The vicissitudes that have, for some reason, been collectively dubbed the 'Arab Spring' are neither Arab nor Spring. One can say that they are actually living proof of the identity crisis and reverberating bankruptcy of Arab nationalism.

Salman Masalha ||

Neither Arab nor Spring

The vicissitudes that have, for some reason, been collectively dubbed the "Arab Spring" are neither Arab nor Spring. One can say that they are actually living proof of the identity crisis and reverberating bankruptcy of Arab nationalism. We must remember that the intifadas that brought the masses to the streets took place in countries that have been ruled by governments considered to be nationalist. They passed over the monarchies, and there is a simple reason for that.

From the first days of Islam, through to the disintegration of the Ottoman empire, the Arab world has been ruled by monarchies in the form of various caliphs. The first caliphs were Arabs who conquered land and established empires. In Arab lands, the legitimacy conferred on rulers was fundamentally tribal, and resembled monarchy. Over time, Arab rule weakened. The caliphates remained Islamic, but the caliphs were no longer of Arab descent.

Nationalism was a new idea. The founding of Arab nationalism had two phases: First there was traditional Bedouin nationalism, while urban nationalism developed later. Traditional nationalism was encouraged by Britain, the colonial power that sought to secure hold of the important areas by taking them over from the Ottomans. Lord Horatio Kitchener, who served as the British secretary of state for war during World War I, actively pursued this goal, working to restore the Arab caliphates.

We know about this from a letter sent in August 1915 from Sir Henry McMahon, the British high commissioner in Egypt, to Hussein bin Ali, the sharif of Mecca: "We rejoice, moreover, that your Highness and your people are of one opinion - that Arab interests are English interests and English Arab. To this intent we confirm to you the terms of Lord Kitchener's message, which reached you by the hand of Ali Effendi, and in which was stated clearly our desire for the independence of Arabia and its inhabitants, together with our approval of the Arab Khalifate when it should be proclaimed. We declare once more that His Majesty's Government would welcome the resumption of the Khalifate by an Arab of true race."

The region was ultimately left without either an Ottoman caliphate or an Arab one. It was divided between Britain and France, and the Arabs got the condolence prize: the Arab League.

The second phase of Arab nationalism developed in the context of the colonial powers' withdrawal from the region and the Cold War. The Arab world, which was divided into "autonomous" entities, continued to be ruled by puppets controlled from afar. Then a new player - the Soviet Union - entered the fray, and the new nationalism fell into the net of the Soviet bloc. This nationalism was created in an unnatural process. Junior officers had brutally raped their people and their lands, and a new kind of regime was born of this assault: a political bastard in the Arab world, neither a monarchy nor a republic.

These governments promised the world, and national pride, but their existence was essentially dependent on empty slogans. All their energy went into maintaining their hold on the reins of power, at any price. And that's how the Arab world got where it is today. One can say that Arab nationalism, in both its empty forms, flunked the reality test.

There is an Arabic phrase that tells us the drowning man hangs by ropes made of air. These days, the ropes of air are being held out to the Arab world by the modern-day successors of Kitchener and McMahon. This time, it is being done through assistance to Sunni Arab Islam and with prominent Turkish-Ottoman support, in the hope that the new regimes will counter the increasingly strong Shi'ite Islam at Iran's helm. But this is just another golem that is liable to turn on its maker.
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Published: Opinion-Haaretz, 5 Dec. 2011

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With yearning soul

Jewish fundamentalism, which seeks to restore the Jewish and nationalist crown to its former glory, had already planted its roots in the settlements and in Israeli society during the Six-Day War in 1967.

Salman Masalha | With yearning soul

When Yigal Amir shot Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in the back on November 4, 1995, he was only the messenger. The sender resided in words set down long before, in May 1948.

It is true that in its Declaration of Independence, Israel promised to "ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants, irrespective of religion, race or sex," but these words were intended only to satisfy foreign ears. The document places greatest emphasis on "the establishment of a Jewish State in Eretz Yisrael," on "the Jewish people," and on this people's "spiritual [and] religious identity" and its "ancient homeland."

Such expressions could not exist outside of a religious context: "Ancient homeland" is connected to Judaism, an ancient religion. Therefore, the link between Zionism and the Jewish religion has never been severed.

It is no accident that the name "Israel" does not appear in the national anthem. The words of "Hatikva" recall a Jewish prayer carried from a distance both geographic and chronological: "A Jewish soul yearns ... The hope of two thousand years ... The land of Zion and Jerusalem." By adopting such formulations, the Zionist leaders turned the State of Israel into a state of halakha, or Jewish religious law, from the very first day.

