Netanyahu Is Israel’s Ted Cruz
MJ Rosenberg
Last Saturday marked the 18th anniversary of the assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin. On November 22, we commemorate the 50th anniversary of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.
Both assassinations were tragedies that altered their respective countries in profound ways.
But there is one giant difference.
Kennedy was not succeeded as prime minister by someone who had, in the months leading up to the killing, openly reviled Kennedy and encouraged his most extreme enemies. Nor did he promise that, if he came to office, he would reverse Kennedy’s goals of achieving equality for African Americans. On the contrary, President Lyndon Johnson took Kennedy’s plans and, citing Kennedy’s memory, made them law.
Netanyahu’s succession of Rabin would have been like having Governor George Wallace succeed Kennedy or, in the current context, be like having Ted Cruz win the 2016 election. God forbid. Netanyahu’s goal was, and is, destroying everything Rabin accomplished. And he’s done a fine job at it.
The other day Netanyahu gave a major speech at Bar Ilan University. Most of it was saber rattling at Iran, but enough of it was about the Palestinians to steel my belief that negotiating with Netanyahu is a waste of time and that U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry’s initiative is a charade.
The centerpiece of his discussion of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was this: his demand that Palestinians recognize Israel “as a Jewish state.” He said:
This is the nation state of the Jewish people … Recognize the Jewish state. As long as you refuse to do so, there will never be peace. Recognize our right to live here in our own sovereign state, our nation-state—only then will peace be possible. I emphasize this here—this is an essential condition.
It’s a new demand, one that only became Israeli policy when Netanyahu came to office. Every prime minister prior to Netanyahu only demanded that the Palestinians recognize Israel. But then, on September 9, 1993, PLO Chairman Yasir Arafat sent this statement to Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin (in exchange for Rabin’s recognition of the PLO as the legitimate representative of the Palestinian people). This agreement stands to this day:
The PLO recognizes the right of the State of Israel to exist in peace and security. The PLO accepts United Nations Security Council Resolutions 242 and 338.The PLO commits itself to the Middle East peace process, and to a peaceful resolution of the conflict between the two sides and declares that all outstanding issues relating to permanent status will be resolved through negotiations.
This commitment—encompassing Palestinian acceptance of Israel’s three long-standing conditions—led to Rabin’s agreement to begin negotiations with the Palestinians.
Netanyahu, then leader of the Likud opposition, vehemently opposed Rabin’s acceptance of Arafat’s concessions and began a campaign of incitement against him that ended with Rabin’s murder by a rightist assassin (assisted by a cell of ultra-Orthodox confederates). Netanyahu understood then, as he does now, that Palestinian recognition of Israel meant the largest obstacle to yielding the occupied territories in exchange for peace was gone.
After becoming prime minister, he came up with a formula to get around Palestinian acceptance of Israel’s demand for recognition. The Palestinians must recognize Israel “as a Jewish state” too.
This is something entirely different. Neither Egypt nor Jordan had to recognize Israel as anything but Israel when they signed peace treaties with it. No country in the world recognizes Israel as anything but “Israel,” just like no country recognizes any other country “as anything” other than its name.
In fact, the phrase “Jewish state” first came into modern prominence because of a mistranslation. Theodor Herzl, who invented political Zionism, titled his 1895 manifesto calling for a Jewish homeland Der Judenstaat which was mistranslated in English as The Jewish State. Actually, the very secular and assimilated Herzl called his book The Jews’ State, meaning a homeland or state for Jews, not some kind of theocracy for the faithful.
And Israeli governments were more than content with simple recognition of Israel as Israel until Netanyahu decided to demand that Israel must be recognized as Jewish by religion.
Secular Israelis don’t like that. Orthodox rabbis already interfere in public and private life in a way that is utterly unique in the western world where church/state separation has become the norm. Theocratic influence in Israel is already so onerous that most Jews in Jerusalem are Orthodox or ultra-Orthodox. The rest choose Tel Aviv and other areas to escape the rabbis and their rulings. In fact, thousands have left the capital for Tel Aviv for precisely this reason.
Additionally, the religious formulation excludes foreign Jews, including American Jews, whose Judaism often derives from their fathers and not mothers. They are ineligible to become instant citizens under the Law of Return. Only Jewish orthodoxy is recognized in Israel.
In other words, the status quo is bad enough, even without the insistence that Israel be recognized “as a Jewish state.”
Palestinians feel this even more strongly than non-Orthodox Jews, of course. After all, there are a million Palestinians with Israeli citizenship who would be relegated to permanent second-class citizenship under Netanyahu’s formulation. Additionally, that formulation precludes any—even a token—return to Israel by any Palestinian refugees or their progeny. The “Jewish state” formulation declares all Palestinians to be foreigners in their ancestral homeland, even those who live there now and whose ancestors never left the land. Given that there will be no resolution of the conflict without addressing the issue of Palestinian return to the satisfaction of both parties, Netanyahu’s formulation destroys any chance for peace.
And that is why the “as a Jewish state” mantra was invented: to preclude an agreement with the Palestinians.
Palestinians have recognized Israel’s right to exist in security. It is Israel that, in occupying the ’67 lands, is denying Palestinians that same right. Adding the phony “as a Jewish state” demand to the mix is just one way to ensure that the occupation continues.
Two assassinations. Two horrific tragedies. But in only one case did the fallen leaders’ worst enemies succeed him and destroy his legacy.
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About the Author
M.J. Rosenberg is Special Correspondent for The Washington Spectator. Previously he served as a Senior Foreign Policy Fellow with Media Matters Action Network, and prior to that worked on Capitol Hill for various Democratic members of the House and Senate for 15 years.
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