The article argues how Israel has normalised its disoriented concept of the “imagined enemy” to justify its apartheid regime and the on going oppression of the Palestinians.
by Parul VERMA 2016-01-30
I have always stressed on the basic right of each nation to protect its territories against the threats of the factually known aggressors. The extreme militarization of any nation requires an enemy, or at least the concept of an enemy and in the presence of the ‘imaginary’ enemy, the healthy suspicious and cautious tendency develops into a full fledged delusion of national persecution, that tends to use tools that are beneath a democracy, the tools of a dictatorship and implemented apartheid . The article argues how Israel has normalised its disoriented concept of the “imagined enemy” to justify its apartheid regime and the on going oppression of the Palestinians.
Joyce Starr notes: Among Americans who have had extensive dealings with Israelis, whether in government, business or the Jewish circles, the first adjectives that hits their thoughts are arrogant, willful, and sometimes infuriating. Ms. Starr, who is also a Jew, recalls the interchange she had with a man called J.R. , high-ranking Israeli intelligence officer.
“Most Americans I interviewed in the government sphere — the State Department, Defence Department — use certain words when they describe Israelis.”
“Arrogant,” J. R. replied.
“Yes, arrogant is a word that comes up frequently.”
“By the way, I think it’s true. It applies to most Israelis. American fairness and Israeli fairness are different.”
“What is Israeli fairness?”
“Israeli fairness is ‘You give me 75 percent and leave 25 percent.’
“Do they know they do it?”
“Most of them do not. I think most of them believe that by some divine decree, they deserve to get everything.”
“What is divine decree?”
“It comes from God.” He saw me laughing.
“It’s not funny. It is indeed not funny , Joyce.”
The conversation above cannot be interpreted in the presence of the political correctness that your consciousness demands, in the mere fear of being labelled as anti-Semitic. That would be a form of linguistic fascism. So, without being apologetic I move forth. One needs to understand the psyche of the once Victim, now turned into a Victimiser, through the prism of critical analysis. Who is the imagined “divine” decree that the Israel is possessed with? What are the commandments of this ‘divine ‘ decree? Is this ‘divine’ decree a collective unconscious defence mechanism, passed on to the generation by the holocaust survivors ? Is this ‘divine’ decree, divine to begin with?
DELUSION OF PERSECUTION (POLITICAL DELUSIONS).
One of the most dangerous and disturbing aspects of the Israeli mind is its proclivity for paranoid delusions stemming from the persecution complex. This is a direct consequence of their imagined enemy trying to exterminate them (Delusions of Persecution). In the past years, Israel has made claims of high probability of being attacked by the enemies, whose sole aim is to annihilate it’s existence. One would take these claims seriously if indeed anyone of these claims occurred, but the mere thoughts of persecution in the absence of any real threat has delusioned the psyche of Israel. Currently the psyche of Israel is transformed by two major proponents. Netanyahu’s core belief that Israel is being delegitimized and that its very existence is in an existential threat, he keeps repeating about the global criticism of Israel by the world. The endorsements of the false assertion that this critique has nothing to do with the settlements, nor with the stalled peace process, is in fact a clear attempt to normalise and communitise the delusional thoughts to be shared by each. He has been vocal in his linguistics to assert that the world doesn’t accept Israel’s existence, hence to survive against the enemy is the only priority.
“ Iran has boosted its supply of devastating weapons and soldiers to war-torn Syria, shipped tons of arms to Houthi rebels in Yemen, and supplied the Hezbollah group in Lebanon with advanced missiles capable of shooting down Israeli planes, sinking its ships and hit any target in the country.” – Netanyahu 2015.
“One in every 10 houses in south Lebanon is a storage facility for missiles or rockets or a launch pad for devices that are increasingly accurate and destructive. From Lebanon, Syria and of course from Iran, they can hit the heart of our cities, and the whole region of Tel Aviv is within their reach,” Gen Aviv Kochavi (2012)
“Al-Qaeda’s leader instructs his followers to move from the global to the local jihad and try to stick as much as possible to Israel’s borders.” Aviv Kochavi (2013)
“170,000 rockets and missiles are pointed at Israeli cities by the enemy states – a danger greater than any, posed by Iran’s nuclear programme.” Israeli Defence Force (Head of Intelligence)
While Netanyahu and Israel Defence Force screams of the threat from the international imagined enemies, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman and Interior Minister Eli Yishai are focusing on Palestinians as a internal column. Each in his own way keeps arguing that Israel is under threat from the inside and from the outside. Since the outside threat cannot be addressed directly, they focus on Israel’s Palestinians, arguing that they are threatening Israel’s existence.
