A recent law obligating military service on religious Yeshiva students reveals the inherent flaw in Israel’s claim to be Jewish
An earlier version of this article has appeared on AlterNet
Prime Minister David Cameron got more than he expected at the Israeli Knesset in his last visit, receiving a cold shoulder from ultra-Orthodox and Palestinian legislators who share common interests, being the state’s most oppressed communities. Cameron’s visit to the Knesset took place on the same day that two controversial laws, the Conscription Law and the Governability Law, were finally approved following a prolonged legislative battle. As Prime Minister Netanyahu welcomed the guest of honour the ultra-Orthodox parliamentariansleft the plenary session in protest while their colleagues, Palestinian Members of the Knesset, refused to attend the event altogether. This was the culmination point of several months of heated protest over the Conscription Law which brought to the surface contradictions between Zionism and Judaism.
Hundreds of thousands of ultra-Orthodox Jews (Haredim) of all denominations took to the streets of Jerusalem to oppose the draft law several days before its legislation. In a mass prayer, the worshippers-protesters declared their faithfulness to Torah study rather than to the military. United under the banner declaring that “the State of Israel is fighting against the Kingdom of Heaven” they held signs stating that military draft is a spiritual suicide. The event was not merely an opposition to the law but nothing short of a battle cry against the very legitimacy of a state that encroaches upon their spiritual autonomy and poses a danger to their religious liberty.
Under the slogan “Equality in the Burden” both religious-Zionist Naftali Bennett and secular-Zionist Yair Lapid were elected and became the two largest coalition partners of a Haredi-free government. The campaign called for the forced conscription of the ultra-Orthodox and garnered wide support from the Israeli public. Unlike the purist Edah HaHaredit group which prohibits its members from partaking in, voting and receiving funds from the Zionist state, the Haredi rabbinical councils which called for the mass protest have their elected representatives at the Knesset. They all walked out of the plenum stating that Netanyahu is an enemy to their religion, yet this did not stop the Prime Minister from addressing Cameron in his welcoming speech by saying “David, welcome to the City of David and to the Jewish Knesset”.
The law enforces an incrementally growing annual quota of ultra-Orthodox students to be drafted, reaching 5,200 by 2017. Religious schools that would send their students to the military will receive financial incentives but in case the goal is not met, a draft for all the ultra-Orthodox would be imposed and financial sanctions implemented. The ultra-Orthodox argue that sanctioning and criminalizing students of the Torah proves that the State of Israel cannot possibly be regarded as being Jewish. The Law’s initiators, Lapid and Bennett, along with Prime Minister Netanyahu, were subsequently depicted in an animated film as they physically abuse a Haredi Jew and place him behind bars.
People of the book, not people of the rifle
The forced conscription of the ultra-Orthodox into an army that is foreign to their culture is deemed by the Haredim as a Zionist attempt to destroy their millennia-old tradition of Jewish learning. The draft law has therefore achieved the rare feat of uniting all non-Zionist religious streams of the Sephardic, Ashkenazi, Hassidic and Lithuanian communities who are currently working together in an emergency action committee. Following the massive Jerusalem demonstration, an immense protest of over 150,000 people took place in the United States, which united all major ultra-Orthodox Jewish denominations. Yet, the law achieved more than simply uniting the Haredi groups but has also allowed for the more radical voices, like the Mahara Satmar Rabbi, to gain dominance. While the initial call for protest referenced the word “Israel,” the Satmar Rabbi conditioned his support on omitting it and managed to convince all other Rabbis to re-sign an amended declaration that will not give an ounce of legitimacy to the Zionist state.
While the religious Zionists see serving in the IDF as a holy obligation, the ultra-Orthodox believe that living according to the Torah and serving God is the ultimate goal of Jewish life. Recent days have displayed a clear divide between the latter and the religious Zionists as the Haredi paper Hamodia referred to religious Zionists in terms unused before, such as “collaborators with Satan,” “deeply messianic” and “worshippers of the state.”
