Truth, Fact and Myth in a Middle East Dialogue

Truth is sometimes a shadowy figure in the world of the Middle East. What truth is for one person, or one group, or one nation, may not necessarily jive with the truth of another person, group, or nation. Facts are equally fungible in this most dangerous of neighborhoods. Alan Dowty, in his book “Israel/Palestine” discusses truth and fact in relation to myth building. As you will see further on, the truths portrayed by those who hate Israel, and the facts that are used to back up the assertions that Israel is the ultimate bad guy, are myths and lies. The myths built up since World War II are big myths indeed, which brings one to reflect on a rather infamous quote; “Make the lie big, make it simple, keep saying it, and eventually they will believe it,” by Adolf Hitler.

The myths that endure are those that go like this; ‘Israel exists on lands taken by force from others; indigenous peoples who were thrown off their lands’ – or ‘it is the result of age-old ethnic and religious hatreds and is not soluble until Israel ceases to exist.’ The myth most strongly reinforced, the biggest lie repeated over and over again, is that Israel threw people out of their homes and took over their lands; that Israel exists only because of what they did to the indigenous Palestinians, and to make amends Israel must relinquish ownership of all the land of Palestine.

It is a conflict over land; it is a conflict that pits two people against each other for the same little strip of earth. The myths about the conflict, and the “truths” used to reinforce those myths, have been hammered into generations of Arabs such that they are now the absolute truths, even in the face of clear and compelling historical facts.

This was brought home to me recently when I participated, over the past few months, in what was described to me as a dialogue group focusing on the Israel/Palestine conflict.

It started with about eleven people seated in a circle. The primary facilitator wore a hijab and described herself as a Palestinian. Over the course of the next four sessions, the group dynamic continually changed as several participants either came or didn’t, and new participants suddenly showed up after not being there for the first sessions.

There was the Israeli, who stated a feeling of “shame” at Israel for oppressing Arabs, and the young Jewish student who talked of listening to an Arab friend describe the ‘horrors of the check points.’ There was a young 19 year-old woman who described her visit to Arab towns in the Palestinian Authority territories and the abject poverty and the terrible stories of the residents, including a very graphic rendition of the oppressive tactics by Israeli soldiers. There were also the stories from a young Arab man from Lebanon and another, the husband of the facilitator, outlining the constancy of oppressive activities and governmentally sanctioned crimes against what was described in several ways as “the indigenous Palestinian population.” Several participants offered no personal history with regards to Israel or Palestine, and one fellow was consistent and insistent on bringing the conversation around to some type of common theme. Two other young men, who only showed up for the first sessions, brought with them their truths of living as Muslims in an Islamophobic world.

Sadly, the facilitators and several of the participants held firm in trying to move the group process toward a resolution that was, at least in my mind, a Pro-Palestinian stance. Israel was definitely the bad guy here. Palestine, and the millions of refugees everywhere, was the victim.

It was stated that, time and gain, the human rights of Palestinians were violated by the Zionist invaders. I heard stories about soldiers’ actions at checkpoints, about the hardships of ‘regular’ people living in refugee camps, the horrible conditions in Gaza. Israel was the oppressor, the goliath, the apartheid state viciously oppressing the true and legitimate inhabitants of the land.

The statement was made that, in order for us to move on as a group, it would be good if we could agree that Israel must first apologize for its actions, its horrible past, comparing this idea with what South Africa did in the aftermath of the end of Apartheid. Lots of head nodding all around. Appeared to be a good idea.

Granted, there was a Rabbi who was invited to attend this group, but alas, the Rabbi’s schedule didn’t allow regular participation and the Rabbi missed most of the meetings. The other, secondary facilitator, was Jewish, but this person was very silent and only spoke sparingly, preferring to play the outsider role. Of course, there was me. I was invited, through an intermediary, because he (the one who wanted to participate) was deemed too ‘Pro-Israel’ for this group. That should have been a giveaway to me, but I went ahead and participated anyway.

I expressed my opinions, and started with the statement that I am, and have always been, Pro-Peace in the Middle East, Pro-Israel, and Pro-Palestine. I challenged my dialogue group co-members to agree with me. What I heard was worse than silence. What people said, during their statements, was that they did support a Palestinian state, and they wanted peace. Nothing was stated that expressed a desire to see a peaceful Israel alongside a peaceful Palestine. According to the truths expressed, the two peoples cannot co-exist on the same little strip of land.

Facts were not a major player in this group. Preferred truths were, especially those that were slanted toward the demonization of Zionism and Israel.

Facts and personal truths collide. If there is no one there to point out the absurdity of some ‘personal’ truths, so they remain, and are reinforced by the head nodding and/or the passivity of the rest of the group. Repeat the lie long enough, and the people will believe it.

It was time for me to go. This was not dialogue. It was Israel bashing.

I am willing to accept that sovereign nations do things that they shouldn’t. America has done some pretty awful things. So has most of the rest of the world’s sovereign nations. Yet, they remain sovereign, safe in their lands. Only Israel is attacked for not being perfect. I do not agree with every policy and action taken by the Israeli government. But the fact that Israel exists at all (or their hope for its destruction) is exactly what is behind the “truths” intoned by those who refuse to utter the phrase “Pro-Israel.”

What is truth? What is fact? What is myth?

The nakba referred to in my previous posting refers to the Arab world’s commemoration of the May 15, 1948 declaration of Israeli statehood. Nakba means catastrophe. I will entertain the notion that some may believe that establishing Israel was catastrophic for some people. I would imagine that some believe establishing the USA on July 4, 1776 was catastrophic (Britain or native peoples); or that the Russian Revolution of 1917 was catastrophic for freedom.

In the same vein, shouldn’t those same people who cry nakba every May 15^th also cry nakba when they remember or think about how dozens of Arab leaders called upon Arab residents from all over Palestine in 1948 to leave their homes "for a short time" just until the Arab armies will have wiped out all the Jews?

Wasn’t it a nakba when, upon receiving hundreds of thousands of refugees, Lebanon, or Syria, or Egypt, chose instead to stuff them into horrid camps, not allowing them to even become citizens of their host country? My denial of the definition of a nakba is based on a much broader understanding of the situation, instead of the narrowly defined nakba involving the establishment of the State of Israel. Wasn't it also a nakba that the Arab world chose to say no to a state when the Jews of Palestine said yes? I would like to hear my dialogue co-members accept these truths, because they are rooted in historical fact.

But the fact remains; the UN authorized Israel’s existence on November 29, 1947; it also authorized an Arab state (Palestine) alongside a Jewish one (Israel) in the same vote. The Arab state would have been 99% Arab, and the Jewish state would have been 55% Jewish (the other 45% would be Arab). The fact also remains that the Jewish population of Palestine immediately said yes, and the Arab population immediately said no.

The fact is that on May 14, 1948, the State of Israel was established under the UN partition plan’s agreement, and by May 17^th, Israel was formally recognized as an independent nation. A fact that is completely overlooked is that, also on May 14, 1948, the Arab League (which was comprised of most of the Arab world) along with Egypt, Syria, Iraq, and Lebanon attacked Israel and all parties entered into a state of war; the Arab world looking to destroy the Jews and Israel fighting for its existence, one that had just been accepted by most of the rest of the world.

What is truth? What is fact? What is myth? Nazi Germany used lies and myths to move a nation toward hate. Now the Arab world, to a very large extent, uses myths and lies to keep hate alive. In 2002, Egypt’s national school system aired a program that presented the Protocols of the Elders of Zion (a proven piece of fiction created to foster anti-Semitism) to schoolchildren as fact. Hamas in Gaza uses excerpts from this fiction in its official anti-Israel diatribes. Hamas paraphrases and hides, but the intent is clear; indoctrinate its citizens against Jews.

The dialogue group used the same methods to establish their side’s truth, which is not based on facts, but will become so as they repeat it over and over in the absence of the fact checker and the myth buster.

Neal Elyakin, Ann Arbor

December 22, 2009

Voting for Education in Michigan

On November 3rd Washtenaw County voters will be asked to approve a county-wide school millage. Over the past several years, this county has seen some of its districts consolidate services, cut programs, increase class sizes, and spend money from the district’s “rainy-day” fund balance. We’ve seen school employees and their unions accept pay freezes and higher contributions to their health care plan. We’ve seen all ten districts reduce administrative costs, not replace retiring staff, reduce inventory, collapse services.

In Ann Arbor, the district has already cut over $16 million dollars over the last four years. But because of the State’s system of funding schools (through sales taxes), over the past several years, State funding has decreased steadily. So, most of the districts are working from an ever increasing deficit, even with the cuts made.

