Asarah B'Tevet: Remembering the Siege

Today of all days seems an appropriate one to recall a brutal siege that took place in the Land of Israel.

And that continues to take place as I write. This siege began more than two years ago, and has utterly devastated the people of the Gaza Strip.

A few facts about the effects of Israel's siege on Gaza, as Jews fast to remember another siege, some two-and-a-half thousand years ago:

- 10,000 people in Gaza have no running water; 40,000 people are cut off from electricity, and power outages for eight hours, four times per week are common in most homes.

- Unemployment in the third quarter of 2009 in Gaza was 42.3%

- School supplies are permitted to enter Gaza only if they are designated for UNRWA (and even then, they have been delayed for months). The other two-thirds of Gazan schools, responsible for the education of nearly a quarter of a million children, must do without.

- Industrial diesel for electricity production is permitted to enter Gaza only up to the 'minimum threshold' declared by the Israeli High Court--this was enough, in the month of November, to cover 39.1% of the population's needs.

- 97% of Gaza factories have been idle for the last two years

- Since last year's 'war,' only 19 trucks have been permitted to enter Gaza with construction materials. This despite the fact that, during the war, 3,500 houses were destroyed and 56,000 damaged.

- Only foods that have been designated as not constituting 'luxury items' are permitted to enter Gaza. But no list is available, nor has any explanation been provided as to the seemingly arbitrary prohibitions and permissions. Honey and canned fruits are forbidden, as was tea, until it was suddenly permitted. Pasta has been permitted since February. Small packets of margarine are permitted, whilst large ones are forbidden.

For more information and data, see the Gisha website.

And perhaps we should ask ourselves, while commemorating a fast for a siege that took place millenia ago: Will this siege be easily forgotten by its victims?

On Copenhagen

Hundreds of the world's leaders meet in an unprecedented forum; millions of dollars are spent; weeks of negotiations about a threat that faces the population of the entire planet culminate in what seems more like a collective statement of vague principles than the legally binding, enforceable set of standards that many had hoped for. And yet, I can't help but feel that it wasn't so terribly bad.

Firstly, and perhaps most importantly, Copenhagen triggered some significant achievements in terms of global activism. I can't help but feel that perhaps for this alone, the conference was worthwhile. The challenge of climate change—like other important global issues—is going to need grass-roots activism to take place around the world. And Copenhagen saw at least two unprecedented moves in this direction: An unprecedented newspaper editorial that was run by over fifty different newspapers, in 20 different languages, around the world. And the largest petition in the history of the world, organised by Avaaz.

The deal wasn't what most activists had hoped for. There was much fighting—both between richer countries and poorer countries, and amongst the poorer countries themselves, whose interests are of course, not identical: Some are oil rich and have an interest in retaining their thriving industries; others, most notably India, China and Brazil, are powerful, emerging economies; still others, like Vanuatu, are small island states that face the possibility of being wiped off the map unless a good enough agreement is both reached and enforced.

The agreement at Copenhagen is not sufficient. About that there is no doubt. But, even though time is indeed precious, what has now taken place is an important start. And, as has been pointed out, the spirit of willingness and cooperation amongst some of the biggest polluters is, ultimately, more important than a legally binding document. After all, who would enforce such a document on the biggest polluting countries? If, once legal commitments are made, China or India or the US were to decide to breach their obligations, what international mechanism would be able to prevent them from doing so? It would seem, then, that a genuine desire for change might be as important, or perhaps more important, than legally binding documents. And so, the seemingly genuine spirit of understanding of the fact that something must be done, and the emerging willingness to invest some of the resources of the world's biggest economies in green technologies, may indeed be cause for some very, very cautious optimism.

In Support of One State (Sort of) – Part III: Jewish Nationalism in a One-State Reality

This is the third and last post on this topic. So far, I have argued (in part I) that a democratic one-state arrangement in the land between the Jordan and the Mediterranean is almost inevitable at this stage. (Of course, a one-state reality already exists, but it is not democratic). In part II, I argued that there are potential advantages and benefits in some imaginable democratic one-state scenarios, and that proponents and opponents alike should be thinking about these and working to ensure that they come about, if and when such a situation arises.

In this post, I want to refute the oft-recited mantra which says that a one-person-one-vote situation would automatically spell 'the end of the Zionist enterprise', that it would necessarily constitute an end to the story of Jewish nationalism. Some pragmatic considerations have been discussed in the previous two posts—this one is about ideas and theory.

Though a one-state arrangement has indeed often been advocated by opponents of Zionism, a democratic one-state situation need not undermine a either Jewish national identity and culture, nor a belief in Jewish self-determination. In other words: One can be a Jewish nationalist and believe in a one-state, democratic arrangement between the river and the sea.

“What? How is that possible? Isn't it an obvious contradiction?” I already hear you ask. And that is the shame of the matter. I shouldn't have to write this post: From its inception, the Zionist movement was a 'wide tent' that included both statist and some non-statist conceptions of Jewish nationalism. But so deeply embedded has a particular kind of political, statist Zionism become in the minds of so many people, that few remember that, in fact, there is a long history of Jewish nationalist approaches which conceived of Jewish nationhood and self-determination differently.

I am not, of course, talking about those who have tidily, but wrongly, defined Jewish identity in terms parallel to 'Christian identity'—a matter of religious conviction, and perhaps communal affiliation, usually with no national dimension. The national element of Jewish identity is, to my mind, undeniable. I am also not talking about those who deny any positive value to the flourishing of national identities in their pursuit of some kind of universal, cosmopolitan, post-national utopia. That is, in my opinion, both unrealistic and undesirable: The things that divide human beings, although sometimes sources of conflict, are often enriching at personal, communal, and global levels, and most people in the world feel a strong attachment to their particular identities.

