January 2006

I didn’t see this reported anywhere else outside of Arutz Sheva. It is 38 years since the Dakar’s tragic sinking of the Dakar. Sixt-nine sailors were lost. They were remembered this week in a ceremony at Har Herzl.

This according to a recent story in Ynet about Kibbutznikim opposing the destruction of homes in Amona and the evacuation of the Kasba market homes in Hebron. The article doesn’t really go into depth though about which kibbutz members they are talking about and how representative they are. I imagine that they are the exception (and thus news), not the rule.

Sam over on Voices of the Left passes on an email from a Ramalla based friend concerning the Hamas victory:

of course, the world is going to just say, what will this development do for peace? it will take it as a message that palestinians want war, that they are only militant. i would be so so suprised if i see the international community recognizing that this election reflects societal and economic concerns of palestinians: this election was not about the palestine question. it was about living in palestine.

And Zach weighs in with the good, the bad, and the fun from the flagship conference of American Zionist Youth that just took place in Miami:

The weekend was an interesting affair sitting through discussions and presentations by different Zionist speakers about many issues. Additionally, the event was a good opportunity for Zionists from incredibly diverse backgrounds to meet and get together. Everyone from the secular of the secular and the religious of the religious were there, and everything in between…One thing that especially got my attention was the attention that was paid to Judaism and Jewish issues. The issues discussed were important, but not really relevant to the conference. I felt the focus of the conference should have been exclusively Zionism, as it was a conference dealing with Zionists issues that are pertinent to us.

Over on the NRV blogger Josh S. gets biblical on the Hamas and Iranian connection. And both Zeev and Michael have weighed in on Hebron.

Do you want to have your say? We are looking for more bloggers. Catch us at blogsofzion-at-gmail.com.

This past weekend, I attended the Young Zionist Leadership conference in Miami. The conference is sponsored by USD/Hagshama (The Youth Department of the WZO), the American Zionist Movement, and the Jewish Agency. The program was billed to be a “conference for leading Israel campus activists.”

The weekend was an interesting affair sitting through discussions and presentations by different Zionist speakers about many issues. Additionally, the event was a good opportunity for Zionists from incredibly diverse backgrounds to meet and get together. Everyone from the secular of the secular and the religious of the religious were there, and everything in between.

It was nice to be in Miami, but I left the conference wanting to get more out of it. Some of the things that went on at the conference kind of bugged me.

One thing that especially got my attention was the attention that was paid to Judaism and Jewish issues. The issues discussed were important, but not really relevant to the conference. I felt the focus of the conference should have been exclusively Zionism, as it was a conference dealing with Zionists issues that are pertinent to us.

Another thing that I did not like about the conference was that I felt it was left leaning. The keynote speaker was Israeli Artist Yehonatan Geffen, who made what I thought was a terrible and incredibly pompous speech. The speech was entitled “Zionism as an Anti-Depressant”. Geffen mainly talked about how amazing his writing was (It wasn’t, he read about 3 chapters of his new book during his speech. Some keynote address..) and also talked about how his parents generation had no love for their children because they were too busy putting everything they had into loving Israel and doing everything for the state. To him, this was one of the major drawbacks of Zionism and one of its failures. While I am sorry that Geffen’s parents did not love him as a child, it is wrong of him to represent an entire generation of Israeli’s as never having loved their children. I might be going on a limb in saying this, but probably not, the majority of Israeli parents of that generation loved their children.

Geffen commented on how this over-arching love for the State and the importance of it over ones family was Fascist. While this might be, Geffen was blatantly characterizing and alluding to the fact that Israel is a Facist State and Zionism as just Facism in disguise. This is a disgusting argument.

Also, both of Geffen’s sessions that he ran for smaller groups at the conference were entitled “The Unique Style and Secrets of My Writng”. He is just so humble.

An interesting discussion happened in one of the programs. As Zionists do we have a stake in the goings on inside the State of Israel or are we just outsiders who are butting into things that are none of our business? Many feel that Zionism was finished with the creation of the State of Israel. I disagree strongly. If we are to be Zionists and establish a State, then how can we not make judgements on the character of the State and things that go on inside. If Zionists feel that we should have no opinion about the character of the Jewish State, then Israel might well have not been created. We cannot just establish a state and then wash our hands of it.

Overall the Conference was a good time, the programming was pretty good, but the best part was the discussions that happened after hours with other Young Zionists from around North America.

