The discourse of segregation that envisions two units, one Arab-free and one Jewish-free, has worrisome implications for democracy and the relations between the two peoples. The Palestinian right of return must be part of a larger vision for the region, in which the regimes belong to all their citizens.
By Muhammad Jabali
Anybody claiming that state actions are legitimate from a perspective of power should be careful about the logic he legitimizes. For, according to this logic, the power and destruction of others is an essential and necessary part of a nation’s self-definition. This logic not only portrays past violence as essential to the creation of the nation-state, but it also legitimizes continued violence as an existential part of the self.
In the debate on Israeli statehood, the argument for homogeneity always arises, blocking our ability to see the richness and the opportunities excluded from the bilateral glasses that are forced on the political discourse, which make us see the land as two separate units – one for Jews and the other for Arab-Palestinians.
I recently wrote here about the problematic stance of claiming liberalism while holding on to the Jewish statehood claim. Most of the comments objecting to the statements in my previous post were hysterical. They ranged from explicit accusations of warmongering, to suggestions that I just can’t admit that the “Israeli nation” was created just like many other nations were. Other comments claimed that my emphasis on the Judaizing process of the space, which wasn’t empty to begin with, as the essence of the Israeli existence is merely an inflexible insistence on the full realization of the Palestinian refugee right of return. As if I called to bring back every refugee, and his or her descendants, to the same spot in which they had lived before 1948.
I deeply acknowledge the historical fact that to be sincere, one cannot ignore the fact that the Palestinian refugee problem was no exception in the Western existence in the mid-20th century. The world was full of refugees, having barely recovered from the Second World War. But let’s go further. Can we accept blood-religion-race as the base for citizenship in a modern state? Can we accept a political regime that is not color-blind? What is the difference between imposing a Zionist agenda on the state regime, and imposing the Ba’ath party ideology over the Syrian regime? These agendas grant people access to political power resources only if they themselves privilege the non-democratic state ideology.
I don’t imagine the Palestinian refugee right of return as the destruction of Israeli life. Moreover, I think the insistence of the “return” of all of the refugees and their descendants is also destructive for the Arab population. I hope for the right of return to be part of a larger vision for the region. I hope for all of the region’s regimes to be regimes for all their citizens. I do think that most of the Palestinian refugees should be granted the right to enjoy a link to the land; the right to visit, move freely and reestablish family bonds with those who remained inside the state of Israel; to reestablish some kind of Palestinian existence where the landscape allows for it; and to be granted compensation where the return to the land is impossible without exiling others. Resolving the Nakba doesn’t have to be imagined only in ways that destroy what is here now. That would mean more than the destruction of Israel – asking the refugees to abandon three generations of existence in the rest of the Arab world, in order to “return,” would actually create another Nakba for those many Palestinians who know and cherish another life. The true extremists are those who try to mask a segregationist discourse contaminated with Islamophobic and colonialist presumptions of the “self” and the “other,” portraying the right of return as the destruction of the Jewish existence.
Viewing the “Jewish existence” or “Israeli existence” as monolithic and completely connected to “statehood” is misleading, related to the imaginary of an urban, secular, Western society with immigrant dreams of the “new man” – like the American self-image. The most disturbing thing about this self-image that it is necessarily not Arab. To my mind comes a story by the brilliant Sami Michael (translated here from the Hebrew by me), recounted on the back cover of Yehouda Shenhav’s book “The Arab Jews,” in which he describes seeming to be an “Arab” in New York, while reading a book in Hebrew. He is approached by a Brooklyn Jewish woman who asks, “Where are you from?” Michael, cleverly guessing where the question is leading, answers “Jerusalem.” The lady asks, “But which side of Jerusalem?” Michael replies, “The northern part.” The lady persists, “What northern part, east or west?” He answers, “That depends where are you standing.” The lady then asks the inevitable question, “Are you a Jew or an Arab? “Michael responds with a smile: “Both!” The lady, puzzled by the answer, says, “There can’t be both an Arab and a Jew. There are only European Jews. Isn’t the Arab trying to kill the Jew?” Michael replies with the answer, “But isn’t the European the one who already killed the Jew?”
