Tag Archives: Israel

Haaretz’s Correspondent for the Occupied Territories and Israel’s Prime Minister Each Have Something to Say

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Amira Hass was born in Jerusalem in 1956 and has been covering Gaza and the West Bank for the Israeli newspaper Haaretz since 1993. She lived in Gaza for three years and has lived in the West Bank for the past seventeen.

Below is most of a recent article of hers. Her thesis is that “Israel’s attack on Gaza is revenge for the Palestinians’ refusal to accept occupation”. 

Quote: 

“There is method in madness, and the Israeli insanity, which refuses to grasp the extent of its revenge in Gaza, has very good reasons for being the way it is. The entire nation is the army, the army is the nation, and both are represented by a Jewish-democratic government and a loyal press. The four of them work together to stave off the great betrayal: the Palestinians’ refusal to recognize the normalcy of the situation.

The Palestinians are disobedient. They refuse to adapt….The insistent, steadfast demonstrations in West Bank villages have not even scratched the surface of the Israeli faith in the normalcy of our domination of another people. The boycott, divestment and sanctions movement did manage to confuse our ego a bit, but it is still not enough to make Israelis want to get the message. The Palestinian reconciliation government seemed to move us another step forward; it had the potential to embark on the path of rejecting the show of normalcy dictated by Israel, but too many forces within Fatah and Hamas did not support it.

Then it was the turn of Hamas’ rockets to disturb the occupier’s rest. Say what you will about it, but they succeeded in doing what the demonstrations, the boycott of Tapuzina orange drink and the concert cancellations did not….

Nation, army, government and press: You have eyes and ears, yet you will not see and you will not hear. You still hope that the Palestinian blood we have already shed and have yet to shed will win a long-term lull, which will bring us back to occupation as usual….

And boy, are you competent when you want to be. The armed Hamas operatives who emerged from the tunnel shaft on Kibbutz Nir Am on Monday were dressed as Israeli soldiers….“Finally, thanks to an aerial photograph taken by a drone, they were found to be Hamas operatives” because “they were carrying Kalashnikov rifles, which the Israeli army does not use”.

So the photographs taken by the drone can be very precise when its operators wish. It can discern whether there are children on the seashore or on the roof — children who, even for the legal acrobats in the Justice Ministry and the army, are not a justifiable target for our bombs. The drone can also discern that a rescue team has arrived to pull out wounded people, that families are fleeing their homes… But for some reason, the eye of the drone that can tell the difference between various makes of rifles cannot tell that this figure over here is a child, and that is a mother or a grandmother….

The Israeliness of the moment is like that drone. It chooses to see blearily. It clings closely to the good, comfortable life of a master nation, unwilling to allow its subjects to interfere with it. Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon translated that into political language when he said, “We will not agree to recognize the reconciliation government, but other arrangements such as controlling crossing points is something we can accept. [Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Mahmoud] Abbas will control the crossing points, but he will not control the Gaza Strip itself.”

That is the routine we are cultivating. Gaza and the West Bank are cut off. Hamas controls the Gaza Strip, but under conditions that we dictate, just as Fatah and the Palestinian Authority “rule” in their pockets in the West Bank, in accordance with our conditions. If the Palestinians need to be tamed at times, we will tame them with blood and with more blood. And peace be upon Israel.”

End quote.

Concurrently, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu brought up Nazi Germany, comparing Israel being bombarded by those troubling but generally ineffective Palestinian rockets to England’s suffering at the hands of the Germans in World War II. From Jerusalem Online:

PM Benyamin Netanyahu met British Foreign Affairs Minister Philip Hammond and compared Israel’s condition in these days to the condition in Britain in World War 2. “Israel’s condition is similar to Britain’s when it was bombed as well”, said Netanyahu, clarifying that Israel’s intention is to go forth with the operation: “There is no guarantee of a hundred percent success, however IDF has shown impressive achievements in the field and we are moving forward with this operation… We aim our fire at those who fire rockets at us”.

