With friends like these
by Gadgie, 30 August 2007
Will has commented on John Pilger’s dreadful piece in the New Statesman calling for a boycott of Israel and has linked to lots of good critiques. His own is less delicately phrased than the others, but it is hard to demur from the sentiments expressed.
I do not want to comment on the article itself but to write a very personal take on why I think that this section of the pro-Palestinian left is, in effect, one of the Palestinians’ worst enemies. This is because they are not the partisans of peace, but of conflict.
Let me first get this straight. I come from a position sympathetic to the Palestinians. I was a volunteer English teacher on the West Bank in the early eighties. The establishment of the State of Israel did lead to the dispossession of the Palestinians, a bitter experience and a continuing hardship. This was compounded by the occupation following the war of 1967. The reasons for the Palestinian ‘catastrophe’ was the failure by all parties, including the British and the Arabs, for whatever reasons, to accept and impose the 1947 UN resolution creating both a Jewish and a Palestinian state. This two state solution is still the only practical basis for a just settlement.
However, a one-state settlement remains as a temptation. Far right Zionist nationalism has talked of involuntary population transfers, modelled on the Greek and Turkish population exchanges following on from the Treaty of Lausanne, in order to incorporate the whole of Mandatory Palestine into an enlarged State of Israel. Palestinian rejectionist movements dream of reversing the defeats in successive wars and achieving a final victory over Israel. This has taken several forms from the ’secular democratic state’ to the statement in the Hamas Charter that ‘the land of Palestine has been an Islamic Waqf throughout the generations and until the Day of Resurrection, no one can renounce it or part of it, or abandon it or part of it‘ (not very comforting to the significant Palestinian Christian minority). This rejectionism has invariably been accompanied by bloody violence. The latest excrescence of the suicide murder of civilians is the most sickening, squandering the Palestinians’ moral and political capital - and that is all they have.
So where does the Pilger inspired pro-Palestinian left go? Do they accept the undeniable legitimacy, or at least the permanence, of Israel and argue for a similar legitimacy for Palestinian national self-determination? To do so would mean engaging with, not boycotting, peace activists on both sides, educationalists and artists, trade unionists and human rights activists. No, they try to define the conflict according to their own lexicon. Zionism becomes racism, it is Apartheid, ‘ethnic cleansing’, colonialism and an agent of American imperialism. By implication those that struggle against it are the noble heroes of an anti-colonial struggle, regardless of their motivation, actions and purpose. They act as apologists for the partisans of an unwinnable struggle for a single state. And while the dynamics of conflict worsen, they can continue to feel ever more self-righteous in their advocacy.
The Palestine/Israel conflict is not easily reducible to categories, it has a unique and complex history. However, it is not about what this section of the left says it is. It is a struggle over land, self-determination, security and human rights. It is rooted in trauma - for one people genocide, for the other dispossession - and has been mediated by war and terrorism. The choice of peace means a de-escalation of violence, mutual recognition and continuing political engagement. It is hard to see that coming from the rhetoric of the left, as they act as cheerleaders for one side, rather than for the painful, slow and difficult processes that confront violence and seek reconciliation. By apologising for the worst, they betray the best. The Palestinians are ill served by such friends.
UPDATE
Terry Glavin has linked to this post . He has other links and, in particular, there are two videos that are well worth watching and circulating widely. You can see them here.
Thursday 30 August 2007 at 19:58
What a wonderful, poetic piece. My sentiments entirely (but expressed more elegantly).
Thursday 30 August 2007 at 20:06
An excellent, thoughtful piece that deserves to be very widely read. You most eloquently make the point that the pro-boycott campaign dsoes the cause of the Palestinians, for a viable state, alongside Isreal, no good whatsoever. In fact, most boycotters are not pro-Palestinian, so much as anti-Israel.
The left in the T&G (some of whom voted to support the successful boycott resolution at their conference this year), are now having second thoughts, realising the damage such posturing has done to Palestinian/Israeli trade union solidarity.
Pilger’s article is simply a disgrace.
Thursday 30 August 2007 at 21:17
What a wonderful, poetic piece
Thanks, but I think that Pilger - what a fucking twat also has a certain lyrical quality to it.
