Myths and Facts - a Quickie

sent 26.Jan.2009

Dear friends,

In an ongoing e-mail chat about the war in Gaza and our Palestinian "problem" in general, a friend wrote me the following comments. My response follows these comments, and once more I thought you may be interested. (By the way, tell me if you're weary of all this and I'll leave you in peace.) So here it is:

Dear Aaron
I do not consider myself a warmonger- I wish for peace as much as anyone, especially considering my grandchildren in Israel. However no one threw the Arabs out of Israel in 1947- their leaders told them to flee. We did not hold them in refugee camps, their fellow Arabs did that. After three or four generations, how can they still be refugees? My grandparents came from Europe after WWI; does that make me a refugee in the United States?......................

My response:

Dear ………..,

I know we are on the same side and I thank you for your response. Nevertheless, I think some of your assertions need to be explored.

There are things our madrichim didn’t know to pass on to us during our years in the Youth Movement. The rebirth of our Nation in Israel is a monumental accomplishment and worth our being proud of. But as often happens with monumental things, it has dragged along with it a number of myths and half-myths. Your categorical belief that “no one threw the Arabs out of Israel in 1947- their leaders told them to flee” is evidently one of the half-myths we grew up with. The facts are evidently somewhat more complicated. For example, many villages fled after the word spread of the slaughter at Dir-Yassin. Of course, we have claimed in the past that either this never really happened or it was a totally isolated incident. So here is a short story:

A couple of months ago I tagged along with one of my sons who was looking for a home in Pardes Chana. He found an old house that had been built some 60 years ago. He invited a local building engineer to check the state of the house. The engineer was about 85 years old and knew how every single house in the area had been built and its condition today. By and by we were talking and he asked me where I live. I told him Gesher Haziv in the Western Galil. He became ecstatic and blurted away…”that’s where I fought throughout the War of Independence..” and continued telling me of his exploits, including “and we kicked out as many Arabs as we could from the area. It’s a shame we didn’t get to kick out more.” This, too, was a totally isolated incident, but evidently there were a few more totally isolated incidents. Israeli historians are learning more and more about totally isolated incidents. Today we tend not to claim absolute purity. Wars are evidently more complicated than that. Even justifiable or unavoidable ones.

We learned, as you wrote, that “their leaders told them to flee.”, and with that statement we thrust the entire blame for the Arab exit on everyone else but us. Aside from today’s knowledge that we also had some affect on the fleeing (some shared blame? See above), we overlook another aspect to the above statement: their leaders warned all noncombatants (men, women and children) to get out of the combat zone (until they finish driving out the Jews). How awful of them to clear the field of non-combatants !! Then again…while thinking of our latest “victory” in Gaza, I sorely wish we too had found some way to get the noncombatants out of the combat zone. Our conscience and our reputation would be less tarnished. (We had the ability to do so, but that would have taken some social planning and not only military planning.) Too late. No, don’t get me wrong. I’m not absolving the Arab leadership. Most of all, ever since 1948 they’ve been using the Palestinian refugees, and the Palestinian “problem” as political tools, without allowing any real integration into the countries of their new residence. I’m only commenting that we may be fairly pure, but not altogether pure. Neither then nor now. Life is evidently not as simple as we’d like it to be.

And lastly (for now, anyways), I must comment on a most questionable assertion of yours: “We did not hold them in refugee camps, their fellow Arabs did that.” For the first 19 years after the war of Independence that assertion had some substance. But for the last 41 years the refugee camps in the occupied territories have been completely under our Israeli rule. After 41 years they are still wholly recognizable as refugee camps. You ask “After three or four generations, how can they still be refugees?”. Well, let’s put it this way: had we been left to remain in the various refugee camps we were herded into after the Second World War (e.g. Cyprus, Greece) with a bureaucracy of permits and a tight reign of Military control over our camps, we too would still today be refugees.

There is more, but I'm trying to be brief. It may seem that I’ve become a voice for the Palestinian “side”. Not at all so. I remain a full-fledged Zionist who is still hopeful for “Ki meTziyon Tetze Torah” and “Or Lagoyim”. But I have learned that in order to get there we need to be somewhat more aware of our own flaws and also a lot more understanding of what we see as our adversary’s flaws.

My warm wishes, knowing that we are still essentially on the same team,

Aaron

Troubled Friends in the Galilee

Sent 24.Jan.2009

To my friends and any who are still reading about reactions to our war in Gaza,

This past week I was involved with organizing a meeting of Jews and Arabs in our part of the western Galil. We are a group of unrelated Jews in our area of the western Galil with an Arab artists group based in the town of Kfar Yasif, 20 minute drive from Gesher Haziv. We are attempting to initiate programs which reach out to larger sectors of our communities in the hope of creating greater understanding between Arabs and Jews in the Galil.

Our previous meeting had been over a month ago. Meanwhile, 1200 bodies were being buried in Gaza. Last week’s gathering had to be called off because most of the Arab participants said they would not come as a result of the war. Instead we called for a small gathering of our steering group. We met in the community center of Kfar Yasif, 8 of us, Arabs and Jews, to discuss how we can overcome the events of the moment and continue our efforts. One of the Arab participants was a young artist who came to the meeting in order to represent many who were against coming. When he was born his father was hoping for peace and serenity with his relatively new Jewish neighbors in the Galil and therefore named him Saalem.

