In the hours since President Trump said he was agnostic about whether Israel and Palestine should be two states or one, many supporters of Israel have taken to the airwaves to cite the danger that a one-state outcome would pose to Israel’s Jewish majority. These folks also said that one-state would bring violence; but the emphasis was the threat to Israel’s status as a Jewish state.
Last night on MSNBC, for instance, Jeremy Ben-Ami, the head of the liberal Zionist group J Street, said that Israel cannot be both democratic and Jewish if it is one state; and all its military leaders say so. In the same episode, Chris Matthews spoke of one state in alarmist terms, describing the “bomb” that Israel faces in Palestinian population numbers in a one-state scenario.
Just look at these numbers, just so people know the problem, the population bomb over there – 6.3 million Jewish people, 6.2 million Palestinians in Israel, in the territories. I mean, it`s just a problem.
Today Senator Ben Cardin, who identifies as an ardent Zionist, expressed the same concern at a hearing. “I don’t see how Israel can remain Jewish and democratic” with a one-state outcome, he said. “The demographics are unambiguous in this regard.”
The Union for Reform Judaism also saw Trump’s statement “darkly,” saying that it spells the end of a Jewish, democratic Israel. Rabbi Rick Jacobs:
The question is: can Israelis and Palestinians live with it in a way that allows for a Jewish, democratic State of Israel and realization of the legitimate rights and aspirations of the Palestinians. And the answer to that question remains “no.” Only a two-state solution can achieve the goals of the Israelis and Palestinians.
That is why we see President Trump’s abdication of the longtime, bipartisan support for a two-state solution so darkly. It is potentially devastating to the prospects for peace and Israel’s Jewish, democratic future.
Earl Blumenauer is a Congressman from Oregon, supported by J Street. He writes:
Astounding. Just when we thought it couldn’t get worse or more chaotic, Trump considers one-state solution–which is no solution at all.
Jeremy Ben-Ami, the president of J Street, retweeted that, saying:
One state is the problem not the solution. For those like
@repblumenauer who want Israel to be democratic natl home of the Jewish people.
J Street’s statement on the Trump comments— “One State is the Problem, Not the Solution”– emphasized the likelihood of violence, though it also cited the state’s Jewish identity:
To be clear, there is no one-state configuration that leads to peace. There is no resolution to this conflict without full political rights and independence for both peoples. All so-called “one-state solutions” are recipes for more violence that will ultimately threaten Israel’s identity as a democracy and a Jewish homeland.
NY Rep. Jerrold Nadler emphasized the Jewish democratic angle, along with the violence:
Trump abandoning a 2SS–Jewish & democratic Israel living next to a Palestinian state–leaves Israel less secure & peace much more elusive.
Peace Now’s statement on the “terrifying” press conference also expressed those concerns, Israel’s Jewish future, and violence:
the two leaders are not only depriving Israel of the very possibility of reaching peace but also undermining Israel’s own future as a democracy and a Jewish state. They are delivering a huge victory to extremists on both sides.
In a piece that came out in USA Today anticipating the Trump indifference about one state, Senators Dianne Feinstein (CA) and Senator Martin Heinrich of New Mexico baldly stressed the population numbers, as the most important issue with one state– even more important than the potential for violence:
Perhaps most importantly, without an independent Palestine by its side, Israel cannot be both a democratic and majority Jewish state. Today, the Jewish people are already a minority between the Mediterranean and the Jordan River. There are 6.3 million Jewish Israelis compared to 6.6 million non-Jewish minorities, most of them Palestinian Arabs.
Since the Jewish people are already a minority, a one-state solution cannot be both majority Jewish and democratic. We have not heard a plausible proposal where a one-state solution wouldn’t require a Jewish minority to govern a non-Jewish majority
By contrast, on PBS News Hour last night, Shibley Telhami had a non-hysterical discussion of one state. Telhami spoke of the left’s support for one-state: “not a Jewish state– a democratic state for Arabs and Jews.” And he mentioned the rightwing support for “an apartheid state.” He also said that the one-state idea was appealing to many Palestinians, even if they did not regard it as realistic. Here he cited population numbers: “If they can have a full equal relationship within Israel, of course they would [support it], because ultimately they’re going to be a majority… It is a non starter for Israelis, undoubtedly.”
Two comments: It would be helpful if these speakers addressed the 20 percent of “Israel proper” that is not Jewish. About the same number of Americans are non-Christian; in the U.S. we would find it insupportable if the U.S. made it official policy that it’s a Christian state.
