Ok, Jerry Haber at The Magnes Zionist, actually says what many liberal zionists miss. Look he says it here:
I am afraid that this is what many liberal Zionists miss. The real dispute is not between the one-staters and the two-staters, but between those who hold that the collective right of a settler people to self-determination trumps the human and civil rights of the indigenous natives, and those who do not. According to the former, the only hope for Palestinian self-determination is to accept Israel’s generous offer of a “state”, and to rely for its security on strangers (s.v. the Geneva Initiative’s multi-national force) and the kindness of the Israelis who have treated them, to put it mildly, rather shabbily over the last 65 years.
That's very well put. Let's have the best bit again:
The real dispute is not between the one-staters and the two-staters, but between those who hold that the collective right of a settler people to self-determination trumps the human and civil rights of the indigenous natives, and those who do not.
This reminds me of a joke I heard a long time ago about the Israeli Education Ministry ordering teachers to honour the legacy of the late Rahavam Ze'evi, an open advocate of the ethnic cleansing of Arabs from Palestine. A teacher told the her class how courageous Ze'evi had been in advocating the, ahem, "Transfer" of the Palestinian population. A child said, "that's wonderful, Miss, when can we do that to the Ethiopians." The teacher said "don't be so racist in my class!"
Anyway, a couple of days ago Ha'aretz reported on a demo by Ethiopians and "representatives of various groups who feel weak in Israeli society."
"The phenomenon of racism harms us all, and it is impossible to separate the discrimination of Ethiopians in Israel from the discrimination of Arab residents or Russian-speakers," said Rabia Elsagir, a resident of Shfaram and member of The Coalition Against Racism in Israel, who attended the protest with a handful of people from the Arab sector.
There are of course many examples of racism in Israel but two more occurred just recently. One was the water throwing incident in the Knesset just the other day:
The other is a further degeneration of the State of Israel into an explicitly apartheid situation within Israel itself and not simply between Israel and the occupied territories. The Israeli High Court has now effectively ratified Israel's so-called Citizenship Law which spells out a crucial difference between the Jewish and Arab inhabitants of Israel within the pre-67 boundaries. Again here is Ha'aretz:
Israel’s High Court rejected on Wednesday petitions against the Citizenship Law, which prevents Palestinians married to Israeli Arabs from receiving Israeli citizenship or residency. Six judges voted to reject the petitions, while five voted to accept them.
Israel generally grants citizenship to spouses of Israelis in a gradual process. In the spirit of this process, a similar process was instituted for the naturalization of spouses of permanent residents, though the process is a little longer. A 2002 temporary order excluded Palestinian spouses from these processes and barred them from becoming Israeli citizens.
Yesterday, the State of Israel became the first western state whose High Court ruled that some citizens have fewer fundamental rights than other citizens based on their ethnicity. Actually, it had done so before, but yesterday it rejected the most sustained challenge to the “Citizenship Law,” which bars the non-Israeli spouses of Israeli Palestinians from becoming citizens. So while an Israeli Jew from Brooklyn has the right of marrying anybody she likes, and having her spouse naturalized, a native Palestinian Israeli citizen cannot marry a distant relative who lives in a town five minutes from her house – unless that relative was a Palestinian collaborator, working for the Israelis, and then, only by special approval of the Minister of Interior.
Yet another answer to Goldstone and all those who try to make out that Israel isn't an apartheid state.
There's quite an interesting blog called the Muddle East run by a chap called Matt Hill. Matt supports the two-state solution in that he sees the maintaining of a state for Jews as essential, desirable and inevitable. See this from his latest post:
It's become almost a cliche: everyone knows, roughly, the likely shape of a future peace deal between the Israelis and Palestinians. And it's true that on issues like borders, settlements, even refugees, the chasm separating the two sides in 2000 has narrowed - even amid all the violence and overheated rhetoric.
Matt describes himself "moderately pro-Palestinian" but this is relative to the fact that he often cross-posts at Harry's Place where his support for the two state solution and criticism of the State of Israel sends most of the commentators and those of the hosts who can bothered to comment into a feed frenzy.
Anyway, he recently stopped by the Magnes Zionist blog and Jerry Haber, the blogger there, returned his visit with a comment of his own as follows:
Thanks for stopping by my place. I think my email is there. Anyway, it's
jeremiah.haber@gmail.com
You wrote:
It's become almost a cliche: everyone knows, roughly, the likely shape of a future peace deal between the Israelis and Palestinians.
You are right -- it is almost a cliche, and like so many almost cliches it is a comforting one.
Fortunately, I stopped believing in it a long time ago.
You see, the proposed peace solution that "everybody knows" (to quote Leonard Cohen) is what the Israeli philosopher Avishai Margalit calls a "rotten compromise". It allows certain groups in Israeli and Palestinian society maintain their current life styles, at the expense of other groups in both societies who will suffer. On my blog, I have been most sensitive to the suffering of the Palestinians who are the victims in this conflict, and that compromise will condemn them to years of subalternation. But I cannot deny the suffering of some of the perpetrators, the brainwashed settlers, should they have to evacuate their homes for several generations. (I can't deny it; I also can't get as upset about it.)
Faith in the peace process allows the liberal Zionist to sleep at night. She sees the daily injustices and inequities (and iniquities) committed by her side against the Palestinians, and longs for some relief, some way out. So she lives under the illusion that things will get better if only the messiah comes, sorry, if only the right formula is figured out. So she will talk about confidence-building measures, state-building, reducing tension, people-to-people initiatives, joint summer camps. In the meantime, more settlements are built, more settlers enter the high ranks of the judiciary, military, and government, more Palestinians are arrested, and most Israelis don't give a damn.
I have been observing this conflict for forty years. The sides are further apart today then they ever have been. And generations of Israeli Jews and Palestinians are growing up with almost no contact whatever -- much different from when I was here as a young man.
My advice to you is to come to Israel, and take Breaking the Silence's trips to Hebron and Ramallah. You won't be able to read the Atlantic again.
And how's this for another cliche: Things will have to get a lot worse before they get better.
I am betting on the truth of that one. And when things do get better -- and they will -- the final settlement won't look anything like your cliche says it does.
Let's keep the dialogue open. Unlike some of my cohorts, I believe in kiruv, engagement.
Peace,
Jerry
So in this case the Magnes Zionist appears to be not as enamoured of zionism as generally understood as the "moderate... pro-Palestinian" is. Should Jerry Haber change the name of his blog? Should Matt Hill change his self-description? Of course both could do either but I'm guessing neither will do either. I do think Matt Hill's blog is worth a look at but I needed the excuse that Jerry Haber's comment has given me.