Religious nationalism, a contradiction in terms
Appalled by the statement of the revered Haredi rabbinical councils, claiming that the State of Israel is an enemy to the religion of Israel, Rabbi Haim Druckman, spiritual leader of Bennett’s nationalist Jewish Home party, instructed his students not to attend the massive gathering. For the ultra-Orthodox, such a rabbi objecting to a gathering for prayer exposes the inherent flaw in religious Zionism whereby, to put it bluntly, the state is worshipped rather than the Almighty.
In response, an op-ed in the Haredi newspaper Yated Ne’eman took the harsh and unusual step of publishing Rabbi Druckman’s name while omitting the title “Rabbi”. Ultra-Orthodox Knesset member Aryeh Deri referred to Jewish Home member Ayelet Shaked, chairwoman of the draft law committee, as a “traitor of Judaism,” “the Jewish Home and Ayelet Shaked did not [only] betray the Haredim, they have betrayed the Torah.”
This unholy union of Zionism and religion is what mainstream Israeli society perceives as the Jewish identity. Yet, the ultra-Orthodox perspective is that Zionism is nothing short of an aberration of Judaism, insisting that Zionism goes against Judaism while claiming to speak on its behalf. The late Prof. Leibowitz, an Orthodox scholar, philosopher and a proponent of separation between state and religion, explained that: “Religious nationalism is to religion what National Socialism is to socialism. National Socialism is not socialism but its opposite and likewise religious nationalism is not religion but its opposite.”
Boycotting the state, saving Judaism
Opposition to Zionism is not new to the ultra-Orthodox. From its very first days, the Zionist movement was strongly condemned by almost all traditional Rabbis in Palestine and throughout the world, who prohibited any Jew from embracing Zionism. As a result, Zionist ideology took hold almost exclusively among secular Jews, i.e. those of a Jewish ethnicity rather than religion.
While talks were underway concerning the future of Jerusalem, Rabbi Dushinsky, the leader of the 60,000 people strong Haredi community in the city, expressed his definite opposition to the Zionist movement and its attempt to expropriate the holy city of Jerusalem. He claimed that religious Jews have not the slightest intention of subjugating the local Arab population. Even earlier, in the years following the Balfour Declaration, Dr. Jacob Israel de Haan who acted on behalf of Rabbi Sonnenfeld, saw the Arabs as natural allies against the Zionist project and met Arab leaders accompanied by the Rabbi, in order to protect their religious autonomy under Arab rule rather than accepting an alien Zionist governance.
Merely a day before embarking for Britain to address the British government, as a part of a delegation which expresses its staunch opposition to the Balfour Declaration, de Haan was assassinated outside the Sha’are Zedek synagogue where he attended the afternoon prayer. The assassins confessed to receiving orders from the top Zionist leadership at the time, including Yitzhak Ben-Tzvi who later became the second president of the State of Israel. It is speculated that David Ben-Gurion was also involved in the decision making.According to Avraham Tehomi, one of the assassins, de Haan was marked for execution due to his meeting with King Hussein and Emir Abdullah (who, according to several oral testimonies), promised unlimited Jewish migration to Palestine in return for renouncing exclusive national ambitions. Following the murder, it was the Zionist Jewish Agency which in turn limited Jewish immigration into Palestine by choosing to provide ‘certificates’ only for Zionist Jews, even during the Holocaust.
While most secular Israelis detest the Haredim, rare stems of solidarity have recently appeared from the almost negligible number of progressive Israelis. The group Democracy or Rebellion claims that a state that denies civil equality and minority rights has no democratic virtue. In its activities it also reaches out to the ultra-Orthodox community and had posted its message of solidarity on the walls of Me’ah She’arim in Jerusalem as well as demonstrating their support in Tel-Aviv.
A whole new discourse is now emerging within the Haredi community. Some call for a political re-alignment with progressive parties and even with elements on the radical left. Others call to boycott the settlements and their produce, while a growing number of rabbis call on Jews abroad to boycott and divest from Israel at large. One Hassidic group went as far as making plans to migrate en masse to the US, seeking political refuge there with the assistance of American senators.
Neither Jewish nor democratic
During Cameron’s visit at the Knesset, Prime Minister Netanyahu’s speech focused on four points. He declared that the boycott is racist, that Jews have religious-nationalist rights to the land and that indigenous Palestinians hardly existed before the Zionist colonization of the land. Aside of the fact that these claims are patently false, a more rational and humane approach would be to propose an end to the criminal policies leading to boycotts, insisting on equality between Jews and non-Jews and acknowledging the rights of all indigenous people.
