vimothy
yurp
Why Israel
Since I am ruining HundredMillionLifeTimes’ cosy fun in the “Boycott Israeli Universities” thread, by asking why he focuses so heavily on Israel to the exclusion of all else (or so it seems), I thought I would take this question to a new thread to try to explore it in greater depth. It is important to recognise why, even if we think it deserved, Israel receives more criticism than any other state.
Wheninrome identifies three reasons explaining why the Israeli-Arab conflict seems to dominate policy, the news and people’s attention:
1. There isn’t a conflict on earth that has caused as much destabilisation or has been raging as long as the Israeli occupation.
2. With the possible exception of India/Pakistan, there isn’t a conflict on Earth with more potential for apocalyptic consequences than the Israeli occupation.
3. A basic principle of political activism is to focus on areas where you have the best opportunities to bring about change, and where your actions will have the most impact.
2. With the possible exception of India/Pakistan, there isn’t a conflict on Earth with more potential for apocalyptic consequences than the Israeli occupation.
3. A basic principle of political activism is to focus on areas where you have the best opportunities to bring about change, and where your actions will have the most impact.
So, we have three statements that take note of the conflict’s history, possible future and consider avenues for change or influence. I think, though, that there is a general lack of positive suggestions, a tendency to focus on what is at fault rather than what can be put right, something perhaps typical of the left’s more nihilistic, pessimistic tendencies (see various other threads, such as “If not Capitalism…”), but certainly less than helpful for policy makers and those working to bring conflict resolution. We know that the wall is unpopular, but not what a credible alternative that ensures Israeli security would be.
The first point doesn’t seem to justify or explain the phenomenon. All conflicts have roots in the past, and given that the Arab states have basically been opposed to the existence of Israel since its origin (based not on their regard for the Palestinians’ human rights – Arab dictators do not respect the human rights of their own subjects – but on their intolerance of a Jewish state), it is unfair to criticise the Israelis for something over which they have no control: the amount of hatred their enemies feel for them. The only salve for this historically would have been exactly what the Arab states were fighting for, the liquidation of Israel as a sovereign nation and its destruction as a physical entity. Negotiating itself out of existence is of course unthinkable to Israel, and so the alternative is to wait patiently for the Arab world to change and to no longer seek Israel’s demise. Of course, this is already happening, gradually, but it means that Israel has no real option other than waiting, allowing more time to pass until the rest of the Middle East comes to accept their presence.
The second point is interesting, as it is inextricably linked to the fact it seeks to justify. Part of the reason that the conflict offers such potential for escalation is the intense interest with which it is regarded and the intense interests at work. Obviously, if no one in the USA or Middle East cared about Israel’s fate, the possibility of escalation would be that much smaller, and, equally obviously, this is in turn affected heavily by the media and by the general opinion of people all around the world. In any case, even if we allow that Israeli-Arab conflict offers humanity’s greatest possibility of apocalypse, it does not follow that disproportionate criticism of Israel will make the conflict less, rather than more, volatile.
The third point is the real argument, and one that others have advanced on this board before. I think that it is quite a common view: there is little point criticising certain regimes, and so we should focus on those with whom we have the strongest connections. The reasons given for this are often similar to those given by Wheninrome, but I suspect that there is also a dislike for boorish pronouncements about the inferiority of third world regimes – people suspect a degree of jingoism to be behind condemnations of this nature. However, such speculation is of no great interest to me. I want to focus instead on some of the implications of this as a method of change and as moral judgement.
* * * * * * *
We let dictatorships off, because they are dictatorships (and so do not give a fig for our opinions), but, of course, the “citizens” of those states let them off as well, for the very same reason – they are dictatorships and so do not give a fig for anyone’s opinions. So there is no criticism of dictatorships simply by virtue of the fact that their leaders are unelected. This is perfectly consistent with Moynihan’s Law, that the amount of criticism a state receives is inversely proportional to the amount it deserves. Truly atrocious states just do not allow it, and the liberal West doesn’t think there’s any point in making it. (Ok, so there is some criticism here and there – an occasional bit of hand wringing – but very little compared to criticism of western states). That is why, in Israel, there are more foreign correspondents than in the rest of the entire Middle East combined.
That being the case, I don’t see that there is any pressure on Middle Eastern states to reform. For instance, if you look at the Arab-Israeli conflict, in popular discourse the role of other Arab governments is ignored, as is the role of the USSR. We talk about America and Israel plenty, but we don’t talk much about any other states. The Palestinians are there, of course, as victims, of course, and so to be bankrolled and appeased at every turn (even as they cheered the planes on September 11th). But Middle Eastern states are strangely invisible. We know that the Israelis are at fault for much of the conflict (and if you believe that this conflict is the cause of wider unrest in the region, for many other conflicts as well). Arab states are not called into account. We talk about the right of return for Palestinians, but never for Middle Eastern Jews who were forced to flee their homes.
What I am driving at here is that part of the reason, it seems to me, that people have a disproportionate view of Israel is that they hear about its faults a lot. “Yeah,” you might say (have said, in fact), “but that’s because no one on the other side will listen”. Fair enough, but the circularity is obvious. In a survey Pipes linked to, more responders thought that Israel was a threat to world peace than any other country on earth today. I suspect that Wheninrome feels the same way. One explanation for that high number is that we only hear criticism of one side of the conflict, so only one side seems important, so we only criticise them, and in any case we’re only interested in criticising democratic states who might listen, so we won’t have heard about anything worth criticising anywhere else (draws breath). At every stage, the logic is self-reinforcing.
If Israel were an illiberal dictatorship like Syria, faced with the same problem, they would have done exactly what Syria did do, and massacred the whole population, Islamists and all. If Israel were an illiberal dictatorship like Jordan, they would have done exactly what Jordan did: massacred Palestinians and displaced the survivors. And if they were an illiberal dictatorship like Kuwait, they would have done exactly what Kuwait did: ethnically cleansed the Palestinians. That’s how other countries in the region solve their problems. They kill everybody and just do laps. Egypt will not be as kind to the Gaza Strip as Israel has been. We know how it treated its own Islamists. Hamas will not be as kind to the Gaza Strip as Israel has been. We know how they treat their own people. They throw them off buildings. Israel is different. That’s why we criticise them more, because they are different. It’s only because the Israelis are essentially decent people with good governments that they are even in this situation in the first place. The proper response of a tyrant to dissent is Roman, i.e. annihilating. A truly atrocious regime would have long since murdered everyone and taken the international community’s stern words and ineffective, incoherent sanctions on the chin. And no would have said shit – because there isn’t any point!
Brilliant …
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