Consider this quote from a 1985 debate (beginning around 17:00):
We are faced with a problem, and that problem is the contradiction between Zionism, Judaism, on the one hand, and western democracy on the other. . . I think it is contempt for the Arab to state that a good Arab would accept living in the State of Israel. What Arab wants to live in a state which defines itself legally de jure as the Jewish State. . . What Arab citizen of Israel, stands up every morning and thinks of the fact that his national anthem, Hatikvah, speaks such words as nefesh yehudi homiyah, the soul of a Jew yearns. What Arab can sing those words? . . . I understand that no Israeli Arab on Independence Day runs out into the streets to celebrate his defeat. I understand that. I understand that when an Arab lives in a state that has a law of return which applies to Jews only, he isn’t happy about that. And I understand that if Israel would be a western democracy which allows Arabs and Jews to have equal rights, political rights, that some day they could become the majority, and then there will not be a Jewish State, for no Arab, no self-respecting Arab, and they are all self-respecting Arabs, they all have national pride, no Arab if he has a majority will ever agree to live in a state that calls itself the Jewish State. And there will be a law of return for Arabs, and rightly so, under democracy.
Who spoke with such clarity and empathy of the predicament faced by Palestinian citizens of Israel? Was it Mandela? Chomsky? No, it was Meir Kahane, Orthodox Rabbi and Member of Knesset, and unabashed racist thug who incited and applauded murderous violence against civilians and proposed forcible transfer of every last Arab from the land of Israel.
Let’s not fool ourselves. The above Kahane quote may seem refreshingly honest, but he arrived at this kernel of truth only because it served his ideology of expulsion. Elsewhere in this 1985 debate with Alan Dershowitz, Kahane dutifully recites the fabrications of history that have been the mainstay of Zionist mythology: “they” started each war, even 1956, and “we” only fought back, etc. But give the devil his due. In this passage, Kahane clearly articulates a conundrum that many “liberal Zionists,” far more decent people, refuse to even recognize. There is indeed an irreconcilable contradiction between Zionism and democracy. Kahane saw it and prescribed the morally reprehensible solution of complete ethnic cleansing. Anti-Zionists also see the contradiction and insist that equal rights triumph over ethno-religious preferences.
Liberal Zionists are caught in the middle. Their “liberal” side propels them toward equality, but their Zionist inclination makes preservation of the Jewish State the paramount concern. Some simply refuse to see any conflict between equality and the Jewish State at all. “Israel is both a Jewish State and a democracy that provides equal rights to both its Jewish and non-Jewish citizens. Why is that so hard to understand?” Others acknowledge the problem but minimize it, assuming that non-Jewish Arabs must and will accept the inherently inferior status assigned to them in a Jewish State.
Adam and Austin Branion have expertly dissected Peter Beinart’s self-imposed blinders on questions of history and continuing discrimination against Palestinian citizens. Essentially, Beinart’s book briefly mentions the tension between “Zionism and liberal democracy” but then dismisses the problem with a shrug. In his op-ed in the NY Times, he acknowledges that Israel is a “flawed but genuine democracy,” but then insists that Israeli democracy be “vigorously embraced,” as if the “flaw” were a mere blemish on an otherwise beautiful face, and not the intractable problem described by Kahane.
Other liberal Zionists consider the existential dilemma of the “Arab Israeli” in varying degrees before deciding it is something they can live with. Jerome Slater acknowledges that Israel has broken its promises to Arab citizens for 64 years, but believes that the situation could be salvageable with a genuine commitment to equality, with the necessary exception of guaranteeing “return” for Jews but not Palestinians. Gershom Gorenberg’s book The Unmaking of Israel offers a vivid description of the nightmare scenario he foresees as the inevitable result of the one-state solution, but he is willing to sentence Palestinian citizens to a lifetime of outsider-hood to avoid this speculative catastrophe. Bradley Burston even adopts the embarrassing comparison of Israel and the US at age 64, judging 21st century Israel by mid-19th century standards, and implying that full equality is the genuine aspiration of the Jewish State but unfortunately such an advanced concept requires decades (or centuries?) of national maturity before it can be achieved. Imagine if one of the newer countries of the world, say a former “republic” of the USSR or Yugoslavia, enacted anti-Jewish legislation, and in response to world outrage, defended itself by saying that England took a millennium to provide equality to its citizens.
