The last two blog posts on the visit by Benjamin Pogrund and the Palestinian ambassador have caused much controversy. However they both suffer from common deficiencies that tend to plague debate on the Middle East. Reading the one blog you might think that Mosiach had arrived at Wits, signed the Oslo accords and implemented them all in one hour. Reading the other there is desperate nihilism about the whole thing that is very hard to stomach. It almost suggests that somehow not only does everybody hate us all the time, but that they will continue to do so forever.
Between these two poles messianism and depression there has to be something missing. I would argue that if we are going to be really Zionist about the whole thing than we need to add a solid dose of pragmatism, something that has sustained the Zionist movement pretty much since the enterprise began.
By way of example let’s look at the most enduring peace event in the Middle East, peace between Egypt and Israel. This was not achieved between some liberal hippy Egyptian and his pinko Jew friend. Anwar Sadat was an extreme Egyptian nationalist with solid anti-Zionist background and uncomfortable support for the Nazis. Menacham Begin was a militaristic right wing Zionist who was survivor of the holocaust. Now how does this work?
After Egypt’s third failure to wipe Israel off the map, Sadat realised that he had two options. He could either piss the rest of his GDP against an Israeli tank column or he could make peace with the Jews. He chose the latter. It wasn’t pretty, it wasn’t warm and it was not out of love but it has held and it has held in a region where things like this often don’t.
But Begin was no roll over. Although overjoyed at the opportunity was the process extremely difficult. He didn’t get wrapped in whose land it actually was but rather focused on the prize. Peace and recognition. Sadat’s wife records extreme frustration saying that Begin went on and on about the Holocaust. For even inch of Sinai that Begin gave away so Sadat learnt every psychological twist to being a Jew.
This has something to teach as Jews. On the one hand we can’t be hypocrites, for years we have bemoaned the fact that no one on the other side will talk to us. The Palestinian ambassador is prepared to speak to us we should let him and we should engage and learn from him. I promise you now this is not great PR for him. A less brave man in his condition could easily have ignored the Jews or just met them in private. He did not as the one blog suggested come out in the favour of a one state solution. He said he would prefer it but that he sees two states as being the only option right now. This Ambassador has a long history of being moderate and I pray that we see more voices like him. However the PA itself is suddenly more inclined to talk. Not because they love us but because they are running out of options. They have tried terror, suicide bombings, support from the Arab states and denunciations in the UN. But they are losing ground, they are not so welcome in the west who see them as corrupt, the Islamic fundamentalists see them as only step above Zionists, as usual they are being betrayed but their Arab neighbours and they have lost control of their leftist solidarity allies.
Like Sadat before, peace with the Jews and their own state next door is looking like the only option that they have left. We daren’t miss this opportunity to help them out with their problem. But as Begin showed us and the Palestinian ambassador reminded we don’t need to lose ourselves over this. We don’t need to be more Palestinian than the Palestinians, the PSC do a good enough job as it is. Israel is thankfully the more powerful player these days. But make no mistake, the people who got us into this mess were rejectionist Arab leaders and they need to be reminded at every opportunity that we get. We have rights to that land also and floating them out onto the Mediterranean will not help our cause.
To describe Israeli policies in such draconian terms as the one blog has done and then say it is to support Israel, is not only counterproductive, it is ridiculous. It does nothing to inform proper debate and erodes our ability as Jews to make the careful and dangerous decisions that we will need to secure our rights as citizens of the world.
Benji Shulman writes in personal capacity and these views do not neccesarily reflect those of SAUJS
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