How often do we get to say this? The Times has a fabulous piece of reporting on the front page today by Ethan Bronner showing that Jenin in the northern West Bank has become a source of Palestinian tranquility and prosperity. Bronner cites 4 causes: the weakness of Hamas, the evacuation of settlements, the fact that the separation wall follows the Green Line for once, and the influence of Gilboa, just across the Green Line in Israel. Israeli Arabs have been barred from getting into the West Bank; yet quietly, Gilboa Arab investors have been allowed to get into Jenin. And in Gilboa, Jews and Arabs coexist. Bronner says:
An example was on display last month when high school students in Gilboa took part in what may be the only one of its kind in the world — the finals for the Bible-Koran contest. Twelve teams, each made up of one Jew and one Arab, were asked questions in both Hebrew and Arabic about the holy books. A mixed team of Jewish and Muslim teachers acted as judges. An Israeli Arab was the master of ceremonies.
Isaac Herzog, Israel’s minister of social welfare, was on hand and told the audience that Gilboa was a model for Israel, that every Israeli Jew should learn the Koran, [emphasis Weiss's] that equality of opportunity should be the norm.
The head of the Gilboa regional council, Daniel Atar, is a Jew and his deputy, Eid Salem, is an Arab. Together they have built a warm relationship with the Palestinian governor of the Jenin area, Qadoura Moussa. The three meet frequently to formulate plans for economic cooperation in agriculture and commerce. Together, they have visited the French-German border area and Switzerland, seeking models of coexistence.
“There are two kinds of peace,” Mr. Atar said one recent afternoon in his office with Mr. Salem at his side. “There is the one on a piece of paper that doesn’t stand up to any test and there is the one built from the bottom up. That is the one we are hoping to build. It is increasingly clear that if Israeli Jews cannot figure out how to have good relations with Israeli Arabs, there won’t be peace beyond the borders, either. We have a choice in Israel of making peace or living in a bunker.”
The wisdom here is that government is almost always an abstraction in our day-to-day lives. My strongest impression of Israel on my one visit was how little the Jews had to do with Arabs. The story also serves my agenda of post-identity-politics, and suggests that there will be no healing in Israel/Palestine without some meaningful right of return. Two-state, schmoo-state. There must be respect for people's real relations to the land. This is the Middle East, not New Jersey. An Arab majority in rural areas is an inevitability, and who cares in the end what they call their states so long as minorites are respected, and Palestinians too can aspire. By putting this piece on the front page, the Times challenges all racial/religious ideologues, and suggests that American Jews ought to concentrate on living happily in the U.S. and leave the peoples of I/P to figure out their future together.
A great story. Thanks to Richard Witty for sending it along. (And a little self-promotion: this blog touched on parts of the Jenin story 3 months back at AIPAC and the NY Theatre Workshop.)
Related posts:
- Israel-centric NYT again misses the story (day care center expels child because she is Arab)
- Story Behind Story: Jackson Vented to Neocon Mole Who Looked ‘n Sounded Arab
- ‘Times’ Visits Gaza. Has a Wonderful Time, Wishes You Were Here
- In dreams begin responsibilities: ‘LA Times’ bravely pictures one-state coexistence
- Imagine the ‘Times’ leaving out deaths of Schwerner, Chaney and Goodman in a story on Mississippi protests!
{ 13 comments }
This, of course, is not how the Israel/Palestinian relationship is commonly portrayed in the media. It adds a very welcome break from dark tales that come from the territories. It shows that Palestinians are not all hate crazed jihadists who must be kept behind the one way mirrors in fortified checkpoints.
But, for all its optimism, lets not forget that this still is an occupation, and every aspect of Palestinian life can be changed and/or destroyed at a whim of the occupation administration with no explanation what-so-ever, and if, God forbid, some crazy subsection of settlers were to start coveting any of the land here, the skies would darken in no time at all.
I always believed that Israeli Arabs should participate in democratic processes of State of Israel. It would not change their position very much, but it would be a breeding ground for new political generation of future leaders.
Those who think that apartheid and buntustans are the only option for "security" reasons, but in fact just want Arabs to become invisible, must work really hard not to have too many such articles appear in the press.
Like Shamir said. Poles take in anti-semitism with their mothers milk. Witness Jedwebne, right Eva
Be careful about taking anything in the Slimes at face value. Despite the length of the article, it contains very few direct quotes. Stenographer Bronner has largely interpolated his own conclusions.
In fact, the ONLY quote from a Palestinian comes from a Colonel Asideh, who has just been bribed with "new Land Rovers." Of course he's in a chirpy mood, as he roars round the ruins in his new hot wheels.