In an ironic and even perverse twist, Kahane, the diehard unapologetic racist criminal, knew that people like Beinart, Slater, Gorenberg, and Burston are refusing to recognize the obvious but uncomfortable truth. Unfortunately, Kahane’s clarity of vision was accompanied by a pathological disregard for the welfare and even lives of fellow human beings he saw as ethnically challenged. Liberal Zionists have much more generous souls and decent instincts, but their devotion to the Jewish State concept trumps all. Ironically, Beinart perfectly captures the source of his own blindness on page 7 of his book, saying that one of the reasons “Israel advocacy” is not persuading American Jewish youth is that “it is intellectually insulting to tell young Jews . . . that they should start with the assumption that Israeli policy is justified, and then work backward to figure out why.” Beinart & co. start with the assumption that the concept of a Jewish State is etched in stone, and then work backward to figure out why. If their starting point were that equality in the land of one’s birth truly is an inalienable right, they would arrive at a very different conclusion. You can say “Jewish and democratic state” 10, 100 or 1000 times fast, but Meir Kahane, of all people, knew an oxymoron when he heard one.
you really nail it at the end david.
All this talk about Beinart and his book but a strange silence about another author who is/was making the rounds in the US: Gilad Atzmon. Other than some ‘noted’ Palestinians trying to distance themselves from “The Wondering Who?” there seems to be very little controversy about that book. Or is it just to hot to touch? Don’t know, but find the contrast intriguing
David Samel wrote:
“Liberal Zionists are caught in the middle. Their “liberal” side propels them toward equality, but their Zionist inclination makes preservation of the Jewish State the paramount concern.”
I think this is letting them off lighty, albeit unintentionally. Being “caught in the middle” implies at the very least being torn between two poles, if not actually having to choose between same.
The fact is there’s been no choosing nor—at least as far as eye can see least—cvvtearing on any big scale for liberal Zionists: How many after all have become One-Staters? And yet, how many have openly or even otherwise rejected the main tenets of liberalism outside of Israel?
Instead of being “caught in the middle” then clearly the far more accurate is that they want it both ways. They want every place and person on earth other than Israelis or Israel to be “liberal”—and indeed condemn those there who are not in the most thundering, derogatory fashion possible—but can’t imagine applying any of those ideas to Israelis generally or Israel.
The political/psychological problem being worked out by Beinart is the clear (to him) problem of the occupation/settlements and — maybe, just maybe — a subliminal (again, for him) problem of the blemishes of Israeli democracy. But he is not alone, and he may turn out to be a leader for people of his politics/ideology/psychology.
And later, after there is (one hopes) movement to end the occupation/settlements, there may come movement on the problem of internal-Israeli democracy.
The problem is that those who dig in their heels most deeply in Israel are the zealots/racists/territorial-maximalists and if they are forced (by a mechanism not yet clear) to leave the OPTs (and Golan), they may strike out at the Palestinian Israelis upon re-entry as it were.
For this reason, it would be better if USA’s “liberal Zionists” could be brought to look at the WHOLE problem instead of at Beinart’s slice of the problem.
“In an ironic and even perverse twist, Kahane, the diehard unapologetic racist criminal, knew that people like Beinart, Slater, Gorenberg, and Burston are refusing to recognize the obvious but uncomfortable truth.”
Most respectable middle class Jewish intellectuals don’t want to lift up the bonnet of Israel and see what’s inside. The truth is the country is run closer to the principles of Kahane than of Beinart.
You don’t turn Gaza back to the 17th century by respecting law or morality.
This schmuck nails it in this video at 2:32
http://eranvered.com/blog/?tag=video-saar-szekely-talking-about-the-occupation
The only reason he can swim in his pool in Greater Tel Aviv is because there are legions of armed Jews (IDF and civilian) abusing human rights in the territories.
And when the respectable middleclass intellectual Jews eventually sever all ties with the settlers the latter will be entitled to feel shafted . Because hypocrisy is at the heart of liberal Zionism- that Tel Aviv is not a settlement but Ariel is. In reality there is no difference.
When Israel eventually breaks the discussion isn’t going to stop at 1967. It’s going to go back to 1948. The original sin.