This is an issue that is likely to engender some serious "discussion" amongst Ranters. I know, because it has in the past. I want to state at the outset that this is in no way an attack on Israel, or Judaism, but an effort at putting the current situation in appropriate historical context - hence the thread title. To do so, I am going to have to dredge up a lot of history. That will make this long, detailed, and, for some, controversial. But, ultimately, this is the premise:
Israel, as currently constituted, is an impossibility, because it seeks to be two contradictory things - a Jewish nation, and a liberal democracy. Those two goals are mutually exclusive, as I will elucidate. It can be one,
or the other, but not both. The hybrid it is trying to maintain cannot succeed because, of necessity, it puts 20% of its (current, non-Jewish) population in an inferior status. It suffers from the same conundrum, and history, that the United States was founded upon (and has yet to overcome), that of a liberal secular democracy and a slave-holding nation.
Now, for the history part. Ancient Israel "began" some 3000 years or so ago, through conquest, and it ended at least 1700 years ago, also as a result of conquest. In the interim, it toggled between a sovereign nation and a subject of a greater empire. "Israel, either of two political units in the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament): the united kingdom of Israel under the kings Saul, David, and Solomon, which lasted from about 1020 to 922 BCE; or the northern kingdom of Israel, including the territories of the 10 northern tribes (i.e., all except Judah and part of Benjamin), which was established in 922 BCE as the result of a revolt led by Jeroboam I. The southern kingdom, ruled by the Davidic dynasty, was thereafter referred to as Judah. The later kingdom’s history was one of dynastic instability, with only two prolonged periods of stable government, under Omri (reigned 876–869 or c. 884–c. 872 BCE) and Ahab (c. 874–c. 853 BCE) and the Jehu dynasty (c. 842–746 BCE). In the 8th century BCE the northern kingdom was overrun by the Neo-Assyrian empire, with Samaria, the capital, falling in 722/721."
Israel: Old Testament kingdom (Britannica)
"A Jewish diaspora existed for several centuries before the fall of the Second Temple, and their dwelling in other countries for the most part was not a result of compulsory dislocation.[5] Before the middle of the first century CE, in addition to Judea, Syria and Babylonia, large Jewish communities existed in the Roman provinces of Egypt, Crete and Cyrenaica, and in Rome itself;[6] after the siege of Jerusalem in 63 BCE, when the Hasmonean kingdom became a protectorate of Rome, emigration intensified. In 6 CE the region was organized as the Roman province of Judea. The Judean population revolted against the Roman Empire in 66 CE in the First Jewish–Roman War, which culminated in the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 CE. During the siege, the Romans destroyed the Second Temple and most of Jerusalem.
This watershed moment, the elimination of the symbolic centre of Judaism and Jewish identity motivated many Jews to formulate a new self-definition and adjust their existence to the prospect of an indefinite period of displacement.[7]"
Jewish diaspora (Wikipedia,
Emphasis mine).
That history, especially the bolded element, is critical to understanding the Jewish identity - and the creation of modern Israel. Many of the rites of Judaism reflect a yearning to return to the homeland, the ancient seat of Jewish identity. It was this yearning that established the
Zionist movement that came into being in the late 19th Century - the effort to reestablish a Jewish homeland in the historical birthplace of Judaism. It sought to replace the idea of Jerusalem, with control over the territory. The problem, of course, is that in the 1700 years of absence, the land had become Palestine/
The Levant, and had no Jewish identity, except in very small communities dispersed throughout the region.
"From 1897 to 1948, the primary goal of the Zionist movement was to establish the basis for a Jewish homeland in Palestine, and thereafter to consolidate it." Initially, the Zionist movement was based upon literally reoccupying the region and was accomplished through acquisition of property and establishing Jewish communities. "In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, a large number of Jews immigrated first to Ottoman and later to Mandatory Palestine. At the same time, some international recognition and support was gained, notably in the 1917
Balfour Declaration by the United Kingdom." Following the defeat of the Ottoman Empire in WWI, the territory became
Mandatory Palestine, under control of the British Empire. It was then, really, that the "civil war" of Palestine began. Both Arab and Jewish nationalist movements created paramilitary organizations that fought both each other and the British administration. "Competing interests of the two populations led to the 1936–1939 Arab revolt in Palestine and the 1944–1948 Jewish insurgency in Mandatory Palestine."
