Why Israel's left has disappeared

[Behind the Aegis]

Israel's left has disappeared; it has nearly no parliamentary representation and remarkably little public presence. At first glance, this is a paradox, because the left's program has, in many ways, won, as Yossi Sarid said when he left the Knesset for good. The idea of a Palestinian state, anathema in Israeli society a few decades ago, is now accepted by the mainstream.

The left has dissipated because it has failed to provide a realistic picture of the conflict with the Palestinians. Its ideological foundation was based on a simple prediction: If we offer the Palestinians a state in the territories occupied in 1967, there will be "peace now."

Then things started to go wrong. After the Oslo process began, the newly formed Palestinian Authority educated its children with violently anti-Israeli and often straightforwardly anti-Semitic textbooks. The suicide bombings of 1996 were not prevented by Arafat (some say they were supported). What brought the left down completely were the failures of Camp David in 2000 and Taba in 2001, as well as the onset of the second intifada.

On the face of it, Israel's left should have said "we were wrong in our predictions. We underestimated the complexity of the situation. We didn't see that the Palestinians were not ready to renounce the right of return and we underestimated how much murderous rage there was against Israel. We still believe that we need to end the occupation as quickly as possible, but we need to face reality."

Instead of admitting that it had been partially wrong, the left tried to explain away all the facts that didn't square with its theory by putting the onus of responsibility for Palestinian actions exclusively on Israel's policies. The left argued that the bombings in 1996 happened because the Oslo process was too slow and the Palestinians wanted to avenge the targeted killing of Yihye Ayash; Camp David failed because prime minister Ehud Barak's offers were insufficient. The second intifada started because of Ariel Sharon's visit to the Temple Mount in September 2000. Hamas came to power because we turned Fatah into collaborators with the Zionists, and so on.

more...

[Jim Sagle]

1. Sounds a lot like much (not all) of OUR left.

;(

[Ken Burch]

7. If the left did what YOU want it to do and supported the Occupation, it would then be the right

And it would forfeit its humanity.

[LeftishBrit]

2. I hope that this is a premature obituary

After all some thought a few years ago that there was a Permanent Republican Majority in America; and on the other side, the Canadian Conservatives seemed to have been wiped out in 1993. It seemed as though Thatcher would never leave office in Britain until just before she did.

I think there's hope for the Israeli Left yet.

(The left think that) 'non-Western groups don't have a will of their own; that all they do, feel or want is purely reactive to the West.'

I think this is true of some on the left, but it's also true on the right, just in a different way. The left tend to blame the West in such a context, while the right tend to assume that the non-westerners are a threat to the West and must be crushed. Both take too little interest in non-Western groups who are not closely interacting with Westerners.

For that matter, I think it's an oversimplification to regard the I/P conflict as 'western versus nonwestern'. Israelis are of less than 50% 'Western' origin.

'I completely endorse Yeshayahu Leibowitz's famous saying that he is not sure whether Israel's policies since 1967 are evil stupidity or stupidly evil, and I continue to think that the occupation must end as quickly as possible.'

Me too.

'But I believe that Israel's stupidity is matched by the Palestinians making every conceivable mistake along the way'

Me too - though in both cases I might change that to 'Israeli and Palestinian leadership'.

[shira]

3. great article written by a true progressive

[pelsar]

4. i think hes too generalizing...

whereas the israeli left tries to emulate the left of the west...it really doesn't succeed. I think one of my favorite reports is by Betzalem on gaza....unlike HRW etc it actually writes about the decisions made in the field, of limited information, the actual munitions used and why...etc It puts a human face on the IDF soldier.....that reality is also faced by others on the left in israel.

Gaza totally wiped out the theory of "land for peace" which was the cornerstone of the left view...furthermore it also shows the problem of the theory of "democratic education after withdrawl." I doubt many believe that hamas can somehow be persuaded to teach democracy and civil rights to its citizens (that is simply against their core beliefs), which is the second cornerstone for lasting peace...and we have now seen how they treat those that threaten their govt....

the israeli left, living under kassams and mortars, watched their busses blowup prewall, etc doesn't mimic the western left...how many western lefties/progressives can also claim to have been a volunteer for the commandos and still doing active duty in the reserves and still see themselves on the left side of the line......