Rather, I am referring to important Jewish thinkers for whom Jewish national identity was central, whilst the expression of that identity through a state 'owned' by the Jewish people has not: Ahad Ha'am, Shimon Dubnow, Martin Buber, Judah Magnes, Shimon Rawidowicz, and others. There is, of course, a spectrum of different non-statist Jewish nationalist approaches: Some, like Ahad Ha'am and Buber, were Zionists. Others, such as Dubnow and the Bund, were not Zionists, but were nevertheless Jewish nationalists. I want to present here a brief summary of some of the views of Ahad Ha'am, considered by many to be the 'father' of Cultural Zionism. Greater familiarity with his approach, which, of course, considerably pre-dated the establishment of the State of Israel, might help some who care deeply about Jewish nationalism come to ideological terms with the possibility (or probability) that we will soon find ourselves living in a reality in which Jewish hegemony is no longer a given.

Unlike his political Zionist counterparts from Western Europe—chiefly, Herzl and Nordau—Ahad Ha'am did not believe that 'Jewish Sovereignty' was possible in the near future; nor did he think that, if a Jewish state did come into existence, it would solve the most important problems facing the Jewish people at a national level. Responding over 100 years ago to the ideological atmosphere at the first Zionist Congress, Ahad Ha'am expressed frustration at the fact that many Western European Zionist leaders seemed obsessed with advocating a misguided solution to the wrong problem.

Ahad Ha'am distinguished between the major problems facing Jews in Western Europe—which he called the 'problem of the Jews'; and those facing Jews in Eastern Europe—in Ahad Ha'am's terminology, 'the problem of Judaism.' Western European Jews, claimed Ahad Ha'am, were unhappy that they were unable to fully integrate into the societies in which they lived, and that they continued to face discrimination despite their best efforts.

The problem of Jews in the East, meanwhile, was a different one. In the West, Jews had left the ghetto, resulting in a desire to fully realise their integration. In the East, however, Jews remained a separate national group, living a distinct communal life. Exchanging their national identity for another wasn't a real option. But for them, modernity had hit as well, just differently; for them, the Jews remained separate, but Judaism had come out of the ghetto. Judaism was facing a crisis in the face of new ideas and concepts, which were now making themselves at home in the heart of a national culture that was Jewish. The serious challenge facing Eastern European Jews was how to adapt Jewish national culture to the religious and philosophical crisis brought about by modernity.

The solution offered by political Zionists such as Nordau and Herzl to the problem as they saw it, was to create a state of the Jews' own. This, they claimed, would solve the 'Jewish problem': Jews will rule over themselves and will no longer face the humiliation of being outsiders. But Ahad Ha'am rejected that idea: You can't integrate as you would like into Western society, he claimed, and so you want to create your own version of it elsewhere.

Instead, Ahad Ha'am was focused on offering a solution to the 'Jewish problem' as he saw it; that is, the 'problem of Judaism'. Instead of national sovereignty, a 'state of our own', his vision involved the creation of a national cultural centre in the Jewish homeland. In this centre Hebrew would be spoken, written and read, and there would be Jewish universities, schools, and other institutions in which Jews could live, learn and thrive, enriching Jewish national culture and radiating it to the communities of the Jewish diaspora all over the world. It would serve as the 'heart' of the body of the Jewish nation, which would remain, of course, mostly in diaspora.

So Ahad Ha'am's disagreement with political Zionism was partly ideological: Herzl envisioned a Jewish State in which Jews wouldn't suffer discrimination; Ahad Ha'am envisioned a Jewish Society that would bring about a renaissance of Jewish national culture. But Ahad Ha’am’s disagreement with political Zionism was also in part a product of his realism. It’s impossible, he argued, that the majority of Jews will come to a newly revived Jewish homeland; millions of Jews are not going to up and leave their homes in such a short space of time. Furthermore, he argued, the land of Israel is already populated. There are Arabs living there, and they, too, will grow in number. They won't necessarily take well to the idea of a Jewish state being established on top of them, and will likely present a serious—and justified—opposition.

Thus, for Ahad Ha'am, Jewish statehood was both unrealistic—because of Arab opposition and because of Jewish dispersion—and not worthy of being a first priority, because it wouldn't solve the major problems facing the Jewish people: The 'problem of the Jews' wouldn't realistically be solved by trying to move millions of people from their homes to a place with an existing population who, in the unlikely event that such a mass influx happened, would not be happy about it, to put it mildly. The 'problem of Judaism', of course, also wouldn't be helped simply by creating a polity ruled by Jews; that problem needed to be addressed at the substantive, cultural level. Statehood couldn't deliver that: it was (and is) neither a sufficient nor even a necessary condition for Jewish culture to flourish in its homeland.

And so, Ahad Ha'am advocated his vision of a Jewish national centre in Israel. A centre that would not be inhabited by the majority of Jews, but which would be the cultural centre of the Jewish nation worldwide. This solution, with or without statehood, would contribute to Jewish national culture and its flourishing in a modern reality.

That is what Ahad Ha'am argued then. And today, too, a Hebrew-speaking Jewish cultural centre in the Land of Israel can continue to make that contribution, regardless of the number of states that exist between the river and the sea.

Don't destroy his house

This week saw permission finally given for the media to publicise the identity of Jacob Teitel, a Jewish terrorist arrested about a month ago for his involvement in a series of attacks and attempted attacks against Arabs, left-wing Jews, messianic Jews, and possibly also homosexuals.

