Editorial: On Israel's 30th Birthday
AN EDITORIAL: ISRAEL'S THIRTIETH One almost wishes that Israel had postponed its thirtieth anniversary for a year or two. Coming now, in the midst of the most dramatic and intensive diplomatic...
...It is a problematic place, and it is enmeshed in a continuing crisis...
...Israel is established...
...Since last year, Egypt has taken an initiative that none had predicted, that none has yet fully assimilated...
...Some year...
...Israel's right to exist does not depend on that measurement...
...Our complaint is not without foundation...
...But save to a few well-intentioned philanthropic Zionists, principally American, that was never the center of Zionist gravity...
...Woe unto us on the day that Israel is expected to behave in the primitive fashion of so many of its neighbors...
...Ideals...
...For anniversaries are times for both revelry and stock-taking, and neither is especially appropriate just now...
...It is against the standard of Zionist aspiration that Israel's achievements deserve to be measured...
...We may yearn for peace and for security...
...It is a permanent fact of international life...
...Socially, the first stage of the absorption of immigrants has been successfully completed, and though there is clearly a long way to go before the problem of the "two Israels" is solved, the most difficult challenges are part of Israel's history rather than its future...
...As well ask nobility of a slave, largeness of spirit of a child of the slums...
...If we adopt, this anniversary season, a perspective born of that year, we simply rehash an ongoing conversation regarding the latest political developments...
...The mood is too serious for revelry, and the facts too slippery for stock-taking...
...Most of Israel's history lies before, not behind, it...
...Extrapolating from the thirty years past to the countless decades yet to come, we have much reason to be filled with joy, joy for achievements recorded, joy for achievements just begun, joy for achievements still only dreamed by this nation with so remarkable a capacity for translating dreams into life...
...Economically, a country which was yesterday agriculturally retarded has now become a net exporter, a country with chronic economic problems still provides substantial material comforts to most of its citizens...
...The fact is that Israel came into existence because a small number of Jewish revolutionaries took it into their heads that Jews had, once and for all, to take charge of their own affairs, and that this they could do only in a land of their own...
...It is to say that not France nor Sweden, not the United States nor Belgium, not Japan nor Costa Rica, not any of the world's democracies, would fare better, and many not as well, once subjected to so intense and so generally hostile a spotlight as has been riveted on Israel lo these many years...
...Militarily, a rag-tag army has become a principal power...
...Since last year's anniversary, Israel has acquired a radically new government, marking an end to the rule of Labor it had known since its inception...
...This leads to an interesting problem...
...It is irritating and sometimes infuriating to witness the indulgence with which savage nations, such as Saudi Arabia, are regarded ("after all, what can you expect of them...
...No country has been so harassed as Israel, so generally maligned for so long a time, so subjected to allegations of illegitimacy and to physical abuse...
...But its existence is not in doubt...
...But it is not less decent and sensitive and thoughtful a nation than the few dozen others who have chosen democracy as their way, and which have had far fewer obstacles placed in their paths along that way...
...For that is the first lesson of the season...
...and to contrast that with the exacting demands imposed on Israel ("they should know better...
...Aspirations...
...Politically, democracy is now a natural phenomenon, this in a country most of whose immigrant citizens had never experienced democracy before their coming, this in an era when the fate of new democracies has been less than encouraging...
...The most significant part of Israel's story lies, however elsewhere...
...But would we really prefer it the other way...
...So let us step aside from the year, and talk about the decades, the three decades of Israel's independence, the first three of this, the first century of its modern independence, this first century of the many yet to come...
...Israel is held to a higher standard because it has chosen that standard and because, in the main, it meets that standard...
...The foundations whose beginnings antedate its independence have now been well-laid, and in every sphere...
...The center was a vision not of haven but of renewal, not of sanctuary but of autonomy...
...But its right to praise does depend on that measurement, and, so measured, the praise is fulsome...
...Since last year, the Carter administration has made its readiness to defer to Saudi Arabia ever more clear...
...Yes, Israel was important, and is, as a refuge, as a safe harbor for Jews in distress...
...But amidst the yearning and the lamentation, the frustration and the apprehension, there is cause—and therefore need—to celebrate...
...Yet even when measured according to the exacting standards which its theoreticians proclaimed, Israel does remarkably well...
...It has made mistakes, it makes them...
...No, Israel on its thirtieth is a nation confused, troubled, uncertain—but fundamentally healthy...
...While such a conversation may be useful, it lacks the luster that the occasion warrants...
...The signs of its health abound: vigorous political debate, unsung heroes in every corner of the land performing acts of great compassion on a daily basis, gifted artists, persistent self-criticism, and endless search for quality...
...its right derives from more mundane considerations, from international convention and thirty years and more of sweat...
...A country that chooses to hew to a high standard must accept the judgment that derives from that standard...
...That is not to gloss over the errors...
...Against that background, it would have been a notable achievement for Israel merely to have persisted, to have withstood the onslaught and emerged intact...
...Since last year, the American Jewish community has become uncommonly restless, apprehensive, uncertain in its appraisal...
...Coming now, in the midst of the most dramatic and intensive diplomatic developments in all of Israel's history, it is exceedingly difficult to relate to the requirements of so auspicious an anniversary...
...we may lament political blunders and diplomatic debacles...
...We sometimes complain about a double standard in the Middle East, according to which the Arab states are measured and appraised in terms appropriate to people of whom not much is expected, while Israel is held to a higher standard...
Vol. 3 • May 1978 • No. 6