Denying the right of return means much more than the words generally used to justify it through hollow statements like, “It will mean the end of the Jewish state.” It has deep significance for the dynamics of the relationships between the peoples in this shared space. It has significance for the self-image of the Israeli. It justifies cleansing Arabs and Arabic culture from “Jewishness.” It also in turn justifies an Arab world clean of Jews. It means that Jews live here, and Arabs live there. In addition, it means that not only does it make it impossible to be a democratic Palestinian Arab living under the regime, but it also makes a democratic identity nearly impossible for Arab Jews. For, if they choose to be attached to their Arabic identity, they are also doomed to be more “Jewish,” more conservative and even more religious and right wing, in order to justify their existence in the Israeli project: their relation to Israeliness is reaped from glorifying the religious idea of the land of the Jews, an Israeliness that denies full citizenship to secular, pro-democracy Arabs.
Muhammad Jabali is a Palestinian Israeli activist and facilitator. He is a coordinator for the Ayam Association’s Jaffa Project-Autobiography of a City, which works to reconcile memory and space for a cosmopolitan Jaffa. He writes for Palestinian media and blogs within Israel, and has published poems in both Hebrew and Arabic. He is also a part of the Palestinema Group, which promotes films from the Arab world inside Israel-Palestine. He is also an occasional DJ.
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Danny Demiculo
“Denying the right of return…ustifies an Arab world clean of Jews.”
The Arab world IS “clean of jews” (lovely phrase). Following the logic: Allowing the right of return, means allowing Jews to go back to Arab countreis, or at least get compensation.
Yeah, right.
Noa
I think Muhammad is wrong here. I believe that the only just solution is an actual return of whoever wishes to come back, either to their lands or just to the homeland. While Palestine has changed in the last 63 years, and not for the better, for the most part, the refugees also transformed their lifestyles as a result of exile, necessity and global changes. Those who used to be Falaheen may have become urbanites, and might therefore prefer to be resettled in an urban setting. We should also envision a truly open society that is NOT internally divided along ethnic or religious lines, and therefore, why can’t the returnees settle in Ramat Hasharon or Kibutz Dalia, if they wish so?
The bottom line is that not only there is plenty of space to accommodate both the returnees and those who presently here, but that we should approach the return of the Palestinian refugees not as a problem but as an opportunity for us all.
Carl
I think this is the best analysis I’ve read in a long time. It points out the two fundamental factors that mark this conflict: there is not going to be a ‘fair solution’, only a ‘fairest solution’; and that ethnicity and religion are a bad foundation for a nation state.
The first is favoured by ‘but they did it first’ types (hi Danny Demiculo!) and zero-sum ethical maximalists. There’s too many Sabras in Israel who have by birthplace a right to where they live, and too many Palestinians who’ve been expelled from their land with the same rights to give everyone a just settlement. That needs to be agreed by those directly involved, but it will involve most people losing out and that wrong will never be righted.
The second is the myth of both ethno-religious homogeneity, and the belief that if that did exist, everyone would get along fine: witness the interminable and frequently vicious internecine fighting of both Israeli Jews and Palestinians if you doubt this. Or have a look over my way and see how in Northern Ireland, having driven almost everyone who isn’t white and Christian out of the area, the residents get on with the important business of killing each other on sectarian grounds. Admittedly, they do pause to carry out pogroms on the (also Christian) eastern Europeans at times. If you base your state on it being Jewish, Palestinian or whatever, the battle will always come down to who are the ‘real’ Jews or Palestinians once the supposed external threat has been vanquished.
Jabali Muhammad
Noa , we don’t disagree on this necessarily .. Just semantics .. just wanted to emphasize the opurtonity in a general democratic discourse instead of a statehood one .. and i don’t see what i wrote here as an “offer” .. “offers” are beyond my humble abilities
I hate the discourse of internatinal resolutions, “offers” and so on..
Richard Witty
There are assertions of the scope of right of return that are affirmations of international law, and scope that are contrary to international law.
Specifically, the right of return to anyone that was born in Israel should be a no-brainer, yes. The right of return to anyone that can demonstrate confident legal title to currently unoccupied land in Israel, should be a no -brainer.
The right of return to someone born in Ramallah to return to Tel Aviv should be a no-brainer, NO. Though many that advocate for a single-state assert that that form of right of return is included in international law.