The Zionism that aspired to establish a "Jewish home" in the Jews' "ancient homeland" did not take into consideration the fact that the land was not empty. It thus adopted the principle of population transfer, based on the same ancient biblical tradition. We know this from what was on David Ben-Gurion's desk: "At the end of the conversation, I saw on his desk a passage from the Book of Exodus: 'I will not drive them out from before thee in one year ... By little and little I will drive them out from before thee, until thou be increased, and inherit the land.'" That is what the writer Haim Gouri said in a lecture at the National Security College (according to the journal "Ma'arachot," issue 359 ).

At the time, Ben-Gurion staunchly opposed conquering all of Eretz Yisrael (the Land of Israel ), but for tactical and demographic reasons only: "In early spring of 1949, I asked Ben-Gurion why he hadn't conquered all of Eretz Yisrael," Gouri related. Ben-Gurion's reply: "Getting entangled in a hostile Arab expanse would have forced us to make a choice we could not bear - either expelling hundreds of thousands of Arabs or absorbing them. They would have destroyed the young state from within."

Ben-Gurion left the conquest of the remaining territory for later. "We have liberated a very large territory, much more than we expected," he said in 1949. "Now we shall have to work for two or three generations. As for the rest, we shall see later."

And indeed, history didn't end there: The Six-Day War broke out two decades later. It not only brought about the conquest of the mountain ridge running through the West Bank and the broadening of Israel's "narrow waist," but also nurtured the seeds of calamity: that "historic and traditional attachment" cited in the Declaration of Independence to the soil of "the ancient homeland," so rich with biblical myths.

Rabin, who was chief of staff during that war, awakened much too late to the implications of the choice "we could not bear." Jewish fundamentalism, which seeks to restore the Jewish and nationalist crown to its former glory, had already planted its roots in the settlements and throughout Israeli society.

The main complaint about the moves Rabin initiated was that he didn't have a Jewish majority, since he relied on the support of Knesset members from outside the Jewish tribe. Rabin tried to rescue "the Jewish state" from the above-mentioned choice by adopting an "Israeliness" that included Israel's Arab inhabitants. But his actions came much too late. The "Jewish genie" was already out of the bottle.

And so the fundamentalist Jewish golem, with yearning soul, turned on its Zionist creator. And so Rabin, too, was murdered, an "honor killing" to avenge the "dishonor" he caused his family, known in Israel as "the Jewish state."

Published: Opinion-Haaretz, November 9, 2011
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Only a society that can engage in introspection and self-examination can emerge from its dark past and march confidently to a different future. Otherwise, it will continue to sink into the same marshy swamp.

Salman Masalha ||

The Arab world's quagmire

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The right's herds of goats

Netanyahu wants to herd the Palestinians out

It seems that the prime minister, who was educated at the knees of land-stealing Zionist farmers, has grown up and become a certified goat herder.

Salman Masalha

The right's herds of goats

We often hear the claim among politicians in Israel that in order for peace to last, it has to be made between nations rather than between rulers. The use of the term, "rulers," comes up when Israel finds itself in a corner and is required by those "rulers" to pay the price of peace. As long as those "rulers" sit quietly and behave in accordance with Israeli expectations, they are not called "rulers," of course; they are "responsible leaders."

If they were to be voiced by the man in the street who really and truly aspires to live in peace with himself and his surroundings, these words could be accepted with full understanding, and even quite a bit of empathy. But when this claim is raised by the leaders of the Israeli right, who see only the continuation of the occupation and the theft of Palestinian lands before their eyes, they sound like the most ridiculous of claims.

Throughout human history, peace agreements have never been signed between nations. Nations don't stand opposite one another in a row, shake hands and pat each other on the back. Agreements of any type, all the more so when they are peace agreements between countries, are always made and signed between the representatives of nations.

There are some nations that live under one type of regime and other nations that live under another; and this will apparently be the situation in the foreseeable future. The Arab world will continue, for now, to live under regimes that are undemocratic, to say the least. Therefore, those who raise the claim about the need for peace between nations - a claim that is popular with the Israeli right - are, in the final analysis, concealing their true intentions.

Even if truly democratic elections are held in the Palestinian Authority, and even if all the Palestinians sign a declaration that they want an end to the 1967 occupation and the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside Israel within those borders, and even if they all declare that that will bring an end to the conflict, the same Israeli right, in all its variations, will find new excuses not to believe the Arabs.

