Thursday, January 8, 2004
Roger L. Simon and Allison Kaplan Sommer point to what Roger calls a "dramatic" interview with Israeli historian Benny Morris, and he ain't kidding. Do read it, and don't stop at page one.
Morris is the historian who has written on the events of 1948 with all the warts still in place. He's also viewed as a radical Leftist who spent time in jail in 1988 for refusing to do his Army service in the territories.
Yet more recently, Morris is beginning to sound like the Israeli version of an American "liberal" who's had his "9/11 moment." As I read it, reality and a practical review of history have kicked in as he's watched history unfold before his own eyes since 2000. He knows that whatever goes on in the next few years, whatever needs to be done - the groundwork, the background, the explanation for why that and not something else - is being laid out now.
And he knows that when viewing the events of the War of Independence, history didn't start in 1948, either. Maybe he's always known, and that's why he expresses surprise at the original reaction to his book - that others didn't also understand the context (note that the Ha'Aretz interview focusses exclusively on the sins of the Zionists), or maybe he's just discovered it for himself and it's a more recent transformation on his own part, I don't know enough about him to say.
Anyway, as someone who's not afraid of warts, as long as they're placed in their proper context and perspective (and assuming they exist - that is, that Morris's statements of fact are indeed, fact), I say read the interview.
Update: Tom Paine is impressed - "Just because a conclusion is unpleasant, doesn't mean it's not true." Judith says this transformation has been in process for some time now - "but bloggers aren't the only ones who haven't caught up." She's got some of what makes this change of views so interesting - perceived defections from the Left tend to result in excommunication - a heavy price to pay. Lynn B isn't all that impressed - "we've heard all of this before." Michael Totten is concerned that reports of the demise of total war have been greatly exagerated. "Total war is being waged as we speak by Palestinians against the Israelis. Don’t be so sure we are finished with it forever." Of course, that's one of the benefits/problems of institutions like the UN isn't it? - a body that's ostensibly there to make war more difficult ends up institutionalizing chronic low-level conflict. Peaktalk says Morris sounds bitter - "he’s not just a realist, but a bitter one at that."
Update 2: Here is the Efraim Karsh article referred to by Mike in the comments. Highly recommended. Revisiting Israel's "original sin": the strange case of Benny Morris.
Update 3: Israellycool is also less than impressed - "It's all been said before."
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How very sobering and hard to finally come to grips with:
"But the problem is not just Arafat. The entire Palestinian national elite is prone to see us as Crusaders and is driven by the phased plan. That's why the Palestinians are not honestly ready to forgo the right of return. They are preserving it as an instrument with which they will destroy the Jewish state when the time comes. They can't tolerate the existence of a Jewish state - not in 80 percent of the country and not in 30 percent. From their point of view, the Palestinian state must cover the whole Land of Israel."
"But in practice, in this generation, a settlement of that kind [the two-state solution] will not hold water. At least 30 to 40 percent of the Palestinian public and at least 30 to 40 percent of the heart of every Palestinian will not accept it. After a short break, terrorism will erupt again and the war will resume."
I fear it will eventually lead to a larger war. The Jihadists will have acquired their WMDs by then. Our lack of resolve and alliance in the West might well be the cause. But who can stand back and look at Pakistan, Iran and Saudi Arabia and not be convinced that, in spite of our greatest efforts, our worst nightmare will eventually be realized nevertheless.
Maybe I'm sappy and sentimental, but I find myself returning to images of The Lord of the Rings and those scenes of fear, steely resignation and renewed alliances before the inevitable - those great and horrible wars the men of the West were forced to fight, the necessary battles they had to fight, for "everything green and good in this world". God knows I don't want to see Jihadist Muslims as war-maddened barbarians who would bring a darkness that would cover this earth if we let it. But if I were to speak the truth, I would have to say I do.
I'm not the old man Morris is, but he captures here exactly how I feel for my own two young boys:
"It's hard for me, too. There is not going to be peace in the present generation. There will not be a solution. We are doomed to live by the sword. I'm already fairly old, but for my children that is especially bleak. I don't know if they will want to go on living in a place where there is no hope. Even if Israel is not destroyed, we won't see a good, normal life here in the decades ahead."
Solomon,
Read the Karsh article from September of 2003 that I posted about and linked to at Roger Simon's discussion of this at his site. I have 3 comments up at the end of the discussion right now and the link is in the 2nd one.
THE ARTICLE IS A ---- MUST ---- READ FOR ANYONE WHO WANTS TO INTELLIGENTLY DISCUSS MORRIS AND THIS TOPIC.