An estimated 40,000 people died in England during the Blitz. Since the latest hostilities began, three Israeli civilians have been killed by Hamas and fewer than 30 in the past 14 years. The Palestinian death toll just this month is now over 1,000, mostly civilians, with bodies still being recovered during the temporary cease-fire.

If we’re going to talk about the Nazis, a more apt comparison is to their infamous response to resistance movements in occupied countries. From Wikipedia:

The Kragujevac massacre was the murder of Serbian, Jewish and Roma men and boys in Serbia by German Wehrmacht soldiers on 20 and 21 October 1941. All males from the town between the ages of sixteen and sixty were assembled by German troops and [Serbian collaborators]  and the victims were selected from amongst them.

Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel had issued an order on 16 September 1941, applicable to all of occupied Europe, to kill 50 communists for every wounded German soldier and 100 for each German soldier killed.

The victims have become victimizers.

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Unorthodox Views on Israel and Gaza

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Below are some unorthodox views on what’s happening in Israel and Gaza. They’re not necessarily unorthodox in the religious sense, and they’re definitely not unorthodox in most of the world, but they’re out of the mainstream with respect to public opinion and government behavior in both Israel and the United States. 

To back up a little: I’ve been struggling this week to write another post about the massacre in the Gaza Strip. “Massacre” is a more appropriate term than “war” given the numbers published today by Haaretz (Israel’s oldest daily newspaper):

In Gaza, the Palestinian death toll in Gaza since Israel launched Operation Protective Edge surpassed the 800 mark, most of them since Israel entered Gaza a week ago. Israel military fatalities stand at 35 since the operation commenced.

It should also be noted that at least one Israeli civilian has been killed as the result of a Hamas rocket attack.

I’m not sure why this subject has got such a hold on me, since people are being massacred in other places, but I think it’s because so many apparently sensible people insist on defending what Israel is doing. For example, here are selections from three letters printed in The New York Times a few days ago (two other letters were critical of Israel’s behavior):

As to Israel’s response to Hamas [the “Islamic Resistance Movement” voted into power in Gaza in 2006], it is proportional to the number of missiles launched against us. Whether these missile attacks are successful or not is not the point… They have the potential to wreak havoc…So far Israel has been concentrating on destroying tunnels that cross the border and missile stockpiles. I consider that a “proportional” response. As in any war, sometimes people are hurt or killed. Israel has nothing to apologize for.

It is a credit to Israel’s moral stature that it is doing everything it can to limit the killings of innocent civilians in Gaza…

Please report about the civilian bomb shelters in Gaza. Wait, there are none. Instead, Hamas uses its citizens as human shields for munitions and to increase Israeli casualties for the media.

It’s true that Hamas has launched thousands of rockets toward Israel in the past 14 years, which is clearly a violation of international law, but those rockets have caused fewer than 30 civilian deaths. That’s why the author of the first letter only claims that Israel’s actions have been proportional to the missiles launched and not to the actual effect of those missiles, which are unguided and usually don’t hit anything. 

Meanwhile, the Israeli Defense Force (the IDF) announced a few days ago that it had already struck more than 3000 targets in Gaza using its very high-tech weaponry. Since Gaza is about the size of Philadelphia, that’s more than 20 targets per square mile. And since 1.8 million people live in Gaza (300,000 more than in Philadelphia), it shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone that the bulk of the Palestinians casualties have been civilians and a large percentage of those civilians have been children. 

Stating that “sometimes people are hurt or killed in war”, as the author of the first letter does, obviously (I’d say “obscenely”) downplays the extent of this massacre. If the Israeli armed forces are truly doing everything possible to limit civilian casualties, as the second author claims, their efforts are clearly failing. As for whether it’s all Hamas’ fault for not building bomb shelters and storing weapons near people (remember, we’re talking about an area the size of Philadelphia but with a bigger population), the powers that be in Hamas are certainly at fault. But that doesn’t change the fact that it’s the Israelis who have chosen to proceed with their massive assault anyway.

