For equal treatment under Israeli law

This NY Times op-ed last week by an Arab citizen of Israel, married to a non-Israeli Palestinian, depicts in painful detail the inequities and indignities forced upon them--especially the unreasonable (even illogical) difficulties imposed upon them when entering the country from abroad.  The one thing he does not do is to provide context when he looks at the historical circumstances under which his grandparents were routed from Lydda, now Lod, by soldiers commanded by Yitzhak Rabin, during the 1948 war.  I say this not to justify the permanent exile of so many people at that time, but to indicate that there was a rational explanation: the need for Israel to avoid a potential threat in its rear while facing an onslaught from outside Arab armies. 

That the writer's grandparents were among only 1,000 who were able to return, while 19,000 others became homeless and stateless refugees, remains a blot on Israel's past.  That he and his wife cannot travel together today, is a blot on Israel's present.  The past is past, and no full "right of return" can be enacted (especially to homes that mostly no longer exist) without impinging upon the rights of Israelis today, but unreasonable inequities in today's law can and must be remedied to help Israel become a more just and harmonious society.  And the stateless refugees must be offered compensation and a variety of options for resettlement, including in the future state of Palestine alongside Israel.

In the meantime, the horrors of the occupation continue in the West Bank, as evidenced in videos of the violence of militant settlers.

New film documents struggle of West Bank village

Guy Davidi (left) with Emad Burnat

My new Forward "Arty Semite" article is about an Israeli filmmaker (Guy Davidi) whose collaboration with a Palestinian cameraman (Emad Burnat) has recreated the latter's compelling story.  Together, they have made a masterful film of the non-violent struggle of the West Bank village of Bil'in against encroachments on its land.  (You can see A.O. Scott's NY Times review here; we were in the audience together with a handful of others at a special screening last week.)

Burnat is injured in the course of the more than five-year struggle, as is a favorite relative---a remarkably sympathetic figure as he repeatedly appeals in polite Hebrew to the conscience of the Israeli soldiers lined up against him in full battlegear.  Another charismatic villager is killed by

Debating Hamas

This is a catch-up post on events that occurred some weeks ago.  Larry Cohler-Esses, an editor at The Forward, recorded his remarkably frank interview with a leader of Hamas, whom he met in Egypt. 

A Forward editorial noted that this meeting with Mousa Abu Marzook “highlights the disappointing, indeed infuriating, fact that Hamas continues to be unwilling to forswear violence and accept the Jewish state of Israel as a reality. It is a message of opportunity lost, for all concerned.”  One may find a tiny bit of wiggle room in the views he expressed, but there was still no promise to honor any peace treaty with Israel, nor was there even an inkling of realization in this Hamas official that the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion," an antisemitic forgery depicting a Jewish plot to dominate the world, is a phony document.

Around the same time in April, Daniel Levy--a think-tank analyst associated with J Street and the Geneva Accord--debated the curmudgeonly Israeli historian, Benny Morris, at the Daily Beast ("Open Zion") website.  Hamas is central to their disagreement.  The following summaries are from J Street's daily email News Roundup:

Remembering Tamara Brooks, Z''L

Leonard Fein with Theo Bikel and Tamara Brooks

Many of us attended the Manhattan funeral for Tamara Brooks, the wife of our board chair, Theodore Bikel.  It was a remarkable service for a remarkable lady, replete with fond memories and beautiful music. 

Click here for a recounting of her career as a musician.  And this links to Leonard Fein's article in The Forward, honoring their friendship.  May her memory be for a blessing.

Thomas Friedman on Netanyahu's New Choices

This NY Times op-ed by Thomas Friedman lays out Netanyahu's choices and asks how he will use his powerful new coalition.  Will he stand pat or move toward peace?

.... Whenever a nation or leader amasses this much power, with no checks coming from anywhere, the probability of misreading events grows exponentially. Bibi could be assuming that the Palestinians in the West Bank can be pacified simply with better economic conditions. Don’t count on it. Humiliation remains the single most powerful human emotion. It trumps economic well-being every time. Bibi could be assuming that the Palestinian security services will indefinitely act as Israel’s forward police force in the West Bank — absent any hopes of Palestinian statehood. Not likely — eventually they will be viewed as “traitors.” Bibi could be assuming that Israel could strike Iran — and upend the world economy — and still continue to build settlements in the West Bank. I would not bet on that; the global backlash could be severe. ...

.... I think [Ami] Ayalon has the best new idea: “constructive unilateralism.”

