Was
Einstein Right?
By JOHN
CHUCKMAN
"My awareness of the essential nature of
Judaism resists the idea of a Jewish state with borders, an army, and a
measure of temporal power, no matter how modest. I am afraid of the inner
damage Judaism will sustain -- especially from the development of a
narrow nationalism within our own ranks, against which we have already
had to fight strongly, even without a Jewish state."
Albert Einstein
Einstein
is one of my favorite twentieth-century characters. He was remarkable,
and I don't mean only for his profound contributions to our understanding
of the physical world. He was someone who drove authoritarians like J.
Edgar Hoover mad. He was one of those rare souls, like George Orwell, who
despite mistakes and flaws, consciously worked to direct his actions, and
redirect them after missteps, by principles of decency, humanity, and
rational thought. He never subscribed to menacing slogans like "My
country, right or wrong" or "You're either with us or against
us." Quite the opposite, he knew any country was capable of being
wrong at times and did not deserve blind allegiance when it was.
Einstein's was one of the most important names lent to the cause of
Zionism. His name and visits and letters raised a great deal of money
towards establishing universities and resettling European Jews suffering
under violent anti-Semitism long before the founding of Israel.
But even in a cause so dear to his heart, Einstein never stopped thinking
for himself. He not only opposed the establishment of a formal Israeli
state--he was after all a great internationalist--but he always advocated
treating the Arabic people of Palestine with generosity and
understanding.
Clearly Einstein's Zionist path was not the one followed. The actual path
chosen by Israel has been pretty much that of "the iron wall,"
a phrase put forward by Ze'ev Jabotinsky in the 1920s as the appropriate
posture for Zionists to adopt towards Arabs in Palestine.
Charles de Gaulle, up until the Six Day War, demonstrated great
understanding and support for Israel. This thoughtful and highly
individualistic statesman felt an instinctive sympathy for the struggle
of the Jews, but the Six Day War caused him to alter France's policies
towards the Jewish state.
The Six Day War was a much darker and more complex affair than it is
portrayed in official Israeli myths. The war was not simply an attack by
a gang of Arab states against Israel--a description which suggests not
just Goliath, but the entire tribe of Philistines, attacking little David
with his slingshot. While this is an appealing image, naturally arousing
great sympathy in American Puritans raised on the Old Testament, it is
not an accurate one. A fine Jewish scholar like Avi Shlaim, a specialist
in the first half century of Israeli policy, recognizing that not all
important documents bearing on the matter have been released, agrees
there are doubts and ambiguities here rather than light and darkness.
Before the Six Day War, David Ben Gurion made it clear to de Gaulle and
other western leaders that Israel wanted more land to absorb migrants.
Before the war, Israel also high-handedly diverted water from the Jordan
river, a hostile act in a water-short region and the kind of thing that
caused more than one "range war" in America's Southwest.
A very tense situation arose with a surge in Soviet armaments to Arab
states, although any knowledgeable observer understood that Israel
continued to hold the upper hand in any potential conflict. A major
diplomatic mission was undertaken by Abba Eban to gather support for
Israel's intended violent response to Egypt's blockade of the Straits of
Tiran. Just as we now have Bush's obdurate, hasty demand for war with
Iraq, Eban made it clear that Israel had no stomach for diplomacy to end
the blockade. The blockade meant war.
De Gaulle made a remarkably prescient observation to the Israeli
government: "If Israel is attacked, we shall not let her be
destroyed, but if you attack, we shall condemn your initiative. Of
course, I have no doubt that you will have military successes in the
event of war, but afterwards, you would find yourself committed on the
terrain, and from the international point of view, in increasing
difficulties, especially as war in the East cannot fail to increase a
deplorable tension in the world, so that it will be you, having become
the conquerors, who will gradually be blamed for the
inconveniences."
De Gaulle also understood that Israel's behavior was nourishing
nationalistic aspirations on the part of the Palestinians, a development
Israel either greatly underestimated or chose to ignore, perhaps
reflecting the arrogance of those supported by great power towards those
without power. De Gaulle's advice was, of course, ignored. Israel managed
easily to overwhelm the Arab states, as its leaders had known it would,
and it has occupied a good portion of the territories seized ever since.
It has ignored many quiet diplomatic voices on this matter. It has stood
in contempt of UN resolutions for years. It has suffered innumerable
guerilla attacks and launched innumerable reprisals, even starting a
bloody war in Lebanon complete with atrocities. Israel finally came to
toy with the notion of a Palestinian state but never made the genuine
effort or concessions necessary to see this become a reality. It has, in
short, fulfilled de Gaulle's warning of trouble more than thirty years
ago.
The 9/11 attack on America, coming under the administration of perhaps
the most aimless, blundering, and least informed president in American
history, was a godsend for Israel's belligerent policy. The people Israel
has occupied and mistreated for a third of a century are regarded by this
American president as something akin to al Qaeda. We have even had trial
balloons released by Republican figures like Donald Rumsfeld and Dick
Armey concerning Israel's right to hold the land and drive out its
people, although it is possible these represent pre-assault softening-up
by Washington to make Palestinians grateful for a second pathetic offer
of statehood now in the works, pathetic because it is impossible to
imagine anything else being blessed by both Bush and Sharon.
Perhaps most revealing of the moral state to which Israel has been
reduced since the Six Day War were preparations for Mr. Bush's war on
Iraq. All Israeli citizens were issued gas masks. A debate and legal
moves centered around whether foreign workers, of which there are large
numbers, should also receive gas masks. If they wanted gas masks, they
must rent or buy them, and the masks available for rental were those
considered as expired and unsuitable for Israelis. In families of mixed
marriages, apparently spouses who remain unregistered under Israel's now
more restrictive registration requirements, do not receive gas masks.
Most Palestinians under Israeli occupation are not issued gas masks, it
being considered the responsibility of the broken Palestinian Authority,
almost without resources, to look after this.
More on...
http://www.counterpunch.org/chuckman04042003.html
Egypt today condemned the latest Israeli repressions.