All of which finally brings me to the other unorthodox opinions I wanted to share.

First, after seriously considering the consequences, an Israeli named Etgar Keret wrote an article for his fellow citizens that’s been translated and reprinted by The New Yorker (the full article, which isn’t long, is well worth reading):

In the past week I’ve seen and heard the popular statement “let the I.D.F. win” more and more frequently. It’s been posted on social media, spray-painted on walls, and chanted in demonstrations. Lots of young people are quoting it on Facebook, and they seem to think it’s a phrase that arose in response to the current military operation in Gaza. But I’m old enough to remember how it evolved: first formulated as a bumper sticker, …it contains within it the twisted world view that has been guiding Israel for the past twelve years….

Twelve years, five operations against Hamas (four of them in Gaza), and still we have this same convoluted slogan…. In each of these operations there have been right-wing politicians and military commentators who pointed out that “this time we’ll have to pull all the stops, take it all the way, until the end.” Watching them on television, I can’t help but ask myself, What is this end they’re striving toward? Even if each and every Hamas fighter is taken out, does anyone truly believe that the Palestinian people’s aspiration for national independence will disappear with them?

It’s an awful thing to make a truly tragic mistake, one that costs many lives. It’s worse to make that same mistake over and over again….The only thing that actually changes is Israeli society’s tolerance for criticism. It’s become clear during this operation that the right wing has lost its patience in all matters regarding that elusive term, “freedom of speech.” In the past two weeks, we’ve seen right wingers beating left wingers with clubs, Facebook messages promising to send left-wing activists to the gas chambers, and denunciations of anyone whose opinion delays the military on its way to victory….This road is not a circle, it’s a downward spiral, leading to new lows….

More optimistically, Peter Beinart, an American Jew who is a professor at New York University, suggests a way out of this situation for both Israel and the Palestinians in an article for Haaretz called “Israel’s Best Weapon Against Hamas”, which is also well worth reading in full:

The short answer is that I’d treat the [Hamas] rockets as military symptoms of a political problem. That doesn’t mean Israel shouldn’t return fire. If Hamas and Islamic Jihad can attack Israel with impunity, they may never stop. But returning fire—or even invading Gaza—will never make Israel safe….

So what would I do? First, I’d seek a cease-fire that eases those aspects of Israel’s blockade that have no legitimate security rationale. (That doesn’t mean acceding to Hamas’ cease-fire demands but it means recognizing that a cease-fire that does nothing to address the blockade – as Israel wants – won’t last). [Note: Israel has maintained a land, air and sea blockade of Gaza since 2007. Most observers, including officials representing the United Nations and the Red Cross, consider the blockade to be illegal.] 

Since 2010, Israel has made it easier for goods to enter Gaza. But it still makes it extremely difficult for goods to leave….Essentially barring Gazan exports to Israel and the West Bank — historically Gaza’s biggest markets — is both inhumane and stupid. It’s helped destroy the independent business class that could have been a check on Hamas’ power, and left many in Gaza with the choice of working for Hamas or receiving food aid. In addition to goods, Israel should make it easier for people to leave Gaza, too.

Second, I’d let Hamas take part in a Palestinian unity government that prepares the ground for Palestinian elections. That doesn’t mean tolerating Hamas attacks, to which Israel should always reserve the right to respond. But it means no longer trying to bar Hamas from political participation because of its noxious views.

Without free elections — which means elections in which all major Palestinian parties can run — Palestinian leaders will never enjoy authority in both Gaza and the West Bank nor the legitimacy to make painful compromises on behalf of their people….

Finally, Israel should do everything it can — short of rigging the elections — to ensure that Hamas doesn’t win. Already, polls show that [Palestine President Mahmoud] Abbas would defeat Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh easily…. But Israel could also help ensure Hamas’ defeat by showing Palestinians that Abbas’ strategy of recognizing Israel, and helping it combat terrorism, actually works. It could do so by freezing settlement growth and publicly committing to a Palestinian state near the 1967 lines with a capital in East Jerusalem. That would give Abbas an instant boost.

