Al Jizz’s Marwan Bishara is “an author who writes extensively on global politics and is widely regarded as a leading authority on US foreign policy, the Middle East and international strategic affairs.” I would suggest that he is also an aspiring writer for the Onion – and anyone who widely regards him as a leading authority on anything go for a medical check-up – based on this recent piece of his.
Why Israel hates the Palestinians so much
He had me at the headline. One side is driven by hatred of the other and it’s not Israel. As Golda Meir once famously said, “Peace will come when the Arabs will love their children more than they hate us.”
The Palestinians have every reason to hate Israel; it is a settler-colonial apartheid state erected on the ruins of their homeland.
Ok, at least he admits they hate us. And he’s justifying it (by alleging we are something that we aren’t, and the land is something it isn’t: theirs) But how does he explain the hatred of Jews in the land that existed before Israel was re-established in 1948? Of course he doesn’t.
But why does Israel hate the Palestinians so much?
We don’t.
It has sadistically and systematically terrorised, blockaded and imprisoned them after taking control of their lives and livelihoods, denying them fundamental rights and freedoms.
No we haven’t.
The obvious answer may not be the right answer. Yes, Israel abhors Palestinian violence and terrorism that has touched more than a few Israelis
At least he owns up to palestinian terrorism! But “touched more than a few Israelis” seems to be a terrible way to spell “murdered and maimed tens of thousands of Israelis and otherwise impacted millions more.”
but it is nothing compared with the wholesale violence and state-terror exacted by Israel on the Palestinians, launching vengeful and preemptive wars, as it has this past weekend.
Again, this is just not the case. But wait, here comes the real juicy part.
To my mind, Israel’s hatred of the Palestinians is shaped and driven by three basic sentiments: fear, envy and anger.
It should come as no surprise that Israel has continued to fear the Palestinians well after it occupied all their lands and became a mighty regional and nuclear power. Because its fear of the Palestinians is not merely physical or material, it is existential.
Under the apt title: Why all Israelis are cowards, an Israeli columnist wondered in 2014 what kind of a society produces cowardly soldiers who shoot unarmed Palestinian youth from a long distance. Some four years later, in 2018, it was indeed surreal to watch Israeli soldiers hide behind fortified defences as they shot hundreds of unarmed protesters for days on end.
Again, Bishara is simply making things up and of course he quotes Ha’aretz to bolster his claims (talk about low hanging fruit). Those “unarmed Palestinian youth” are invariably always armed and, in some case, just in close proximity to those who are. Our soldiers are trained to avoid killing unless necessary, although mistakes sometimes happen. To paint this as a system of cowardly soldiers is dishonest to say the least.
Israel basically fled Gaza in fear back in 2005, imposing an inhumane blockade on the two million, mostly refugees, living there.
We unilaterally withdrew in 2005, giving the Gazans a chance to build a thriving society. They instead elected Hamas, choosing the course of terror, so we were forced to impose restrictions in order to try prevent as much terrorism as possible.
Israel fears all that is Palestinian steadfastness, Palestinian unity, Palestinian democracy, Palestinian poetry, and all Palestinian national symbols, including language, which it downgraded, and the flag, which it is trying to ban.
Israel especially fears Palestinian mothers bearing new babies, which it calls a “demographic threat”. Echoing this national Israeli obsession with Palestinian procreation, a historian warned 12 years ago that demography is a threat to the survival of the Jewish state much like a nuclear Iran, for example, because in his view, Palestinians could become a majority by 2040-2050.
No, we don’t fear “Palestinian mothers bearing new babies”, except perhaps how these mothers will treat them:
But we do pay attention to those palestinian Arabs constantly calling for our destruction.
Fear is also instrumental for a garrison state like Israel, known as “an army with a country attached”. In a book summarising his decades-long experience in Israel, an American journalist noted that: “Today’s government stirs up fears, most of them imaginary or at least wildly exaggerated, painting Israel as an isolated, lonely, threatened, little country, always on the defensive, always on the lookout for the next sign of hate somewhere, eager to overreact.”