Finally, Netanyahu argued that the Balfour Declaration validates Zionist exclusive rights over the land and that this is the will of Jews worldwide. The declaration states, however, that “nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine” and the political assassination of de Haan by the Zionists can hardly be regarded as a form of agreement between Jews and Zionists. Therefore, it would have been appropriate for the British Prime Minister to correct his colleague and explain that the Balfour Declaration, as unfair as it is, has never recognized the right to dispossess, expel or subjugate.
The so-called “Jewish and democratic” state is neither Jewish nor democratic. Religiously speaking, Zionism is a secular movement that went as far as dehumanizing and mocking the religious Jews of Europe. Israel’s majority is secular rather than religious, while it can hardly be argued that the state’s oppressive policies are in agreement with Jewish values. As religion has been “nationalized”, hardships also exist for those practicing Jews who choose a different path from the state sanctioned form of Judaism.
Ethnically, the majority of world Jewry prefers to live abroad rather than in Israel. At the same time,Israeli figures show that ethnic Jews are no longer a majority between the river and the sea, while not even counting the many Palestinians living in exile.
Paramount to the Zionist project in Palestine is the claim that the land is exclusively Jewish and that all others, even its indigenous people, are alien and unwanted. It is therefore no coincidence that Israel refuses to have a constitution or to acknowledge an Israeli nationality since this would mean, at least on paper, that its citizens are to be treated as equals. Instead, the privileged group is defined as having a “Jewish” nationality while the others may be “Arab,” “Druze” or “Circassian,” none of which are nationalities. On this basis, discrimination has been codified into law.
The Israeli regime can therefore best be characterized as an ethnocracy which practices the Crime of Apartheid as defined by international law. Israel is only “Jewish” in the ethnic-supremacist sense, in the same way that South Africa was white. Consequently, the demand to recognize its Jewish character is just as questionable as legitimizing white supremacy in South Africa at the time.
After many decades, new bonds between anti-Zionists – ultra-Orthodox, Palestinians, and progressives – are now being forged. While dispelling the myth of Zionism, a new path is being paved in the Holy Land.
Let us walk that path.
Joshua Tartakovsky comes from an ultra-Orthodox family in Jerusalem, went to a Zionist-Haredi army unit and is a graduate of Brown University and the LSE. He is an independent researcher and filmmaker.
Ronnie Barkan is an Israeli human rights activist, conscientious objector and co-founder of Boycott from Within, a group of Israeli citizens and residents that supports the Palestinian call for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS).
Follow him on Twitter: @ronnie_barkan
I am intrigued by your claim that deHaan had a ” meeting with King Hussein and Emir Abdullah who promised unlimited Jewish migration to Palestine in return for renouncing exclusive national ambitions.” This meeting was supposed to have been in 1922 and documented in some sort of writing, per your link. It is also claimed that the document “vanished in a burglary of de Haan’s house following his assassination a year later.”
I hope you understand that your claim sounds preposterous, absurd and as if a fabrication to further some particular point.
Do you have any further documentation for the promise by King Hussein and Emir Abdullah? Explanation? Historical source? Contemporaneous minutes? Diaries? Something? Anything?
Otherwise you are making a wild statement with no way to back it up and your claim would have to be ignored and treated as fantasy.
So what do you have?
Admittedly, there’s no available official document. There are, however, several accounts of the Vienna meeting of Agudat Israel where the letter was read out as well as other correspondence between Rabbi Sonnenfeld to King Hussein for example.
But far more important for our case is what appears in the previous link in the article (in Hebrew, pages: 242, 244, 247) – the assassins’ own words explaining that de Haan was marked for execution for his meeting with King Hussein months before his trip to Britain and for the reason stated in the article.
Thank you Mr. Barkan.
1. Unfortunately, without a Hebrew translation I cannot read much less judge the importance of the link
” According to Avraham Tehomi”
http://rotter.net/cgi-bin/forum/dcboard.cgi?az=show_thread&forum=gil&om=5522&omm=81&viewmode=
2. You refer to
“several accounts of the Vienna meeting of Agudat Israel where the letter was read out as well as other correspondence between Rabbi Sonnenfeld to King Hussein for example.”