Based on the proposed cuts in the State budget and the recent decision by the Governor to issue mid-year prorations to local schools, there is a reasonable expectation that Michigan school districts’ cuts will fall in the $289-613 range – per student.

While it is difficult to imagine what that cut means; by way of illustration, let me walk you through an elementary school in this post cut world.

First of all, if the district doesn’t cut it completely, school buses may be really full, and if you live within a mile of school, no bus for you, and by the way, your kids’ ride to school may very well be an hour and a half long (*Note; school transportation is not a required educational service, except for special education).

The school building may not be sparklingly clean, as the district had to put all custodial staff on part time or split assignments. Classrooms may be cleaned every other day, so don’t look too closely at the floor of your kindergartener’s classroom, and don’t worry that the bathrooms are not that tidy. Your building secretary may not know you, as the district will probably cut these positions as well, going with contractors perhaps, or split scheduling office staff. Don’t worry, the message will get through, eventually.

In the classrooms, your child will be one of about 40, or more. (*Note; there is no law in Michigan mandating class size) Each building will certainly collapse classrooms, lay off the newest teachers, take library/media staff and/or music and/or art teachers with teaching certificates and put them in classrooms. So, no more instrumental music for your kid, vocal music is out, art classes may be out, and the library may become a field trip for your kid’s class. Speaking of field trips, those are gone too.

I imagine that some families will be able to augment the instrumental music with private lessons, art classes at the Y, maybe taking their children to the public library and spending some quality time finding some good books to read. Maybe some of us will revel in the fact that we can now walk our children to school, like the old days, and be there at 3:48 pm to pick them up and walk them home. We’ll have to quit our jobs, though, or maybe go to part time so we can augment our children’s lost education. We'll all pay for the lost education of our children.

Or we can support our schools, our hard working teachers, and our children’s education. Business leaders like to be in Washtenaw County, because they can point to our great schools in recruiting high level employees. The University of Michigan attracts world class researchers, doctors, and academics because we have a highly successful school district. Our homes are actually worth more when the local schools are considered successful. Even with the substantial cuts already made, Ann Arbor Schools’ MEAP scores (an indicator of school success) are significantly above the state average.

We are at a tipping point with regards to our local schools. If these state cuts are actualized, and all indications are that they will be, the schools will not be able to absorb that level of cuts without cutting deeply into your child’s classroom. This millage will allow the schools to maintain current levels of class size, transportation, related service providers (Music, Art, Library, PE, etc) for next few years as we continue to push our state to repair the structural deficit problems with regard to State funding of education.

Vote for our future. Whether you have children in the schools or not, we must act now to ensure that our future leaders have the opportunity to learn in high achieving schools.

Vote Yes on November 3, 2009.

Neal Elyakin, Ann Arbor
October 23, 2009

A Sad Day -

Three years ago today (June 25, 2009), not far from the Israeli-Egyptian border, near the fence that separates Israel and Hamas controlled Gaza, a group of seven Hamas terrorists entered Israel through a tunnel dug under the fence and attacked an Israeli convoy, killing two soldiers, injuring five others, and abducting one, dragging him across the de-facto border into Gaza. The attack was unprovoked and clearly in violation of Israel’s sovereignty.

For the next three years, Gilad Shalit, born on August 21, 1986 in Nahariya, Israel, the son of Aviva and Noam Shalit and the brother of Yoel and Hadas, has been a prisoner of Hamas, the terrorist group that forcibly took control of Gaza from the Palestinian Authority.

Gilad entered the military in July of 2005, just about a year before his abduction, just like almost every Israeli, and he entered the armored corps, like his brother Yoel before him.

For a year, nothing was heard about him or from him or from his captors. Then, on June 25, 2007, an audio tape with his voice was released by Hamas. Since then, only rumors and unsubstantiated stories have circulated about his welfare.

Governments make noise, leaders make speeches, legislatures pass resolutions and condemnations. He remains isolated, alone, a prisoner of a deadly, terror group bent on the destruction of Israel.

Rallies are held, promises are made, meetings are convened and still he sits, unheard, somewhere in Gaza, maybe?; alive?; hopefully; healthy?, who knows?

Will we get Gilad back? What will be our cost? Where is the outrage by the governments who want peace? Why would we want to sit and talk without conditions? There is a condition; the return of this young man to his family, his nation, his friends. Bring Gilad home. Three years is enough.


Neal Elyakin, Ann Arbor
June 25, 2009

Palestine, Israel, Borders and Nationhood

So everyone knows my bias right up front, I’ll start with this statement. There was a war for independence that Israel waged after being attacked on all fronts by pretty much the entire Arab world at the time; a war that began only after the world body known as the United Nations recognized the nascent nation of Israel, also in 1948.

Palestine as an entity was part of the Ottoman Empire until it was carved up by the victorious Allied nations after World War I. The French got some of it, the British got some of it, and some of it remained with the 'Sheiks of Araby.' The area now known as Israel was little more than a few isolated villages with ancient roads leading to Jerusalem. Even Jerusalem was rarely visited by the Arabs of the day. Mecca, in Saudi Arabia was the predominant destination for those of faith in the Muslim world.

Israel has always existed in the hearts of Jews all over the world; the Zion of old, the place of the Prophets, of Moses, of the Kings. Israel was what Jews sang songs about, told ancient stories about, and it featured prominently in the everyday liturgy and prayers. Jerusalem is what Jews wanted, more than anything else, when they sang “Next Year in Jerusalem” to end the Passover Seder, the telling of the Exodus of Egypt and the establishment of the Jewish homeland in Israel, led by Moses thousands of years ago. To be sure, there have always been Jews living in Israel, along side Arabs, Druze, and Bedouins more or less in peace. The governing entities of the time tolerated more or less all the inhabitants of the areas.

It wasn’t until Herzl and Ben-Gurion and ultimately, the Holocaust, when Jews all over the world began once again to dream in earnest about the homeland, the nation that was once theirs in the holy land of Israel.

The British and French “Mandates” in the Middle East consisted of the lands that are now called Iraq, Kuwait, Syria, Israel, Lebanon and Jordan. Except for Israel (then called Palestine), Britain and France carved up the rest and distributed it to various Arab tribal leaders, sheiks, and other Muslim leaders. Palestine, the land mass that was most argued over, was divided into strangely shaped non-contiguous segments and offered to both the Jews and the Arabs to live there as two nations, one for the Jews and one for the Arabs. The Jews immediately accepted. The Arabs immediately refused.

The tribalism in Iraq, Kuwait, Syria, Lebanon and Jordan was localized and indifferent to nation building. Britain and France were interested, as was most of the rest of the rest of the world, in the natural resources (oil) that were prevalent there, so they created nation-states which they hoped would be very friendly to them. The western powers cared little about the tribalism or feuding as long as it didn’t spill over to affect the oil exports. This is truly an over-simplification, yet it is instructive to know that the new leadership in these manufactured countries had no real interest in nation building, borders, commerce, laws, or international relationships. Their primary focus was on retaining control of their tribe, clan, family and lands.

Since the dawn of the 20th century, Jews from Russia, Europe and elsewhere arrived to re-build the ancient land of Israel. Hundreds of thousands of Jews were killed and driven out of villages, cities, and towns throughout Russia and Eastern Europe as part of the pogroms. These early transplants began to transform the land, plant tress, drain swamps, build cities, establish commerce, and begin the arduous task of nation building dreamed of by generations of Jews. Most of what is now Israel was not much more than a bunch of rag-tag villages until the influx of Jews. Even Jerusalem was nothing more than ruins and broken, dirty streets. There was little government, barely any oversight, and nothing in the way of infrastructure that would support a thriving city. The Jews escaping the horrors of Russia made their way to Jerusalem and began to clean it up. As the years went by and external forces (Britain and France, primarily) carved up that part of the world, the Jews of Palestine slowly, intentionally, and quietly, began re-building the Israel of their dreams, connecting to those who had been there all along, building international relationships with people and nations, establishing commercial ventures, laying the foundation for a nation.

In the 1920’s in Syria, as the remnants of the Ottoman Empire was being divided up by Britain and France, the borders of the newly invented country of Syria excluded many who lived in what is now northern Israel, and many others who lived in what is now Jordan and Lebanon. The Syrians who lived in these now foreign regions were enraged that they were no longer able to be Syrians, angry at the occupying forces for separating them.

Most of the Arabs living in what is now Israel came during the early years of the century, enticed by the work offered as a result of the opportunities created by the early Jewish immigration and international capital flowing into the area. The Arabs of the day lived hard lives in Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, and Iraq. They came for the commerce, the work, and the employment that the Jewish enterprise offered. They came from as far away as Iran (Persia) and Saudi Arabia.

