JERUSALEM–If there is a simple key to what has happened, and what is likely to happen as a result of the dust up surrounding building in Jerusalem and the visit of Vice President Biden, it is a lack of trust. It is hard to find a serious Israeli commentator who expresses trust of the wisdom of the American administration or its posture vis a vis Israel. Public opinion surveys of Israeli Jews parallel that lack of trust.

Israeli Jews do not trust Israeli Arabs or Palestinians. The violence since 2000 and in response to the withdrawal from Gaza has done its work to reinforce this lack of trust that has older roots.

Palestinians and Israeli Arabs do not trust Israeli Jews; and Palestinians and Israeli Arabs do not trust one another. Israeli Arabs show no interest in becoming citizens of Palestine. Casual suggestions to give Palestine the Arab neighborhoods of Jerusalem naively avoid the issue of referenda in those neighborhoods. Secular Palestinians do not trust religious Palestinians, Christians and Muslims do not trust one another, and those with Fatah loyalties do not trust those with Hamas. Serious violence occurred between Fatah and Hamas in Gaza. Members of one extended family do not trust those of other families. Bloody feuds erupt from time to time among Israeli Arabs and Palestinians. The notion of a Palestinian “nation” is a considerable exaggeration.

Israeli Arabs and Palestinians look ritualistically to others to press the Israelis, but there is not a lot of trust among them directed at Americans or other Arabs.

And who trusts Palestinians? Not many Americans, according to Gallup. Or elites in other Arab countries. Think of the Palestinians as the Jews of the Arab world.

Israelis to the right and left of center do not trust one another. Neither the settlers and their friends, nor the anarchists and other persistent advocates of Palestinians rights are widely popular in the large Jewish center of the spectrum. There is little trust between secular Israeli Jews and the Orthodox and ultra-Orthodox, both on issues that are internal to the Jewish communities and those that spill over to matters of land and peace.

“Bibi? I don’t believe him” was the centerpiece in Tzipi Livni’s 2009 election campaign. Her Kadima Party received more votes and Knesset seats than Netanyahu’s Likud, but she did not have the allies to form a coalition. Since the election she may have been too quiet in order to preserve her political base. Her party rival, Shaul Mofaz, is finding support among Kadima activists who do not trust Livni to do what is necessary to become prime minister.

People in and around the White House would sign on to Tzipi’s slogan. They are probably quoting Bill Clinton, “Who the f— does he think he is?”

Do Israeli and overseas Jews trust one another?

This is a sensitive question with no clear answer. Probably not as much as they used to. It is common to say that the Lebanon war of 1982 was the watershed, i.e., Israel’s first “war of choice” in the eyes of those who opposed it.
Leaving aside what may be the majority of overseas Jews who are apathetic or uninformed about Israeli issues, there are parallel conflicts  with the issues that separate Israeli Jews. Diaspora Jews argue about land and peace, settlements, and religion. There is a conflict over Orthodox and non-Orthodox Judaism that overseas Jews try without much success to implant in Israel.

Good signs are the economic development and the spurt of peace that has marked the last few years in the West Bank. Israel’s economy is doing better than many others. The shekel has performed well in relation to the dollar and the Euro.

If foreign politicians will keep quiet and pursue the advancement of their reputations elsewhere, the good times in Israel and Palestine (West Bank) may develop further.

But I do not trust my moments of optimism. There are enough fanatics among Palestinians, Israelis, and others wanting to promote themselves, their ideology or theology, willing to destroy the good for their view of Paradise, peace, democracy, or whatever.

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Sharkansky is professor emeritus of political science at Hebrew University.

The status quo in the West Bank, if it continues for some time (let us say a few years) might continue to allow economic development and provide Palestinians a reason for keeping the peace. That, in turn, might increase Israeli willingness to trust their cousins and give peace a better chance.

Might the Israelis express that trust by agreeing to withdraw some settlements?

That is a tough one after the Gaza experience, but let’s say maybe.

And what about Gaza?

That’s also a tough one.

Would continued blockade with a minimum of supplies weaken Hamas and produce a situation where that bit of crowded misery would sign on to a theme of peaceful coexistence.

Perhaps if we ruled religion as well as politics out of the picture.

One should never say never. Life will go on even after we cease writing, reading, and doing everything else.

Unfortunately, our whimsy cannot change reality.

Both religion and politics are in the picture, as well as nationalism for those who claim to be secular yet feel their hearts beat faster at the prospect of ethnic glory or insult.

Current efforts by those who claim to aspire good seem likely to make things worse.

My candidate for the greatest source of bad is sitting in the White House. His aspirations drove key parties further apart by insisting on a settlement freeze, and now is pushing them even further apart by forcing them to separate rooms for “indirect” negotiations via his mediator.

Neither the Palestinian nor the Israeli parties can resist American pressure to start some kind of negotiations but American pressure cannot force them to do what their constituencies will not permit.

So the day before the announcement of indirect negotiations the Israeli government announced the approval of new construction in one of the settlements. “Indirect” negotiations set back Israel-Arab relations to the early 1970s, and provoke religious and nationalist Israelis, on whom the prime minister depends for staying in office.

Palestinians also have their politics, nationalism, and religion. So they are insisting on the achievement of what the Israelis say they cannot provide. The Palestinian leadership (West Bank) is saying that it will not agree to direct negotiations until there is a total settlement freeze as well as Israeli acceptance of several other non-negotiable demands. Bibi is saying that he will not go to direct negotiations until the Palestinians recognize Israel as a “Jewish state.”

Not only is there an impasse, but recent events have set the stones athrowing. In the past, that has been a prelude to suicide bombings, which have led to the destruction of Palestinians and their economy.

Who is to blame?

All the key politicians, with the Israelis and Palestinians pushed by their religious and nationalist extremists, and the Americans pushed by their fantasies of accomplishing what has eluded previous attempts, with the same ideas, over the course of decades. One can go back to 2008, 2000, 1967, 1949, or the teens and twenties of the twentieth century to find Jews and Arabs willing to go along with one or another division of the land, but coming up against others not willing to go along.

Obama and his advisers have succeeded in radicalizing Palestinian demands (settlement freeze as condition of negotiations) and have pushed Israeli religious nationalists to pressure Bibi, with the result that he loses control over his hyperbole (national heritage sites), which provokes Palestinian stone throwing, which can lead to Hell in a hurry.

And there is Gaza. It is in the hands of religious extremists, with several groups claiming affiliation with Hamas squabbling over who can be more extreme, and other extremists fighting Hamas with more than verbal jousts.

Can there be an Israeli-Palestinian agreement without Gaza? The White House has not indicated how that could be done.

May it do better in the reform of American health care.

*

Sharkansky is professor emeritus of political science at Hebrew University.

JERUSALEM–Another round of high level visits and photo opportunities. Defense Minister goes to Washington. Vice President comes to Jerusalem. Special envoy arrives as well, hopefully to declare the onset of negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians. Not direct negotiations, in order to protect Mahmoud Abbas’ reputation, but indirect via American mediators.

Pressure on Israel to avoid something preemptive with respect to Iran? Or high level discussions of what it will take to keep Israel out of that fray?

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has said that 9-11 was engineered by the United States to give it an excuse for invading Afghanistan.

The Chinese are saying that it is not appropriate to impose sanctions on Iran. Diplomacy is the answer. Russia opposes an embargo on (its) arms sales to Iran. Ranking Americans say that sanctions should not be so harsh as to harm Iranian civilians. The US and its western partners are bargaining about which Iranian banks–if any–should be on a black list.

Should Israel go ahead with an operation, likely to bring a rain of missiles on itself from Iran and Lebanon, produce an escalation that shuts down Lebanon and maybe Syria, brings in the United States and produces a grand regional something or other, maybe even let the N-thing out of somebody’s bag? Or let the Holocaust denier, who declares Israel’s imminent demise, and says what he does about 9-11 continue to develop his own weapons of mass destruction?

Somewhat lower on the scale of apocalypse is an upturn in Palestinian protest. For the first time in years Palestinians on the Temple Mount threw stones on Jews praying below at the Western Wall. So the police went onto the Mount to stop them. Then Palestinian religious and political figures accused the Jews of violating their sacred space. A mile or so away, thousands of Palestinians and their Israeli supporters protested court decisions allowing the expulsion of Palestinian squatters from residences owned by Jews.

Should there be no rule of law when Palestinians claim preference? Or is it simply unwise for Jews to provoke unrest by moving into areas heavily settled by Arabs? And unwise for Bibi to put Rachel’s Tomb and the Cave of the Patriarchs on a list of national monuments? What about the Arab family living in our apartment house?

As long as the United States refrains from imposing serious sanctions on Iran–either unilaterally or as part of a coalition–one can expect that the same coalition partners that pressed Bibi to put Rachel’s Tomb and the Cave of the Patriarchs on the list of national monuments will press him to refrain from any concessions to the Palestinians. With every stone thrown against Jews in East Jerusalem, that pressure will increase.

Things are connected.

You’ve heard of a conundrum?

There are several of them intertwined.

Suggestions welcome.

*

Sharkansky is professor emeritus of political science at Hebrew University.

JERUSALEM–Despite the fact that Israel defines itself as a “Jewish state,” and does not insist on a separation between religion and the state, it is more secular than that other country that does proclaim a separation. Despite unknown sums of money poured into religious education and the support of synagogues (and a bit of public money spent on institutions of the Christian, Muslim and Druze communities), more Israeli Jews identify as secular than religious. Issues that are hot buttons in the United States, like homosexuality and abortion, are less troublesome here. Until recently one could say that Israel had bi-passed the quarrel about evolution.

No longer.

A week ago the man with the exalted title of Chief Scientist in the Ministry of Education proclaimed his opposition both to global warming and evolution, and promised to assure that the school children of Israel would not be brainwashed in either. http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1151223.html

All of Israel’s ministries have a “chief scientist.” One wonders if their task is to ride herd on the lesser mortals on the ministry’s payroll, or if it a job for the minister to give a supporter with scientific credentials. This scientist has a PhD from the Technion, and worked in the field of aeronautics. No less important was his two decades activity in the Likud Party, including an unsuccessful run for a seat in the Knesset. The current Minister of Education is a Likud Member of Knesset, who until now seemed competent in his job. He has distanced himself from his appointee’s comments, but he has not yet taken steps to unappoint him.

According to the chief scientist.

“There are those for whom evolution is a religion and are unwilling to hear about anything else. Part of my responsibility, in light of my position with the Education Ministry, is to examine textbooks and curricula . . . If they keep writing in textbooks that the Earth is growing warmer because of carbon dioxide emissions, I’ll insist that isn’t the case.”

 ”Another scientific field that is problematic is biology, or life and environmental sciences. When your doctrine is based on Darwin’s theory of evolution and its implications, you are standing on unreliable foundations – that is, there is no God, there was only something primeval, and then there are certain random developments which led to the apex of all creation, the human being.

