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by Peter A. Belmont / 2012-04-09
© 2012 Peter Belmont
No, children, Peter Beinart is not calling for full-court BDS against Israel. Sad but true. His disillusionment has not yet prevailed over his loyalty to the liberal Zionist dream.
However, in his NYT op-ed and in his books, Peter Beinart is speaking to the whole world — and not only to the Jewish community. This is good, because public talk by Jews is obviously necessary if there is to be change to the too-long status quo of Israel’s effective immunity and impunity with respect to its violations of the UN Charter, international humanitarian law, and the laws of war.
Not that international action to reign Israel in seems immanent. The nations seem unlikely under present circumstances to act to force Israel back toward a law-abiding path —doubtless immobilized by their own natural inertia, commercial ties, and the paralysis enforced by the USA’s not inconsiderable pressure against anti-Israel action.
The USA, for its part, has long been caught in the paralyzing quick-sand of its own noxious self-and-world-destructive money-dominated political system: the well-heeled pro-right-wing Israeli Lobby (AIPAC and its allies) effectively “owns” Congress, and can force it to do its bidding as it has repeatedly shown, and also has huge leverage over the administration.
But if there is any chance that the nations (excluding the USA, sadly, for the foreseeable future) will decide to act to twist Israel’s arm—either to achieve a just and lasting peace with the Palestinians or to avoid war with Iran and others—that slim chance can not but be augmented if sizable portions of the world’s Jewish communities begin to speak out, freely and “noisily”, to condemn Israel’s illegal acts.
Israel’s illegal acts, if the reader has any doubts, include: [1] the making of unprovoked attacks on other countries; [2] the commission of war crimes during its wars; and [3] unwarranted and illegal (at international humanitarian law) conduct of its belligerent occupations.
As to those occupations—now of Gaza and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and the Syrian Golan Heights—it is well to note that [4] Israel has made clear its intention to hold most of these territories forever as its own sovereign territory, in violation of the UN Charter, which makes the acquisition of territory by use or threat of war inadmissible.
OK, there is reason for Jews (and for everyone else) to freely and “noisily” condemn many of Israel’s actions. It is not solely a job for Jews, but it would be helpful if Jews gave “permission” and encouragement to everyone else to get this important work done.
Such “noisy” (by which I mean widely public) Jewish condemnation by Jews of Israel’s illegal behaviors will come hard to many Jews who have been taught to think of Israel as “family” and taught also not to wash the “family’s” dirty linen in public.
But the people of the world—like the nations—have grown used to the idea that Jews support Israel, desire unending belligerent occupation and unending wars, have no sympathy for Palestinians, have no desire for the establishment of a Palestinian State as part of a “just and lasting peace” (UNSC-242 (1967)), do not dread an Israeli attack on Iran (or Gaza or Lebanon, etc.)—and DESERVE TO HAVE THESE BELLICOSE DESIRES HONORED because of Jewish suffering in the Holocaust.
Jews need to tell them that such ideas are wrong today—however much they may have been true earlier.
Back to Peter Beinart.
Beinart is to be honored for making public his gentle criticisms of Israel. But he speaks in too muted a fashion and does not call for REAL TOUGH LOVE for Israel from the community of nations, only for a ridiculous civil-society BDS-lite of commercial products made in occupied territories.
(BDS means “boycotts, divestment, and sanctions” and names a civil society program promoted by many Palestinians and joined by many others, including many Jews. Its aim is to pressure Israel to end the occupations, provide real democracy within pre-1967 Israel for the Arab minority, and to allow return to their homeland (Israel) for the Palestinian refugees/exiles from the 1948 war.)
What might be a lot more helpful than Beinart’s BDS-lite—and his books and so forth hint in this direction—is for Jews less worried than he is about Jewish-community-acceptability to go to their national publics seeking to give encouragement to their nations to perform BDS-heavy—such as, initially, withdrawal of ambassadors and cessation of commercial air-traffic—until Israel complies with I/L to the extent (for example) of removing all 650,000 settlers, dismantling the settlements (per UNSC-465 (1980)) and the wall (per ICJ-2004), removing internal check-points, and ending the siege of Gaza.
Holocaust-consciousness (guilt, pity) on the part of “the nations” has tended to prevent them from holding Israel to the standard of compliance with UNSC resolutions and I/L — at great cost, including money wasted on PA, the threat of more-and-more war, and the plight of the Palestinians.
The nations need a lot of urging (to overcome their own natural inertia and the USA’s pressures toward inaction). Jews should lead that urging, not oppose it.
So, I for one thank Peter Beinart for his timid but very public steps in the direction of modeling Jewish criticism of Israeli policies and practices. The journey of a thousand miles starts with a single step.
But Beinart is still very much a loyal member of his Jewish community—rather than a loyal member of the human community—and his criticism and policy recommendations are too timid. He is too much a loving supporter of a “liberal” Israel which if it ever existed outside the minds of “liberal Zionists” such as Beinart exists no longer.
Paradoxically, the pseudo-religion of uncritical love of Zion constitutes fetters, chains, that bind and imprison Jews of the world and prevent them from doing what Jewish ethics and quite possibly self-interest calls on them to do.
They should throw away these voluntarily worn chains. They have nothing to lose from it, and much to gain.
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