Journalist Noam Sheizaf writes for the daily Israeli newspaper Maariv and has a blog called Promised Land. His most recent post is a useful response to anyone who thinks that things in Israel/Palestine would be different “if only the Palestinians were more like Gandhi.” He uses the recent killing of Bassam Ibrahim Abu Rahmah in Bil’in as a reminder that Israel’s response to Palestinian resistance has nothing to do with the form that it takes, but the ultimate goal of controlling the land:
What we tend to forget is that the current violence is a relatively new phenomena. Since 1967 and for the first 20 years of occupation, the West Bank was fairly quiet. I remember, as a kid, how we traveled there during weekends, went shopping and sightseeing. Yes, the PLO carried on the armed fight, but this was done mostly from other countries – Jordan, later on Lebanon, and finally Tunisia.
But guess what – this nonviolent struggle never made Israel even think about abandoning the land it conquered or hand the Palestinians any civil and political rights. In fact, these were the years in which the colonization of land became an official government policy. Israel agreed to a Palestinian autonomy as part of the 1979 peace treaty with Egypt, but never really considered keeping its promise . . .
My bottom line is this: in Bil’in, like in the first three decades of the occupation, Israel proved that it didn’t really care what kind of a fight the Palestinians are putting up, or what they ask for. This has nothing to do with “abandoning terrorism”, like Netanyahu – and all Israeli PMs before him, except for one – keep on saying. For all we care the Palestinians can convert to Buddhism or join the Likud. We just don’t want to go back to the ‘67 borders. That’s why, when they throw stones or wave flags, as they do in the video above, we open fire.
It might be that Palestinians would have been invisible if not for the horrid violence, or it might be that Palestinians would have been seen and trusted and a successful negotiation would have already occurred.
It is a truth, that violence gives Israel the excuse or reason for attacking Gaza.
Its false to say that there was never Palestinian violence, either before or after 1967.
Definitely, after the PLO adopted Oslo, the two factions (Hamas and Likud) sought to undermine any future peace and reconciliation efforts by violence.
Its a dead end towards any end.
Witty, the issue is not whether there was Palestinian violence. It is about extent. You cannot expect a hostile population to be non-violent. I don't understand these unrealistic and cynical standards put upon the Palestinians. It's all for political reasons – not principles of peace/non-violence.
The Palestinians have the right to resist w/ violence if their right to self-determination is being violated. That is a collective injustice specifically aimed at preventing an entire population of people to achieve their freedom. Israelis already have that.
Palestinians are not forcing Israelis through checkpoints/fragmenting their society/abusing them daily/indiscriminately killing them/etc.
So we can wag our finger but it's all unrealistic. The violence will not stop.
Wow. Israel has truly institutionalized the dehumanization of an entire people for the sole purpose of stealing their land out from underneath them. I have to believe that Obama has come to understand American complicity in this travesty — if he was the sole conscientious objector to the war in Iraq, and he was elected to office on that basis . . . he must believe he has a higher purpose of bringing true peace to the ME, and I/P in particular.
Here's hoping the Jane Harman scandal launches the civil war within our government that's necessary to rid us of the neo-con element that has corrupted our elected officials.
BTW does anyone remember the name of the Palestinian activist who was exiled from Israel because it was feared he would cause a non-violent revolution? It was in the 80s I believe and was a NY Times article.
Again,
It is a truth, that violence gives Israel the excuse or reason for attacking Gaza.
It's also not fair to say that Sheizaf implied that there never was violence pre or post 1967. "Fairly quiet" and "relatively new" does not immediately mean that there was zero (actually is means the opposite). There remains little inclination that the rest of the world would have taken notice if it wasn't for the abhorrent images of the PLO scathing through the pages and the TVs of the late 60s through to the 70s. The Palestinians would have probably have shared the same invisibility of the Tibetans and the Zulus until both decided to have an insurrection against their own oppressors. It's not as if this was happening in our own backyard; distant lands are distant in most peoples' minds.
It is also a truth that the infliction of the occupation gives every Palestinian an excuse to resort to violence. Somehow the logic has been reversed here where we have the hyper-power who is occupying another population depriving them of the most basic of rights and yet they're the ones who are calling for self-defense. It's the bully using pre-emptive violence because he feels threatened that all the children he has beaten up in his entire life have not forgotten all the sins he committed against him/her and his/her relatives and might feel inclined to avenge what was taken from them.