The right of return to the grandchild of someone born in Ramallah to Tel Aviv should be a resounding NO.
The right of return to the West Bank and Gaza, determined by Palestinian law is their business. They are free to construct policy per their own determination.
The vague applications are the right of return applied to grandchildren former squatting fedayeen, that had permission to reside on others’ land, but not title, is problematic and nearly certainly cannot be lawfully applied as right of return.
And, those people are many that populate the current refugee camps in Lebanon, Syria, Gaza (less so).
Still homeless. Still needing patriation somewhere (West Bank?), still needing help.
aristeides
Danny D – the Tunisians just issued an invitation for the Tunisian Jews to return. Setting a good example that Israel won’t follow.
Aaron
Sami Michael is pretty atypical of mizrahim. I’ve never talked to any mizrahi who considered himself an Arab Jew, with the exception of one mizrahit who was from France, not Israel. By far the most anti-Arab Jews I’ve known are those who were born and raised in Arab countries, or whose parents were. So all this talk of “Arab Jews” is academic, I think, even though it’s obviously well-intentioned. You’re talking about a handful of people at most.
Aaron
Just to add one thing, the “Jews live here, and Arabs live there” approach is also much stronger among mizrahim. The whole co-existence idea is popular with only a small minority of Israeli Jews, the vast majority of whom seem to be ashkenazi. Look at the names of the contributors to +972.
aristeides
The majority of contributors to +972 are American Jews.
Noam Sheizaf
@ARISTEIDES: that’s not true.
aristeides
Is it not, Noam? Some contributors don’t list their place of birth, so the numbers aren’t clear.
Carl
More to the point, it’s way, way off topic.
Concentrate kids!
Yaar
@Richard Witty: Gaza and the West Bank have been occupied by Israel for already 44 and a half years. The state of Israel existed only 19 years without this occupation beforehand.
By separating between the historical rights of Palestinians born in “Israel” (by which I understand you mean the territory of the historical state of Israel before the Six-Day War; though the Nakba refers to Palestinians born before the state) and those born in the West Bank, you take for granted (as a “no-brainer”) a very short-lived border that was not respected by the same State whose rights you are trying to protect.
The right of Palestinians from Gaza and the West Bank to resettle there is not “their business”, since they have no power or sovereignty. They can’t even stop the demolition of houses of Palestinians who are not (yet) refugees.
Sinjim
In Richard Witty’s ideal world, Palestinian families would be torn apart. Only some would be allowed to return, while the rest including members of their own families would not be. Of course, he would never wish this on Jewish families, yet he calls this justice.
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And as if that’s not enough, he insults the Palestinian farmers who tilled the land for centuries by calling them “squatters” and refers to them as “fedayeen,” which means “militants.”
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I knew there was a reason I skipped over his comments. I’ll go back to doing that now.
AYLA
This is an excellent analysis, and I learned a lot reading it. Thank you, Muhammad.
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Aristeides–seriously–a) you’re simply incorrect, and b) stop sitting in Philadelphia, trying to delegitimize the work of people living here (many, yes, born here, and others who have been here a very long time (how long do you have to be a citizen of the U.S. before it’s okay to be called American?), all who are fluent in reading/writing/speaking Hebrew and some in Arabic) devoting their lives to this conflict in ways you cannot possibly imagine. It’s really cowardly, and also offensive given that you refuse to tell us anything about yourself, including your name.
Matan Lurey
“The discourse of segregation that envisions two units, one Arab-free and one Jewish-free”
It’s a serious stretch, even by Likud standards, to say Israel will be “Arab-free” to any extent. They might not take in Arab refugees of 3 generations ago, but that’s not “Arab free”.
Richard Witty
Sinjim and Yaar,
Sorry for the mistake of fedayeen for fellahin. Its not my native language or even a language that I hear really at all.
The fellahin had permission to live on others’ land, but not title. When the law changed, first in Turkish law, then British, then Israeli, their rights were thrown to the wind.
Your expectation that Israel should allow individuals that resided outside of its border, is extra-legal.
Its not justice, its something else.
Richard Witty
Theft maybe?
