I was reading Imshin’s blog from Israel, and came across a post in which she translated a long extract from a recent article by Shlomo Avnieri bitterly criticizing the few brave souls inside Israel who started to argue that, given the huge degree of demographic mixing that the settlers have achieved, maybe the best path now is to aim for a unitary binational state in Israel/Palestine rather than for the very difficult disaggregation of the populations into two mono-ethnic states.
If Avnieri’s arguments are the best that the “anti- one state” brigade can come up with, then that is really a poor showing. I note that Avnieri has been around for a VERY LONG TIME as first an Israeli Foreign Ministry official whose arguments were always (no surprise here) that Israel could do no wrong, and more recently as a retired person whose tune seems not to have been changed by one jot. Also, he doesn’t seem to have learned much over recent years. He notes the collapse of many mutli-ethnic states after the fall of communism, but seems unaware of the continued existence of large numbers of other multi-ethnic states around the world.
Even on Canada and Belgium, the recognition he gives is grudging indeed:
- Canada and Belgium–two veteran bi-national states–are facing great difficulties, in which the last word has not yet been said, even though no one has been murdered or killed there for over 150 years.
(Quick question to readers: would you rather live in Canada today, or in Israel? In Belgium, or in mono-ethnic Saudi Arabia?)
Most importantly–since this is really is the best analogy to the prospect facing Jewish Israelis–he totally neglects the incredible experiment in multi-culturalism and multi-ethnicism that has been underway in South Africa for the past nine years.
Here’s why the South African experiment is so relevant: because there, as in any future Israeli-Palestinian binational state, you have members of the colonizing community living in full civic equality within one state with members of the colonized community. And yet, with huge amounts of creativity and goodwill, they are managing to do it.
In his article, Avnieri asks huffily a bunch of questions that he assumes to think we will agree would have the aanswer “It’s impossible!”
However, the record of South Africa’s amazing cultura/political transformation shows us that for a forward-looking, generous-hearted people, it is by no means “impossible” to find answers to the kinds of questions he asks. Such as these:
- * How will it be possible to run a state in which half of the population will see the fifteenth of May as a holiday, and the other half as a tragedy, a day of national mourning: What will be celebrated exactly?
* What will be taught in mixed state schools, for instance, about Herzl: Founder of a national movement or western colonialist? What will be taught about the Mufti (of Jerusalem in the period of the British Mandate–I.J.): National hero or collaborator with the Nazis? Or maybe one thing will be taught in the Jewish schools and another in the Arab schools?
* Will it be permitted to name streets after Hovevei Tzion (a group of ninteenth century Jewish settlers–I.J.), Herzl, Bialik (Israel?s national poet–I.J.), Ben Gurion or (heaven help us) Jabotinsky (founder of the right wing Revisionist Party, that provided the ideological basis for the Etzel and the Lehi Organizations–I.J.)? Will roads be named after Izzadin A-Kassam and Haj Amin al-Husseini? Will Zionism Bvd. in Haifa change its name to something “neutral” (Avineri obviously brings this example because this road used to be called UN Bvd. and its name was changed in 1975 when the UN passed a resolution equating Zionism with racism–I.J.)? Or will a parallel road be named “Hamas Bvd.”, for the sake of balance?
* What will be taught about the Holocaust? A terrible crime or a Jewish “invention”?
* How will the history of the 1948 war be taught? What will be said in schools about the suicide bombers: Murderers or heroes of the War of Independence?
* If organizations, Jewish or Arab, threatening violent action, will be established, which police force exactly will deal with them?
*If the state has an army, what will it be called exactly? Or maybe there will be two armies, the IDF and the PLA?
But his pessimism that answers to such questions can ever be found is quite misplaced. Let him go to South Africa. Let as many Jewish Israelis as possible go there, and see with their own eyes how challenges exactly similar to these ones have been addressed there…
You might like reading http://www.israelblog.org/index.html
Marjolein
Helena,
Since you’ve positioned yourself as a woman of the world, and since we all know that the Arabs would be a majority in a binational state, and since it would be a democracy (at least through the first election), perhaps you can explain the fate of:
* women: several hundred women have been murdered in the last year by their husbands or fathers for the “crime” of having been raped. These are called “honor” killings.
* gays: The debate in palestinian society is whether it’s better to bury them up to their necks in excrement and beat their heads in or collapse a wall onto them. They’re not discussing gay marriage yet, let’s say.
* minorities: The number of Christians in Bethlehem plumetted under PLO rule from 15% to 2%.
And that’s not even beginning to discuss what the fate of Jews has been for hundreds of years under Arab rule. On one side, my family comes from Morocco, a “moderate” Arab state. I happened to be visiting when the last king died. The news spread through the synagogue as we were praying on a Friday night. The prayer was rushed and everybody went home quickly so that they could remain at home, doors closed, because they knew what could happen if the Arab street got its hand on some Jews.
That’s exactly what you’re consigning the Jews to if your proposal of a binational state goes through – a life of fear under whichever potentate manages to hold the reins at the time. I have come to understand from your posts that you don’t particularly care about the fate of the Jews, but your readers deserve to know better.
AMin Nusseibeh wrote:
>
>To the editor:
>>>> I am a college educated Arab, and picked up your magazine for the first
>>>> time. I have to say I found it amusing. Let me explain how most Arabs
>>> feel
>>>> about the israeli-Palestinian conflict. First, Jews make a claim to
>>>> Palestine based upon their religion. However, we all know that there was
>>> no
>>>> ancient kingdoms of Israel, no king David or king sollomon, no first or
>>>> second temple in Jerusalem, and no evidence of jewish settlement in
>>>> Palestine prior to the late 19th century. Your new historians have
>>> achieved
>>>> enough comfort to tell us that the history of the jews is a lie. In the
>>> 19th
>>>> century, master real estate agent Theodore Hertzl saw that Palestine is
>>> the
>>>> home of two great religions, Islam and Christianity, and felt that
>>> Palestine
>>>> would be some pretty good real estate. After 50 years, the jews usurped
>>>> Palestine in the greatest larceny of history. Even your “holocaust” is a
>>>> great exageration, but has achieved marvelous returns in terms of
>>> extorting
>>>> Europe for reparations and playing upon the guilt of the world to
>>> support
>>>> your theft. Much of the discussion of Tikkun calls for a two state
>>> solution.
>>>> Given that Judaism is a lie, or as you more politely call it, a “myth”,
>>> and
>>>> that jews stole Palestine, why should we share it with you. When a thief
>>>> steals something, and he is caught, he doestn get to share the stolen
>>> object
>>>> with the owner. Why then, should we share Palestine with jews? There is
>>> one
>>>> solution.One Palestine, from the river to the sea.The jews should go
> >> back
> >>> where they came from.
> >>> Sincerely yours,
> >>> Amin Nusseibeh
> >>> Rockville, Maryland
Sholem aleichem Helena,
I’m sorry to say your own comments on the subject have all the freshness of Avnieri’s.
To at least get the terms of the discussion straight (e.g., “one-state” does not equal “binational state”), I recommend the May, 2000 roundtable held by the Palestinian Academic Society for the Study of International Affairs with Dr. Susan Hattis Rolef, author of “The Bi-national Idea in Palestine During Mandatory Times,” transcript available at:
http://www.passia.org/meetings/2000/biNation.html
Then perhaps you could address the question of what constituency there is for a binational state. For instance, do you see any significant fraction of the Palestinian political leadership undertaking a “forward-looking, generous-hearted” effort, comparable to the ANC’s, to win Israeli Jews over to the possibility of binationalism or any other form of multicultural experiment?
Blessings,
-Hayyim
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