@ Witty
You can throw all the speculations out there you want, but what you can't explain, go ahead try, is why every Israeli government since 1967 continued building settlements, and in fact accelerated settlement building after signing the Oslo accords. What kind of trust was being established from the Israeli side? Why should any Palestinian have deduced serious intent from the Israelis? And don't just blame Likud. Labor governments were just as bad. Even a dove like Shlomo Ben-Ami ended up overseeing the worst massacre of Palestinian youths at the start of the Second Intifada.
Give it a rest. You are embarassing yourself.
It doesn't go back to the 80s, only a few years ago, but could you be thinking of Azmi Bishara? He was a Palestinian Israeli politician of the Balad party and member of the Knesset. He led a populist movement among Israel's minority to demand equal rights for all people. The Jews effectively kicked him out of the country saying he was a "terrorist," or "antisemite," or "enemy of the state," or whatever the hell they call people they don't want around.
Mubarak Awad. He was interviewed by Gorenberg if you cared enough to actually read a long article.
What's that supposed to mean Joshua? I do care. I wouldn't have asked unless I cared.
Richard Witty said…
Again,
It is a truth, that violence gives Israel the excuse or reason for attacking Gaza.
Most true. Also any resistance (violent or nonviolent) to Israeli domination of West Bank lands gives Israel the excuse or reason for attacking Palestinians. There is really no option, they either accept Israeli domination over their lives or they will just have to accept more Gaza solutions. 'They must either submit to our rule or be crushed by our superior force.' I quess that both liberal and right wing Zionist agree on that rule.
Damn this new system seems insensitive to hard returns and html tags.
I think it was Avnery who said something to the effect that when things are "quiet"( meaning no Palestinian violence, as continuing Israeli violence never disrupts the "quiet") then Israelis conclude that there is no need to negotiate to resolve any issues because its quiet, and then when Palestinian violence breaks out, well, then Israel can't negotiate because that would be giving in to violence. Its an Israeli Catch-22.
testing a bit here:
tree said…
I think it was Avnery who said something to the effect that when things are "quiet"( meaning no Palestinian violence, as continuing Israeli violence never disrupts the "quiet") then Israelis conclude that there is no need to negotiate to resolve any issues because its quiet,…
and of course when Israel responds to Palestinian violence they can argue there is no one to talk to.
By this logic they cannot lose — The West Bank is theirs, no rational argument can stop them.
One more test: does bold work?
Let's look at this from the hard core Jewish Zionist perspective. Israel right now has more land than ever. The West Bank is slowly being colonized, and the Palestinians there strangled. Gaza is totally hemmed in and can be turned into a turkey shoot by the Israelis at will with no sanctions whatsoever. Lebanon, 2006 was also a turkey shoot. America was attacked on 9/11 largely because of corrupted Washington's blank check support for Israel, and its ongoing protection of Israel in the UN. The Israel lobby in all its manifestations played a decisive role in lying America into the Iraq war…
And despite all of this, the Zionists continue on as they always have, totally unmolested by any world powers are international governing bodies. So the hard core Jewish Zionists say to themselves: man, we can literally get away with murder. No one has the moxy to stop us. The entire West Bank will soon be ours, and no one can do a damn thing about it. The world will move on once facts on the ground are accomplished.
That's why the two-state should be imposed now, because how many more 9/11 and Iraq wars will have to take place before now and Israel's accomplished goal? And how many 9/11's and Iraq wars will take place after?
What the Israelis want or don't want, at this point, is irrelevant to American interests. A great leader would understand this and impose American will. Will Obama go down in history as a great leader, are merely a great politician talented at running the angles?
I dislike this new format.
Mubarak Awad
see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mubarak_Awad
Very true. And if Obama does not curb this Likud policy of Never Again Yet Again
enthusiasm it will be the cause of the continued demise of the USA. No future US president will have
Obama's mandate for change.
Looks like I turned bold on, can it be turned off.
How about on again
and off
Israel committed many betrayals. I've NEVER here stated that the state-sponsored settlement project was a good, or was anything but an effort at gradual annexation.
