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...