Out of the Frying Pan

A final thought about Israel-Palestine

After all the emotive commotion surrounding my original Linkedin post on the seemingly irresolvable issue of the Israeli-Palestine conflict, accusations of bigotry, antisemitism, closed-mindedness (and far worse) hurled at me from a few outraged readers in contrast to the considerable and unwavering support from people I respect, followed by my decision to write a lengthier piece that ruffled feathers still further, two questions remain uppermost in my mind. They hold the key to at least partially resolving the discord:

1. What are the alternatives, assuming there are some, that might adequately protect Israel and all its citizens, given its location in a resource-rich region encircled by Arab states? What has been tried, and what has yet to be tested?

2. If the current tumult is mostly concerned with the Hamas attack on 7th October 2023, together with Israel's subsequent counter offensive in Gaza, why have Jews been the victims of persecution going back centuries? How are these things connected?

Given the impossibility of arriving at a perfect solution within the present confines of political and social orthodoxy, let's approach this from just two vantage points: first understanding the conditions in which any proposal must be able to function and persist, and then imagining alternatives that haven't yet been tried but might work.

As friends far more knowledgable than me have pointed out, there are certain indisputable facts that set the conditions within which these questions must be framed. The Jews are an ethnic group, scattered across many countries but united by a common faith. That of Judaism. Although many Jews live in Israel, many do not. It's therefore incorrect to conflate Jewish society and culture with the 'state' (government) of Israel. The two are distinct; assuming they are the same radically diminishes our ability to consider the situation from a neutral viewpoint.

Other points, less indisputable, relate to the issue of statehood itself, in particular:

• The Westphalian model of sovereignty and how that is interpreted in times of insecurity, threats and geopolitical ambiguity.

• The specific milieu within which the state of Israel was conceived and declared in 1948, in the aftermath of the 2nd world war.

From 1897 the Zionist ethno-cultural movement, a nationalist revival group that had arisen as a response to new waves of antisemitism sweeping across Europe, had been campaigning vigorously for the founding of a homeland for the Jewish people. This was given new impetus, especially in Britain, when the horrors of the Holocaust became evident in 1945.

Although Palestine was the favoured location for such a nation, and the arrival of Zionist settlers during the period is widely seen to be the start of the present Israeli colonisation of Palestine, alternative options like Uganda, Argentina, Mozambique, Cyprus and the Sinai Peninsula were all considered but rejected. Palestine, after all, was considered by most Zionists to be the historic homeland of the Jewish people; a region corresponding to the Land of Israel in Jewish tradition, an area deeply embedded in Jewish history, religion and identity.

Following the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948, Zionism became an ideology supporting the development and protection of Israel as an unconditionally Jewish state, and particularly a state with a Jewish demographic majority, and seeking recognition from the international community of nations. It can also be thought of as Israel's national or state ideology. In that regard it is similar to other non-secular states in the Middle East.

Zionism has continued primarily to advocate on behalf of Israel and to address threats to its continued existence and security. Advocates view Zionism as a national liberation movement for the repatriation of an indigenous people that were subject to persecution and share a national identity through national consciousness, to the homeland of their ancestors as noted in ancient history. Criticism of Zionism as a settler-colonialist state of ideological exceptionalism, is not necessarily rejected by proponents of Zionism, although the accusation of racism is bitterly denied.

Which brings us to today. A long-standing mixture of divergent views, indignant propositions, please of self-defense, partial truths fighting for the moral high ground and all struggling to find cohesion, violence and oppression. As things continue to escalate, and people are plunged into a frenzy of misdirected aggression, we're no closer to finding peace. Instead, paralyzed by a limbic seizure, we resort to displays of self-righteous indignation - wisdom and compassion retreat, to be replaced by a seething madness. 

In our hallucinatory throes we blame everyone from Hamas and Benjamin Netanyahu through to self-hating Jews, the Israeli Defence Forces, and even commentators like myself who live half a world away and simply deplore violence - indeed any violence. The issue we all seem to overlook is that beliefs and decisions of hundreds of individuals, particularly following the Balfour Declaration in 1917 have all conspired to create the situation we face today.

Notwithstanding the global jitters of a Westphalian model trying to adjust to seismic technological and environmental changes, an effective society needs a moral foundation stitched from the delicate fabric of civic virtue. But civic virtue is openly susceptible to deterioration and decline, if it's not constantly nurtured, refreshed, and stewarded by a conscientious caretaker. This is not understood by the Israeli Knesset (or the US Lobby) where obsolete notions of exercising power and influence seem still to prevail.

In a desperate attempt to seal the security of the nation from neighbours that have long sought to destroy it, Israel's paranoia, fury, edicts of exceptionalism (as in 'the chosen people') and Jewish trauma exploded, overwhelming any possibility of prudent stewardship being exercised. Invited into the trap set by Hamas, Israel duly obliged, releasing a tsunami of unrelenting revenge and discharging decades of suppressed frustration and pain.

But by responding with such overwhelming force against a terrorist organization or resistance movement, depending on one's point of view, whose elimination is in reality most improbable without the systemic conditions shifting dramatically, leaves Israel in an untenable position. In the eyes of many, the victim is now the assailant. Through the rulings of the International Court of Justice, and the International Criminal Court, in addition to countries queuing up to denounce Israel, this nation has lost any moral authority it might once have reasonably claimed. Not only is Israel in a precarious state, it's future unsure, a pariah in the world community of nations, but the Jewish people themselves are arguably more insecure today than they were in 1939.