The Zionists after all are experts at pushing herds of goats into the Palestinian home, and even putting up pens for them inside the home itself - and all in order to later remove a goat here and a checkpoint there, thereby giving the Palestinian some sense of relief, so that he can walk through the living room and reach the window in his own home. The Arab proverb says: Anyone who grows up on something in the home of his mother and father is destined to grow old with it.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu knows a thing or two about gathering herds of goats and moving them out. All the Bar-Ilan speeches cannot change his ideological stripes. These stripes are etched deep in his worldview. He has neither the desire nor the courage to erase this past and to embark on a new path.

I tend to believe things that a son says to his father in private. To this end, we should go back to 2009, to the words revealed by the father, Benzion Netanyahu, regarding the conduct of his son, Benjamin. With the consent of his son, the prime minister, the father gave an interview to Amit Segal on Channel 2 News, and this is what he said about the Bar-Ilan speech advocating the establishment of a Palestinian state: "He [the prime minister] doesn't support it. He supports it under conditions that they [the Arabs] will never accept. That's what I heard from him, not from myself. He proposed the conditions. They will never accept those conditions, not one of them," said Netanyahu Sr.

It seems that the prime minister, who was educated at the knees of land-stealing Zionist farmers, has grown up and become a certified goat herder.
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Published: Op-Ed, Haaretz, 19 Sep. 2011

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Which people, what justice?

Who doesn't want "social justice"? Or "peace" or "equality"? But underneath these pretty slogans, things look different. We frequently come up against examples that reveal the lie behind the words.

Salman Masalha

Which people, what justice?

Even if the slogan uttered by tens of thousands in the streets of Israel of late is pleasant to hear, it is the greatest of lies. Were its users asked to explain which "people," demand what "justice" for which "society," the slogan would crumble.

The state and all its institutions have never acknowledged the existence of an "Israeli people." It is doubtful that the demonstrators recognize its existence. Therefore their lofty cry of a people demanding "social justice" cannot be put into practice, in light of the absence of the existence of said "people."

There is no shortage of nice-sounding slogans. Who doesn't want "social justice"? Or "peace" or "equality"? Who doesn't long for "coexistence"? But underneath these pretty slogans, things look different. We frequently come up against examples that reveal the lie behind the words.

Take, for example, this example of someone who was certainly raised on the principles of "social justice" and Zionist "equality" - Modi Bracha, a resident of Kibbutz Ma'agan Michael and deputy head of the Hof Hacarmel Regional Council. As he explained last month in a Haaretz story about opposition to expanding Jisr al-Zarqa, "No one needs to teach me about socialism, but if a farmer received land then why should he relinquish the asset that is supposed to provide him a living?"

To spell it out to the champions of "social justice," Jisr al-Zarqa is the only Arab community that "socialist" Zionism left along the coast. The community is trapped between the sea and the coastal road, between Caesarea and Ma'agan Michael. Data from the Central Bureau of Statistics can surely add to the explication: The population density in the village is catastrophic, 7,730 people per square kilometer, compared to an average density of 321 per kilometer for the whole country.

In order to ease the overcrowding, the Haifa District Planning and Building Committee seeks to to implement a plan under which land from the neighboring communities of Ma'agan Michael, Beit Hanania and Caesarea would be expropriated to Jisr al-Zarqa and the coastal highway would be diverted to the east. It turns out that residents of the three communities are fiercely opposed to the "social justice" reflected in the plan.

They are, of course, in favor of lovely slogans about coexistence and the like: "We are in favor of coexistence and peace. Despite the differences in mentality, we are doing a lot in this regard," said Beit Hanania Councilman Arieh Freedman in the same article. "We are not opposed [to the scheme] because they are Arabs; they are good neighbors and we have no beef with them," Freedman emphasized.

Later on his worldview was revealed in all its glory: "... but from a national perspective, too, I am opposed to the idea of taking land from a Jew to give to an Arab ..." He even warns the authorities: "If the plan is approved, there will be a mass departure: People will sell their homes and the existence of the community will be threatened."

Freedman and his ilk, who are "in favor of coexistence and peace," in favor of "social justice" and the like, must be told that European Zionism searched for a place in the Middle East, and there are many Arabs who live there. One must cope with this fact of life.

So it's nice to wave the flag of the social justice that the people demand, but it seems that first of all the people must demand a clear definition of justice, and of a people.
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Published: Op-Ed, Haaretz, 5 Sep. 2011

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