But we hear nothing from the Israeli Arabs being allowed to cross the border (though without their cars — always the need the twist the knife a bit), or the Palestinians they interact with. Bronner assures us that they are contented — verily, like happy darkies on Ol' Massa's plantation — but I ain't so sure.
All real solutions are social, NOT political.
"All real solutions are social, NOT political."
So true, Richard, so true.
Phil, I don't mean to put a damper on good news if indeed that is the reality, but I just finished reading the article and frankly, it's very Israeli/Jewish-centric.
Hamas is of course referred to as a "Palestinian militant group" as opposed to the democratically-elected government that it is, and the fact that it is "relatively weak" is the first and most prominent reason given for the success.
The article basically describes a situation in which Israeli power has created a livable situation for all. "Terrorists" (Palestinian groups, of course) are magnified ("early on Wednesday morning, for example, Israeli soldiers and security men raided a home in Jenin and detonated a 30-pound pipe bomb."), while Israeli brutality is glossed over (the "settlements" and the "barrier" are a major source of "friction.")
I laughed, too, when I read that the organic produce was going to be GROWN by the Palestinians and MARKETED in Europe by the Israelis.
I mean, again, I understand trying to find some good in all the crap that's going on, but this article would seem to be nothing more than another piece of seemingly well-structured Zionist propaganda.
I can show stories like this one going back to the early 1900s. Ahad haAm (Asher Ginzburg) essentially told the Zionist leadership that they were needed, or there would be a negative reaction to Zionism. The basic form is contained in the Reschid Bey section of Herzl's Altneuland.
Sometimes the stories are even true. The Great Liquidation really did benefit Palestinians but the result was inadvertent and viewed very negatively by the leaders of the Yishuv, the Zionist leadership in the UK and "Our Crowd" in NY city. Carefully reading of Ben-Gurion's writings and diaries indicates that preventing such unintended consequences of investment in Palestine was part of the reason for his positive view of the Peel Commission's proposal.
Unfortunately, until Jews fully assimilate the idea that Zionism is wrong and evil and that Jews today are at least as much a Taetervolk as Germans ever were during the Hitler years, show remorse and make complete reparations for all the crimes they have committed and all the damage they have caused (including against the victims of Soviet communism), we have to assume that Zionists will someday in the future once again engage in an orgy of mass murder, ethnic cleansing and genocide against the native populations of the ME.
BTW, in Judonia I discuss the general reason why Palestinians have been so resistant in comparison with ethnic Ashkenazim (and other populations) to compulsory population transfer although not specifically the Peel Plan.
Because Zionist and non-Zionist Jewish leaders assumed that leaving homes and villages was similarly easy for all populations, they dreamed especially during the 1930s but even to this day of reaching some sort of final agreement with Palestinians by settling them in some other Arab country.
Because the cultural and ethnic centers for Palestinians are Jerusalem, Haifa, Jaffa, Nablus, Ramallah, and Hebron but not Baghdad, Basra, Najaf, Karbala, Ramadi, or Samara, Palestinians were never going to agree to transfer to Iraq or some other Arabic territory. (See Baksheesh Diplomacy, Secret Negotiations Between American Jewish Leaders and Arab Officials on the Eve of world War II,[160] by Rafael Medoff, pp. 61-62.)By contrast removing the entire Zionist population of stolen and occupied Palestine would not be difficult today and most would probably welcome it. Because Neocons acting as a Jewish special interest have managed to manipulate the US government into causing the dislocation of about 11 million Arabs and Muslims since the start of the Bush administration, relocating the Zionist population elsewhere really should be part of the discussion and is really the best solution to the problem of Zionism and would cripple or perhaps even cripple the ability of the Zionist intelligentsia to mobilize Jewish political economic oligarchs and ordinary Jews to the harm of the USA.
The ability of Zionist intelligentsia to create Jewish groupthink or to drive Jews to do things they know to be wrong may be the greatest threat that the USA faces today.
I remember a story that Dr. Jay Gonen recounts — I believe — in The Psychohistory of Zionism. When the Palestinian Zionist leadership ordered a boycott of Palestinian produce and the Palestinian egg vendor came by that day, she bought something 3-5 times as many eggs as she needed while she cried the whole time. She told him not to come again and was still crying in the evening when Dr. Gonen's father came home. Mrs. Gonen knew that the boycott was wrong, but she obeyed anyway. In the same situation, a German, Pole, or Russian was much more likely to disobey wrongful commands, and this sort of authoritarian behavior, which has deep roots in E. European ethnic Ashkenazi culture, persists to this day to the harm of Palestinians, the USA and the whole world.