Thursday 30 August 2007 at 21:38
Excellent post.
Thursday 30 August 2007 at 21:57
Terry Glavin has a new post up with two video clips appended that I very much recommend viewing and disseminating.
http://transmontanus.blogspot.com/2007/08/against-pilger-inspired-pro-palestinian.html
Thursday 30 August 2007 at 23:04
Nice piece by Gadgie on Pilger etc.
Everybody rightly talks about the wrongs committed by Israel in 1948
but they forget this
http://www.engageonline.org.uk/blog/article.php?id=1353
It’s important as both sides committed wrongs in 47/48.
Friday 31 August 2007 at 1:31
“Thanks, but I think that Pilger - what a fucking twat also has a certain lyrical quality to it.
Well, in terms of achieving a 2 state solution both Will and John “fucking twat” Pilger get it more right than you do.
You say a two state solution is the best way to go and then contradict by advocating internationalist trotskyitely: “To do so would mean engaging with, not boycotting, peace activists on both sides, educationalists and artists, trade unionists and human rights activists.” for unity and not division. This is not a bad thing to advocate, but it ain’t two states. What you are really advocating is a single state solution where humanitarian ideals rule, perhaps similar to the EU superstate where each lot of people are ruled by common peaceful cause, but won’t admit it.
That ain’t a bad dream to have but it will not work. There isn’t enough common cause between the liberal, humane mostly secular democracy of Israel and the religious troglodyte, tribal dictatorship of Palestine.
A better solution is a two state solution with two seperate states for the two seperate nations. This deals with the reality of the situation (which you touch upon when you refer to far-right Zoinists/Hamas charter and unique & complex history) of two Nations in a single place. Conflict is the reality and a two state solution with each side pointing their guns at the other is the best solution we can achieve. Will (and myself) are fans of the liberal democracy of Israel, John “fucking twat” Pilger of the martyr rich facism of Hamas and both think the other needs to be destroyed.
The best chance of peace is a peace that comes when the Hamas facists get to the brink of conflict look across at Israels nukes and tanks and missiles - and know they must blink or die. I think they will blink. Then we can start usefully spouting your unifying ideals, but until the facists blink we need to back Israel.
Friday 31 August 2007 at 2:06
unahaclosp:
Hamas is ALREADY looking across at Israeli nukes and tanks and missiles, and they are doing a lot more than blinking about it.
And this sentence of yours:
“What you are really advocating is a single state solution where humanitarian ideals rule, perhaps similar to the EU superstate where each lot of people are ruled by common peaceful cause, but won’t admit it” … sounds like you’re accusing Gadge of being less than honest.
You will now say it isn’t so, and that you simply wrote a lousy sentence.
Friday 31 August 2007 at 7:32
You said…”The choice of peace means a de-escalation of violence, mutual recognition and continuing political engagement. It is hard to see that coming from the rhetoric of the left, as they act as cheerleaders for one side, rather than for the painful, slow and difficult processes that confront violence and seek reconciliation. By apologising for the worst, they betray the best. The Palestinians are ill served by such friends”…
Like Israel does right,Palestinians should recognize Israel but Israel does not have to recognize them.They can just go on building illegal settlements(but I guess if forced to they will then recognize Palestinians rights to a state on what little land they have left,or what land Israel decides they will accept as Palestinian).Nor does Israel have to recognize the rights of all those Palestinians they forced into refugee camps.
And like Israel uses peaceful means to dispose Palestinians of their land.
Give me a fucking break.
Is there any way people can show solidarity with the suffering Palestinians that you approve off.Remember who took who’s land,it was not the Arabs
Friday 31 August 2007 at 8:59
Give me a fucking break.
When you are taking it you might like to try actually reading the post.
Remember who took who’s land,it was not the Arabs
Whose land, not who’s.
You do realize that you are amply proving Gadgie’s point?
Friday 31 August 2007 at 9:18
Excellent post
Friday 31 August 2007 at 9:25
Interesting comments
1. What you are really advocating is a single state solution
No I am not. This is a rhetorical trick known as extension (and I am not an International Trotskyite). I explicitly reject it in the post. I am writing about a process that can achieve a two state solution.