Hamas’ great ally is despair…Nothing would weaken Hamas more than growing Palestinian faith that through nonviolence and mutual recognition, they can win the basic rights they’ve been denied for almost half a century. Israel’s best long-term strategy against Palestinian violence is Palestinian hope.

By the way, the unemployment rate in Gaza is roughly 50%. Malnutrition is widespread and the water supply is contaminated.

If you’d like a more complete view of what’s happening in Israel, Gaza and the West Bank, and also be exposed to a broader range of opinion than what generally appears in American media, Haaretz was recently offering a one-month subscription to its website for one dollar. There is a much more vigorous and critical debate regarding the Israeli government’s policies in Israel than in the United States, even though the U.S. contributes billions of dollars in military aid to Israel (a practice that should stop right now).

A Way Forward for the Palestinians

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While wondering what to say about the growing slaughter in the Gaza Strip, I happened to read a review of two movies dealing with Israel’s occupation and increasing colonization of the West Bank. 

The review, published in April, was written by David Shulman, a professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem who is active in the Israeli peace movement (a part of the Israeli political scene that doesn’t get much publicity in the United States). Shulman is an American who emigrated to Israel almost 50 years ago. Here are some extended excerpts (I hope The New York Review of Books won’t mind):

The impossible backdrop … is the Israeli occupation of the West Bank; and indeed there is much that is unbelievable about this occupation and the reality it has created and maintained for nearly half a century….It is hard to fathom how the Israelis themselves can stand to live with the ongoing misery and cruelty they have inflicted, and it’s not so easy to understand how the rest of the world has let them get away with it.

Like any young Palestinian, Omar [the main character] is subject to routine harassment and humiliation by Israeli soldiers. Those who have not seen such practices with their own eyes will find the relevant scene, early on in the film, instructive. Omar is stopped by soldiers while walking down the street, then forced to balance himself on a rock while they chat and laugh at him; when he protests, they break his nose. I’ve myself seen much worse incidents in the South Hebron hills, including violent arrest of innocent civilians simply trying to reach their fields or homes.

On the level closest to the surface, the film shows us one of the main pillars of the occupation—the deep penetration of Palestinian society by an army of informers and secret agents who provide the information necessary for near-total control ….. For decades, well-trained Israeli handlers have mastered an evolving and highly effective repertory of psychological devices and various forms of blackmail that serve first to “turn” their captives into informers, and then to manipulate them.

Life under the occupation, with its Kafkaesque requirement of bureaucratic permits for almost anything a person might want or need to do (movement from place to place, medical treatment, visits to parents or other relatives, building an outhouse, and so on) makes any Palestinian potentially vulnerable to blackmail. That, in fact, is the meaning, and also the ultimate purpose, of full control. The Israelis have not invented these methods, but they have proven to be very skilled, and unscrupulous, in using them. Among them, needless to say, is the devilish threat to harm or even destroy a loved one, a girlfriend or wife, as we see in this film….

The problem is that these ordinary Israelis, the “common people” who are just people, have mostly, for decades now, elected governments of the extreme right, like the present settlers’ regime run by Benjamin Netanyahu. Moreover, these same ordinary people continue to demonstrate, day after day, a shocking, willful indifference to the fate of their Palestinian neighbors. Here we touch another, even more fundamental pillar of the occupation, something far more malignant and consequential than anything the Shin Bet can do….

At bottom, all of us [Israelis and Palestinians] feel trapped. Why, then, one might wonder, does Israel, which holds nearly all the cards in its hand, not wish to move toward some possible resolution of the endless conflict…? Why is Israel continuously deepening and expanding the occupation, and above all the settlements, instead of negotiating in good faith? … Does Israel really think it’s possible to hem in and terrorize an entire people by torture, blackmail, and other instruments of coercion far into the unknown future?