I do primarily blame likud for INTENTIONALLY organizing the settlement enterprise as a primary means to achieve gradual annexation using what was called "the finger strategy", that is to intentionally build settlements in fingers extending into otherwise Arab territory (it wasn't thought of Palestinian by Israelis or Palestinians consistently until after Palestinian national consciousness was firmed post 67).
The strategy is similar to the earlier Yishuv strategy which built purchased settlements in groups first (obviously there was a first one alone), then in fingers to establish critical geographical linkages. (It is a strategy that EVERY party attempting to control a region politically, militarily, economically, socially employs. I've successfully undertaken product introduction using the same strategy.)
There is a significant difference between the labor approach and likud. Likud organized, designed, fundraised, constructed the settlements with large amounts of state money AS a strategy. Labor largely more passively didn't oppose the expansion of already designed, annexed, populated settlements. And, it regarded the responsibility to defend Jews living in settlements as Israeli citizens.
There is a DIFFERENCE between an active aggression and a negligence.
Both wrongs, but one is theft, the other is the failure to prosecute.
For you to say "Labor governments were just as bad" is to vote for Nader a third time.
Violence intentionally directed at civilians, is not resistance or deterrance, its murder.
Greetings from Damascus.
I am happy to know about this article. The reality is that only very rarely has any successful liberation struggle been conducted by non-violent means only, and that includes India, South Africa, and the civil rights struggle in the United States. Ghandi and MLK were only part of their respective struggles.
Richard Witty, you are arguing in bad faith.
It's absurd to say that Palestinian violence provides the excuse for Israeli violence, when the explicit message of this post is the clear and videotaped evidence that Israel needs no such excuse. Have you watched the video?
It shows very clearly Israeli soldiers firing on peaceful protestors.
Your cruelty and arrogance are on display when you try to justify such senselessness.
My impression is that settlement expansion was greater under Barak than under Netanyahu, which if true sounds like the alleged passive acceptance was something more than that.
Witty refers to the dismantling of Jewish colonies in Palestine and removal of the settlers as an 'ethnic cleansing'. These colonies which would only be removed by their own government and these settlers who are essentially paid to live on someone else's land and steal someone else's resources – whether it be water or pretty soon, natural gas.
Witty is an apologist and windbag.
I didn't see the video, and having shot a great deal of video, I know the extent that selection of material can change the meaning of a picture (a thousand honest words is better).
You may be right in the specific incident, and hopefully not in patterns of incidents.
But, you still IGNORE the intent and action of actually shelling civilians as the moderate form of resistance with the overlapping precedent of very brutal acts of terror directly ONLY at civilians.
The implication of the original headline and post, is that non-violent struggle didn't and doesn't work.
I've been in many non-violent protests that didn't work, with lesser but still violent responses by police and military, that DID convey that the discipline of the protesters AND their knowledge beyond just a level necessary for propaganda, instilled trust.
So, that at the next opportunity, when there were new administrators, progress was then possible.
With Hamas, and especially absent a committed change of heart (instead of their oft-quoted public "invitations"), that progress isn't possible now.
To forcefully remove a large number of people from their homes, with their ethnicity as any element of screen, not status of title, or willingness to subscribe to Palestinian sovereignty and law, would be an ethnic cleansing.
Its sad that you have selective blinders about that.
Its a second wrong, a second theft, rather than healing.
Its odd to call that just, in any skillful application of justice.
I urge you to watch the video and explain how it could have been selectively edited. I find the selective editing argument infuriating because basically it allows one to unendingly deny evidence. I think Israel defenders are like 9/11 truthers in this regard—yes, evidence can be and should be reasonably questioned, but at a certain point one has to accept that plausibility rests on the likelyhood that what you see is what actually happened. There is an overwhelming amount of documentation of Israel firing on unarmed demonstrators, and if you really want me to, I can start posting links to it or forwarding it to your email address privately if you honestly promise that you would change your rhetoric upon viewing them.
But I don't want this discussion to be sidetracked to debates about the theory of non-violent protest.
I want you to learn and acknowledge that much non-violent protest does occur in Palestine and that Israel responds violently to it all. Once we agree on the basic facts we can proceed with a discussion.
If you like, I will be happy to concede that Hamas shelling is violence and as such is deplorable, as all violence, is. I think you will find, examining the historical record, though, that Zionist militias introduced the practice of indiscriminatory violence against civilian targets by means of car bombings, market bombings, etc. as far back as the 1930s.