Palestine has no military.
Palestine has no air force.
Palestine has no navy.
In the absence of any nuclear/army/sophisticated ammunitions, how can Israel conclude that Palestinians are threat to their existence? The world is puzzled by the incoherence in the conclusion Israel has reached. Israel as a society has been fragmented. With the lack of a common culture and ethos and the increased isolation from the international communities through the BDS campaign, all has led to the flourishing of the right wing Zionist delusional state of mind. The very lack of the understanding of the core problem leading to such fragmentation, the political induced pathological explanation is introduced to comfort the confused minds of Israelis. When faced with an intractable problem, right-wing politicians single out an easily identifiable group to be the scapegoat. This is the essence of what psychoanalyst Wilfred Bion called paranoid leadership.
DELUSION OF GRANDEUR (RELIGIOUS DELUSION)
“Our race is the Master Race. We are divine gods on this planet. We are as different from the inferior races as they are from insects. In fact, compared to our race, other races are beasts and animals, cattle at best. Other races are considered as human excrement. Our destiny is to rule over the inferior races. Our earthly kingdom will be ruled by our leaders with a rod of iron. The masses will lick our feet and serve us as our slaves.” Menachem Begin (Israeli Prime Minister, 1977-1983)
The crass degradation of anything that is not Jewish has had a deep psychological effect not only on the non- Jewish population in Israel but has deeply pathologised the formation of self-identity among the population. The idea of “God’s chosen people “ is an unconscious attempt to fill in the ruptures of the loss of self-worth the Jewish population suffered through the Holocaust period. This unconscious attempt has led to the formation of a apartheid, racist, paranoid, brutal thought process that needs a clinical psychological intervention at a national level.
Israeli Rabbi Dov Lior
Dov Lior,a Israeli Rabbi from the West Bank settlement, endorsed of killing innocent civilians, after being asked about the “war” (it’s a massacre) in Gaza. “The Torah of Israel guides us in all walks of life, private and public, on how to behave during war and also how to keep moral standards. During the war the attacked people (Israel) are allowed to punish the enemy population (Palestinians) in any punishment it finds worthy, such as denying supplies or electricity and also to bomb the whole area according to the discretion of the army minister and not to just simply endanger soldier’s lives but to take crushing deterrence steps to exterminate the enemy.”
OUTPUT OF THE DELUSIONS
The mechanism of explaining the events via the persecutory delusions has one immediate psychological effect: It develops a deep-rooted anxiety around the threat to the existence of Israel. It becomes crucial to observe that the psychological warfare being played is against an imagined enemy, a classic clinical trait of Mental Disorder.
As I have mentioned above, the fragmented soma of the Israel, tries to unify its dendrites through its delusional mythology: “Our society is in danger, there is an external enemy, and we now need to stick together and fight that enemy.” Now, this delusion is collectively shared by the Israelis , which also profits the right wing Zionist political party in gathering vote by inculcating fear and furthermore, providing solutions to the fear. The cycle of Thesis – Synthesis – Antithesis has been indeed working well for the political grounds in Israel.
But in the long run, this type of myth/ deliberate political indoctrination exacerbates the real problems. The result is that the international community no longer sees Israel as a partner for peace talks, whereas it does see the Palestinians as constructive; hence the notion that Israel needs to be pressured into a peace agreement is gathering momentum. This, in turn, is used in Netanyahu’s linguistics that the world is delegitimizing Israel’s existence. Internally the situation is getting worse. With constant torture/ shooting /demolition of houses/confinement of Palestinian children is escalating. This facilitates the never ending delusional state of the Israelis. Existential anxiety is translated into hatred and suspicion, which disrupts peaceful and constructive communication with the outside world and internal groups (Palestinian Muslim and Christians) are designated as enemies. This leads to further isolation, which escalates the existential anxiety among the Israel. As I mentioned in the beginning, the extreme militarization of any nation requires an enemy, or at least the concept of the enemy and in the presence of ‘imaginary’ enemy, the healthy suspicious and cautious tendency develops into a full-fledged delusions of persecution, that tends to use the tools that are beneath a democracy, the tools of a dictatorship and implemented apartheid.