"Following the arrival of the British, Arab inhabitants established Muslim-Christian Associations in all of the major towns. In 1919 they joined to hold the first Palestine Arab Congress in Jerusalem. It was aimed primarily at representative government and opposition to the Balfour Declaration. Concurrently, the Zionist Commission formed in March 1918 and actively promoted Zionist objectives in Palestine. On 19 April 1920, elections took place for the Assembly of Representatives of the Palestinian Jewish community." The biggest problem with the British administration Mandate period was that it was decidedly anti-Arab, and pursued by actual Zionists within the British government and guided by the Balfour Declaration. "In July 1920, a British civilian administration headed by a High Commissioner replaced the military administration. The first High Commissioner, Sir Herbert Samuel, a Zionist and a recent British cabinet minister, arrived in Palestine on 20 June 1920 to take up his appointment from 1 July."
"One of the first actions of the newly installed civil administration was to begin granting concessions from the Mandatory government over key economic assets. In 1921 the government granted Pinhas Rutenberg – a Jewish entrepreneur – concessions for the production and distribution of electrical power. Rutenberg soon established an electric company whose shareholders were Zionist organisations, investors, and philanthropists. Palestinian-Arabs saw it as proof that the British intended to favour Zionism. The British administration claimed that electrification would enhance the economic development of the country as a whole, while at the same time securing their commitment to facilitate a Jewish National Home through economic – rather than political – means.
That bias later informed the 1947 UN Partition plan, based upon the 1937 recommendation of
The Peel Commission. "The causes of the Arab rebellion that broke out in the previous year were judged to be. 'First, the desire of the Arabs for national independence; secondly, their antagonism to the establishment of the Jewish National Home in Palestine, quickened by their fear of Jewish domination. Among contributory causes were the effect on Arab opinion of the attainment of national independence by ‘Iraq, Trans-Jordan, Egypt, Syria and the Lebanon; the rush of Jewish immigrants escaping from Central and Eastern Europe; the inequality of opportunity enjoyed by Arabs and Jews respectively in placing their case before Your Majesty’s Government and the public; the growth of Arab mistrust; Arab alarm at the continued purchase of Arab land by the intensive character and the "modernism" of Jewish nationalism; and lastly the general uncertainty, accentuated by the ambiguity of certain phrases in the Mandate, as to the ultimate intentions of the Mandatory Power.'
The Commission found that the drafters of the Mandate could not have foreseen the advent of massive Jewish immigration, that they considered due to "drastic restriction of immigration into the United States, the advent of the National Socialist Government in Germany in 1933 and the increasing economic pressure on the Jews in Poland." They wrote that "The continued impact of a highly intelligent and enterprising race, backed by large financial resources, on a comparatively poor indigenous community, on a different cultural level, may produce in time serious reactions." "
"The Commission concluded that the prospect of a unified Palestine with Jews and Arabs as fellow citizens in a common state was remote due to the highly nationalistic natures of the two communities. On the nature of the Yishuv, it wrote that:
"The Jewish National Home is no longer an experiment. The growth of its population has been accompanied by political, social and economic developments along the lines laid down at the outset. The chief novelty is the urban and industrial development. The contrast between the modern democratic and primarily European character of the National Home and that of the Arab world around it is striking. The temper of the Home is strongly nationalist. There can be no question of fusion or assimilation between Jewish and Arab cultures. The National Home cannot be half-national."
And therein lies the seed of the impossibility of the Israel experiment. The "modern democratic" and "Jewish nationalistic" character of Israel are perpetually at odds, even within the Jewish population. This identifies the divide between the Jewish nationalist Likud and associated parties, and the Liberal Zionist/Secular parties, who hew to more democratic principles than Judaism as policy.
Your thoughts are appreciated.