But rockets in Sderot do not justify firing on unarmed protestors in Bil'in and N'ilin and Jayyous. They have been having unarmed protests every week for years. There in fact should be a very high level of "trust" if that is your paradigm, and yet violence against them continues. These protests are not aligned with Hamas, and their leaders have openly renounced the principles of violence and extended the hand of human rights and friendship to Jews and Israelis.
Will you state that you support them? They seem to follow all of your demands.
Israel state violence against civillians certainly predates the existence of Hamas– Eliabun in late 1948, Kafr Qasim in 1956, etc. The Land Day protests of 1976 were a famous incident of unarmed protestors being shot, with 4 killed and hundreds wounded. Israeli government commissions have admitted that firing on unarmed Palestinians citizen of Israel in October of 2000 contributed to the outreak of the 2nd Intifada.
"I want you to learn and acknowledge that much non-violent protest does occur in Palestine and that Israel responds violently to it all. Once we agree on the basic facts we can proceed with a discussion."
How can you state "all" in a statement and expect it to be a discussion of facts. I can't see "all". Again, I didn't see the video, so am not making a comment on that specific incident.
It is necessary to talk about the consequences of non-violent vs violent approaches, and its extension between violence at actual military occupation vs terror on civilians residing within Israel.
I support non-violent resistance against the occupation, and reserve my judgement as to whether I advocate for everything that people say in doing so.
As all important struggles imply, it takes long-standing determination to accomplish social change. The idea that a suggestion, or an idea floated, IS a change of heart, is false.
When one asserts that they are a humanist, an opponent of oppression, then I would expect that they would affirm that value in how the conduct every action, that every action include a predisposition and persistent respect of the humanity of the other.
Otherwise, its just a pendulum swing, swinging wider or less, depending on degree of hate in the dissent.
I hope you acknowledge that there are many ironies associated with EVERY assertion by every side. For example, prior to the intifada in 87, Palestinians had much freer movement, and could relatively meet their families across the green line. Also, there were many more friend personal relationships between individual Israelis and Palestinians.
The intifada and moreso the Iraq shelling of Israeli cities (and the PA acknowledged embarrassment at siding with Saddam Hussein), convinced Israeli officials that the prior assumption of annexation was impossible and unjust, and Madrid and Oslo discussions and agreements resulted.
I consistently advocate for the green line as border, in conformance with the Arab League proposal (with the exception of the Jewish parts of the old city of Jerusalem remaining Israeli).
And, I also consistently advocate for color-blind title assessments in the West Bank and in Israel, with a strong preference for compensation to perfect title rather than the forced removal of any more hundreds of thousands from any community.
Anything less than that seems cruel to me, especially if there is any ethnic screen applied.
Ed, good comment! Not even my oversensitive self could detect any of those old 50's right-wing tropes. Good job, and thanks.
"And, I also consistently advocate for color-blind title assessments in the West Bank and in Israel,"
Oh, the Palestinians are a different "color" from us, Richard? I never knew!
Tell us, O Richard, what color are your Jews and what color the Palestinians?
Am I changing (probably) or are you (probably, too)? One thing I've noticed is that the more time that Jews spend studying this issue, and spending on sites like this, the less haywire their "anti-semitism" detectors go when people speak plainly instead of in politically correct code.
One thing that I've learned is that it is essential to distinguish between factions of Jews (ie “the Jews” from Jewish Zionists), because plenty of factions indeed have plenty of good will. For a long time I harbored grave and dark doubts about exactly how many Jews contained an iota of good will on this issue. I'm happy to report there are far more than I originally thought, even if their definition of "good will" doesn't exactly match mine.
Palestinian non-violent protest has a long history, for example,
the period 1935-1939 provides a monumental turning point for Palestine and Palestinians. One of the notables of that period was Akram Zeiter. He was born in Nablus in 1909 and studied at AlNajah College, AUB, and AlHuqooq College in Jerusalem at a time when the geographic continuity of bilad Alsham was notable and the main issues were the Arab resistance to Turkish Ottoman Rule and then WW1. He came of age under the British occupation which started in 1919. At age 20, he left his teaching position in Acre and became editor of Mira’at Alsharq in Jerusalem. He was arrested and imprisoned 3 months later and then “deported” to Nablus where he intensified his work against the British occupation. He cofounded Hizb AlIstiqlal and was arrested in the uprising of 1936. Later he headed an Arab delegation to Latin America and wrote a book about that experience. In 1980 he published “Diaries of Akram Zeiter: Palestinian patriotic movement 1935-1939”. He explains that the origin of the 1935 revolt began with distress over the British occupation and its unjust policies of supporting land transfer to the Jewish agency.