Where are those sources? Where are they available? I am referring to the “several accounts” and “other correspondence”?
I am interested in your claim and since I am not qualified to judge its truth, I would like to ask an academic historian for his or her opinion. So the precise sources are important and I am not asking for casual conversation.
Dear DMS,
If you are passionate about the subject, you can hire a translator or learn Hebrew. The fact that you do not know Hebrew is not in itself an argument against the claim in this article which is based on testimonies from various sources. It is unfortunate that Middle East historians have no dedicated significant attention to the long-term communication and collaboration which existed between Rabbi Sonnenfeld, de Haan and the Emir Abdullah and King Hussein. The meeting took place in 1924, not in 1922.
I would correct Ronnie and claim that Tehomi says that de Haan was murdered due to his meeting with Hussein but does not mention any promise made by Hussein and Abdullah.
According to Menachem Mendel Gerliz author of ”מרא
According to Menachem Mendel Gerliz author of ”מרא
According to Menachem Mendel Gerliz author of ‘The Teacher of Israel’ on Rabbi Zunnenfeld published in Hebrew, Emir Abdullah said the following: “All Arab countries are entirely open to Jews, as long as they do not demand exclusive rights. And this also referres to the Land of Israel, and as long as the majority of the people there are Arab, the government there should be mostly Arab. But what is certain is that the government should not stop immigration to the Land of Israel”. As quoted in an article from 1994: http://www.ranaz.co.il/Images/articles/newsp2/n19940609_1.jpg
Thanks you for your response Mr. Tartakovsky for including the other link though again whether it has any value I don’t know.
You are absolutely correct that lack of translation means nothing and I didn’t even remotely suggest so but simply responding that I, personally, had no way to respond.
But if I can find the source materials, I will gather them and contact a real historian to see if your story has any value.
Dear DMS,
Whatever your intentions may be, I hope the following will help. Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Sonnenfeld, great grandson of Rabbi Sonnenfeld, said the following in an interview in Hebrew:
“Dr. de Haan had an historical document of great importance. Emir Abdullah wrote to him that he will be happy to see Jewish settlement in the other side of the Jordan as long as it is not accompanied by political goals or intentions. The value of this document was immense. It was the greatest document of peace in the past 100 years. Dr de Haan guarded it closely.
When the Agudat Israel leader, Rabbi Moshe Bloi, May his righteous memory be a blessing, took this historical document to the great gathering of Agudat Israel in Vienna, Dr de Haan waited for him at the train station in order to receive it back from him.
This historical document was kept in the drawer of Dr de Haan’s desk and disappeared immediately after his murder by the same people who murdered him, who broke into his home and stole the precious documents.
These days the Zionists are willing to take any effort to achieve such a precious document. They are willing to give back many lands and pay a high price to get an accomplishment equal to the accomplishment of Dr de Haan.”
The interview with great grandson of Rabbi Sonnenfeld:
http://www.yoel-ab.com/katava.asp?id=150
3 volumes in Hebrew on the legacy of Rabbi Sonnenfeld, as written by his great grandson:
http://www.hebrewbooks.org/50062
http://www.hebrewbooks.org/50063
http://www.hebrewbooks.org/50064
Cheers,
Ronnie
Wow, how convenient. The ultra Orthodox and progressives left , who would normally loath each others life styles and value, banding together over their hatred of a Jewish national movement. Well it is pretty clear to almost all Israeli what is on the mind of most Ultra Orthodox Jews. They don’t want to recognize Israel, serve in the army or work. The want to study, have huge families and live off of Israeli state welfare. It is oh so clear. You can rationalize your refusal to serve the state that supports you, but the bottom line is clear.You wantvtovtak take take and not give back. I was very resentful when I served months in a war zone while ghd ultra Orthodox refused to serve. If the ultra Orthodox would like to join BDS, they should boycott state welfare as well. BTW, rock throwing at moving cars is no way to celebrate Shabbat.
