Nov 21, 2023·edited Nov 21, 2023Liked by Micah L. Sifry
I mean, the short answer to the question of how Palestinians and Israelis can be free is voting. In areas the Israeli police and army can enter, Palestinians should be able to vote in Israel federal elections, and vice versa. It will be a long journey and will someday look like what post-slavery countries like the US or Brazil look like, with police violence and high crime, but the right to vote is not 'magical gnomes'.
How are you going to convince Israelis that it is in their interest to give Palestinians in the West Bank (and Gaza) the right to vote in Israeli elections? This is what I mean by magical thinking.
When slavery was practiced in America and Brazil, or when apartheid was practiced in South Africa, or when France occupied Algeria or England occupied Ireland, was the idea that you could win the right to vote magical thinking? I'm sure many thought so. Hamas thinks the answer is survival and violence. The answer I prefer is increased thoughtfulness and shame. If you didn't have the right to vote what would you do?
(I agree that the 'stop US aid' approach is magical thinking. US aid isn't a big enough factor anymore. And the divest approach only works to the extent it creates shame and a feeling of inevitability among Israel's electorate or political class, because small countries with lots of English speakers don't need national level export industries in the same way they used to. That's why I think thoughtfulness and shame are key. Challenging the legitimacy of the current status quo, the lack of voting rights e.g., is another way to phrase 'shame'. Once everyone but a crazy fringe knows the status quo is wrong, it will change.)
Well I don't know the history of each of those places as well as I know the Israel/Palestine history but my general point remains--organizing to win political power through nonviolent means is the only path that makes sense to me. I also think campaigns that seek to isolate Israel's maximalists and that help (re)build the center-left there make more sense than those that treat Israel as one unified monolith (the "settler-colonial" frame) which can't be converted and can only be overthrown. What Hamas did on October 7 has set back that cause tremendously.
Gideon Levy has followed this for a lifetime and seems super smart and morally clear. He thinks the answer is voting, and he disagrees with me and thinks that nothing less than sanctions on Israel will create change. He also thinks that BDS isn't enough but is "the only game in town," which sounds more fair to me than my own pessimism about it.
@micah, what do you think about these two talks of his?
The notion of a single democratic and pluralistic Israeli/Palestine is a wonderful idea...much like Western Civilization. It is something I subscribed to as a very young man. Problem is, it's impossible. The only way Jews and Palestinians, at this juncture, would be able to peaceable live side by side would be the establishment of an authentic Palestinian state with a corridor between the West Bank and what if anything is left of Gaza. But even that two state solution seems extremely remote at least in the medium to short one. Apart from the virulent anti-Arab racists sitting in Bibi's cabinet who would never agree, there's also this problem: Israel's abandoning of Gaza over the last 20 years had led to the construction of a semi-Islamic state there. Or at least, it has created a political bade for Hamas that has been enlarged. Meaning that a whole lot of Gazans themselves may no longer be so excited over a two state solution, especially if the PA has hand in governance. In the end, there is NO short term solution on the horizon. Only palliative steps to reduce the massive bloodletting and destruction.
I agree that there is no short term solution, but also believe that people winning the right to vote (in Palestine, Russia, China, wherever) is a fully reasonable and non-magical solution, and the most likely eventual outcome in each of these cases. Solutions don't have to be short term or easy to be valid. One way to look at this is, if an Israeli voter has friends and family abroad, or works internationally, and every single person they encounter outside of Israel believes that it's appalling that Palestinians don't have the right to vote yet, that will influence them and make the status quo less tenable. People around the world have the ability to create that state of affairs simply by looking clearly at the situation and noticing the absence of Palestinians' right to vote, and remembering how important that right is in their own societies. It could take a while but there is a pretty clear path forward from a political change standpoint.
I used to think that Israel could become "post-Zionist" (as articulated by people like Avram Burg and Bernard Avishai, a "normal" country that decided to stop privileging Jews with extra rights but that had a Hebrew-speaking majority). Maybe in the late 1990s that was beginning to emerge. The second intifada of suicide bombings and the rise of Bibi and Hamas as mutually supportive enemies neutered that prospect. Now I think the only short term potential is in a two-state solution with international security guarantees, so Palestinians indeed get the right to vote as you suggest. (You could ask why Hamas stopped giving them the right to vote 17 years ago, and they do have the right to vote in pre-1967 Israel, by the way). Maybe a generation or two later as both peoples learn to live side by side in their own countries a binational confederation could evolve.