“Today I am pleased that more and more scientists engaged in pure science, rather than being employed in the name of an ideology, are reaching the conclusion that the world must have a master. Nothing is given to chance.”

The people who have won more than their share of Nobel Prizes are roiling in protest. The Rector and President of The Hebrew University have sent us all a note asking that we spend a few minutes in class talking about the controversy. Their letter emphasizes the role of the university as the home of rational science. It describes the accomplishments in medicine and physics that derive from an evolutionary perspective, admits the controversies about global warming, and asserts that science provides room for challenge and continuing research. They conclude with a firm condemnation of the chief scientist, and his failure to recognize the distinction between science and belief. They assert that there is room for both in the university, provided they are not confused, and urge the Minister of Education to assure that in every Israeli school the students learn the essence of the scientific method so they can judge correctly what is known about evolution and global warming.

Some of those sentiments may penetrate the schools for the Orthodox, while not much is likely to get into those for the ultra-Orthodox.

There may be no better demonstration about the isolation of the latter community than a picture of youngsters costumed for a Purim party in the ultra-Orthodox neighborhood of Mea Sharerim.

JERUSALEM–One of my Jerusalem friends supplied me with another piece of the Jewish mosaic by talking about his youth in Mashhad.

Mashhad is a sizable city and religious center in the northeast of Iran, where the Jewish community was given a choice of conversion or death in the 1830s. Some died in the pogrom that accompanied the decree, some moved away, and most accepted Islam outwardly, but continued to be Jews at home. A century later the Jews of Mashhad began to live more openly. Nonetheless, the Mashhadis I have met carry deeper scars than those traceable to my having to sing Christmas songs and recite the Lord’s Prayer in Fall River.

Israeli Jews from Muslim countries, and their children, tend to be on the hawkish side of the hawk-dove spectrum. Some of this may derive from lower than average levels of income and education, and the populist element in right of center Likud. Some also derives from residual feelings of discrimination, and being forced to leave their homes, typically with few if any possessions. While there are well known intellectuals and politicians from these communities who speak out prominently from the dovish sides of the spectrum, it is not difficult to find individuals willing to talk about family suffering, as well as their distrust of Palestinians and other Muslims.

One should not exaggerate the impact of these communities on Israel. We are not talking about the residents of refugee camps subject to regime incitement for more than six decades. Although Israel’s poor “development towns” continue to have a disproportionate share of “Oriental” Jews (as well as migrants from the former Soviet Union and Ethiopia) Jews tracing their families to the Middle East have moved throughout the country and into every sector of the economy and politics. So many of them have married Israelis whose families came from Europe, North or South America as to render the categories of “Sephardim,” “Oriental,” or “Jews from Asian and African backgrounds” increasingly elusive for social research.

My Mashhadi friend responded to one of my recent notes where I mentioned the Palestinians’ creation of an ownership tale for what has long been described as Rachel’s Tomb. He urged me to write about how the Muslims have created similar fabrications about the importance of Jerusalem. “What do they mean about the third holiest city in Islam? I grew up hearing that Mashhad was one of the holiest cities. Muslims who visit Mashhad call themselves Mashhadi. I’ve never heard of a Muslim who visits Jerusalem giving himself the Arabic name of this city.”

I responded by recalling my own visit to Samarkand. The tour guide described it as the “third most holy city in all of Islam.”

No doubt that Muslims have touched up the status of Jerusalem (al Quds–the Holy City), largely in response to the Jewish presence. However, the story is not a simple one. Jerusalem does figure in the writings associated with Mohamed, and the city was an important focus in the struggle against the Crusaders. The Dome of the Rock and al-Aqsa Mosque have been on the Noble Sanctuary/Temple Mount since the 7th century, and the main shopping street in East Jerusalem carries the name of Salah al Din, the Kurdish warrior who led the fight against Crusaders in the 12th century.

The Muslims never made Jerusalem anything more than a provincial town during the several regimes that ruled until the British conquest in the 20th century. Baghdad, Damascus, Ramla, Nablus, and Gaza were more important. During the 16th century, Jerusalem’s population was less than 5,000. The city was a miserable place with garbage and dead animals in the street, and widespread disease when Europeans and Americans began building churches and hospitals in the 19th century. There has been a Jewish majority since the late 19th century. When the Jordanians controlled the Old City and other neighborhoods from 1948 to 1967, they invested more heavily in Amman. 

Voltaire  said that history is the lie commonly agreed upon. Napoleon softened that to history as accepted myth.

So whatever the truth to the claim that Jerusalem is one of Islam’s holiest cities, or that Rachel Tomb is really Bilal ibn Rabah mosque, there are many who will accept and act on those beliefs. Tour guides in Samarkand and Mashhad will continue with their descriptions. Tempers about Jerusalem and other sites will rise and decline with events. Muslim politicians will incite their followers when they need an issue, or when Jewish politicians are careless in how they make a point about their own claims.

Currently the concern is not so much with historical accuracy, as with the possibility that speeches and stone throwing will develop into something more serious. A resident of Jerusalem should not say that history is unimportant. Only that the details do not depend on what really happened.

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Sharkansky is professor emeritus of political science at Hebrew University.

JERUSALEM–Several of my Internet friends have ridiculed my concern with American health policy, and several have ridiculed my dismal assessment of Palestinians seeking statehood.

Nonetheless, I will reiterate the importance of both issues, and emphasize some commonalities that provide useful lessons about politics. And while many view politics as not a fit topic for conversation, I insist again that it is the essence of civilization. Political maneuvers and deals may offend the delicate, but they are the best way to deal with disputes that get to the public arena.

What is most prominent in bringing together the politics of American health and the politics of Israel-Palestine is the intense involvement of Barack Obama.

I have praised his Cairo speech about the Middle East, and his proposal to expand health care for Americans. Both were well crafted efforts to deal with serious problems, using the leverage available to the leader of the world’s most powerful country.

As Obama’s efforts have gone forward, he has demonstrated that he does some things very well, but more important things very badly.

The Cairo speech demanded from Israelis, Palestinians, and other Arabs what seemed able to resolve a conflict that had defied numerous earlier efforts at peace making.

What is crucial to politics, however, is not the grand idea, but how the follow-up deals with the numerous problems of implementation. If those problems did not exist, there would be no need for the grand idea. Ordinary people can conceive of what might be done, but genius consists of knowing how to defuse the land mines created over the years by hostile actions and distrust.

Obama’s grand idea about the Middle East made both Israelis and Palestinians suspicious. Numerous Arabs said that he was arrogant shortly after they applauded politely. He flubbed badly when he gave Israeli naysayers an ideal target by demanding a freeze on Jewish neighborhoods of Jerusalem. A politician claiming religious sensitivity should have recognized the centrality of Jerusalem going back to the Biblical origins of Judaism. Then when he backtracked and praised the Israeli prime minister for doing less than what he had demanded, he alienated whatever support he had from the Palestinians. Now the two sides are further apart than at any time since 1993, when they first agreed to negotiate.

The President’s record in health is similar. Initially there were good ideas to expand coverage, move against the worse abuses of insurance companies, and reign in costs.

Patriotic Americans continue to claim that no country has better health care, and that all residents can go for treatment to a hospital emergency room.

Facts are that the United States scores so poorly on longevity and infant mortality that no efforts to find reasons in social problems can account for the dismal record. It is the only wealthy democracy that does not assure access to basic care for all its citizens. Access to emergency rooms for those already severely ill or injured does not make up for what is missing.

Those who trumpet the quality of American health care sound like deranged individuals saying that everyone else is crazy. 

When actually submitted for Congressional deliberation, the proposal of a thousand pages provoked more fears and suspicions than it soothed. Now it is said by some to cover 2,400 pages and by others 2,700 pages. Whatever the size, there are at least as many reasons to oppose as to support.

A public encounter between the President and Members of Congress, billed as a way to find a common path, is being reported as a confrontation. “By day’s end, it seemed clear that the all-day televised session might have driven the parties even farther apart.” http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/26/health/policy/26health.html?hpw

Could the President have been challenging the Republicans, and setting them up for defeat at the polls?

His adversaries are salivating at election returns from Massachusetts, Virginia, and New Jersey, as well as pointing to the lack of accord on health between Democrats in the House and Senate.

For Obama to qualify as a good president, he must go beyond successful lessons in rhetoric, and learn more about implementation.

A major test will come with mid-term Congressional elections in November. By 2012, it may again be the national economy on everybody’s mind.

And you cannot beat somebody with nobody. If tea-party conservatives think they can win with Sarah Palin, it may be the best news a Democratic candidate has received since John McCain chose her as his running mate, or since an earlier generation hoped that Barry Goldwater could defeat Lyndon Johnson. Unless Barack Obama comes to look too much like Jimmy Carter.

Politics is not for those who are overly certain.

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Sharkansky is professor emeritus of political science at Hebrew University.

By Ira Sharkansky

JERUSALEM–There has been considerable criticism of the inclusion of Rachel’s Tomb and the Cave of the Patriarchs on Israel’s list of national heritage sites. Players as lowly as Israeli leftists and as mighty as the General Secretary of the United Nations have made the following points.

No Muslim or Christian sites merited inclusion on the list. Prime Minister Netanyahu showed how he panics under pressure. After a list was announced without Rachel’s Tomb and the Cave of the Patriarchs, he ignored the reasons for overlooking them, gave into demands from the religious right, and added them along with some nationalist bombast that helped inflame opposition.

Adding those sites, both of which are under Israeli control, may not change facts on the ground. Insofar as they are both over the 1967 lines, making an issue of them in Netanyahu’s style makes it even more difficult for the Palestinian leadership to begin negotiations.
All that is true.

Official responses that Israel is a Jewish state and protects the access of all communities to their religious sites does not deal with the insensitivity associated with point #1. It would not shake Israel’s security to include some of the structures prized by Christians and Muslims as part of the country’s national heritage. Yet even that might provoke protest. One can imagine the various Christian communities that squabble over the Church of the Holy Sepulcher and Muslim authorities objecting to “Israeli adoption” of their sites.

Point #2 also has merit. Prime Minister Netanyahu is a skilled politician, but limited by a tendency to overlook the need for balance. He has slipped too far into language or actions when pressed by religious and nationalist constituencies. However, his position is not an easy one. Those groups are part of his base, and they have shown a willingness to withdraw support and topple a government that does not bend to their intensities. Americans whose health care suffers from the insistence of extremists pro and con on abortion should recognize the problem.

Point #3 is the most interesting from the larger perspective of the peace process. Once again we see international figures pampering Muslim sensitivities, and adding to the weakness of the Palestinians by responding to their whimpers. With no substantive changes resulting from a  list of national heritage sites, the pressure is on Israel to be more feeling rather than on Palestinians to approach the table with a commitment to getting the best deal they can.