Debating Zionism at YIVO conference

A somewhat abridged and differently edited version of the following was published last week on the blog of Dissent magazine: 

YIVO, the prestigious Manhattan-based Jewish social research center, hosted a sell-out crowd at its “Jews and the Left” conference, May 6-7. A number of speakers were former activists, but it was a conference on the Left rather than of the Left.

Sparks flew only once, at a panel entitled “Israel, Zionism, and the Left: Past and Present,” with a presentation by Yoav Peled, a professor of political science at Tel Aviv University, on the debate over whether Zionism should be viewed as a form of colonialism or national liberation. Prof. Peled began respectfully, regretting that Anita Shapira—also a professor at Tel Aviv University—had to cancel her appearance. She is prominent among historians who defend Labor Zionism; he mentioned his debt to the late Baruch Kimmerling, an Israeli sociologist who advanced a critique of Zionism as colonialism.

Peled presented the arguments of pro-Zionist academics and then proceeded to rebut them point by point. For example, central to the Zionist case is that the olim, Zionist immigrants to Palestine, had no “mother country.” Peled pointed out

Remembering Athletes Murdered at Munich Olympics

I JUST SIGNED THE PETITION BELOW and wrote why.  At first I was not inclined to sign, but the more I thought about it, the more I realized that it is fitting to have a moment of silence on behalf of the 11 Israelis who were killed because no other national group at the Olympics has been singled out for slaughter.  The Olympics is supposed to be a global universal competition where all the participants are there to compete in their individual sports.  It was supposed to be a safe space.  We need one moment of silence so people around the world can aspire to be more than we are at the moment.-- Lilly

Please take a minute to read the message and decide whether you can add your name to the growing number of people who have signed this important petition.

Jeremy Ben-Ami vs. Wm. Kristol on Israel

William Kristol--son of Irving Kristol, a founder of the school of thought and activism known as neo-conservatism--is an advocacy journalist and partisan of hardline foreign policy views.  To his credit, he agreed to debate J Street's leader, Jeremy Ben-Ami, at New York's famously liberal synagogue, B'nai Jeshurun, last Tuesday night.

First, he noted good-naturedly that Jeremy's connection with B'nai Jeshurun had unexpectedly topped his:  Kristol's family had celebrated his daughter's nuptials with a pre-wedding "auf-ruf" (the traditional blessing of the Torah for the bridal party) at the shul, but Jeremy experienced his first date at a Sabbath service there with his future wife.

Kristol is not of the far-right in the Republican party.  He says that he would like to see a two-state solution, but disagrees with Ben-Ami's dire warning that the lack of progress toward this resolution is a danger to the democratic and Jewish character of Israel.   As Krisotl indicated explicitly, the current status quo is fine with him.

Kristol's lack of knowledge and concern for what's going on was shocking; he admitted to knowing less about the issues than his opponent yet refused Jeremy's invitation to join him in visiting the places where aggressive settlement activity is undermining a two-state solution at an alarming rate.  I wasn't close enough to see the self-satisfied smirk almost always planted on Kristol's face that I've come to know from his way-too-many television appearances, where he is a constant partisan advocate for the Republican Party.

These exchanges are featured in the first of three YouTube videos being placed online by J St.:

My dialogue with Isi Liebler continues

I emailed a comment to Isi Liebler, on his piece about Peter Beinart, after he me with him when visiting the US a short time ago.  Liebler--somebody I know slightly on a personal basis--is a columnist for The Jerusalem Post and a blogger who is clearly right of center.  I began as follows:

It's fine to disagree with Beinart.  Although I am supportive of Israeli performing artists boycotting the theater in Ariel, I am not enthusiastic about a blanket boycott of all settlement products ("Zionist BDS").  But I do appreciate that in conceptualizing in this way, Beinart is trying to oppose the general BDS campaign against all of Israel.

What troubles me with your response is that you continue to oppose people by demonizing them, rather than contending with their ideas more respectfully.  What does it even mean to be a "far left liberal" (an oxymoron if there ever was one)?

As for the Palestinians, Abbas clearly needs to persuade most Israelis that the PA wants to live in peace with Israel.  But in this vein, you would not even address the significance of his letter to Prime Minister Netanyahu in which he outlines reasonable terms for a negotiated two-state solution to the conflict.  You wimped out (perhaps even insulting me) by declaring it a waste of time to discuss this with me.

Int'l. Media Peace Award to Hillel Schenker

Our chaver and blog contributor, Hillel Schenker, co-editor of the Palestine-Israel Journal, has been honored in London, along with his Palestinian colleague, Ziad AbuZayyad. We add our hearty congratulatory mazal tov to the many accolades for both of them. The following is the PIJ's press release and a video of the ceremony: 

Hillel Schenker

On May 5th, Palestine-Israel Journal co-editors Ziad AbuZayyad and Hillel Schenker were awarded THE INTERNATIONAL MEDIA AWARDS Outstanding Contribution to Peace Award by the International Media Council of the Next Century Foundation based in London.