George Antonius, a Christian Lebanese-Egyptian who lived for a while in Jerusalem, wrote frequently about the Arabs of the area during these years. One book he wrote, The Arab Awakening, included the following; “The year 1920 has an evil name in Arab annals: it is referred to as the Year of the Catastrophe (Am al-Nakba). It saw the first armed risings that occurred in protest against the post-War settlement imposed by the Allies on the Arab countries. In that year, serious outbreaks took place in Syria, Palestine, and Iraq.” In later years, Mr. Antonius was a fervent anti-Zionist, yet his description of the events during these times reflected the deep Arab desires to remain insulated and isolated within their own tribal lands, leaving the rest of the world, including the little strip of land now called Israel, to its own devices. Nowhere was there any mention of desires to build an Arab nation here. Quite to the contrary, the vast majority of Arabs wanted to return to Syrian lands.

The nakba (catastrophe) referred to Arabs, Syrians, and the dividing of Syrian lands, long before there was any Israeli nation. The rioting that ensued was because the Syrians who were cut off from Syria wanted desperately to be part of Syria, not independent from Syria. This was not a nationalistic call to arms; it was the intense desire to re-unite with the Syrian nation. These Arabs had no desire for their own independence, their own nation called Palestine, indeed, they wanted out of the areas now known as Israel, they wanted to return to the Syrian fold.

Palestinian nationalism didn’t exist prior to the UN vote, prior to the war of 1948, prior to the establishment of the State of Israel. There were no Arab calls for an independent Arab Palestine prior to these times, there were no Arab countries petitioning the UN to create an Arab homeland in this little strip of land. For all intents and purposes, there was no Arab Palestinian movement until Israel began to exist.

Yet, here we are, 62 years later, confronting the call for the establishment of a Palestinian nation in the very same little strip of land that, until 1948, no one in the Arab world cared anything about. Sure, Arabs left homes, villages, and cities in Palestine during the 1948 war. Sure, Arabs felt threatened if they lived in Haifa, Tel Aviv and other cities within the war zones. And sure, there were occasions where the Arab inhabitants were forced to leave by the armies or the circumstances of war.

The war of independence, the war declared on Israel by the Arab world; this was a war that was unnecessary. Had the Arab world accepted the UN Partition Plan, there would have been two nations created, one for Jews and one for Arabs. Instead, the Arab world attacked the Jewish population in Palestine. The Jews fought back and won. As with any war, once ended, the victorious army held land conquered. The ensuing political process of establishing a nation took place in those lands. Fast forward to 1967. Once again, Israel fought a war against almost the entirety of the Arab world, with little help from the rest of the world. And once again, Israel prevailed, holding lands conquered during the war. Remember also, that these were not wars of conquest, of expansion, of colonialism. These were existential wars of defense against nations that held firm to their intent of wiping Israel off the face of the earth.

We are left with questions about statehood, about ‘the right to exist’ and whether there even should be a Palestine. Palestine, after all, was the word used to describe the piece of the British mandate that wasn’t Jordan or Lebanon, or Syria, or Egypt. That ‘piece of land’ became Israel, and remains Israel. There is no longer an entity called Palestine, or not yet. Just like there is no longer a New Amsterdam, it’s now called New York. There is no more Rhodesia; it’s now called Zimbabwe. Transjordan became Jordan. Tanganyika and Zanzibar were two semi-autonomous tribal nations that became Tanzania. Most of the area that was once called Palestine is now called Israel.

Should the world acknowledge the need to establish an entity called Palestine? Should the Arab world, specifically Jordan, Egypt, Syria, and Lebanon, embrace the creation of a land mass called Palestine somewhere other than where Israel now exists?

The borders of Israel are or will be what Israel, through the peace process, determines them to be. They could have been all of the areas called Judea and Samaria and the Gaza strip at the conclusion of the 1967 war. All of the Golan Heights, won in a defensive war from Syria, is part of Israel. Countries wage war; countries lose and countries win. Israel won. Get over it. Gaza should go back to the Egyptians (indeed, many believe it should have been returned in 1967). Parts of the areas called Judea and Samaria could become a nation for Palestine, but Jordan should be part of this calculation. After all, most of Jordan consists of people who call themselves or identify with the Palestinian nationalism currently in vogue.

Israel could, and should, reach out to Jordan to determine what a new Palestine, an Arab Palestine, will be. If the Arab world wants peace in their neighborhood, they, the Arab nations, must work to bring the Palestinians into their fold. Over 700,000 Jews were expelled forcibly from Arab nations after 1948 and 1967. They are now Israelis, or Americans, or French, or Canadian, or whatever. The Arab people who left Israel in 1948 and 1967 (and let me be clear, not all were forced to leave) were kept in squalid refugee camps to keep the hate alive. It worked; two generations later, the grandchildren and great-grandchildren of these people are filled with hate toward Israel, due in large part to the conditions of their lives. Had they been absorbed into their host nations, those descendents now would be active, productive members of their nation, instead of hateful pawns living in poverty (a poverty imposed by the Arab nations), educated to hate, and still called refugees.

Regardless of this, or maybe in spite of it, the clarity of the existence of Israel is now undisputed. It is, and will remain, a nation of this world, with the right to an existence, a right to self-defense, a right to be safe and secure and acknowledged by other nations, just like the other 193 nations of this world.


Neal Elyakin, Ann Arbor, Michigan
June 16, 2009

My response to Congirl - "Being Real About the Mid-East"

You seem to pull specific incidents and events into an argument that then indicts the nation.

I think it best now to respond specifically to your specific comments, although my view is far broader than any single incident. First, although single incidents that involve the deaths of people are terrible things, my opinions and beliefs are couched in a longer view of both history and future.

Let’s start with human shields.

Rachel Corrie (you misspelled her name) was a member of the International Solidarity Movement (ISM). The ISM is a Palestinian-run organization that lures its members into war zones to act as human shields in obstructing counter-terrorism efforts. It was started by Adam Shapiro, who was fired from his job as a counselor for Seeds of Peace because of his extremist views against the Jewish teens who participated in the program. He admits to being sympathetic to the Palestinian groups who are terrorizing Israelis through suicide bombings and indiscriminate mortar fire into Israel. He and several Palestinians started ISM to bring in outsiders to use as shields, because, as he said in an interview back in 2002, it brings more press when an American or a British citizen is involved instead of an Arab.

The ISM describes itself as a peaceful humanitarian group, but in reality it is sympathetic to terrorist tactics and lures well-intentioned, idealistic young adults to the Palestinian Territories to promote its anti-Israel views. The ISM then knowingly leads its members into war zones, placing them directly in harm's way as human shields in an attempt to obstruct Israel's counterterrorism operations.

On March 16, 2003, Rachel, acting as a human shield, attempted to deter bulldozers clearing brush and earth around homes in Rafah. According to a witness, Rachel slipped as she moved in front of the bulldozer, fell in front of the slow moving blade and was crushed by unearthed debris. An investigation, which included extensive interrogation of the driver and his commanders, using polygraphs and video evidence, revealed that the driver's view had been obstructed by the debris and by the bulldozer’s protective driver cage. An independent autopsy confirmed that the bulldozer had not touched Rachel.

You argue that the press rarely reports when bad things happen to Palestinians. This is not the case. When you use the word “International” I expect you are describing the Rachel Corries of the world. You are mistaken to believe that the international press is not present. The Gaza war was the first time that the press was held back officially by the Israeli government.

The Israeli press is constantly reporting on attacks by settlers and others in the West Bank. “Israeli settlers burn olive trees.” “Israeli settlers attack Arabs” who live in towns and villages next to the settlement. These incidents are reported on with increasing frequency in both the world press and in Israel. The government doesn’t condone this and prosecutes those found in violation of law. It happens, and it is unfortunate that it does happen, but it is not the policy of the Israeli government to terrorize other people.

You said that the Israeli army is not allowed to fire live rounds at those ‘internationals’ but “Palestinians are fair game.” Well, there are rules of engagement, but they do not separate out Palestinians from others. They set out the rules based on the behavior of people and whether the soldier perceives a threat. The IDF has concluded that some commanders in Gaza were lax in monitoring those rules. This happens in war; what is astonishing is that Israel is internally investigating this. I’d challenge you or anyone else to find one single example of an Arab nation conducting an investigation into its soldiers’ behaviors. Also understand a clear difference in the behaviors of an army and terrorists. Israeli soldiers wear uniforms. Israeli policemen and Israeli border guards wear uniforms. Arab terrorists, suicide bombers, and many militia members (Al-Aska Brigade, Hamas militia, etc.) do not. At best, they walk around wearing black head coverings so people can’t identify them. At worst, and this has been documented time after time, they hide in mosques, school buildings, private homes, hospitals. They use your precious “internationals” as shields as they fire at uniformed troops. I’ll throw the UN in here as well; there are many documented instances of Hezbollah fighters stationing a mortar firing gang next to UN facilities in southern Lebanon. How do we know they are Hezbollah? The UN had identified them as such (amazing, huh?).