And as to the fear of greater violence in one state, this is surely legitimate. But the problem with emphasizing this fear is that it tends to be very Jewish-centric. What do I mean? Well, there’s one state right now in which violence is dished out regularly to Palestinians, so the real problem in Israel Palestine is not prospective, it’s before our eyes, but that’s never the problem; and the concern that Israel will become an apartheid state amounts to a denial of the reality for Palestinians today, that it is an apartheid state. As to the unstated but looming apprehension that Israel and Palestine will become Algeria, and many Jewish Israelis will flee– only a fool would say that that is not a possible outcome, and a concerning one. But that apprehension cannot justify the tyranny that exists right now, in which the conflict is “managed,” and Palestinians have no rights. The American revolutionaries were rather succinct about the use of violence to achieve their rights.
“That is why we see President Trump’s abdication of the longtime, bipartisan support for a two-state solution so darkly. It is potentially devastating to the prospects for peace and Israel’s Jewish, democratic future. –
Trump is just responding to Israel’s facts. 50 years of building. It’s not Trump’s fault that Judaism stood by while the building went on. ”
What do soi disant Liberal Jews expect ?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tcliR8kAbzc
from Moshiach.com: The husband tells the wife, “The Rabbi said that soon we will no longer suffer from the Cossacks, the Messiah is about to come and take us all to Israel.” The wife thinks for a while and says, “Tell the Messiah to leave us alone. Let him take the Cossacks to Israel!”
Liberal Jews tried to ride the tiger and hope for the best . They didn’t care about Palestinian rights because the implications of reason and justice were less than the cost of loss of acceptance in the big Jewish tent. Rav Rick is now being hoist on his own petard. Palestinian rights do actually matter,
Back in 2014 the Presbyterians had a vote
https://ericyoffie.com/presbyterians/
“Like virtually all Jewish leaders, I am not too happy at the moment with the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) for its profoundly unfortunate and mistaken decision to divest from three companies that it claims “further the Israeli occupation in Palestine.” But I am not any happier with Jewish Voice for Peace, a small Jewish activist group that was only too happy to help the Presbyterians along.
I could see their success on Sunday morning, June 22, when Heath Rada, the church’s moderator, appeared on CNN with Rabbi Rick Jacobs of the Union for Reform Judaism. …..Rabbi Jacobs noted that the church’s vote had caused pain and dismay among American Jews”
http://www.haaretz.com/reform-rabbi-rick-jacobs-american-jews-are-afraid-to-talk-about-israel.premium-1.477429
• Rabbi Rick Jacobs, president of the Union for Reform Judaism, says U.S. Jewry is “afraid” to conduct internal discussions regarding Israel.
• “Conversations about Israel often get polarized,” Jacobs told Haaretz this week, “so we’ve stopped having them. And that’s the worst kind of disengagement there is.”
• In an interview with Haaretz, Jacobs said that American Jews are applying stricter definitions to the meaning of “pro-Israel.” The ever-diminishing circle of who is included in the word “we,” he adds, “has gotten so small that it’s a shame.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zuuObGsB0No
The heart of the matter has always been holding to the pipe dream of a “pure” ethnic state. Yet such has been a major part of Judaism since its beginning. Only in the 1800’s when Jews were emancipated were the Jews faced with an existential question they had not faced previously: Should the assimilate to the extant they would be participating members of the larger society as a whole, or should they retreat within their own self-imposed “ghetto”? Before this time, there was no worry. the larger society as a whole allowed or more likely, forcibly imposed this segregation of Jewish society from its neighbors. But, what happens when those artificial barriers are lifted? Zionism is the reaction to emancipation. It is the creation of an artificial “ghetto” or “shtetl”. Yet reality has a nasty habit of reasserting itself. Will the Jews give Palestinians equal rights in Israeli society? If they do, no matter how much Netanyahu and his friends beg and threaten, Israel will cease to be a “Jewish” state. Frankly, one of the things I despised about the Obama administration was the use of the phrase “Jewish state”. A state is a state is a state…it is not up to the US or anyone else to define it. If Israel wants to keep the land and transfer the indigenous population, a regional war will ensue and the idea of Israel will be buried under all the bodies. Finally, it the Jews decide to keep the land and make the Palestinians residents of “bantustans”, the world will sanction Israel endlessly and it will cease to be a modern state in any sense of the word.
Time and again, Zionists make it abundantly clear that “Jewish State” supremacism – with or without its ill-fitting “Jewish and democratic” disguise – matters more to them than do justice, accountability and equality.
Time and again, Zionists make it abundantly clear that they are content to undermine international laws and human rights and the protections they are meant to afford to all people.