By Bruno Jäntti
While the EU and the US policymakers have no difficulties allowing Israel to go on its merry way and pursue the massacre in Gaza, the despicable state of Israeli Jewish political culture shines for all to see.
Before the Israeli army began the ground assault in Gaza, over 90 % of Israelis were supportive of aerial bombings that killed scores of civilians. Furthermore, a majority of Israelis were opposed to a ceasefire.
For all those around the globe aspiring towards the realization of Palestinian rights, the current slaughtering of the civilian population of Gaza by the Israeli ground forces, navy and air force is the 11th hour to honestly assess where Israeli society stands in relation to the overall political situation.
Whereas the systematic denial by Israel of Palestinian self-determination is now somewhat more widely recognized in the West than it was when the Second Intifada broke out in the year 2000, a considerable amount of confusion still exists on how the Israeli public relates to state policy.
Specifically, the conventional Western perception on the characteristics of ‘the Israeli peace camp’ or ‘the Israeli peace movement’ may or may not have much to do with reality.
If the notion of ‘peace’ in Israel-Palestine refers to a set of tangible political arrangements anchored in international law, then there is no mass movement for peace in Israel.
International law regards the right of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes as inalienable. International law also regards all of the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and Gaza as Occupied Palestinian Territories. International Court of Justice, the highest judicial body in the world, defines the wall Israel has constructed mostly in the West Bank as illegal and calls for its dismantlement.
Both a fully sovereign and independent Palestinian state on international borders and a single democratic state entity that guarantees full civil and political rights to all of its inhabitants in historical Palestine can be realized in a manner that respects and enforces these positions of international law.
Yet, the Israeli Jewish opposition to all of these positions is unwavering and relentless.
Out of the 6,1 million Israeli Jews, a miniscule fraction is in favor of enforcing the bare minimum of the rights that international law guarantees to the Palestinian people. Although such a claim might, on the face of it, seem far-fetched, there is more than anecdotal evidence to corroborate it.
A quick look at the milieu of Israel’s political parties offers some insight into the matter.
Not a single Israeli Jewish member of the Knesset (Israeli parliament) has come out in support of the basic positions of international law sketched out earlier. Not only has there been no proactive support for these positions, the Israeli Jewish political parties, whatever domestic disagreements they might harbor, are united in their staunch opposition to all arrangements that would ensure that the rights of the Palestinians are enforced.
The lack of overlap between what international law guarantees to the Palestinians, on one hand, and the what the Jewish Israeli party political consensus asserts on the key questions of the conflict, on the other, is not the only alarming piece of evidence on the deeply-ingrained nationalism and racism in the Israeli society.
Statements which in other OECD countries might be tantamount to career suicide and could lead to prosecution nonetheless pass as business as usual in the Israeli domestic discourse. Let us take a glance on recent public statements by notable Israelis which have not lead to any repercussions.
Moshe Feiglin, the Deputy Speaker of the Knesset and Member of Knesset from Israel’s Likud party, wrote an op-ed titled ‘My Outline for a Solution in Gaza’, published in the midst of Israel’s ongoing assault on Gaza. In the op-ed he proclaims that
“Gaza is part of our Land and we will remain there forever. Liberation of parts of our land forever is the only thing that justifies endangering our soldiers in battle to capture land. Subsequent to the elimination of terror from Gaza, it will become part of sovereign Israel and will be populated by Jews. This will also serve to ease the housing crisis in Israel.”
On the modus operandi of the Israeli attack on Gaza, Feiglin advises that the Israeli military should
“[a]ttack the entire ‘target bank’ throughout Gaza with the IDF’s maximum force (and not a tiny fraction of it) with all the conventional means at its disposal. All the military and infrastructural targets will be attacked with no consideration for ‘human shields’ or ‘environmental damage’.”
On the future prospects of the Palestinians in Gaza, the Deputy Speaker of the Knesset writes that
“Those who were not involved in anti-Israel activity will be offered a generous international emigration package. Those who choose to remain will receive permanent resident status. After a number of years of living in Israel and becoming accustomed to it, contingent on appropriate legislation in the Knesset and the authorization of the Minister of Interior, those who personally accept upon themselves Israel’s rule, substance and way of life of the Jewish State in its Land, will be offered Israeli citizenship.”
Ayelet Shaked, a member of Knesset from the Jewish Coalition Party which is part of the current Israeli government, called for the murder of the mothers of Palestinian terrorists so that the mothers could not give birth to more “little snakes”:
[The terrorists] are all enemy combatants, and their blood shall be on all their heads. Now this also includes the mothers of the martyrs, who send them to hell with flowers and kisses. They should follow their sons, nothing would be more just. They should go, as should the physical homes in which they raised the snakes. Otherwise, more little snakes will be raised there.”
Shaked also stressed that
“They have to die and their houses should be demolished so that they cannot bear any more terrorists. They are all our enemies and their blood should be on our hands. This also applies to the mothers of the dead terrorists.”
Mordechai Kedar, a former Israeli military intelligence officer who is currently a lecturer at Bar Ilan University, contemplated on whether the sisters and mothers of Palestinian suicide bombers should be raped as a form of deterrence against Palestinian terrorism.
After saying that
“the only thing that will deter [the Palestinian terrorists] is if they know that either their sister or mother will be raped if they are caught”…
“What can we do? This is the culture that we live in.”
Dov Lior, a rabbi from Kiryat Arba, an Israeli settlement in the West Bank, issued a Halakhic ruling that contains the following:
“during war the people under attack are allowed to punish the enemy population in any punishment it finds worthy, such as denying supplies or electricity and also to bomb the whole area according to the discretion of the army minister and not to just simply endanger soldier’s lives but to take crushing deterrence steps to exterminate the enemy.
In the case of Gaza, the Minister of Defense will be allowed to instruct even the destruction of Gaza so that the south will no longer suffer and to avoid harm to our people who have been suffering for so long from the surrounding enemies.”
Any kind of talk about humanism and consideration are moot when speaking of saving our brothers in the south and in the rest of the country and bringing back quiet to our country.”
These remarks by renowned Israeli political and religious figures have not caused any scandals in Israel, nor have they led to any noteworthy consequences.
A society which produces and tolerates such rabid racism and open calls for perpetrating mass murder of civilian people is quite a rare occurrence in today’s world.
For all the political movements working towards the enforcement of Palestinian rights around the globe, the immediate conclusion is to let go of the idea of being able to reach the broad public in Israel. Israeli policies, as well as the discourse that fosters the kind of formulations quoted earlier, need to be confronted and challenged by a cluster of non-violent tactics that are directed towards Israeli decision makers and state structures as well as Israeli institutions and companies that benefit from Israeli illegalities.
Furthermore, political campaigning outside of Israel-Palestine that seeks to fundamentally alter the current governmental policies towards the state of Israel as well as educating the general public’s perception of the reality in Israel-Palestine needs to be intensified.
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