Let’s see if Hamas or the Palestinian Authority will agree to investigate whether paid members of Hamas or the PA are involved in the indiscriminate mortar fire into Israel, or whether any members of their organizations are involved in the training of and sending out of suicide bombers, who indiscriminately murder innocents. Let’s see if those “internationals” you describe are willing to stand in front of a suicide bomber dispatched by the PA or Hamas and absorb the blast. Let’s see if any of your precious “internationals” are willing to stand in the streets of Sderot as the sirens go off to demonstrate against the barbarity of indiscriminate killings.

Now let’s turn to your use of nationalism turning poisonous to kill people. Here’s a few more challenges; drive into Nablus, or Jenin, or Ramallah in a car with Israeli plates. See how long it takes before you are set upon by a mob intent on your murder. Israeli troops do not enter these cities. The Palestinian Authority governs them. Indeed, these cities are surrounded by Israel, but should a self-governing entity see it as completely appropriate to condone the murder of citizens of that other entity? Where is the outrage? You certainly didn’t find it horrible enough to mention.

Now, take a trip in the same car into Gaza. I doubt you’d survive. Is this the behavior of a democracy? Jews are less than them. In the schools in the West Bank, Gaza, Syria, Iran, and other Arab nations books and lessons do not even acknowledge Israel’s existence. The schools teach that the Jews were responsible for World War Two, the World Trade Center destruction, and the economic collapse, among other things. Summer camps in Syria, the West Bank and on the beaches in Gaza put young teens through para-military training exercises that include shooting at mannequins that look like Israelis (not just soldiers, but Rabbis, students, farmers). They are taught songs that extol the actions of the martyrs and encourage them to become “shaheeds” as well.

Let me take a few moments to go over a few words and phrases used in your argument.

“Disproportionate response”
You didn’t overtly use this term, but it is intimated by your description of casualty figures, the military response, the building of a security barrier, etc.

Let me be blunt in illustrating the meaninglessness of such a debate by describing what “proportionate” might look like. Would it be best if Israel were to manufacture a thousand or so wildly inaccurate missiles and then fire them off in the general direction of Gaza City? There is a chance, though, that since Gaza is more densely packed than Israel, casualties might be much the same as they are now, so although the ordnance would be proportionate, the deaths would not. Of course, if one of Gaza's rockets did manage to hit an Israeli nursery school at the wrong time (or the right time, depending upon how you look at it), then the proportionality issue would be solved in one explosion. Would you be happy then?

Now, about the “blah blah blah rhetoric” about using force against the terror network causing discomfort about a government killing people becoming poisonous in regard to nationalism.

Is it poisonous to react to a threat to your existence?
Is it poisonous to react to constant and consistent attacks on your sovereign lands?
Would any nation use force, even deadly force, against forces that repeatedly use terror tactics in an effort to destroy your nation? Remember, it is no secret that Hamas, the Palestinian Authority, Hezbollah, Al-Aska, Iran, and others want Israel destroyed. They proudly proclaim it. It is on their flags, their maps, in their school’s books, their summer camps, their official Charters.

The poison is in the leadership of Hamas, Hezbollah, the Imams in Iran, the terrorist leaders in Syria, Lebanon; the poison is in the governmentally sanctioned educational curriculum that equates the Jewish people with pigs and dehumanizes Israelis.

Nations respond to threats to their existence, indeed, nations band together to help each other repel those threats, hence the United Nations, NATO, etc. The Allied powers during World War Two defeated Germany because they, together acting in concert, responded to threats to world peace. Do you disagree that Israel has the right to defend itself against aggressors? Do you believe that Israel should not respond to existential threats? The threats posed by Hamas, Iran, Hezbollah and the terrorist groups in the West Bank and Gaza have as their goal the destruction of Israel. They say so publicly and proudly. The Hamas Charter proclaims it as their national goal. Do you not think that is poisonous? Why do you insist on pointing out some specific incidents and events that happen in Israel as poisonous but completely ignore the larger poison?

“Palestinian Land” and your phrase “pre-67 green line”

However you may define the land mass that is occupied by Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria and Egypt, I will try here to educate you in what I believe to be a more accurate view of that little slice of the world.

The general impression given in the media is that Palestinians have lived in the land we now call Israel for hundreds, if not thousands of years. No wonder, then, that a recent poll of French citizens shows that the majority believe (falsely) that prior to the establishment of the State of Israel an independent Arab state existed in its place. Yet curiously, when it comes to giving the history of this "ancient" people most news outlets find it harder to go back more than the early nineteen hundreds. CNN, an agency which has devoted countless hours of airtime to the "plight" of the Palestinians, has a website which features a special section on the Middle East conflict called "Struggle For Peace". It includes a promising sounding section entitled "Lands Through The Ages" which assures us it will detail the history of the region using maps. Strangely, it turns out, the maps displayed start no earlier than the ancient date of 1917. The CBS News website has a background section called "A Struggle For Middle East Peace.'' Its history timeline starts no earlier than 1897. The NBC News background section called ''Searching for Peace'' has a timeline that starts in 1916. BBC's timeline starts in 1948.

Yet, the clincher must certainly be the Palestinian National Authority's own website. While it is top heavy on such phrases as "Israeli occupation" and "Israeli human rights violations" the site offers practically nothing on the history of the so-called Palestinian people. The only article on the site with any historical content is called "Palestinian History - 20th Century Milestones" which seems only to confirm that prior to 1900 there was no such concept as the Palestinian People.

While the modern media maybe short on information about the history of the "Palestinian people" the historical record is not. Books, such as Battleground by Samuel Katz and From Time Immemorial by Joan Peters long ago detailed the history of the region. Far from being settled by “Palestinians” for hundreds, if not thousands of years, the place we call Israel, according to dozens of visitors to the land, was, until the beginning of the last century, practically empty. Alphonse de Lamartine visited the land in 1835; wrote in his book, Recollections of the East, writes "Outside the gates of Jerusalem we saw no living object, heard no living sound."

American author Mark Twain, who visited the Holy Land in 1867, confirms this. In his book Innocents Abroad he writes, "A desolation is here that not even imagination can grace with the pomp of life and action. We reached Tabor safely. We never saw a human being on the whole journey." Even the British Consul in Palestine reported, in 1857, "The country is in a considerable degree empty of inhabitants and therefore its greatest need is that of a body of population."

In fact, according to official Ottoman Turk census figures of 1882, in the entire "Land of Israel" ("Palestine" on both sides of the Jordan River... including what is now Jordan), there were only 141,000 Muslims, both Arab and non-Arab. This number was to skyrocket to 650,000 Arabs by 1922, a 450% increase in only 40 years. By 1938 that number would become over 1 million or an 800% increase in only 56 years. Population growth was especially high in areas where Jews lived. Where did all these Arabs come from? According to the Arabs the huge increase in their numbers was due to natural childbirth. In 1944, for example, they alleged that the natural increase (births minus deaths) of Arabs in the Land of Israel was the astounding figure of 334 per 1000. That would make it roughly three times the corresponding rate for the same year of Lebanon and Syria and almost four times that of Egypt, considered amongst the highest in the world. Unlikely, to say the least. If the massive increase was not due to natural births, then were did all these Arabs come from?

All the evidence points to the neighboring Arab states of Egypt, Syria, Lebanon and Jordan. In 1922 the British Governor of the Sinai noted "illegal immigration was not only going on from the Sinai, but also from Transjordan and Syria." In 1930, the British Mandate sponsored Hope-Simpson Report noted that "unemployment lists are being swollen by immigrants from Trans-Jordania" and "illicit immigration through Syria and across the northern frontier of Palestine is material." The Arabs themselves bare witness to this trend. For example, the governor of the Syrian district of Hauran, Tewfik Bey el Hurani, admitted in 1934 that in a single period of only a few months over 30,000 Syrians from Hauran had moved to the Land of Israel. Even British Prime Minister Winston Churchill noted the Arab influx. Churchill, a veteran of the early years of the British mandate in the Land of Israel, noted in 1939 "far from being persecuted, the Arabs have crowded into the country and multiplied."

