Israel's scandalous course

...Daniel's words from the midst of a Babylonian furnace sound especially prophetic today: "we have at this time no leader, no prophet, no prince...

...Not the sort of question one can answer, yet to ask it is to discover a potential chink in Israel's unyielding facade, and a spark of hope for the people themselves as well as the "strangerin their midst" (Dt 24:17...

...Only the three-week visitor can afford to write knowingly...

...For the polarization of attitudes twists each side's rendering of events themselves, even to the words used to describe them...

...For Israel is quite nearly an island, since beyond the gate left ajar by Egypt, Israelis can enter or depart their country only by air or sea...

...Here ethnic groupings enjoy definite concessions, but all are citizens of one state...

...So first a word on that...

...If the current prime minister enjoys a "most-favored" status with the PLO, there must be good reasons for it...

...For if political Zionism's justification for statehood is best made expressly relative to other contemporary arrangements (or deprivation, as with the Armenians), religious Zionism's claim to the land is even more radically relative...

...I AM ONE who would defend the right of Jews to settle in Palestine, as well as the relative necessity of their establishing the state of Israel...

...What is more, the current disarray on the West Bank seems of little interest inside Israel...

...Many American visitors, impressed by the West Bank's share in Israel's relative prosperity, cannot understand why the more sensible among its inhabitants will not be satisfied with what they are being offered: space in which to earn money and raise a family...

...3:38...

...And when I reflect on how the Arab and Jewish families one meets inside each of the two societies reflect such similar aspirations and so powerful a range of human sensibilities, that question becomes all the more painful to put...

...Without an effective opposition from the political or religious forces in Israel, then, the current policy of willful assertion and suppression in the occupied areas reigns supreme...

...To the extent that American policy conveys an image of an aggressive, swaggering and heavy-handed protagonist on the world scene - an international John Wayne - such an image of America is potentially far more threatening than Israel's belligerence, except for the strategic and symbolic location this little nation occupies...

...So the Jewish state of little more than a quarter of a century finds itself playing the hated role of the mandate authorities, and even tolerates fringe groups of Jews whose attitudes can fairly be described as neo-Nazi...

...If a state continues to rule over a group of people without offering to incorporate them politically, then the only description of such a situation is "occupied...

...A sensible question, no doubt, and one immensely tempting to the naturally capitalist Arab...

...For scandalous it is when a people with such rich religious and intellectual resources cannot arrest so suicidal a course as the present mood and politique which directs events in Israel...

...Since it is not some impersonal institution, "the army," then, but individuals fulfilling their military service who are called upon forcibly to suppress the aspirations of their Arab contemporaries, what effect will continuing such a policy have on them, and through them, on Israel...

...For if sounding a clear voice contrary to current Israeli policy is to invite the charge of anti-Semitism, the yet clearer heart of friendship must invite the accusers to assess who their true friends might be...

...Yet there is little vocal protest from the expressly religious sectors, whose political associations stand ever ready to help him form a coalition...

...And on the part of Israeli Arabs, notably from the Galilee, this latter practice must be seen as an effort to maintain their self-respect as well as the required modicum of allegiance to the state of which they are a part...

...In fact, one's greatest fear now is that the conventional enemies who ring this land will not have to lift a finger, for the fear that their very presence induces, fanned into paranoia by short-sighted political leaders, will carry Israel itself to a second Masada...

...one dictated by simple prudence...

...Yet sober assessments seem hardly a match for more provocative rhetoric on the part of highly placed officials, say, at the United Nations...

...By the same token, all but the most fanatic - in fact, every Israeli whom I have met - finds the current prime minister's propensity to translate from biblical injunctions directly into political claims insulting to both arenas...

...they are after all Israelis...

...So one cannot but wonder how much the allure of the "secular arm" dampens the prophetic spirit...

...Israeli radio and television standardly tar any initiative on the part of the Palestinian Liberation Organization as "terrorist activity," while Arabs cannot bring themselves to refer to Israel except as "the Jews...

...Unwilling and unable to unravel it all, the "average Israeli" prefers to elect a government that will "get tough...

...The convictions which brought them here - freely or forcibly - will harden into a set determination, unless lured into more reasonable channels by thoughtful and charismatic leaders...

...The Israeli "autonomy" scheme is undilutedly paternalistic: we'll let you live your lives so long as you don't ask for political status...

...Similarly, Israeli news commentary insists on calling anyone who refuses to back their political schemes in the "administered" territories an "extremist," whereas most westerners - Jews, Christians, or secular - would hardly regard a desire for political self-expression as extreme...

...THERE IS HAPPILY a small but vocal sector, well-expressed in the monthly New Outlook (2 Karl Netter St., Tel Aviv 65202 - see especially the March 1982 issue...

...It is true, of course, that many Jews find so expressly theological an attitude towards the land as inexplicable as most Christians, yet they must also acknowledge sentiments towards it which would count as religious in any other culture...

...It is in fact difficult to understand how Israeli promises to the Palestinians of "personal autonomy" can be regarded as a political charter...

...Here is where the collective reaction to a moral and human dilemma shows its ugliest face...

...One would expect such a situation, over time, profoundly to affect a populace...

...It is that single-minded intent which leads me to break a self-imposed silence on developments here: a silence imposed by the continuing effort to represent each side fairly, as well as FATHER DAVID BURRELL, CSC, is rector of the Ecumenical Institute for Theological Research (Tantur) in Jerusalem...

