Footnotes on Romney's Visit to Israel

As a 501 C 3 non-profit, this organization does not endorse candidates.  It is legitimate, however, for our purpose as a pro-Israel/pro-peace organization to reflect upon statements made on Israel and Palestinian society by the presumptive Republican Presidential candidate, Mitt Romney.  We cite two outside experts for some penetrating thoughts:

Bernard Avishai, a Hebrew University professor of business and a well-known writer on Israeli society, blogs on Romney's comment that Israel's strong economy positively reflects Jewish culture and the "hand of Providence," while suggesting that the Palestinians suffer from a lack of same. By way of contrast, in an open letter to Romney (posted at the Bernard Avishai Dot Com blog) pointing out that they both were once Boston-based management consultants, Avishai briefly outlines the market-depressing effects of the Israeli occupation:

.... you see the frustrating effects of an occupation designed to advance the settlers, not Palestinian development. Problems of mobility are most widely reported: over 60 percent of land in the West Bank is so-called Area C—controlled by the Israeli army to secure Israeli settlements, but turning Palestinian cities into economic islands.
Try growing a supermarket chain when your just-in-time logistics system has to deal with 600 roadblocks; try planning meetings to open a new store. The drive from Ramallah to Jerusalem should take about 12 minutes, but with the checkpoints, it's normally an hour, and that's if you have permission. A Palestinian businessman routinely waits a half day just to collect an Israeli permit to enter Jerusalem and begin the journey. The World Bank estimates that, in spite of a projected 6-7 percent growth, per capita GDP is falling ....

And Ezra Klein, a journalist who is an authority on health care policy, blogs on Romney's praise for Israel's health care system.  The title of Klein's piece says a lot in itself: "Romney praises health care in Israel, where research says ‘strong government influence’ has driven down costs."

'Why Israel’s Right will stay in power'

Above is the title of Haaretz columnist Carlo Strenger's somber piece, published on July 25, using his insight as a psychologist (on the faculty of Tel Aviv University) to state in the subhead:

Carlo Strenger

There is little use in trying to convince Israelis to move towards historical compromise with the Palestinians in the near future: they will not buy it.

I fully agree with the content of his column, especially regarding the series of violent actions from Arab parties that have precipitated this gloomy assessment (I emphasize them in bold type below), but wish to draw a slightly different conclusion following this extended quote from his article:

Over the last weekend the New York Times published an editorial entitled “Israel’s embattled democracy” that expresses concern that Israel may be distancing itself from the liberal democratic principles on which it was founded. ....
.... The NYT editorial quotes experts who say that Israel’s demographic shift has led to the point where a majority of Israelis no longer trust the values and institutions of democracy. Akiva Eldar’s insightful article in the National Interest and recent polls by the Israel Democracy Institute underscore this point powerfully. ...
.... The proportion of the population that is ultra-orthodox or national-religious grows because of their high birthrates, and a large proportion of immigrants from the former Soviet Union have not been raised in a tradition of liberal democracy.
But I do not believe that this is the whole story. Experimental existential psychology has shown in dozens of countries that people who are faced with existential threat tend to move to the right politically, become less tolerant and more judgmental towards those with other religious and political views.

Backstory to my new Tikkun article

In the summer 2012 issue of Tikkun magazine, my article, "When American Jews Were Divided and Weak," reviews two books published on the same subject in 2011: JEWS WITHOUT POWER: American Jewry During The Holocaust by Ariel Hurwitz (MultiEducator, Inc., New Rochelle, NY) and MILLIONS OF JEWS TO RESCUE: A Bergson Group Leader's Account of the Campaign to Save Jews from the Holocaust by Samuel Merlin, edited by Rafael Medoff (published by The David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies, Washington, DC).  The original conclusion of my article, which I include in this post for your perusal, was rejected.

I vaguely recall meeting author Ariel Hurwitz once or twice.  He made aliya from New York in 1953 as a member of the socialist-Zionist Hashomer Hatzair youth movement and has lived on Kibbutz Gal'on ever since. He is the editor of AGAINST THE STREAM: Seven Decades of Hashomer Hatzair in North America (1994); I see that he inscribed my copy with a brief personal note ("To Ralph--Hope that we will keep reading Israel Horizons...", referring to the magazine I used to edit). 

I've recently learned through email correspondence with Dr. Hurwitz that the death of a daughter caused him to drop plans to publish what had basically been his doctoral dissertation about 20 years ago.  He felt obliged to return to it, however, after a spate of politically-charged histories coming from the Zionist right. As part of what he sees as a trend, he feels that the Bergson Group has been elevated unfairly at the expense of the American-Jewish community's leadership during the Holocaust.  Yet, because he writes with the reasoned tone of a historian and not as an ideological combatant, his book does not loudly proclaim a political agenda.