Responses have been more or less predictable. Many settlers and their supporters have focussed their responses less on the deeds allegedly carried out by Teitel than on countering the supposed left-wing tarnishing of all settlers with Teitel's brush. Some have made the absurd comparison to Assaf Goldring, a depressed, mentally unstable father who murdered his own child. It makes no more sense, they say, to talk about the 'settlers' and their values in discussing Teitel, than it does to talk about the 'secular' and their principles in relation to Goldring. Of course, the comparison is nonsensical. Goldring's disgusting actions stemmed from a combination of mental instability and personal strife; his motivations were not political. There is indeed no association between 'secular values' and his actions.

Teitel's activities, on the other hand, were motivated by a set of values held passionately by many within his community and those like it. One need only walk into any shul in Israel, and peruse one of the many pamphlets on the weekly Torah portion, in order to get an idea of the kind of vitriol that is seen as acceptable within many/most religious-Zionist communities. These same values, this same hatred, motivated Teitel. True, most people who share his worldview do not express their views through violence. But there is an ideological climate that cannot be ignored.

Some of the leaders of the so-called Israeli left and centre, for their part, have proven once again their hypocrisy—and possibly their racism—when it comes to dealing with terrorists. Where are the calls to destroy the terrorist's family's home? Just last year, when a Palestinian terrorist from Jabel Mukaber massacred students in the Merkaz Harav yeshiva, then- (and now-) defence minister, Ehud Barak, not only called for the terrorist's family's home to be destroyed; he called for the legal processes involved to be adjusted so that the house could be destroyed more quickly (http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1009167.html). Where are those calls now? Is the defence minister unable to arrange for the destruction of a house of the family of a terrorist who is Jewish? Does his family have rights that the Merkaz Harav terrorist's family does not?

Of course, I don't think the houses of Teitel's family should be destroyed. If they were involved in his activities, then they should stand trial just as he will, and face the consequences of their actions as mandated by the law. If they weren't involved, then to destroy their homes as a 'deterrent' to potential future terrorists, whether effective or not, would be a gross violation of their human rights. Just as it would be a gross violation of their rights to destroy their homes if they, and Teitel himself, were Arabs. This is known as the rule of law; it's held in quite high esteem in some places.

Maimonides' Religious Agnosticism

Religion in the west today is almost universally associated—by adherents and detractors alike—with the belief in a 'personal' God—that is, a God who has a psychology somewhat similar to that of a human being: God created the world and is involved in it; prayers are listened to and answered; God punishes the wicked and rewards the good. Miracles happen. God is good, just, all-knowing, all-powerful. For more orthodox believers, God is an arch-conservative; for liberals, God is often very concerned with social justice. And, according to the terminology employed by most people today, someone who doesn't believe in any of this stuff is an atheist. Or at least an agnostic.

But these matters weren't always viewed that way. In the Middle Ages, there were many religious philosophers—mostly Muslims and a few important Jews—who thought in ways that in some senses might today be called secular. Many subscribed to one of various kinds of 'naturalistic' worldviews according to which 'the world runs according to its natural course' (ha'olam keminhago noheg), and God does not (or cannot) interrupt the natural course of nature. Some, such as the Muslim philosopher Averroes, and the Jewish philosopher Gersonides, did not subscribe to the belief that God created the world out of nothing; the world (or at least the matter from which everything in it is made) is, according to them, eternal. And some thinkers—such as the great mediaeval Jewish philosopher, Moses Maimonides, famous for his Jewish legal works and his medical writings as well as for his philosophical treatise, the Guide of the Perplexed, held views about God's essence that can fairly be described as agnostic. This aspect of Maimonides' thought was not at odds with his religious outlook; on the contrary, it was a deeply religious form of agnosticism.

I should add here that I have a particular meaning of the word 'agnostic' in mind here. The term is used in (at least) two ways: The first definition, referred to above, sees agnosticism as a statement of uncertainty about whether a particular statement is true or not; in this case, whether or not 'God exists'. This use of the term assumes an agreed meaning to the claim that 'God exists', which some people agree with, others disagree with, and some are uncertain about. It is these unsure people who are referred to as 'agnostic' according to the first, more shallow, definition of the term.

There is also a deeper sense in which the word is used. This use of the term 'agnostic' involves a far more radical kind of unknowing, tied to a recognition of the limits of human cognition and of religious language. The meaning of God's 'existence' is emptied of anything that we can know about or meaningfully discuss. This kind of religious posture entails standing in awe before the radically incomprehensible; it lacks knowledge not because it is 'not (yet) convinced', but because there is nothing that can be known.

It is in this second sense that Maimonides was agnostic. He put forward, as I hope to briefly show here, a conception of God—or, rather, a non-conception of God—very different to the 'personal' God that is often associated with religious thought.

Maimonides devotes a number of chapters of the Guide to the problem of religious language (Book I, chapters 50-60). I'm going to try to sum up some of the important aspects of his argument here; the material is taken from a number of chapters (not necessarily in order), primarily: I:50, I:54 and I:56.

Maimonides’ starting point is God’s total otherness. If the claim that God is one, unique, is to be taken seriously, then we cannot really say anything at all about God's attributes. God, according to Maimonides, cannot be described in terms of any features that are transient, like being 'old', or 'happy' ('accidental attributes'). This is fairly uncontroversial. But Maimonides goes further than this: As well as lacking any 'accidental' features, God also has no 'essential attributes'; that is, we cannot talk about God as having any defining features, like absolute power, knowledge or goodness.

Religious language, words that are used to describe God, are for Maimonides equivocal: They are used about God in a way that is in no way similar to the way that they are used about anything in the world. Maimonides rails against those who have misunderstood the religious use of words such as 'wise', 'good', 'powerful', in describing God. Some, he complains, have understood the difference between our use of these words in describing human beings or other things in the world, on one hand, and God, on the other, as a difference of degree rather than kind. An aged university professor is very, very wise. God's wisdom is much, much, much, much greater. Barack Obama is powerful, as is a D9 bulldozer, albeit in a very different way. God is exponentially more powerful than both.

