Thomas Friedman just wrote a column about Israel for The New York Times that says the Palestinian issue doesn’t matter. “[T]he Arab-Israel conflict for Israel… has largely disappeared,” he says. Israel is in the same boat as the U.S., building a diverse “idealistic” country in the face of rightwing trends.
This approach by the leading foreign affairs columnist is significant. It shows how liberal Zionists are responding to the bad news Israel got in January, being labeled an apartheid state by a leading Israeli human rights organization, at a time of “mounting recognition” of this fact internationally.
Liberal Zionists and the New York Times have ignored the apartheid charge. They don’t seem to care that an organization led by Jews has designated Israel an apartheid state so long as nobody who matters– American government officials– cares about it.
Here are Friedman’s observations about Israel. His big idea is a liberal Zionist staple, America and Israel are in the same boat.
Their defining external threat of the second half of the 20th century — the Cold War for America and the Arab-Israel conflict for Israel — which had a huge binding effect on both nations, has largely disappeared, and nothing remotely as compelling has come along to cement national solidarity.
The fact that half of Israel/Palestine’s population has no rights is nothing to lose sleep over when you’re thinking of big ideas. Friedman can’t bring himself to mention Palestinians, or the occupation.
Israel’s most important demographic tipping point, though, is not the one you think — i.e., not just with the Arabs — it’s with its exploding ultra-Orthodox Jewish population…
[G]overnments… have to keep mortgaging Israel’s future to the ultra-Orthodox for short-term political gains….
Israel is a robust democracy just like America, with a rightwing problem.
In short, to thrive in the 21st century both America and Israel need to define anew what it means to be a pluralistic democracy — with big, idealistic aspirations — at a time when their populations have become so much more diverse.
A big idealistic country. No mention of the fact that Israel is now under investigation by the International Criminal Court for its illegal settlement project.
Tom Friedman has said that his job entails promoting Israel. He was explicit about that in remarks to the 92d Street Y in 2019:
Israel had me at hello. Whatever you think folks– don’t worry. In times of crisis, I know where I will be. When the Jewish state is under threat–
But I worry about– I’m 66, I’ve been the foreign affairs columnist [at the New York Times] for 21 years– what about the next generation? Will the next foreign affairs columnist– we got David Brooks, we got Bret Stephens, we’re all sort of the same generation, one that socialized in a different era– Will they [the next foreign affairs columnist] get that buzz when they see an El Al plane landing in Beijing? That’s what worries me.
And his ignoring the apartheid charge follows in a long pattern of ignoring bad news for Israel.
But his indifference here to Palestinians is a sad reflection on liberal Zionists. It suggests that their endorsement of the two state solution is a fig leaf. If there is no threat to Israel and people don’t raise a stink about the Palestinians, they are happy to do nothing to change the status quo.
Israel’s apartheid regime is under more and more pressure. B’Tselem said in January that the country maintains an “apartheid regime” of “Jewish supremacy” between the river and the sea. While in the London Review of Books, Nathan Thrall called out liberal Zionists for enabling apartheid by promoting a “delusion,” that there is one regime of democracy on one side of the Green line and a “provisional” military occupation “somewhere outside the state” –when actually all state institutions have supported the conquest and settlement of Palestinian land for decades.
It will be interesting to see how J Street counters the new awareness of Israel’s conduct at its conference later this month. It has maintained that apartheid is an unfair description of the occupation, and has noted the apartheid charge in a “by the way” manner.
h/t Donald Johnson.
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Attention;Thomas Friedman!!
Manifesto – all (onestatecampaign.org)
One Democratic State Campaign
Preamble
“In recent years, the idea of a one democratic state in all of historic Palestine as the best solution to the conflict has re-emerged. It started gaining increased support in the public domain. It is not a new idea. The Palestinian liberation movement, before the catastrophe of 1948 (the Nakba) and after it, had adopted this vision, including the Palestinian Liberation Organization. The PLO abandoned this idea in the framework of the diplomatic negotiations at the late eighties that led to the Oslo agreement of 1993. The Palestinian leadership hoped that this agreement would enable the building of an independent Palestinian state on the territories that Israel occupied in 1967. But on the ground Israel has strengthened its colonial control, fragmenting the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza into isolated cantons, separated from one another by settlements, checkpoints, military bases and fences.
“The two-state solution, which is basically an unfair solution, is clearly dead. Israel buried it deep under its colonial settlement policies in the territories that were supposed to become the independent Palestinian state. Israel has imposed a single repressive regime that extends over all the Palestinians who live in historic Palestine, including those with Israeli citizenship.
