The Blue Monkey Review

Yaacov begins chapter 6 with a discussion of the disastrous decision of the Begin government to invade Lebanon in 1982 in a pact with the Maronite Christian Phalange that then jockeyed for power in the shifting quagmire of Lebanese politics. Although Israel has made military incursions into southern Lebanon before in response to PLO attacks on northern Israeli settlements, Yaacov questions the wisdom of “ [t]aking sides in the Lebanese civil war, where all sides routinely slaughtered civilians by the hundreds” and condemns the “inaccurate bombing of military targets in the middle of civilian neighborhoods….” (166) Chapter 6 also discusses the first intifada, the 1987 uprising that lasted into the 1990s in which Palestinians opposed Israeli occupation with general strikes, riots, stone throwing, and other direct confrontation with Israeli soldiers and settlers. Surprisingly, Yaacov judges at least some of the results of the intifada as salutary. “By running a widespread and sustained rebellion against the Israeli occupier, in which a broad section of society—including women, unusual for an Arab society—actively participated, the community that called itself Palestinian proved its existence as a nation in a way that could not be overlooked even by its most committed adversaries. In doing so, it forced Israeli society to face the price of continued occupation and required us to decide if this was a price worth paying for continued control of the entire land.” (178) But the intifada also gave impetus to further machinations by the PLO and also inspired the formation of Hamas, a movement dedicated to the destruction of Israel.

Interestingly, Yaacov also had proactively responded to two of my recent entries on Blue Monkey. On page, 179, he appraises the Enlightenment attitude (expressed by me, in “Children of Abraham”) that at the heart of the conflict in the Middle East was religious hatred, expressed most directly in the conflict between Palestinians and settlers. This “seemingly rational and enlightened perspective,” Yaacov writes, “totally disregards the fact that murderous violence against civilians is the hallmark of the Palestinian extremists; the hallmark of the settlers is the creation of settlements. Even a child, you would think, could see the moral difference.” Well, I guess I can see the difference. But, in spite of the rehabilitation that Yaacov’s book has worked in my view of the settlements, there still seems no doubt that the settlements continue to aggravate tensions between Israelis and Palestinians. As Yaacov points out, Israeli governments have dismantled settlements as a result of agreements. But, settlements are still scattered throughout the territory of the Palestinian authority. (See the map on page 14 .)

Yaacov also questions the connection I made in my last blog between Soviet communism and its Palestinian “cyborg.” “Why assume that communism motivated Islam, rather than that Islam, or a radical strain of it, manipulated communism?” Well, good point again. I think it is most like the case that communist and Islamic ideologues attempted to exploit each other, holding their noses while they took arms or political support or whatever they could gain in the zero-sum game of Middle Eastern power plays.

Yet even though I can’t read enough about conflict and bloodshed, I found the next chapter a welcome respite and also one of the best so far. Chapter 7 provides an extended discussion of Israeli society, breaking it down into the obvious social components—Ashkenazi Zionists, Oriental Jews, Haredim, Ethiopian Jews, Russian Jews, Russian and other non-Jews, immigrants, and Arabs. Anyone who visits Jerusalem, or even reads the Jerusalem Post, learns quickly that Israeli society is not only diverse but raucous, with differences among Jews leading to confrontation, debate, and rivalry. The secular haredim tension is “tearing Israel apart,” an acquaintance told me at a dinner a few years ago. “It is a dynamic tension within Israeli society,” someone else at the same table said. Both men were American Jews familiar with Israel. I’m sure they both made at least partially valid points.

What Yaacov describes, though, is a nation. That appears to be a pretty trite observation, but not such an obvious one. For years Israelis have struggled with the issue of, “Who is a Jew?” Does it include American Reform Jews? Does it include Ethiopian Jews who have been separated from the Jewish mainstream since before the development of the Talmud? Does it include secular Israelis? The answer in all cases is yes. But is a Russian Jew, with no cultural, let alone religious connection to Judaism also a Jew if s/he immigrates to Israel? Is her/his Christian husband a Jew? Well, the answer (if I keep going) has be no sooner of later. I think the real issue a hand is, “Who is an Israeli?” Nationhood overcomes barriers of race, religion, and culture. It generally overcomes them imperfectly, leaving some races, cultures, religions at the top of a hierarchy. Yaacov readily explains that hierarchy in Israel. But the diversity he describes can only be contained in a nation, a democratic one with a more or less open society, social mobility, and economic dynamism.