It seems to me the narrative of the Jewish people is unique in modern history. An ethnic group despised by many for no reason other than their extraordinary abilities and ingenuity across so many diverse fields and in all walks of life; cohabiting a land to which they have legitimate claims; emboldened and forced into a situation where they feel obliged to continue what they started regardless of world opinion.

There are immediate dangers in the present situation that are being overlooked, ignored, not spoken about, or mentioned only in hushed tones. Without US financial support and weapons, Israel is isolated and an easy target for those who would destroy it. With an election in November where it is possible Joe Biden will be ousted, nobody can guarantee the flow of money and weapons to Israel.

But for the Jewish people there are intrinsic dangers that literally nobody will discuss. We know that when a persecuted individual retaliates against a bully with extreme rage and fury, the situation often escalates further as both parties become more entrenched in their positions. This can lead to a cycle of retaliation and counter-retaliation, potentially worsening the conflict. Meanwhile, both the bullied person and the bully may experience heightened stress, anxiety, and emotional distress as a result of the confrontation and its aftermath.

In that context the deep trauma and recorded injustices experienced by the Jewish people, not only from the Holocaust which can be kept alive in the minds and hearts of modern Jews through mandatory rituals, but from a lengthy saga of persecution and maltreatment, could potentially be lifted out of the annals of time to become an intensifying, intergenerational, pseudo-schizophrenic psychosis in which the Jewish persona is both predator and prey. In that moment the ceremony of innocence can no longer apply.

So where does this leave us in terms of our opening questions? It's clear that the attack by Hamas on 7th October 2023 was not an 'unprovoked' attack as horrific as it was. That, along with the counter offensive, were provoked by decades of enmity and frustration. The US and Israeli establishment want us to believe it was unprovoked so they can point to an enemy. That attack and the Israeli response is a continuation of hostilities that have been going on for decades, with no viable resolution in sight.

The real enemy is us. Not as in conventional warring parties where an 'immoral antagonist' is fighting a 'principled defendant' (usually portrayed as having democratic, capitalist, and Christian virtues in danger of being destroyed) but in a series of decisions that led to a system being cunningly constructed to solve two problems facing the US and its allies after the end of the 2nd world war: how to assuage the guilt felt in Britain and Europe by Hitler's treatment of the Jews; and how to create and preserve a democratic base in the Middle East that could continue to guarantee an uninterrupted supply of resources, particularly oil, to the West.   

The first question is much more problematic. By using a process of foresight and morphological inquiry, one or two currently 'unthinkable' possibilities surface. The constraints certainly don't work in favour of a future aimed at benefitting everyone in the region. yet we know that the best protection comes through cooperation and not hostilities.

I have also yielded to a few core assumptions aligned to my key points. First, that any attempt to maintain the status quo, whether by force or persuasion, cannot work and will result in an inevitable deterioration of the relationship between Arabs and Jews globally. Second, that the option of a two-party solution on the same land, as typically described, will fail simply because not everyone wants that. Third, that the main reason we have so far failed to come up with viable solutions to this problem is not for lack of trying, but because ethno-cultural and religious distinctions are not given the same credence as legal, political and economic constructs.

Taking these factors into account allow us to imagine several scenarios, unconstrained by ingrained logic, transcending supposed difficulties, and breaking free from dependence on the past. Keep in mind the fact that any serious departure from the status quo must necessarily be seen as a socio-political experiment and instituted in that manner. There is one scenario that might merit further analysis and discussion, one that intrigues me if it could be pulled off. Namely....

In a world racing towards climate chaos, increasingly uninhabitable tracts of land across countries in the Middle East, mass migration, and intensifying geopolitical frictions between an exhausted Western empire and a revitalized Global South led by China, Israel's newly elected government of national unity and healing, guided by Prime Minister Ayelet Shaked, invites representatives from the youth of Palestine into a government of national unity featuring a collaborative process of governance and deep design. Reconfiguring Israel's constitution to enable a new-found spirit of reciprocity between Jews and Arabs to flourish, direct foreign investment is sought from the community of nations and the new land of Palestine rebranded as custodian of 'future-human'.

An entrenched male gerontocracy, lingering suspicions not only from the elite but from ordinary citizens, a lack of trust on all sides, and continuing interference and propaganda from the war-mongering classes, along with industrial-military complex still needing to maintain profits, would scupper this scenario unless those elements were consciously addressed during the design stage.

Indeed these negative features, which sustain every aspect of the current narrative, are much more likely to persist, resulting in a dystopian world in which Israel is encouraged to continue its attempts to defeat Hamas, not truly understanding the futility of such an enterprise, only to be drawn into a more existential conflict with Hezbollah and Shia militias from Syria and Yemen. If the US retracted its promise to always support Israel at that stage we could call end game. Isolated in the region, Israel would have little choice but to submit to a greater force.

There's no doubt the state of Israel would be dismantled, and Jews worldwide would feel a range of emotions even they, after everything they have endured, have not yet experienced. If I was an Israeli cabinet minister, and I really thought through all the consequences of today's activities, I think I might want to discuss the former scenario with my colleagues, or at least something close to it.