If the century-long Palestinian rejection of political pluralism continues to be rejected at its root, what hope is there for the future?

By Rabbi Hillel Goldberg, JNS

As I survey the horrendous damage unleashed by Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023, I have many sources of depression. Of course, I am depressed by the loss of Israeli life, the loss of Palestinian life, the destruction of much of Gaza, the continuing horror of the hostages, the abject brutality of Hamas, the array of Hezbollah missiles and drones still arrayed against Israel, the (at best) postponement of an Israel-Saudi Arabia peace accord, and the outbreak of antisemitism, including the tremendous growth of anti-Israel sentiment around the world. Like countless others, I am deeply wounded by all of this, but I am also depressed by something else: The fact that despite all the horror, nothing fundamental has changed. Yes, Israel will, I fervently hope and pray, disarm Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis and Iran, but I remain depressed.

I cite as evidence a piece from The Economist (Oct. 5-11). I could cite a plethora of other sources. I cite The Economist only because it happens to be at hand. This is the point. There is no special insight or revelation in the article, “After Gaza, how do young Palestinians want to build their state?” The assumptions in the article are pretty much the same anywhere else that articulates a current Palestinian point of view.

A slew of assumptions color a variety of conflicting Palestinian policy ideas. It’s not the policies that ultimately count but the assumptions, the underlying premises.

They pop up in The Economist piece in no particular pattern. I address them as they come.

Important qualification: My main purpose is not to lay bare the journalistic bias that pervades this article. My focus here is not mainly the journalists but the thinking they present.

Assumption #1:

The article says of young Palestinians that they are dismissive of an aging leadership and “seek new ways to pursue their century-long struggle.” Where did things stand a century ago in Palestine? Did conditions there in 1924 warrant an Arab “struggle?” Was a “struggle” necessary? Was it wise? Was it beneficial for the local Arab population? (They did not call themselves Palestinians then.)

First of all, the area in 1924 was called Palestine, not Israel. There was no modern State of Israel. Even the British in the Balfour Declaration (1917) did not promise Palestine to the Jews as a Jewish state. Rather, it promised a Jewish homeland in Palestine. It explicitly acknowledged the presence of local non-Jewish populations and conditioned its promise to the Jews on the respect for the religious and civil rights of the local populations. So, the British did not impose a “struggle.” Second of all, the local Arab population outnumbered the Jewish population by about five to one! So, demographics did not impose a struggle. Third of all, the British envisioned a council of governance run jointly by the Jews and the local Arabs. This governing council would be the first opportunity for self-rule by the local Arab population. Before the British conquered Palestine in 1918, it was controlled by the Ottoman Empire. Under the Ottomans (and before them, the Mamluks, Crusaders, etc.), Arabs had no rights. What did the super-majority Arab community in Palestine do with the British proposal for joint, Jewish-Arab self-rule? The Arabs boycotted it. They would not sit together with the Jews. They would not accept a Jewish corporate presence in Palestine of any size, nature or authority. Rather, they themselves created a “struggle.” It was against a small, minority Jewish presence in the area. No objective conditions required a struggle. It was an idea. An idea that has not changed for a century. It is this idea that depresses me. The Palestinian vision, going back a full century, is binary. Black and white. Us vs. them. No sharing. No joint anything. I don’t see anything in the current war changing that. That’s depressing.

Assumption #2:

The Economist article states: “Many feel that the shock [of the current war]is already as awful as the nakba (‘catastrophe’) of 1948, when Israel was formed and around 15,000 Palestinians were killed and some 750,000 were driven from their homes or fled.”