One need just pay attention to the disproportionate amount of UN resolutions condemning Israel, disproportionate amount of media bias against Israel, and the amount of vitriol spewed against us on social media to see our feelings of isolation are not exaggerated. Neither is our perception of our country as threatened – we are literally threatened every day by the likes of Iran and their proxies. And of course we have an army – if not, we would no longer exist.
In sum, fear generates hatred because, in the words of another Israeli observer, a state that is always afraid cannot be free; a state that is shaped by militant messianism and ugly racism, against the indigenous people of the land, cannot be truly independent either.
Again, Bishara goes straight to Ha’aretz, a sure sign you are desperate to make your “points” and wouldn’t know the truth if it hit you in the face.
Israel is also angry, always angry at the Palestinians
Um
for refusing to give up or give in, for not going away; far away.
Not true. We have made repeated peace offers, and those Arabs who have chosen to live in peace with us – the Israeli Arabs – are productive members of Israeli society, the majority of which would choose to remain Israeli citizens over citizens of a palestinian state or are otherwise happy to live in peace with us.
Israel, for all intents and purposes, has won all its wars since 1948, and become a regional superpower, forcing Arab regimes to bow in humiliation.
At least he admits me won all our wars (tell that to Egypt). But we did not do so to “force Arab regimes to bow in humiliation.” In fact, our victories have ultimately led to peace with the likes of Egypt, Jordan, the UAE and Bahrain.
And yet the Palestinians continue to deny the Israelis victory, they will not submit; they will not surrender, rather they continue to resist come what may.
Israel has the world powers on its side, with the United States in its pocket, Europe behind it and the Arab regimes sucking up to it.
Same energy:
Israel is also envious of Palestinian inner power and outward pride. It is envious of their strong beliefs and readiness to sacrifice, which presumably reminds today’s Israelis of early Zionists.
We have nothing to be envious about. In fact, I am pretty sure they are envious and bitter over our success. Also, “readiness to sacrifice” is a really creepy way to describe suicide bombing and other terror attacks in which the terrorist knows they won’t survive.
Today’s Israeli conscripts-turned-Robocops face off against bare-chested Palestinian bravery from behind their armoured vehicles, cowardly shooting with vengeance.
Because nothing says “bare-chested Palestinian bravery” like firing rockets at civilians, shooting babies in the head, boarding a bus with a bomb attached to you, and using your own civilians as human shields.
Israel is most envious of the Palestinians’ historic and cultural belonging to Palestine;
The Palestinian Museum called. It wants its exhibits back.
of their attachment to the land, an attachment Zionism has had to manufacture in order to entice Jews into becoming colonial settlers.
Our attachment to the land spans thousands of years, well before the Arabs set foot here and conquered it in the 7th century. And Zionism is an integral part of Judaism; the only thing manufactured is everything our booming industries have since the state’s reestablishment (and even before).
Israel hates the Palestinians for being so integral to the history, geography and nature of the landscape it claims as its own. Israel has long resorted to theology and mythology to justify its existence,
“Mythology” seems to be a strange spelling of “archaeology”
when the Palestinians need no such justification; belonging so effortlessly, so conveniently, so naturally.
Almost their entire narrative is a fabrication.
Israel has tried to erase or bury all traces of Palestinian existence, even changing the names of streets, neighbourhoods and towns.
In the words of one Israeli historian, “to find accurate parallels for the reconsecration of places of worship by a conqueror, one must go back to Spain or the Byzantine Empire in the middle of the late 15th century.”
Holy projection, Batman! The palestinian Arabs literally built mosques over the site of our holy Temple, changed the names of our places and – as Bishara is so effectively showing – denied our ties to our homeland.
Now get ready for the punchline to end this comedy set…
Yet, it would be wrong to glorify any of this. Love is always better than hate. Hatred is destructive and feeds into more hatred. Hatred is devastating to the hateful and the hated. Israel could still turn all that hatred into tolerance, envy into appreciation, and anger into empathy, if only it has the courage to atone for its violent past, apologise for its crimes, compensate the Palestinians for their suffering and start treating them with the respect and honour they deserve as equals, even privileged equals in their homeland. Israel’s hatred will not drive the Palestinians out but it may well drive the Jews out and away.
Ba-dum-ch!