>That we tend to forget is that the current violence is a relatively new phenomena. Since 1967 and for the first 20 years of occupation, the West Bank was fairly quiet. I remember, as a kid, how we traveled there during weekends, went shopping and sightseeing. Yes, the PLO carried on the armed fight, but this was done mostly from other countries – Jordan, later on Lebanon, and finally Tunisia.
So Israel was not oppressive in the West Bank when there was little violence from the West Bank.
>But guess what – this nonviolent struggle never made Israel even think about abandoning the land it conquered or hand the Palestinians any civil and political rights.
Non-violent struggle? You mean like hijacking airplanes, attempting an armed takeover of Jordan, blowing up schoolbuses? Please tell me when the PLO was non-violent? And remember that during this time Israel was told over and over that the PLO was the only legitimate representative of the Palestinian people.
Ed, you indeed seem to be abandoning some of the mis-conceptions and tropes I, at least, thought were plaguing your otherwise sound conclusions on the issue.
For me, it's simple. It's the situation, the colonial-settler project. Zionism is not, by a long shot, the only one, and they all bring up the same exigencies, operate under the same strictures and schemas, and demand pretty much the same responses. None of this is exclusive to Jews. And when the aquisition of land and state power is at issue, all who choose that path, or are compelled or minipulated into it, will act pretty much the same.
How poetic. It's almost as if you want to excuse the fact that there is an occupation going on, that the Palestinians are stateless because of Israel and that the Palestinians have little to no other means to retaliate in due kind to Israel's own "murder". (I have a feeling you still justify Gaza and will do so over and over.) Why is it that it is a broken record that everything has to be decontextualised and that every Palestinian grievance is removed to fit into the role of "Israel's self-defense". To minimise the relationship of violence with bigotry and inequality (and humiliation and denial of existence) to something so elementary as this reasoning is to give every favour to the stronger party to continue to wield its power to dictate its own rules to its own oppressed peoples.
This world would look very, very different and we would not be upholding such values and trying to apply them to the Third World if we used this type of thinking to every political conflict in years and centuries past. Think of where you could apply this to mold it into a defense of imperialism, colonialism and subjugation of the weaker natives over the stronger armed colonists. They all could have used this defense of their brutish acts (and they all did, Mandela is not some kind of angel, he is, as shall we say it, a "murderer") but somehow people didn't want to be on the wrong side of a racist regime fighting another people who wanted rights and freedom. When it comes to this, we read the Witty line over and over and it just doesn't fit with the way history has dealt with it. Liberation is/was not going to be given up lightly by anyone who is profiting so much from the imbalance.
Greetings from Old Damascus.
Excellent comment, Joshua – thanks.
"Palestinians are stateless because of Israel"
What bullshit. The Palestinians are stateless because of Jordan and Egypt.
Which is why when things get quiet in the occupied territories or in countries they target for destabilization, Israel attacks and kills a load of people to provoke a reaction. A reaction that will be amplified ten-fold by the Western press, and without any mention of an Israel atrocity carried out only days or weeks earlier.
This is actually quite an old-school Israeli tactic, one of which was used to justify the theft of the Golan from Syria in 1967, justify the destruction of Beruit in '82, etc – and of course just recently the slaughter in Gaza.
Actually, I'm hard pressed to think of a military operation carried out that wasn't provoked purposely first. The Yom Kippur war is probably the only one, and even that was a result of Israel's refusal to negotiate with the Egyptians over territory Israel stole in '67 – when they were offering a full peace treaty based on returning the Sinai. After the war they got back the Sinai(the goal of the attack); Israel later made a big deal out of Sadat coming to the Knesset to 'finally' recognize Israel's existence(crowing about how Israel's hand had always been extended for peace)when he had offered to come to Israel before the war and make peace….
Yeh, those Jordanians and Egyptians rolled over from Europe and grabbed up the land.