Last week Dana, who immigrated to the U.S. from Israel, made some important comments here re Palestinian options inside Israel. We asked her to elaborate on those thoughts, and to tell us who she is. She writes:
I must agree with people here (like Mohammad and others) regarding the effectiveness of transplanting national and/or civil movements across time, demographics and geography. Oftentimes it is all too true that we have only a few historical examples to draw on, so we are tempted to borrow language, tactics and strategy and transport them to where they really don't apply. As someone who is [originally] from Israel, I am convinced that merely resorting to non-violent means of resistance will not work given the Israeli mentality as it is today. Perhaps it could have worked once, before hearts got hardened and minds closed up, but not any longer. In addition, the longer I live in America, the more I realize just how deep are the differences between the US and the Israeli cultural and national models, despite some superficial similarities.
One issue to consider is that the US was founded on the concept of assimilation of people from wide backgrounds, ethnicities, classes and origins. In a way, Israel was a melting pot too, with one caveat: assimilation was a desired outcome only for the Jews. No one, even in Zionism's heyday (that supposedly illustrious, glorious past before '67) remotely considered the possibility of integrating WITH (rather than OUTSIDE) the Arab community. Full integration with Arabic people would have been considered a heresy (as in "preposterous idea") in any circle – even those of the most open-minded socialist liberal Zionist founders. The reason is obvious: a key aspect of the Jewish existence (cultural, religious, what not) is a desire to maintain its "purity' (in parenthesis here because that "purity" is highly suspect and has long ago been compromised). As Phil often points out – this built-in wish for separateness is closer to tribalism than anything else (which is where it differs, IMO, from say, racism). Furthermore, Judaism was never an evangelizing religion (except for a brief period of time in history) unlike most Christian and Muslim denominations that actively sought new members. Far from being proactive in bringing others into its fold, Judaism did not try to assimilate others to its world views, customs or traditions, and in fact, the Halacha makes it quite an ordeal to convert – by design. The opposite is also true: Judaism relied from its very beginning on promoting a sense of exceptionalism – virtually by definition. After all, that's what the Covenant was all about, singling Jews out of all others.
What that means in the context of this discussion is that the ones who consider themselves Jewish in Israel (a consideration that is far from clear, at least to me) do not regard the Arabs as fundamentally integrable with themselves. And if integration is precluded, that means associations are fundamentally limited, no matter how many Arabic friends one may have, or the depth of these friendships. An Israeli can be a colleague and/or collegial with an Arab – and many are. But one cannot (or should not, on pain of being ostracized) marry them, date them or otherwise bring them home for dinner as, say, a prospective part of the "family". What that leads to, unfortunately, is a hard separation between Israelis who consider themselves Jews and the country's Arabic residents (much less residents of the territories). Just consider this: so far, in over 60 years, only a party like Hadash has dared cross this boundary (and even that under the guise of "communism", which it has, of course, ditched long ago). Now compare that to the way things are in the US – even going back many decades. Obviously, a very different social and political dynamics.
The bad part – as I have come to see after years of living outside Israel– is that where there's complete separation, there's no respect, and more deeply, no real empathy (though one can still have sympathy). And where there's no respect, all Palestinian resistance – whether violent or non-violent – will be regarded with the utmost disdain, and be reacted to accordingly. The recent Gaza escapade served to show the total callousness with which civilians were treated there (the excuse of Hamas using all Gaza civilians as "human shields "only proved that those civilians must not have made very good shields, did they?). Then think of the horrified reaction in the US to say, something like the Kent state shootings, or the murder of the civil right workers in the South. Would the reaction to "excessive police action" against say Palestinian protesters be similarly horrified in Israel? or would they find a thousand and one way to rationalize it all away – then proceed to commit some more of the same (a la "show them who's boss")?
I once suggested that Palestinians – as a new tactic – could declare themselves as really Jewish (why not; many of them probably descend from the original Jews anyways) who just happen to have adopted certain customs – Christian or Muslim or Samaritan, etc. They can then demand their right to be absorbed in Israel proper under the right of return laws, just as any other descendant of Jewish blood could. After all, if one were to look at Palestinian customs as compared with, eg, the falashi of Ethiopia, or the some recent Russian immigrants, there may be many Palestinian communities who are more similar to the Jews of old (if not the more recent European version) than Israelis care to admit. Interestingly, the reactions to this [admittedly tongue-in-cheek] exercise in gendankenspiel were far more gut-level angry from Israelis (and certain Jewish-Americans) than from Arabs. I found the differences kind of telling. Anyone who doesn't believe it can try this on their own (at your own risk, of course…).