They were presented with this accolade at a packed gala ceremony at the Oxford & Cambridge Club in London, hosted by Lord Stone, with the presence of a very distinguished audience representing the elite media society in the UK, prominent public figures, leaders of the Jewish and Arab communities in London and diplomats including ambassadors of Palestine, Jordan and several other countries.

Bernard Lewis: 'Opposed Invading Iraq'

This is an excellent article on Bernard Lewis, noted scholar of Islam and bon vivant.  Try not to bring ideological positions into reading this piece; I haven't checked the background of this author, David P. Goldman, in Tablet. I think the article gives us an insight into the long evolution of "Orientalism" and how it is ideologically manipulated by all sides.  I enjoyed the piece so much that I wanted to share it. -- Lilly
Here's a sample from its beginning:

.... Notes on a Century—his personal and professional memoir—makes for sad reading.... Part of the reason is ideological. The post-colonial-studies movement typified by the late Edward Said has ruined a field that once was called “Orientalism”—meaning simply a specialty in Near Eastern philology rather than Greek and Roman. Saudi and other Gulf State funding of Middle East studies programs, meanwhile, has made a critical stance toward Muslim culture an academic career-killer. Even without the ideological divide, though, our culture has grown too brittle to nurture another mind of Lewis’ depth.

Uri Avnery (Among Others) on New Coalition

Almost everything you want to know about the move. ... For lots of reading, click on this headline: 
"Analysis and opinions on Israel's new government by Haaretz's top writers"

Everyone has had their analysis, but Uri Avnery's is the best because it is accurate and humorous. -- Lilly [The following also corroborates what we heard last Tuesday, at the Partners executive committee, from our longtime friend, Avshalom (Abu) Vilan, a former Meretz Member of Knesset.]

From "Operetta in 5 Acts" by Uri Avnery: 

.... Netanyahu arrives at the inaugural meeting of the new Likud convention. This convention is traditionally a rough and tumultuous scene, resembling the Roman arena in ancient times. Netanyahu is a master of these assemblies. This time, too, he is warmly received and, on live TV, proclaims to the nation the fabulous achievements of his 3-year-old government. He then asks to be elected convention chairman, which would give him control over the candidates’ list in the next elections.

Then the really unbelievable happens. Half the members in the hall jump up and start shouting at him. Like Nicolae Ceausescu on a memorable occasion, Netanyahu stares at his underlings uncomprehendingly.

It appears that in the recent Likud registration drive, the settlers made a concerted effort to stuff the party with their people. These have no intention of ever voting for the Likud (they vote for the more extreme Right) but want to blackmail Netanyahu. Coming early, they pack the much-too-small hall in which the convention takes place. Since they all wear a kippah, they are easily recognizable. They shout demands for the election of  the chairman by secret ballot. Netanyahu surrenders and the convention is postponed.

Smarting from this public humiliation, Netanyahu swears revenge.

Moshe Kagan (1920-2012): Fighter for Democracy

Caricature of Moshe at 1960 World Zionist Congress

I learned a thing or two from having my article published in The Forward on the life and passing of Moshe Kagan, our elder statesman and longtime friend.  One thing was that I had to convince The Forward to allot space for mentioning his actual work with the World Zionist Organization and the American Zionist Movement.  As the news editor was undoubtedly correct in saying, Moshe's organizational associations in this realm are indeed arcane to most readers of The Forward, and most Jews in general (even to most Israelis).  

Part of what is important for me to say about Moshe (but didn't in my article) is that he believed in the Zionist movement as a democratic forum for the Jewish people, rather than the plutocracy that so much of the Jewish organizational world has become.  He was bitterly disappointed when a majority of the constituent groups of the American Zionist Movement decided to appoint delegates to the most recent World Zionist Congress in 2010, without the benefit of elections (arguing they were too expensive).  For understandable promotional reasons, both my article and The Forward emphasized the human interest story of Moshe's 50-year friendship with Ariel Sharon.  This is the totality of what was finally published on his Zionist activism, anchored in his being...

.... a founder of Americans for Progressive Israel, the American affiliate of Mapam, which he also served as president for a time. In 1997, paralleling developments in Israel, API merged with another group [the Education Fund for Israeli Civil Rights and Peace] to form Meretz USA (now Partners for Progressive Israel).

