Correspondence
Correspondence WITHER ZIONISM? As one who has admired the perception, sometimes brilliance, and style of Charles Krauthammer's essays on public issues, I am perplexed by what appears to me to be a...
...They fought for their lives...
...JOHN HILLEN U.S...
...Krauthammer concludes: "Israel's enemies see the future, a future Israelis themselves may now be creating: a world without Zionism, a world without Israel...
...This is because they eschew the war of ideas, preferring pragmatic, "realistic" approaches, which end up serving the vision of their adversaries...
...As one who has admired the perception, sometimes brilliance, and style of Charles Krauthammer's essays on public issues, I am perplexed by what appears to me to be a blind spot or blur on his vision of Zionism and Israel's future as expressed in his essay ("The Collapse of Zionism," May 29...
...Commercial intercourse through global free market capitalism can bridge what appear to be impossible gaps between these groups in a way wars and mutual pleas for good hearts, good intentions, and good understanding never can do...
...What hope can there be in fighting, when the best conceivable outcome is to grant the objectives of the enemy that they sought in war...
...Our neighbors still do not have the fundamental attributes of modernity, and they can still be relied upon to miss opportunities and miscalculate, to their own detriment...
...There is no more than a passing nod, if that, to the collapse of socialism, the incredible success of free-market capitalism everywhere, the emergence of the age of the Internet and global commerce and communications, and the accompanying spread worldwide of democratic ideas...
...Territorial contractions, a lost mini-war in Lebanon—these are symptoms of a deeper malaise...
...To bolster his overstated views, Donnelly uses what can only be characterized as cheap shots from anonymous sources supposedly tied to the commission...
...Yes, as a people, we are not yet expert in the exercise of power...
...This raises the question, What is the source of their demoralization...
...We do not have what it takes to stick it out in our nasty neighborhood, and if we don't shape up, the next century will be cruel to us, and undo all the achievements of this one...
...Can anyone conceive of Israel as a state which is half Silicon Valley, half Eastern Europe...
...And his 1983 words in Encounter would be his riposte to Krauthammer: "Does Israel as it is now depend on the truth, or cogency of the doctrine which presided over its coming to be...
...And, given the differing self-views which coexist in the Jewish world, it is not easy, or indeed even practicable, to have recourse to one single ideology in order to explain and justify the nation-state...
...Yes, this is a disappointment to some Jews of the Diaspora, who look to us to do one or the other...
...Third, people buy houses in sprawled developments because that is what is available, not because it is preferred...
...The late Elie Kedourie, whom I think most of us admired, was a practical friend...
...Second, communities of more traditional design are not "utterly impractical for a postindustrial nation of 270 million people...
...And Israelis will continue to fight for their lives, their homes, their families and countrymen, their new prosperity, and their freedoms...
...Donnelly disagrees with the commission's viewpoint and thus pronounces the entire thing an expensive failure despite the fact that the great majority of its work is not scheduled to be delivered until after the presidential election...
...It was the outcome of desperation and need...
...Every power in European and American history has known setback and defeat on some battlefield, and the idea that the Jews could be an exception is all too reminiscent of the mindset of Buber, who also held up Israel to an impossible standard...
...In fact, the strategy of sacrifice, begging for peace, and subsidizing adversaries has placed Israel in a no-win situation, fraught with humiliation...
...But it is painful to see our friends do the same, and succumb to a gloom which has no more foundation than their past euphoria...
...If a prestigious scholar associated with the commission really feels it is “a bad idea, badly executed,” why would he sign up in the first place and why would he not be of a mind to identify himself...
...It does not need to justify its existence by appealing to some ideology...
...Israel was not a product of Zionist ideology...
...He should not be so quick to judge...
...MARTIN KRAMER Director Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies, Tel Aviv University Tel Aviv, Israel Charles Krauthammer aptly describes Israel's demise...
...ANDREW AGREE Vienna, VA SHAME ON YOU for adopting a knee-jerk "Three Cheers for Sprawl" position that is nothing more than cheerleading for a dubious status quo...
...However it came about, here is a society which is now a going concern, in all its variety and complexity, its tensions and complications...
...Telling an aggressor that when he attacks you he will be rewarded and understood rather than be forced to pay a regrettable price only encourages hostility...
...If a prestigious scholar associated with the commission really feels it is "a bad idea, badly executed," why would he ALLEN WEINGARTEN Morristown, NJ WE DISAGREE I STRONGLY DISAGREE with Tom Donnelly’s article about the Hart-Rudman Commission (“Newt Gingrich’s Last Boondoggle,” May 29...
...I strongly disagree with Tom Donnelly's article about the Hart-Rud-man Commission ("Newt Gingrich's Last Boondoggle," May 29...