Justice is as elusive in the matter of Israel-Palestine as it is in every other conflict over public policy. Should the borders be here or there is not different inherently than the provisions to be added or excluded from a nation’s program of health insurance.

Best to forget the endless quest for justice and to pursue a deal that will make things better. If it is hard when the dispute is about costs and benefits in one country, it is harder for a dispute infected by claims of religious priority, and when outsiders wanting to be politically correct encourage intransigence with comments and money, and others provide incitement and munitions. 

So we are stuck. Palestinians threaten violence (a third intifada) over actions that may have been insensitive, but change nothing. Israel’s government is showing no inclination to make tangible concessions when none seem to come from Palestinians. Jewish settlements continue to grow and add their complications to any deal that can be made.

Pessimism is not appropriate. Realists should be used to this long running scenario, and recognize an anomaly among nations: no Palestinian state; no clear boundaries and constant bashing for Israel; a fluid autonomy for the Palestinian communities in the West Bank; and an infectious disease ward for Gaza.

The world accommodates numerous other anomalies: governments in the Third World whose reach does not extend beyond the capital city, or even beyond the presidential palace; Lebanon under the control of Syria and/or Iran; Spain with unresolved regional issues; Kashmir; and one wealthy democracy without health insurance for all its people.

Sharkansky is professor emeritus of political science at Hebrew University.

JERUSALEM–The religious and territorial dimensions of the Israel-Palestine conflict came together again with Arab assertions, demonstrations, and stone-throwing in response to Prime Minister Netanyahu’s announcement that he would include Rachel’s Tomb and the Cave of the Patriarch’s on a list of Israel’s national heritage sites.

The prime minister’s announcement adds nothing tangible to Israel’s control of the sites. Rachel’s Tomb is between Jerusalem’s southern suburbs and the Palestinian city of Bethlehem, and has been on Israel’s side of the security barrier, and tucked behind imposing towers and gates constructed as a result of attacks on Jewish visitors during the uprising that began in 2000. The Cave of the Patriarchs is located in Hebron, and has been accessible to Jewish as well as Muslims since the IDF began guarding it after the 1967 war.

The reality of the claims associated with these places (that the Biblical Rachel is buried in one site and that Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, Rebecca, Jacob and Leah are buried in the other) is no more certain than claims for the Church of the Nativity, the Holy Sepulchre, or any number of burial places claimed for historic rabbis throughout the Galilee. Christian communities have selected competing sites for the Holy Sepulchre, and Samuel was decent to leave two tombs, which facilitate a division of a hilltop structure west of Jerusalem into a mosque and a synagogue on different levels, with each claiming the prophet’s remains.

Including the sites on a list of Israeli historical sites need not preempt a political division of the Holy Land. Israel has obtain visiting rights for Jews at the tombs of Rabbi Nachman of Bratslav in the Ukraine, Rabbi Yaakov Abuhatzeira in Egypt, and several rabbis in Morocco, and is working to keep a shopping mall from encroaching on the site of Auschwitz without raising issues of national sovereignty.

Despite several year’s of Israeli control, Palestinians as well as a United Nations official have weighed in against what they claim as a change in status.

Saeb Erekat said, “The unilateral decision to make Palestinian sites in Hebron and Bethlehem part of Israel shows there is no genuine partner for peace, but an occupying power intent on consolidating Palestinian lands.”
A United Nations special coordinator said, “These sites are in occupied Palestinian territory and are of historical and religious significance not only to Judaism, but also to Islam, and to Christianity as well.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/23/world/middleeast/23mideast.html?hpw

Mahmoud Abbas has claimed that the prime minister’s announcement represents an Israeli effort to take Muslim holy sites, and threatens an escalation of tensions into a religious war.

Israeli policy about holy sites has been more accommodating to non-Jews than was the practice of the Muslims during the period of Jordanian control between 1948 and 1967. Despite an armistice agreement that holy sites would be open to members of all faiths, Rachel’s Tomb, the Cave of the Patriarchs, the Mount of Olives, the entire Old City of Jerusalem including the Western Wall, the Temple Mount, and several historic synagogues were closed to Jews. Since 1967 Israeli authorities have left day to day management of the Temple Mount to Muslim religious authorities, and they enforce a division of the Cave of the Patriarchs between Muslims and Jews. Currently Rachel’s Tomb may be accessible only to visitors from the Israeli side of the barriers, but they were constructed in response to attacks against Jewish pilgrims.

After years of recognizing the significance of Rachel’s tomb for Jews, Palestinian discourse has begun calling it Bilal ibn Rabah mosque. This resembles Muslim claims that there was never a significant Judaic presence on the Nobel Sanctuary (Temple Mount).and stands as a modern effort to bolster territorial claims with newly created historical tales. 

Archaeological research and extra-Biblical writing provides considerable evidence of the Temple destroyed by the Romans in 70. Some may see those as deserving some weight against the Muslim claim of priority on account of Mohamed’s horse ride to heaven from the site some 500 years later.

Archaeologists, preachers, myth makers, and believers contribute to the din about rightful possession or control, but the most recent conflicts and accommodations have been more important. Current reality is approaching 43 years and counting since June, 1967.

Proposals for sharing may sell better among secular politicians than claims of monopoly or priority. However, this is a birthplace of monotheism. The notion of One God too easily becomes claims of priority for my view of God. Among the intense, that does not bode well for accommodation.

*

Sharkansky is professor emeritus of political science at Hebrew University.

JERUSALEM–Friday evening with a secular group, the conversation was exclusively about the assassination in Dubai. My companions were convinced it was Israel’s work, and almost all of them were sure it was a failure. Their standards are demanding. Anything less than perfect is embarrassing. No matter that the bad guy was dead and the good guys got away. Their crime was identified as such rather than death from natural causes that was preferred, and their pictures spread across international media.

My companions ignored efforts to turn the conversation to Rabbi Elon. I tried twice, then realized that I was learning something from their lack of concern.

My hypothesis gathered weight Saturday morning in a religious setting, where the conversation was exclusively about the Rabbi, and the profound shock and dismay felt in the Orthodox community. In this conversations, Dubai was a passing event of no lasting importance.

Benjamin Disraeli wrote a good novel and social commentary, Sybil, or The Two Nations (1845)

Two nations between whom there is no intercourse and no sympathy; who are as ignorant of each other’s habits, thoughts, and feelings, as if they were dwellers in different zones, or inhabitants of different planets; who are formed by a different breeding, are fed by a different food, are ordered by different manners, and are not governed by the same laws:  the rich and the poor.

Israel’s two nations are not those of mid-19th centuryEngland, and one can exaggerate the difference between them. In fact, there are three that are prominent: religious and secular Jews, and Arabs. Moreover, there are significant variations within each of these.

Religious Jews differ principally along the Orthodox-Ultra-Orthodox axis, with Conservative, Reform, and Reconstructionist Jews occasionally noisy but small minorities. Secular Jews vary by ethnic origin, income, education, and political perspectives. What to outsiders may look like a homogeneous Arab group are Druze, Christian, Beduin and the sizable communities of non-Beduin Muslims, who vary in their character by locality or extended family.

I make no claim that my weekend encounters comprised a scientific sample. Yet they are people I have known over the course of three or four decades to fall across the social cleavage between secular and religious Jews that is the most important for the country’s politics. On this occasion, the cleavage was apparent in what was important, or of little interest, to each community

As I have written in several of these notes, one should not exaggerate the extent of this cleavage. It marks, but does not threaten the social fabric of the country. Tensions and conflicts are routinized, and only occasionally heat up to a low level of violence. The people I spoke with over the weekend are moderate in their political views, but more or less representative of secular Israelis and Religious Zionists.

Orthodox and ultra-Orthodox Jews together may be only 20 percent of the Jewish population (10 percent each), but they are prominent to the right of center on the political spectrum. Neither the Orthodox nor the ultra-Orthodox have ever dominated a government, but they have been close to several prime ministers, and have put their people at the heads of important ministries of finance, justice, and interior, as well as in the chair of the Knesset Finance Committee. They have been significant in defining what it possible with respect to the sensitive issue of settlements.

Some see the religious as important enough to cast a veto on the removal of major settlements or proposals for peace. However, they were not successful in stopping Ariel Sharon’s move to withdraw settlements of religious Jews from Gaza in 2005. That failure still pains Religious Zionists, and helps to account for  efforts to persuade religious boys to refuse recruitment to the IDF, and to persuade religious soldiers to refuse orders that would remove additional settlements. Those remain minority efforts within the settler community. Activists come up against the patriotism that prevails among Religious Zionists, as well as the condemnation of refusing military orders or recruitment by leading rabbis.

The anxiety felt by Orthodox Israelis in response to the condemnation of a leading rabbi for violating sexual norms by a distinguished group of his colleagues is different from the anxiety produced by the failure of Religious Zionists to stop the withdrawal from Gaza. This crisis is associated with anguish about a fundamental element of rabbinical Judaism: the authority of a rabbi who had widely been viewed as a leading religious and political authority, as well as a counselor of individuals seeking help for their personal problems. Not only has he been revealed as a homosexual, but as an individual who took advantage of young men who sought his help for their own feelings of sexuality.

A secular social scientist is tempted to note that homosexuality would appear among the rabbinate in about the same incidence as it appears among other populations. However, this is not relevant to this shock about the prestige that attaches to rabbis, especially those who have acquired status as leading commentators, teachers, and counselors. Such men share in the tradition that begins with Moses, passes through Ezra, and counts as its members rabbis who are prominent in the arguments of the Talmud and subsequent commentators on religious law. For one of the contemporaries who has acquired some of that prestige to have violated both religious law and the trust of his colleagues and students is a shock to a foundation of the Orthodox community.

Israel will survive whatever embarrassment of its security services will come out of the operation in Dubai. Religious Jews will also accommodate a recognition that some of their leaders resemble Catholic priests and television evangelists that have sullied the expectations of their communities.

The exposure of Rabbi Elon strikes more sensitive nerves than whatever errors were made in Dubai. Also it is more shocking to members of the religious community than the possibility that a former president and a former prime minister may go to prison for their violations of sexual or financial norms. Israelis are familiar with the clumsiness of security operations, and have low expectations of politicians. Disappointment rather than shock or even surprise marks discussions about the follies of Moshe Katsav or Ehud Olmert. Religious Jews should also be familiar with the traits that religious leaders share with other humans, and this experience–however painful–may move them toward that realization.

*

Sharkansky is professor emeritus of political science at Hebrew University.

By Ira Sharkansky

JERUSALEM–The speculation appears widely in the international press. We have seen the films from security cameras placed throughout Dubai, and blow-ups of facial shots of 11 of 17 agents said to be involved in the murder of Hamas figure Mahmoud al-Mabhouh. We have also seen photos of three British immigrants to Israel whose identities may have been stolen. They look passably similar to three of the operatives identified with the deed. The immigrants claim they never left Israel and that they have not lost their British passports.