Saalem spoke at this meeting, and I am trying here to bring you a transcription of what he said. True, I and others weren’t ready to accept all his conclusions, and we had things to say to him as well. But it is also so important for us to hear him out and understand its implications. The results of Gaza are not only in our ability to earn a period of no rockets in the south, and not only about the repercussions in the world media. The results also affect our neighbors who are Arab Israeli citizens.

Here is my attempt at transcribing what Saalem said:

“At this moment in time I have no desire to meet with you and your Jewish friends. Your people have just killed so many men, women and children who are my Palestinian Arab brethren. I and my friends are still licking our wounds and our anger and our despair. I have come here this evening unwillingly, only to tell you these things so that you are not left with the illusion that there is now still an ability for joint communication and dialogue between us.

You Jews come here for dialogue in order to create a semblance of co-existence between us. I’m not looking to make friends. I’m looking for equality. I’m looking for you to know that this land is my land, my father’s and my grandfather’s and his grandfather’s. You have made me a low-class citizen in my land, the land you took from me.

Though I know I cannot roll-back history, I am angered at your not recognizing my history. In school and on my own I’ve studied your history and your suffering over the centuries. I visited the remains of the concentration camps in Europe. I’ve studied your Bible and your literature. But you….you turn your faces away and remain unaware of our Nakba, our disaster, as our land was torn away from us. You live in towns and villages that sit upon the ruins of our villages, and are unaware. Your schools don’t teach our history. You resent any mention of what we have lost. You resent any mention of our rights to our land.

In your eyes we are sub-human. 13 Israeli Arabs were shot and killed by the police during the demonstrations of October 2000. True, the demonstrations were not quiet ones. They were a result of pent-up anger and frustration at our treatment as sub-citizens in our own land. Violent demonstrations by criminal settlers in the West-Bank have never been treated by killing of Jews. But when we demonstrated, you shot and killed 13 of us. It is with that same regard to our sub-status that you saw no wrong in killing so many hundreds of innocent men, women and children in the war against the Hamas in Gaza. You would not have done the same if there were Jews living in the homes which you bombed and destroyed.

I am an artist, and together with other artists in our group I’ll continue having joint art exhibits here in our town with other Jewish artists. But I and most of my friends in this group cannot supply your need to show how we can co-exist while we moan for the loss of so many lives and continue to be a sub-status in our own land.”

That's it. His words were much more compelling than I could transcribe from memory, but I thought you may be interested in reading this. Our dialogue with Saalem was much longer and I think we still have common ground for joint work with Saalem and his friends, but both we and he have an uphill struggle which has now been made more difficult and complicated.

With a deep (but troubled) hope for the future,

aaron

Mutual Myopia

sent 19.Jan.2009

In response to an important article in Haaretz by Amira Hass asserting that the Qassam rockets coming from Gaza are one of the results of a long chain of historical traumas suffered by the Palestinians from before and since the creation of Israel, a friend of mine reacted with a totally netgative declaration: MYOPIA !!

I commented on that declaration:

Dear -----,

I believe that "myopia" is (aside from its medical meaning) a lack of foresight or discernment, a narrow view of something. It is definitely a term appropriate to the present situation and indeed to the entire Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Most Palestinians suffer from acute myopia as well as most of us Jews and Israelis.

I think we'll never be able to close the myopia gap between us without making a good deal of effort to understand the other side. We don’t need to completely agree with the other side, but a certain sense of understanding is essential. I think we would be surprised how a sense of understanding helps close the gap (compromise?) even when there is still no real agreement as to facts and causes.

Myopia needs to be treated on both sides of a fence. Probably treatment on one side is also contagious to the other side in some small way. At any rate, we have the privilege of trying to treat our own biased Jewish and Israeli myopia (though we have a right to be biased). Hopefully it may even have some kind of contagious effect on our neighbors. In any case, it would influence the things we do and say.

Best wishes

aaron

Our Attack of Gaza

Sent 17.Jan.2009

The beginning of 2009 saw us engaged in an all out attack on Gaza as a response to years of continued shelling of Israeli towns, and a continuation of those same rockets after clearing Gaza of both Jewish settlements and army occupation.

An activist involved with the Palestinian plight wrote to me the following words:

"I think that Israel pushed Hamas into pushing Israel into attacking Gaza (siege,targeted assassinations of political as well as military leaders, firing on civilians....)...I agree it is very sad. "

THIS WAS MY RESPONSE:

Hello------

I need to question your seemingly one-sided support of the Hamas predicament in the unfortunate fighting that is taking too many lives this month. I assume that all of what I write here is known to you, yet perhaps our interpretations are somewhat different. Then again, my comments may be too lengthy, repetitive and boring. I send them anyways, out of a truly great respect for your opinion and for what I know about your past involvement.

