Isabel Kershner does tell us quite a bit about the Arab-Israeli conflict. But she owes it to us to put it in better perspective. It's not "balance" to tell the truth some of the time and repeat lies some of the time. Israeli desires for peace are simply not...
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Isabel Kershner does tell us quite a bit about the Arab-Israeli conflict. But she owes it to us to put it in better perspective. It's not "balance" to tell the truth some of the time and repeat lies some of the time. Israeli desires for peace are simply not analogous to Arab demands for war. If Arab aggression against Israel ceases, there will be peace between Arabs and Israelis. If Israel ceases to defend itself, not only will there be a catastrophe, but there still will not be peace.
Yes, it is true that many Arabs sincerely desire a return to the, um, good old days (if indeed they were all that good) when Jews had no rights. Some people want to return to the days in the antebellum South when Blacks were slaves. But society needs to put that behind it, not in front of it.
To Kershner's credit, she does explain that the Israeli security barrier is "less an expression of choice than a measure of last resort." Suicide bombers had killed and maimed plenty of Israelis and "posed an existential threat to the Israeli way of life." In addition, the suicide bombings precluded peace negotiations. So Israel came up with a barrier. She mentions that only 5 or 6 per cent of the barrier is a wall, with the rest being a fence. She interviews both Arabs and Jews, and we get plenty of information about what some of them think. And we see that for most people, the conflict is not about land. It is indeed about rights.
Also to Kershner's credit, she tells us that in general, Israelis do see the United Nations and the International Court of Justice as seriously biased. And that Israel considers the West Bank to be disputed territory, not occupied territory.
One can write books that describe the attitudes of terrorists and racists and their supporters. But I think that Kershner ought to have made it even clearer that it is not a mere opinion of a few Israel-lovers that Levantine Jews ought to have a right to life. It is an absolute requirement for them to have such a right if we are to support human rights for all. The barrier is not pleasant for the Jews and Arabs, but the way to get it removed is to stop the Arab aggression.
This book reminded me that we really need to oppose lies. Do we wink when a public figure states that two plus two is ten, take him aside and reprimand him privately when he says it is a hundred, and scream with outrage when he says it is a thousand? Of course not. These days, there is genuine outrage when public figures say that the Holocaust never happened, that the Jews of Israel must be moved to some other continent, and that those Jews who stay in Israel must be eradicated. But there's only a private reprimand for those who say that the Jewish temples never existed, that there was never a connection between the Jews and Jerusalem, that Jesus was an Arab, that Jews did not write the Old Testament, or that the Israelis poison Arab wells. And there's often just a wink of implied agreement when folks say that Israel is a colonialist, greedy, peace-hating and racist state whose birth was an international crime, or that Jewish land in the Levant was all stolen from the real owners.
This won't work. Lies need to be opposed. And perhaps the most insidious lie is that the very idea of Levantine Jews being allowed to have human rights is the ultimate in immorality and that Mankind owes all racists an apology for permitting such a thing to ever have happened.
Society will always have some tyrannical opponents. We ought not be shocked to find that it has some today. Nor ought we be shocked to realize that this battle is not about territory but about human rights. I think it is a very big mistake to regard the battle over Israel as simply one over territory, with the only people supporting Israel being those who are infatuated with this little state (as if all those who opposed Germany or Japan in World War Two were infatuated with Czechoslovakia).
Kershner does show that many of those who live in the region can't see a wall as a reasonable long-term solution. I think they are right. For global society to function, people will eventually need to have the right to live pretty much wherever they please. And in return, people will need to support the right of the nations they live in to exist and to carry out their charters. Yes, there may not be a way to get there from here right now. But we need to remind ourselves that this is the proper goal as well as one which is likely to be achieved (even if only in the distant future). And that reducing the solution to this conflict to the theft of a couple of hundred square miles of land from a land-poor Jewish state is improper, arbitrary, anti-strategic, immoral, totally absurd in the long term, and antithetical to peace.
Isabel Kershner does tell us quite a bit about the Arab-Israeli conflict. But she owes it to us to put it in better perspective. It's not "balance" to tell the truth some of the time and repeat lies some of the time. Israeli desires for peace are simply not analogous to Arab demands for war. If Arab aggression against Israel ceases, there will be peace between Arabs and Israelis. If Israel ceases to defend itself, not only will there be a catastrophe, but there still will not be peace.
Yes, it is true that many Arabs sincerely desire a return to the, um, good old days (if indeed they were all that good) when Jews had no rights. Some people want to return to the days in the antebellum South when Blacks were slaves. But society needs to put that behind it, not in front of it.
To Kershner's credit, she does explain that the Israeli security barrier is "less an expression of choice than a measure of last resort." Suicide bombers had killed and maimed plenty of Israelis and "posed an existential threat to the Israeli way of life." In addition, the suicide bombings precluded peace negotiations. So Israel came up with a barrier. She mentions that only 5 or 6 per cent of the barrier is a wall, with the rest being a fence. She interviews both Arabs and Jews, and we get plenty of information about what some of them think. And we see that for most people, the conflict is not about land. It is indeed about rights.
Also to Kershner's credit, she tells us that in general, Israelis do see the United Nations and the International Court of Justice as seriously biased. And that Israel considers the West Bank to be disputed territory, not occupied territory.
One can write books that describe the attitudes of terrorists and racists and their supporters. But I think that Kershner ought to have made it even clearer that it is not a mere opinion of a few Israel-lovers that Levantine Jews ought to have a right to life. It is an absolute requirement for them to have such a right if we are to support human rights for all. The barrier is not pleasant for the Jews and Arabs, but the way to get it removed is to stop the Arab aggression.
This book reminded me that we really need to oppose lies. Do we wink when a public figure states that two plus two is ten, take him aside and reprimand him privately when he says it is a hundred, and scream with outrage when he says it is a thousand? Of course not. These days, there is genuine outrage when public figures say that the Holocaust never happened, that the Jews of Israel must be moved to some other continent, and that those Jews who stay in Israel must be eradicated. But there's only a private reprimand for those who say that the Jewish temples never existed, that there was never a connection between the Jews and Jerusalem, that Jesus was an Arab, that Jews did not write the Old Testament, or that the Israelis poison Arab wells. And there's often just a wink of implied agreement when folks say that Israel is a colonialist, greedy, peace-hating and racist state whose birth was an international crime, or that Jewish land in the Levant was all stolen from the real owners.
This won't work. Lies need to be opposed. And perhaps the most insidious lie is that the very idea of Levantine Jews being allowed to have human rights is the ultimate in immorality and that Mankind owes all racists an apology for permitting such a thing to ever have happened.
Society will always have some tyrannical opponents. We ought not be shocked to find that it has some today. Nor ought we be shocked to realize that this battle is not about territory but about human rights. I think it is a very big mistake to regard the battle over Israel as simply one over territory, with the only people supporting Israel being those who are infatuated with this little state (as if all those who opposed Germany or Japan in World War Two were infatuated with Czechoslovakia).
Kershner does show that many of those who live in the region can't see a wall as a reasonable long-term solution. I think they are right. For global society to function, people will eventually need to have the right to live pretty much wherever they please. And in return, people will need to support the right of the nations they live in to exist and to carry out their charters. Yes, there may not be a way to get there from here right now. But we need to remind ourselves that this is the proper goal as well as one which is likely to be achieved (even if only in the distant future). And that reducing the solution to this conflict to the theft of a couple of hundred square miles of land from a land-poor Jewish state is improper, arbitrary, anti-strategic, immoral, totally absurd in the long term, and antithetical to peace.