Both of my roommates seemed to have stumbled on the conference by accident. One of them had never been to Israel and had barely any knowledge of Zionism and the other had been once but made the comment to me the first night “I’m not really a Zionist.” I found that a little disturbing, but the juxtaposition of the two seemingly non-Zionists with the hardcore Zionists was interesting. My roommates seemed to be a better representation of the Jewish community of North America, disconnected with Zionism, some not even knowing what Zionism is. While Geffen’s representations were false, my two roommates were not.

One of the many problems of Zionism today is one of disassociation. Jews care about Israel and are big supporters, well at least most do. There is a difference, a huge one between being “Pro-Israel” and the big “Z” word. The challenge for the Zionist movement is getting people involved, and that does not just mean voting for the World Zionist Congress elections. Don’t get me wrong, voting for the WZC elections is fantastic. One solution to this problem is getting more and more people to Israel in their youth because those are their most influential years. It is that much harder to be a Zionist if you have never been to Israel. This is also true for Birthright, which dozens of my friends have gone on and told me that the Zionist aspect was lacking. I haven’t expierienced this myself because I am ineligible to go on Birthright, but I trust their opinions. A ten-day trip to Israel, only given to youths 18-26 is not enough!

Programs like Masa, a Jewish agency consortium of hundreds of programs in Israel run by every Youth movement and Jewish organization you can think of, are a fantastic start, but are hardly the solution to the problem. There are many issues that fall under the scope of Zionism, all of which are important, but the most important thing in my mind is sustaining the Zionist movement for the future. Zionism will not die if we do something about it, be proactive, keep the dream of millions of Jews, both of Today and long ago, alive.

For the last few months, Iran has been announcing in front of the world that Israel should be removed from the map. They have been claiming that the Holocaust hasn’t happened. They have been moving quickly toward developing the bomb. And the world has done relatively little. Basically, because of oil pressure, the politics with China and Russia, and the atmosphere in light of Iraq and Afganistan, there doesn’t seem much to do. Iran said the fobidden words and saw that nothing happened.
Shortly thereafter, the Palestinians went to the polls and elected Hamas. Are the two things related? It’s possible that the brazeness of Iran showed the Palestinian people that they could elect a terrorist government that would thumb its nose at the world’s concerns and nothing would happen.
I want to make it perfectly clear that I do not mean to equate Iran (or Palestine or even Hamas) halachically with Amalek, but on a simple level, isn’t this what Chazal say Amalek did? They attacked the Hebrews following the Exodus and showed that nothing too supernatural happened, opening the door to other attacks.
I hope that the words of Iran and the victory of Hamas do not open the floodgates and are not left unchecked.

By now the media tempest surrounding Hamas’ accession to power has reached its highest fervor.

My friend Reema, with whom I worked on several projects as an undergraduate at Virginia, was in a Ramallah press room as the results came in. Reema has also been working for Al Mudabara, an organization of Mustapha Barghouti, whose party Independent Palestine picked up a few seats in the election to come in a distant third. Here, I reproduce an edited version of the e-mail she sent to her family and friends from the epicenter of the action:

hey sam.

yeah. they won by lots. lots. lots more than people thought. it was even a surprise to hamas. THEY TOOK 9 SEATS IN HEBRON. hebron used to be for fateh. i just heard a story about a fateh man in hebron whose family alone consists of 27,000 from talking to a lot of people here, and he lost. (but 27,000 seems awful high…)

it’s really apparent that the majority of voters here are not hamas, but they voted for hamas—a big difference. even though 11 parties ran, people here considered this election as if it were just two parties. you’re either for fateh, the same old, or against them. i think many many people voted for hamas not because they are with its program, but because they really want change from fateh.

just a few minutes ago i got word that at the hamas press conference an hour ago, one palestinian reporter stood and said, i am a muslim but i am secular. am i going to have to leave the country? is this going to become an islamic state? and the dude, i could not find out which leader specifically, said ‘no, you don’t have to worry.’ he said that the government would be secular—he used the word secular—to respect the secular and diverse society. this is good first because if it’s true, it’s just good. second, because he said it. the party has been questioned immediately about this, and now they have to live up to their words. or if not, have those words thrown back at them to discredit them.

and you know, if hamas lives up to that statement, then i am actually very hopeful as to the changes for palestine. because hamas has actually demonstrated competence in governing. they organized parts of gaza, and did it well. and they did not restrict their social structures to those pledging allegiance to hamas—they just did it. if they try to make palestine the ideal islamic state they talk about, then that’s a big problem. but if they say, we recognize what palestine is, and we want to help it (ie changing structures within society, not fundamentals of it), then i think palestinians will have a much better life. because thus far, the pa has done nothing to help. yes, they governed under occupation, but they could do more, and haven’t thus far.