This conception of God, claims Maimonides—and here I am merely paraphrasing, though I think I'm doing justice to his sentiment—is bullshit. Why? Because when we use the same vocabulary to describe two different things, there is an implied similarity between the two. To adapt an example that Maimonides himself brings: A mustard grain is very small; a planet is very big.* But in a certain sense, they are similar: Both exist in time and space and can be described in terms of size. Those people who describe God as super-powerful, super-wise, etc, are presenting God as a planet in comparison to a mustard-grain. Maimonides rejects this conception outright.

Since God is totally other, totally unique, words that are used in describing God are actually being employed as homonyms, that is, words that look the same but have two different, unrelated meanings. The word 'bank' can refer to the place where I deposit my savings, or it can refer to the side of a river—there is no connection between the two meanings. So too, claims Maimonides, words such as 'good', 'powerful', and 'wise' carry one meaning when used to describe anything at all in the world except for God, and another to describe God. And these meanings are unrelated. In the traditional sense of our understanding of these words, then, it would actually be incorrect to say that God is powerful, or that God is wise, or even—and Maimonides himself brings this example—even, that God exists. When we use any of these words with respect to God, they lose their regular meaning altogether. To paraphrase Maimonides once more: God is 'powerful', but not in power; God is 'wise' but not in wisdom; God 'exists' but not in existence.

This leads us to a very important question: If these words don't carry their regular meaning, and if they can't be used to say anything substantive about God's essence, what is their purpose? Why not get rid of religious language altogether? Maimonides does not call for an end to the use of religious language. Rather, he offers two ways in which religious language can be understood in the context of a radically agnostic worldview:

First, words can be used to describe what Maimonides calls God's ‘attributes of action’. What he means by this, is that religious language that is seemingly being used to say something about God, is actually referring to one or another feature of the natural order. If, says Maimonides, a given feature was produced by a person, we would describe them as having a particular trait. When we use such a feature in talking about God, what we really mean is that an aspect of creation (ie the natural order), if it were formed by a human, then that human would likely be described as having this attribute. Thus, for example, the natural order of the world is such that embryos are able to find surroundings that help them to survive; natural conditions are such that they are able to grow and develop. If I had established this set of conditions, I might be called ‘gracious’. By calling God 'gracious', what we are really saying, according to Maimonides, is that the world's natural order has aspects that are experienced as beneficial. Similarly, there are earthquakes and natural disasters; if you had inflicted them, you would possible be described as 'jealous' or 'zealous'; this is all that is meant when these traits are attributed to God.

In other words, the statements made ‘about God’ in this form are actually not being made about God at all; they are being made about the world. But this does not lessen the importance of such statements for Maimonides. To know the world well, and to gain a thorough understanding of its natural order, is religiously significant—the better we know it and understand it, the more we are able to comprehend what God is not.

The second way in which Maimonides understands religious language is as negation. When a term is used in this way about God, it is not being used to say anything positive, but rather just to negate the truth of a different claim. For example, if I say that 'God is alive', I cannot mean, as we saw, that God 'lives' in the way that humans live. But my statement can be understood as a rejection of another, equally problematic claim: that God is dead. You might be thinking: This kind of speech tells us almost nothing! If the statement 'God is alive' really just means that God is neither dead nor alive in the sense that we normally use the word, what is the purpose of saying it at all? Maimonides suggests a reason to employ this kind of language, and in so doing we once again see his deep agnosticism come through: These statements, Maimonides claims, eliminate one by one the things that God is not. In some sense, this act brings us 'closer' to understanding God. But this increased 'closeness' is in a sense illusory, since these statements cannot ever tell us anything about what God is. What we have, then, is a kind of religious posture or stance in which the individual looks toward the unknown, walking infinitely in its direction, knowing that no destination will ever be reached.

The God that Maimonides 'believed' in cannot be described in any real way. Maimonides' God is not 'good', 'wise', or 'powerful' in the senses in which we regularly employ these words. God also does not 'exist' in the sense in which we normally use that word. And when religious language is used, it is not really directed towards God. Its purpose is to understand the world and its natural order, or to further categorise the things that God is not.

Maimonides' religious outlook is one that is in awe of the consistency of the natural order of the world, and humbled by the limitations of human cognition and language in perceiving anything beyond that order. That which is beyond, which can't be described in any meaningful way, which is totally unknowable, Maimonides refers to as 'God'. Beyond that, he has nothing to say.

Different from the kinds of opinions we tend to associate with religion today, no?

In Support of One State (Sort of) - Part II

In the first post on this topic I wrote about why a two-state solution is probably impossible. My conclusion there: Even though political orthodoxy tells us that the creation of an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel is the only way forward in the Middle East, that scenario has very little chance of being implemented at this point in time, and as such, some kind of democratic single-state arrangement might be inevitable.

It is worth bearing in mind that the current reality is already a one-state reality, though not a democratic one. Around 10 million people live under the rule of the State of Israel. But only about seven million of those people have the rights entailed in citizenship. The others are ruled over without having the right to participate in the political institutions that govern their lives.

The moral argument for one democratic state over one undemocratic state is an obvious one. Although security for Jewish Israelis is a real concern (just as the security of Arabs is), after denying an entire population its basic rights ‘temporarily’ for forty-plus years, largely on 'security grounds', it is no longer possible to justify the status quo as a 'temporary' set of measures. Palestinians, as human beings, have basic rights. They deserve citizenship. Maybe the day will soon come when an independent Palestinian state can grant them that citizenship, and the rights that come with it. If not (and, as I've already said, I don't think that is likely), then we have a choice: Apartheid or Equality.

I know which option I prefer.

