By Ira Sharkansky
JERUSALEM–The issue of Israel as a Jewish state is currently at the top of the blah blah agenda, with two issues adding to the noise and creating some confusion.
The other is the proposal made by the Prime Minister, and immediately rejected by Palestinians, that he would extend the freeze on settlement building in exchange for Palestinian recognition of Israel as a Jewish state.
Numerous Israelis oppose one or both items, and the issues have brought force lots of comments and some yelling by those who view the country with suspicion, worry, or outright hatred. Those who view Israel with suspicion, those who worry about it, and those who express outright hatred are three separate groups of people, although occasionally there is some overlap.
Those who criticize from the realm of the reasonable claim that both issues will bring more harm than benefits to the country. Internally they will upset and maybe inflame non-Jews, the most important of whom are the Arabs. They are 20 percent of the population and some of them are always on the edge of anger or rebellion, with aspiring leaders alert to what can inflame the community.
Overseas the good people of Western Europe and North America, wedded to ideas of multiculturalism, view an emphasis on religion as offensive as well as dangerous. Internal and external critics see both issues as likely to end the peace process with the Palestinians. The Palestinian leadership was quick to say that both items prove that the Israeli leadership has no interest in peace.
As I wrote in an earlier note, the item about a citizenship oath is largely symbolic, and not likely to survive the parliamentary process at all, or in its present form.
More interesting is the Prime Minister’s proposal to trade a settlement freeze for the Palestinians’ recognition of Israel as a Jewish state.
Critics say it was meant as a deal breaker, and they may be right.
It has long been apparent that neither Israelis nor Palestinians really wanted a peace process at this time. It was a fantasy of a naive President Obama and those who cheered him on. It seemed destined to fail on issues of Gaza and Israeli suspicions of Palestinians, and to interrupt the good signs of economic development and increased security in the West Bank.
Already the tensions about a failed peace process have made life a bit dicier in Jerusalem and other places between Jewish and Palestinian populations. We feel it alongside Isaweea, and there are daily reports about incidents that may escalate to something much uglier.
Israeli critics to the left of the Prime Minister and others are jumping on Netanyahu for demanding of his negotiating partners what they cannot accept. His critics to the right are jumping on him for offering to freeze settlement construction.
In the midst of the noise from the right and the left and increasing problems on the borders, it appears to me that the Prime Minister’s idea isn’t all that bad.
To be sure, it offends Palestinians and Israeli Arabs (or Palestinians with Israeli citizenship including those who are Members of the Knesset). It emphasizes the Jewish nature of the state, threatens the feelings of Arabs, and provides a foundation for Israel’s refusing Palestinian demands that refugees from 1948 (and their descendants) have a right to return.
However, it positions Israeli negotiators in a place where they are demanding an initial concession from Palestinians to match the concessions that the Palestinians demand for continuing negotiations. Tit for tat is standard operating procedure.
The package offered also accommodates the American administration. Barack Obama has said time and again that Israel is a Jewish state, and ranking officials of the Egyptian government have said that Israel should be able to call itself what it wants.
Skeptics about Palestinian intentions are right to ask, If the Palestinians are not willing to concede Israel’s status as a Jewish state (while they insist that Palestine will be the state of the Palestinian people without Jews), maybe the time is not appropriate for further negotiations.
Israeli Jews of virtually all stripes have long said that they recognize the civil rights of non-Jewish citizens. The issue is apparent in the Declaration of Independence and has been reinforced by numerous decisions of the Supreme Court. One can argue if the opportunities available to Israel’s minorities are greater or lesser than those available to minorities elsewhere, including the bastions of civil rights in North America and Western Europe. However, it is equally a matter of wide acceptance that Israel cannot accept the right of return for Palestinian refugees. Perhaps a symbolic but small number will be allowed to come back if all else is agreed, but not the millions demanded by Palestinian activists.
We should not expect quiet. Often it is not part of the Jewish condition, and this is again one of those times. Let’s hope that the crisis created by the Obama administration will pass without too much bloodshed, or too much damage to what had been the positive signs of development and security in Palestinian communities of the West Bank. If there have been signs of hope for both Palestinians and Israelis, it is those steps, and not the bombast coming out of the White House.
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Sharkansky is professor emeritus of political science at Hebrew University