First let me qualify my own credentials. In the local parlance of political directions I am neither a rightist nor a centrist in the Israeli scene. I am probably considered by my Israeli friends as somewhat left of the leftists. This is (among other things which I will not itemize) because I have also spent many days during each of the last few years going into the West-Bank in order to help protect local farmers near Shchem from the criminal harassment of Jewish settlers. Unfortunately, very few Israeli “leftists” are there to join me (as you probably also well know from your own past experiences).

I must also qualify my starting point in any evaluation today of our Israeli-Palestinian conflict. I have always contended that our original sin as a nation has been to allow Jewish settlers the “invasion” of occupied territories after our defense in the War of ‘67. This is an important qualification being that others around the world consider our original sin to be the creation of the State of Israel. There is much to be said about this anti-Zionist contention, and it has a great relevance in any discussion of our legitimate or illegitimate right to defend our safety in Israel. But I leave that discussion aside, and will for now comment on the present situation via my left of leftist Zionist viewpoint – one that rejoices in our ability to recreate our Statehood, while bemoaning our mistakes and crying at our behavior towards “others”.

It may well be (as I so think) that we share a good amount of responsibility for the rise of militant Moslem fundamentalism (e.g. Hamas) in the occupied territories. I write only “share” because the tsunami of militant Moslem fundamentalism is rooted and spread by much wider causes than us. I also have little doubt that the local situation would be vastly different had we not allowed the Jewish settlement of the West-Bank and Gaza (and eastern Jerusalem as well); or had we long ago pulled our settlers out, as we did much too late in Gaza; or had we not purposely worked to destroy the PLO government under Arafat; or a whole lot of other “or”s that we could have done or not done but did or didn’t. But my inclination is to support what I think we can and should do (or not do) today – at this juncture of history, which already incorporates all that happened till now and poses the present situation. Unfortunately, what could or should have been done yesterday is not always viable today.

This brings us to the year 2005, to the point at which even a goodly part of a right-wing government arrived at a (sadly temporary) conclusion that a two-state solution is the only viable solution, and that we will need to leave Gaza and slowly leave almost all of the West-bank along with a goodly amount of our Jewish settlers. The political right-wing split. A generally right-wing government took us out of Gaza and stated openly to our Israeli public that the next steps will be in the West-Bank. The Israeli public (mostly moderate right wing), tired of terrorist attacks and internal arguments, was “sort of” willing to try out this leftist approach to the Palestinians. This did not happen easily. But the process actually began (to my infinite dismay).

Unfortunately (for both us and the Palestinians) the Hamas kept us from reaching the point of no return. Seemingly, this was done deliberately, as the Hamas has been consistent in its militant opposition to a two-state solution. The Hamas is entirely honest publicly, perhaps to their credit, in still insisting on driving me and my family into the sea, and that the way to do it is by discouraging any progress towards a two-state solution.

As we left Gaza, there was no Israeli siege of the area. As soon as the Hamas gained full control of Gaza our towns began to feel a greater brunt of rockets than had been prior to our departure, with the open support and direction of the local government – Hamas.

(We live close to the Lebanese border and know full well the meaning of living for long periods (starting from 1969 and meanwhile still in 2006) under the threat of rockets. Shrapnel flew inches above our children’s heads as they slept in their bedroom. That was long ago. In 2006 my grandchildren learned the same threats. Friends of ours in the south have been learning about it for a number of years now.)

Since 2005, having torn settlers out of Gaza, having pulled out all army out of Gaza, having opened mediocre but regular passageways between Gaza and the West-Bank…..rockets have continued to land on Israeli towns and yishuvim. This had two major results:

1. The Israeli public decided that leaving any of the occupied territories bodes more harm than expected. It was no doubt the major cause for putting the process towards a two-state solution on a definite hold. On that issue the Hamas won hands down. We shall need another significant breakthrough from within (doubtful) or from without in order to once again prod our Israeli public to wean itself of the West-Bank and begin a process for a two-state solution.

2. Israel tried to convince the Hamas government to cease and desist by a variety of attempts: a siege by closing the passageways out of Gaza to Israel and the West-bank; pinpoint assassinations of militant leaders; sporadic short-term stoppage of basic needs via the passageways (such as fuel). Perhaps these are the attempts which led to the Hamas agreeing to halt rockets for a half year period, during which time sporadic rockets continued to be launched (while weapons continued to be stockpiled). The half year ended with a mighty daily barrage of rockets along with Hamas declarations that such days will continue.

True, some of us (including myself ) thought it would be good to parlay directly with the leadership of the Hamas in an attempt to reach a mutual modus vivendi eliminating the threat of rockets and Israeli retaliation. But even many local lefties (like me) knew that this was a very dangerous gamble. It had the great likelihood of undermining the much more moderate West-Bank Palestinian leadership who were willing to negotiate for a two-state solution, an anathema to the Gaza Hamas.

In 2008 it became evident to all that (other than parlaying with Hamas, a gamble that may bring the Hamas to power in the West-Bank) the only options were to continue living under constant Hamas rockets or some more drastic solution that would stop the rockets.