Ex-Security Chiefs Publicly Oppose Attack on Iran

Avnery at a demonstration.

Click here for JJ Goldberg's view of the recent Jerusalem Post conference in New York, which had a very right-wing tenor, but also some instances of sharp dissent and acrimony.   

The following is part of  Uri Avnery's "A Putsch Against War" piece, May 5.  Our reference to this column is out of respect for him as an intelligent observer, but should not be read as an endorsement for all his views:
.... IT STARTED with the most unlikely candidate to lead such a rebellion: the ex-Mossad chief, Meir Dagan.

For eight years, longer than most of his predecessors, Dagan led the Mossad, Israel’s foreign intelligence service, comparable to the British MI6. (“Mossad” means “institute”. The official name is “The Institute for intelligence and Special Operations”.)

Nobody ever accused Dagan of pacifism. During his term, the Mossad carried out many assassinations, several against Iranian scientists, as well as cyber attacks. A protégé of Ariel Sharon, he was considered a champion of the most aggressive policies.

And here, after leaving office, he speaks out in the harshest terms against the government’s plans for an attack on Iran’s nuclear installations. Not mincing words, he said: “This is the stupidest idea I have heard in my life.”

It makes your head spin: Elections called & cancelled

Just as the Knesset was about to vote to dissolve itself for national elections, Sept. 4, this happened (summaries courtesy of J Street's daily "News Roundup"):

Early Tuesday morning, Prime Minister Netanyahu and opposition leader MK Shaul Mofaz (Kadima) reached an agreement to cancel early elections and instead form a national unity government that will fold Kadima into Netanyahu’s coalition, giving the combined parties a significant legislative majority, as well as making Mofaz deputy prime minister and Labor Chairwoman Shelly Yachimovich the new opposition leader: http://www.haaretz.com/news/national/in-surprise-move-netanyahu-mofaz-agree-to-form-unity-government-cancel-early-elections-1.428843

A spokesman for Mofaz said that the peace process figures in the unity agreement, and that “part of the deal” Mofaz and Netanyahu have struck is “to turn on the process”: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/08/world/middleeast/leader-of-israel-centrist-party-kadima-agrees-to-join-netanyahus-coalition.html

Netanyahu and Mofaz formally announced the agreement on Tuesday, outlining four priorities for the unity government, the fourth of which is to “move forward responsibly in the peace process”: http://www.jpost.com/DiplomacyAndPolitics/Article.aspx?ID=269127&R=R1

As for an early analysis, one can check out J.J. Goldberg at the online Daily Jewish Forward, who opines that the "Bibi-Kadima Unity Deal Saves the Peace Camp." Stay tuned to the news to see if he's correct, but don't hold your breadth.

Jerusalem Post dubs 'New Yorker' mag: 'Anti-Israel'

Clearly it is becoming more and more difficult to hold a "liberal" or "progressive" view about Israel. --Lilly
[The author of this online 972 magazine article regarding The Jerusalem Post and The New Yorker is Mairav Zonszein, a one-time assistant director of Meretz USA and a former director of the Union of Progressive Zionists (now J Street U).]

          Jerusalem Post op-ed calls New Yorker editor ‘anti-Israel’

By publishing an op-ed whose sole purpose is to demonize the editor of The New Yorker, the Jerusalem Post is positioning itself in direct odds with liberal values – not to mention  journalistic integrity.
The Jerusalem Post ran an op-ed yesterday (Monday) by a writer and attorney from Washington, D.C. explaining why he is canceling his 50-year subscription to the New Yorker magazine. The poorly-argued and belligerent article directly implicates the magazine’s editor of 14 years, David Remnick, for being “unabashedly anti-Israel,” and personally attacks him as being unfit for the job and its salary since his “only previous editorial experience was at his high school newspaper.”
I guess the writer did not want to mention Remnick’s Pulitzer Prize-winning book on the fall of the Soviet Union when he was still a Washington Post correspondent, or his award for excellence in journalism, or his Editor of the Year award from 2000.

Partners for Progressive Israel mourns the passing of Moshe Kagan

Partners for Progressive Israel mourns the death of Moshe Kagan, who passed away on Thursday, May 3, 2012, 11 Iyar 5772.

Moshe was a giant of progressive Zionism in the United States.  He co-founded Americans for Progressive Israel (a predecessor to Partners for Progressive Israel) in the early 1950s, and was one of the founding presidents in 1998 of Meretz USA, as our organization was then called.  He will be very deeply missed.

Please find below a short biography of Moshe written by journalist Doug Chandler in May 2009 when Meretz USA bestowed upon Moshe our “Lifetime Achievement Award”. 