I’d like to make another claim though: Despite the tendency amongst many people—especially those who identify with the pragmatic Zionist 'centre'—to dismiss any bi-national arrangement as 'national suicide' or as blindly unrealistic, I do think that there are a number of advantages to a one-state arrangement over the consensus two-state option. I say this cautiously: I recognise that there are some big risks involved. I also recognise that a one-state arrangement—even a one-state democratic arrangement—can be realised in many ways, each with its own advantages and disadvantages. Nevertheless, because this option is considered taboo in some circles, I wish to outline some potential advantages that this kind of set up (whether it be a bi-national state, a federation or some other kind of arrangement) might offer.

I want to emphasise: I am not claiming that these potential advantages necessarily make a bi-national state preferable. The potential benefits may or may not outweigh the dangers. But I am saying that: (i) I don't think that discussion of this topic should be taboo; I reject the suggestion that a one-state democratic arrangement is an extremist position; and (ii) Since the kind of political arrangement under discussion here may well be inevitable, even opponents ought to examine the potential benefits so that if and when a one-state democracy comes about, they will be able to work to at least ensure that the positive aspects are not undermined.

So, here goes:

Equality. In a one-state set up, everyone has citizenship. Every person can vote in the national elections that determine the make-up of the government whose organs have a large degree of influence on his/her daily life. Everyone has a stake in the army, the foreign service, the health system, the education system—and these services are there for the good of all. And anyone, if unsatisfied, can raise her voice in protest and vote for an alternative. In a two-state reality some of the above is unlikely to be true: The disengagement from Gaza demonstrated that Israel can retain control of important aspects of Palestinian life even after withdrawal. And even the Geneva Accords leave much of Palestinian life in Israel's hands (for example, through demilitarisation).

(Relative) neutralisation of extreme ideological groups. Some have argued that in coming to a resolution between Israel and the Palestinians, ideological divides are the bigger challenge. The practical logistics, no matter how complicated, will be solved; but ideologies need to be changed or abandoned in order for a resolution to be reached. I've already argued against this simplistic approach to the practical side of things. I also disagree with the second part of the claim: that ideologies can smoothly change in the way that the two-state camp has often argued must take place.

It is highly, highly unlikely that religious Zionists on the far right will be able to simply reconfigure their belief system around a partitioned Eretz Yisrael. The passion that has for decades infused the settlement movement and the opposition to any territorial withdrawal, as well as the fact that such a significant percentage of this demographic lives over the green line, make the possibility of a withdrawal something that much of this group cannot countenance and will oppose passionately, perhaps violently. In addition, a somewhat wider group of religious political parties—including Shas and Yahadut Hatorah—promote visions of Israel as an ethno-religious Jewish state, whilst also traditionally opposing withdrawal from settlements.

What is my point? That some of the most ideological and passionate groups and political parties in Israel are opposed more passionately to withdrawal and partition than to anything else. They don't necessarily love the idea of a bi-national democracy either—most would probably openly prefer apartheid—but it is, perhaps, a solution that they would be able to live with, to accomodate ideologically. The far-right (especially the religious far-right), in other words, might oppose giving Palestinians the vote. But they likely wouldn't come out against it in droves in the same way that they came out to oppose uprooting their own communities from Gaza.

So too on the Palestinian side. Hamas and many ideological Muslims are interested in one, Islamic state in all of Palestine. Ideally. Occupation obviously runs counter to this, as does partition, which would mean that the control of a significant percentage of the land is in the hands of 'infidels.' That is a difficult pill to swallow, ideologically. So is the notion of living as a minority within a democratic state that is not run according to the principles of Islam. But the latter is something that religious Muslims deal with in other places. Some of them like it, some don't, but it is something that can be and is lived with.

Which brings me to the related matter of new political configurations. For those who would prefer to see a state which is truly democratic, a bi-national state has the advantage of rendering the moderate majority the most powerful political force. In both Israeli and Palestinian politics, religious fundamentalists have significant—and increasing—political power. And their respective visions, of course, conflict with one another. In a state in which the political divide is no longer about whether or how the land will be divided—because everyone is already a citizen—supporters of Fatah and Kadima, for example, suddenly seem like potential (if initially uncomfortable) political allies; democratic political parties interested in fostering the institutions of a healthy state that respects the rights of all of its citizens. Religious and other extremist parties will not be able to bully their agendas through, because they will have become a minority force.

Even if Hamas gets 50% of the Arab vote, for example, that would still only amount to 25% of the electorate. And unlike the secular-democratic parties, who will be able to cross ethnic/national lines in order to further a common political/social agenda, Jewish and Islamic fundamentalists have very different visions of what they would like the state to look like. This would likely mean that they, like everyone else, would have to shift their agendas: Instead of attempting to influence the character of the entire state in a way that imposes their respective religious visions on others, they will need to take up the (noble) agenda of working to protect the religious and other rights of their respective constituents. Obviously, not everyone will agree with me that this kind of change is desirable. But for those of us—religious and secular—who believe that religion and the state are bad for each other, who are worried by the rise of religious extremism—especially in the political realm, and who would like to see a strong, moderate centre with genuine political cooperation between Jews and Arabs, a democratic bi-national arrangement has the potential to do much good.

The ability of different groups to retain their historical narratives is another important potential difference between one-state and two-state arrangements. The Jewish people has a millenia-old connection to Eretz Yisrael, both as the object of yearnings from afar, and as a place in which Jewish communities existed throughout the ages. That connection is tied up with the whole land, and includes many specific places that are on the 'other side' of the green line. This, of course, is something that the right has said for a long time; those on the left have often responded that there are more important values at hand that need to be considered. That might be true. But even so, severing the Jewish connection with, say, Hebron, with its ancient significance and which had a Jewish community long before the arrival in Palestine of the Zionists, is a difficult and traumatic prospect.