The international community could have aided us with a number of possible options. It did not. (example: the international regulators at the Rafiach passagepoint left as soon as they were told to by the Hamas.) Nor did the international community and the international aid movements see anything weird with demanding that we continue supplying needed electricity and fuel and banking services and such to the same governing body that inflicts the threat of rockets on our communities and openly declares its plans for our demise.

It has also been disappointing to hear many in the international aid associations tell us to respect the Hamas as the legitimately elected leaders of the Palestinians, while also telling us that the people of Gaza should not suffer for our conflict with Hamas. Unfortunately, We all suffer the mistakes of our leadership. If we recognize their mistakes, and if the leadership is really a legitimately elected one, than we are also able to change it. Otherwise, the leadership is either illegitimate or its actions are fully supported by the people.

Our own leadership decided that enough is enough and decided to tell the Hamas that we will no longer endure their militant provocations. We gave a full blown military response as a result of smaller military responses not bearing any results, knowing full well that this military response is a last resort within such a dense population wherein the Hamas stores its prowess. And war is war is war.

Here is where my doubts begin and where I begin feeling unsure of myself and insecure about our future.

Every new war of ours has resulted in fewer and fewer positive results as far as obtaining political objectives and safeguarding our future. This is not because of weakening military might. It seems to be because the nature of war has changed and the complexities of our situation are such that military might can also aggravate affairs more than before. If so, there would be no sense in lives lost in order to end up as before or possibly worse. In this case, Gaza, lives lost means also the hundreds of civilians who may or may not be active supporters of Hamas, but are certainly not at all involved in militant acts towards us.

In December of 2008 I asked myself what type of action I would support to counter the daily rockets. Small military actions have been useless. Closing passages has not stopped the rockets. Peace talks?? With whom?? Directives are coming from Syria, munitions from Iran. Trying to talk with Hamas in Gaza, while they still insist on our demise would only greatly weaken those Palestinians in the West-Bank who are still willing to talk with us. But full scale WAR??!! I could think of no recipe as an alternative to this right of self-defense.

I am greatly disturbed by some of our Israeli reactions during this military action, already applauding our “victory” with a great smile and happiness: “we really showed them, didn’t we?”. Our Talmud relates that while we Israelites rejoiced at seeing Pharaoh’s charioteers drown between two walls of sea, God moaned and rebuked “my creations are drowning at sea and you choose to rejoice?!” It is difficult to rejoice over a “win” that kills so many civilian men, women, and children in Gaza. Hopefully the price paid in lives will bring us closer to quieter times. This, though, is far from certain. Evidently some things need to be done simply for lack of more viable alternatives. (I don’t think I would have written that last sentence a few years ago.)

I fully understand Louie’s dilemma. Reality is seldom lacking in grey areas of uncertainty. But reality also demands answers to situations, and so many answers in our present world are not foolproof and perfect. But they are our starting point for getting from today to tomorrow.

My best to you. I still think we will find ourselves on the same side of many, many lines.

Aaron

Comments on "Letter To Obama" and My Response

Sent 26.Nov.2008

Having read my letter to Obama, a good friend sent me some comments, to which I also responded.

THE LETTER AND COMMENTS FROM MY FRIEND:

"..........I agree with you and others that the only solution is a two-state solution. But stating this solution is easy. Knowing what the solution is, is not difficult! The difficulty is in establishing the trust on both sides to enable each side to gamble on the vey many steps that must be taken by each to approach and achieve the two-state solution. Despite your own laudable individual activities to bring about better understanding with the people of a small town in the West Bank and even taken together with similar activities of other like minded persons, your and their activities are just that; activities taken by individuals. I imagine you feel that if only the peoples could act, as opposed to the governments acting, we would be closer to a solution. But the reality, through my eyes, is that agreements between national entities are made by governments, not by individuals. There is nothing that I know of (I am open to being enlightened) which suggests to me that the PLA is interested in a two state solution. I think that it has yet to unequivocally and publicly repudiate its stated goal of destroying Israel. I think they have yet to do much to curtail terrorist attacks against Israel. I think that through the tunnels connecting Gaza and Egypt, Hamas, the democratically elected government of the Arabs of Gaza and the West Bank are preparing to inflict great damage on Israel, not to mention the recently resumed rocket fire. I believe that if they had the power, the West Bank and Gazan Arabs would slaughter the Jews of Israel. I believe the only thing not allowing this is the power of Israel and the presence pf the IDF in the West Bank and around Gaza.

I am dismayed that you, like so many others, call on (Barack to call on) Israel alone to do this or do that or to stop this and stop that with no mention of any actions that the PLA should take. A lot of Palestinian and Lebanese terrorists and other riminals have been freed from Israeli jails; for what? How about asking for some gestures of good will from them. Why don't you also call on President Obama to call on the PLA to free Gilad Shalit instead of their using his as a pawn to blackmail Israel; to stop its indiscriminate rocketing of Sderot, Ashkelon (The separation of Gaza and the West Bank works very well for Abu Mazen, don't you think?); to allow the IDF to leave the West Bank by fulfilling their responsibility to curtail terrorists and the terrorist infrastructure. I know, it's Israel's fault that they aren't able to do this. What other government has ever given arms to a hostile government to build its internal security forces, even when that hostile government has a stated goal of its destruction; to clearly, unequivocally, and publicly in English, Arabic, and Hebrew repudiate the stated goals of the destruction of Israel and the establishment of an Arab State in all of Palestine; to re-write the public educational texts and change the everyday television programs which villify Israel (That's no way to prepare a people for a two-state solution, is it?); to change the Friday afternoon sermons of hate into messages of reconciliation and cooperation. Couldn't you have asked Barack for even one of these?