...One does not have to be a big government advocate to believe that local and regional governments should provide leadership in shaping the growth and development of their communities...
...The destiny of Israel should be to become the Hong Kong, the Taiwan, or at least the Silicon Valley of the Middle East...
...He offers the alternative explanation of "simple exhaustion," claiming Israelis "are tired of the hard life of sustaining the Zionist vision...
...They don't need intellectuals to tell them why they need do so...
...The philosophical disagreements between The Weekly Standard and the commission can be respected...
...Does Barnes really believe that given the alternative of an early twentieth century community design, people wouldn't prefer it...
...But peoples with far more experience also know something of the limitations of power, and we are learning those lessons, too...
...JAMES HOWARD KUNSTLER Saratoga Springs, NY...
...Nor can the ideology make Israel immune from the chances and changes to which all states are necessarily subject, or save its rulers from mistakes and blunders...
...One may wonder why the Zionists did not provide a competitive vision, such as truth and justice, rather than accommodating aggression...
...It must be politically usable to be valuable...
...The true comparison should be between the sprawled developments of today and the suburbs, towns, and urban neighborhoods that came to maturity all across America in the early twentieth century...
...That public institutions generally have not risen to the challenge is a result of many complex and interrelated causes, but it is a failure nonetheless, and until we come to grips with it, we will continue to get communities that isolate us from each other and weaken civil society...
...and perhaps we intellectuals would do well to remind ourselves, as Elie Kedourie always did, of the limits of our own power...
...MAURICE ROSENFIELD Chicago, IL Charles Krauthammer is disappointed with his brethren who reside in Zion...
...Already some of them are drawing the wrong conclusions from what happened in Lebanon...
...They worked for metropolitan New York in 1920, and they can work in metro Salt Lake City or Austin today...
...This results in the growing irrelevance of national boundaries, reducing them to nothing more than artificial lines in the sand...
...Koreans, Vietnamese, Arabs, and others have been able to sustain their will for victory for generations...
...Krauthammer's reference to a Mag-inot line of five-star hotels as a defense against Israel's neighbors is totally misleading...
...The future will compel us to live differently, whether we like the drive-in utopia or not, and Duany's vision of the future is at least civic and honorable in character...
...The fact that society is now "postindustrial" should open, not close, the possibilities of intelligent community design...
...His argument is flawed on several counts...
...Fortunately, we do have some room to maneuver...
...Better a Maginot line of five-star hotels or an Internet Maginot line of software and technical components, than the Maginot line of concrete fortifications and ground obstacles which in an age of electronic and missile warfare are hopeless...
...I submit that Israel became demoralized as a result of a faulty vision, which may be labeled "love thine enemy...
...It's future thus is to be the Silicon Valley in a regional economic community comprising itself, Jordan, Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, and the Palestinians—perhaps ultimately even Iran and Iraq...
...It is even a disappointment to some Israelis...
...In fact, the piece could have stood alone on those issues without the contrived hatchet job that characterizes its first half...
...First, Old Town Alexandria, Virginia, is not a prototypical "unsprawled" community because it is an extreme (18th century) example, and functions more as a museum than as a community...
...Conversely, with one possible exception, there is not one elected official in the United States who signs on to The Weekly Standard's brand of American hegemony...
...Why should this be difficult for Jewry, who have kept Jerusalem in their hearts for millennia...
...Donnelly and the editors are entitled to their opinion...
...To bolster his overstated views, Donnelly uses what can only be characterized as cheap shots from anonymous sources supposedly tied to the commission...
...We can no more win every battle than we can uphold every moral principle...
...But we are an ordinary people facing ordinary choices, which are never simple...
...And we will win the big wars on which our existence depends, but we may sometimes forfeit the little ones on which it doesn't, and we expect encouragement from our friends, since our enemies will offer none...
...We can maintain democracy and human rights, but in an imperfect way, and we expect understanding from our friends, since our enemies will offer none...
...However, it must be remembered that this eclectic, bipartisan commission seeks to put forward a plan that can actually make a difference...
...Commission on National Security/21st Century Alexandria, VA SPRAWL REVISITED I take issue with Fred Barnes's notion that "sprawl works" ("Suburban Beauty," May 22...
...Barnes completely missed the big story: A vast new American landscape is being created that will last hundreds of years and no one is taking responsibility for it...
...Most of those who came to its shores had no ideological indoctrination...
...He then criticizes Yoram Hazony's explanation that the cause is "the intellectual influence of a small group of universalist German-Jewish professors...
...Israel cannot prosper alone in a sea of poverty...
Vol. 5 • June 2000 • No. 37