Far from displacing the Arabs, as they claimed, the Jews were the very reason the Arabs chose to move to the Land of Israel. Jobs provided by newly established Zionist industry and agriculture lured them there, just as Israeli construction and industry provides most Arabs in the Land of Israel with their main source of income today. Malcolm MacDonald, one of the principal authors of the British White Paper of 1939, which restricted Jewish immigration to the Land of Israel, admitted (conservatively) that were it not for a Jewish presence the Arab population would have been little more than half of what it actually was.

Not only pre-state Arabs lied about being indigenous. Even today, many prominent so-called Palestinians, it turns out, are foreign born. Edward Said, an Ivy League Professor of Literature and a major Palestinian propagandist, long claimed to have been raised in Jerusalem. However, in an article in the September 1999 issue of Commentary Magazine Justus Reid Weiner revealed that Said actually grew up in Cairo, Egypt, a fact which Said himself was later forced to admit.

But why bother with only Said? The late PLO chief Yasser Arafat, self-appointed "leader of the Palestinian people,” always claimed to have been born and raised in "Palestine." In fact, according to his official biographer Richard Hart, as well as the BBC, Arafat was born in Cairo on August 24, 1929 and that's where he grew up.

To maintain the charade of being an indigenous population, Arab propagandists have had to do more than a little rewriting of history. A major part of this rewriting involves the renaming of geography. For two thousand years the central mountainous region of Israel was known as Judea and Samaria, as any medieval map of the area testifies. However, the state of Jordan occupied the area in 1948 and renamed it the West Bank. This is a funny name for a region that actually lies in the eastern portion of the land and can only be called "West" in reference to Jordan. This does not seem to bother the majority of news outlets covering the region, which universally refer to the region by its recent Jordanian name.

The term "Palestinian" is itself a masterful twisting of history. To portray themselves as indigenous, Arab settlers adopted the name of an ancient Canaanite tribe, the Philistines, that died out almost 3000 years ago. The connection between this tribe and modern day Arabs is nil. Who is to know the difference? Given the absence of any historical record, one can understand why Yasser Arafat claims that Jesus Christ, a Jewish carpenter from the Galilee, was a Palestinian. Every year, at Christmas time, Arafat goes to Bethlehem and tells worshippers that Jesus was in fact "the first Palestinian".

If the Palestinians are indeed a myth, then the real question becomes "Why?" Why invent a fictitious people? The answer is that the myth of the Palestinian People serves as the justification for a future Arab/"Palestinian" occupation of the current Land of Israel.

On to the border issue.
First of all, the “green line” you reference is an imaginary demarcation first titled such in 1949 as the cease fire lines at the end of the war that resulted in the State of Israel and a continuing state of war between Israel and Jordan, Syria, Egypt, and Lebanon. Prior to that, the landmass that constituted all those countries was in the hands of the British and the French, having wrested it from the Ottoman Empire some 30 years earlier. As you just learned earlier (above), the population centers of this landmass in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s were a mix of European Jewish Zionists, Jews who had been living on the land for generations, Christian and Muslim Arabs, some of whom had been there for years and others who were more transient (Bedouin, Druze, etc.). The story is that the military commanders at the time, during the General Armistice Agreement talks in 1949, used a green pen on a map to describe the lines of cease-fire.

I’ll take a moment here to discuss the population shifts in these lands during the years leading up to the war in 1948 and the eventual declaration of the State of Israel. Zionist pioneers from middle of the 19th century onward began their work of rebuilding a Jewish homeland in what was then the Ottoman or Turkish Empire by their purchase of land from the Turkish Crown and from Arab landowners (Effendi). There was no invasion, no conquest, no theft of Arab land and certainly not of Palestinians who were subjects of Turkish rule (remember, ‘Palestinians’ at that time in history were Arabs and Jews). Unarmed and with no military, the Jews bought so much land that in 1892 a group of Effendi (the word used to describe the tribal leaders in the Arab nations) sent a letter to the Turkish Sultan, requesting that he make it illegal for his subjects to sell land to Jews.

No one complained of theft because there was none. No Arabs were driven from their homes. In fact, as a demographic study published by Columbia University demonstrates, the Arab population of the area grew tremendously during this period in part because of the economic development that the Jews helped to generate. Thus, between 1514 AD and c. 1850, the Arab population of this region of the Turkish Empire was more or less static at about 340,000.

The first Jewish influx into Palestine occurred between 1882 and 1903 and totaled about 25,000. The second, between 1904 and 1914, brought in around 35,000 immigrants, which resulted in a total Jewish population of 85,000. The third wave between 1919 and 1923 brought another 85,000 immigrants, mostly Polish and middle class. The December 1931 British census of the country showed that of the 1.04 million people, 84 percent were Arab and 16 percent were Jewish. While the increase in the Jewish population was due largely to in-migration, the Palestinian population increased naturally at 2.7 percent per year. Because of the rise of Nazism, 174,000 Jews migrated to Palestine between 1932 and 1936. Suddenly the Jewish population in Palestine rose to an estimated 28 percent of the total inhabitants.

As to the words “borders” and “illegal territory” and “property” you used, let’s start with the 1949 cease-fire agreement, sometimes referred to as the Armistice Agreement. In the Armistice Agreement, the cease-fire lines are defined as follows:
* 5(2). In no sense are the cease-fire lines to be interpreted as political or territorial borders and their delineation in no way affects the rights, demands or positions of any of the parties to the cease-fire agreements regarding final disposition.
* 5(3). The fundamental objective of the cease-fire lines is to serve as a line beyond which the armed forces of each of the parties will deploy.

Thus Israel has no "safe and recognized" borders under these agreements, and the cease-fire lines, as agreements signed in Rhodes in 1949 make clear, are unacceptable to the Arab countries. The November 1947 borders specified in the UN partition plan could have been the borders, but those borders were rejected by the Arab Nations at the time, and were not acceptable to Israel later since they proved indefensible against armies and porous to terrorists.

So, borders are to be determined as part of some future negotiations. Israel makes do with a cease-fire line as its temporary borders. Anything constructed on or near the cease-fire lines, such as a barrier/fence to keep terrorists away from Israeli population canters is also a temporary solution until a final status of borderlines is determined. The fence/barrier along the Gaza strip’s “border” has been successful since it went up over 30 years ago. It too is considered temporary; if such a peace exists that allows for good relations, commerce, travel, etc., between the residents of Gaza and Israel, the fence will come down. Israel and Egypt determined final border status on the Sinai property and no fence/barrier exists between the population center in Eilat and Egypt controlled Sinai.

Since I’m on the topic of lines, let me tell you a bit about this ‘green line’ you referred to. Sure, there is the historical record, the Armistice lines, etc. There’s something else too. It’s a bit less political, or maybe it is pure politics to describe this; I would suggest you take a look at satellite imagery of Israel, the West Bank lands, the Negev, the Gaza, and Sinai.

See the forests? That's Israel. See where it ends and desert begins? That's the West Bank, the Sinai, and Gaza.

Now think about the phrase "the Jews made the desert bloom.”
Not many people are aware of it, but the world's largest reforestation effort is in Israel. Israel is probably the only country in the world that entered the 21st century with a gain of trees. The Jewish National Fund (JNF) is responsible for that. It constantly plants new trees and creates new forests every year, making Israel greener and greener. Indeed, during the Lebanon war the JNF was up in the forests of the upper Galilee fighting fires, protecting trees (the firefighters were under fire while they were fighting fires). Immediately after the fighting ended, hundreds of volunteers were in the destroyed forests, planting replacement trees.

The situation on the other side is very different. The few natural reserves that the British left were left destroyed and unprotected by Jordan. Rivers are polluted. Less than 10% of the land on what has always been Jordan is used for farming. The Jordan River is left untouched, except for dumping garbage.

Speaking of garbage dumping, because the Palestinian Authority (the governing body of the Arab lands in the West Bank) is more focused on maintaining high levels of hatred of Israel, infrastructure projects are virtually non-existent in the West Bank. There is no efficient garbage handling in the Palestinian cities and villages. Their ways of getting rid of trash is taking it a mile away from their villages and burning it or dumping it in the rivers and valleys in unpopulated areas. Which not only badly pollutes the environment, but also leaves a constant stench in the outskirts of their villages. Sometimes it's so bad, that driving in a few miles radius from such a site without throwing up becomes a challenge.

Sewage in Gaza spills right into the Mediterranean Sea. Since the Israeli built treatment plant in Gaza went out of order in the 90s, they just let the sewers flow into the sea.