I do hope that President Obama pressures Israel to stop settlement expansion in the West Bank, but I hope this is done in a context which also requires steps by the PLA, some of which, I have mentioned above......."

MY REPLY TO THE LETTER:

..............I’ll spend the rest of this letter commenting on the “political” portion of your letter.This may be overly long-winded, but please bear with me. I fully respect your objections to my letter to Obama and feel that they deserve total attention and an attempt at a response. Being your letter is packed with statements (I think you know how to shorten things better than I) I’ve tried here to comment on those that seemed most provocative to me. So here goes:

You wrote“I imagine you feel that if only the peoples could act, as opposed to the governments acting, we would be closer to a solution. But the reality, through my eyes, is that agreements between national entities are made by governments, not by individuals.”Let’s not mix up between two things: what an individual can and should do vis-à-vis what a government should do. For example: Minimizing “poverty” within a country can only be done by government goals, policies and budgets. Volunteer work at a soup-kitchen will not solve the problem of poverty. That’s not a reason not to volunteer or support the help given by the soup-kitchen. (certainly so in an atmosphere where government policies only widen the gap between poor and rich.) of course soup kitchens at their best will never replace the work needed to be done by a government.

How well I know that my own (and a few others) involvement – very low keyed and sparse – with the farmers in the West Bank will leave hardly an imprint on the policies of our governments. Here and there we are a thorn in the system (a very slight pain in the ass), but non-consequential policy-wise.

My involvement is a result of two situations. One: the tremendous de-facto policy support given by all of our governments over the past three decades (and more) to the expansion and legalization of settlements on conquered lands. Second: the support (mainly by silence and turning away heads) given by our army and government to the daily illegal and immoral acts of our “legalized” settlers and settlements upon their Palestinian neighbors.

You write: “I am dismayed that you, like so many others, call on (Barack to call on) Israel alone to do this or do that or to stop this and stop that…”Wrong. I call on Barack to help in one thing alone……..convincing us of the urgent need to stop expansion of settlements in the west bank and getting our settlers out of land which is not ours. Without this there is no way that any call to the Palestinians “to do this or do that or to stop this and stop that…” can have any avail. To date, each time we promise to at least “freeze” the settlements, we have allowed unperturbed expansion. So long as “freeze” equals “expansion” we are doing nothing to lessen the “The difficulty….in establishing the trust on both sides to enable each side to gamble on the very many steps that must be taken”.

“There is nothing that I know of (I am open to being enlightened) which suggests to me that the PLA is interested in a two state solution. I think that it has yet to unequivocally and publicly repudiate its stated goal of destroying Israel.”This month marks the 20th anniversary of the adoption of a two state solution by the PLO and the public repudiation of the stated goal of destroying Israel……..which also led to the Oslo agreements. Ever since then even the Likud Governments and other right-wing parties have stopped asking for public repudiation (as you ask for in your letter). The public repudiation is now being asked of the Hamas in Gaza, not of the leadership in the West Bank. (I leave aside for now the varying levels of trust in public pronouncements.)

It is instructional and proper that all of your direct references to “that hostile government” which has a stated goal of the destruction of Israel, refer to actions by the Hamas government of Gaza (tunnels connecting Gaza and Egypt, rockets on Sderot and Ashkelon, Gilad Shalit). Yet you try not to differentiate between the situation in the west bank and that in Gaza as far as having some type of leadership willing to talk with us on the basis of a two state solution. Of course just as in Gaza we aided in the destruction of those willing to talk with us, we are on the road to doing something similar in the West Bank by constantly promising to remove the most criminal of the illegal settlements, while doing hardly anything of the sort.

"(The separation of Gaza and the West Bank works very well for Abu Mazen, don't you think?)"

Yes, I do think so. It can also work very well for us. But as we did our best to undermine his infrastructure in Gaza, we are on the road to do so in the west bank as well. If we thus succeed, we can be sure to see a Hamas win in the west bank as well, and there probably is not much time left.

You ask that I “call on President Obama to call on the PLA….. to allow the IDF to leave the West Bank by fulfilling their responsibility to curtail terrorists and the terrorist infrastructure”.As mentioned earlier I didn’t call on Obama to influence the IDF to leave the West Bank. We can leave the West bank only when we have a fairly viable agreement for a two state solution. The occupation, in and of itself, is not an obstruction to an agreement. Phasing out the military occupation is the carrot we have to offer in any negotiation. And by the way…..yes, there is a lot of joint work done by the Palestinian police and the IDF in locating terrorists. At least this is what we’ve been shown on Israeli TV. Of course, if getting to an agreement turns out to be a dead-end street, tables will be turned, Hamas will take over the streets, and the third intifada will have begun. So far, our settlement policy is assuring a dead-end street. Ergo, my call regarding settlements.