Dear DMS,
I hope this helps. Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Sonnenfeld, great grandson of Rabbi Sonnenfeld, said the following in an interview in Hebrew:
“Dr. de Haan had an historical document of great importance. Emir Abdullah wrote to him that he will be happy to see Jewish settlement in the other side of the Jordan as long as it is not accompanied by political goals or intentions. The value of this document was immense. It was the greatest document of peace in the past 100 years. Dr de Haan guarded it closely.
When the Agudat Israel leader, Rabbi Moshe Bloi, May his righteous memory be a blessing, took this historical document to the great gathering of Agudat Israel in Vienna, Dr de Haan waited for him at the train station in order to receive it back from him.
This historical document was kept in the drawer of Dr de Haan’s desk and disappeared immediately after his murder by the same people who murdered him, who broke into his home and stole the precious documents.
These days the Zionists are willing to take any effort to achieve such a precious document. They are willing to give back many lands and pay a high price to get an accomplishment equal to the accomplishment of Dr de Haan.”
The interview with great grandson of Rabbi Sonnenfeld:
http://www.yoel-ab.com/katava.asp?id=150
3 volumes in Hebrew on the legacy of Rabbi Sonnenfeld, as written by his great grandson:
http://www.hebrewbooks.org/50062
http://www.hebrewbooks.org/50063
http://www.hebrewbooks.org/50064
Cheers,
Ronnie
Dear Mr. Tartakovsky:
I have just re-read your 9:29 AM comment and am dumfounded. Do you claim that King Hussein promised anything? Or not?
At 9:29 AM you state that “Tehomi says that de Haan was murdered due to his meeting with Hussein but does not mention any promise made by Hussein and Abdullah.”
Yet one of your other links
“meeting with King Hussein and Emir Abdullah”
(paragraph 12 in this post)
which is
http://wikispooks.com/wiki/Zionist_Political_Violence#1924_killing_of_Jaacob_de_Haan
states as follows:
“The rabbis of the Old Yishuv, very alarmed by the trouble being caused by often violent Zionists, established contact with Arab leaders such as King Hussein of the Hejaz and extracted from his son a signed document welcoming Jewish immigrants to Palestine, providing that they not evince any exclusivist political ambitions (such as setting up a Jewish state). Abdullah’s letter was read out to the Congress of Agudat Israel held in Vienna in 1923 but this important treaty vanished in a burglary of De Haan’s house following his assassination a year later.”
So what is going on? You two authors don’t agree?
I am getting very confused about what not only actually did happen in history but what you two authors claim to have happened.
Do you need to re-edit your post to comport with your actual views?
In Hebrew:
http://www.hebrewbooks.org/50064, p. 361
The text, part of a three volume memoir of the legacy of Rabbi Sonnenfeld as written by his great grand-son, Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Sonnenfeld, mentions:
“Dr. de Haan had an historical document of great importance. Emir Abdullah wrote to him that he will be happy to see Jewish settlement in the other side of the Jordan as long as it is not accompanied by political goals or intentions. The value of this document was immense. It was the greatest document of peace in the past 100 years. Dr de Haan guarded it closely.
When the Agudat Israel leader, Rabbi Moshe Bloi, may his righteous memory be a blessing, took this historical document to the great gathering of Agudat Israel in Vienna, Dr de Haan waited for him at the train station in order to receive it back from him.
This historical document was kept in the drawer of Dr. de Haan’s desk and disappeared immediately after his murder by the same people who murdered him, who broke into his home and stole the precious documents.
These days the Zionists are willing to take any effort to achieve such a precious document. They are willing to give back many lands and pay a high price to get an accomplishment equal to the accomplishment of Dr. de Haan.”
http://www.hebrewbooks.org/50064
The text, part of a three volume memoir of the legacy of Rabbi Sonnenfeld as written by his great grand-son, Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Sonnenfeld, mentions:
“Dr. de Haan had an historical document of great importance. Emir Abdullah wrote to him that he will be happy to see Jewish settlement in the other side of the Jordan as long as it is not accompanied by political goals or intentions. The value of this document was immense. It was the greatest document of peace in the past 100 years. Dr de Haan guarded it closely.
When the Agudat Israel leader, Rabbi Moshe Bloi, may his righteous memory be a blessing, took this historical document to the great gathering of Agudat Israel in Vienna, Dr de Haan waited for him at the train station in order to receive it back from him.
