the cry behind which Israel, and her supporters worldwide, hide when confronted with the inhumanity of Israel's own actions.
If you punch someone in the face and he punches you back, maybe he hit you because you hit him and not because he is a reflexive Jew-hater.
Personally I have found both Jews and Israelis to be very engaging and interesting people, although it bears noting that an Israeli Sabra is very different from an American Jew. The problem here is that defenders of Israel consistently ignore the grievous harm Israel is doing to the Palestinians on a daily basis while using any instance of the Palestinians resisting this as evidence of their being pure evil.
Anti-Semitic, no. Anti-Israel, YES.
Antisemitism is going extinct in the First World. American Protestants have taken the lead in the war against antisemitism in a big way. Pope Benedict has called it "a crime against humanity." Nowadays, First World antisemites hide behind their suddenly-discovered great love of Palestinians. Up-front antisemitism isn't respectable. Even the antisemites "get it."
Nowadays, antisemitism is mainly a Third World phenomenon. For them, it explains why they are such losers. "We're not losers because the witch doctor told us to burn down all of the schools and hospitals. That was an assertion of our antiimperialism and deeply-felt indigenous culture. We're losers because there are vast Evil Jewish forces arrayed against us."
The thoughts of disgruntled Third World losers is of interest in reactionary Third World loser states, only. Very few Jews live in the Third World, nowadays. Furthermore, the function of losers is to lose. One may feel occasional pangs of pity for them, but that is all. Mostly, they wouldn't have things any other way.
Izak:
"The thoughts of disgruntled Third World losers is of interest in reactionary Third World loser states, only.
****
Furthermore, the function of losers is to lose. One may feel occasional pangs of pity for them, but that is all. Mostly, they wouldn't have things any other way."
You are such a sick overtly evil racist Izak have you no shame whatsoever? Has it ever occurred to you that the reason third world countries are poor and desperate is that they had brutal dictators imposed on them by the "west" for the purpose of stealing their resources? Might does not equal right Izak that is fascism, again the philosophy that almost destroyed your own people. Shame on you, deep shame! It is exactly people like you who NO empathy and who are proud thieves from people you consider to be "losers" and war mongers that cause real deep anti Semitism Izak, count on it.
FUCK YOU COMPLETELY YOU VILE FASCIST!
Most of the Israelis themselves are anti-semitic. Most of the Jews in Israel are not of Mediterranean stock. Their ancestry is from teh Khazars who spread Judaism throughout Europe. The Jews from Africa and the Middle East ARE Semites who are treated as second class citizens in Israel.
BTW, the argument is not about ideology! It's about pure and unmitigated land and water thievery by European and American settlers. The practice reminds one of the reservations set aside for native Amerindians and the South African reserves set aside for indigenous native. So I guess we know just how addicted the Israelis are to peace and justice - NOT!!!
But I could be wrong !
"If the Jews deserve antisemitism, then what, if anything, is morally wrong with the Holocaust?"
There is nothing wrong with the holocaust that isn't equally wrong about the other 80 million deaths of World War Two. They were both systematic mass murders for abstract ideological causes.
The obsession that many Jewish people have with the deaths of "their own kind" in that war reveals a kind of anti-goyism, treating non-Jewish deaths as irrelevant - or maybe even as a kind of desirable "retribution" for Jewish suffering.
The narrative works in both directions, but only the holocaust-centric one gets any airtime.
Here is some history re Hitler and anti-Semitism.
Why the hate? Simple. After WW1 when Germany was broken and people were starving, Jews carpet-bagged to Germany with mobile capital and bought up the businesses and homes for pennies on the dollar.
These new landlords and shop owners then turned the screws to their victims. The homeless people whose cottages they now lived in. The starving people whose bakeries they had purchased.
Exactly the same phenomenon as in the American South after the civil war except instead of Northern yankee carpetbaggers, the carpetbaggers were Jewish and primarily European.