Yaar
Richard Witty,
You seem to be missing the point.
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How come settlers residing *outside* of the 1967 border get from the state water, electricity, an education system, the right to vote, etc., etc. — as if they were living *inside* the country?
Or is there one border for Jews and another for Palestinians?
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There is no border. The West Bank and Gaza are under the sovereignty of the state of Israel, and the native population in these territories is deprived of its rights due to institutionalized racism.
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If Israel gives Jews on both sides of the 1967 border the same rights, it should do the same with Palestinians on both sides, including the right to regain the property and residency they were robbed of by the paramilitary forces of the Yishuv.
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As for your argument about permits: according to the same logic, all Jews who immigrated to Palestine illegally (and naturally, without permits) should be expelled and reparations should be paid to the British — or is it once more an argument that you are willing to use only in order to justify the dispossession of Palestinians, but not with regards to Jews?
Lisa
@Noa – I agree with you 100%. People should live wherever they want to live, regardless of their ethnic origins or religion. Diversity strengthens democracy, and enriches the culture and education of the whole society.
@Danny – pick up a book. There are plenty of Jews in Arab countries. Granted, not as many as before 1948, but they are there. Some of them went back voluntarily because of the discrimination in Israel, and because they just missed their homes (home is where you feel comfortable with the language and culture; it’s where your family & friends are; in short, it’s where you want to be).
@Aaron – I’m assuming you are Ashkenazi, right (as am I). Do you really think Mizrachim are going to admit to feeling akin to Arabs and Arab culture when it’s taken them several generations now to “prove” themselves as Jews and associating themselves with the “enemy” would turn the clocks back for them? Ever hear of internalized oppression? I mean seriously – first they were called “Sephardim” and then “Mizrachim” just to avoid being called what they are: Arab Jews. Just like there are Arab Christians, Arab Muslims, Palestinian Israelis, etc.
I recommend this article: http://mondoweiss.net/2011/04/young-arab-jews-of-israel-cry-out-for-their-tahrir-and-palestines-too.html
And I recommend Rachel Shabi’s book:
http://www.rachelshabi.com/?page_id=17
Mikesailor
It is quite disingenous for Richard to mention theft. Whose theft? Israel’s legitimate borders were set by the UN in ’48. Since ’67, Israel has refused to specify borders, not even the armistice line (Green Line) which has become the basis for any negotiations between the parties. Except Israel will not even agree to that. The UN General Assembly passed R. 194 that said all refugees from the ’48 conflict should be allowed to return to their homes. Israel ignored it and even celebrated the assassination of the UN envoy by the Stern Gang (Count Bernadotte). They even elected one of the leaders of this group of, dare I say, terrorists as PM of Israel. Now, Richard wants to have it both ways. He doesn’t want to let the childrren or grandchildren of refugees, who maintained their status due to the intransigence of the Israelis. Profiting from injustice yet maintaining the injustice should continue. In other words, pure sophistry and hypocrisy.
You are moving toward a one-state solution whether the Israelis or the Palestinians wish it or not. Some sort of compemsatory scheme nust be formulated to ameliorate the theft of Palestinian land and property by the Israeli government.A constitution granting equsl rights to all must be both adopted and enforced. The ridiculous idea of a ‘Jewish’ state, or an “Islamic’ state must be consigned to where such ideas belong: The dustbin of history.
Henry Weinstein
“You don’t have to be hysterical to object to certain statements”, I would say to begin, questioning your intro, “Most of the comments objecting to the statements in my previous post were hysterical”.
Non-logical?
Yes, it’s a subliminal (but humorous) message.
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What is disturbing is your will to deny first and last the Israeli right of statehood. All the other points are subsidiary: you ask Israeli Jews to throw their nation-state to the dustbin, asserting it’s the magical “conditio sine qua non”.
Beyond Zionism is not enough for you, you call explicitely for ending Israel.
That’s what I wrote in my previous comment on your previous statements: you have a problem with reality.
But maybe I’m hysterical to think Israelis are not eager to throw Israel in the dustbin.
