Seeds of Peace or Pessimism?
Saul Landau
Radio Progreso Weekly, 18 April 2002
A friend phoned this week and asked me if I was ready to resign from membership in the Jewish people. No, I said, it's only the Israelis- not all of them - that are behaving like brutal occupiers. Other Jews - not as many as I would like to see - have demonstrated against the Israeli invasion. And, I reminded him, even though the current military moves may be worse than ever, they are certainly not new. Keep perspective, I advised him - and myself, as I winced before the TV images on war in the Middle East.
Since 1948 some of Israel's founding fathers have tried to expel the Palestinians from the original and subsequently enlarged Israeli territory. Ariel Sharon, then a young soldier, apparently believed that only through ethnic cleansing could Jews exclusively occupy the now "Greater Israel".
If ethnic cleansing offends some Jews, I would ask them to explain how Israeli behavior differs significantly from what those governments in Africa and the Balkans did to ethnic groups they despised in the 1990s. Perhaps Sharon has been less brutal than Milosovic, but nevertheless when he ordered his powerful air force, heavy tanks and artillery and a large and well-equipped army to invade another people's territory - no matter the "terrorist" pretext - this amounts to a crime.
We have watched video footage of the Israeli Defense Force under Prime Minister Sharon, now an old soldier, stripping Palestinian men, refusing to allow wounded civilians access to medical care, and putting pornography on Palestinian TV. These practices and the cold blooded assassination of some Palestinians labeled as "terrorists" reminds me of the behavior practiced by the condemned Serbian army and militia. Israeli troops have also raided hospitals, fired on ambulances, and prevented their crews from delivering wounded people to hospitals.
To make life as miserable as possible for the Palestinians on the West Bank, the Israeli military has deprived them of food, water, access to medical care, transportation - they cannot go to work - and all of their basic human rights. The Israelis have also shot some journalists. Deliberately?
Israeli troops shot Boston Globe reporter, Anthony Shadid, took a bullet from an Isareli soldier on March 31 in an area they controlled. Apparently, there was no fighting going on when the Israelis fired at Shadid, who wore proper journalist's identification. To say that such practices contravene international law would be a mild understatement.
But what's the point? To stop insanity, suicide bombing, by torturing, killing and humiliating an entire people? To demand from a powerless Arafat that he stop the "terrorism", after confining the Palestinian leader to his house and allowing him the use of a celphone? Something does not compute.
Ironically, the US media tends to repeat Sharon's mantra and place blame on the victims, the occupied people, for their plight. The talking television heads invariably repeat Bush's ignorant patter about Arafat, who cannot control his own life, somehow failing to stop the psychotic practice of recruiting and sending suicide bombers to Israel.
I watched Leslie Stahl interview Sharon on 60 Minutes in late March and remarked to my wife that referring to the Palestinians he had used the words "terror" and "terrorism" in almost every sentence, as if they were the only words in his song's chorus. Sharon did not address the issue of Israelis occupying Palestinian land, nor did Leslie Stahl ask him hard questions about dismantling Jewish settlements in Palestinian territory.
But CNN's Christine Amanpour did ask Arafat, as Israeli tanks were blowing holes in his compound's walls, if he thought he could control the violence. Arafat lost it and implied that Amanpour was crazy or worse.
President Bush, after much of the Arab world demonstrated in the streets and even European leaders - usually docile - pressed him, demanded that Sharon withdraw Israeli forces from Palestinian territories. His serious voice reminded me of the parent clamping down on his kid after years of indiscipline. Bush sternly commanded his ally to leave withdraw his forces. "Go to your room - at your earliest convenience", he might well have told his child.
The forceful-sounding Bush declared that he would send Secretary of State Colin Powell to the region in a week. Chuckle, chuckle. "That oughta give Sharon enough time to finish his mission", which is the physical destruction of the Palestinian Authority's base of operations. Bush, the tough parent castigator figuratively told the naughty Israeli child: "I'm going to count to fifty thousand, so don't think I'm not serious".