Observe the inevitability. Israel formed. Local Arabs killed. Arabs driven from their homes (no mention of being told by their leaders to leave). Glaring here is the utter absence of agency, as if this catastrophe just rolled over the local Arabs—and so who can blame them for their enduring resentment and resistance? That’s the take now and the historic take then. No acknowledgement that not a single Arab needed to die or leave his home; that war was declared by Arab states against Israel, not the other war around. No acknowledgmeent of the Arab rejection of the Arab state of Palestine in the area voted by the U.N. in 1947. No acknowledgement that Israel “was formed” not in isolation but by the United Nations jointly with an Arab state, and both of these states were rejected by the Arab world. The Jewish state was rejected when five Arab states declared war and invaded the Jewish territory, and the Arab state was rejected because its acceptance required the simultaneous acceptance of the Jewish state. This is the mentality in the “catastrophe” narrative: The fault for Palestinian suffering lies beyond Palestinian actions and attitudes. It was the United Nations. It was the Zionists. It was the British. Whatever it was, it was not the local Arab population. That population was strictly a victim with full right of revenge. That mentality is depressing.

Assumption #3:

The article writes of conditions in October 2024:“[Israeli] Checkpoints keep them [West Bank Arabs] locked under siege and shut out of Israel’s labour markets.” Actually, there are two assumptions in this one sentence.

First: Not the only, but the most extensive labor markets for Palestinian Arabs in construction, hotel management and other fields are Israeli, not Palestinian. This mentality is sad. The idea is not for Palestinians to create and rely on their own labor markets, not to focus on building their own society, but to nurture grievance. The fact is that there are creative and successful Palestinians, but the narrative must not be confused by the facts. The narrative is: If we have no work, it’s Israel’s fault. Israel closed its labor markets to us and put us under siege. That mentality holds no hope for a future Palestinian society focused on its own welfare. That mentality is depressing.

The second assumption in this sentence is that checkpoints are affirmative Israeli efforts at repression, not defensive Israeli efforts against the infiltration of terrorists, as if the atrocities of Oct. 7, which won plaudits among large sectors of the West Bank Arab population, never happened; as if Israel’s pre-Oct. 7 open border policy with Gaza did not enable Hamas to reconnoiter southern Israel and identify its intended victims. The mentality here is that when Israel clamps down, it’s strictly out of malice.

This mentality is reflected later in the article: “ … each round of [Palestinian] violence provides a pretext for Israel to grab more territory.” In other words, violence against Israel is not wrong, it’s prudentially unwise since it provides Israel with a “pretext.” Israel’s response to violence against it is not self-defense; it is a cover for land grabs. That mentality, that understanding of Israel, offers no hope for the future.

Assumption #4:

“ … violence [as a West Bank strategy]is also regaining its appeal. … A pollster in Ramallah [shows]support for violence in the West Bank grew from 35% in September 2022, when Yair Lapid was Israel’s prime minister, to 56% in September this year.”

Yair Lapid is on the political left. He is drastically different from the current prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu. They are rivals. But it makes little difference on the West Bank. Under Lapid, support for violence against Israel in the West Bank polled at 35%! The assumption in The Economist is that Israel’s response to Hamas has turned the tide of Palestinian opinion towards violence since it now stands at 56%—as if 35%, more than one in three, under a leftist prime minister is not extreme. A very depressing point of view.

Assumption #5:

“Western governments have not forced Israel to relent [and accept a ceasefire].”

In the context of The Economist article, the idea of a ceasefire is not to secure the release of hostages; the idea is an unconditional cessation of Israeli fire, as well as the international imposition of a two-state settlement. The Hamas invasion of Oct. 7 is not even mentioned. Hostages are not even mentioned. The rape, murder, kidnapping and body-burning of Oct. 7 are not even hinted at. The assumption here is that Israel is at war for no reason. The current war is “like previous conflicts in Gaza.” The conflict is limited to Gaza. Israel was not invaded. Israel was not attacked. The capacity to see cause and effect—Israel is attacked, ergo Israel responds—is utterly absent. Depressing!

If the century-long (and longer than century-long) Palestinian rejection of political pluralism continues to be rejected at its root, what hope is there for the future?

This column originally appeared in the Intermountain Jewish News.