“In view of these dangerous developments, and, more important, based on the values of justice, freedom and democracy, we contend that the only way to achieve justice and permanent peace is dismantling the colonial apartheid regime in historic Palestine and the establishment of a new political system based on full civil equality, and on full implementation of the Palestinian refugees’ Right of Return, and the building of the required mechanisms to correct the historical grievances of the Palestinian people as a result of the Zionist colonialist project. (cont’d)
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“On this background, many activists and groups, Palestinians and Israelis, have recently initiated the revival of the one-state idea, proposing differing models of such a state, such as a bi-national state, a liberal democratic state and a socialist state. They are all united, however, in their commitment to the establishment of a single democratic state in all of historic Palestine, as an alternative to the colonial apartheid regime that Israel has imposed over the country from the Mediterranean Sea to the Jordan River. A similar regime was toppled by the joint struggle of black and white South Africans under the leadership of the ANC in 1994.
“The goal of this political program, as formulated by the One Democratic State Campaign (ODSC), is to widen the support for this solution among the local populations, Palestinian and Israeli alike, as well as among the international public. We call on all those in the world who struggle for freedom and justice to join and support our struggle against this apartheid regime and for the establishment of a democratic state free of occupation and colonialism, based on justice and equality, which guarantees a better future for the next generations and real peace in all of historic Palestine.”
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Very interesting, very revealing:
Pfizer halts delivery of Covid-19 vaccines to ‘banana republic’ Israel after bill goes unpaid amid political infighting – media | Defend Democracy Press
“Pfizer halts delivery of Covid-19 vaccines to ‘banana republic’ Israel after bill goes unpaid amid political infighting – media” Defend Democracy Press, April 6/21
“Calling Israel a ‘banana republic,’ Pfizer has frozen further deliveries of the Covid-19 vaccine until it gets paid for the last 2.5 million doses, Israeli media reported. The blow comes amid political infighting in Tel Aviv.
“Some 700,000 doses of the Pfizer vaccine were expected in Israel on Sunday, after Passover ended, but were delayed until further notice on grounds that the previous shipment hadn’t been paid for, the Jerusalem Post reported.
“Pfizer executives reportedly called Israel a ‘banana republic’ and said they couldn’t understand how something like this could happen in an organized country, a correspondent for Galatz, the Israeli army radio, said Monday on ‘Good Morning Israel.’
“Pfizer’s only official comment was that its original contract with Israel for an unspecified number of doses, signed in November 2020, had expired and that they were working to ‘update the agreement’ and ‘supply additional vaccines to the country.’
“’While this work continues, shipments may be adjusted,’ Pfizer added in a statement.
“Israel has reportedly bought 15 million doses of the vaccine made by Pfizer and BioNTech, as well as 12 million more of the Moderna and AstraZeneca jabs. The country has spent 2.6 billion shekels ($788 million), with another 2.5 billion shekels ($758 million) reserved for further purchases, a health ministry representative told legislators last month.
“The figures, disclosed for the first time at the request from Knesset Finance Committee chairman Moshe Gafni, showed that Israel had paid a price per dose ‘much higher’ than previously believed.
“The Israeli health ministry sought approval to get 30 million more doses, but the meeting they requested for last Monday was canceled due to a conflict between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his coalition partner Benny Gantz, Israeli media reported.”. (cont’d)
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“According to the Jerusalem Post, Gantz called the meeting off because Netanyahu refused to confirm Gantz as justice minister, leaving him in acting capacity after his term expired on April 1. However, Gantz’s office said that the purchase of the 2.5 million Pfizer vaccines had already been approved and that the payment delay was the fault of Health Minister Yuli Edelstein, a member of Netanyahu’s Likud party. The health ministry has not commented on the situation.”
“Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla was supposed to visit Israel in early March to negotiate further deliveries and possibly even production of the Covid-19 vaccine there. He canceled the trip five days before its scheduled date, however, saying he and his team weren’t fully vaccinated and would gladly come later after ‘coronavirus restrictions are lifted or improve, and allow better visiting conditions.’
“However, a NGO critical of Likud called Achrayut Leumit (National Responsibility) called on the government to prevent Bourla’s visit, calling it ‘prohibited election propaganda’ using health ministry resources to boost Netanyahu’s election prospects.
“An estimated 6,248 people have died in Israel after testing positive for Covid-19, since the beginning of the pandemic.”
As for Israel’s idealism, someone – I forget who – noted that the trouble with bad ideals is not so much that they are bad, but that they are ideals. Israel’s ideal, of a mono-religious state, is like the ideal of the foreigners who went to fight for ISIS.