An appeal to my religious Zionist friends

THE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM

This blog is basically an appeal to my religious Zionists friends and to their friends, to join with those of us who are secular and/or traditional Zionist Jews, who want to live in a Jewish, democratic state with secure borders and who have, like you, been serving in the Israeli defense forces for generations, just like many of you.

I am talking about the Naftali Bennetts and Matan Kahanas amongst us.

My appeal starts with a description of the “elephant in the room!”

The elephant in the room has been in the room since June 1967 and I mean- Judea and Samaria, or the territories, or “The Shtachim” or The West Bank!

The elephant has divided our people for almost sixty years.

If the “shtachim” were not under our control right now would there be such a major division between the modern orthodox Zionist section of our society and the secular Zionist section of our society? There was a time when parties (with different names at those times) of both parts of our society sat in the same governments.

Of course, besides the difference over the “shtachim” each section of our society has its defining beliefs, some are the same in both sections and some are obviously different, but it is the question of what to do with the “shtachim” which really divides us and continues to divide us.

And yet even now, Bennett and Kahane and Golan, will sit in the same government if the present opposition wins the elections, even though they have different views of what should be the future of the “shtachim”. They can do that now, because they will not even discuss the topic and take a unified stand on the future of Judea and Samaria!

To get to the main point of this article, the future of Judea and Samaria has been the question that has been dividing us since 1967. Will we remain a Jewish country, whose population is overwhelming Jewish or we will become some kind of bi-national state, which is somehow controlled by the Jewish part of that bi-national state.

Since 1967 we have been faced with the problem of what to do about “the territories”. We can no longer push the problem down the road. What happened, three years ago on 7 October and in the three years since, and the reaction throughout the world including the reaction of our best real ally-the United States of America- has pushed us to the point in which we have to make some hard decisions based on demography, democracy and security!

In my opinion it is time to separate from the Palestinian populations surrounding us. Separation does not mean the two-state solution now! To put it mildly this is not the right time in history to move our troops back to the pre-1967 borders but it does mean that some time in the future and that may be decades-it has already been almost sixty years since 1967, (during which we have signed peace agreements with Egypt and Jordan) there may be a chance to negotiate again.

But it is still the “Palestinian” problem which separates our people, and we have to finally make decisions for our benefit!!

Even I who ran for the Knesset with Lova Eliav in 1984, do not really see any real future for a compromise peace agreement with a Palestinian population controlled by the Hamas and Jihad mentalities, and their supporters in the Western World.

But on the other hand, unilateral absorption of the “shtachim” closes all options for peace in the future for our children and our grandchildren. First, we will be committing demographic suicide and second, even if we want to commit demographic suicide the world and I mean even the Western World, including the USA, at its most friendly time (which is far from true now), will not allow it to happen.

All I am proposing is to stop the building of new settlements in the “shtachim” in order to leave the door open for a possible agreement with a more reasonable Palestinian population in the future and in the meantime to separate from the Palestinian population as much as possible.

This idea is not new, the idea has already been proposed, most recently by the organization called the “Commanders for Israeli Security” (CIS), an organization of hundreds of retired high-ranking members of the defense establishment (see recent Blog by Richard H. Schwartz). Again, the basic idea is to separate from the Palestinian population in the hope that sometime in the future it may be able to agree to a two-state solution (or something similar) with our security demands in place.

We will have borders defined by us, which are defensible and acceptable on the international stage. We, with the help of our main ally, the United States, will once more appear on the international stage as a country which wants peace and is willing to compromise to achieve peace with security. We will no longer be a pariah amongst nations.

No one is innocent enough to think that Palestinian leaders will come forward now to negotiate a compromise agreement but at some point in the future, even their society may hopefully wake up. When they do wake up, we will be able to negotiate from a point of military and political strength, with international backing and will be able to make demands to guarantee our security after an agreement. We will be negotiating from a point of military and political strength, which should guarantee favorable results of any negotiations.

My appeal is to that part of our society which consists of the religious Zionists. I realize that giving up the dream of the Land of Israel will be hard to accept, that is why I am appealing to you to make the lives of our young soldiers more important than holding all the Land of Israel, as much as many of us would like to do.

But unless someone is planning a mass emigration of the four million Arabs in Gaza and the West Bank, that dream is not possible now if we want to remain a Jewish democratic society. What we can guarantee now to our children and grandchildren is that there will be a Jewish State of Israel, which remains democratic and secure!!! And can guarantee the security of its people-something which we did not do three years ago!

Right now, we have created at a high cost, a sovereign Jewish State of Israel including the present settlements, and parts of Jerusalem which includes close to eight million Jews.

When the State of Israel was created there were more Jews in The Bronx (where I was born) than in the State of Israel, and now there are 50,000 Jews in The Bronx and eight million Jews here!! And right now, we are one of the most advanced countries in technology and science and medicine. Why sacrifice all this for more land? If there is no change in government in a few weeks I do not even want to think of how many Israelis will leave Israel to a world which is more antisemitic than it has been in almost one hundred years.

On the other hand if our government changes in a few weeks we will be able to return many of the Israelis in the “New Diaspora” (-those who returned to Israel and left again after two thousand years of their own choice) and we will be able to attract the Jews of the Old Diaspora-the remains of the forced emigration from the Land of Israel two thousand years ago.

So here is my appeal to my Religious Zionist Friends please join those of us who want to change the government and want to create a new Israel which is Jewish, democratic and secure!

We can do this if the dream of a greater Israel is replaced by a dream of a Jewish Israel with maximum security. A country which will attract Jews from all over the world and will be a wonderful place to live in for those of us who choose to live as proud Jews in their own country!

Please help us to create the dream of a Jewish Israel!