“Beyond Words” is a published
seven volume collection of Rabbi Meir Kahane’s writings that originally
appeared in The Jewish Press, other serial publications, and his
privately-published works.
“Beyond Words” also includes
a number of extra features:
Chronology of Rabbi Kahane's
life.
Volume 5
The Arabs of Israel: No Surprise -
1988
Once again, Israeli leaders and
Jewish Establishment groups are “surprised.” In the wake of the riots which saw
Arab citizens of the Jewish state stone Jewish buses, attack a police station
and firebomb security vehicles — the one word which Jewish leaders,
intellectuals and news media used over and over again was “surprise.” Suddenly,
all the years of efforts by Israeli and Jewish leaders to persuade the world —
but more important, themselves — that the Arabs of Israel were loyal citizens
of the Jewish state exploded in the wake of the Arab riots — not in the territories, but inside the
Israeli cities of Jaffa, Lydda, Ramle, Acre, Nazareth, Um el Fahem and, of
course, Jerusalem.
The most surprising thing about all
this is the fact that Jews are surprised. It is this “surprise” and shock which
is the direct result of decades of deliberate efforts to avoid dealing with the
real, root cause of the problem, a madness that continues to this very day. All
the absurd “explanations” and rationalizations: the problem, we were told, is
that the Arab economic and social position is not equal to that of the Jew. Or
the problem is that the “occupation” of the West Bank and Gaza is causing anger
and upset among the Israeli Arabs. As
if those are the reasons Israeli Arabs take to the streets and cry “Palestine!
We will free the Galilee with blood and spirit!” As if giving Israeli Arabs more sewers
and more indoor toilets will put an end to the problem. As if a “Palestinian”
state in the territories will send the Israeli Arabs back to their homes, happy and
satisfied.
The root of the growing Israeli
Arab revolt does not lie in economic inequality. It lies in a problem that is
so basic and so painful and so terrifying for secular Israeli and Jewish
leaders that they flee from confrontation with it — thus assuring that it will
grow to proportions that will threaten the very existence of Israel.
The root of the Israeli Arab
hostility and, indeed, hatred of Israel, lies in the very definition of Israel
as a “Jewish state.” It lies in the very basis of Zionism, which arose to
recreate the “Jewish state” that twice stood in the land. And Israel which, in
the words of the Declaration of Independence, was to be “a Jewish state in the
Land of Israel,” by definition could never allow the Arabs to be equal. It
could never allow the Arabs the opportunity to become the majority — albeit
peacefully — and democratically change a Jewish state into an Arab one, an
Israel into a Palestine. Indeed, the root of the problem and of the liberal
Jewish nightmare is that there is a basic, immutable contradiction between
Western democracy and a Jewish state.
Western democracy eliminates all
such concepts as national background or religion. Whoever are the majority
rules, and both Arabs and Jews have the right to become the majority in Israel
— under this Western democratic credo — and do with the country what they, the
majority, will. Certainly, such a basic law as that passed by the socialist
Zionist government of David Ben-Gurion in 1950, the Law of Return, that allows
Jews automatic right to immigrate and become Israeli citizens, is not what
Western democracy would adopt.
But that is exactly the kind of law
that Zionism and a Jewish state did adopt and
must adopt, for the Jewish people’s main dream is that of a Jewish state,
and all that can be done to insure the Jewishness of that state is not only
proper but mandatory. A Jewish people, for 1,900 years, lived in involuntary
exile, as a minority in Christian and Moslem countries. It enjoyed such
minority benefits as Crusades and Inquisitions and pogroms and, of course,
Auschwitz. It decided that never again would it be trampled upon, spat upon,
gassed to death and burned alive. It decided that it would have a Jewish state
in which the Jew was master of his fate, never dependent on others.
That is Zionism and that is Israel
— the Jewish state — and there is nothing for any Jew to be ashamed of. But let
him never deceive himself. A Jewish state can never be a Western democratic
one, and it can never allow the Arab political equality with the Jew, no matter
how much the liberal and Left in Israel and the Jewish Establishment refuse to
face it.
And that is why the Arab in Israel
riots and hates the Jewish state. Because it can never be his, by virtue of the
stark fact that he is not a Jew. It is the contradiction between Zionism and
Western democracy that is at the heart of the inevitable Arab hostility. And
all the economic benefits and all the Palestinian states in the world will
never remove the reality of the Israeli Arab who will never accept the Jewish
state. It will get worse. Much worse. The Arab birthrate and the new
generation of young, educated and hostile Israeli Arabs guarantee that in the
years to come, the world will watch on its television screens rioting and
shooting of Arabs in the Galilee and the cities of Israel.
The Arabs of Israel joined with the
Arabs of the territories in rioting, for the simple reason that they are ONE.
For them there is no nonsensical “Green Line,” of 1967. The Arabs of Israel and
the territories, both, are logical and normal. They know and proclaim what
normal Jews such as Kahane do. They believe and proclaim that there is but ONE
“Palestinian” people and that all of the land — “West Bank” and Israel — is
really ONE, “Palestine.” To be sure, the Arabs of Israel have no intention of
leaving Israel, but surely not because they love Israel. The contention of so
many vapid Israeli leaders that the Israeli Arab is caught in the dilemma of
being a member of the Palestine nation and citizen of Israel is ridiculous. There is no dilemma for the Arab. His identity is not dual; it is clear
and unmistaken. He considers himself to be a member of the Palestinian Arab
nation. The fact that he is also a citizen of Israel and lives in the Jewish
state is not a dilemma for him, but rather an unfortunate tragedy that he must
live with at the moment, but which he strives, daily, to change.
The problem in getting Jews to
understand all this lies in the basic dishonesty of the Jewish leadership and
the ‘gentilized’, liberal views that surround them, and from which they spring.