There are, I think, answers to these questions that go beyond the usual platitudes about mutual suspicion and the ancient, ever-lengthening list of Jewish traumas. Tribal nationalism, including in Israel, tends to be totalistic and easily drifts toward the totalitarian. It absolutizes the tribe as an almost-divine being and demonizes the outsider, who can—perhaps must—be humiliated, removed, or destroyed. You can hear voices speaking to that effect every day in the Knesset, including those of some who are close to or indeed are members of the present government. But whatever the reasons, it seems clear that Israel will have to be forced to make some sort of peace—or, in a variant of the South African trajectory, eventually to enfranchise all Palestinians and thus move into some model of the single, binational state.

A positive scenario would involve mass nonviolent Palestinian resistance. On the face of it, the apparatus of Israeli control so vividly portrayed in both these films would seem to preclude such an outcome; the Israeli security services probably still think they can control any foreseeable outcome on the ground. Moreover, the extreme fragmentation of the West Bank into discontiguous, fenced-in enclaves has so far worked to keep nonviolent protest highly localized. But anyone who knows the Palestinian grassroots activists … knows that the dream of mass Gandhian-style action is their great hope.

Israel would have no answer to hundreds of thousands of unarmed civilians marching on the roadblocks or the settlements (and, no doubt, paying the price in casualties). Many of the younger Palestinian activists are educating a new generation about this ethos, invoking Martin Luther King, Mahatma Gandhi and Henry David Thoreau. They’ve had plenty of time to read the relevant texts, usually in Israeli jails…

Violence on one side merely provides an excuse for violence on the other side, and there is always some incident perpetrated by the other side that can be offered as justification. It’s reported that 2 Israelis but more than 260 Palestinians have been killed in the recent fighting (and of course there are the non-fatal injuries as well). Since the Israelis are willing and able to generate much more violence than the Palestinians, the Palestinians will never reclaim their freedom or land by force.

On top of that, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu made this declaration last week: “There cannot be a situation, under any agreement, in which we relinquish security control of the territory west of the River Jordan”.  As noted in Israel, but hardly at all in America, that means Netanyahu has now publicly stated his opposition to the “two-state solution”. Of course, full integration of the Palestinians into Israeli society is off the table too.

As Professor Shulman says, mass nonviolent resistance is probably their best hope. The Palestinians need their own Gandhi or Martin Luther King, and leaders like that are rare. 

End Military Aid to Israel Now

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From The Guardian:

Thousands of Gazans fled their homes … on Sunday after Israel warned that it would “strike with might” against what it says are rocket-launching sites.

The exodus … came after Israel dropped leaflets and sent text messages warning civilians to evacuate northern Gaza by midday on Sunday in advance of a large-scale bombing campaign. The area is home to at least 100,000 people….

The warning was issued hours after Israeli naval commandos launched an early morning raid on a beach … in the north of Gaza City, targeting another rocket-launching site. On Saturday the coastal enclave suffered the bloodiest day of the six-day Israeli assault, with 54 Palestinians reported killed.

There has been speculation that Israel may launch a ground offensive into Gaza, a move likely to sharply increase the number of civilian casualties. So far 166 people have been killed, including 30 children, according to Gaza’s health ministry. There have been several Israeli injuries but no fatalities….

In the worst single incident of the conflict so far, at least 17 people were killed and 45 injured when two large Israeli bombs hit a house in the Tuffah neighbourhood of Gaza City where the city’s chief of police … was sheltering. Five other people were missing, presumed dead.

Most of the injured were returning home from a mosque when they were caught by shrapnel from the blast.

Israel has been massing tanks and soldiers at Gaza’s borders, which some fear could signal a wider ground offensive that would cause heavy casualties. “We don’t know when the operation will end,” the Israeli prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, told a cabinet meeting on Sunday. “It might take a long time.”

The United States gives more military aid to Israel than to any country except Afghanistan. This year we’re giving the Israelis more than 3 billion dollars to spend on their military. 

