Security: Two Peoples, Two States. By EZRA GOLDSTEIN only one party — the
one that wins — would be allowed to exercise its nation- al rights. This “we win ...
Security: Two Peoples, Two States B y EZRA GOLD STEIN N ew H eart, N ew Spirit, by Arie Lova
Eliav. Jewish Publication Society, Philadelphia, 1988, 232 pages, $16.95. Creating the Palestinian State: A Strategy fo r Peace, by Jerome M.
Segal. Lawrence Hill Books/Chicago Review Press, 1989, 192 pages, $9.95, paperback. HE Israeli-Palestinian conflict is as much about attitudes as specific complaints, past grievances as present solutions. Attempts to resolve the conflict are constantly betrayed by lack of trust, fear and hatred of the “other,” communal defensiveness, the desire to get even. The obvious solution was first suggested by a British commission in 1937 and affirmed by the United Nations in 1947: create two distinct states through partition; one predominantly Jewish, the other predominantly Palestinian. This partition solution was based on the negative premise that Jews and Palestinians cannot live together harmoniously, but also on a positive one: Jews and Palestinians belong to national movements with the right and the desire to exercise self-determination in their own homelands. Partition is a compromise solution that offers a measure of victory and a measure of defeat to both sides. First Palestinians and now Israelis rejected compromise and opted to strive for total victory: a single state in which
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EZRA GOLDSTEIN, a new contributor, is form er co-chair o f N ew Jewish Agenda s M iddle East Task Force and is Associate Editor o f the Long Island Jewish
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only one party — the one that wins — would be allowed to exercise its national rights. This “we win — you lose” solution was the goal of the Arab states in repeated wars against, and continued rejection of, Israel, and is the goal today of a significant portion of the Israeli government. Lova Eliav and Jerome Segal have written radically different books, but with the common goal of moving the combatants towards acceptance of the partition solution. Eliav’s book is “spiritual” and directed primarily towards Israeli Jews. Segal’s is political and directed primarily towards Palestinians. Both writers offer solutions that, they claim, would result in the shift in attitudes essential for peace. Eliav’s N ew H eart, N ew Spirit calls for return to the “true” prophetic spirit that imbued Jewish thinking from the Talmud to Theodor Herzl. This spirit, he argues, is the best hope for stopping “Israel’s mad, nationalistic rush downhill” and convincing Israel’s leaders that “without compromise between the two peoples and their national movements, there can be no peace in this part of the world.” Eliav would take Biblical Judaism back from the fundamentalists who have claimed it as their exclusive province and return it to Israel’s secular Jews as an instrument of ethics and social justice. And he calls upon those religious Jews who are “ the sages of the genuine Judaism of Israel” to lead Israel away from “distorted Judaism.” Eliav is looking for new prophets to restore Israel to the ways of the old prophets, to give Israel, in the words of Ezekiel, “a new heart and a new spirit.” Eliav is a Knesset member and a JEWISH CURRENTS
leader of the peace faction within Israel’s Labor party. He was raised in a secular Zionism built on “the doctrine of the Prophets, who spoke of a return to Zion and the rebuilding of the foundations of truth, justice, righteousness and peace.” Prophetic Zionism has given way to what Eliav calls “ritual” Zionism, bom in the euphoria of vietory at the end of the 1967 Six-Day War. This ritual Zionism has “given rise to a generation of religious fanatics, who do not hesitate to undermine and pervert the democratic and tolerant foundations of Israel as a nation and a state.” Ritual Zionists are as adept at quoting the Torah as Eliav. He insists, however, that citations supportive of territorial ambitions and the “cruel and violent treatment of the conquered” are the “dross of tribal behavior, punitive laws and cruel customs of war.” The essence of the Bible, he argues, is the striving to move from the brutality of Joshua towards the prophetic humanism of Isaiah, Amos, Micah and Jeremiah. Eliav builds his case with Biblical quotations supportive of seven values: the sanctity of life, justice, freedom, equality, brotherhood, mercy and peace. Eliav is so intent on making his point that the book sometimes becomes tedious. A more serious problem is the highly personal line Eliav has drawn between what he considers the Torah’s “pure essence” and its “dross.” Israeli novelist Amos Oz, in his introduction, writes, “One could certainly find no inconsiderable Biblical confirmation for the opposites of the values that Eliav has chosen to emphasize: confirmation for the denigration of life, injustice, oppression, discrimination, hatred, brutality and aggression.” But Oz also defends Eliav, pointing out that it is a time-honored tradition to underline certain portions of the Torah and to ignore others, and because “the battles among us” should not be left to the “bible OCTOBER, 1989