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What is misleading is to assert that the Palestinian right of return implies the destruction of Israeli statehood: indeed you begin your post with “the debate on Israeli statehood”, and then you assert the realization of the Palestinian right of return implies the destruction of the Israeli right of statehood, i. e the state of Israel. You add that you “don’t imagine the Palestinian refugee right of return as the destruction of Israeli life”, how very reassuring words, “imagine”, “Israeli life”.
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The most disturbing logical proposition you wrote is to assert that “Viewing the “Jewish existence” or “Israeli existence” as monolithic and completely connected to “statehood” is misleading, related to the imaginary of an urban, secular, Western society with immigrant dreams of the “new man” – like the American self-image”. To put it simply, I don’t blame Israelis for viewing the “Israeli existence” as completely connected to Israeli statehood, i.e Israeli self-determination & culture completely connected to the state of Israel.
I don’t deny reality, even if I don’t like what’s going on in Israel at the present time.
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What’s wrong with the project of a “secular, Western society”? What’s wrong with the project of a secular Israeli state? When you imagine the future, “the Israeli life”, do you imagine an Islamic democratic state?
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Don’t get me wrong, Muhammad: I appreciate deeply your challenging statements, and your writing. I wouldn’t have take the time to write this if it was bullshit.
Aaron
Lisa, the “internalized oppression” story is very shaky to start with, as it relies on a relatively complicated, indirect, “Freudian” explanation to avoid a much simpler, direct explanation. Does it also explain the fact that mizrahim from Arab countries have always liked Arabic food and muzikah mizrahit, despite historical ashkenazi attempts to denigrate them? The point is that mizrahim from Arab countries *do* admit – in fact, proudly proclaim – feeling akin to some elements of Arab culture. Just not to Arabs.
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Beyond that, I think the “internal oppression” explanation is falsified by a comparison. In my experience (maybe the people I’ve met aren’t typical), mizrahim from Iran are very positive about their homeland and have no ill will towards Muslim Persians. I don’t think “internalized oppression” explains why *these* mizrahim are positive towards the peoples and societies they were forced to leave behind but Arab mizrahim are generally not.
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In any case, even if I’m wrong and you’re right, the author’s place for so-called Arab Jews depends on their going beyond this “internalized oppression” to embrace their Arab as well as Jewish identity, but that is a step that they themselves vehemently reject. So even assuming your explanation, the author’s vision is a utopian one. Which does not mean it should be ignored, even by those of us who disagree with it.
Ben Israel
Lisa-
Again trying to peddle the “Arab Jews” myth. The Jews in the Arab countries were NOT considered the same as the non-Jewish population. True, they may have spoken the same language and music and various externals, but they had a different religon and different values and were viewed by the non-Jews as basically ALIENS. Sometimes there were good relations on a personal level, sometimes the regime was friendly, but the basic situation for the Jews was a feeling of INSECURITY. The term Arab Jews could be viewed just like the term ” German Jews”. Spoke German, loved German music, German culture yet the German non-Jewish population VOMITED the Jews out of their society.
Cortez
“Again trying to peddle the “Arab Jews” myth. The Jews in the Arab countries were NOT considered the same as the non-Jewish population. True, they may have spoken the same language and music and various externals, but they had a different religon and different values and were viewed by the non-Jews as basically ALIENS. Sometimes there were good relations on a personal level, sometimes the regime was friendly, but the basic situation for the Jews was a feeling of INSECURITY. ”
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LOL this is factually incorrect. (1) arab and jewish nationalism has only been around for less than 120 years. Prior to that, people identified with local neighbors and leaders. Jews having an alien status is modern construct 2)Differences in identity were expressed through religion…despite being oppressive at times(the dhimmi status of jews and christians)…but they were not the same as racial identities or ethnic identities as we think of it today.
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Go check the British population surveys of Palestine at the turn of the century….where people are categorized according to religion…
Ben Israel
Thank you, Cortez, for proving my point. There was NO “Arab” nationalism in the past. Thus, Jews would not have been considered “Arabs” even if they spoke Arabic. However, people identified with their clan and family. Jews were different than the non-Jewish population and were regarded as being DIFFERENT.
I have spoken with Jews whose origins were in Arab countries. The vast majority did NOT feel they were part of any “Arab” people and the idea was laughable. Why do you think the Jewish population of the Arab countries has gone to near zero and the Christian population is in sharp decline in those same countries.