Israeli officials have neither affirmed nor denied involvement in the assassination.

The British Foreign Office has expressed concern that its passports were compromised. It called in the Israeli ambassador for clarification. The ambassador said he had nothing to provide the British, and that diplomatic conversations are confidential. The British Foreign Minister asserted that he was serious, and not just going through the motions. Which may mean that he is going through the motions.

Critics claim it was a botched job, with the operatives caught by the cameras. Perhaps it was too amateurish to have been done by the Mossad. Yet this is difficult work. There is a long record of failed attempts, including exploding cigars supplied by the CIA that did not kill Fidel Castro, and an innocent waiter in Norway killed by Israelis who thought he had been involved in the murder of the Olympic team in Munich. Dubai may have more closed circuit TV cameras per square kilometer than any other place on earth. Being photographed is inevitable. The operatives knew it, and changed disguises several times. Dubai may have other traits that attract this kind of work. The team got in and out without being stopped, and the target is dead.

al-Mabhouh deserved a place on Israel’s list. The Dubai police chief said he was 99 percent sure that the Mossad was responsible, but there are some odd indications that complicate the story, or at least make it interesting. Jordan has extradited two Palestinians to Dubai, who used forged European passports to reach Jordan after the murder. Syria has arrested a Palestinian identified as a member, or defector from Hamas, also suspected of being involved. Fatah and Hamas are trading accusations, with each saying that the other cooperated with the Israelis.

The costs to Israel, if indeed it was responsible:
• The operatives may have burned themselves with respect to international operations. They will retire to something duller, or remain in the organization training others to do similar work at least as well.
• Something is owed to the immigrants whose identities were stolen. It is not beyond imagining that they agreed to the theft (perhaps for the good of Zion) and are playing the role of offended individuals. They might not be able to travel internationally without being picked up on a Dubai warrant. One said that he would like to visit Mom, but he does not dare. Israel might get Dubai to wave its international arrest order in the interest of the war against terrorism. A number of Arab countries have expressed concern, not always in public, for Islamic extremism, and on this occasion they may have done more than speak quietly. The blaming of Israel by Dubai, Britain, and other countries whose passports were forged may be nothing more than a slap at a credible target. Israel is familiar with blame. Add this to the file that also includes the Goldstone report.
• It is not unusual for individuals to change their names when coming to Israel. Israel may provide these immigrants with new identities and passports, and maybe something else for their trouble.
• Hamas is threatening to retaliate in kind, saying that its targets will be quality, and not ordinary Israelis. This is the nth threat of retaliation from Hamas, and together with numerous outstanding threats from Hizbollah and other Palestinian groups may not add much incrementally to concern for the safety of Israeli individuals and institutions, both at home and overseas. Overseas Jewish institutions may also take note, but they, too, have been threatened and cautioned on numerous occasions.

In case you haven’t noticed, this is an interesting little country.

JERUSALEM–An Orthodox rabbi appeared on a prime time television news program to explain his rationale as one of numerous rabbis who signed a statement reiterating that sexual relations between men was a violation of the Torah, but indicating that homosexuals should be welcome in the community of believers. They should be allowed to read from the Torah and practice other commandments. Relations should be as with Jews who do not honor the Sabbath. A religious person should know that they are violating God’s law, but may still include them within the circle of loved ones if a member of the family, or within the circle of friendship. The rabbi indicated that he felt efforts to reform homosexuals were likely to be more harmful than beneficial, but noted that some of his colleagues that signed the statement support programs of reform.

A day later there began a story that has preoccupied news and discussion programs, and has caused profound soul searching among the Orthodox. Rabbi Mordechai (Motti) Elon, one of the most prominent rabbis of the Religious Zionist movement (closely identified with settlers in the West Bank and formerly those in Gaza), was revealed to have been ordered some time ago by a forum of rabbis and other distinguished individuals to abstain from teaching and providing one-on-one counseling.

The forum calls itself Takana (תקנה), which can be translated as remedy, regulation, or reform, and deals with allegations of sexual misconduct.

When it became clear that Rabbi Elon had violated its prohibitions, the forum reported publicly that he had been accused of sexually harassing a number of his students. It “warned that he was dangerous to the public, and demanded he step down from all rabbinical, educational, and community responsibilities.” http://www.jpost.com/Israel/Article.aspx?id=168846

The organization referred to its actions as “painful and sad,” but said the issue must be brought to a resolution.

Rabbi Elon has been prominent as a teacher, creator of curricula for teaching religious materials, and honored for his spiritual and political leadership. His father is a retired justice of the Supreme Court, one brother was elected four times to the Knesset as a member of right wing parties supported by Religious Zionists, and another brother is a regional court judge and was a candidate for the Supreme Court.

The attorney general, with responsibility for initiating judicial proceedings, was aware of allegations about Rabbi Elon as early as 2006. He refereed the matter to the police, but did not order an investigation in the absence of a formal complaint. The forum that banned the rabbi from teaching and counseling said that it urged those reporting sexual contacts to submit their details to the police, but may not have employed all the persuasive weight associated with its status. The forum has been assiduous in not detailing the complaints, or the infractions involved. We hear of improper contacts with students. The Hebrew indicates that the students were men, but does not exclude the possibility that some were women.

One man appeared on prime time television, pictured from the back with his voice disguised. He described a number of meetings that he had initiated some years ago at the age of 19 to gain the rabbi’s help with what he sensed were improper feelings of attractions to men. He told how the meetings progressed to the point where the rabbi asked him to remove his clothes and touched him intimately. However, he persisted in viewing the rabbi in positive terms, as someone who was trying to help him deal with complex feelings.

The day after the first public revelations, the rabbi was pictured explaining his situation to a group of 50 or so present and former students. Several embraced the rabbi in what seemed like genuine expressions of support. The rabbi said that he must remain silent about the allegations, and avoided any denial.

The next day the forum announced that other former students had come forward to complain about sexual abuse.

A web site includes painful commentary on Elon by individuals who appear to be Orthodox Jews.
http://failedmessiah.typepad.com/failed_messiahcom/2010/02/rabbi-motty-elon-removed-from-public-life-234.html

Some of the comments seek room to avoid condemnation. They note that the language of the forum does not mention sexual misconduct, but activities in contrast to holy values and morality.

So far there has been no prominent condemnation from the ultra-Orthodox. Generally it is the Orthodox segment of Judaism closest to them, and most relevant as a competitor, that comes in for their most serious criticism. The ultra-Orthodox are more likely to attack Orthodox rabbis than secular Jews for their lack of piety. (Conservative and Reform rabbis are not recognized as rabbis by the ultra-Orthodox or the Orthodox, and sometimes not even as Jews.) The issue of homosexuality may be too sensitive for the ultra-Orthodox, and too familiar under the cover of their own secrecy, for any exploitation of this embarrassment.

Male homosexuality appears to be a clear violation of God’s law. “If a man lies with a man as one lies with a woman, both of them have done what is detestable; they must be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads.” (Leviticus 20:13) Problematic, however, is David’s declaration at the death of his friend Jonathan: “I grieve for you, Jonathan my brother; you were very dear to me. Your love for me was wonderful, more wonderful than that of women.”
(2 Samuel 1:26) Religious scholars interpret this passage as an expression of love among friends similar to the love of brothers. Yet a simple reading renders the story one of numerous indications that “Biblical law” is anything but simple and straightforward.

Although the New Testament claims that it was Jesus who brought humane values to the world in contrast with Judaism, more than two centuries earlier the rabbis interpreted biblical law in a way to transform capital and corporal punishments into payments of monetary compensation. Except in unusual cases, they ruled that death was a punishment to be meted out in Heaven by the Almighty, and not on earth by humans.

The Torah does not make it easy for religious organizations do deal with homosexuality or other sexual behaviors that occur among their followers and leaders. Efforts of Orthodox Jews to isolate Rabbi Elon resemble those of other communities. We see a disinclination to turn over violators to the criminal procedures of the secular state, along with comments revealing pain for the violator as well as concern for those violated. It all appears to be part of tension and change between what has been forbidden in doctrine for 2,500 years, and what is accepted increasingly in western societies by both religious and secular circles.    

*
Sharkansky is professor emeritus of political science at Hebrew University.

JERUSALEM — The Marker, the economic supplement of Ha’aretz, celebrated the first year of the Netanyahu government with a front page story comparing the prime minister’s promises and accomplishments. The headline deals with the most recent great idea, to extend rail and improved road networks to the far corners of this small country, but indicates that the prime minister is already downsizing under pressure from the Finance Ministry. Other items so far not accomplished are:

• a proposal to extend the value added tax to fruits and vegetables, opposed by farmers and groups concerned with social policy;
• a “drought tax” on water usage, opposed by the Kadima Party and the Association of Local Governments;
• a reform in the planning laws to make project approvals easier, opposed by the Labor Party and environmentalists;
• reduction in the income tax and tax on companies, opposed by the Budget Office of the Finance Ministry and the Bank of Israel.

These details will not interest many Americans, but they may lead them to think about their president’s health reform, his promises to close Guantanamo, bring the troops home from Iraq, and to fix the world via a commitment to engagement, all of which were to be part of a larger commitment to Change.

The lesson from these two countries is that change does not come easily, and often not at all. Democracies in particular have their separations of power and checks and balances which give advantages to those who oppose new ventures. American school children learn the prominent features of federalism, three branches of the national government, two Houses of Congress, a separately elected President, and courts, each of which have some leverage over proposals coming from elsewhere. American lessons tend not to emphasize the power of bureaucrats. That is a dirty word in the land of all those elective offices, but it is important in countries that are not so fearful of the governing professions..

Israel’s checks and balances works via political parties that may agree to join a government coalition, but do not consent to many of the proposals that come from the prime minister, plus a bureaucracy with its own sources of authority. The Finance Ministry, in particular, has several ways to veto the grand ideas of elected officials. There is also a central bank and courts that can weigh in on issues that conflict with how they view their responsibilities.

Even where a parliamentary system produces a government ruled by a party with a majority in the legislature, there remain intra-party rivalries and policy disagreements, as well as a professional bureaucracy with pride in its responsibilities. Great Britain provides a model of a parliamentary democracy where the ruling party usually has a majority, but it also gave rise to the television series, Yes Minister. Its title illustrates how ranking bureaucrats scuttle the initiatives of politicians by seeming to go along. Numerous episodes feature its administrative heroes sitting in their club, drinking something good, and pledging to fight the inclination of politicians to think for themselves.

One of the lines I remember from a senior administrator in Australia: “Why do you want to talk to politicians? They’re good in the bars, but they don’t know anything.”

Whatever their source, democracies have several checks that keep the government from doing too much that is new, expensive, daring, or goes against the preferences of a significant group in the population, even if it is a minority.

