The Arabs of Israel: No Surprise - 1988
Once
again, Israeli leaders and Jewish Establishment groups are “surprised.”
In the wake of the riots which saw Arab citizens of the Jewish state
stone Jewish buses, attack a police station and firebomb security
vehicles — the one word which Jewish leaders, intellectuals and news
media used over and over again was “surprise.” Suddenly, all the years
of efforts by Israeli and Jewish leaders to persuade the world — but
more important, themselves — that the Arabs of Israel were loyal
citizens of the Jewish state exploded in the wake of the Arab riots — not in the territories, but inside the Israeli cities of Jaffa, Lydda, Ramle, Acre, Nazareth, Um el Fahem and, of course, Jerusalem.
The
most surprising thing about all this is the fact that Jews are
surprised. It is this “surprise” and shock which is the direct result of
decades of deliberate efforts to avoid dealing with the real, root
cause of the problem, a madness that continues to this very day. All the
absurd “explanations” and rationalizations: the problem, we were told,
is that the Arab economic and social position is not equal to that of
the Jew. Or the problem is that the “occupation” of the West Bank and
Gaza is causing anger and upset among the Israeli Arabs. As
if those are the reasons Israeli Arabs take to the streets and cry
“Palestine! We will free the Galilee with blood and spirit!” As
if giving Israeli Arabs more sewers and more indoor toilets will put an
end to the problem. As if a “Palestinian” state in the territories will
send the Israeli Arabs back to their homes, happy and satisfied.
The
root of the growing Israeli Arab revolt does not lie in economic
inequality. It lies in a problem that is so basic and so painful and so
terrifying for secular Israeli and Jewish leaders that they flee from
confrontation with it — thus assuring that it will grow to proportions
that will threaten the very existence of Israel.
The
root of the Israeli Arab hostility and, indeed, hatred of Israel, lies
in the very definition of Israel as a “Jewish state.” It lies in the
very basis of Zionism, which arose to recreate the “Jewish state” that
twice stood in the land. And Israel which, in the words of the
Declaration of Independence, was to be “a Jewish state in the Land of
Israel,” by definition could never allow the Arabs to be equal. It could
never allow the Arabs the opportunity to become the majority — albeit
peacefully — and democratically change a Jewish state into an Arab one,
an Israel into a Palestine. Indeed, the root of the problem and of the
liberal Jewish nightmare is that there is a basic, immutable
contradiction between Western democracy and a Jewish state.
Western
democracy eliminates all such concepts as national background or
religion. Whoever are the majority rules, and both Arabs and Jews have
the right to become the majority in Israel — under this Western
democratic credo — and do with the country what they, the majority,
will. Certainly, such a basic law as that passed by the socialist
Zionist government of David Ben-Gurion in 1950, the Law of Return, that
allows Jews automatic right to immigrate and become Israeli citizens, is
not what Western democracy would adopt.
But that is exactly the kind of law that Zionism and a Jewish state did adopt and must adopt,
for the Jewish people’s main dream is that of a Jewish state, and all
that can be done to insure the Jewishness of that state is not only
proper but mandatory. A Jewish people, for 1,900 years, lived in
involuntary exile, as a minority in Christian and Moslem countries. It
enjoyed such minority benefits as Crusades and Inquisitions and pogroms
and, of course, Auschwitz. It decided that never again would it be
trampled upon, spat upon, gassed to death and burned alive. It decided
that it would have a Jewish state in which the Jew was master of his
fate, never dependent on others.
That
is Zionism and that is Israel — the Jewish state — and there is nothing
for any Jew to be ashamed of. But let him never deceive himself. A
Jewish state can never be a Western democratic one, and it can never
allow the Arab political equality with the Jew, no matter how much the
liberal and Left in Israel and the Jewish Establishment refuse to face
it.
And
that is why the Arab in Israel riots and hates the Jewish state.
Because it can never be his, by virtue of the stark fact that he is not a
Jew. It is the contradiction between Zionism and Western democracy that
is at the heart of the inevitable Arab hostility. And all the economic
benefits and all the Palestinian states in the world will never remove
the reality of the Israeli Arab who will never accept the Jewish state.
It will get worse.Much worse. The Arab birthrate and the new
generation of young, educated and hostile Israeli Arabs guarantee that
in the years to come, the world will watch on its television screens
rioting and shooting of Arabs in the Galilee and the cities of Israel.
The
Arabs of Israel joined with the Arabs of the territories in rioting,
for the simple reason that they are ONE. For them there is no
nonsensical “Green Line,” of 1967. The Arabs of Israel and the
territories, both, are logical and normal. They know and proclaim what
normal Jews such as Kahane do. They believe and proclaim that there is
but ONE “Palestinian” people and that all of the land — “West Bank” and
Israel — is really ONE, “Palestine.” To be sure, the Arabs of Israel
have no intention of leaving Israel, but surely not because they love
Israel. The contention of so many vapid Israeli leaders that the Israeli
Arab is caught in the dilemma of being a member of the Palestine nation
and citizen of Israel is ridiculous. There is no dilemma for the Arab. His
identity is not dual; it is clear and unmistaken. He considers himself
to be a member of the Palestinian Arab nation. The fact that he is also a
citizen of Israel and lives in the Jewish state is not a dilemma for
him, but rather an unfortunate tragedy that he must live with at the
moment, but which he strives, daily, to change.