Ben Israel
Muhammed wrote:
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Can we accept blood-religion-race as the base for citizenship in a modern state?
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Apparently Muhammed hasn’t seen the election results in Egypt in which the two Islamic movements got 70% of the vote. While I would think that these movements are not saying that the Coptic Christians are not citizens, they do face legal descrimination and a large majority of Egyptians agree with this. Same with HAMAS in the Palestinian territories. Thus, I think Muhammed first should work about his fellow Arabs and get THEM to think in “universalist, secularist” terms and after he has convinced them, come back to us and attempt to reeducate us to his liberal views.
Danny Demiculo
@Lisa: how many Jews went back from Israel to Arab countries and managed to stay alive/out of jail/comfortable ?
Your definition of “plenty”: 99% less than previous number. Israeli right wing will surely accept “plenty” of palestinians coming to Israel.
Arab countries are brutal, racist countries – hence the “right of return”
Greg
Ben Israel: you lost some coherence there. First, the existence (or lack) of Arab Nationalism – a political consciousness – has nothing to do with people self-identifying (or not) as Arabs – an ethnic consciousness.
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Second, the victory in Egypt (and Tunisia and Turkey) of Islamic political parties is a very different phenomenon to the blood-religion-race based politics in Israel / Palestine that the writer is critiquing. I don’t know the details of what these political victories DO mean for minority rights in those countries but then neither, clearly, do you. What I do know is that in all three countries, political leaders have gone out of their way to pay respect to universalist, democratic principles, which is more than can be said for either the PA or the Israeli administration.
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So if your dire warning is that we have to stick to the current ugly race-blood-religion framework in I/P or else we’ll turn into Egypt, then I think I’ll take Egypt, thanks.
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Beyond this, it is intellectually bankrupt to lecture any Arab or Muslim writer, who wants to talk about Democracy and Rights HERE, in THIS context, about the shortcomings of other Arab regimes. Unless your argument is that all Arabs are the same (as in equally and inherently racist, antidemocratic and untrustworthy). If that’s the case, then congratulations, your argument is only morally bankrupt instead.
Carl
Ben you’re arguing that in Egypt and Gaza, they practise a form of ethno-religious bigotry which is worse than that which you say you carry out in Israel. Ergo, you’ll carry on doing so until that greater evil is put to rest, and only then consider changing: if someone (over to you Muhammad) can convince you to.
Actually, I’m not convinced that’s really what you believe. It might just be the words you used. And the order you put them in. And the punctuation.
Mikesailor
Getting off this silly merry-go-round is the main question under dispute. Therefore, I would oooffer the following thoughts. First of all, Zionism was a silly idea more akin to the racist colonial philosophies of the 16th and 17th centuries than the 20th and 21st. Presupposing that you can merely immigrate onto someone else’ property without any backlash or repercussions was insane. There was no ‘land without a people’. It didn’t exist then and it doesn’t exist now, with the possible exception of Antartica.
The interesting argument for those who adhere to the myth of a ‘Jewish’ state is that Israelis don’t want to give up the myth. They are terrifiied of being treated, as a minority, as they have treated the Palestinians. I would only advise: GET OVER IT. The Boers lost their dominant position in South Africa and what happened? Was there a bloodbath as they had previously claimed? Did the black Africans try to ‘push them into the sea’? No. Although the same silly arguments were used: The blacks are lazy, uneducatedm hostile to whites, can never live with whites, are more racist than whites etc. etc.
Now we are witnessing the same arguments by the Zionists. The “Arabs’,(they never use the correct term Palestinians) are not a people, they are lazy, they are ignorant, uneducated, and allthey want to do is kill Jews. Sane dumb argument, same dumb result. Are all Palestinians Arabs? Most if not all. Are all Arabs Palestinians? Definitely not. Are there Palestinian Christians? Yes. Are there Palestinian Musliims ? Yes. Are there Palestinian Jews? Yes again. Likewise, are there israeli Muslims? Yes. Israeli Jews? Of course. Israeli Christians? Yes, although a minority. So, is this a political problem rather than an ethnic or religious problem? Ir should be except for those who would presuppose their dominance within they system, somehow claiming a ‘divine right’ to discriminate.