When you say you think there's short term potential for a two-state solution where Palestinians get the right to vote, do you mean they *really* get the right to vote?
Would they be able to vote to build a military and a defense industry? To make military alliances? Accept military aid? Protect their coastline and borders? Do espionage and counter-espionage? Imprison or execute suspected spies? Sign extradition treaties? Extradite terrorists and war criminals, including Israeli ones? Have an air force? Build nuclear power plants? If they give up some of these rights and submit to "international security guarantees," would Israel make similar concessions?
All of seems completely outside of the Overton window in international discourse, let alone internally in Israel. It seems impossible in the short-term.
The best they will get is a vote for mayor or governor, and a few years to rebuild their cities until they're destroyed again. Anything less than full sovereignty just continues or devolves into occupation. Who will believe their vote really matters when there's a ceiling on it? How will you convince young, smart, ambitious political people who understand power to engage with the molasses of the electoral process when it has a ceiling and lack of legitimacy? What will they do instead? Some of them will do more violent resistance. Then there will be more occupation.
The most important thing here is for everyone to agree on what is wrong and untenable about the current situation. Palestinians are under the territorial control of a modern democracy, without equal or even basic rights. Neighbors living just meters or miles from each other. That is what's wrong. Not the violence. That. It's just an abomination.
There probably is not any short term change possible, other than violence and pauses in violence. But the long term solution starts with everyone outside Israel seeing what is wrong, and saying it. If we all agree it's wrong, spread the idea of what's wrong, teach our kids it's wrong, tell our friends it's wrong, without any distortions or excuses, eventually there will be enough international resolve to change minds inside Israel, either through the force of legitimacy or through punitive isolation.
I mean, the short answer to the question of how Palestinians and Israelis can be free is voting. In areas the Israeli police and army can enter, Palestinians should be able to vote in Israel federal elections, and vice versa. It will be a long journey and will someday look like what post-slavery countries like the US or Brazil look like, with police violence and high crime, but the right to vote is not 'magical gnomes'.
How are you going to convince Israelis that it is in their interest to give Palestinians in the West Bank (and Gaza) the right to vote in Israeli elections? This is what I mean by magical thinking.
Mot magical. Delusional.
When slavery was practiced in America and Brazil, or when apartheid was practiced in South Africa, or when France occupied Algeria or England occupied Ireland, was the idea that you could win the right to vote magical thinking? I'm sure many thought so. Hamas thinks the answer is survival and violence. The answer I prefer is increased thoughtfulness and shame. If you didn't have the right to vote what would you do?
(I agree that the 'stop US aid' approach is magical thinking. US aid isn't a big enough factor anymore. And the divest approach only works to the extent it creates shame and a feeling of inevitability among Israel's electorate or political class, because small countries with lots of English speakers don't need national level export industries in the same way they used to. That's why I think thoughtfulness and shame are key. Challenging the legitimacy of the current status quo, the lack of voting rights e.g., is another way to phrase 'shame'. Once everyone but a crazy fringe knows the status quo is wrong, it will change.)
Well I don't know the history of each of those places as well as I know the Israel/Palestine history but my general point remains--organizing to win political power through nonviolent means is the only path that makes sense to me. I also think campaigns that seek to isolate Israel's maximalists and that help (re)build the center-left there make more sense than those that treat Israel as one unified monolith (the "settler-colonial" frame) which can't be converted and can only be overthrown. What Hamas did on October 7 has set back that cause tremendously.
Gideon Levy has followed this for a lifetime and seems super smart and morally clear. He thinks the answer is voting, and he disagrees with me and thinks that nothing less than sanctions on Israel will create change. He also thinks that BDS isn't enough but is "the only game in town," which sounds more fair to me than my own pessimism about it.
@micah, what do you think about these two talks of his?