Hamas is a dangerous minority. There is a sizeable Palestinian constituency for a two state solution. Watch Terry’s videos. I think that you are far too pessimistic and anything based on mutual fear will be a non-starter.
2. And Dirk, mutual recognition actually means, err, mutual recognition and all that it involves.
Friday 31 August 2007 at 10:13
Gadgie said…”And Dirk, mutual recognition actually means, err, mutual recognition and all that it involves”…
…so when is Israel going to recognize Palestinians lands,when are they going to stop using violence and theft to build more illegal settlements on Palestinian lands.
It amazing the Palestinians always have to makes the first move,even though they never occupied nor took any ones land.
How dare they resist,how dare anyone take their side or at even articulate their point of view.
So when Israel bombs and kills indiscriminately do they do loss any moral capital?
you said…”The Palestinians are ill served by such friends”…
….actually their more ill served by people who always excuse everything Israel does,while holding Palestinians(the victims) up to an impossible standrad
A bomb that kills whether dropped from a f-15 or carried is a bomb is a bomb.The end result is the same death and misery.
I am sure if they could Palestinians would rather use jet fighters or drones in defense of what little land they have left(what is it now 22% or there abouts and getting smaller).
Friday 31 August 2007 at 11:25
Sorry Dirk
You are not reading what I have written, which is a attack on angry partisanship and misunderstanding, on behalf of either side, as part of a peace process.
I quote the Israeli peace activist, Uri Avnery:
They (Israeli and Palestinian policies) were shaped by their historical narratives, by their disparate views of the conflict over the last 120 years. The Israeli national historical version and the Palestinian national historical version are entirely contradictory, both in general and in every single detail… Resolution of such a long historical conflict is possible only if each side is capable of understanding the other’s spiritual-national world and willing to approach him as an equal. Therefore, the primary role of a new Israeli peace camp is to get rid of the false myths and the one-sided view of the conflict. This does not mean that the Israeli narrative should automatically be rejected and the Palestinian narrative unquestionably accepted. But it does require open-minded listening and understanding of the other position in the historical conflict, in order to bridge the two national narratives.
You could do worse than to look at his organisation Gush Shalom, on the left of the Peace Movement (Interestingly, Avnery actually started off in the Irgun in the 1940’s). Better still is the One Voice Movement, for me this is what serves Palestinian interests best.
Friday 31 August 2007 at 17:22
tg,
The whole comment is meant to say Gadgie is mistaken in citing the finding of commonality as a route to a two state solution. That sentence was to say that it is dishonest to think of European states as seperate.
Hamas fight now, because they have nothing to lose. Provide them with a state so power becomes responsibility (to maintain that power), Hamas will need to maintain control so that they do not lose what they have gained. Rocket attacks and suicide bombngs are ineffective at fufilling ‘the land of Palestine has been an Islamic Waqf throughout the generations and until the Day of Resurrection, no one can renounce it or part of it, or abandon it or part of it‘ and Hamas knows this. To achieve that goal Hamas know they need a bigger, better military and to get this they need a peace in which to arm. Hence a two state solution will bring peace. And when they get to be a big enough power to wipe Israel of the map 30 years will have passed in peace, kids will look to their grandparents and say “What were you fighting about?”.
Gadgie,
Hamas is a dangerous minority. There is a sizeable Palestinian constituency for a two state solution. Watch Terry’s videos. I think that you are far too pessimistic and anything based on mutual fear will be a non-starter.
Hamas won a majority in the most recent elections, they would have won more of a majority if Fatah had not closed polling stations and commited electoral fraud. The “sizeable Palestinian constituency” won how many seats in the elections?
I am not being pessimistic by seeing a history of competing race and religion and moral values in a very small patch of dirt as begetting conflict. It is quite nonsensical to call something that has been happening for 60, 120, 1400, 3000 years a “non-starter”, it started ages ago.
Friday 31 August 2007 at 17:44
Hamas actually got a large minority vote - both they and Fatah scored in the 40’s. It was an incredibly close election and the electoral system distorted the result. They are now excluded from the West Bank and may be losing a rather fragile support base above their core. They do not represent all the Palestinians. There is a diverse political scene out there, but like our own not fully represented in the system.