Henry Weinstein
MikeSailor,
You might blame “Zionism” and “the Zionists” for everything turning wrong in your life since your birth, but it’s just Hatred, the compulsive need to identify Impurity & Wrong outside our weak psyche.
And neither Israelis nor Palestinians can cure this sickness, it’s up to you to realize that the Beast & the Enemy, is not outside, but inside your intellect.
We have all the same enemy, our fake self-centered self.
We have all to fight Evil, and trust The Only One.
Mikesalor
Henry:
Grow up. Zionism was, and is, an idea which should rightly be consigned to the ‘dustbin of history’. It is far too late to separate the parties, and with the continual construction of more settlements and ‘facts on the ground’, segregation is more nad more impossible. TheIsraelis cannot and will not stop the occupation. They can’t without risking civil war. So where do you go from here?
AYLA
Anyone still here? I think Henry’s right, and the opposite of immature, to say that we place labels on each other and deem this and that Wrong in order to feel better about ourselves and in order to make what is extremely complex seem simple. I’ve said it before, but I won’t use the word “zionism” anymore, so I’m not here to defend it (the word, or the movement); it means a vastly wide range of things to different people. But we’d all be better off taking a hard look at ourselves. @MIKESAILOR–since I live in Israel, with citizenship, you’ll be happy to know that that’s a big piece of the mirror in which I am required to look. Where to go from here, indeed.
AYLA
Muhammad Jabali–I just re-read your piece more slowly, with more time. It’s one of the most beautiful, thoughtful reflections I’ve read or heard about Palestinian Right Of Return, and about what it means to be true to the character of this land, this state, for all her people. I’m often so offended by the idea that it’s considered “liberal” for Jews to care about preserving culture and life here such as, say, the arabic language in schools, Lifta, etc. As a Jew on this land, as a human on this earth, I am deeply offended by the white-washing (okay, Judaizing–I hate that term, however apt) on this land. We do it also to Ethiopian Jews, Arab Jews; we do it to everyone, and mostly, we do it to ourselves. I live in the Negev because when I first moved here and lived in a tent without electricity outside of Mitzpe Ramon, it felt to me like it may have felt thousands of years ago, mostly because of Bedouin, and the land itself.
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As for the religious population who think we were given this land in some exclusive way, they are not reading very carefully, or are so consumed with Talmud, they can no longer see the Torah: We ARE the same people. This goes way beyond the whole we are brothers business. Ishmael is emphasized, with love, in nearly every parashah in which he is still living (one parashah ends with him being circumcized with Avraham; the very first well in the torah comes to Hagar when she weeps for Ishmael; when God tells Abraham that Sarah will bear a child (Isaac), his direct response to that news is to say, “Oh, that Ishmael may live before you.” And there’s tons of intermarriage, including Esau to one of Ishmael’s daughters. Moses himself married a Cushite woman.
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And you don’t have to care at all about religious text to find our common blood, cultural connections… The biggest reason I don’t want there to be an Israeli State that erases Arab history and culture (including Jewish Arab history and culture) is not out of some kind of liberal, bleeding-heart sense of morality (not that there’s anything wrong with that); it’s because we are destroying this place i want to love.
AYLA
I would add that if I had to name the most offensive bit of injustice on this land–and that is hard to do–I would have to say it’s that Palestinians who fled the Nabka cannot even visit. Also, that so many other neighboring Muslims can’t come visit their Holy Land. How we can live with this, I don’t know. I can’t.
Mikesailor
Ayla: I understand your reluctance to use the term: ‘Zionism’. You feel that it means different things to different people. I would contend however that the basis of Zionism is all too glaring: It was the idea that a certain group of people, Zionist Jews, had the right to move to an already inhabited part of this planet, Palestine, to create an ethnically pure ‘Jewish’ state wherein Jews could exercise their right to ‘self-determination’ without regard to the indigenous inhabitants.
