Hating the government, any government, but not the people

[Tansy_Gold]

OKNancy's beautiful post on her "grocery store moment" http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x1671992 and a reply from MadHound got me to thinking about how we react to the news and the actions of various governments.

Whether it's the latest arrogant, warhawk assininity of the booosh administration, the "we'll get the Bomb but we'll starve our own people" mentality of the demented Kom Jong Il, or the "never again" ultra-victim attitude of the Israeli government, we seem to do our best not to identify the person-in-the-street with the insanity of her/his leaders.

Where we seem to have a little difficulty is when it comes to Israel. Now, wait, don't flame me yet, because I have had to think this through very carefully for my own benefit.

Although I'm a devout orthodox non-believer, much of my family is Jewish. I grew up in one of those semi-WASPy post-war suburbs where we had our share of Catholics, but nothing much more exotic. Certainly no Jews. So in the 1960s I was among the distinct minority in my high school history classes who already knew about the Holocaust, about the death camps, and even a bit about the Balfour Declaration and the UN vote on partitioning Palestine.

I read Leon Uris' "Exodus" long before I saw the movie. I read "The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich." And of course my sympathies lay with the Jews. I watched the 1967 war on television, and I cheered when "the Jews" won, because of course they were right.

But as the years went by, and as the atrocities against the Palestinians mounted, I had to learn to separate my sympathies for the Jewish people from the my lack of support for the Israeli government. Even so, I felt like a traitor. These were "my" people, in a way, and I felt obligated to defend Israel's right to exist as a homeland for this group of people who had been hated and loathed and reviled and slaughtered for so many hundreds of years.

Then this morning I got into a conversation over the issue of undocumented immigrants and whether or not they had a "right" to come across the border, take up residence, work for less than minimum wage, pay taxes, etc., etc. And as I took the position in this conversation that ideally there would be no "borders," and everyone would be free to come and go as they pleased anywhere in the world, I began to rethink that whole notion of anyone having a right to keep "others" out.

Someone else posted something here yesterday about the history of Zionism and the fact that the early leaders of the movement to return the Jews to "Israel" knew that they would be displacing people who had lived there for generations -- and they didn't care. Whether this is true or not doesn't matter to my argument, because whether Weizmann knew or cared doesn't change the fact that people did live there. And as a result of the 1947 partition, those people were essentially forced off "their" land, which was then given to "the Jews."

Now, with the 20/20 hindsight of history, I'm wondering if this was really such a good idea? Obviously, it wasn't a good idea for the Palestinians, and I don't think too many people on our side of the political aisle would dispute that. Granted, some folks may say that the Palestinians were compensated, and others will argue that the "Israelis" brought the 20th century to the region, thus in one sense benefiting the people who had been displaced.

But in the long run, didn't anyone expect that this whole manufacturing of a State of Israel would cause problems? Surely the whole 1948 war should have given someone a clue?

I suppose it makes sense that people who have been so viciously persecuted over centuries would want a place where they could be safe. However, wouldn't it have benefited them more if the world had been changed in a way that they could be safe no matter where they were?

Was anyone aware, in 1947, that the creation of a State of Israel was tantamount to creating a huge ghetto, just like Warsaw only bigger? Or was that, in fact, the objective? Was there still such a deeprooted anti-Semitism in the western world that the idea of putting all the dirty jews into one place was seen as a good thing? That it would be all right if the Arabs finished what Hitler started? After all, who could blame anyone if the Jews got what they wanted and it turned out badly for them? Shrug, shrug, so sorry.

We don't want the U.S. to turn into a fundamentalist christian theocracy, but isn't Israel a jewish theocracy? And why is that any better, any more "right" than what the Pat Robertsons and Jerry Falwells and James Dobsons want to do with America? Why is that any different from the Inquisition of a Catholic Spain?

I struggle with this because emotionally I have trouble accepting it. I don't want to see hundreds or thousands or, heaven forbid, millions of people killed in the name of religion. (I can't imagine anything stupider than slaughtering people who don't have the same imaginary friend(s).) I am appalled that Shias kill Sunnis, that Catholics kill Protestants. It's utterly absurd.

But by taking the stance that Israel, as a theocracy, has a right to exist as a sovereign state, must we not also accept that a Shia Iran has a right, and a Sunni (or whatever) Iraq? A Hindu India and a Muslim Pakistan? Why is what's right for Israel not right for ANYONE else?

I know that there is enormous western christian guilt over the holocaust. The pope didn't fight it, so there's Catholic guilt, too. And the German people as a nation still carry a burden of guilt. I'm not arguing the rightness or wrongness of that guilt.

But doesn't there come a point where our sympathy for the oppressed victim of ethnic discrimination has to be balanced with the victim's responsibility not to
do things that support the "myths" that led to the discrimination?

As a feminist, I abhor the patriarchal religions that denigrate women, and of course that includes Judaism, as well as Christianity and Islam. So why do I feel this need to defend Israel's right to exist as a government? Why can't I get over that emotional obstacle?

Today, I finally did.

Every individual Israeli, every individual Lebanese, every individual Syrian, every individual Palestinian, Jordanian, Iraqi, Iranian, Pakistani, whatever, has as much right to live, to worship her/his god(s), as anyone else.

But no nation or group acting in a governmental fashion, not Lebanon and not Israel and not Hizbollah and not Hamas and not al qaeda and not the Taliban, has an inherent right to strip individuals of their rights.

We must now, however, deal with the reality. Israel as a nation exists. Generations have been born there and feel that they have as much right to their "land" as Americans feel they have a right to what they took from the natives three hundred years ago. If we start a policy of "sending them back where they belong," we have too many people who don't belong anywhere but where they are!

But I think we have to stop and take a look at alternatives to this wholesale killing of people, not so much because they've taken "our" land, but because they're different from us. I think the non-jewish states of the world took unfair advantage in 1947. I think they allowed a Jewish state to be created because they felt guilty over the Holocaust but not guilty enough to suggest that Jews be recognized as human beings wherever they lived. However, I think there must also be a recognition that the whole "chosen people" mantra encourages difference and encourages isolation and encourages ethnic arrogance -- and encourages retaliation.

Do I think it's possible to overcome all the hatreds and bitternesses and guilts overnight? Not hardly. But I think the more we put that kind of message out -- that we acknowledge the rights of people of any religion and any ethnicity to live in peace but we do not grant them the power to remove that right from anyone else nor do we encourage even the self-ghettoization of any group -- and the more we recognize the distinction between governments/QGOs (quasi-governmental organizations) and the general public, the sooner we'll achieve a peaceful resolution.

I know I haven't thought this out completely. I'm kind of composing by the seat of my pants. And maybe I'm just reiterating what someone else a lot smarter than I has already said. But I feel more comfortable with my stance now.


Tansy Gold

[bryant69]

1. Israel is not a theocracy.

It's confusing I suppose, because Jewish refers to both the people and the religion; but there are plenty of secular and even atheist jews.

That said I largely agree with your suggestion, but not sure how we get from point A to point B. Primarly because as you note the right of Israel to exist where it does has not really been settled (even now). As long as people believe they can get everything they want, there's little impetus to compromise.

Bryant
Check it out --> http://politicalcomment.blogspot.com

[cali]

2. It doesn't really matter anymore

whether Israel was a mistake. The reality of its existance and of the existance of the Palestinians is the ultimate ruling reality in this situation. It's rather pointless to go back 60 years; it's not like the creation of Israel can be undone.