The Palestinians, of course, also have strong bonds with the whole land. This is true not just at an abstract historical-national level, but also at an individual and familial level. Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians left or were expelled from the nascent state of Israel in 1947-8. Their families are from towns, villages and cities—some of which are still standing, others that are not—to which they today have no access and to which they would not ever be able to return under a two-state arrangement.

In one democratic state, people would be able to live wherever they choose, within the limits of the law. No need for Jews to make up new stories in order to convince ourselves that Hebron is not central to our history or that Tel Aviv is ancient. And no need for Palestinian refugees to be told that the towns from which their families came are off-limits to them eternally; that their family bond is somehow not real, and that their 'right of return' is only to the West Bank.

Another significant advantage that is worthy of mention is pre-existing infrastructure. No doubt, incorporating two national groups into one democratic framework is not a simple thing to achieve. But neither is creating a new state from scratch. Israel already has a state infrastructure in place. It has also absorbed large numbers of new citizens in the past, and even already has some aspects of a bi-national infrastructure in the institutions that already (under)serve the Arab public within Israel. Expanding membership to this club would change its character drastically, and would require monumental expansion and adjustment; but it would not require the creation from scratch of the infrastructure of a new state, nor would it necessitate complex, detailed border arrangements between two utterly artificial political entities within one geographical area.

Institutional solidarity and individual relationships are the last two advantages that I'll mention here. The fact that state institutions—including the police, the ambulance service, and yes, the army—would be shared, has the potential to foster a shared sense of solidarity and even pride. Yes, there are many potential problems to be overcome in creating, for example, one combined army. But the result, over the years, of people having to work together in such frameworks, could be the creation of new symbols, 'language' and shared identity around which people could unite—in addition to, not instead of, existing identities. And of course, unlike a two-state solution, in one state there would be increased, rather than decreased, interaction between Jews and Arabs—both in day-to-day life and in forced contexts such as the army. Bear in mind that for the last eight years it has been illegal for Israelis to enter Palestinian-controlled areas, resulting in very limited interpersonal interactions. A reality in which people can and do interact with each other is likely to be one in which personal relationships are formed, and in which demonisation of the 'other' is (more) limited.

So there you have it. Some potential benefits of a one-state arrangement in Israel/Palestine. Once again: Yes, there are dangers. Yes, there are disadvantages. Yes, maybe the dangers and disadvantages outweigh the potential gains. But maybe they don't. And even if they do, maybe such an arrangement is coming our way regardless, in which case we may as well prepare ourselves to make it work as best we can.

Much has been written about the downsides of a one-state arrangement, and I don't feel the need to address them: some are legitimate concerns, others have more to do with paranoia or racism. But there is one concern that I do want to deal with: the claim that giving citizenship to Palestinians and thus forming a bi-national state would mark the 'end of Zionism'. Jewish nationalism can and should survive and even thrive in a bi-national state. More on this next time..

Internet Censorship

When trying to access Ha'aretz from my laptop whilst in transit at Dubai Airport, I was met with the following response:

See: http://proxy.emirates.net.ae/images-ip/siteblocked.jpg.

The same happened with any website ending with '.il'. But Israeli sites ending in '.com' did work. So I read the Jerusalem Post instead. I wonder if that's what the UAE government had in mind...

On attempting to nip a fledgeling state at the bud

For those who haven't already heard, Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad recently released an official document, entitled 'Palestine—Ending the Occupation, Establishing the State', in which the basic principles are outlined for the development of infrastructure so that a Palestinian state can be established in the West Bank and Gaza Strip within two years. The document calls for the creation of the necessary infrastructure for a state, piece by piece. It calls for the cooperation and support of the international community. And it presents a vision of what the future Palestinian state should look like. Fayyad's opening letter sums up the aims of the program as follows (You can access the whole document here):

We look forward to continued regional and international support to establish Palestine as an independent, democratic, progressive, and modern Arab state, with full sovereignty over its territory in the West Bank and Gaza, on the 1967 borders, with East Jerusalem as its capital. Palestine will be a peace-loving state that rejects violence, commits to co-existence with its neighbors, and builds bridges of cooperation with the international community. It will be a symbol of peace, tolerance and prosperity in this troubled area of the world. By embodying all of these values, Palestine will be a source of pride to all of its citizens, and an anchor for stability in this region.

The plan presents a 'vision' of a future Palestinian state as a democratic country run according to the rule of law, respecting human rights, and living in peace with its neighbours. Lest the message against the common claim that 'there is no Palestinian partner' not be heard, the plan is explicit:

We are a partner for peace. Like all other peoples of the world, we aspire to live in peace, secure prosperity for our people, and bring stability to our region. But, like all peoples, we also seek justice. This cannot be achieved unless our people attain their legitimate, national rights as prescribed by international resolutions and implicit in the two-state solution. The PNA has made remarkable progress in establishing the rule of law and delivering public services under the occupation regime and in spite of the obstacles it has constructed. For its part Israel must immediately begin dismantling these obstacles, which undermine PNA’s efforts. Israel must dismantle the infrastructure of the occupation and create the space for international efforts to reach a just and lasting peace.