guardians and those who would forfeit the bible. . . Rather, they are battles between differing visions of Judaism.” • Eliav wants Israeli Jews to see that ac־ ceptance of Palestinian rights is demanded by their tradition. Jerome Segal wants Palestinians to see that acceptance of Israeli rights is demanded by their political self-interest Creating the Palestinian State: A Strategy f o r Peace
is an expanded version of ideas Segal has been promoting for several years in meetings around the world and in dozens of publications, from East Jerusalem’s El Quds to W est Jerusalem’s Post to the Washington Post. Segal became famous — he has been referred to frequently as the “Herzl of the Palestinian state” — when Israeli intelligence agents named him co-author of a plan for Palestinian statehood found in an East Jerusalem raid. It is a tribute to Segal’s vision and audacity, and to the sea-change brought about by the Palestinian uprising in the occupied territories, that his ideas seemed radical and fantastic when they were first broached, in spring, 1988, but are now susceptible to criticism for how they’re actually working out in the real world. Segal’s premise is that the best way for the Palestinians to gain a state is to declare a state, and that such a state should be constituted so as to eliminate a number of the present barriers to compromise, in particular psychological barriers on the Israeli side against accepting a Palestinian state. The provisional government of Segal’s new state would declare itself demilitarized and at peace with Israel, and its constitution would replace the PLO ’s anti-Israel covenant This govem m ent would renounce claims to armed struggle as both counterproductive and suicidal, and to any future attempts to overthrow Israel, either by violence or by demanding the right of return of millions of Palestinians to pre15
You are invited to come to the PAU L N O VICK M EM O R IA L Sunday, Nov. 5, 1989, 2 to 4 PM at the New York Historical Society Central Park West and 77th S t 1967 Israel. The government would organize the Palestinian residents of the occupied territories as a citizenry committed to their provisional government and to non-violent resistance against the Israeli occupation. Key to Segal’s plan is the transformation of the Palestine Liberation Organization from a movement into a provisional government. As a movement, Segal argues, the PLO is concemed with matters of fairness and balance, while “States. . . think in terms of national interest and national security. The highest duty of a state is to protect its citizens; and typically its most powerful drive is the preservation of its own existence. It is this. . . responsibility of statehood, which will drive the peace initiative forward. There is no other viable policy of survival for the Palestinian state.” Shortly after this book went to press, in Nov., 1988, the Palestinian National Council (PNC) did indeed declare Palestinian statehood. This state has turned out to be mostly symbolic, and the PLO has, thus far, not attempted to reconstitute itself as a provisional govemment. Segal gives us no time frame, so it is difficult to know whether his strategy would allow for this “Palestine” as a transitional entity. On the one hand, he makes allowances for the difficulties the PLO has had in advancing its political agenda because of the variety of political groups that cluster
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uneasily under its umbrella. On the other hand, Segal seems to be saying that it should be obvious to the Palestinians what is in their best self-interest and behave accordingly. Segal constructs an excellent case for his strategy and, to the individual reader, his arguments seem entirely sensible. Few national liberation movements, however, have ever acted with the degree of clarity and unity Segal’s plan demands, let alone one as potentially fractious as the PLO. Faults aside, Creating the Palestinian State and New H eart , New Spirit are important books. They urge the Palestinians and Israelis to take the lead in pursuing compromise, and to stop their endless waiting for the other party. “The Jewish encounter with the world,” writes Segal, “has left Israelis too shattered to make sound policy. If a cataclysm in the Middle East is to be avoided, some other actor must be found. I believe that actor is the Palestinian peopie themselves.” Eliav, on his side, tells Israelis that none of the questions about Arab or Palestinian willingness to make peace is “decisive regarding the future of Zionism.” He argues, “W e must answer for our own image as human beings and as Jews: What is the nature of the political and social regime in which we live; and what are the borders within which we are willing and able to survive.” These two authors are asking Israelis and Palestinians to change their attitudes towards themselves and their enemies. They are saying that certain choices must — and can — be made by the two peoples, for the sake of the two peoples. If one state is to exist and survive, both states must do so. In the end, regardless of the degree and kind of international involvement in the Middle East peace process, it is the combatants themselves who must come to accept the defeat and victory of partition. ■ JEWISH CURRENTS