My own admittedly amateur judgment on this subject lies somewhere in between his view and that of the Bergson partisans, but I lean toward the Bergson Group.  In fact, Dr. Medoff, the editor

Gorenberg On Collapse of Israel's New Coalition

The American Prospect magazine's Israel correspondent, Gershom Gorenberg, asked on July 19, 2012, "Why did the most recent coalition in the Israeli government only last ten weeks?" His answer: "It's the Occupation, Stupid":

.... By bringing Shaul Mofaz's centrist Kadima Party into his government in May, Netanyahu sought to avoid early elections. Among the big things that new friends Shaul and Bibi promised to do were ending the widely resented draft exemption for ultra-Orthodox men and jump-starting the peace process with the Palestinians. In other words, Netanyahu would show that he was really a moderate, and that he had been waiting for Kadima's support to rule as one.

The explicit reason that Kadima left the coalition on Tuesday was irresolvable differences on the draft issue. Turns out that Netanyahu is not any kind of moderate. He'd like to maintain a façade that he is willing to agree to a two-state arrangement, and that he'd sadly compromise on the West Bank eternally belonging to Israel, if only the Palestinians were willing to talk without setting preconditions. But the façade is crumbling.

Back to the Street – The Fire This Time

There were a lot of young Hashomer Hatzair demonstrators chanting Anachnu Harov, Chazarnu LaRehov ("We are the majority, we’ve returned to the street").
Anyway, here are some of my impressions of the demo that marked the first anniversary of the social protest movement, drawn from my latest blog post at The Times of Israel website: 

.... When I got home [from the July 14 demonstration], I learned that Moshe Silman, a desperate 57 year old man had set himself on fire.  The note he left said “The State of Israel stole from me and robbed me. It left me helpless…” and he blamed “the State of Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz, for the humiliation that weakened citizens go through every day, taking from the poor and giving to the rich.” ...

Interview with Zehava Galon, head of Meretz

This is a terrific piece about Zehava Galon, the new head of the Meretz party in Israel.  Some of you met her a few months ago.  She is almost the last hope....

I no longer know what will help, but I am going on the (formerly Meretz USA, now Partners for Progressive Israel) Israel Symposium.  Read about her. Think about coming with us,  Oct. 20-27th. When things look this bad, as the Chinese say, and I'm paraphrasing, it is surely a time for opportunities.--Lilly

Meretz leader Zahava Gal-On is not looking to be loved
She's proud to be an outspoken leftist, even if it annoys politicians, settlers and army officers alike.
By Neri Livneh | Jul.12, 2012
[The following is an abbreviated version of a long article available at the Haaretz website by registration or subscription only.]

.... “It’s pretty common for people who meet me face to face to be amazed that I’m not scary and that I’m actually nice,” Gal-On told me. ... [But] Gal-On apparently intends to keep “annoying” everyone. That's who she is: an avowed leftist and secular, a fighter for human rights, an opponent of the occupation, and a supporter of social justice who opposes religious coercion.
.... There are people in the party she heads who are perceived as less annoying because they don’t insist on the whole “package”: Nitzan Horowitz focuses mainly on green issues, while Ilan Gilon, an amiable social justice activist, is perceived as being “one of the people” more than she is.
Meanwhile, Gal-On insists on firmly expressing her views on every controversial issue, and in a voice that, for some reason, really seems to bug men in particular. ...
.... in 2011, Gal-On returned to the Knesset, and during that year was elected to lead Meretz: a classic leftist who sees the struggle for social justice also as a fight against the occupation, against the violation of Palestinian human rights, against continued illegal construction in the territories and excessive budgetary allotments to the ultra-Orthodox.

Evidence of a Jewish 'race'? Yes & No

A recent article in Haaretz, with the somewhat misleading title of "DNA links prove Jews are a ‘race,' says genetics expert," unveils a line of inquiry that grapples honestly with the matter of genetics and Jews.  I've written a number of times on the outrageous work of Shlomo Sand, an Israeli historian who disputes Jewish peoplehood with a highly selective review of evidence and a pronounced anti-Zionist agenda.  (Feel free to enter his name in our Blog's search window on the upper left.) This article provides a rational and measured counterpoint to Sand's ideological screed. 

As the article acknowledges, this subject is a political bombshell, but it also proves that it can be addressed reasonably.  One should not be thrown off by "race" being in the title; the article is in no way "racist" in its analysis.  It accepts that genetic differences among populations (historically separated by geography and/or cultural or political factors) are relatively minuscule, but still have a significance in terms of dispositions toward certain diseases, physical appearance and other possible traits.

Many (perhaps most) Jews have a sense of themselves as a people who are intellectually superior.  There is some statistical (and now genetic) evidence for arguing this point, but my feeling is that the factual basis for such a contention is probably more a function of culture and the social legacy of Jews being treated as a reviled minority group that has had to scramble to make a living because they were denied access to land.  There's the Jewish tradition of Talmudic scholarship and the elevation of learning as a cultural value, and the historical need for Jews to be innovative as businessmen in order to survive. 