That’s between 15% and 20% of Israel’s military budget, even though Israel is a relatively wealthy country. According to the International Monetary Fund, Israel has a higher gross domestic product per capita than South Korea, New Zealand, Italy or Spain.

We should immediately cancel all military aid to Israel. They would still survive and prosper with a smaller military budget; we could create some jobs in America with $3 billion; our standing with the rest of the world would improve; and the right-wing Israelis might finally understand that they need to reach a reasonable accommodation with the Palestinians instead of treating them as if they’re less than human.

Criticizing Israel and the Fundamental Problem

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Max Blumenthal is the 35-year-old son of former Clinton adviser Sidney Blumenthal. The younger Blumenthal published his second book in October. It’s called Goliath: Life and Loathing in Greater Israel.

In an interview at Salon, he discusses the right-ward shift in Israeli politics, the rise of some scary racism and the reaction to his book. The Amazon reviews indicate the reaction the book is getting:

5 stars…………71
4 stars…………..7
3 stars…………..3
2 stars…………..4
1 star…………..65

That’s what’s called a “distinct pattern”.

What interested me most about the interview was Blumenthal’s description of Israel as a “settler colonial ethnocracy”. That is, after all, an accurate description of colonial America’s treatment of both the native population and African slaves. It’s doubtful that the Indians or slaves would have considered the United States to be a straightforward constitutional democracy.

Blumenthal points out an important difference between America and Israel, however. He says that the Israeli government’s official policy is to maintain a Jewish population in the country of at least 70%. The United States has controlled immigration, but has never had a policy aiming at a specific percentage of the population being, for example, white Christians.

This demographic policy, Blumenthal argues, leads to oppressive policies toward Palestinians, non-Jewish Africans and, most recently, Bedouins:

The Jewish state requires [holding non-Jews] in detention centers like the Saronim, where thousands of non-Jewish Africans are staying right now in shipping containers in the Negev desert; or the Prawer Plan, which mandates the removal of 30- to 40,000 veteran [Bedouin] citizens of Israel to Indian reservation-style communities from their ancestral lands; or the fact that Palestinians face constant home demolitions — we’re talking about 26,000 home demolitions since 1967. The Jewish state mandates the creation of the separation wall, which is said to prevent “demographic spillover”; and it requires the Gaza Strip to be under siege perpetually, because 80 percent of its population is refugees who have legitimate claims to the land and property inside what is now the state of Israel.

(Note: Demonstrations against the Prawer Plan were in the news recently.)

I haven’t been able to confirm Israel’s 70% demographic target, but did find an article by Israel’s most respected demographer, Sergio DellaPergola, a professor at Hebrew University. He lays out the basic existential issue Israel faces (putting aside any threats from its neighbors):

…it has been suggested that [Israel] faces a conundrum because it has three fundamental goals, but can achieve only two of the three at the same time. The three goals are to preserve the Israeli state’s Jewish identity, democratic character, and territorial extent.

Thus, Israel can choose to apply a Jewish cultural identity to the whole territory and population between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, but in that case it cannot be a democracy. Israel can opt for the same territorial extension and apply to all residents the democratic principle of “one man, one vote,” but in that case it will not be a Jewish state. Or Israel can choose to be a Jewish and democratic state, but in that case it will have to withdraw sovereignty from significant parts of the territory and population.

Professor DellaPergola points out that 1947’s U.N. resolution 181 called for the establishment of a Jewish state, an Arab state and a U.N.-administered area around Jerusalem (in the diagram below, the proposed Jewish state is yellow and the Arab state is gray). The 1948-49 war resulted in Israel expanding its borders beyond those in the U.N. resolution. DellaPerfogla believes that “the real bone of contention is what happened in 1947-1949, not the outcome of the Six Day War in June 1967”.

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If the non-Jews living in Palestine and surrounding regions back in 1947 had welcomed the creation of Israel, the Middle East would be a much calmer place today. They didn’t and it isn’t.