The Jewish Power Blog: The Buck Stops… Where?

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu recently announced that the government’s commission of inquiry into the events of October 7, 2023 would examine not only the events of that day and who is responsible for the failures, but also earlier policies, such as the withdrawal from Gaza in 2005, and the Oslo accords in 1993-5; also, the responsibility of the supreme court, apparently because of its occasional actions on behalf of Palestinian human rights.

However, given Mr. Netanyahu’s vaunted sensitivity to the whoosh of the wings of history, one might suggest that he reach farther back to seek the culprits for our present predicament:

Israel’s support for Hamas dates back to the early nineteen eighties, when the religious organization was seen as a counterweight to the secular Palestinian Liberation Organization, and continued until October 7, as a way to keep the conflict on a slow burn and prevent any progress toward a Palestinian state.  Somehow, I suspect that that “story” will not be on the agenda of a commission appointed by the governing coalition.  But they may want to look farther back:

David Ben-Gurion’s governments should certainly be investigated: in 1956, just four months after Israel’s amazing lightning conquest of Sinai, the government buckled to US pressure and totally withdrew.  And before that, in 1949, it was Ben-Gurion’s government that signed the armistice agreements leaving Jordan in control of the West Bank, and Egypt ruling Gaza.  So the root of the problem is obviously the left’s soft-mindedness which ought to be thoroughly investigated, so that we can change our textbooks accordingly.  But it turns out that soft-mindedness has deep roots:

For example, just before the dawn of statehood, in 1947, Rabbi Isaac Halevi Herzog (who went on to serve as the state’s first Ashkenazic chief rabbi) wrote:

It is certain that preventing discrimination and unfair treatment of Muslims and Christians will serve as a key foundation of the right to a state that we shall be granted…. Shall we respond that our holy Torah forbids a Jewish government from granting them freedom of worship and the right to purchase land?  I would say that there is no rabbi in Israel with a brain in his head, with common sense, who would …claim that that is our obligation according to the holy Torah. (A Constitution for Israel According to the Torah, p. 18)

But that’s not all:  In 1938, the World Zionist Congress voted 299-160 to accept, in principle, the partition of Palestine into Jewish and Palestinian states.  299 terrorism sympathizers?

And in 1937, in his testimony to the Peel Commission (which ended up proposing partition), Zev Jabotinsky, the “founding father” (or patron saint) of today’s Likud party, said: “France is a state and Kentucky is a state…When I speak about a state, I am not… actually interested in the exact extent or scope of its independence.” hmmm.

Chaim Weizmann, ultimately Israel’s first president, is commonly credited with convincing the British government to issue the Balfour Declaration in 1917; this document is often seen as the rock of our existence – the recognition of our right to a state.  However, the wording is ambiguous: “His majesty’s government view with favor the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people…”  Not “the establishment of Palestine as the national home…” but rather “the establishment [somewhere] in Palestine of a national home…”  So if we’re investigating, we ought to ask how Weizmann let that get by him.

Meanwhile, in 1891, Ahad Ha’am, Herzl’s “cultural Zionist” nemesis, complained after his visit to the settlements in Palestine:

…We must be careful to avoid arousing the anger of the people of the land by means of despicable behavior, to be cautious in our treatment of the gentiles among whom we are returning to live, to treat them with love and respect – and it goes without saying – with justice and fairness.  And what do our brothers in Israel do?  The exact opposite!  (Truth from the Land of Israel)

Almost two millennia earlier, early in the Great Revolt against Rome, Vespasian’s army arrived at the Galilean city of Zippori, whose residents opted to surrender without a fight. Those towns that insisted on resisting went down in a blaze of glory.  Should we really have a national park at Zippori?  Seems a problematic message…  (but not to worry, Masada, with its story of holding out to the end and then committing suicide, is a far more popular park).  And though it’s awkward, we should take a look at how the Romans got control of the country in the first place, in 63 BCE: In the civil war between the supporters of Hasmonean brothers Hyrcanus and Aristobulus, Hyrcanus invited Pompey to help him out…

Of course, if we’re investigating the supreme court justices, we probably should look into the demoralizing influence of the prophets, whose constant bad-mouthing of their contemporary coalition’s policies rivalled that of our current Ha’aretz journalists.  Take Zechariah for example:  “Not by might, nor by power, but by My spirit, said the Lord of Hosts… ” (4:6)

But wait, there’s more: note that while the Children of Israel were still camped at the foot of Mt. Sinai, God told Moses to relay to the people, “You shall not oppress a stranger, for you know the feelings of the stranger, having yourselves been strangers in the land of Egypt.” (Exodus 23:9)  Maybe that is the root of all our troubles!  I wonder if God is immune to investigation.