The plan is unreserved in its calls for an end to the occupation of territories captured by Israel in 1967; and it calls for an end to Israeli measures that are preventing Palestinians from achieving their basic rights. But at the same time, it takes the initiative for creating Palestinian institutions into Palestinian hands, calling for the establishment of the necessary institutions for a future state already now, before the state's establishment (sound familiar?). The plan goes into great detail, outlining, amongst other things, the responsibilities of individual ministries, from the Justice Ministry to the Central Bureau of Statistics. Here, for example, is an excerpt from the description of the Ministry of Education:

The Ministry of Education (MoE) has the following objectives:
Provide opportunities to access and benefit from the ‘Education for All’ Program through:
 Building classrooms throughout the occupied territory.
 Providing text books, stationery and equipment.
 Ensuring an appropriate learning environment for persons with special needs.
 Supporting education in Jerusalem.
 Providing loans to enable students to enrol in higher education.
 Encouraging enrolment at vocational and technical educational centers.
[…]

So what we have, then, is a call for opposition to the Occupation through the establishment of the institutions of a state; institutions whose purpose is to create the framework for a future independent, democratic Palestine. This state is described as a right. And the plan calls for its establishment—with or without the consent of Israel.

What is the official Israeli response to this plan so far? From Ha'aretz today:

Lieberman: Israel won`t let Palestinians declare state unilaterally

Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman on Monday declared that Israel would not stand by idly should Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad go ahead with his stated plan to declare a de-facto state within two years. Lieberman told visiting UN envoy Tony Blair and European Union's foreign policy chief Javier Solana that such unilateral initiatives did not contribute to the creation of positive dialogue and vowed that Israel would respond.
[...]

Read the rest here.

Not-so-veiled threats seem to be the order of the day (well, the order of most days... see the Swedes last week) for our beloved Foreign Minister.

Some thoughts:

Many Israelis and Zionists like to claim that this whole big Middle Eastern mess is all the fault of the Arabs, who decided to meet our declaration of independence in 1948 with hostility. That response, it is argued, was an immoral and unjustifiable reaction to our self-evidently peace-loving desire to establish an independent state. So this leads me to ask two questions:

Question 1: If we had the right to establish a state unilaterally, with the agreement of the international community but without the agreement of most of the population of Palestine/Eretz Yisrael at the time, why don't the Palestinians have that same right?

Question 2: If, on the other hand, we have the right, as suggested by Lieberman, to respond to the unilateral declaration of Palestinian independence with violent opposition, why did the Arabs not have that same right in 1948?

These are not (just) rhetorical questions. Responses are invited.

Yeshayahu Leibowitz on the coming of Mashiach

'Belief' without believing:

In Support of One State in Israel/Palestine (Sort of) – Part I

This is something that has been brewing for a while in my mind. It increasingly seems to me that, for a number of reasons, a 'two-state solution' is, at this point, almost impossible. We're in a rather paradoxical situation: One one hand, accepted orthodoxy—in Israel and abroad, although perhaps a little less so amongst Palestinians—says that those who support compromise and are in favour of resolving the conflict must support a two-state agreement. Yet at the same time, some of the key issues that would need to be resolved in an agreed-upon manner by the two relevant parties are, it seems, no longer resolvable (if indeed they ever were).

Here are a few central examples:

1) Jerusalem

It is clear that there cannot be a two-state solution—one that involves a viable Palestinian State alongside a secure Israel, as they like to say—without Jerusalem being the capital of both countries. There are plenty of Israelis (such as our current Prime Minister) who pay lip service to the idea of a two-state arrangement whilst at the same time insisting that Jerusalem remain undivided, under Israeli sovereignty. This is a delusional position—there is no way that any Palestinian leadership can or will agree to this. For there to be a two-state solution, Jerusalem must either be divided, or it must be shared.

The problem is, either sharing the city or dividing it in two would be a practical nightmare. Division is problematic because of the mess of overlap between Jewish and Arab population—especially in light of the fact that, as a result of the building of Jewish neighbourhoods in East Jerusalem since 1967, nearly half of the population of the Eastern part of the city is now Jewish. Add to that the difficulties involved in managing an international border in the cramped confines of the old city, and division seems altogether unimplementable. Remember: politicians and generals can write documents about the delicate, refined details of every piece of fence, every gate, door, road, guard-post. But in reality, these details need to be managed by regular people, of various degrees of competence and goodwill. The more intricate the plan, the more that can go wrong. And what can go wrong, will go wrong.

An open Jerusalem that is shared by two states is similarly problematic. Assumedly, a real border would divide the two states everywhere outside the holy city. That being the case, how would Jerusalem be set up so that people living in the mixed city can travel freely to their own state but not to the other? Theoretically, checkpoints could be set up at every entry and exit to Jerusalem, to ensure that Israelis don't travel without permission from Jerusalem into Palestine, and that Palestinians cannot freely enter Israel without passing a 'border'. But then what we would have is not an open city, but an utterly closed one, surrounded by border-crossings/checkpoints on all sides; a city that would be cut off in a serious way from all of its surrounds.

We have a problem, then. If a two-state solution is the only compromise/agreement that can be seriously discussed, and a two-state solution requires the division or sharing of Jerusalem, but both of these are impossible, what happens then?

2) Jewish Settlements in the Occupied Territories

There are today nearly half a million Jewish settlers living in the West Bank—around 200,000 in neighbourhoods in Israeli-annexed East Jerusalem, and approximately 275,000 in the West Bank 'proper'. For a two-state solution to come into effect, one that includes a viable Palestinian state that Palestinians would be able to accept, the areas in which most of these settlements are situated would not be able to remain under Israeli sovereignty. Many Israelis advocate a Palestinian state in borders that would allow large 'consensus' settlements to remain a part of Israel—in some cases, this is realistically conceivable, through a land swap arrangement of some kind. But many large settlements—such as Ariel, for example, are located deep within the territories, far from any future border. Their location was designed precisely to prevent the establishment of a viable, contiguous Palestinian state. A two-state solution would require that these settlements either come under Palestinian sovereignty—with all that that entails; or that they be evacuated.