This historical document was kept in the drawer of Dr. de Haan’s desk and disappeared immediately after his murder by the same people who murdered him, who broke into his home and stole the precious documents.
These days the Zionists are willing to take any effort to achieve such a precious document. They are willing to give back many lands and pay a high price to get an accomplishment equal to the accomplishment of Dr. de Haan.”
Dear DNS,
I am glad to see you are raising more serious questions. In the beginning you hinted that we were fabricating evidence, which is quite a serious accusation.
Ronnie and I have disagreements on various issues as most people do. That is natural.
If you would read carefully my comments on Tehomi, I clarify that he claims de Haan was murdered due to his meeting with King Hussein but does not mention what was discussed between the two or any statements by King Hussein. Of course, this does not mean that nothing was discussed between the participants in the meeting just because Tehomi does not mention it.
I would like to repeat my earlier point that there seems to be a wide variety of testimonies which point to understandings between de Haan and Emir Abdullah.
Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Sunnenfeld, great grand-son of Rabbi Sunnenfeld said the following in an interview:
“Dr. de Haan had an historical document of great importance. Emir Abdullah wrote to him that he will be happy to see Jewish settlement in the other side of the Jordan as long as it is not accompanied by political goals or intentions. The value of this document was immense. It was the greatest document of peace in the past 100 years. Dr de Haan guarded it closely.
When the Agudat Israel leader, Rabbi Moshe Bloi, May his righteous memory be a blessing, took this historical document to the great gathering of Agudath Israel in Vienna, Dr de Haan waited for him in the train station in order to receive it back from him.
This historical document was kept in the drawer at Dr de Haan’s table and disappeared immediately after his murder by the same people who murdered him, who broke into his home and stole the precious documents.
These days the Zionists are willing to take any effort to achieve such a precious document. They are willing to give back many lands and pay a high price to get an accomplishment equal to the accomplishment of Dr de Haan.”
http://www.yoel-ab.com/katava.asp?id=150
Normally the Ultra Orthodox and far left would actively oppose eachother’s values and life style but here you have them uniting against the existence of the only Jewish state on earth. The ultra Orthodox have always opposed the existence of Israel, yet they do enjoy the financial benefits of the state in the form of welfare while raising large families. If they want to be consistent to their boycott of Israel, they ought to surrender state welfare benefits. Other wise it accepting state benefits means serving the state that supported them like any Israeli. I spent 9 months in a war zones while serving in the IDF. They could share that budan as well.
Hi Andy,
A large part of the Haredi community, including almost all of the Ha’eda Ha’haredit refuses to have any relations with the Zionist state, including the refusal to participate in state elections or receive state funding.
Other parts of the ultra-Orthodox community have been co-opted to a certain extent by the state, and yet they receive but a tiny fraction of what any secular student, for example, would receive from the state. We could discuss the numbers but I wouldn’t want to go there because I would rather not justify their stand and rather that they didn’t lend their legitimacy to the state which uses and abuses the name of Judaism on their behalf.
What is important to note is that things are changing these days and those non-Zionist Jews are now at a point where they may have to choose which side of the fence they are on. Whether they choose Zionism or Judaism.
To Joshua,
If you are a humanist, it’s hypocritical to unite with the Haredim, because Haredi Judaism is based on the hatred of all goyim. My friend, the late Israeli acdemic Israel Shahak, wrote about the countless Halachot (Judaic laws) very hostile to goyim. I have written about this. The Haredim wear their clownish clothing to distance themselves as much as possible from the (immoral) goyim. Read the Sefarim (books) of the late Satmar Rebbe, who passionately hated both Zionists and goyim. I went to Haredi yeshiva and I was taught constantly how evil the goyim are. The group DaatEmet in Israel fights against this fanaticism.
please don’t expect a response as there seems to be a technical problem submitting comments here.
more resources in English:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/216795936
http://www.scribd.com/doc/216797049 (read the “see more” section)
Btw, Mr. Barkan & Mr. Tartakovsky, putting aside the truth of your claim for now, supposing it is true — what would it mean?