It lies in the basic dishonesty of the Jewish news media, intellectuals and
clergy (both non-Orthodox and, in great degree, Moderdox Modern
Orthodox). This dishonesty is rooted in the terrible fear of admitting the
fundamental contradiction between their beloved Western democracy and gentilized
social values, and the values and definitions of Zionism and authentic Judaism.
None of them has the courage to face up to this contradiction and choose!
It is this cowardice that threatens
the very existence of Israel, for the vacillation, the hesitation, the flight
from the obvious and only choice — expulsion — sees the enormous growth of Arab
population as well as the radicalization of an educated and boldly brazen new
generation of Israeli Arabs. The cowardly refusal to choose and to act sees a
growing sense of uncertainty and then guilt among young Israeli Jews, young
people who — in any event — are naked of Jewish values, thanks to the
‘gentilized’, secular education they receive.
This cowardly fear of deciding for
Zionism and a Jewish state, and rejecting Western democracy, is nothing short
of criminal. The signs and the evidence of Israeli Arab hatred of the Jewish
state have been there to see for decades! In recent years not even the most
blind of people could fail to see it. When Arab Communist Party Knesset Member
Tewfik Ziad hears Labor M.K. David Libai speak of Jews defending the right of
the Arab minority, he calls out: “The minority that will be the majority, in
the future” (Knesset minutes, Dec. 9, 1986).
And when Muhamad Mussarwa, the
Israeli Consul General in Atlanta (chosen by Israel as some Uncle Ahmed to show
the greatness of Israeli token democracy), tells a group of Atlanta rabbis
(come to drink from his feet): “Israel is my country. I do not perceive it as a
Jewish state” (Atlanta Jewish Times, Nov. 20, 1987) — he is merely proclaiming
what every Arab sees as the most logical strategy. Unable to demand a
“Palestine” at this moment, proclaim Israel to be a Western democracy in which
Jews and Arabs are truly equal,
i.e., Israel is not a Jewish state and Arabs have the right to become the
majority and create the kind of state they desire.
This is exactly what the openly
pro-PLO Arab M.K., Mohamed Miari (Progressive List), meant when he said: “The
State of Israel is not the state of the Jewish people but rather of the
citizens who are there by virtue of being citizens of the State of Israel”
(Knesset minutes, Oct. 15, 1985).
And this is what Na’ama Saud, an
Israeli Arab teacher, tells the newspaper Ma’ariv (May 28, 1976): “Today, I am
in the minority. Who says that in the year 2000 we Arabs will still be in the
minority? Today, I accept the fact that this is a Jewish state with an Arab
minority. But when we are the majority I will not accept the fact of a Jewish
state with an Arab majority.”
And Muhamed Muhareb, chairman of
the Arab students at Hebrew University, tells Ma’ariv (January 20, 1978): “I am
first and foremost a Palestinian, resident of Lydda. My Israeli citizenship was
forced upon me. I do not recognize it and do not see myself as belonging to the
State of Israel. With the final solution common to the Arabs of Palestine and
of Judea, Lydda will be in the sovereign boundaries of the democratic state.
What will that state be called? Palestine, naturally.” And that is why Arab
mobs in the Israeli town of Taibe shout: “Katyushas will yet fall again on
Kiryat Shemona,” and some 6,000 Israeli Arabs come to the Knesset to
demonstrate and shout: “We will free the Galilee with blood!”
The Arabs of Israel are a hostile,
hating minority in the midst of a Jewish state they hate and despise and dream
of overthrowing. The absurd shibboleth that is waved on high again and again by
the ‘gentilized’ cowards to the effect that “the overwhelming majority of
Israeli Arabs have never been involved in anti-state acts” is worse than
stupidity. One could as well prove that the French or Dutch or Norwegians
enjoyed living under the Nazi occupation because so few joined the underground
against the Germans. Most people do not risk life and limb by attacking authority.
It takes courage to join an underground or a terrorist group. Most people do
not relish being caught and serving long prison sentences. That does not mean that they do not admire the PLO
or support it. And even those who are against violence are of that mind for the
pragmatic reason that they feel it will not work. But all of the Israeli Arabs reject
a “Jewish state,” reject the Zionist concept of a Jewish state in which they — the non-Jews — must,
of necessity, be strangers.
The Jewish leaders in Israel; the
Jewish Establishment in the Exile; the Jewish news media and the intellectuals
— all are bound to Western democracy as some Prometheus, to which their
Hellenism so gravitates. All are too terrified and too weak to choose a Jewish
state over Western democracy. That is why they doom Israel to years of slow and
agonizing torture; to years of Arab rebellion within the country; to years of
bloody confrontation with Arabs inside the Jewish state; to years of world
condemnation of Israel.
If we do not want that, we must
throw off the yoke of the present Jewish leadership in Israel and the Exile. We
must reject the sterile anger and protests of sterile Jewish liberals, who are
the most dangerous enemies that Israel faces.
If we do not want tragedy, let us throw
off our fear of facing the contradiction of Western democracy and a Jewish
state. And let us choose a Jewish state, with
no guilt. The answer, the inevitable answer is — remove the Arabs to any of
their 22 states, and Israel will remain the one Jewish state for the Jewish
people. Without liberal guilt or apologies.
Anyone reading this Rabbi Meir Kahane or Rabbi Binyamin Kahane article and is not on my personal list to
receive the weekly articles and would like to be, please contact me at:
To view articles written by Rabbi Meir Kahane and Rabbi Binyamin Kahane
go to blog:
To view Rabbi Meir Kahane site of Youtubes, Videos. CDs posted by
Michael Miller go to: http://www.youtube.com/user/bayitvegan
Facebook:
Anglos for Otzma Yehudit
Barbara Sandra Ginsberg
No comments:
Post a Comment