“Why don't you also call on President Obama to call on the PLA ………to re-write the public educational texts and change the everyday television programs which villify Israel (That's no way to prepare a people for a two-state solution, is it?); to change the Friday afternoon sermons of hate into messages of reconciliation and cooperation. Couldn't you have asked Barack for even one of these?”, etc…..

I sense that out of your objection to what I did ask the President-elect you have over-reacted regarding things which were not included in my letter. Please understand, we have been asking for all those things constantly, and justifiably so, during every American mediation effort that has come our way, though we full well know that these will not change much until a successful mediation. My call to the President-elect was to add to our mediation wish-list also the one item which our government does not ask of the mediation: help us to help ourselves in getting our settlers out of land not theirs, because we are evidently unable (or unwilling) to do this on our own.

“I believe that if they had the power, the West Bank and Gazan Arabs would slaughter the Jews of Israel. I believe the only thing not allowing this is the power of Israel and the presence of the IDF in the West Bank and around Gaza.”

I agree with you so, so much. For that reason I thought it wrong of Sharon to vacate Tzahal from Gaza (along with so many other things Sharon was wrong on throughout his public life). Nor can we pull Tzahal out of the West Bank. My letter to Obama made no mention of anything of the sort.(read again perhaps). I have always seen the conquered territories as our hostages, with our ransom demand being a non-belligerent relationship with our Arab neighbors fortified by a variety of guarantees. I repeat - my call to the president-elect was to add to our mediation wish-list the one item which our government does not ask of the mediation: help us to help ourselves in getting our settlers out of land not theirs, because we are evidently unable (or unwilling) to do this on our own.

Please understand the damaging results of our settlement policy:

1. we are stealing lands belonging to private arab owners.

2. we have made our soldiers the guardians of people who have stolen lands, brutally harassed the original owners, and see their theft and the entire conquered lands as a permanent extension of the State of Israel.

3. With so much of our army deployed to protect our settlers, we have turned much of our training into that of a police force rather than training for the probable eventuality of some terrible wars that are still ahead of us. (Our Second Lebanon War was a good example of police training needing to cope with bringing a war into enemy territory. What a military disaster!)

4. Our soldiers are returning home having learned that you can shoot children throwing stones if they are Arab, but look away when settlers they are guarding have their children throw stones, or if settlers attack Arab farmers trying to work their fields. These are moral lessons brought back home after the army tour is over. They are wrong moral lessons, and they have spread and grown.

5. protecting our settlers, building them roads and other infrastructure, grants and favorable deals for moving to the conquered areas – all these have drained enormous funds from infrastructure, education, welfare and more within the State of Israel. (I can expand on the nose-dive each of these has taken, but some other time.)

6. So long as we have settlers and expanding settlements in the conquered lands, there is no way of holding these lands as ransom for better days when we can reach some kind of modus Vivendi for a two state solution living non-belligerently next to each other. The settlements are a constant living physical proof to the Palestinians that we have absolutely no intention of giving up the occupied lands in lieu of some type of agreement.

7. the continued expansion and natural growth of settlements in the West Bank will eventually be so heavy in population numbers so as to make it impossible to exit our settlers (many say that we have already passed the point of no return.) At that stage a two-state solution will no longer be an option. The only democratic option that will be left is to incorporate the West Bank into the State of Israel (the talk is already there – among arabs!). We will then hold the Palestinians in guarded enclaves or make them Israeli citizens (as we did on the Golan and in Eastern Jerusalem). With the second option, We can say goodby to a “Jewish State”. Being a Zionist, I prefer our country unilaterally pulling out our Jewish settlers from all occupied lands – now, before its too late.

I was always disturbed by stories coming out of the occupied lands regarding the behavior of our Jewish settlers towards the local Palestinians and the lax attitude of our army towards the actions of the settlers they are guarding. I assumed that part of the hype was also manufactured as some political tactic. I was wrong. These past few years I’ve taken the time to be among the olive groves of towns near Shchem. I’ve walked the streets and hills of Hevron and I’ve visited the sparse landscape of the cave dwellers south of Hevron. Being there and seeing convinced me that your justified request of the Palestinians “to change the Friday afternoon sermons of hate into messages of reconciliation and cooperation” must also be requested of the community of Jewish settlers that encourage their children to hate and harass their Arab neighbors while they themselves either commit or turn a blind eye to criminal acts committed towards their Arab neighbors. And don’t turn to me saying “yes, but that’s how the Arabs would act towards our Jews (and much worse) if we gave them the chance”. I yearn for our moral code to be different and so much higher and better than that which you may think is theirs.

I realize these words don’t answer all your objections, nor will I attempt to comment line by line, but please realize that my concern for the plight of the Palestinians is perhaps secondary. My main concern is what our settlement policy is doing to us as a people and where I fear it brings us to in the future.