Moshe Kagan: Dor L’Dor [Generation to Generation]
Moshe Kagan’s closest friends and colleagues have always regarded the man as reserved and modest, reluctant to talk about himself or to place himself in the spotlight. But they also know that what applies to many people of modesty also applies to Moshe: his vast reservoir of experience, his repertoire of talents, his practical wisdom and, perhaps most important to an organization like Meretz USA, his willingness to share those qualities.

Indeed, generation after generation of progressive Zionists have learned from Moshe and been inspired by him.

Film documents kibbutzim evolving beyond utopia

Shot of kibbutz children in 1948, from the film, reproduced in NY Times

What struck me almost from the outset of "Inventing Our Lives," the new documentary on the history and evolution of the kibbutz movement, was that I knew one of the key onscreen personalities whose opinions and experiences shape this film.  It was the summer of 1982 when my tour group of North American young adults, organized by Americans for Progressive Israel, visited Israel as guests of the Kibbutz Arzi [National] Federation, arguably the most left-wing of Israel's four kibbutz federations at the time (now condensed into two). And it was Aliza Amir-Zohar, KAF's executive head, who met and spoke memorably with us on the nature of kibbutz life and the special challenges faced by the movement at this time of national crisis during that summer of the first Lebanon War, the first war undertaken by Israel without a firm national consensus.  

Associated mostly with Mapam (the socialist-Zionist party that coalesced with Shulamit Aloni's Ratz and part of Shinui to form Meretz in the 1990s), the KAF was very much in opposition to the invasion of Lebanon from its outset, feeling that Menachem Begin's government had seized upon the flimsy excuse of a Palestinian splinter faction attempt on the life of Israel's ambassador to Britain, in order to forestall the possibility of negotiations with the PLO, ten years before they began in earnest with Oslo.  We heard about Mapam's nuanced advice to its supporters to serve in the war as ordered, but when on leave, to demonstrate with so many others against it.  Why the decision to serve in a war that the movement disapproved of?  It was explained that considering Israel's precarious security, given its tiny size (much smaller 30 years ago than the not-quite 8 million population of today), they didn't want to undermine the army, the one institution that guaranteed the country's survival.  But some kibbutzniks we met, even some staff at the KAF headquarters in Tel Aviv, were members of Sheli, a newer left party that urged refusing military service in Lebanon and in the occupied territories.  (I wonder if Ms Amir still holds to this view.)

Be that as it may, I was moved by Aliza Amir's intelligence and humanity. I also marveled at how

Saudi Initiative, 10 years ago: What might have been

Original article in Hebrew

We've received this from Zeev Raphael, a retiree from the Technion, who writes from his Haifa home, where he translated this article from the April 20 weekend issue, approximately ten years after the Saudi Peace Initiative.  This begins with his note:

Here is a story that received little attention; I think it warrants public debate. Maariv's political commentator, Ben Caspit, reminds his readers that last month was ten years to the 'Saudi Initiative' also known as the 'Arab Initiative' and the 'Beirut Declaration.' 

Caspit reveals a story told for the first time, he says: A few days before the initiative was made public, then Mossad chief Efraim Halevy told then prime minister Ariel Sharon to "go to Beirut." Halevy said there is an historic opportunity there that should not be missed. Halevy told Sharon he could arrange a secret meeting with the Saudi Crown Prince and he could decide for himself. "All you need to do is to say you will arrive in Beirut with no preconditions. They will agree. Go to Beirut and speak before the Arab League. Speak to them. They will accept you graciously." Halevy told him he did not have to accept the initiative, but something might come out of the face-to-face meeting of leaders. "In general, the initiative has acceptable elements from our point of view that could be the basis for discussion."

"It did not happen" Caspit comments.  "What a pity that our region, on all sides, is filled with so few Anwar Sadats.  But there is no lack of Ariel Sharons. Not on their side, but neither on ours." Below is my translation:

Meretz Legislator Interrogated by Interior Ministry

Meir Margalit

Meir Margalit, a Meretz member of the Jerusalem city council, is under investigation by the Interior Ministry for helping to rebuild demolished homes in East Jerusalem.  This is from a news article in Haaretz:

Meir Margalit, a Jerusalem municipal council member, was questioned on Sunday under warning, about his part in rebuilding a house demolished by the municipality in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of A-Tur. This is the first time an Israeli activist has been questioned about helping to rebuild demolished houses.

Margalit, who represents Meretz in the council and is active in the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions, was summoned by the state prosecutor to the construction supervision offices of the Interior Ministry....