My view is that the Israelis would not allow a hostile Palestinian state to form so that a two state solution has to involve a version of the unlikely peace processes we have seen elsewhere. I am fully aware that it may fail, but it has to be tried.
There have been many opportunities in the past, but they have been missed. BTW Have you seen Shlomo Ben-Ami’s recent book?
Friday 31 August 2007 at 17:45
Gadgie again,
You are not reading what I have written, which is a attack on angry partisanship and misunderstanding, on behalf of either side, as part of a peace process.
You are putting the cart before horse. Asking for understanding, mutual humanitarianism as preconditions to a two state solution, when it is apparent that strong segments of both sides (which you do acknowledge at length) have none of this commonality. Trying to get people to come together when they are actively shooting at each other is stupid, you need to stop the shooting first. What is required is finding a way to get the two sides to stop shooting at each other that is in their acknowledged existing best interests. I believe that gifting the Palestinains a state does this, the will need peace to start arming for a future conflict. In this peace your concepts will likely find more fertile ground, because the people you are trying to convince will actually not be shooting at each other.
Friday 31 August 2007 at 22:30
You said…”Sorry Dirk
You are not reading what I have written, which is a attack on angry partisanship and misunderstanding, on behalf of either side, as part of a peace process”…
well I actual did not misunderstand,of course the two sides will have to talk at some point.But in the meantime the focus should be on Israel to stop building settlements etc etc etc.The fight is over the land and the continuing occupation of of what little land Palestinians have left.Palestinians are the ones suffering and they have been for decades.
Please do not even compare the two sides.One is occupied the other is the occupier,this is fact this is what drives Palestinians to resist,they have every right to resist,this right they share with all people who have been invaded and occupied.
The tragedy of the holocaust does not give Israel some special right…
Saturday 1 September 2007 at 2:38
My view is that the Israelis would not allow a hostile Palestinian state to form so that a two state solution has to involve a version of the unlikely peace processes we have seen elsewhere.
Why not? They accepted in South Lebanon. A hostile seperation similar to there or in the Balkans or Eritrea or South Sudan or East Timor is more likely to make peace, a hostile peace but a peace.
Where are these “unlikely peace process” success stories that have led to two friendly states?
PS - I have not read the book.
Saturday 1 September 2007 at 10:29
unaha-closp
Good debate. I think the impasse between us is that you see the processes I talked about being something that has to happen after the guns have stopped whereas I see it as part of a process that can stop the guns.
I think we both agree on Pilger though.
Sunday 2 September 2007 at 23:28
We both do agree Pilger is a twat, because he wants the worst type of a single state (one based on genocide & exclusion). However a single state does not need to be formed by exclusion, it could be a an inclusive, secular democracy that respects human rights and this would be a very good thing. IMHO the absolute ideal solution.
I see a reconciliatory nature to those processes you talked about. They are good ideas that if allowed to grow will cause a lasting peace as the two peoples come together in the best and most ideal of soultions, but it not in a two state solution. If people share common ideals, respect human rights, a secular view of religion, democratic values and a desire to live peaceably with their neighbours - two states are unwelcome. If the Jews and Arabs are able to reconcile their differences having two states with seperate armies & police forces, patrolling borders and with exclusive different laws will be an unneeded complication to hinder cooperation and cause other problems that will then need to be worked around.
I see a two state solution as being an implicit acceptance of my type of pessimism with the differences being irreconcilable. I therefore pessimisticlty advocate for two seperate states without precondition on the basis that a hostile peace is the best we can expect.
Monday 3 September 2007 at 22:11
Dirk:
You continue to prove Gadgie’s point. Palestinians were not forced from their homes in 47-48 by the Jews. They left at the urging of their leaders and the leadership of the surrounding Arab nations that were promising to exterminate the Jews and wanted the way clear of them. (Some of those Jews, by the way, lived in the Holy Land far longer than the current claimants with Jerusalem, Safad and Hebron all having Jewish majorities long before the Ashkenzim started fleeing pogroms in Eastern Europe.)