Another Response to my "Letter to Obama"

Sent 13.Nov.2008

In response to reading the message I wrote to Obama on his website, a friend wrote me the following comments, and I thought it important to reply. I also thought you too may be interested in our correspondence.

So here it is:

To Aaron
(……………….)
You cannot begin to imagine how toxic the environment is in the Jewish community; anyone from Israel with your views would be booed off a speaker's platform here in San Francisco and elsewhere.

With rare exceptions, and mostly in private, it is impossible in the American Jewish community to express sentiments one used to be able to find on a daily basis in Ha'aretz. The experience following the pullout from Gaza has, unfortunately, provided an extremely strong argument against the efficacy of reaching any kind of accommodation with the Palestinians, one that is not easily refuted. And so, if you have any time, or the inclination, I'd be interested in your response to those who say that the lesson of Gaza is not to yield an inch. My own inadequate response is that increasing the frustrations of an entire people is what got us to this juncture and that pursuit of an expansionist agenda can only lead to disaster.

My attempt at a response:

Hello ------,

Thanks for your comments on the message to Obama and your appraisals of sentiments in our American Jewish community. Yes, I am also aware of the simplistic backlash as a result of the Gaza pullout. A response to that backlash is not simple. Just as destroying something is simpler and quicker than building something. A response to the simplistic backlash needs listeners with patience to listen. We seldom find them.

What you call your “inadequate response” seems to be fairly adequate, but I understand your frustration. I too am frustrated by the fact that we can’t convince our people that what is happening is not right, not good, not moral, and not helping us in the long run. We live in a complex world both macro and micro. We are on the front line of a conflict between Western and Moslem civilizations. We are also a people grappling between an older opportunistic and humanistic Zionism and a newer neo-Zionizm drenched in messianic and jingoistic aspirations. We also have very real enemies (in both macro and micro) who would enjoy seeing us disappear from the Middle East.

Obviously none of us has all the answers and a good bit of where we stand on the issues depends on the chemical composition of our conscience. That’s probably the best we can ever do. Nevertheless, I think there are some conclusions which may help influence (sometimes) the thinking of others.

First some comments on Gaza:

1. The Israeli Left (see: Yosi Beilin) did its best to warn that leaving Gaza unilaterally without coming to an agreement with the Palestinian Authority is a mistake. Unfortunately, no attempt was made by the Sharon Government to reach an agreement. Nevertheless, as Beilin said begrudgingly, Leaving is better than staying.

2. Prior to the withdrawal from Gaza, our Government did its “awful best” to weaken the Fatah led Palestinian Authority, both before and after Arafat’s death. We succeeded immensely, and brought on the Hamas domination of Gaza (and its influential inroads into the West Bank as well).

3. The main obstruction to an agreement with the Palestinians is not the occupation itself. The military occupation (fazing it out) is the carrot we would be able to offer in any negotiation. The main obstructions are the settlements, both illegal and pseudo-legal. Their existence and expansion deny us the ability to use the military occupation (fazing it out) as a carrot.

4. In leaving Gaza we pulled out settlements and military supervision both at the same time. (and, of course, after having done an excellent job of weakening the Fatah led Palestinian Authority.) We did not leave the military in place as a negotiating carrot for a (probably gradual) withdrawal.

But the sins of occupation and the crimes of settlements are much more complex, and their effect on the profile of Israeli society runs much deeper than the localized question of Gaza.

We are a nation of soldiers, and our young soldiers return home marred and scarred from their few years in the army. In our army they learn that they are not there simply for the important task of protecting our country, as was (mainly) the task of soldiers who prepared and fought in ’56 and ’67 and ‘73. Today they learn that they are also in the army to protect settlers and settlements that are grabbing lands from an occupied people, and its O.K. ; Today they learn that in order to patrol an occupied people you also need to degrade and debase and humiliate them, and its O.K. too ; today they learn that shooting at children throwing stones is O.K. if they are Arab, not O.K. if they are Jewish, and that too is O.K. ; Today they learn things we once considered immoral and deeds we remember as criminal and this too is O.K.; after 2 or 3 or more years in the army, our young soldiers bring home a set of norms that set the background for the profile of the new Israel; and this has been going on with ever increasing inertia for a number of decades; and this too is O.K. ??

Our soldiers have spent most of their time during the past 40 years learning to police the occupied territories by forcefully controlling the Palestinian populace while heavily protecting the settlers and settlements. The occupation mixed with land-grabbing settlers have turned our army from soldiers to policemen (including Swat Teams and all). From high ranking officers down to the lowly private we have trained a successful police force. But police forces don’t fight wars and are ill trained to bring a battle into foreign enemy territory. We proved this with the operation and results of the Second Lebanese War in 2006. The future holds for us the danger of wars that threaten our existence infinitely more than a hostile Palestinian entity. For that eventuality we need an army of all soldiers trained for 21st century wars, not an efficient police force trained mainly to subdue and control Palestinians while protecting settlers and their settlements. In the long run, the policy of occupation and settlement remains the greatest threat to our future existence.