1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kTaErJCfwcw
2. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MMNVccRAkww
I'll try to find time to watch in the next few days--thanks for sharing.
The notion of a single democratic and pluralistic Israeli/Palestine is a wonderful idea...much like Western Civilization. It is something I subscribed to as a very young man. Problem is, it's impossible. The only way Jews and Palestinians, at this juncture, would be able to peaceable live side by side would be the establishment of an authentic Palestinian state with a corridor between the West Bank and what if anything is left of Gaza. But even that two state solution seems extremely remote at least in the medium to short one. Apart from the virulent anti-Arab racists sitting in Bibi's cabinet who would never agree, there's also this problem: Israel's abandoning of Gaza over the last 20 years had led to the construction of a semi-Islamic state there. Or at least, it has created a political bade for Hamas that has been enlarged. Meaning that a whole lot of Gazans themselves may no longer be so excited over a two state solution, especially if the PA has hand in governance. In the end, there is NO short term solution on the horizon. Only palliative steps to reduce the massive bloodletting and destruction.
I agree that there is no short term solution, but also believe that people winning the right to vote (in Palestine, Russia, China, wherever) is a fully reasonable and non-magical solution, and the most likely eventual outcome in each of these cases. Solutions don't have to be short term or easy to be valid. One way to look at this is, if an Israeli voter has friends and family abroad, or works internationally, and every single person they encounter outside of Israel believes that it's appalling that Palestinians don't have the right to vote yet, that will influence them and make the status quo less tenable. People around the world have the ability to create that state of affairs simply by looking clearly at the situation and noticing the absence of Palestinians' right to vote, and remembering how important that right is in their own societies. It could take a while but there is a pretty clear path forward from a political change standpoint.
I used to think that Israel could become "post-Zionist" (as articulated by people like Avram Burg and Bernard Avishai, a "normal" country that decided to stop privileging Jews with extra rights but that had a Hebrew-speaking majority). Maybe in the late 1990s that was beginning to emerge. The second intifada of suicide bombings and the rise of Bibi and Hamas as mutually supportive enemies neutered that prospect. Now I think the only short term potential is in a two-state solution with international security guarantees, so Palestinians indeed get the right to vote as you suggest. (You could ask why Hamas stopped giving them the right to vote 17 years ago, and they do have the right to vote in pre-1967 Israel, by the way). Maybe a generation or two later as both peoples learn to live side by side in their own countries a binational confederation could evolve.
When you say you think there's short term potential for a two-state solution where Palestinians get the right to vote, do you mean they *really* get the right to vote?
Would they be able to vote to build a military and a defense industry? To make military alliances? Accept military aid? Protect their coastline and borders? Do espionage and counter-espionage? Imprison or execute suspected spies? Sign extradition treaties? Extradite terrorists and war criminals, including Israeli ones? Have an air force? Build nuclear power plants? If they give up some of these rights and submit to "international security guarantees," would Israel make similar concessions?
All of seems completely outside of the Overton window in international discourse, let alone internally in Israel. It seems impossible in the short-term.
The best they will get is a vote for mayor or governor, and a few years to rebuild their cities until they're destroyed again. Anything less than full sovereignty just continues or devolves into occupation. Who will believe their vote really matters when there's a ceiling on it? How will you convince young, smart, ambitious political people who understand power to engage with the molasses of the electoral process when it has a ceiling and lack of legitimacy? What will they do instead? Some of them will do more violent resistance. Then there will be more occupation.
The most important thing here is for everyone to agree on what is wrong and untenable about the current situation. Palestinians are under the territorial control of a modern democracy, without equal or even basic rights. Neighbors living just meters or miles from each other. That is what's wrong. Not the violence. That. It's just an abomination.
There probably is not any short term change possible, other than violence and pauses in violence. But the long term solution starts with everyone outside Israel seeing what is wrong, and saying it. If we all agree it's wrong, spread the idea of what's wrong, teach our kids it's wrong, tell our friends it's wrong, without any distortions or excuses, eventually there will be enough international resolve to change minds inside Israel, either through the force of legitimacy or through punitive isolation.