[shira]

5. the author is leftist - referring to the SLES (self-righteous left) like Uri Avnery, Gideon Levy..

[Ken Burch]

8. If you abandon "land for peace", peace then becomes permanently impossible

It's impossible for their to be peace through Israeli military victory over the Palestinians. At least in part because it is impossible to ever end the Palestinian resistance by crushing it militarily. History has proven that attempting "peace through victory" simply produces worse and worse Palestinian leadership groups.

[ProgressiveMuslim]

6. Or... could there be no Zionist left because it's a contradiction in terms?

Perhaps Zionism -- a political movement based upon uprooting an indigenous population from their land, and transplanting them with a single religious and national group -- is an inherently RIGHTWING political view.

[Kurska]

13. Nationalism is inherently rightwing, both the jewish and the palestinian kind. n/t

[Donald Ian Rankin]

9. I think the main problem is the myth of the "generous offer".

:- The left has been saying all along "make the Palestinians a generous, or even a less selfish offer, of a territorial settlement for a final status, and it will bring peace".

:- Over the past decade, there have been offers from Israeli prime ministers - Barak at Camp David, Sharon's withdrawal from Gaza, and more recently Olmert.

:- All of these have been both far less that the Palestinians possibly could either accept or be expected to accept, and they've come against a background of continued oppression, occupation and expansion.

:- Nevertheless, the Israeli electorate has somehow come to believe that they were "generous".

:- As such, the standard response to the solution genuine left-wingers have been backing for generations: "make a generous offer, and it will bring peace" is "we tried that, and it didn't work", despite the fact that actually it has never been tried.

:- This places genuine left-wingers in a very difficult political position, and makes it easier for self-identified "left-wingers" like the one in the OP to support the right.

:- Unless and until the Israeli electorate realises just how grossly inadequate its moves in the past decade have been, there is no real chance for a consensual peace, and I can't see that happening any time soon.

[shira]

10. oh please

Did you read Neve Gordon's latest on boycotting Israel? Is he "true" left, because all he's calling for is an offer precisely like the one Olmert put on the table that was rejected just last year by Abbas.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

11. You perfectly prove my point - take a look at what Olmert actually offered

Neve Gordon writes

"The second means of ending our apartheid is through the two-state solution, which entails Israel's withdrawal to the pre-1967 borders (with possible one-for-one land swaps), the division of Jerusalem, and a recognition of the Palestinian right of return with the stipulation that only a limited number of the 4.5 million Palestinian refugees would be allowed to return to Israel, while the rest can return to the new Palestinian state."

Olmert wanted to keep 7% of the West bank, offered barren desert of smaller area in return, refused to acknowledge even a symbolic "right of return", and - most importantly - didn't offer Palestinian sovereignty over Jerusalem.

You perfectly illustrate my contention - that the Israeli electorate believes that their state has made offers far more generous than it actually has.

[Kurska]

12. No Israeli prime minister is going to give palestinians sovereignty over Jerusalem.

You're insane if you think that is possible.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

14. I don't think it's going to happen, I just think peace will be impossible without it.

You're quite right, Israel is moving to the right, and I don't see any chance of any Israeli prime minister making the necessary compromises in the forseeable future - any leader not committed to keeping all of Jerusalem Israeli will not be able to win election, I think.

But acknowledging that puts paid to the myth of the "generous offer".

[Kurska]

16. If Israel's position on Jerusalem is unshakable and the palestinian position likewise, peace will

always be impossible.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

18. Indeed.

I don't see any real chance of a consensual peace in the forseeable future, and the odds of a US-imposed peace don't look great.

[shira]

15. let's take a look, shall we?

1. A 100% offer was given that included landswaps and a passageway connecting Gaza and the W.Bank.

2. Olmert offered to take back some refugees as a humanitarian gesture. Both Saeb Erekat and Abbas admit this.

3. The offer of a division of Jerusalem in which adminstration of Palestinian areas is given to Palestine and Jewish areas to Israel was offered under the Clinton Parameters in 2000 - as well as in Olmert's offer. You are going well beyond Neve Gordon's suggestion.

http://cgis.jpost.com/Blogs/warpedmirror/entry/saeb_erekat_s_secret_posted
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1238562897110&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

[azurnoir]

17. Wasn't there also a caveat

that said this generous offer would only be implimented after Hamas was somehow removed from power?