Subsequently, poster Ana Sanchez asked just what can – or should – the Palestinians do to advance their cause in the face of a hardened foe, and I wrote:
Not being a Palestinian myself, I always feel it'd be presumptuous on my part to make potentially life-threatening suggestions for others from the comfort of an armchair far far away from the maddening crowds. But I can't help but think strategically (which is not the same, of course, as devising tactics), so I tend to look at just what could shake the Israeli front – maybe enough to make a difference. Of all the possibilities, the one action that Israelis dread the most is that the Palestinians – en masse – would start agitating for inclusion in the country of Israel. That's because Israelis have become (wrongly and irrationally, IMHO) wedded to the notion of a "Jewish state" – a funny devotion if we look at the endless hand-wringing among the factions perpetually trying to define "what is a Jew". Frankly, for most citizens of Israel, being Jewish does not mean much more than celebrating Hanukkah, dressing up for Purim, having a bar-Mitzvah and for the few who are so inclined – boning up on Jewish history enough to feel perpetually persecuted (and hence justified in whatever one does in the name of "never again"). For the secular person in Israel (and perhaps for many in the diaspora), being Jewish in Israel means – at the root of it – being a member of a 'special" tribe, defined more by whom it excludes than what it stands for. Therefore, it always seemed to me that challenging the tribal boundaries is by far more threatening than any physical violence or agitation for a separate state could ever be.
The one scenario I keep going back to is the [hypothetical] situation where the Palestinians wake up one day and decide that, come to think of it, they'd love to be part of the greater Israel, much as say, the Russian immigrants are, or the extant Christian community in Israel, or the Ba-hai community. Thus turning the struggle overnight into a civil rights battle, waged in courts and newspapers, rather than a physical struggle waged on battlefields. Whether agitating for equal voting rights, or the rights to liberty and happiness – those would be details people can figure out. Maybe the Palestinian leadership could offer any number of lifestyle compromises to convince Israel that they could be perfectly loyal citizens (at least as loyal, as say, some of the ultra-orthodox Jews). To be sure, a civil rights struggle has been suggested by many others, I know, but my interest is more in what the Israeli reaction is likely to be. And this is where we don't need too much imagination to conjure up the utter rage that would greet such a sea change in Palestinian aspiration.
Actually, I believe that most Israelis – were they to believe that the movement is 'for real" – would regard it as an all-out affront – a direct challenge to the tribal boundaries – the "Israel as a Jewish state" myth (which is what it is). The prospect of dealing with Arabs as potential fellow citizens – even if this makes greater Israel a reality – would be something so profoundly threatening to the dominant Israeli psychology that overnight there's likely to be some major clamoring for that much maligned 2-state solution, including the earnest offer of compromises never seen before. After all, if the 2-state scenario has indeed been used by official Israel as a fig leaf to cover up a colonial enterprise, as many of us believe, perhaps two can play at that poker game, no?
I guess what I'm suggesting is that, based on what I know about the Israelis, it'd probably be necessary to find a way to take it to their turf, using similar existential language. If only there was a way to mount a convincing and passionate movement for rights of citizenship, I kind of doubt that Palestinians would have to go as far as to actually start a mad scramble for Purim costumes….or recipes for hanukkah sufganiot…or boning up on Rashi commentary, etc (the Russians sure haven't done the later, have they?).
Sure, this looks like a mere intellectual exercise, but may suggest a few practical steps too. Taking the recent elections in Israel imagine a scenario where the Arabs in East Jerusalem could – and/or would – vote en masse. And suppose they chose to vote for some mixed Jewish-Arab party such as Hadash, rather than a plethora of Arab parties. Based on the results I saw, I believe that given the number of voters, this bloc alone could have garnered Hadash another 2-3 representatives. Enough to be viewed as a potentially disruptive electoral block? sort of an anti-Lieberman movement? Even if this is just an idle exercise (which I realize it is) imagining the reaction in Israel is enough to give one goose-bumps.
And yes, I guess this means that personally, given my gut-level feelings about where most (if not all) Israelis are now, I hold little hope – at least in the short run – that appeals to common humanity will make much difference to most of them. Those who grew up there and went through the school system have indeed developed a remarkable ability to see the ghosts of past persecution in every action – or reaction – by tribal outsiders. The majority of the population – as the recent election proves – have become almost immune to viewpoints that challenge the narratives they were fed (literally from infancy). Sad, but that's just the way it is.
Now who is Dana?
I grew up in Israel – and went through my entire elementary/high school
years there during the late fifties/sixties (from which you can kind of
guess an age range). I did go on to serve in the IDF and got my first
degree in The Hebrew University of Jerusalem before coming to the US,
where I went through a few more University years. I've been a hard
working scientist ever-since. I spent most of my professional life in
California though not without forays of several years in Europe (UK,
France, Holland, Finland). I now split my time between California and
two other states, which makes for a busy life and explains (excuses,
excuses) why I still couldn't get my own blog together (maybe soon?).
I feel far more comfortable now in English than I ever was as a Hebrew
speaker (to the consternation of what family I still have over there
and those few Israeli-Americans I still associate with here. I say
"still" because I had to learn the hard way, that given my own epiphany
on the subject of the Palestinians – and Israel – politics has to be
meticulously avoided – which makes for sometimes laborious, if not
outright boring conversations). I believe that a gestalt shift in
language probably had much to do with my awakening on the Middle East –
perhaps different personas emerge depending on the language used (am
undecided on that score). As I read more I've come to see – over the
course of many years – that the narrative we were brought up on in
Israel had huge gaps, and those gaps made all the difference. These
days I consider myself just another immigrant to the US rather than an
ex-patriate Israeli – which most dual American-Israeli citizens are at
heart – whether they choose to say so or not.
