“We will soon be the majority!” says a huge billboard in the heart of Tel-Aviv in Arabic, showing Palestinians with Palestinian flags. As Walla reports (Hebrew), many Israelis have “erroneously thought this to be a hostile takeover of the media by Palestinian terror organizations”. But this is a completely Israeli, Zionist campaign – in fact a liberal-Zionist campaign from the ‘center’ of politics.
A parallel television campaign is running at the same time. It starts by saying the phrase in Arabic, and then translating it into Hebrew with a caricatured Arabic accent. The ad ends with warnings from various Israeli security officials saying that soon ‘they’ will be the majority and that there’s no choice – we “have to separate from the Palestinians – now!”
The campaign is meant to frighten Jewish Israelis. It’s meant to spur them into action. This is actually the work of an Israeli ‘liberal’ organization called “Commanders for Israel’s Security.” The movement is comprised of some 200 senior commanders of IDF, Shin Bet, Mossad and police, and was endorsed by former PM Ehud Barak at last year’s Herzliya Conference.
Typically, the English description of the organization’s work that appears on the front page of its website is much more politically correct than the Hebrew version. The English version seems to be along the lines of a ‘two-state solution’, described as ‘two-states for two peoples’:
“The Government of Israel shall initiate a regional process to consolidate political-security arrangements with the Palestinians and the Arab States. These arrangements will grant Israel permanent and recognized borders that ensure Israel’s security, its solid Jewish majority and the democratic character of the state for years to come.
The agreement with the Palestinians will be based on the principle of “two states for two peoples” and the 1967 line with arrangements and adjustments as dictated by Israel’s security and demographic needs. Only this path will prevent the creation of a bi-national state.
Realities in the Middle East make it necessary, and the Arab Peace Initiative makes it possible to achieve a combined agreement – with the Arab States and the Palestinians – that significantly enhances Israel’s national security interests.
Israel’s security forces have the power to secure the borders agreed upon by the government of Israel and endorsed by the Israeli people.”
So far, it seems to dovetail rather nicely with the ‘Kerry logic’.
But it’s somewhat different when you open the Hebrew version which is much more candid.
When opening their front page in Hebrew, a 20-second audio description runs automatically and describes the organization’s four goals as:
1) Strengthening security of Israeli citizens
2) Strengthening our standing in the world
3) Mending the tear in the nation
4) Opening for future negotiations
The message ends with the slogan: “No waiting for a partner – we’re taking the initiative. Security now! Peace – later.”
At the center of the Hebrew front page there is a more elaborate description. It starts with the red headline “No partner is not a strategy.” This is a reference that leans heavily upon Barak’s slogan after his fictitious ‘generous offer’ in Camp David 2000, and the belief that ‘there is no partner for peace’. The headline on the page both strengthens the ‘no partner’ claim, as well as the need to take unilateral action. But what is that action, exactly, when it is said in Hebrew? Here is the rest of the Hebrew description of the goals, on the front page:
“SECURITY FIRST is an outline for an independent Israeli initiative, not reliant upon a partner.
The outline reflects the attitude, that between viable peace and passive alleviation of the existent threats, there exists a wide array of possibilities for initiative that would improve and promote the national goals of Israel.
The plan presents NEW APPROACH combining the need to enhance the personal and national security and the need for full security control of West Bank, preserving conditions which will enable, with time, negotiations regarding final-status and improvement of Israel’s regional and international standing.” [my emphases in last paragraph].
In other words, the emphasis of the initiative is not really ‘peace’ – that’s for ‘later’. Its emphasis is security, the one word which can unite Israelis like no other, and of course Israel’s PR image. “Full security control of the West Bank” is the goal while leaving the matter of possible negotiations to an indefinite point in the future.
When this is summed up, one wonders how this really differs from Netanyahu, when he had to backpedal from his promise that there will be no Palestinian state under his watch? Netanyahu’s pre-election remarks were for the Israeli public to get him elected (and they arguably did), but he had to do an ‘international version’ in English after the elections for some cosmetic diplomatic damage control. Netanyahu reassured international audiences by saying “I want a sustainable and peaceful two-state solution, but circumstances have to change for that to happen.” In the end every side got what it wanted – Israelis knew Netanyahu meant what he said before elections, and the US could say that he endorsed two states again and that there’s ‘hope’.