After the hostilities died down, the Israeli government invited them to return and many did. Others didn’t, chosing to stay in the refuge camps set up by the surrounding Arab nations, where they and their descendents have stayed to serve the purposes of various Arab dictators and kings who have continually subverted the cause of peace as dear old Saddam Hussein did by giving blood money to the families of Palestinian martyrs while he maintained his republic of fear.
Monday 3 September 2007 at 23:04
Actually Lynne t, much as I appreciate your support against Dirk who seems to be unable to read simple English, this isn’t true.
The Arab leaders did not urge them to leave. They fled from Jaffa but in some places, such as Lydda and Ramleh they were forced out (you can read some of the the details in Yitzhak Rabin’s memoirs, he was very open about the whole affair later). In areas where there is still a strong local Palestinian Arab presence, such as Nazareth, this is because deals were negotiated with local military commanders who let them stay, against the implied (as far as we know) wishes of Ben Gurion. A fair number did manage to get back, but without invitation. Israel made an offer to take some (around 10% of the total) in 1949 as part of a comprehensive peace deal that was rejected and the offer was withdrawn the following year. By the early 1950’s Israel had legislated against return. No one has chosen to remain in the camps and if you had been to any you would understand why.
I am a believer in the importance of good historical research as the only arbiter and there has been much published that demolishes the mythologies of both sides.
The most celebrated is the Israeli historian,Benny Morris, and he has recently updated his study first published in the late 80’s. I would recommend it strongly The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem Revisited
It is very long and detailed for an easier read his general history,Righteous Victims is a personal favourite.
Monday 3 September 2007 at 23:52
Actually Lynne t, much as I appreciate your support against Dirk who seems to be unable to read simple English, this isn’t true.
The Arab leaders did not urge them to leave. They fled from Jaffa but in some places, such as Lydda and Ramleh they were forced out (you can read some of the the details in Yitzhak Rabin’s memoirs, he was very open about the whole affair later). In areas where there is still a strong local Palestinian Arab presence, such as Nazareth, this is because deals were negotiated with local military commanders who let them stay against the implied (as far as we know) wishes of Ben Gurion. Some did manage to get back, but without invitation. Israel made an offer to take some (around 10% of the total) in 1949 as part of a comprehensive peace deal that was rejected and the offer was withdrawn the following year. By the early 1950’s Israel had legislated against return. No one has chosen to remain in the camps (incidentally set up and maintained by UNWRA an agency of the United Nations not the Arab nations) in preference to return and if you had been to any you would understand why.
The most celebrated historian of the affair is the Israeli historian, Benny Morris, and he has recently updated his study first published in the late 80’s - The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem Revisited (2003). I would recommend it strongly but it is long and detailed. His general history, Righteous Victims, is a personal favourite and is more accessible.
On the population, you are right, there was continuous Jewish settlement, both under the Ottomans and before, with majorities where you say, though they made no claim to statehood. In 1880, before the first wave of European immigration, Martin Gilbert gives the figures as 470,000 Arabs and 24,000 Jews.
I think your picture of Israeli Arab citizens is rather unfair but that is another and longer question.
Tuesday 4 September 2007 at 1:31
Have thought about this and in summary I think you are advocating for something better than a two state solution - a unified single state of secular citizens.
Tuesday 4 September 2007 at 11:47
Actually, no. A single unified state would result in an Arab majority and would mean the end of Israel as a Jewish state. The Jewish population would suddenly become a minority and return to the European status that Zionism was supposed to rectify. The simple demographics of the area mean that a one state solution would always mean the abolition of Israel.
One of the ironies about the situation is that there are profound economic and cultural ties between the occupied territories and Israel. This means that a two state solution could and, arguably, should result in two states with close and friendly economic and political relations. This would continue to preserve the integrity of the two national communities. I think that it is this that you take for an advocacy for a single democratic secular state.
In the long term, long after I have gone, who knows what might happen. The organising principle of the nation state is a recent historical phenomenon and may well evolve into something different. Again, you have been quite perceptive in spotting my less than wholehearted advocacy of 19th Century nationalism.