You have a situation analogous to that of Northern Ireland. After conquering Ireland, the British exported a population of mainly Scottish and English citizens (Protestants in a majority Catholic country) to create their own version of ‘facts on the ground’. They also gave these new ‘settlers’ a privileged existence over the Irish indigenous citizenry. Over the centuries, the Irish hostility grew toward these interlopers with ensuing violence. Only recently have the Irish ended the violence. Why? Because the UK ended its policy of using force to defend the enclave and sought a political solution. They had to give up on the idea, and so did the Northern Protestants, that their priveleged domination over their neighbors was excusable or even disirable. You can’t expect the Protestants to all move from the area, they have grown up there and have nowhere else to go. And the Catholic minority didn’t request that solution, merely the idea of equal rights under the law and an end to discrimination against them.
Israel has now reached that same crossroads, but most Israeli Jews refuse to recognize it. They feel the status quo is necessary to maintain a ‘Jewish’ state. What I argue is that the idea of a ‘Jewish’ state, a state presupposed on the xenophobic idea that Jewish dominance must be maintained at all costs, and the minorities within Israel, and in the West Bank, Gaza or the area, must be rendered powerless to change this myth, is self-destrructive to say the least and, in its present form, unconscionable. Rightist settlers abuse and humiliate Palestinians with impunity. The political classes cannot confront the lawlessness without risking their positions. The IDF and Border Police actively ignore any violence if promulgated by these groups,and sometimes even assist them, as long as the victims of their depredations are ‘Arabs’, ‘leftists’or any other group which is not dominant. And the arguments I have seen from those I have labeled the ‘hasbaristas’ are all too familiar as I have stated in my previous post. It is only fear that continues this mess: the fear of giving up their present priveleged position and facing the future with the ideal that ‘all men are created equal’. And that the rule: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you” must become the prevailing ethos rather than ‘Juden uber alles’.
AYLA
@Mike–we mostly agree; we just express it differently. I also don’t believe we can have a Jewish State that’s a democracy, though Israel can have a constitution that includes certain Jewish interests. I want to see one state for all her people rather than two states, again (see my comment above), for my own sake; I don’t want to live with all jews on one side and all muslim and christian arabs on the other on some kind of a pick-axed body of land (pretty much as I do now). Thank God I’m not making a life of policy work, but the basic tenets of your post, I agree with. I just didn’t like how you were talking to Henry, and I didn’t think, based on his post, that he deserved it. I think the term “zionism” was a hot button for you both and that you were arguing different points. Anyway: Let’s fight for something, together, rather than fighting one side against another, because we share a nearly common vision.
Henry Weinstein
Ayla,
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Just a few words, an improvisation
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The problem with intellectual comments is that there is not enough REAL LIFE in them
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Most commenters & contributors on 972 are driven by IDEAS, what they miss is OTHER PEOPLE’S LIFE
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For them, Israel is just a concept, not a country
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& For them, Palestinians are not a people, they are a fiction
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They have not the same IDEAS, but they share the same HATRED
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Intellectual Games
AYLA
@Henry–Which is why we need to fight for the land Muhammad Jabali is speaking for. For now, I’m in the Negev, which is, to me, as close as one can get.
Afulan magavnikkit
the Nakba wasn’t in 1948; it was in 1881 when the Arabic speakers failed to prevent the re-colloquialization of Hebrew. Everything which has happened since then, is only an inevitable CONSEQUENCE of that. The Holocaust only speeded things up a bit. Let us not forget, Orde Wingate was teaching militia classes at Ein Harod about how to ambush Arabic-speaking thieves, YEARS BEFORE WWII started.
The language train has already left the station. The Arabic-speakers need to concentrate on passing matriculation exams in Egypt or in the Hashemite regime which illegally occupies East Judea. Doing otherwise will only push themselves further down the rabbit hole. Which, until now, they’ve been experts at.
Or they join Tzahal and go to ulpan at Michve Alon.. Then they could enjoy Hebrew disco life in TelAviv like all those sabra Filipinit kids. Those kids take the Roman Catholic Mass in Hebrew and no Israeli really bothers themself about it. Thus, the Hebraicized Muslims can go to Hebrew speaking mosques. Kinda like all those English-speaking Muslim kids in Michigan.
Don’t worry, we’ll kick all those Yiddish-speaking Americans out of the Hareidi neighborhoods – send them to Gaza! You can grab their houses. Just fill out your papers in Ivrit. Please work on getting a proper TelAviv accent.
Peace in our time!!!