Once again, neither possibility seems realistic. The settlement enterprise, in a sense, has achieved its goal—the West Bank egg cannot be unscrambled. Residents of settlements that were established precisely to retain Israeli control over territories are not going to accept a reality in which they are forced to become minority citizens of a Palestinian state. And mass evacuation, although morally justifiable (settlers moved to these places knowing full well that they were under dispute and that eventual evacuation was a possibility), is fraught with difficulties. In 2005, in the lead-up to the disengagement from Gaza, the religious-Zionist right demonstrated the force and presence that it can muster in opposition to withdrawal from territories. Thousands rallied; activists went from door to door convincing people to oppose the withdrawal, and with a good degree of success. (Though the mobilised activists were largely opposed for ideological reasons, they were able to convince a much larger slice of the population that withdrawal was a bad idea on pragmatic and security grounds).

Gaza was peanuts in comparison to what would have to happen in the West Bank for a two-state arrangement to come about. Gaza was outside the national consensus for a long time, contained no holy places with the religious and historical baggage of places such as Hebron (the Cave of the Patriarchs) and Bethlehem (Rachel's Tomb), and had a settler population that was relatively small. It will not be difficult for the religious-right to mobilise once again against any potential comprehensive agreement. And this time around it will be far easier: one need only convince a potential opponent of one problematic aspect of a far-reaching withdrawal in order to get her onside. And most Israelis, including left-wing Israelis, have never been in favour of a full withdrawal anyway, so convincing them shouldn't prove too difficult. Add to this the fact that there is a much larger number of settlers in the West Bank than there were in Gaza (even if only a minority of settlements need to be evacuated, the number is still much larger than Gaza), and the places of religious and historical significance—some of them deep in the heart of populated Palestinian areas—and it seems unlikely that majority support could ever be achieved, let alone maintained for long enough to actually carry out a withdrawal. And in addition to the above, of course, is the huge trauma involved in uprooting—rightly or wrongly—a population that includes whole communities, many of whom were born and raised over the green line and have never lived anywhere else.

It is inconceivable that the Palestinians would formally agree to statehood on anything less than the 1967 borders (perhaps with some adjustments based on a one-for-one land-swap). But for that to happen there must either be a withdrawal of thousands of Israeli citizens, or those citizens—many of whom identify with the far-right, would have to come under Palestinian sovereignty. Both situations seem, at this point, highly unrealistic.

3. Refugees

A two-state solution, of the kind regularly discussed in Israel and abroad, implies the existence side by side of a Jewish Israeli state and a Palestinian state. For those who define the 'Jewishness' of Israel in terms of its demographics (more on this another time), a Jewish majority is necessary if Israel is to remain both 'Jewish' and 'democratic'. On the other hand, a central part of the Palestinian narrative is bound up with the exile of hundreds of thousands of refugees in 1947-8—a population whose descendants count in the millions—and their right, at least in theory, to return to the homes that they left. As we saw in the failure at Camp David in 2000, Palestinians are unlikely (or unable) to give up on this core belief no matter what their leaders agree to, and as such their leadership cannot and will not back down from this demand. The stories of the hundreds of thousands of refugees have infused the lives of their families, communities and society for decades, and these stories cannot be erased. Yet, an agreed-upon two-state solution relies precisely on an abandonment of this longing, so that Israel can remain—in theory and in practice, a 'Jewish State' with an ensured Jewish majority. Agreement on this issue is necessary for a final settlement. Such agreement seems impossible. So in this case too, the so-called 'consensus' solution requires the (probably) impossible in order for agreement to be reached.

So what now?

I still don't think that the possibility of a two-state solution is yet absolutely dead. I even still mildly prefer it, in the short term, to the alternatives. BUT I think that such an arrangement cannot and will not come about bilaterally, simply as a result of negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians. The gaps are too wide, and the lack of any balance of power means that so long as the gaps remain, Israel will continue to enforce the status quo. Real agreement between the sides is impossible, certainly under this government, and likely under any other as well. Unilateralism also doesn't work, as we saw in Gaza, where the withdrawal was interpreted by extremists as victory, on the one hand, and imposed a reality on Palestinians in which they had no real say, on the other. One-sided Israeli 'solutions' by definition will not create any kind of balanced or just arrangement, because they are formulated in line with Israeli interests alone. But perhaps there is a chance that a two-state 'solution'—one that both sides are uncomfortable with—might be imposed by outside powers, most likely including the US. This is highly unlikely but not impossible. For it to work, Israel as well as the Palestinians would have to be pushed into steps that do not have popular support; but it would be the outside power that would be blamed for these injustices by Israelis and Palestinians alike. Again: highly unlikely, but not totally impossible. And if something along these lines doesn't happen during Obama's administration, then it will probably never happen.

Which leads me to the possibility of a one-state arrangement—one state from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea in which every resident, Jew and Arab, Israeli and Palestinian, is an equal citizen. If a two-state solution is not imposed in the next few years, then a one-state arrangement of some kind is inevitable, and even desirable in comparison to the alternative—indefinite continuation of the current reality in which one people has ruled over another for decades. I'm going to write two more posts related to this topic: (1) The ideological changes that I think need to take place in Israeli society, and amongst Jews outside of Israel, in order to prepare for the possibility of a bi-national state—whether it is desirable or not; and (2) The reasons that I think a one-state arrangement in Eretz Yisrael/Palestine may actually be advantageous, at least in some respects.

About the Blog

The blog's name is inspired by (or rather, a somewhat belated response to) the famous words of Judah Leib Gordon, the Lithuanian maskil: "Be a Jew in the home and a man in the street!"

I am a Jew, in the world, with some opinions about stuff. I prefer to blog semi-anonymously, at least for the time being. Jerusalem is the place that I (mostly) call home, though I can often be found in various other parts of the world. I can be reached off-blog at ajitw2 -at- gmail.