Much of the resistance comes from the complex substance of social, economic, and overseas problems that do not lend themselves to the quick fixes that sound great in political rhetoric.

If Americans really wanted a health system that provided decent coverage to everyone, they would have had it long ago. Barack Obama, like Bill Clinton before him, now seems to have gotten his government off to a bad start by trying too much in a sensitive area. Both sought to make decent policy, similar to what every other democracy provides, but somehow not suitable to the United States. Obama’s task was never a slam dunk, but now may have been scuttled by Massachusetts.

Recent news is that persons having individual health insurance contracts in California (as opposed to employer-provided insurance) may be hit with a 30 percent increase in premiums. This may drive more of the young and healthy to abandon their coverage, which will assure further increases in premiums for the older and not-so-healthy who remain a larger proportion of those having this kind of coverage. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/14/us/14anthem.html?hpw 

Guantanamo is still up and running despite the President’s pledge. There is no firm end date for American troops in Iraq. There has been a decline in their casualties, but that reflects their withdrawal to safe havens. Mosques, markets, and the lines of candidates seeking government positions are still exposed to suicide attacks. Increases in military commitments for Afghanistan and elsewhere in the war on terror, with no optimistic prognosis, appear closer to the policies of the Bush administration than to anything qualifying as Change. Likewise the retreat to conventional language about Israel and Palestine, rather than a frontal assault with a deadline for an agreement.

Both Bibi and Barack are good talkers. Reports are that they do not like one another, but they are required to take one another into their considerations. Comics may say that they deserve one another.

Harry Truman told us that politicians are limited social beings “If you want a friend in this town buy a dog.”

Both Bibi and Barack are good at blustering commitments and both have demonstrated how they can back down without admitting defeat.

That is normal politics, here, there, and elsewhere.

*
Sharkansky is professor emeritus of political science at Hebrew University

JERUSALEM–Israel radio announced that The Times of London was accusing Israel of “waging covert war across the Middle East.” The worry was that this would be the start of another campaign to condemn and delegitimize Israel, recruit support for boycotts of its exports and its academics, and arrange arrest warrants for officials and military personnel.

The headline resembles what we heard on the radio, but the article is more descriptive than prescriptive. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article7025821.ece

It speculates about a series of killings that could be ascribed to Israel, and notes the lack of response from Israeli authorities. While it is impossible to predict how Israel-bashers will respond, the article itself contains neither condemnation nor overt criticism.

Another article in the Washington Post may serve to limit a renewed focus on Israel. “Under Obama, more targeted killings than captures in counterterrorism efforts.” http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/02/13/AR2010021303748.html?hpid=topnews
 
The Post article is also descriptive, but may contain more ammunition for critics than the Times article about Israel. The Post details the choices faced by the administration between capture and killing, and indicates that the easier task of killing has the downside of wiping out a possible source of intelligence. It also notes the problems caused by American human rights advocates and the president’s pledge–so far not honored–of closing Guantanamo, and the closing of US military prisons in other countries. Without opportunities to hold suspects under American control but outside the United States, the choice of capture is less attractive. Holding suspects within the United States would subject the process to a range of legal constraints, which was the reason for using Guantanamo and those military and CIA facilities in countries willing to accommodate America’s security needs.

Israel as well as the United States has its opponents to killing the bad guys. Military personnel have said on numerous occasions that they would prefer capture, and getting what they can from the prisoners to help them go after others who are intent on violence, or to locate their stores of munitions. Israel holds some 12,000 Palestinian security prisoners in several facilities. It does not kill lightly. Operational realities often dictate killing rather than capture. On several occasion it has suspended the policy of assassinations, and it has stopped ongoing missions that would endanger numerous civilians. Other missions have killed enough civilians to produce considerable outrage, both locally and overseas.

The Washington Post article, along with reports over the years from Israel, suggest that both countries operate by similar norms. Ranking officers must approve each attack, and may operate under the close control of the highest civilian officials.

A highly critical article of US practice written in response to the Washington Post article indicates that some of the people targeted by the United States are American citizens. Three of them are said to be currently on the list for extermination. According to one official, if ”we think that direct action will involve killing an American, we get specific permission to do that.” http://www.faxts.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=275:rights-legal-experts-slam-targeted-killings-of-us-citizens&catid=1:latest-news&Itemid=121

Similarities between these features of American and Israeli counter-terrorism campaigns raise the question of who learned from who.

Both countries have a long record of assassination. John F. Kennedy is said to have approved the killing of Vietnam President Ngo Dinh Diem, and Richard Nixon is given ultimate responsibility for the death of Chilean president Salvador Allende.

The Washington Post credits George W. Bush with beginning the use of targeted killings as part of his war against terror after 9-11, and says that Barack Obama has increased their use.

To my knowledge, no American president has actually pulled a trigger or pressed a button to produce a targeted killing. Some assign a direct role in the assassination of UN mediator Count Folke Bernadotte to the young  Yitzhak Shamir, who became prime minister 35 years later.

The questions invited by this discussion are:

* Will the United Nations send Richard Goldstone against the United States of America? and

*Will Benyamin Netanyahu receive the Nobel Prize for Peace?

Do not accuse me of naivete. Cynicism maybe.

*
Sharkansky is professor emeritus of political science at Hebrew University.

JERUSALEM–What is amazing about the preoccupation with Israel and Palestine is the certainty with which respectable individuals preach about a problem whose complexity has been pondered for decades, and where fluidity is more prominent than stability.

Even more amazing is the focus of urging change on the one element that is stable, while failing to take account of the instability elsewhere that may run over in several directions with no end in sight.

A prominent recent example of misplaced certainty is an op-ed piece by Roger Cohen in the New York Times. Cohen has a long record of blaming Israel for the problems of the Middle East. He has called for an end to Israeli settlement in the West Bank, and expressed shame for the operation in Gaza that he described as a disastrous case of Israel slaying Palestinian children.

Now he is lamenting that President Obama must do more to honor an election pledge for “new thinking, outreach to the Muslim world, and relentless focus on Israel-Palestine. . . . The conflict gnaws at U.S. security, eats away at whatever remote possibility of a two-state solution is left, clouds Israel’s future, scatters Palestinians and devours every attempt to bridge the West and Islam.”

Cohen realizes that problems among Palestinians contribute their share of the frustrations, but he asserts that President Obama must work harder “to ask such tough questions in public and demand of Israel that it work in practice to share the land rather than divide and rule it.”

If the two-state solution does not work, Cohen is certain that “there will be one state between the river and the sea.”

The one-state solution is a common threat, typically made by the Israeli left and overseas critics who claim that they are friends of Israel, and want to reign it in before it is lost. As Cohen writes of the one state he sees as possible, “very soon there will be more Palestinian Arabs in it than Jews. What then will become of the Zionist dream? http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/12/opinion/12iht-edcohen.html?emc=eta1

The one-state threat illustrates the weakness in many criticisms of Israel. It is more a fantasy than anything that can be extrapolated from realities.

Who would make Israel absorb into itself land and people that do not succeed in achieving statehood. The process would not reflect any natural law of politics that I recognize.

If something must be done with the West Bank, why not urge its absorption into Jordan rather than into Israel? And if something must be done with Gaza, why not Egypt?

The answers to these questions are similar to the answer of Palestine’s absorption into Israel. Israel does not want it any more than Jordan or Egypt want the portions that outsiders would assign to them.

Israel has ample power to say no and to police what it defines as its borders. Its rejection of American demands to make concessions prior to negotiations is only the most recent instance of rebuffing what the elected leadership decided was not in Israel’s best interest.

Israel is the stable element in what had been the British Mandate until 1948, with a history of resisting diplomatic initiatives meant to down-size it, and numerous efforts at violence over the course of 60 years. Israeli settlements have been on the Golan Heights and the West Bank for 40 years, suggesting that they have enough stability to be worked around rather than wished away by anyone thinking seriously of a diplomatic breakthrough.

The instability among Palestinians indicates that pressure on Israel cannot be predicted to produce anything that will appeal to moving cultural and political phenomena that are going who knows in what directions.

Recent revelations of corruption may reverberate, despite the claims of Palestinian political elites that they are nothing but Israeli fabrications.

The latest Economist describes heavy handed efforts of Fatah to impose its control on the mosques of the West Bank, as well as declining support for Hamas in Gaza. The newspaper shows no confidence for knowing who will emerge on top.
http://www.economist.com/world/middleeast-africa/displayStory.cfm?story_id=15503327
http://www.economist.com/world/middleeast-africa/displayStory.cfm?story_id=15491292 

The West Bank has shown several years of impressive economic growth, attributed to Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, a professional economist (PhD University of Texas-Austin) who returned to Palestine after a career in the U.S. Federal Reserve and World Bank.

Among the unanswered questions:  Will Fayyad survive whatever happens at the summit of Palestinian politics, in the context of corruption, unresolved conflicts between the political and religious leaders, militants affiliated with Fatah and Hamas, and the long delayed national elections?

Will the chronic outmigration of Palestinians continue? Over the years this has nearly emptied the West Bank and Gaza of Christians, and has led numerous Muslims with means to seek their future elsewhere. http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article5910.shtml

While some blame Israel for this migration, others link it to the frustrations created by Palestinian rejectionism, violence, and on-again, off-again promises of national success. Israeli optimists see the migration as relieving pressure from high birth rates for a one-state solution, and reducing the prospects that Jews will lose their large majority in Israel.

Politics is not permanent. However, the current Israeli government is well entrenched. Left of center parties did poorly in the 2009 election, and show no signs of recovering in recent polls. Labor is in danger of splitting against its party leader who joined the Likud-led government as Minister of Defense. Knesset members of the centrist Kadima opposition party may also be splitting into right and left factions. In that context, Prime Minister Netanyahu gains further assurance, even if the right wing of Kadima does not formally join his government.

In all of this, it appears that power holders like Barack Obama and commentators like Roger Cohen should rethink where they apply what pressure they possess, or look elsewhere for a region where their activism would be appropriate.

*

Sharkansky is professor emeritus of political science at Hebrew University.

JERUSALEM–Israel has been unlucky in its neighbors. Prior to the onset of mass migration to Palestine, some of the early activists considered solving the European problem of the Jews in Argentina or East Africa. Then they discovered the sentiments of Jews with stronger religious feelings than their own, and decided that only the Land of Israel could motivate large numbers to move.

It is not possible to rethink history. Israel has been a success, despite the screams of European and American barbarians when its officials come on invitation to speak at their universities. From poverty, mass migration of refugees, hunger and chronic threat of violence it has become an impressive military and economic force. Despite outlays on security three or more times those of other democracies proportional to the economy, the country’s per capita resources rank it 23rd in the world, higher than Spain, New Zealand, Greece, Portugal, and Saudi Arabia.
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/eco_gro_nat_inc_percap-gross-national-income-per-capita

Unfortunately, the latest news from the West Bank (i.e., the better half of Palestine) indicates once again that the neighbors are far from the brightest spot.