The
problem in getting Jews to understand all this lies in the basic
dishonesty of the Jewish leadership and the ‘gentilized’, liberal views
that surround them, and from which they spring. It lies in the basic
dishonesty of the Jewish news media, intellectuals and clergy (both
non-Orthodox and, in great degree, Moderdox Modern Orthodox). This
dishonesty is rooted in the terrible fear of admitting the fundamental
contradiction between their beloved Western democracy and gentilized
social values, and the values and definitions of Zionism and authentic
Judaism. None of them has the courage to face up to this contradiction and choose!
It
is this cowardice that threatens the very existence of Israel, for the
vacillation, the hesitation, the flight from the obvious and only choice
— expulsion — sees the enormous growth of Arab population as well as
the radicalization of an educated and boldly brazen new generation of
Israeli Arabs. The cowardly refusal to choose and to act sees a growing
sense of uncertainty and then guilt among young Israeli Jews, young
people who — in any event — are naked of Jewish values, thanks to the
‘gentilized’, secular education they receive.
This
cowardly fear of deciding for Zionism and a Jewish state, and rejecting
Western democracy, is nothing short of criminal. The signs and the
evidence of Israeli Arab hatred of the Jewish state have been there to
see for decades! In recent years not even the most blind of people could
fail to see it. When Arab Communist Party Knesset Member Tewfik Ziad
hears Labor M.K. David Libai speak of Jews defending the right of the
Arab minority, he calls out: “The minority that will be the majority, in
the future” (Knesset minutes, Dec. 9, 1986).
And
when Muhamad Mussarwa, the Israeli Consul General in Atlanta (chosen by
Israel as some Uncle Ahmed to show the greatness of Israeli token
democracy), tells a group of Atlanta rabbis (come to drink from his
feet): “Israel is my country. I do not perceive it as a Jewish state”
(Atlanta Jewish Times, Nov. 20, 1987) — he is merely proclaiming what
every Arab sees as the most logical strategy. Unable to demand a
“Palestine” at this moment, proclaim Israel to be a Western democracy in
which Jews and Arabs are truly equal, i.e., Israel is not a Jewish state and Arabs have the right to become the majority and create the kind of state they desire.
This
is exactly what the openly pro-PLO Arab M.K., Mohamed Miari
(Progressive List), meant when he said: “The State of Israel is not the
state of the Jewish people but rather of the citizens who are there by
virtue of being citizens of the State of Israel” (Knesset minutes, Oct.
15, 1985).
And
this is what Na’ama Saud, an Israeli Arab teacher, tells the newspaper
Ma’ariv (May 28, 1976): “Today, I am in the minority. Who says that in
the year 2000 we Arabs will still be in the minority? Today, I accept
the fact that this is a Jewish state with an Arab minority. But when we
are the majority I will not accept the fact of a Jewish state with an
Arab majority.”
And
Muhamed Muhareb, chairman of the Arab students at Hebrew University,
tells Ma’ariv (January 20, 1978): “I am first and foremost a
Palestinian, resident of Lydda. My Israeli citizenship was forced upon
me. I do not recognize it and do not see myself as belonging to the
State of Israel. With the final solution common to the Arabs of
Palestine and of Judea, Lydda will be in the sovereign boundaries of the
democratic state. What will that state be called? Palestine,
naturally.” And that is why Arab mobs in the Israeli town of Taibe
shout: “Katyushas will yet fall again on Kiryat Shemona,” and some 6,000
Israeli Arabs come to the Knesset to demonstrate and shout: “We will
free the Galilee with blood!”
The
Arabs of Israel are a hostile, hating minority in the midst of a Jewish
state they hate and despise and dream of overthrowing. The absurd
shibboleth that is waved on high again and again by the ‘gentilized’
cowards to the effect that “the overwhelming majority of Israeli Arabs
have never been involved in anti-state acts” is worse than stupidity.
One could as well prove that the French or Dutch or Norwegians enjoyed
living under the Nazi occupation because so few joined the underground
against the Germans. Most people do not risk life and limb by attacking
authority. It takes courage to join an underground or a terrorist group.
Most people do not relish being caught and serving long prison
sentences. That does not mean
that they do not admire the PLO or support it. And even those who are
against violence are of that mind for the pragmatic reason that they
feel it will not work. But all of the Israeli Arabs reject a “Jewish state,” reject the Zionist concept of a Jewish state in which they — the non-Jews — must, of necessity, be strangers.
The
Jewish leaders in Israel; the Jewish Establishment in the Exile; the
Jewish news media and the intellectuals — all are bound to Western
democracy as some Prometheus, to which their Hellenism so gravitates.
All are too terrified and too weak to choose a Jewish state over Western
democracy. That is why they doom Israel to years of slow and agonizing
torture; to years of Arab rebellion within the country; to years of
bloody confrontation with Arabs inside the Jewish state; to years of
world condemnation of Israel.
If
we do not want that, we must throw off the yoke of the present Jewish
leadership in Israel and the Exile. We must reject the sterile anger and
protests of sterile Jewish liberals, who are the most dangerous enemies
that Israel faces.
If
we do not want tragedy, let us throw off our fear of facing the
contradiction of Western democracy and a Jewish state. And let us choose
a Jewish state, with no guilt. The answer,
the inevitable answer is — remove the Arabs to any of their 22 states,
and Israel will remain the one Jewish state for the Jewish people.
Without liberal guilt or apologies.
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