Clearly, the Palestinians have much bigger problems than their environment to handle. But so did young Israel in the 1950s, where every home had a JNF collection tin to plant as many trees as possible, to fund agricultural innovations in the desert, to bring necessary resources to bear to help feed the people and be a good steward of the earth. The green line is a very visible demarcation between a people and a nation interested in nation building and a variety of nations and terror-inspired people interested in maintaining hatred, poverty, and terror. A sad commentary on the aspirations of a people.

So whom should you really have a problem with?

You said in your posting that you have problems with “elements of the government of Israel” that are apparently making poor decisions. You say you have problems with media (and academic) elements in the US who are “single minded(ly)” supporting the poor decisions of the Israeli government.

Let’s look at this a moment.
First of all, as a student of political science, I’m sure you are aware that governments make poor decisions all the time; and I’m sure you are aware that one person’s poor choice is another person’s excellent decision. I will not debate your right to determine your definition of a poor decision. In fact, I will defend your right to voice it. I will however, let you know that an argument indicting a government’s decisions should not be made without understanding how it fits the puzzle of the broader geo-political spectrum. As I mentioned at the beginning of this very long piece, I am more interested in the broader macro influences than any single occurrence or incident. As much as those incidents may inform us about intentions, they do not in themselves lend to broad generalizations or indictments.

The Arab world has had numerous chances to forge a peaceful settlement to the Israeli-Arab conflict. From the beginning, as I brought up earlier, Israel has been offering her hand in peace. Israel keeps her other hand well armed in case it is needed, but the first offer is not one of aggression.

Yasser Arafat, back in 2000, rejected what is called the Clinton parameters of the Camp David offers. The Clinton parameters would have produced an independent Palestinian state with 100 percent of Gaza, a little more than 97 percent of the West Bank, and Jerusalem’s status would have been guided by the principle that what is currently Israeli will be Israeli and what is currently Arab will be part of Palestine, meaning that Jewish Jerusalem — East and West — would be united, while Arab East Jerusalem would become the capital of the Palestinian state. Israel was prepared to follow through on that offer.

Before that, there were a string of offers stretching back to Ben-Gurion in the late 40’s, to Golda Meir, Shimon Peres and Itzhak Rabin. All offers have been rebuffed by a succession of Arab leaders. Israel accepted the partition plan in 1947 and the Arab nations refused; primarily because the Arab nations and leaders at the time could not accept Jews living among them. Any deal would have legitimized a Jewish entity, and the leaders in the Arab world could not be seen to accept such a notion. Then, like now, the fundamentalists rule. Then, like now, the tribal nature of the Arab psyche dominates and overrules any movement toward accepting Israel. The Jewish leadership of Israel, on the other hand, saw it as a fresh start at nation building. The Israelis accepted a flawed plan because they desperately wanted a land of their own in the land of their forefathers.

Conflicts within the Middle East cannot be separated from its peoples' culture. Seventh-century Arab tribal culture influenced Islam and its adherents' attitudes toward non-Muslims, and it has been influencing the decisions of the Arab nations toward Israel since before 1948.

Today, the embodiment of Arab culture and tribalism within Islam impacts everything from family relations, to governance, to conflict. While many diplomats and analysts view the Arab-Israeli dispute through the prism of political grievance, the roots really lie in culture and Arab tribalism. The Arab tribal belief is unwilling to relinquish the tribal rights of retribution to a central governing body.

In tribal law, the Sheikh (the patriarch of the tribe/family) is the leader, but the tribal laws are sacrosanct and even the Sheikh cannot overrule them, let alone any central governing body.

Even today, in most Arab nations, tribal law prevails. Women are not equal to men, have little or no rights in society, and cannot argue against their husband, ever. An aggrieved party seeking justice is afforded the right to kill the one who wronged him and/or his family. This is the prevailing legal system in most of the Arab world. The central government does not impose authority that is counter to tribal law. Tribal law is, therefore, based on the absence of any central authority.

Thus, in tribal law there is no State interested in punishing offenders in order to deter others from crime. There is only the aggrieved party seeking justice.
I don’t know about you, but I have a real problem with this. Much more so than with some isolated decisions made by a democratic nation’s elected leaders.

As to your contention that the media stand behind Israel, well, some media do. Some media do not. As argued earlier, there is enough anti-Israel vitriol out there as well as the Fox network stand by your man attitude. Indeed, you can find media in Israel challenging the government’s decisions daily. Find me one Arab nation that allows that. I have problem with that.

My problem is not with Fox, everybody knows their politics. My problem is with the United Nations, which has been slowly re-writing geography, peoplehood, and history in the Middle East. My problem is with France, when it lets the France2 TV network broadcast lies and does nothing. My problem is with Britain when it allows anti-Semitic Holocaust deniers public airways. My problem is with the Vatican, which reinstated a Bishop who denies the existence of the gas chambers.

These should be your problems too. It is disturbing that none of this made its way into your argument. The destiny of the Middle East is not yet written. Unless and until the world realizes that Israel is not the problem, that the ever increasing anti-Israel belief based on the terrible truth of genocide (“throw them into the sea”) by the Arab world is the real problem, the only democracy in the middle east and a model of Democratic ideals and free society is in danger of losing a war.

Realize what this means.

Any Arab nation can wage a war against Israel, lose the war and remain viable. Israel only has to lose one war.

I hope this rather long post has had a positive effect on your beliefs. If not; well, I tried.

Neal Elyakin, Ann Arbor, MI 3-22-09

Critically thinking about those who criticize Israel

I was recently sent an article written by an obscure writer, writing in the LA Times Opinion page, arguing that Zionism is anachronistic and the two-state solution is dead because of the policies of the Israeli government. While the writer has his right to his opinion, and the LA Times certainly has the right to print this, my interest was piqued when I read the introduction to the forwarded article. It read; “A major news outlet is criticising Zionism. Maybe the cloud of poisonous sympathetic nationalism/transitive manifest destiny is beginning to lift?”

Let’s start with semantics, shall we?

‘Nationalism’ used as a derogatory description of nationalistic aspirations; there are many kinds of nationalism, some practiced by good guys and some by bad guys. Ethnic Nationalism forbids diversity and results in things like ethnic cleansing; cultural nationalism describes the nationalistic sense of community and diversity under a banner of cultural identity and pride in country; socialistic nationalism (or national socialism) is, well, we know what that results in.
Most countries engage in nationalistic activities, from flag waving, to cultural identification, to immigration absorption. Those activities are encouraged and applauded by the world of nations as positive ways to build pride in the population.

Now, let’s take the expression “poisonous sympathetic nationalism/transitive manifest destiny” as a description. There is an implication that the phrase somehow relays a sense of foreboding, of an emergence of evil. Coupling the word poisonous with manifest destiny and including the word nationalism in the expression gives the impression that this a very bad thing for people under that nation’s flag. Territorial expansion is most associated with manifest destiny. Who is really trying to expand and which country’s policies are indeed poisonous? Let’s discuss.

Israel is the only real Democracy in the Middle East. Her leaders are elected by a vote of the citizens. All Israeli citizens are eligible to vote freely, without duress. Israel is comprised of about 75% Jewish and about 23% Arab (Christian and Muslim) citizens. All of these citizens are eligible to vote. Thirteen of the 120 members of Knesset (Israeli Parliament) are Christian or Muslim Arab. There have always been (since the founding of the State) Arab Knesset members.

Women in Israel have equal rights. Those who live alternate lifestyles, have disabilities, or are different are not discriminated against. Health care is afforded to every citizen under a National Health Care system. Education is guaranteed to all, for free, regardless of race, ethnicity, religion, etc. There is a free press, freedom to gather, to demonstrate, to march, to disagree with the government. There is a rule of law, a Supreme Court (which, by the way, includes a Justice who is an Arab), where all citizens of Israel may take their grievances.

Israel’s Declaration of independence includes language that expressly reaches out to her neighbors peacefully, with the hope and expectation that those neighboring countries will choose to move forward in peace and prosperity. That declaration, written immediately after the war that created the State of Israel in 1948, could not have more clear. Let me quote the actual document; “We extend our hand to all neighbouring states and their peoples in an offer of peace and good neighbourliness, and appeal to them to establish bonds of cooperation and mutual help with the sovereign Jewish people settled in its own land. The State of Israel is prepared to do its share in a common effort for the advancement of the entire Middle East.”

As a result of that war, Israel comprised a tiny fraction, a sliver, of what used to be the British mandate in the Middle East. The rest belonged to Egypt, Jordan, Syria, and Lebanon. The Arab nations surrounding Israel comprised, and still comprise, close to 99.9% of the middle east land mass. Yet, Israel was willing to “do its share” to create a peaceful community of nations.