The treatment meted out by these Jewish carpetaggers to their starving 'tenants' did not engender Love. It engendered hate. Hitler stands out as having had a bad experience or two.
You stupidly ask if anything is morally wrong with the 'holocaust?'
I assume you mean the killing fields of Cambodia. Pol Pot. Of Course.
Murder is wrong-Especially of little Arab babies by White Phosphorous.
Joseph.
PostScript-You go on about anti-semitism. Do you believe in cause and effect in general? Or do things, (people's feelings,) just kind of magically appear out of a nebulous void.
Hmmmm, causality.....or.....magic!
I think that antisemitism begins in Sunday School or in the madrassah. Once it has been religiously established that the Jews Are Bad (that's why it's okay for us to claim superior entitlement to their religous texts), it becomes possible to demonize them politically as well. In a theocratic state, the second step occurs automatically.
Your account of interwar German antisemtitism is pure fantasy. German antisemites successfully promoted the idea of the Jewish "stab in the back." It was a variation of the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion" story. It said that Germany had won WW1 in the east, but lost terrtitory there in the peace deal, as the result of a Jewish plot. (The territory in question went to Poland. The Nazis were fundamentally as much anti-Polish as antisemitic.) "The Protocols" are a staple of contemporary Arab political thought as well.
YitzakFriend.
I did not describe "German anti-semitism"
I described Jewish carpetbaggers descending on Germany's carcass after WW1 and feeding like Vultures. The hate this engendered.
This "Fantasy" was related to me by people whose family lived through it. Remembered it experientially.
Yitzak, people's opinions by and large are a product of their experiences.
Of course their is no way you can acknowledge that. Because then you'd be impaled upon the truth that Israel is so bitterly hated for cause. That anti-semitism is real and has been throughout history.
Since even you can't say people are born hating Jews, you say we learn it in Sunday School.
Guess what? People like, love or hate others based on their expeirences with them. If Jews have been reviled and exiled throughout history, (Hello Gaza), if Jews have been reviled and exiled everywhere they go......
GUESS WHAT???? It ain't Sunday School classes that are the problem.
Ha Ha. Hezbollah coming soon. Joseph.
Jews have been hated in the Lands of the Rightful Successor Religions, only. Indians, Chinese, Eskimos, non-Christianized/Muslimized Indonesians, Inca, Japanese,etc etc do not expend much energy on The Jews, one way or another.
People interpret their experience in terms of their expectations, which are learned. For example, I sometimes meet people, who tell me that black people are intellectually inferior to whites. If I say to them, "What about Condoleeza Rice, Barack Obama, Michelle Obama..,?" they reply, "Sure they're bright, but they are the exceptions to the rule."
Now, consider where "the rule" comes from.
What is a "Rightful Successor Religion?" Religion is a mental poison. Are you one of those wing nut zealots who believes the bible promises a greater Israel and therefore you have impunity for killing and stealing land? Answer the question Izak. Hint there are no promises from a non existent god those are hallucinations in all too human minds suffering from mental illness.
ALL religion is nothing but organized insanity.
One of the plethora of justifications for invading Iraq was that it had ignored UN resolutions. Since Israel holds the record for number of UN resolutions ignored, why don't we just invade them, too?:) Then we could treat the Orthodox the same way that we are treating their soul brothers (al Qaeda) in Iraq. After six or seven years maybe we can beat them into submission. Or maybe not. Maybe if we just left them alone they would collapse under the weight of their own inhumanity and the problem would be diminished.
The latter course is what Mr. Anderson foresees with the de facto destruction of Israel as a force for decency.
There is only one solution at this point -- A ONE-STATE SOLUTION that allows Arabs and Jews to live side-by-side free of state religious control. Call it Israel-Palestine or Palestine-Israel, but this is really the only possibility at this point.
Unfortunately, there are only two Arabs on Earth who favor this outcome--- Fouad Ajami and Wafa Sultan--- and neither lives in Palestine nor in Israel.