Am I not shocked by the images of dead Muslim children in Palestine and Lebanon? No, I am not. There is no commandment of compassion to an enemy’s population. Even in Christianity, the compassion is qualified. In the parable of the Good Samaritan, Jesus defined the neighbor as the one who did good to you (the priest and Levite who passed by the victim proved no neighbors, but a despised Samaritan who helped him was declared a neighbor). Never in the recent history had a Muslim community helped the Jews. We owe no compassion to them.
With or without compassion, one should not inflict unnecessary suffering on others. Even animals should be killed for food with least suffering. So the proper question is, Do we the Israelis inflict unnecessary suffering on the Palestinians? The answer is emphatic yes.
Israel gave Palestinians the illusion of possible coexistence. Absent that illusion, Muslims from Israeli core, Judea, Samaria, and Gaza would have long ago emigrated and lived comfortably elsewhere. We cannot coexist. As the Palestinians see it, the Jews took their land. Living on international welfare in their ridiculously small state, Palestinians will never forget the Israeli offense. In the familiar pattern, Arab university graduates who lack job opportunities will join the radicals and fan the anti-Israeli struggle. They saw that cheap things like suicide bombers and fertilizer-filled rockets do work and bring political benefits. Palestinians have no reason to stop, and every incentive to continue their struggle.
American Indians do not fight the European occupants because the settlers decimated them, suppressed them, ridiculed them through the stereotyped images of Red Indians, brainwashed them with American media and educational programs, and bribed them with extensive welfare programs. Great Britain failed to do the same with the Irish people, and the Irish fought for independence. Israel cannot influence education or media in the Palestinian state. They would seed or, at the very least, not oppose Palestinian nationalism which is necessarily anti-Israeli.
Would the Palestinians emigrate and spare their children if they were smarter? Decades ago, perhaps. Now the smart are ideologically motivated and remain to the risk of their children. The Jews, too, risk their children. Land, honor, ideology, religion – they are way above lives.
Truth hurts, but minimizes long-term suffering. Israel and a Palestinian state cannot peacefully coexist. One of them must be dismantled.
Article comments
1 - Triniman
"Israel and a Palestinian state cannot peacefully coexist. One of them must be dismantled."
There may be a Palestinian authority, but there is no real Palestinian state to dismantle.
Are most Palestinians hell bent on seeing Israel destroyed or is this a minority view?
I only hope that they realize that a bright future for the Palestinians is tied to a safe, secure and prosperous Israel. Once they accept this, if they ever accept it, they will be on the path to realizing their own dreams of peace in the region. The operative word here is "if."
2 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
So, Ovadiah?
Where are you leaving for? Or are you willing to dismantle at long last, the illusion of "Palestine"?
3 - Peter J
Someone who's not lived under such circumstances cannot pass judgement on who is right or who is wrong. I have no claim and I have no judgement. I don't claim righteousness, only humanity.
As a person who must share this earth with all forms of worship and manner of lifestyle I believe that no innocent should be deliberately placed in harms way under any circumstances.
As a person who would claim to believe in any manner of God they would also believe that the taking of an innocents life would doom their soul or being for eternity and any way you twist or convolute this action, if one is a true believer then his soul cannot escape the truth that he knows in his heart.
Land, honor, ideology, religion, these are worth any childrens lives? Their is no honor or idelogy or religion about a torn childs body. Whose lives are those to barter? Why not just hold them up as a shield?
How can one claim honor, ideology, and religion as just cause for murder, at least be honest.
This is about land. God have mercy.
4 - Danny
To Triniman: The brightness of one's future is not about food or money; it is about the ideals. Coexistence with Israeli state which took the land the Palestinians consider theirs is not a bright future for them, but permanent insult, and the insult they wouldn't tolerate.
To Ruvy: After the Camp David, Palestine is no longer an illusion. Israelis may or should do away with the Palestinian state, but don't deceive yourself: Palestine is no illusion.
To Peter: Does the Vatican "share its earth" with other faiths? Does the US "share its earth" with communists? Why should Israel share our tiny land? Were the American Indians innocents? The Germans of Dresden? The Lebanese who freely elected Hezbollah to the US-installed democratic Lebanese parliament? If land or religion are not worth lives - even children's lives - what the Children's Crusade was about? How about dead German children in WWII? Christianity is about eternal salvation - is it not above lives? Was there any state ever that didn't establish and maintain itself by force? Don't you think you deliberately apply different standards to the Jews: it is Jewish land, Jewish religion, Jewish honor, and Jewish ideology, in your opinion, that are not worth the lives of the Palestinians and the Lebanese.
5 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
Triniman, Peter,
From what little data is available, the majority of Arabs identified as "Palestinians" approve of terror and support the eventual destruction of this country. This validates one of the basic points that Ovadiah makes in his brief article.
If this were merely about land, then the positions taken by both sides in this conflict would be unreasonable. This is not over rocks and pebbles or farms and factories, it is over destiny.
Unlike the conflict in Northern Ireland, for example, it is not about mere sovereignty over a piece of territory. It is also about Divine gifts of land.
Those who do not wish to believe in the Divine, cannot be heard to appeal to Him for mercy. But those of us who are believers, Moslems and Jews alike, also have to wrestle with the issue that there is a Divine Grant involved, and what that grant means.
This approach is being forced upon non-believing Israelis (who would prefer to be Parisians in the Middle East than Jews) by Arabs who are determined that Allah has granted them El Kuds. So then a choice has to be made. The Arab vision must prevail or the Jewish one. There can be no compromises. That is the other point that Ovadiah makes, and which I agree with.
The only question is whether Ovadiah is willing to forego his G-d given destiny so that the Aerabs might have theirs, or will he insist on pursuing the destiny his birthright has bought him in this country. Hence my comment, my question to him. For the moment, he still has a choice in the matter.
6 - Danny
To Ruvy:
Obadiah's personal choice is clear: it is Eretz Israel in its entirety. He refuses, however, to force his opinion on others. Thus he advocates a second Jewish state, Judea.
7 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
Danny, you write,
Obadiah's personal choice is clear: it is Eretz Israel in its entirety. He refuses, however, to force his opinion on others. Thus he advocates a second Jewish state, Judea.
Danny, with all due respect, I'd rather hear Ovadiah say this himself. He can't force his opinions on anyone without using force, a rather neat trick in the cyber world. But he can state them. He does have that right. And given that this is an American site, American laws concerning incitement, etc. apply, not Israeli ones.
I don't have any problem with your suggestion. We don't need the Israeli VAT of 16½% to pay thieves in Jerusalem, we can defend ouselves with adequate weaponry, and can cut some kind of deal with the sick funds in Israel if we establish a government of our own out here.
BUT, for all that, I'd rather see Ovadiah make this sugestion himself - it is not at all clear from the text of his article that a separate Judean state is what he is suggesting at all.
8 - Danny
Hi Ruvy,
Obadiah states his position on Judea in his book. It is also implied in the blog article
Obadiah works in Israel, and his views are subject to Israeli laws and censorship. Thus the pen name.
9 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
Hevanti
G'mar Hatima Tova,
Hag Sukkot SameaH
Yihyeh l'kha shana tova, u'mtuka, u'bria, v'yihyeh aleynu b'shana hazot g'ula shlema, v'sof l'tzarotenu, v'aHarei n'tzaHon neged oyeveinu, shalom b'yamot hamashiaH!
(translation for the Hebrew challenged)
May you be inscribed for a good year, and a happy Sukkot holiday to you;
May you be blessed with a good, sweet and healthy year;
May we see this year the full Redemption of our people, an end to our troubles and after victory against our enemies, Peace in the Days of the the Messiah!