Is it purely of historical significance? So what if King Hussein made such promise? He obviously wouldn’t or couldn’t follow through or else he would have repeated it far and wide; the British were deeply embedded in his court so if your claim is true, obviously the British (including Lord Peel) would have known and it would have been a factor in, for example, the Peel Plan of 1937. So why do you tell us?
Does your allegation mean anything in terms of our current dilemma? Does your allegation offer any practical lessons?
What is the dilemma? Whether to support a criminal apartheid regime which is based on ethnic-supremacy or whether to support equality, democracy and human rights for all?
The historical documents reveal that there was a huge potential for having all of that already back in 1924. The Zionists insisted on destroying that hope and still insist on doing so today, demanding their “right” to carry on ethnic-supremacy on account of the indigenous people of the land and in the name of Judaism, even though it has precisely and exactly nothing to do with Judaism.
1.There were 2 partitions of British mandated Palestine. The 1st was in 1922, creating the Hashimite Kingdom of Jordan. The 2nd was in 1947 by the UN, creating a Jewish state and a still born Arab state. The Middle East is full of arbitrarily drawn borders, creating multiple Arab states, there is nothing wrong with having 1 Jewish state. Jews have had a presense in the Middle East for thousands of years, they have as much right to a piece of real estate as their Arab neighbors. 2. Haridim can leave Israel if they do not agree with its existence. They should not bectskjng from a welfare system of a state they fk not recognize.
Hi Andy,
I responded to your earlier comment above but that response didn’t go through apparently..
1. The question is not about the division of land but about the supremacist character of the JDSI (“Jewish Democratic State of Israel”) and its vehement opposition to recognize the rights of the indigenous people of the land.
The Palestinian tragedy is not so much in the unfair UN partition plan which gave away over half of the land to the colonizers who were hardly 30% of the population and who only owned around 10% of the land. The tragedy is in the Zionist decision to ethnically cleanse the land and create an ethnic-Jewish majority by force. Ever since, to this day, maintaining this artificially created ethnic-Jewish majority is the main concern of every Zionist government out there.
2. There is a very large group of Haredim who refuse to have any and all relation with the Zionist state, including the refusal to participate in elections or receive state funding. This includes almost the whole of the Ha’eda Ha’haredit for example.
Those who have been co-opted to a certain extent and receive a certain amount of state funding are a) usually looked down upon in the Haredi community and b) receive a tiny fraction of what an Israeli university student would receive, for example. This group does not only lend its legitimacy to a state which stands in opposition to their values but also does so for a very small gain.
As for leaving the JDSI – most don’t live here but those who do, do so even though it is a Zionist state. Why would you expect them to leave rather than demand that the regime will change its apartheid ways?
Mr. Barkan.
Your historical documents don’t pass the smile test. I am not claiming that you personally fabricated anything as I don’t think that there is anything to fabricate.
But the most telling point is that the Jordanian Royals never repeated their promise (or else you would have told us.) It is not credible that the Royals would have made the promise to only a select few. If they had been serious about it they would have told it far and wide. Had they known it and found it credible, the Brits, for example, might have interpreted the Balfour Declaration as fulfilling King Hussein’s “promise”. Done deal so far as they were concerned.
From everything I can understand of your so-called claims you simply don’t like Israel and seek to do it harm and are willing to believe any “facts” to somehow undermine Israel. You may not have fabricated anything but you seem willing to believe anything.
Rabbi Lerner and Tikkun should be embarrassed and should withdraw your post.
Jacob and Andy,
Jacob,
It may be useful to look at the reality on the ground while not being blinded by ideological constraints: many secular Israelis, some of whom claim to be humanist, end up occupying the Palestinians and repressing them while the ultra-Orthodox which may not adhere to progressive values in a formal way but seek to practice their religion in a tight community, do not serve in the military and do not shoot innocents while claiming to be a democracy. Ultra-Orthodox Jews who lived in Palestine before Israel was founded, remember quite well the friendly and intimate friendships they enjoyed with their Palestinian neighbors and realize that without the Zionist state much unnecessary bloodshed could have possibly been avoided. Furthermore, many ultra-Orthodox who are anti-Zionists speak out not only due to the their belief that a Jewish state cannot be created before the coming of the messiah but their are outraged by Israel’s crimes in Gaza.