...Demagoguery manipulates the religious traditions and historical fears of persecution so effectively as always to capture the flag in a contest with rational debate...

...Yet it must be put, for a little analysis can sometimes begin to dissolve a mass of rhetoric, and the latest rhetorical expression, of course, is autonomy, as it is officially interpreted here...

...As one who has lived now for a year and a half in both sides of Jerusalem, studying Hebrew and Arabic while administering an ecumenical institute and now teaching at the Hebrew University, immersed in medieval theological discussions involving Jewish, Christian, and Muslim thinkers while discussing these and contemporary topics with their successors of today, I have worked scrupulously to respect and to understand both sides...

...Israel is a western outpost in the Levant, but so has Lebanon been since the French secured it after the first war...

...But this contrast is a comparison as well...

...Yet it is that very requirement of today's world, that each individual carry a passport, which allows one to recognize the relative necessity for establishing Israel as a state in the promised homeland of Palestine...

...Yet only a little reflection is needed to see that it is to their credit that they do not take the bait...

...Yet one also knows that the hearts of this people are strong and stout enough to resist such a suicidal course, if only a few grams of imagination could be found in their political and religious leadership...

...So western Christians, placed by tradition and recent events in a position to be for both contenders in the Holy Land, can be chastened by these parallels yet heartened by them as well - especially in the face of nasty retorts of anti-Semitism...

...And what can we whose religious history is entwined with an historic Israel and whose political destinies are linked with both peoples, do about it...

...This fact is evidenced in the considerable space devoted to thoughtful opposition statements in the Hebrew press...

...Quite independently, then, of the status of Palestinians' right to their land (who else could rightly claim it...

...We can continue to try to make sense of the situation and so encourage each side to talk sense, while refusing to allow ourselves to become polarized...

...Where it emerges, let us join forces to support it...

...the character of Israeli rule is certainly more accurately described as occupation than administration...

...as a priest and theologian I am even more dismayed at the impotence of religious spokesmen to bring the finest traditions of Judaism to its rescue in this scandalous moment...

...AH that one like myself has come to admire and respect in this spectacular venture of returning to settle the land hangs in jeopardy before an "ugly Israeli" policy which makes the notoriously ugly American almost attractive by comparison...

...Yet under present Circumstances I am pressed to ask whether that nation, under its present leadership, is not resolutely engaged in forfeiting that right and respect by its aggressive and unimaginative treatment of the indigenous population...

...Its writers stress the potential effect of such policies on Israel itself, especially through an army which is assured of being thoroughly representative by thirty months of compulsory service for every man and woman, followed by reserve duty for men until fifty...

...How can we respond to it...

...Yet a pervasive sadness over the recent death of Arab youths in and near Ramallah and Hebron, as well as the retaliatory destruction of family homes in Beit-Sahur (near Bethlehem), impels a word to and about Israel from one who finds in the nation so much that is admirable, and who loves so many of her people...

...And it has...

...Israel's scandalous course DAVID BURRELL Jerusalem IT IS TELLING that people living in the Middle East turn to BBC or to Radio Francais for information and assessment of events around them...

...And these, of course, have been notoriously silent or simply unavailable to Israel in recent days-on religious or political fronts...

...Rather than risk getting to know this indigenous people whom they are "administering," Israelis prefer to let their army handle it, watching impassively the scenes of television which show the lengths to which their uniformed representatives must go to keep things under control...

...Secular analysts may deplore the absence of sane political leaders...

...An example of the first approach would be to press the discussion of autonomy for some relevant parallels, so that the term can function at least analogously to situations we know, as in the autonomous provinces of Sicily and Sardegna, or of Val d'Aosta and Alto Adige (Sudtirol) in Italy...

...Yet we can find in America strong countervailing voices of church and synagogue...

...That impression bespeaks the defense mentality of an Israel so effectively surrounded by an alien culture and more or less hostile states that the attitudes engendered remind one of an island people...

...And what is truly dismaying in Israel today is the widespread inefficacy of an extremely literate (and often incensed) intelligentsia over against the rhetorical campaign of a government intent on polarization...

...How did Israel come to such a self-contradictory and potentially self-destructive impasse...

...So the seeds of the conflict are deeply cultural: from the roof of the Ecumenical Institute (Tantur) on the southern edge of Jerusalem, one's scan is sharply divided between the village of Beit-Jala climbing up the steep slopes of the Gilo ridge to leave the contours unencumbered,and the southernmost sector of a new Jerusalem which covers the north end of that same ridge with high-rise apartments clustered in fortress fashion...

...For the vast majority, who cannot afford periodic respites in Europe or America, conciliation can only spell weakness...

...Without even broaching the vexing question of the settlements, whose land acquisitions have made a mockery of any promise of "personal autonomy," the Israelis cannot do otherwise than show force if they would keep in line close to a million and a half people who will not be assimilated and whom they would not assimilate, and yet cannot dispossess...

...For the prophets' teaching echoes and intensifies that of Moses, in the Deuteronomic spirit tested in Babylon: the land is given to God's people not as a right but in trust, and one of the tests for its rightful possession is precisely their treatment of the stranger in their midst...

...I believe I am more appreciative than westerners who do not live in the region of the justice of Israel's claim that theirs is the only democratic social and political structure in this part of the world...