Bush simultaneously repeats his demand that Arafat stop suicidal terrorism. Imagine Bush standing on the street looking up and shouting at the man who was about to jump off a roof into the crowd below: "Don't you dare commit suicide, you dirty terrorist". He did plead with Israel to be compassionate, as if to say, "Hey, don't be too harsh in punishing the criminals who attacked you - heh, heh".
Bush, like Sharon, loves to use the T words, but not about Israel. He still insists that Iraq - remember our mission to bomb Iraq? - was in some way connected to the recent outbreak of terrorism. He sent the almost always successful Vice President Dick Cheney to arm twist some support for attacking Iraq and was told that there would be no support for anything until the United States imposes a solution on the Israel-Palestine debacle.
Given the limits of Bush's intellect and the politically imposed restrictions on his own Middle East policy, what can the broader-thinking Powell accomplish? The Middle East crisis has become more than just an obstacle to US revenge against Saddam Hussein for not dying ten years ago. The War has helped push the dollar down against world currencies. Will all this turmoil lead to a cutback in Middle East oil production or distribution? Golly, this is complicated.
So Bush focused on the T word, the 18-year-old Palestinian girl who detonated herself and killed a teenage Israeli girl. "Terror must be stopped", Bush declared, "No nation can negotiate with terrorists". Like Sharon, Bush and his programmers and speechwriters emphasized the value of repeating "terror", which is of course juxtaposed to "civilized". Bush blamed the ever-scruffy Arafat for failing to control "terrorism'' - something like failing to control one's temper or urge to have a drink or fire up a joint.
As British journalist Robert Fisk noted "The whole Bush speech revolved around Israel's well- being, with scarcely three minutes devoted to the Palestinians and their 35 years under occupation. Israel should, Mr. Bush decided, show a "respect'' for and "concern'' for the Palestinian people".
On the talking heads show we hear references to UN Security Council resolutions 242 and 338 that demand Israeli withdrawal from the territories it occupied after the 1967 War. Sharon does not accept those limits, nor does he agree to stop the extension of Jewish settlements in the Palestinian lands.
So, where do we stand, the people of the world on the one hand, and those Jews who do not agree with Israeli policy on the other? We watch in despair as suicide bombers destroy themselves and innocent Israelis. We watch in despair as the Israeli Defense Force kills and destroys Palestinians and their property.
I try to retain my optimism. As Haaretz columnist Tom Segev wrote in the April 7 Los Angeles Times, "History shows that virtually all the national liberation movements of the 20th Century prevailed, and virtually no regular army has ever defeated popular national terrorism". So, eventually, I hope, Israel will have to withdraw its troops to the borders recognized by the UN and negotiations can proceed, many of the settlements will be dismantled and a two state solution will emerge. After all, in 1948 the UN imposed this small piece of territory on two peoples who have encountered great difficulties living alongside each other in peace.
If that kind of historical thinking could seep into decision making chambers in Washington and then be imposed on the Israeli government we might yet see the solution for this thorniest of issues in our time. Then some of us could go back to feeling like Jews again without having to worry that Israeli government policy might move us to resign from that great ethic.
Israelis tell the story of a rabbi fervently praying at the Wailing Wall and a tourist sees him and takes some video footage of this dramatic scene. The rabbi stops, and the tourist apologizes:
"Forgive me, Rabbi, but I couldn't resist filming such energetic prayer. What were you praying for?"
"I was praying that the Jews and Palestinians would stop this crazy fighting and live in peace with each other", says the Rabbi.
"Wow", says the tourist, "what a great theme. Do you think you were getting anywhere with your prayers?"
"Feh", says the rabbi, "it's like talking to the wall".
Yes, I can still laugh. I hate to admit that I am joined by history to zealous Hassidim, who have little else in common with me, and with fanatic Zionists of all religious stripes, some of whom call me a self-hating Jew - and they don't even know me. Israel has threatened the ethic that has bonded Jews for thousands of years. As an atheist, I charge Israeli leaders with taking the Lord's name in vein. Let's not even bring up "Thou shalt not kill". In His name Sharon and company have violated His commandments. Let's hope - and pray if we're religious - that this wave of violence will bring the dove of peace, not fan the flames of war, so as to help restore that noble ethic that demanded accountability to God without any excuse of commands of state.
Copyright 2002 Radio Progreso
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