also, israelis will finally have to deal with other extremists. they will get all their own extremism given back to them at the negotiating table (hamas already said it would negotiate). and that is good.

of course, the world is going to just say, what will this development do for peace? it will take it as a message that palestinians want war, that they are only militant. i would be so so suprised if i see the international community recognizing that this election reflects societal and economic concerns of palestinians: this election was not about the palestine question. it was about living in palestine.

but no one will say that. this will be a continuation of the ‘no partner’ narrative. “look, they elected the terrorists. they dont’ want israel to exist.” but that’s not what’s going on. even if hamas was calling for the destruction of israel (which it’s not), this election was about getting a government that would do something for palestinian lives.

I think Reema’s right. Except for the bit about Hamas having agreed to negotiate - I’ll have to ask her where she heard that - she is right on target.

Obviously, it’s not my favorite outcome. Ha’Aretz has already run an article comparing the victory to that of the Likud in 1977.

Lefties like me enjoy comparing Palestinian terrorists to the old pre-state Jewish terrorists like the Irgun and Lehi, who gave birth to the Likud. But what we sometimes forget to do after we do that is remember that if we had been around at the time, we would have opposed the actions of the Irgun and Lehi, just as Martin Buber and others did, because they were the wrong way for the movement. And we should oppose groups like Hamas for the same reasons. They have so far failed to achieve much - now we’ll get to see what they do with a more powerful infrastructure.

I’m more optimistic than Ariel that they will moderate, but even if they do they will probably never be able to meet Olmert’s conditions for negotiations. Which, of course, will be just fine by him. Gilbert Achcar, posting at Juancole.com, has even put forward the theory that the strengthening of Hamas was part of a Sharon master plan all along. An idea, if you take it seriously, that would lead straight back to pessimism.

I refuse to make predictions - chaos is the rule here. We’ll all just have to wait and see…

I think Hamas’s victory might be a good thing for both Israel and Palestine.

This is why:

First, for the past 14 years, the State of Israel has been stuck in a relationship with a Palestinian leadership who has done nothing to stop or cut-down the infrastructure of terrorist groups. In fact, we know that the central administration under Arafat passed along payments to terrorists. Hamas being in government, therefore, removes the veneer of legitimacy from the Palestinian Authority and enables Israel to negotiate with a hostile power as a hostile power. Peace is made with enemies, not friends.

Second, the Palestinians I met when working with youth in Gaza were hardworking and caring individuals–and pissed as hell at Fatah. I can imagine that they would have voted for Hamas if only to unseat Fatah. Yes, this does present a certain paradox, but it is a paradox they will have to deal with–on their own. Self-determination is a right, not an option contingent upon realist policy. I know Jack Snyder’s data rather well–I took his class and learned with him–so I am pretty well read on arguments about how early democratization may lead to war; well, if war is what Hamas will lead the Palestinian people towards, war is what they will get–and Israel can fight a war much better than the “low-intensity conflict” of the past five years. But eventually the Palestinian people–who do care about their own lives, unlike the suicide-cult of Hamas–will unseat Hamas too, thereby clearing the field from both the corrupt “Tunisian” Fatah and the insane “Martyrphile” Hamas.

Third, because Hamas’ domestic policy is quite good, and there might be people within Hamas that will wake up and realize that they will not ever beat Israel. Might be. I doubt it–but the possibility exists. I’m not saying Hamas will moderate–Hamas as a movement is what it is–a movement hell-bent on destroying Israel and the Jewish people, and subjugating all non-Muslims to dhimmi status. But there will be those who came to Hamas for it’s opposition status, and might be empowered to take over when they see that the Martyrphiles are too insane to govern.

To be clear: there will be a lot of violence in the coming weeks as Hamas and Fatah gangs have it out. But I believe that over time this can be a positive development, just the shock that the region needs to get out of the mud.