Because of the Zionist indoctrination of Jewish education today (a major project of the Zionist intelligentsia and oligarchs), far too many Jews no longer have the ability (as Mrs. Gonen had) to understand that their actions are wrong.
And this is Jenin, "capital of the suicide bombers." A reminder that politics is the art of the possible and that people react to what they're given–8 years ago Hamas ruled Jenin and any Israeli, Jewish or otherwise, who ventured in was as good as dead (except Juliano Mer Khamis). Obviously some of the people who could strap on bombs and blow themselves up don't want to, for whatever reason. I remember when a bomber a week came from Jenin. This is remarkable by any measure.
higginsland: I laughed, too, when I read that the organic produce was going to be GROWN by the Palestinians and MARKETED in Europe by the Israelis.
You are aware that the business partners, the article talks about, are Arab Israelis? You think Bronner should have made that more explicit …? But wouldn't that be racist? Besides, what's wrong with a Jewish-Israeli and Arab-Palestinian cooperation, if e.g. a merchant with exquisite contacts on the European market offers his experience to specialized farmers? I think to sell on the European market, it has to be sold via Israel so far, anyway. But I am not 100% sure.
**********************************************
My favorite passage – more!:
An example was on display last month when high school students in Gilboa took part in what may be the only one of its kind in the world — the finals for the Bible-Koran contest. Twelve teams, each made up of one Jew and one Arab, were asked questions in both Hebrew and Arabic about the holy books. A mixed team of Jewish and Muslim teachers acted as judges. An Israeli Arab was the master of ceremonies.
Sounds more like the formula for one-state with people working together, rather than two states of separatist creeps who care less about cooperation and more about schism and conflict.
Its the formula for cooperation between real people, living real lives, doing real things.
It happens often elsewhere.
Haifa for example, is a genuinely multi-cultural city. The Jewish, Arab, and partnered felafel restaurants are indistinguishable. The parks are populated by all.
Good neighbors coexist.
Even in Zionist Israel. Even in liberal US.
Hopefully in Palestine, in Lebanon, in the future.
Who knows who will insist that the Lebanese or Palestinians not accept Israelis as Israelis, or that Israelis not accept Palestine?
Who knows who will Instigate conflict where acceptance prevails.
Joachim wrote: "Because Neocons acting as a Jewish special interest have managed to manipulate the US government into causing the dislocation of about 11 million Arabs and Muslims since the start of the Bush administration, relocating the Zionist population elsewhere really should be part of the discussion and is really the best solution to the problem of Zionism and would cripple or perhaps even cripple the ability of the Zionist intelligentsia to mobilize Jewish political economic oligarchs and ordinary Jews to the harm of the USA."
I disagree. It would merely transfer the problem elsewhere, but the exploitation, usury, and ultimately murder would continue. Containment, in a formally demarcated Israel, is the answer, as it was with virulent Communism.
One way to get there, which has been overly ignored given what I believe to be its potentially transformative value, is to demand Israel declare its borders (or its intended borders) immediately, and discussions on the final borders, with a firm deadline, begin immediately. One reason the Zionists get themselves into trouble is because if something isn't written in stone, their minds immediately begin processing the means by which they can milk, manipulate and finesse the situation to their advantage to squeeze out more benefits for themselves. This inevitably leads to angry recrimination and breakdowns.
Americans should think of Zionists more as a collection of shyster lawyers than as a well-intentioned, beleaguered group filled with good will, as they are portrayed in American media.
Joachim wrote: "Because of the Zionist indoctrination of Jewish education today (a major project of the Zionist intelligentsia and oligarchs), far too many Jews no longer have the ability (as Mrs. Gonen had) to understand that their actions are wrong."
This dynamic, of diaspora oligarchs using their vast economic resources to indoctrinate fellow diaspora members of the nation of Zion into hate, treachery and warmongering against all non-Jews, essentially turning them into sociopaths, will continue forever until the nation of Zion is transferred and contained within the established borders of Israel. There, the oligarchs can scheme and plot all they want, but so long as "the nations" are firm in their commitment to containment, the scheming and plotting will have to be against their fellow Zionists. Only then, after they have witnessed the toll it takes on their own people, might they one day appreciate the destructiveness of their ways, and that the usurious, parasitic mentality is morally wrong.
Do honest lawyers serve a positive function? Yes. Do shyster lawyers? No. Do honest Jews serve a positive function? Yes. Do Zionist Jews? No. Fortunately for the world, most shyster Jews are attracted to Zionism.
I might add, many shyster gentiles are attracted to Zionism, too.
Comments on this entry are closed.