Customer Reviews

Seeking Mandela: Peacemaking Between Israelis And Palestinians (Politics History & Social Chan)

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I love this book - it is so perceptive, carefully argued, and well written. I have been working on the Israeli/Palestinian conflict for several years and I have learned that most writers on the subject are emotionally involved one way or other. They see things through a tinted lense and this doesn't just color what they see, it changes what they see completely. Suddenly, one is greater than ten, and black is white. The authors, Adam and Moodley, are outsiders with no axe to grind and so are refreshingly objective and honest. They see the situation with clarity.

What they say is most helpful. They explain why we cannot derive too much hope from the South African experience in which the oppressed native people whose land had been taken by powerful invaders ultimately prevailed. When you really dig in, as they do, you see that the situation is different in nearly every important specific. This is valuable as we don't need peacemaking proposals for Israel/Palestine that amount to wishful thinking based on a superficial understanding of the South African success.

I agree with their conclusion that a unitary binational state offers the best chance for long-term stability, is fairest, and in some ways is the least disruptive solution as the settlers could remain where they are and there would be no more talk of expelling the Israeli Arabs who are outbreeding the Jews. The unitary binational state is the goal... but how to achieve it, this is the problem.

I have to disagree with their conclusion that the way to achieve the unitary binational state is to go for a two-state solution now, and this will be a stepping stone to the unitary state. I think an independent Palestinian state is certain to fail - Israel for its own security reasons will make sure that such a state, filled with people who hate Israel, is impotent, i.e., a failure. Why then would the Israelis relent and welcome union with a failed state and people even more resentful of what the Israelis have done to them? Two-states is not an "interim solution" but a dead-end.

I see the challenge as figuring out how to induce the Jews to enter into a genuine unitary binational state. I think the path to peace involves understanding the Israeli psyche, their group narcissism, and figuring out how to address it. As Adam and Woodley say, "A binational state will not arise without minimal mutual trust in the possibility of peaceful coexistence and mutual recognition of the two people." So true. Such a challenge. I wish the path to peace was obvious but it is not.

One aspect that is not addressed in this book is that there never will be a Palestinian Mandela as the Israelis will not permit one - they would assassinate or deport him. In fact, there was one: Mubarak Awad. He barnstormed all over the West Bank and Gaza beginning in 1984 and was instrumental in getting a non-violent campaign going in 1987, the First Intifada. But the Israelis treated him as an arch-terrorist and he was arrested and deported. The Israelis are seeking Mandela too, not to achieve peace, but to kill him.

This book is an important building block to peacemaking and every peacemaker should read and digest its message.

Adam and Moodley's book "Seeking Mandela" deals with the current situation in the Middle east and tries to see what can be learnt from the South African case that could be useful in understanding the conflict in the Middle East.
The book gives a very thorough picture of the conflict both historically and up to date. For anyone who is interested to understand the situation and the different views that exist in the region this book a very good resource.
Although critical of the Israeli Occupation and of the Israeli and Palestinian leadership, the authors show a strong compassion for both people. A genuine attempt to use the south african experience not as a way to attack Israel but in a search for possible answers towards a peaceful solution.
Being an Israeli, terribley concerned about the deterioration in our area, and longing for peace and a just solution for all people in the region, I found this book very supportive and interesting.

This book displays incredible closed-mindedness. I've read plenty of books about Israel. Some say Israel is right to defend the lives, liberty, and property of its citizens. Some say it isn't. But until now, every one of them has given some semblance of a justification for its stance. This book is an exception. It simply takes it as a given that Israel is Wrong with a capital W. It was Wrong for it to incur the wrath of the Arabs. It was Wrong to build illegal homes on Sacred Arab Land. For Adam and Moodley, it is not necessary to give some bogus history of the Middle East to defend such a conclusion. To them, it is simply Truth. To me, it is simply a Lie that can be stated in ten seconds but takes years of work to expose. That's one of the powers of lies: they destroy in seconds what civilization has taken years to build up.