Yesterday a man who had been appointed by President Mahmoud Abbas to expose corruption made a public report of what he called partial findings. It included documented cases of money being siphoned off by senior officials, including at least one member of the president’s family, from aid received from the United States and European donor countries. Estimates are that some 10 percent of $10 billion in aid has ended in personal bank accounts. The man charged with exposing corruption also produced a video clip of the President’s senior adviser in flagrante delicto with a woman said to be his secretary. An earlier release of that video led to the firing of the corruption investigator. Now he is threatening to release a full report if President Abbas did not move against corruption.

President Abbas did move in response to the report. His aides charged that the publicity was the work of Israelis intent on scuttling the peace process. They ordered the arrest of the official appointed to expose corruption, at least partly for the crime of selling land to Jews.

The man in question lives in East Jerusalem, where Palestinian police have no authority. But he is pessimistic enough to have purchased a cemetery plot.
http://www.jpost.com/MiddleEast/Article.aspx?ID=168327
http://www.jpost.com/MiddleEast/Article.aspx?id=167194

So far the Israeli reaction to the revelations of corruption is closer to a ho hum than oy gevalt.

There has been more official comment about the killing of an Israeli in the West Bank by an officer of Palestinian security forces. Israeli officials in West Bank communities and a Knesset member from a right wing nationalist party blame the killing on gestures toward the Palestinians like removing roadblocks. According to them, there is no future in a peace process when Palestinians given arms and sworn to uphold law and order become terrorists. They accuse Netanyahu of sacrificing the lives of Jews for the illusion of a peace process. In this case, however, the victim was an Arab sergeant in the IDF, who was stabbed to death while sitting in a military vehicle.

Ongoing is violence in the Arab neighborhood of Shoafat, across a main road on the northern edge of our neighborhood French Hill. Some 45,000 people live in what had been a refugee camp, now within the municipal boundaries of Jerusalem but almost entirely outside the reach of Israeli police, tax collectors, and other authorities. Shoafat has been left to its own devices, provided services by the United Nations organization, UNRWA. Now for better or worse, the present city administration, along with the national police, seems intent on collecting property tax, value added tax, enforcing court orders, and arresting troublemakers. For more than two days Shoafat has been a scene of stone throwing, arrests, and injuries. Palestine National officials are charging aggression, and saying that Israeli actions are yet another element that will doom the prospects of peace.

Not to worry. The tragedy of an Arab Israeli family and commotion in Shoafat will not derail the peace process. That is more likely to result from Palestinian intransigence,  Palestinian fear of retribution from extremists if they compromise any of their iconic goals, or Israeli fatigue at the emptiness of the ritual . . .

Or all of the above.

*
Sharkansky is professor emeritus of political science at Hebrew University.

Jerusalem–Sarah Palin is still with us. “Us” is appropriate, insofar as any American presidential prospect must provoke concern here and elsewhere. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/02/06/AR2010020603264.html?nav=rss_email/components

“Concern” is a neutral word. My guess is that Israelis who applauded George W. Bush are warming their hands at the prospect of a Palin presidency.

I am less than enthusiastic, but I am not surprised at the support she has. Different sex, skin color, and politics than Barack Obama, but in other respects a clone. Just as Obama differed in color and politics from GWB, but was a clone in the same ways as Palin resembles him. Not too long ago, Jimmy Carter was in the same category.

Photogenic, articulate, demagogic, inexperienced, and naive about the postures that make them attractive candidates. Electable, but not likely to make the world or the United States better places.

Other democracies demand a long apprenticeship for their national leaders. Typically the ladder goes from local or regional office to the back bench of a party delegation in the national legislature, to a gradual climb through minor ministerial appointments to candidacy for party leadership.

Americans claim to admire democracy. Commentary about the president’s health reform also features the assertion that Americans know what is good for them, in contrast with Europeans held slaves to their governments and high taxes. In the same cultural mix are assertions that political parties have too much power; that the right policies will come from good people who think primarily about the national interest.

This an American syndrome: parochial, promoted by people who know little about Europe, think that the more democracy the better, do not recognize the roles of strong parties in imposing discipline on would be demagogues, and think that low taxes are good indicators of personal freedom. I am amazed by what I read about the superiority of the United States, and conclude that the authors have not flown on a European airline, traveled on a European train, driven on a European road, made a serious comparison of European and American health care, elementary or secondary education, statistics for violent crime, or pondered the quality of political debate and living standards that make Europeans at least the equal of Americans on measures of personal freedom and opportunity.  

By some measures the United States is the most democratic country on the planet. Most states allow the people to vote directly for important issues of public policy: whether the government can borrow money or increase taxes, as well as religious issues like same sex marriages and limits on abortion. Most state judges must stand for election, along with those who aspire to numerous offices that in other countries are filled by political party committees, or appointed by senior civil servants concerned with the professional backgrounds of the applicants.

The downsides of the American democracy are extremely low turnouts for almost all electoral contests below those for president, governor, and United States Senator, as well as low turnouts for those key offices when compared to turnouts in other democracies; and the simplification of referenda by people who create the issues, raise money for the campaign, define the wording that is initially the subject of petitions and later on the ballot.

Complexity of the population and procedures have saved the United States from catastrophe. The separation of powers designed by the framers still works to make it easier on those who want to kill a proposal than to pass a law. The consequence is a difficult in keeping up with international standards. Barack Obama’s party has a majority in both Houses of Congress, but not enough of a majority in the Senate to overcome procedural features added over the years to the basic frustrations of legislation created by the separation of powers.

No one should try to make the United States like a Western European democracy. Histories and cultures are different, as are government structures and the rules (formal and informal) of politics. A campaign to insist on more experience for presidential candidates would be condemned as elitist. And if the likes of Jimmy Carter, GW Bush, Barack Obama, and Sarah Palin are any indication, such a campaign would also be un-American.

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Sharkansky is professor emeritus of political science at Hebrew University.

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JERUSALEM–What’s happening in the Middle East?

Nothing.

It doesn’t look that way, with the White House trying one proposal after the other, and virtually every national leader of consequence suggesting how to produce the two state solution.

A bit below the surface, one can find good reasons why none of those directly concerned want anything serious to occur.

Israel does not want to move hundreds of thousands, or tens of thousands of Jews (the numbers depend on which settlements) who have lived where they are for up to 40 years, when no previous movements have brought parallel concessions or a halt in the violence. Israel is also wary of creating a Palestinian state that would be vulnerable to take over by Hamas or groups even more extreme, that would have access to simple rockets fashioned in their workshops and more powerful stuff supplied by Iran, Syria, Sudan, North Korea, or whatever government comes to the fore against western democracies.

For similar reasons, neither Jordan nor Egypt want a Palestinian state with access to serious armaments that could provoke radical ideas among their own Palestinians (a majority in Jordan) or Islamic extremists (problematic in both Jordan and Egypt). Likewise, Lebanese Christians and Sunni Muslims are nervous about what their Shiite neighbors might provoke, and concerned about the Palestinian residents of Lebanon (non-citizens since 1948) demanding rights or instigating action against Israel.

Syria speaks with an angry voice against Israel, but has a record of vicious actions against its own Muslim extremists that rivals what any government in the region has done.

None of the non-Shiite elites in the region have expressed warm endorsement of what might come from a refurbished Persian Empire.

What all the leaders of these countries want, more than anything else, is quiet at home.

One might also put the ostensible Palestinian leaders of the West Bank in the same camp. They are hanging on to office and perks with the help of Israeli, Jordanian, and American security personnel, and know the popular resentment that is seething under their feet. Any concessions necessary to entice Israel to an agreement could provoke enough resentment to topple them.

Hamas of Gaza also wants to keep hold of what they have. One notes their claim that they always aimed their rockets at military targets and apologize for Israel’s civilian casualties. Nonsense, to be sure, but it may gain them a point in international forums stacked to support whatever they say.

The major outlier in this description of nothing-supporters is the Obama White House. It departed from the modest efforts of its predecessors to bring about change, and their more  typical acceptance of the status quo between Israel and Palestinians. The loud efforts of Obama and crew might actually have nudged the participants to possible negotiations further apart from one another.

Europeans are inclined to follow the American lead, especially on issues that do not commit them to much. Recently they have joined the parade of visitors to Israel and Palestine saying in public what the Americans are saying in public.

Obama is naive but not stupid. He is admitting that he made some errors in his initial overtures with respect to Israel, Palestine, and their neighbors. One should not expect him to endorse the platform of nothing, but he may retreat quietly and focus on other issues. That will bring him close to what most of his predecessors did, most of the time.

The appeal of nothing may not last. There is no permanence in politics. But politics gravitates to what is easy, and usually avoids the risky and heroic. For the time being (which will last who knows how long), let’s hear a cheer, or at least see a quiet nod, in favor of nothing. It works for us all.

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Sharkansky is professor emeritus of political science at Hebrew University.

Now I am pleased to identify a significant departure from public sector stinginess. The American representative to the Palestine National Authority–Daniel Rubinstein–traveled to Bethlehem and announced another U.S. contribution, this time of $40 million, to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA). According to the Palestine News Agency, “The United States is UNRWA’s largest bilateral donor. In 2009, the United States provided over $267 million to UNRWA, including $116.2 million to its General Fund, $119.5 million to its West Bank/Gaza emergency programs, $30 million to emergency programs in Lebanon, and $2.2 million to assist other Palestinians in the region.” Other Palestinians in the region are mostly those in Syria and Jordan. http://english.wafa.ps/?action=detail&id=13712

Yet another positive note in the story is the openness of the State Department to people with a name like Daniel Rubinstein. The 1940s was a long time ago.

Close to last in aid to its own citizens but first in aid to Palestinians is a mark of some distinction, but not clearly a positive mark. If any people demonstrate the folly of excessive public support it is Palestinians who have lived off their claim of being refugees through four generations and 60 years.

One can argue without end about the facts and the morality as the British Mandate for Palestine became Israel. Who did what, and who rejected what compromises are questions in the dustbin of history, along with who is responsible for African slavery, and which group may claim ownership over each part of North and South America, Europe, Asia, Africa and other places where migrations and bloody conquests began long before recorded history, and continued through much of the history that has been recorded. One can ponder the responsibility of Arab countries and the United Nations, along with Palestinians themselves and Israel for the maintenance of the refugee phenomenon. While individual Palestinians have left the camps and done well, UNRWA remains a vital part of Palestinian lives and international politics. Dependence is the name of the game, for the organization, the refugees, the politicians of Palestine and those of other countries who accuse only Israel of responsibility.

There is no better demonstration of the American mantra that aid breeds weakness, and cuts off individual initiative before it can develop.