Apropos to YKH’s article the spin on the Hamas election begins:

The question at the core of Wednesday’s election is this: Which face of Hamas were Palestinians voting for? The Islamist movement that has vowed to destroy the state of Israel? Or the highly disciplined domestic party that runs schools and health clinics and promised to sweep away the corruption and incompetence that marked the rule of Fatah? There are three threads of hope in answering the question. The first is that Hamas agreed to, and has honored, a cease-fire with Israel for the last year. The second is that Palestinian polling over the years has shown large majorities to favor a peaceful settlement with Israel. The third is that Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas, a peacemaker respected in Washington, will retain his office as Palestinian president while Hamas organizes a cabinet. That gives the Bush administration a channel to explore Hamas’ intentions and transmit a message: Hamas has won the election, but it cannot win international recognition or American support until it renounces violence and accepts the premise of a two-state solution.

as has the discussion over whether a foriegn policy based on promoting democratization is really feasible:

The Bush administration once thought it could take a holiday from complexity and remake the world through a few bold strokes. But democratization is hard, complicated and frustrating. It requires the patient building of institutions and attention to detail. There are no short cuts. You wonder if the president will come to terms with the flaws in his own status quo.

Yossi Klein Halevi paints a bleak picture in TNR. First, responsibility for Hamas’ victory should not be excused by talk about corruption:

The second spin concerns the Palestinian people. Palestinians, we’re being told, didn’t really intend to vote for the bad Hamas that blows up buses and promotes Holocaust denial and enshrines the Protocols of the Elders of Zion in its charter. They were simply fed up with Fatah corruption and voted for the good Hamas that provides social benefits and a sense of discipline and purpose. True, Palestinians were understandably outraged at Fatah, which was the recipient of billions of dollars of foreign aid and managed in the last decade not to rehabilitate a single refugee camp. Yet to excuse the landslide vote for Hamas is to continue to patronize the Palestinian people, as most of the international community did through five years of suicide bombings. Palestinians voted for a movement for whom means and ends are identical: The suicide bombings are mini-preenactments of Hamas’s genocidal impulse. Not to hold the Palestinians responsible for their fate, when they vote democratically, is to deny them the right to define themselves.

He describes the effect of this election on Israelis:

The rise of Hamas also marks the end of the era of the guilty Israeli conscience, which began during the first intifada in the late 1980s. Perhaps the most effective ally of the Palestinians in their quest for statehood was the realization among many Israelis that the Palestinians had rights and had been wronged. Over the last five years of terror, though, the Israeli guilty conscience has been steadily eroded. Now, none but the most deluded Israelis will continue to maintain that the conflict is about the occupation and the settlements rather than Israel’s existence. As Dan Meridor, one of the Israeli negotiators at Camp David, put it, the peace process failed not because of a Palestinian state but because of a Jewish state.

The results are pointing to a Hamas victory in the Palestinian elections. This will democratically usher in a radically more belligerent Palestinian government(at least in form, though not necessarily in substance). These Palestinian elections cut to the larger question of what type of foreign policy will lead to more peace and stability in the Middle East. The old model, pursued by the United States and to a certain extent Israel, was to extend explicit or implicit support to the more reliable, though unsavory, despotic leaders, in the hope of maintaing regime (oil) stability and suppressing extremism. These elections are the product of the new diplomacy of supporting democratization even in a milieu as beset by extremism as the Arab World. The next few years (assuming power is actually transfered to Hamas) will be a case study as to whether supporting the more idealistic vision, pro-democracy at any cost, policy, leads to peace or just more extremism.

We also need to ask what Israel’s role in the new reality will be and whether it should support democratization in the Arab World even if it means getting Hamas as a neighbor. These elections necessitate such a conversation and I’m sure we’ll see some interesting stuff in the next few months. In the meantime, check out “Israel and the Arab Spring” where Benjamin Balint and Daniel Doneson, striking early, make the case for an Israel that is on board with the policy of encouraging democracy in the Middle East, come what may:

Democratic self-government–liberty and equality and the rights dependent on them–are ideals to which all people can aspire. The post-Iraq Middle East and the American-led drive for democratization present Israel with the unique opportunity to seize an old argument with new urgency, and to present itself not merely as no impediment to regional democratization, but as an exemplary instance of it. In most cases, overt Israeli support of Arab reformers would only damn their cause. But a wise Israeli response to the burgeoning pax democratica, one that does not make the mistake of disdaining the American democracy initiative, can work to subtle but powerful effect. The world needs examples of Middle East democracy, and while the Americans work towards this goal with the Iraqis, Israel–undeterred by classical realists, cultural relativists, or isolationist leftists–should exemplify it in its treatment of its Arab citizens and demand it from the Palestinians, especially in post-Arafat and post-disengagement Gaza.

(Full Disclosure: This article was published in the quarterly where I work)

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