The authors pretend to be reasonable. They are nothing of the sort. They boast about having talked to all sorts of Jews and Arabs. But they have learned nothing from them. They repeat some of the arguments they have heard. But they do not understand them at all. They sympathize with those who are being hurt on both sides of the conflict, without once doubting that the Israelis are Wrong.

It never occurs to the authors that in a just world, in peacetime, the Israeli Jews would simply buy up 20,000 or 40,000 or 60,000 square miles in the Middle East and make it bloom, improving the economy of the area. And that no one would challenge the ability of Israel to stand on its own feet, treat its own citizens properly, or hold on to its own land. It is beyond their imagination to picture, as I do, Israel as a Bantustan, with racist Arabs refusing to let Jews pollute neighboring nations by buying homes and living there.

Nor, in their closed-mindedness, do the authors realize that many rational people see Israel as being entitled to its land. Instead, they imply that the only people who could think such thoughts are closed-minded zealots who are "beyond rational persuasion."

When antizionists shout down Zionist speakers on campuses, the authors complain that opposing such bullying would "ban all discussions" and shirk "rational, analytic debate where it should be encouraged." They insist that the logic of Zionism requires that Arabs be second-class citizens in Israel, if not completely expelled. That's nonsense, of course. Zionism is simply human rights, and what they say is its opposite.

The authors come up with contradictory arguments about demography, saying that Jews can't be a majority in little Israel but then dismissing the idea that an Arab "right of return to Israel would threaten its Jewish majority!

The authors discuss the idea of shaming people into acting morally. I wonder if the National Socialists in the early 1940s could have shamed the Slavs, Jews, Roma, and others into killing themselves. Somehow, I doubt it. Moreover, I even more strongly doubt that such actions would have been moral.

The authors regard Israel as a fluke of nature, created by pogroms, slaughters, and so on. It does not occur to them that Jews were going to flock to the Levant as soon as it became possible for them to do so: emancipation as the cause of Israel just escapes them.

The authors say that there are good and bad things about Zionism. And that "Zionism" ought not be a term of opprobrium! But I wonder what the good things might be when simply acquiring land is considered by them to be an act of displacing Arabs!

I have never seen the case in favor of terrorism made so loudly internationally as it has been for Yasir Arafat and his gang of thugs. But the authors complain that their case is represented poorly in the Western media!

Adam and Moodley argue in favor of a Truth (and Reconciliation) Commission. I strongly agree. I think they display their closed-mindedness by not even dreaming of what it might discover. They are right that it would find that some Arabs were expelled from their homes in 1948. It might discover plenty about what the Arabs did to the Jews, of course, but I wonder if they realize just what this might mean. They do say that it would find that there was indeed a Jewish Temple in Jerusalem long ago. Good for them. But there is so much more. And, oh yes, they even say that being Christian is not necessary for reconciliation. As a Pagan, I'm glad to learn that!

The authors display shock that anyone with liberal credentials could support the Israeli fence which had to be put in place to defend the lives of Israelis against suicide bombers. They wonder how 83% (of Israeli Jews, presumably) can support defending the lives of their fellow Jewish citizens, even those who live in Ariel or Maale Adumim. I, in turn, wonder how Adam and Moodley can deny that Israel has a duty to defend those lives, and I would feel the same way even if I thought that Israel ought to cede Ariel and Maale Adumim to the Arabs.

If the Levantine Arabs had been represented by Mandela, not Arafat, would there have been peace? I have no idea. But I'm sure that having a thug like Arafat lead the Arabs precluded peace. The authors say that even Mandela could not have brought peace. And they conclude that Israel is unwilling to have peace while the Arabs lack the capacity to achieve it. This conclusion is total nonsense. If enough people believe it, maybe we'll avoid peace for a very long time.

This book is simply awful.