I challenge the writer of that statement I quoted at the outset to find one Arab nation with a living former leader (they are usually killed). I challenge that person to find one Arab nation that doesn’t’ supress the press, that doesn’t murder its own citizens who practice alternate lifestyles. I challenge my friend to locate one place in the Middle East, save Israel, where minorities have rights. Indeed, diversity is not the word of the day in the Arab world. Gaza has been made Jew-free; most of the Arab villages, towns, and cities in the West Bank are Jew-free. Jews have been expelled from pretty much the entire Arab world. Those who remain live under severe restrictions. How would one define that system of nationalism? One that expels those who are different? One that oppresses those who are different? Or a nation that expressly and under governmental sanctions allows the killing of Jews simply because they are Jewish?

My friend seemed happy that a news outlet was criticizing Zionism, Israel. My friends, the world has been condemning Israel since it was founded. The Arab world has been looking for ways to engage in genocide and exterminate the Jews and Israel since 1948. The manifest destiny quoted is more correctly aimed at the ethnically cleansing Arab world, who has, for the past 60 plus years, been systematically, strategically, and politically, been attempting to rid the world of the Jew and expand into the land that is now called Israel. Pushing the Jews to the sea will allow the Arab nations to claim land that was never theirs.

The world’s press has been complicit to a large degree in this; the United Nations has absolutely been complicit in a much more transparent way.

Now let’s talk about balance. Balanced reporting is a hallmark, or at least it is maintained by the “mainstream press” to be a hallmark of a free press. Let’s throw the United Nations in the mix as well in this discussion of balance. We’ll start with the United Nations.

During the 2006-2007 General Assembly, the UN passed 22 separate resolutions against Israel, which took considerable time and energy. During this same time, not one single utterance in the General Assembly occurred regarding the genocide in Darfur. The World Health Organization passed only one resolution over the past year as part of their UN responsibility; it was against Israel. The UN Commission on Human Rights voted on eight resolutions last year; four of which were condemnations of Israel. China, Sudan, North Korea, and others were ignored.

There are three special UN entities dedicated to the Palestinian cause. The oldest is the Special Committee to Investigate Israeli Practices Affecting the Human Rights of the Palestinian People and Other Arabs of the Occupied Territories, created in 1968. In 1975, the General Assembly added the Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People. Supporting its work is the Division for Palestinian Rights. Lodged within the UN Secretariat, the Division boasts a sixteen-member staff and a budget of millions, which it devotes to the constant promotion of anti-Israel propaganda throughout the world. This is not balanced. Afghanistan, China, Sudan, Indonesia, Kenya, Nigeria to name but a few are among the worst human rights violators on the planet and the UN has not seen fit to name any committees or divisions to investigate them (see additional information on the non-partisan highly regarded website - http://www.colorq.org/HumanRights/).

Our world is, unfortunately strife with nations and regimes engaging in horrible acts against their own people. Yet the United Nations, the world wide body charged with monitoring the world’s activities, chooses to focus enormous resources, millions of dollars and vast amounts of time and energy toward resolution after resolution, studies, and investigative bodies, not to mention those three specially designed full committees, against Israel.

Let’s go to the media now. Balanced reporting occurs when news reports highlight both sides of a conflict, bringing to bear the necessary resources to give the reader/listener/observer as much of an objective viewpoint as possible so the citizen can make educated judgments.

The BBC has a long and storied history of presenting one sided news broadcasts from Gaza, Nablus, and Ramallah. Their reporters do not even enter Israel when researching their stories. They have been called out for years on their accuracy by other mainstream media outlets as well as media watch groups. The French TV network ‘France 2” admitted it botched camera work and allowed a doctored film clip to be aired. The admission was buried so not highly visible. The Guardian newspaper in England printed opinions written by Holocaust deniers. The LA Times has printed opinion pieces from people who have a history of inaccuracies in other postings; the newspaper prints their opinions anyway. This is just a few samplings of the ‘balanced’ reporting that goes on when it comes to Israel. The mainstream media, such as it is, has been quoting from biased sources, using doctored materials, and allowing unsubstantiated reports to find their way onto the airways for years. My friend is naïve to think that this one poorly written article is an example of some insightful new beginning. More examples of clear bias can be found at http://www.camera.org/.

I have attempted to respond, briefly, not to the article written by an uneducated author, but to my friend who yearns for a freer world, a safer more ethical world, a world that does not include oppression and violence.

Israel is not a perfect place; neither is anywhere else on earth. Israel is an imperfect nation, struggling to improve and unfortunately, being put in the position of struggling to survive at the same time. So many times the Arab world could have had peace with Israel. So many times the Arab leaders chose instead to miss an opportunity to live in peace and prosperity with Israel. Too many times the Arab leaders listened to their fundamental terrorist advisors and rejected the peaceful advances by Israel and her allies.

Until the Arab world moves away from its tribal customs it will be trapped in is own terrible cycle of rejecting even the concept of an Israeli nation. I am not confident that the Arab nations have the ability, never mind the will, to accomplish this.

Neal Elyakin, Ann Arbor, MI; 3.20.09

One State, Two States, Three States, or …

The two state solution was dealt a mortal blow the day Hamas starting throwing Fatah representatives off the roofs of buildings in Gaza in 2007. Up to that point, Israel’s leadership had been dancing with Mahmoud Abbas the strange dance of diplomacy, twirling around a Palestinian state that would have two pieces, separated by a single, secure Israel.

The Middle East has been carved up, separated, created and re-created dozens of times over the years, and the pie cutting continues to this day.

From the disputed areas of Yemen, to the “wild west” areas of northern Pakistan, to Iraq, outsiders and insiders have been re-shaping that part of the world forever, it seems. Wasn’t it Vice-President Joe Biden who suggested we carve Iraq into three nation states? Iraq is nowhere near a solution to its internal divisions, and I would wager a re-emergence of that argument is destined to make its way back into the international debate over Iraq’s future.

Ever since Israel’s founding in 1948, and especially after the 1967 war when Israel conquered what is now called the West Bank and Gaza, to the aftermath of the nearly disastrous 1973 war, debates have raged about what to do with Gaza as part of a potential two state solution. How do you create a nation called Palestine in two disparate sections? Will there be a tunnel connecting the two? Do you build a “highway in the sky” perched above Israeli land that shuttles residents from one to the other without them entering Israeli property? Do you just open the borders, like other civilized nations? Well, we know what happens when you open borders; people with explosives strapped to them visit coffee shops, restaurants, and schools.

The hope was certainly there earlier in this decade when Fatah renounced the PLO Charter and began to behave like nation builders. Under the leadership of Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian Authority started a campaign of commerce, educational reform, and political repair. Elections were held and elected officials appeared to act like community leaders instead of terrorists. That is, until the elections in Gaza when Hamas gained a majority of the council seats. Hamas then felt emboldened enough to seize all power in a violent and deadly power struggle against Fatah, the recognized ruling government of the Palestinian Authority.

Of course, the “can’t we all just live together in peace” crowd continued chanting for a single entity on all the land. A single nation of Israelis and Palestinians, Muslims and Jews and Christian Arabs all living together under one government is that dream. There are so many absurdities with that notion that it is equally ridiculous to even review them.

By the summer of 2008, Gaza was clearly an Islamic entity, from its leadership to its police to the terrorists masquerading as soldiers, to the teachers and the lower level bureaucrats. The Hamas charter was quoted often in the media. Israel as an aggressor was highlighted frequently in press clippings from Gaza, even when rockets were falling indiscriminately over and into the homes of Israeli civilians throughout the southern quarter of the country, the majority of the press focused on the hungry of Gaza, the poor Gazans being oppressed by big bad Israel. Gaza also broke off communications with Fatah in the West Bank, and promised to work to take over there as well. Abbas and his Fatah loyalists, as well as many civilians in the West Bank, voiced opposition to Hamas’ reign of terror in Gaza.

Maybe, thought some, Gaza should become Hamastan. Fatah has the West Bank. Israel has, well, Israel. Can three states survive? Gaza would self destruct, or be destroyed. The new Palestine in the West Bank may become a fractured society, even with the support of moderate Arab nations. Although Abbas enjoys high levels of popularity in the West Bank, the polls also indicate that many Palestinians consider Gaza part of Palestine, and do not favor Gaza as a separate entity. Clearly, many moderate Arab nations are against another Iran dominated and sponsored nation-state next door. Egypt, Jordan, the Palestinians to name a few will work to topple any recognized Islamic entity in Gaza. Why do you think there is such a silence, in relative terms, coming from Jordan, Egypt, etc., during this recent war against Hamas in Gaza? The moderate Arab world fears Iran, Hezbollah, Hamas and the radicalized Islamists.

