February/March 2002 Feature
Israel Is Not Yet Secure
Henry L. Feingold
My generation believed that the existence
of a Jewish state would forever change the condition of murderous hate and
insecurity that for centuries haunted Jewish life in the Diaspora. We would
reenter history as a people in control of its destiny. That was our hope. But
one need only read the Arab press to be reminded that Israel occupies a position
in the Middle East not unlike a Jewish shtetl in east Europe ensconced in a
hostile Christian landscape. More than half a century has passed since the
founding of the state, sufficient time to conclude that the historic inability
of the Jewish people to find its place in the world goes beyond temporal
politics. We are a people forced to live apart, even when we no longer want to.
The drawing power of the Zionist movement that gave birth to Israel has waned.
All ideologies ultimately age and decline, but, in the case of Zionism, that
cannot be an innocent datum. Ideologies and the myths on which they are based
are crucial in maintaining the cohesion of every nation, especially of those,
like Israel, that were created from the outside in. The 20th century is full of
examples of nations like Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, and superpowers like the
Soviet Union that collapsed from within when their founding ideologies were no
longer able to instill confidence in the course taken. The divisive power of the
conflict between Israel’s secular and religious communities did not come to the
fore until the Zionist ideology was no longer able to serve as a bridge between
these deep chasms. The waning of Zionism’s persuasiveness impacts on the
Diaspora communities as well. Is there a Jew who was not enormously proud of the
Jews’ return to the stage of history, and of the idea of social justice as it
was lived in the kibbutz? But that pride is part of the past. Today, Israel’s
deep internal divisions are not abandoned, even in the face of external threat,
as would be the case in a “normal” nation. The UJA slogan, “We Are One,” only
mocks those of us who wanted desperately to believe it.
Modernity, which has secularism at its ideational core, and premodern romantic
nationalism, with its theocratic underpinnings, have become the intersection of
Israel’s political life. The assumptions on which secular life is based,
self-realization and self-commandment, become more difficult to realize in
israel. The strident religious fundamentalism, which matches a similar posture
in the Islamic world, is converting a basically political conflict into a
religious one. The consequence of such a conversion is bound to be bloody,
since, when everything is sacralized, little space is left for negotiating the
terms for living together. Clearly, the secular vision of statehood holds out
the best hope for finding such a modus vivendi. It is precisely the idea of the
individual “citoyen” and his rights that would allow a Palestinian to live
securely and equally in a “Jewish state,” and a Jewish settler to similarly live
in a Palestinian one. Under normal circumstances, Israel could achieve such a
status for all its citizens, but the duplication of such equality in an Islamic
state, such as a Palestinian state is likely to be, is inconceivable at the
present juncture. The emerging Islamic theocratic vision of state and society is
exclusive and cannot accommodate the concept of inclusiveness and pluralism,
which is at the heart of the modern nation state. It is that sensibility that
threatens to generate conflict and insecurity in the region into the indefinite
future. It compels the Islamic republic of Iran to confront a Jewish state
geographically and politically removed from its normal orbit of national
interest.
Nor is all “sweetness and light” in the secular model of statehood. Taken to its
extreme, secularism runs the risk of disconnecting Jews everywhere from their
historic past, much of which they lived as part of a religious civilization. It
may be possible to change the dream of Zion from a “Jewish State” to a “state of
the Jews,” but a purely secular state would lose its binding spiritual power for
the Jewish people. It would become merely a tourist attraction. There is thus a
threat to Jewish survival at either end of the religious/secular spectrum.
Neither seems to warrant total Jewish trust. It was, after all, the secular
state in both east and west Europe that posed the greatest threat to Jewish
survival in the 20th century. Moreover, while secular modes dominate the Jewish
world, Islam is far less inclined to be guided by them.
How then can the separation of these kindred people, which is at the heart of
the Oslo agreement, produce the peace that is requisite for Israel’s continued
development? Most Jews have reconciled themselves to the inevitability of a
Palestinian state. Some even view it as a moral imperative. Practically, it
would at least give Israel better rules of engagement than an armed uniformed
force pitted against seemingly dissident civilians who throw stones. But even
here, one can have serious doubts that an answer will be found through
Palestinian statehood. It is not a modern democratic republic we witness
aborning. There are already clear indications in the development of eleven
separate security forces within the 450 square miles of the West Bank and Gaza
that what is developing is a corrupt, lawless state, governed by Mafia-like
gangs. It will be a state dependent on Israel for economic support. A Jew who
has lived his life in the bloody past century has good reason to be wary of
having such a neighbor, especially when the new state may set the stage for an
even more bitter conflict with irredentist overtones such as prevails between
India and Pakistan.
What a paradox. There is little doubt as to the ultimate survival of Haiti and
Uganda and the dozens of other basket-case nations. They will muddle through the
21st century. But for Israel, with its democratic political system and thriving
economy, for the feisty little nation that has proven its will to live four
times on the field of battle, there can be no such certainty. The burden of
Jewish history remains extraordinarily heavy, and the promise of Zionism to
finally lighten that burden has not come to pass.•
About the author
Henry L. Feingold, a member of the editorial board of Midstream, is professor
emeritus of history, Baruch College, CUNY, and past president of the Labor
Zionist Alliance.