Remarks on the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

Floor Speech

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Mrs. KIGGANS of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record remarks submitted at the request of a Virginia Beach constituent, Rabbi Dr. Israel Zoberman of Temple Lev Tikvah, and are a reflection of his views: On The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

Palestinian award-winning author and lawyer, Raja Shehadeh is co-founder in 1979 of Al-Haq, the Palestinian human rights organization. The Observer loaded him, ``Palestine's greatest prose writer'' and the New York Times Book Review heaps praises as well, ``in his moral clarity and bearing of the heart is self-questioning and assistance on focusing on the experience of the individual within the storms of nationalist myth and hubris, Shehadeh recalls writers such as Ghassan Kanafani and Primo Levi.''

In his latest book with a challenging title, What Does Israel Fear From Palestine? New York: Other Press. 2024, Shehadeh, clearly a Palestinian patriot who was born in 1951 in the West Bank town of Ramallah, offers us a concise packed yet imbalanced perspective on the long and agonizing Palestinian-Israeli conflict that the October 7, 2023, Hamas's vile attack with terrifying Holocaust dimensions, has brought into sharp view with months of fighting and much suffering to both sides. The detail-oriented writer and activist is anchored in the Palestinian saga of loss and grievances going back to the pivotal 1948 victorious Israeli War of Independence which the Palestinians painfully regard as their Nakba (Catastrophe).

Touching are the author's reminiscences of growing up in Ramallah with his grandma who was a refugee from Jaffa, ever missing her old home and inculcating in her young grandson an attachment to the family's past. ``For a long time, I was hostage to the memories, perceptions and attitudes of others that I could not abandon. My sense of place was not my own.'' However, following the 1967 War when he was able to visit Jaffa, his family's roots gained a realistic sense of belonging. The close physical proximity was a primary factor.

Shehadeh blames the British for the turn of events culminating in the 1948 Arab defeat and the Palestinian debacle, pointing at the 1917 Balfour Declaration as the root cause, stating that the 1922 to 1948 British Mandate was dedicated to fulfilling the earlier declared British commitment toward the Jewish people. I believe that historians would beg to differ, regarding a gradual British shift in the Arabs' favor and manifested in severe limits on Jewish refugees before and after WWII and the Holocaust. Intense Jewish military pressure was created as the British Empire was disintegrating. The author claims that ``what happened in Palestine was the utter dissolution of a nation,'' notwithstanding the acknowledged fact that no such ``nation'' historically existed yet the Israeli Jewish narrative supported by the Bible claims past millennial Jewish life and creativity which is cavalierly dismissed by the author, ``Israel treated the Bible as a historical document and used it to back up the claim that the land had belonged to the Jews from time immemorial, having been promised to them by the Almighty.''

He bemoans the fate of the Palestinian Arabs, about 160,000, who remained in Israel and were ``forced'' to celebrate Israel Independence Day. Admittedly, they were caught in a bind but there is no evidence that they were coerced to celebrate Israel's national festivals. After all they have enjoyed the benefits of becoming Israeli citizens and significant progress of integration was accomplished though challenges remain in a complex scenario with serious security issues. There is evidence of growing Palestinization of Arab Israelis while polls reflect no desire on their part to trade their Israeli citizenship for an Arab one. There is no mention by the author of the 750,000 Jewish refugees in 1948 from Arab lands who left under duress, subject to pogroms and losing their belongings following centuries of discrimination.

It is hard for Shehadeh to come to grips with Israel's success to establish a modern Jewish national identity, defined by him as ``Zionist colonization,'' with the revitalized Hebrew language bestowing Hebrew names on the rebuilt landscape that had carried Arab ones. He points at, a non-starter, proposal of his late father, Aziz Shehadeh, following the 1967 War, to use the 1947 Partition Resolution--then denied by the Arabs--for a Palestinian state. Abba Eban, Israel's legendary foreign minister, insightfully coined that the Palestinians ``never missed an opportunity to miss an opportunity.'' Indeed, the controversial Jewish State Law of July 19, 2018, caused understandable consternation among Israeli Arabs, exacerbated by the dropping of Arabic as an official language. Sadly, I share with the author, only 3% of Israeli Jews are literate in Arabic. That is part of an important discussion concerning Israel's better integration into the surrounding Arab Middle East while there are those Israelis who prefer a Western orientation. I suggest that both approaches ought be pursued tandem.

The book's Part Two is dedicated to the Gaza War, 2023-4, triggered by the October 7, 2023, Hamas's massacres which the author thankfully condemns though seemingly impressed with the military aspects of catching Israel by surprise as Egypt did in the 1973 Yom Kippur War, the breaking through the failed billion plus costly barrier, along with the heavy Israeli fatalities, casualties and captives. ``The brutality of Hamas's attack and the civilian death toll certainly cast a shadow on their military success.

Whereas an occupied population has the right under the international law to resist, they have no right to commit war crimes. Still, this time the Palestinians did not fit into the role of victims. To the Israelis it seemed like aggressors who were challenging Israel's very existence.''

The astute Shehadeh is surely aware that Gaza was returned to the Palestinians in 2005 by then Prime Minister Sharon, followed by Hamas's forceful occupation and the cruel toppling of the Palestinian Authority there with no elections since the 2006 Hamas's ``victory''. He regards the Israeli response to the October 7 Nazi-like Hamas's massacres excessive, expecting public Israeli criticism as back in 1982 with the horrific Sabra and Shatila massacres in Lebanon. The author though surely knows that the Christian Phalangists had a decisive hand at that time. Somehow, there is no reference also to Iran's leading role in directing its radical proxies, Hamas, Hezbollah, Houthis and others, to prevent the near peace between Israel and Saudi Arabia with the successful foundation of the Abraham Accords. Also, the author's comparison of Israel to the once South African apartheid state is misleading.

I wholeheartedly concur with Shehadeh's following assessment, ``Young Israelis felt secure enough that they planned a rave night on the border with Gaza. But when Hamas broke through Israel's vulnerability and insecurity were exposed. Israelis were traumatized because they realized they couldn't go on with their life in the same way, making the same assumptions about the reality of the state and its security. Unless, that is, they defeated the aggressor.'' I also share the author's own response to his book's title, ``The very high human and material cost of the war in Gaza proves that what Israel fears from Palestine is Palestine's very existence.'' Surely a Hamas controlled Palestinian state is not accepted by Israel for obvious reasons.

I do appreciate Shehadeh's optimism concerning the future, ``And yet, looking back at the history of the region it is only after great upheavals that hopeful consequences follow.'' However, the central question and challenge remain, whether two separate and contradictory narratives can be reconciled for the future sake of both peoples.

Rabbi Dr. Israel Zoberman is the founder of Temple Lev Tikvah in Virginia Beach. Kazakhstan's only born rabbi, he is the son of Polish Holocaust Survivors and spent his early childhood in transit and DP Camps in Austria and Germany. He grew up Haifa, Israel.

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