The Commanders for Israeli Security, whilst ostensibly separating themselves from the ‘delusional’ recent suggestions for annexation of West Bank territories by rightwing ministers (as the organization’s head Genreal (res.) Amnon Reshef notes in the Walla interview), nonetheless portray a no less nationalistic vein and attitude. Its main motto is ‘separation’, naturally in order to secure the sacred Zionist goal of Jewish demographic superiority and sovereignty. But whilst it emphasizes the diplomatic aspect and the need to preserve ‘democracy’ in the English face, it works on a much more coarse, nationalistic and blatantly racist line in the Hebrew version directed at Jewish Israelis, and its Arabic mock campaign just takes the cake.
It’s not strange for centrist, liberal Zionists to say their goal is “maximum Jews on maximum land with maximum security and with minimum Palestinians” – that’s MK Yair Lapid’s line.
The Commanders for Israel’s Security reveal in their campaign the true, racist face of liberal Zionism.
One religion-supremacist “Jewish State” in as much as possible of Palestine containing as small as possible a “demographic threat” + absolution of obligations under international law and accountability for past and on-going (war) crimes = what Zionists like jon s refer to as “peace”.
Hilarious – The agreement with the Palestinians will be based on the principle of “two states for two peoples” and the 1967 line with “arrangements and adjustments as dictated by Israel’s security and demographic needs.”
Of course, no mention of security for the Palestinians from the illegal settler squats who will not stop their fanatical, messianic rampage for sure.
Silly me, I get it now; Palestinians only have those rights which do not conflict with the “right” that Israeli Jews had to steal most of their land.
Oh my yes, Israels definition of “peace” means Jewish supremacism and a religion-supremacist “Jewish State” in as much as possible of Palestine.
Most certainly Israel would want peace…once it is done ethnically cleansing all of Palestine.
I think I’ll grab a bottle of wine, a bag of popcorn and a deck chair and enjoy the sh*t show that is Israel to come.
It has been clear to me for years that Israel will eventually annex huge parts of the West Bank, and press for the bits of Palestine that remain to be confederated with Jordan, as if that makes things ok for the dispossessed Palestinians. If you read the comments section across the internet, the Hasbarists clearly think or dishonestly argue that Palestinians came from Jordan, and that Jordan is the only true Palestinian homeland. I can see Israel making a take it or leave it offer with large-scale support from our stupid and craven American politicians.
And I find it so ironic that Jewish senators like Al Franken have been grilling Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions about his role in the desegregation of Alabama, but would never in a million years acknowledge and criticize the presence of Jim Crow in Israel and the occupied territories. This hypocrisy on the part of the Jewish establishment must be exposed.
Wow. Black propaganda. But why should we be surprised. Shocked, yes, but not surprised.
To borrow a phrase: Palestinians have no rights that any Israeli Jew is bound to respect.
The sad thing is that this is no different from current US foreign policy in the Middle East. Our leaders are constantly and publicly floating their vision for democracy and peace in the region, yet in reality the establishment of democracy and peace is not in any shape or form their prime objective or even on the agenda. That’s “for later”. Everything else falls under the vast umbrella of “security”.
Bombing a civilian hospital? Security. Hundreds of indiscriminate drone strikes every single day of the week? Security. 1000 more boots on the ground? Security. $100 million in cash to the new leader of some obscure right-wing political party? Security. $30 million is cash to the opposing leader from another village, town or city? Security. Destabilizing the Assad regime, arming rebel terrrorist fighters to bring about a brutal civil war that has killed and displaced millions and millions of civilians? Security. Billions in arms sales of the best weapons and tech on the planet to a highly oppressive monarchy in Saudi Arabia that has since moved on to destabilize neighboring Yemen with American support and military intervention? Security.
Our own Orwellian double-speak and actions are right out of the now 70 year old Israel playbook of eternal conflict, never-ending occupation and constant destabilization, displacement and dispossession. All in the name of bringing about “peace” and “democracy” and “securing our interests”. When our leaders use this language, as they do, we must be aware that there is, as they say, “no daylight between us and Israel.”
These are “shared interests and values” every single US President and Member of Congress speak of when they quote from their AIPAC written policy manual. This is the kind of so-called “peaceful democratic values” they espouse. Not civil rights. Not equality. Not liberty and certainly not justice for all. Peace through “security”. Peace through the barrel of the biggest gun money can buy and under the trillion dollar jackboot of unending military occupation. As Orwell himself said, “War is Peace”.