In 1967, after 6 days of war, I was exhilarated at the outcome. We won. The Western Wall was ours. Sinai and the West Bank were in our hands. I wondered how long it would be before we’d be able to negotiate a “peace for territories” agreement with our enemy neighbors. I hoped for “soon” but knew that it may also be a long time. We had two choices. Either graciously return conquered lands immediately (as we did in ’56) with the hope that our “generosity” would bring our enemies to decide on a peaceful modus-vivendi with us, or else we would hold on to the conquered territories as hostages in return for eventual peace agreements. I never foresaw the third alternative: holding on to the conquered territories with the desire of keeping them and expanding national boundaries.

When the first settlers landed in the West Bank I saw it as a criminal act that when compounded will bring on the demise of a democratic Jewish homeland. Forty years later, alongside so many Israeli and Palestinian corpses, I find a general apathy to the changed norms that have overtaken and rooted all around us. The plight of a subdued people is taken for granted as are traffic accidents. But also our own streets are more violent, our indifference to others misfortune is greater, we are no longer a united people pulling in fairly similar directions, and so many have no directions at all. No, not everything because of the occupation and settlements, but so much time and energy and money are expended on holding on to the territories and settlements that so much less is left for the tasks of molding a nation that is a “light unto the nations”.

O.K., I think I’ve begun to digress into our wider Israeli scenario, and anyways I doubt there will be many willing to listen to this much. Also, I know that all I’ve written has counter arguments that are delivered forcefully and convincingly. As I said earlier, a good bit of where we stand on the issues depends on the chemical composition of our conscience. That’s probably the best we can ever do.

My best wishes,

aaron

Letter to Obama

sent 10.Nov.2008

Dear Friends,

Like so many others, I've not yet gotten over the exhilaration of seeing Obama elected President. As an Israeli I also have special hopes regarding a changed American approach to our local conflict. As you may know Obama has a web sight where we can communicate our thoughts and hopes for an American "Change". I sent Obama a message thru this web site, and though I know that some of my friends would disagree with my message, I thought it would be well to share with you the things I wrote.

So here it is:

To our President-elect, Barack Obama

Re: your involvement with us in Israel

I was stunned by your election to the Presidency, and I thank whatever circumstances enabled your election aside from your truly wonderful attributes which make you what you are. I did not think those attributes of excellence would be enough to place you in the driver’s seat…..not in the America I knew.

But you are there……a combination of all that is YOU and circumstances not envisioned when you started on the road to the presidency.

I am a citizen of both the USA and of Israel. I am Jewish. I live in a kibbutz close to the Lebanese border. I am an ardent Zionist and believe in Israel as our Jewish Homeland. My fervent Zionist desire for a democratic Jewish Homeland is the basis for my belief that only a true two-state solution between Israelis and Palestinians can satisfy the desires and the future of our two peoples in the most just and democratic spirit.

A two state solution will never develop as long as we Israelis continue to settle and expand our settlements in the territories we conquered after being unilaterally attacked in the war of 1967. As long as we continue civilian settlement in occupied territory, as long as we continue to find legal and security excuses for shameful land-grabbing, we shall never arrive at a two state solution acceptable (even grudgingly) to both sides.

American Presidents in the past, and certainly during these past few decades, have given sound support to Israel in its stand within a hostile Arab world in the Middle East. But the American bear-hug has also allowed us to say we are truly looking for a two-state solution while blatantly continuing our settlement policy in Palestinian lands. This is a policy that will eventually destroy the democratic moral fiber of our country, and perhaps also lead to the physical melt-down of our Jewish democratic homeland.

If you are truly a friend of Israel as a democratic Jewish homeland, which I believe you are, please don’t continue the overdone bear-hug. Please be a true friend, one who takes us to task for those acts that are counterproductive to both our physical future and to our moral standing as a democratic Jewish homeland. I know that we here in Israel will make the final policy decisions. But our decisions have always taken into account the American bear-hug which has generally looked away from our failings in the occupied territories. Be a true friend. Stop looking away. If we need a detox period, help us bring it on.

I know….helping us as I ask may get you into hot water with many other American Jews who will paint you as an enemy of Israel. But this is not an election year anymore, and you have an eight year surge, and most of your contributions came via the web. Give us the proper guarantees while going thru detox. After we get to a two-state solution, my fellow American Jews will come around. But most of all, you will have done the right thing……..for us Israelis and for the Palestinians. It will not solve the conflicts in the Middle East, but it will alleviate some tensions enough to allow better dialogue between the United States and the Arab world. This is good for America. This is good for the world. This is good for us.

I am well aware that you have so many other issues to resolve in the immediate future. Our conflict will not top your list on the 21st of January. But remember us in February, because without your help, settlements will continue to grow and expand in the Palestinian occupied lands and our conflict will continue seeding a full blown conflagration that will also land at your doorstep.

Along with my sincere respect and admiration for you, I wish you the strength and stamina and wisdom that we so expect from you as the President of the United States.

Respectfully,

Aaron Sharif

Kibbutz Gesher Haziv, Israel