The paralysis of initiative appears in politicians’ efforts to deal with the dispute, as well as the help me lethargy in the neighborhoods still called refugee camps. Palestinian leaders have learned only the language of demand and expectation. It is for Israel to make concessions, and for other countries to pressure Israel. The Palestinian narrative–supported by numerous others–is that Israel has a monopoly of blame and Palestine a monopoly of justice. Nothing offered to the Palestinians has ever been enough, and we are hard pressed to cite a concession Palestinian officials have offered to Israelis in their numerous meetings.

On the same day that I read about the latest American government donation to UNRWA I received an article from a professional journal reflecting the toughness of some Americans toward their own people. The subject is the cost of emergency service for
“Individuals who Necessitate Their Own Rescue.” That is, people who through carelessness or ignorance get themselves into situations where it is dangerous and expensive to extract them. The article ponders the legal, moral, and administrative issues involved. It notes that there are states and localities that may charge for rescue, but “Charge-for-rescue policies are a bad idea.” http://www.bepress.com/jhsem/vol7/iss1/2/?sending=10901

Israelis are familiar with the problem. Most common are overseas tourists and ultra-Orthodox youths who wander unprepared into the desert, go off the marked trails, fall into ravines, or suffer from dehydration. On our hikes we have encountered well dressed women trying to clamber down rocky slopes in high heels, and young men dressed for the study hall, without water bottles and obviously uncomfortable in the sun. During each season of flash floods there are people who try to drive through torrents that cover desert roads and must be rescued. Sending a military helicopter to such cases, or picking a lost hiker from a ravine costs the IDF thousands of dollars per hour. Politicians have raised the question of demanding payment from the careless, but none has dealt with the administrative problems or the opposition.

I recall stories from the United States of fire brigades that depend on subscriptions, refusing to fight a fire destroying the home of an owner who has not paid the dues. Should a helicopter crew refuse to pluck a survivor who cannot pay on the spot, has no receipt from rescue insurance, or left the credit card at home? Perhaps Americans can be more creative and persistent than Israelis in solving the problem.

If the person in distress could claim Palestinian status, the payment might come out of the next United States allocation to UNRWA. And will non-Palestinian welfare families be far behind?

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Sharkanksy is professor emeritus of political science at Hebrew University

JERUSALEM–Money, money everywhere, but not enough. That’s the message from the massive deficit already apparent and projected for the United States. It comes from too many wars, too many tax cuts, too many entitlement programs, and too much exploitation by highly paid capitalists who forced the government into unprecedented bail-outs. Who’s to blame is problematic. Any quest for responsibility will produce a political dog fight that worsens the chances of getting cooperation to deal with it.

A newspaper headline captures the strategic threat, “Huge Deficits May Alter U.S. Politics and Global Power.” http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/02/us/politics/02deficit.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

At stake is the war on terror, health reform, tax and spending leverages to increase employment, along with prosaic domestic programs that are suffering on account of financial problems among states and localities. There is also a prospect of Chinese influence on American policy due to government bonds they have acquired from selling consumer and industrial goods to Americans, Europeans and others. The same changes in international commerce have also brought about the closing of factories throughout countries where shopping is a favored pastime.

It is too early to write finish to the power of North America and Europe. The Chinese cannot unload their bonds without reducing their value, and hurting themselves along with the United States. America and Europe are wealthy, and may be wise enough to avoid disaster. Yet signs of trouble include the interruption of medical evacuations from Haiti to the United States due to arguments as to which institutions would pay for treatment, and the president’s comments that the country could not afford an endless war in Afghanistan, a country his experts warned was unrepairable.

The dismay over deficits may be more important for the prospect of health reform than the loss of a Massachusetts Senate seat. The country with the best medical facilities in the world may continue to have them unavailable to much of its population. Large numbers will get only emergency treatment in public hospitals, and others who think they have paid for decent care will suffer the stinginess of insurance companies.

While avoiding the temptation of indicating which president or which bloc of Congress has contributed what portion to the deficit, it is useful to identify some traits of the United States that contribute to its problem.

The financial problems of the United States (national, state, and local governments) suffer from taxes that are lower than those of other western democracies, as well as from the costs of its overseas commitments. Americans concerned to deal with their deficits should not focus on their domestic programs, which generally are less generous than those of other democracies.

Wealth may be the single most important factor responsible for American prominence in international conflicts. Resources per capita in the United States are lower than in Luxembourg, Norway, Switzerland, Ireland, Denmark, Iceland, The Netherlands, and Sweden, suggesting that the average individual in those countries is better off than the average American. However, the American population is larger, and the overall wealth of the United States is greater than those countries. This gives the American government leverage not possessed by others. Military power derives from the total wealth of the United States, as well as its being the greatest surviving western power at the end of World War II, and then one of the two major players in the Cold War.

Being the lone superpower left standing in 1990 invited endless appeals for assistance, and made the United States the most attractive target for those whose targets are capitalism, individualism, the rich, and the non-Muslim. The World Trade Center fell as a result of the second attack on the icon of all that was viewed to be evil. The Gulf War of 1991 was a prelude to major military investments, largely American, in the area from Iraq eastward and southward. Iran’s animosity to the United States dates from intense opposition to the friends of the Shah and the hostage taking of 1979-81. It does not seem to be diminishing under the Obama effort at engagement.

The prominence of the United States, as opposed to that of Britain, France, Germany, or Russia in international politics is not only a product of wealth and military power. The structure of American government also has made its contribution to the role the country has chosen for itself. The separation of power, and the competition between Congress and the presidency adds to the heroic defense of national values not so apparent in the parliamentary regimes of Europe. The unity between executive and legislature may facilitate the willingness to accommodate hostile forces, most apparent in going along with Muslim and Third World demands in the United Nations, or abstaining alongside American nays.

Somewhere in the American mix is the power of the Jewish lobby. One must be careful of exaggerating. It is far from dominant. Insofar as Israel is often a target of Muslim and other Third World countries, however, Jewish influence in Congress and the White House is among the factors responsible for United States vetoes in the Security Council, and votes against resolutions in the General Assembly and other UN organs where European governments are generally not as outspoken.

While on the subject of Jews, it is appropriate to continue with the advantages of a country that is beleaguered, but also small and limited in its responsibilities. Israel devotes three or four times the percentage of its resources to security as the United States, and has suffered perhaps 10 times the casualties on a proportional basis since World War II, but it has advantages that the American giant can envy. While American troops fight from bases on every continent but Australia and Antartica, Israel’s military operations are restricted to a couple of hundred miles from the center of its country, plus the occasional operation further afield. The cultures and languages of America’s  enemies are beyond the ken of its intelligence capabilities, while Israel has operated throughout its history with agents in places not so foreign to those who direct and analyze the gathering of intelligence. Israel can get credit for the quick dispatch of a few well trained people, with appropriate equipment to Haiti and other disaster areas. The United States starts slower, but does the heavy lifting of prolonged care and the refurbishing of infrastructure. Israel’s airport and national airline led the world in security, but they deal with a smaller number of flights than those at a sizable American or European airport, and need not bother with inflated demands to treat every passenger as posing the same risk. Israeli security personnel pay less attention to aged Jews than to young Arabs.

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JERUSALEM — Here is something that President Obama and his advisers should consider before spending any more of their time nudging Israeli and Palestinian leaders to negotiate a peace.

http://www.jpost.com/MiddleEast/Article.aspx?id=167194

The details are not entirely clear, but reinforce the larger story of corruption in high places of the Palestine Authority, the lack of popular confidence in the Authority among Palestinians, and the likelihood that Hamas would take over the West Bank if Mahmoud Abbas and his people were not propped up by Israel, Jordan, and the United States.

The article resembles what I heard from a lecturer at a Palestinian university who visited me at the Hebrew University. The lecturer’s biography featured numerous consulting activities with Palestinian companies and public authorities that had been financed by European and North American governments. When I probed the details and asked if any of the consulting had produced improvements in administration, the answer was negative. My visitor confirmed my impression that a great deal of foreign aid given to Palestine does nothing but provide employment for a few Palestinians. The article in the Jerusalem Post indicates that a fair amount of the aid ends up in the overseas bank accounts of Palestinian officials. It is more public relations for the donors than anything that helps to develop the Authority. “Is the Authority a serious entity?” I asked my visitor. The answer again was negative.

Other news includes revelations from ranking Palestinians of what they claim Ehud Olmert offered close to the end of his service as prime minister, and what the Palestinians rejected. The acceptance of one thousand refugees from 1948 was not enough to justify a response. Neither was what Olmert offered with respect to transferring neighborhoods of Jerusalem to Palestine, and other territorial swaps. The Palestinians were not willing to accept Israel’s control of Maale Adumim, a suburb of Jerusalem where 30,000 Jews have made their homes.

We cannot be sure about the above details, insofar as disinformation is as much a part of Israel-Palestine relationships as it is of other political feelers that may be preparing the road for serious negotiations, or preparing the way to avoid negotiations. However, they fit the image of an Authority that is more comic opera, or Greek tragedy, than serious entity.

The best guess is that Palestinians are willing to turn the clock back to 1967, 1948, or 1947–depending on who is talking–but not to engage in their share of concessions in order to end the dispute.

So what should Israel do? And what should be the posture of the Obama administration?

Nothing is the answer appropriate to both questions.

The Palestinian leadership–whether the corrupt figures who claim to be in charge of the West bank or the religious fanatics in Gaza–are not appropriate managers of a state alongside Israel. They may continue to manage what they have, but Israelis do not want them to acquire the authority to import arms and formulate international agreements appropriate to a state.

Doing nothing appears to be the policy of the current Israeli government, learned from the frustrations of negotiations in 2000 and 2008. Israelis do offer lip service about their willingness to negotiate, and to make certain concessions, as befits a supplicant of the United States. Israelis might be gaining a point or two among friendly audiences from the hardening of Palestinian demands as conditions for beginning negotiations.

Insofar as Obama is Obama, we can expect a continuation of efforts, tweaking this way and that, in the hope that something will produce flexibility from Israeli and/or Palestinian leaders. Think of Obama as Sisyphus, and the prospect of getting that rock to the top of the hill.

As far as Israel is concerned, the stand-off is harmless. It is as secure as it has ever been. Iran looms, but no matter what the Iranians claim as their concern for Palestine, their nuclear efforts are beyond the parameters of Israel’s dispute with Palestinians. The stand-off is also harmless for most Palestinians of the West Bank. As long as extremists remain quiet, or neutralized, economic development can continue. Gaza is something else, but the people voted for Hamas and many cheered the rockets being sent toward Israel. Neither the German negotiator concerned with Gilad Shalit nor Egyptians concerned to resolve the disputes between Hamas and Fatah have produced any flexibility that is apparent. Egypt is concerned with the spread of Hamas’ enthusiasm to its own extremists, and is constructing barriers meant to frustrate smuggling of arms and other material into Gaza.

We remain with the problem of Barack Obama’s itch for achievement, and for that there is no solution on the horizon.