I certainly oppose ultra-Orthodox coercing secular people to live by a religious way of life, but do think a multicultural society should have room for all groups seeking to practice their unique way of life so long as they do not force it on others. While Israel claims to be progressive and is proud of Tel Aviv and its achievements, in the Occupied Territories people are being humiliated, pushed off their land and randomly killed, since they do not fall into the ethnic category by which the Zionist state grants rights. In other words, the Haredim may protest against a cinema that is open on Sabbath but do not enforce a system of apartheid in Palestine.
Andy,
Since you admit to serving in a military which is guilty of various war-crimes and are showing no remorse about taking a part in an effort to repress millions of people, it should come as no surprise that you are suggesting that Haredim should leave Israel since they disagree with it or do not ‘recognize’ it (while in fact, the ultra-Orthodox lived in Palestine long before modern Zionists arrived).
Dear DMS, I am a bit tired trying to figure out your point, as you zigzagged consistently between saying we fabricated facts, then acknowledging them, then claiming they must be untrue since they do not fit your hypothetical suggestions.
We do not know for sure what could have happened had de Haan not been assassinated in cold blood. What we can say for certain, however, is that the Zionist claim that Arab leaders never wanted to allow Jews to settle in Palestine is untrue. As King Hussein said, the problem is not with Jews settling in Palestine but in political Zionism.
Joshua, I reiterate that Haredim hate all goyim, particularly the Arabs. I wonder if you were raised as a Haredi Jew or studied in a yeshiva, because if you were, you were certainly taught that all goyim – who are called, pejoratively, idolaters (the Hebrew acronym is Akum) – are subhuman. Read the Sefarim (religious books), Torah bulletins distributed in shuls in Haredi shuls on Shabbat, and Haredi newspapers in Hebrew, English and Yiddish, as I do, then you would never write the utter nonsense that there is anything “progressive” about Haredim.
Read any Sefer by the Lubavitcher Rebbes, Belzer Rebbes, Vishnitzer Rebbes, Gerer Rebbes, Satmar Rebbes, Klausenberger Rebbes, Bobov Rebbes, Chafetz Chayim (who died in 1933 and was the greatest sage in pre-Holocaust Europe), and they all despised the goyim with a passion. The only reason Haredim may be “friends” with goyim is to minimize hostility towards Jews.
The Neturei Karta are the biggest hypocrites because their theoretician clearly says in his Sefer that the goyim are worthless (Efes in Hebrew) before God. The only reason they profess their love of the Palestinians is because the enemy of my enemy is my friend.
Haredim hate the Arabs more than the Israeli settlers for theological/religious reasons. In the Torah, Arabs are known as Yishma’elim, and the Midrash and Talmud go into detail why Jews must despise the Yishmaelim, descendants of Yishma’el, hostile brother to Isaac. There is an excellent Sefer citing all the sources about the “evil” Yishma’elim. I can make a copy and send it to you.
According to the Talmud, Shulchan Aruch, Maimonides and Sefer HaHinuch, the beneficiaries of all ethical mitzvot ( to love your friend, not to curse him, not to take revenge, to rescue him from danger, to return a lost object, etc.) applies only to Jews. Indeed, the ArtScroll (or Schottenstein) English translation of the Talmud has the well-known saying: “He who saves a Jewish person, it is as if he saved a whole world.” The original saying in the Talmud had also the universalistic saying: “He who saves A Person, it is as if he saved a whole world.”
Joshua, I can spend weeks with you showing the thousands of laws hostile to goyim that Haredim observe. There are many ways to cover up the hatred of goyim found in Haredi Judaism. The late Prof. Israel Shahak of Hebrew Univ. – the great human rights activist lauded by Christopher Hitchens and Prof. Noam Chomsky – spoke out about this hatred in his books and was demonized by the Jewish establishment. See my letter in Britain’s Guardian newspaper appreciating the heroic Israel Shahak.
The Tikkun community, to be true to its self, must stand up and denounce not only how Haredim treat women, but also their hatred of goyim, “based on God’s Torah.”
Happy Holiday of Liberation to You All.
Down with Apartheid.