Israeli President Shimon Peres recently remarked that this period of time, during this current Gaza operation, is Israel’s finest hour. This comes from a man who has been a leader in Israel since before Israel existed. President Peres has witnessed it all, the miracle of 1948 and the UN vote, the victory of 1967, the horror and near defeat of 1973, the tragedy of Sabra and Shatilla, the 1982 war, the intifadas, the Lebanon fiasco, the good, the bad, and the ugly. Why does he say this? According to Daniel Gordis of the Shalem Center in Jerusalem, President Peres, former Prime Minister, Nobel Peace Prize Winner, rightly sees Israel once again taking control of her own destiny. When Israel came into being, the Jewish State told the world that no longer would someone else be in charge to tell Jews when to live and when to die. Israel now tells the world, and Hamas, that they will not dictate to Israel by rocket fire Israel’s destiny. Israel’s destiny is in her hands, through the determination of her people, her army, and her worldwide supporters.

Israel will not tolerate a terror state next door. Hamas cannot be allowed to terrorize Israel’s people. Israel is willing to make peace. Israel is ready to talk with President Abbas and others in the Arab world toward a peaceful resolution of hostilities. Having Hamas on her southern border is unacceptable to Israel.

One state won’t work, Israel would disappear and that is unacceptable. Two states could work, but not with Hamas in control. Three states; never mind – it’s not going to happen.

What if we entertain the notion that Jordan already is Palestine? And what if we also entertain the notion that Gaza, which came out of Egypt, could be returned to Egypt?

Jordan must be convinced that a secular, law abiding nation of Palestinians, many of whom are Jordanian by ancestry, join the Jordanian enterprise, with peaceful relations with Israel and open borders for trade, travel and tourism. Egypt on the other hand, will need considerable help in absorbing the hotbed of Gaza. The world, especially the Arab world, can help finance the absorption. The ideologues of Islamic fundamentalism and the Hamas terrorists, not to mention Hezbollah on the north and Iran further afield, will need some nudging from true Islam to fade into obscurity. It seems impossible, doesn’t it? So did Israel in 1945.

“Start by doing what's necessary; then do what's possible; and suddenly you are doing the impossible.” St. Francis of Assisi is credited with this quote.

We’ve tried what we think is possible and we’ve tried everything else. Now is the time to move on to the impossible. We owe it to our children and the next generation to try.

Neal Elyakin, Ann Arbor, January 16, 2009

Why this war?


The first rocket was fired from Gaza in October, 2001. It was crude thing, landing outside a community over the border from Gaza, hitting no one. In Gaza, the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) was busy protecting a small number of Israeli settlements in the midst of over a million Palestinians. During the next four years, the Israeli Government moved toward the recognition that withdrawal from Gaza was the only option. Give Gaza to the Palestinians; allow them to govern themselves, begin to build the Palestinian society as a first step toward statehood. The border would remain secure and, hopefully, the Palestinian Authority would focus on building a nation.

More rockets followed. Israel continued to prepare to leave. Many counseled not to. A bold statement was made in the summer of 2005 by the Prime Minister; Israel would unilaterally leave Gaza to the Palestinians. Hamas and other terror groups called it a victory against Israel. Many Israelis hoped against hope that the Palestinian leadership would, for once, use this opportunity to begin the long road toward independence.

On September 12, 2005, the last Jew left Gaza.
They left homes, villages, communities, infrastructure, buildings, roads; ready made for nation building.

The greenhouses were also left intact for the Palestinians; greenhouses worth tens of millions of dollars, producing exportable flowers and produce using the most modern technology in the world.

The Palestinians inherited these greenhouses intact because a group led by a Jewish philanthropist raised, almost overnight, over 14 million dollars to buy the greenhouses so that the current owners wouldn’t dismantle them as they left. The philanthropists turned the greenhouses over to the Palestinians as a gift. The hope was that Gaza would use this to help develop itself into a thriving community, and with a future West Bank, become the Palestine that the world, and Israel, was hopeful would emerge.

By October, 2005, the greenhouses were in ruins. Looters took the pipes, roof tiles, glass, floors, brass fittings, rubber hoses, trays, furniture, equipment, anything and everything. Photos from late 2005 showed utter destruction. By the end of the year, new photos emerged showing tunnels being dug from inside the greenhouses, linking Gaza to Egypt to move weapons and terrorists between Gaza and the untended Egyptian side of the border. The rockets continued.

During the next three years, thousands of tunnels have been dug between Gaza and Egypt. Some are used exclusively for terror operations, and all are under the direct supervision of the leadership in Gaza. There are tunnels under homes, linking together to form a network underground. Tunnels emerge in schools, mosques, government buildings, homes and hospitals. Terrorists set traps for any Israeli soldiers who might fall into the tunnels. Explosives were stored in the tunnels, in the mosques, schools and hospitals. The rockets continued.

In January, 2006 Hamas won a majority of elected seats in the Palestinian Authority’s ruling council. Hamas promptly took control, evicting the Palestinian Authority from Gaza and installing its own gang of leaders, transforming all of Gaza into a religious armed camp. Hamas and its sponsors in Hezbollah and Iran intensified its rocket fire into Israel. By some estimates, over 8,000 rockets have rained down on southern Israel, terrorizing a million civilians in dozens of cities and villages.

By the summer of 2008, Hamas, now firmly in control of all of Gaza, continued to support the firing of rockets into Israel. Israel held back major responses. Israel continued to use diplomacy, along with moderate Arab states and the Palestinian leadership in the West Bank, to alleviate the situation in Gaza for the people without direct contact with the Hamas terrorist group. A lull in fighting was agreed to in June, 2008 for six months. Many said that this was a mistake, it would give Hamas time to re-arm, to fortify the tunnels, the weapons, the rockets, with the help of their sponsors in Iran. Israel accepted the lull, and for several months a reasonable quiet settled on the south of Israel, interrupted from time to time by a rocket.

Humanitarian aid to Gaza, in the form of food, medical supplies, etc., has been an ongoing exercise in futility. A Jordanian convoy of aid trucks entered Gaza, unencumbered by the Israelis, in July of 2008. After passing the border, the Jordanian drivers were removed from the ten trucks, laden with food and medical supplies and the trucks were taken to separate warehouses controlled by Hamas police and military. The contents of the trucks never made it to the hospitals or aid stations.

Earlier in the year, in January, a shipment from Turkey destined for Gaza, was stopped at the Kerem Shalom border crossing. Over 2 tons of explosives were found to have been added after the shipment left Turkey and hidden in the trucks.

On December 27, 2008, after almost eight years of rocket attacks, after incursions from Gaza into Israel resulted in the kidnapping of Gilad Shalit, after Hamas made it clear that their goal remains, as it is written in their Charter, the complete destruction of Israel, and after seeing an escalation of the rocket technology such that 1/6 of the whole of Israel is potentially under threat of rocket attack, Israel said enough is enough.

I have no illusions. Israel will not destroy Hamas. You cannot kill an ideology.
I have no illusions. Gaza will still be there, the Palestinians will still live there, and Israel will still have cities and villages just over the border.
I know that hundreds of Gaza residents have died. I know that many non-combatants have died. I know that schools and mosques have been destroyed.

I blame Hamas. Hamas cynically uses children and civilians as shields. Hamas stores rockets in schools and mosques. Hamas hides in tunnels, popping out in the midst of civilians, dressed as civilians, to shoot at uniformed soldiers of the IDF. (It has been discovered recently that Hamas ordered all fighters and even the police not to wear uniforms). Hamas has spent millions of dollars, some donated by generous countries, to fortify tunnels with concrete meant to build roads and hospitals. Hamas has kept their own loyal terrorist fighters well fed and cared for while civilians go without and then Hams cries out that the people have nothing. Instead of focusing on building a nation, Hamas has steadfastly kept to the ideology that all efforts must be made to destroy Israel and kill Jews.

I mourn the loss of life during this terrible war.
I am distressed that so many parents are mourning the death of a child.
I want this war to end.

I also want Israel to be safe. Until the rockets stop, I will continue to mourn the loss of life. Until Hamas ends its campaign of annihilation against the Jewish people, I will continue to be distressed by every death and every grieving parent. As much as I want this war to end, I will support Israel in her campaign to keep her children free of terror, away from the bomb shelters, and secure in their own recognized country.

Neal Elyakin, Ann Arbor 1-11-09