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Sharkansky is professor emeritus of political science at Hebrew University

JERUSALEM–One of my internet friends objects to my calling Europe the enlightened continent.

There are problems, both within Europe and in the actions–or lack of actions–that European governments are willing to take toward others. Yet a superficial look at history justifies the most positive of adjectives.

Until 1945, warfare, rigid class lines, and limited personal opportunities were the prominent traits of Europe. Thanks largely to the United States, but with no little help from Britain and the Soviet Union, the worst ended for Western Europe. The results were a gradual emergence of the European Community, the refurbishing of German universities that had dropped from the peak to the bottom of intellectual prestige during the Nazi period, the opening of new universities throughout Western Europe, the lowering of class barriers, as well as a single currency, free migration, and decent social policies throughout much of the continent.

Bargaining and vote trading, rather than saber rattling is now the medium of exchange among governments. The institutions of the Community are no more perfect than the United States Congress, and European bureaucrats are not clearly better or worse than those of the United States or the individual European governments. Individuals and organizations complain and mobilize their forces, but the language is politics rather than war.  

Sections of European cities have been made unpleasant by migrations from Muslim countries and other places where limited opportunities provide the push that used to send migrants from Western Europe to North and South America. Currently nine Western European countries score higher than the United States on a widely used measure of economic well being, and all countries of Western Europe score as more egalitarian than the United States. There are also European advantages in lower rates of violent crime and longer life expectancy, as well as more effective ways of providing medical care.

The United States remains attractive. The flow of migrants from Latin America, as well as from Africa and Muslim countries testifies to that, with social problems similar to those in Western Europe, as well as the benefits of many hands to do the dirty work that “natives” (whoever they are) do not want for themselves..

Has Europe’s anathema to conflict gotten in the way of appropriate efforts to save the world from evil? It is Russia and China, rather than Western European governments, that have most clearly dragged their feet on sanctions against Iran. France and other European governments opposed the Bush invasion of Iraq, on the ground that sanctions had limited Saddam’s aggressive capacities. Remember the American response, which included the renaming of “French fries?”

Insofar as several years of assiduous looking turned up no stocks of weapons of mass destruction, one can say that the Europeans were wiser than Americans with respect to Iraq. And the same Europeans have been less than supportive of Bush and now Obama in their efforts to occupy and reform Afghanistan. Until Iraq and Afghanistan (as well as Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia) turn a corner toward stability and democracy, one should be chary of concluding that the Americans were right and the Europeans wrong.

What to do?

It would be great to ratchet down the excess patriotism, and to add a bit of modesty to the anyone’s aspirations for leadership. The world is complex, with both evil and poverty. Neither Europeans nor Americans have the key to Paradise. Israelis are fated to maneuver between demands coming from powers greater than themselves. They are strong enough to respond in part, and to obfuscate where necessary.

So where are the most enlightened? I know of no summary measure. Neither do I know a cure for those who insist that it is them.

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Sharkansky is professor emeritus of political science at Hebrew University

By Ira Sharkansky

JERUSALEM–Media in Israel and overseas have described in the most positive of terms the aid that a team of IDF and Magan David Adom (Red Star of David) personnel have provided in Haiti. An article in the New York Times adds to the praise, but also reports on Israelis who lament that their country does not do next door in Gaza what it does across the ocean in Haiti.

It would be a surprise if there were not such Israelis. It is an argumentative society, where any view held by a majority or anything more than a tiny minority is an open invitation to dispute. The left wing remains active, even if recent election results and polls indicate that its numbers are in the realm of the insignificant. The resignation from the Knesset of one left wing member of the Labor Party, and the announcement of another that she would not enter her party’s next primary are further signals that their slice of the polity is in extremis.

Left-wing Meretz currently has three members in Knesset and left-of-center Labor 13. Both are historic lows for those parties. A poll has shown Labor likely to drop to six members. Critics who remain within its Knesset delegation have been quieted by the futility of their protests against party leader and Defense Minister Ehud Barak.

If the left is well represented anywhere, it is in the op-ed page of the prestigious Ha’aretz, which supplied some of the material quoted in the New York Times article about Israelis who lament the lack of aid to Gaza. The left also remains lively in the social science and humanities faculties of the universities. One of my friends and political science colleagues was quoted in a recent headline–again in Ha’aretz–criticizing the decision of the Defense Minister to advance the status of a college located in the West Bank settlement of Ariel.

Each weekend for the last year or two, Israeli activists (some of them claiming the label of anarchists) along with Palestinians and colleagues from overseas have demonstrated against a segment of the security barrier near the village of Bilin. Initially they sought to prevent the construction of the barrier, and now they try to dismantle it. Every weekend we hear how many were arrested or injured by the army, and how many soldiers were injured by the demonstrators. Some of the same people, or those who think like them, have demonstrated, been arrested, and have protested their arrest in an Arab neighborhood of Jerusalem, where their target is a structure that a number of Jews claim as their own.

I have no data to judge the incidence of Israelis who lament that their country does not do in Gaza what it does in Haiti. There has not been coverage of any such protest on the prime time discussion program that I have watched, or the radio talk shows I have heard since the earthquake.

There was a segment of the discussion program that coupled a retired senior officer of police and the leader of an Israeli civil rights organization who was arrested for demonstrating against the Jews who have moved into the Arab neighborhood. Their quarrel focused on the right of demonstration, as well as the activist’s assertions against ownership by Jews of a disputed building. The police officer said that the activist had been arrested because his behavior was not as dignified during the demonstration as it was in the television studio.

It appears to me that the New York Times correspondent was going beyond political realities when he wrote:

. . .  Israelis have been watching with a range of emotions, as if the Haitian relief effort were a Rorschach test through which the nation examines itself. The left has complained that there is no reason to travel thousands of miles to help those in need — Gaza is an hour away. The right has argued that those who accuse Israel of inhumanity should take note of its selfless efforts and achievements in Haiti.

His introductory paragraph is closer to what I have perceived, i.e., a pride in the activity and attention given to Israelis in Haiti, without linking it to domestic quarrels.

The editorial cartoon in Thursday’s mass-circulation Israeli newspaper Yediot Aharonot showed American soldiers digging among the ruins of Haiti. From within the rubble, a voice calls out, “Would you mind checking to see if the Israelis are available?”

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Sharkansky is professor emeritus of political science at Hebrew University

JERUSALEM — Israel is usually in the headlines about war, terror, great power efforts to make peace, or some other bloody or politically charged issue. This note is not about any of that exciting stuff, but deals with the way others and Israelis often view themselves. That may have something to do with having the world’s most popular publication assign us the label of Chosen People living in what the same book calls God’s Promised Land. Extremism is the language in dealing with Israel. Adversaries or our own domestic critics think it is the worst, and some friends consider it only a small measure removed from Paradise.

Recently some ranking officials of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development visited Israel to wrap up the country’s application for membership. The OECD is a prestigious organization, arguably of the world’s best countries, growing out of the reconstruction of Europe after World War II. Israel is expected to join within the coming months, and that will add another mark of distinction to a place thought by many to be a pariah.

What has marked the visit of OECD dignataries is their statements that Israel would be the poorest member, as well as most marked by inequality between its well-to-do and poor. The allegations have been repeated by left of center Israeli politicians, including the distinguished economist and former university president, Avishay Braverman, who is serving as a minister in the government with responsibility for minorities. Braverman appeared on a discussion program to assert that he would work to assure the entry of Israel to the OECD, and would press his colleagues in the government to allocate more resources to the underprivileged Arab sector. Joining him on the program was a prominent Arab Member of Knesset. Mohammed Barake discounted Braverman’s promises, and demanded that the OECD suspend Israel’s membership application on account of its discrimination against Arabs.

Even a minister from the right-of-center Likud signed on to the claims that Israel would be the poorest and least equal of the OECD members. Or maybe this minister was seeking to get something for his education portfolio in the discussion about membership. Gideon Sa’ar said that the OECD report was a reflection of the reality of Israel’s society. 

“Investment in human capital and higher education is the future of Israel . . .We are going to make every effort to improve teacher skills and qualifications and ease the entry and participation in education for the Arab and haredi sector.”
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1263147943073&agename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

Sounds good, insofar as it comes from reputable people, but it ain’t so.

Israel would be neither the poorest nor the least egalitarian of the OECD members. Data from the World Bank indicate that on a common measure–Gross Domestic Product per capita–Israel scores wealthier than existing OECD members Portugal, the Czech Republic, South Korea, the Slovak Republic, Hungary, Poland, Turkey, and Mexico. On a common measure of income equality (Gini coefficient), it scores more egalitarian than OECD members Turkey, United States, and Mexico, and the Gini coefficients for Portugal and Japan are only fractionally in the direction of greater income equality than Israel’s.

The distinguished people who comment inaccurately on Israel’s poverty and inequality make more sense when they speak about other traits of the country. They emphasize that the ultra-Orthodox and Arab minorities are poorer than the average. That is true, but both owe some of their poverty to themselves and the politicians who represent them. The ultra-Orthodox volunteer for poverty. The men avoid work for prolonged study of religious texts. Their families live on the incomes of wives as teachers or in other low-paid occupations, and the payment of poverty-level stipends to mature yeshiva students and child allowances for their large families. These payments–and the continued abstention of ultra-Orthodox men from the workforce–reflect the importance of ultra-Orthodox parties for government coalitions.

Arab family incomes are actually closer to those of the Jewish majority than are comparable figures for minorities and majorities in the United States. That is not a great compliment for Israeli egalitarianism, insofar as the United States is a prominent outlier among wealthy countries, noted for its lack of equality. Statistics from the Central Intelligence Agency rank the United States close to the Philippines, Uganda, Jamaica, Uruguay, Cameroon, the Ivory Coast, Iran and Nigeria, and far from Western European democracies on the conventional measure of income equality.https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/rankorder/rawdata_2172.text

Israel’s Arabs might gain a larger share of the country’s opportunities if the parties that most of them vote for learned the political game of going along to get along. Instead of trading their 11 votes in the Knesset for their constituents’ benefits, the Arab parties continue to stand united in opposition to whoever is in the government. Severe criticism rather than cooperation is the name of their game. For someone who sees the trading of political support for benefits as the key of civilization, the Arabs who vote for those parties get what they deserve.

Some of you have ridiculed my claim that Israel is a normal country. You are partly right. Thanks to those who would sanctify or demonize it, Israel is different from other countries. But if you look at reputable statistics, most extreme claims pro or con prove to be false. The most prominent indicators that show it to be abnormal are that 80 percent of the population is Jewish, and that it allocates two or three times the proportion of its resources to defense compared to other western democracies. The defense indicator reflects the chronic aggression threatened by Israel’s neighbors, which makes them far less normal than Israel itself.

And if any of you object to my designation of Israel as a western democracy, go read something else.

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Sharkansky is professor emeritus of political science at Hebrew University.