The Unfolding Crisis of Asylum Seekers in Israel

At a New Israel Fund event on Monday, two speakers, Hagai El-Ad and Libby Lenkinski from the Association for Civil Rights in Israeli (ACRI), discussed “an unfolding crisis in Israel.” These days, it’s not uncommon to hear the words “crisis” and “Israel” used in the same sentence, but when I think of a crisis in Israel, I instantly think about threats to Israel’s existence. Rarely, do I consider African refugees and asylum seekers.

El-Ad began by explaining that over the past few years, 50,000 African refugees have crossed the border into Israel. El-Ad insisted, however, that we put this figure in a proper context. 50,000 refugees would unlikely shift the demographics in Israel. The country has a total population of 7 million citizens and, 1 million of these citizens Asylum seekers absorbed from the Soviet Union. Suddenly, the number of refugees seems smaller.

So where is the crisis here?

First of all, the number of refugees in Israel will only increase. The pair explained that despite Netanyahu’s efforts to keep African immigrants out of the country, his deportation laws and anti-immigration publicity campaigns will have little noticeable impact. Netanyahu cannot deport refugees from Sudan and Eritrea given the unsafe political climate, nor can he discourage immigrants via media because all media in both countries is government regulated. These two nationalities comprise over 80% of the total immigrants. Yet, ultimately, Netanyahu can do little to keep them out of Israel. According to international law, all nations must welcome asylum seekers who were victims of human rights violations in their home country, and whose life would be in danger if returned.

What's next if the two-state solution disappears?

Yesterday, July 4th, I sent my email list a downer when everyone else might have been celebrating with fireworks.  It was Gershon Baskin’s newest article in which he pleads for a two state solution to the conflict that has lasted so many decades.  And he despairs.  So do I.  Not a good thing for activists to despair.   What is equally depressing is to read the comments that were posted inveighing against "leftist" thinking.  http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Columnists/Article.aspx?id=276038

 

In response to my recent depressing emails, here is what Aaron Sharif wrote me.  Aaron and I were in Habonim together.  I was a few years older, and hence called the Madricha (the leader); today he is a veteran kibbutznik, lives in Gesher Haziv, is a writer, a poet, and a family man with grandchildren.

 

Hello Lilly,

Yes, I’ve already read Gershon Baskin’s letter. So simple, so true. A couple of months ago I wrote a very-very similar letter and filed it away for my grandchildren to read in the future. I’ve lately stopped sending letters to a list, mostly because I fear of depressing any of those very few activists who still fight for what I today already see as lost. As an Israeli democratic Zionist I join the Gershon Baskins who feel that a major cause (2-States) is pretty much lost, are floundering at sea in a boat without a sail, trying to figure out “O.K., if this is the case…what now?”. Where do we go from here? What can be our second line of defense or offence?

 

A brief history of draft exemptions for the ultra-orthodox in Israel

With the Tal Law and Plesner Committee dominating the news, I searched in vain for a straightforward English-language background piece to summarize the history of ultra-orthodox draft exemptions in Israel and contextualize the implications of today's political debates. So I produced one myself.  Comments welcome.

Date	Development	Details
1949	Torato Omanuto - Torah study is his craft - arrangement	First Israeli Prime Minister and Defense Minister David Ben-Gurion exempts 400 senior ultra-orthodox (haredi) scholars from draft so they can study in yeshiva full-time. Ben-Gurion motivated by desire to avoid political conflict with ultra-orthodox and to help revive the haredi community and its yeshivas which were decimated by Holocaust.
1977	First Likud government expands Torato Omanuto	Menachem Begin’s Likud government removes existing cap (800) on deferment eligibility and relaxes eligibility conditions.  Number of deferments rises to 17,017 in 1987, 26,262 in 1995, 28,772 in 1997, and 61,000 by 2010.
1998	Supreme Court ruling in Rubinstein v. Minister of Defense	Led by its chief justice, Aharon Barak, Court rules that original objective for yeshiva student deferment no longer valid, and that wholesale deferrals lacked legal authorization. Court demands that Knesset introduce legislation.
1999	Tal Commission formed	In wake of Rubinstein v. Minister of Defense, PM and DM Ehud Barak creates special commission, headed by former Supreme Court Justice Tzvi Tal, to deal with special military service exemption for ultra-orthodox.
July 2002	Tal Law passed by Knesset	New law gives haredi yeshiva students automatic draft deferral if they study Torah full-time.  Law offers 22 year-old yeshiva students the option of continued study, one-year unpaid civil service job alongside a paying job, or a shortened 16-month military service and future service in reserves. Law defined as ‘temporary’, with need for re-approval every five years.