June 22- On two critics of Israel, Burg and LeBor

I've been practicing, but it's hard.

Here's a sample. “Heil Hi....” See? I can't do it, not even in print. I'll try again. “Heil Hit...”. Nope, still can't.

And why would I even try? Because I've just finished reading a lengthy interview in a recent Haaretz magazine. The subject was Avrum Burg, 52, former Speaker of the Knesset, former chairman of the Jewish Agency for Israel, one time candidate for Labor Party leader. You might think that such a person would be an advocate of Israel. Well, he is—much as Vidkun Quisling advocated for Norway.

According to Burg, The Law of Return “is the mirror image of Hitler.” The interviewer, Ari Shavit comments: “In your book we are not only victims of the Nazis... we are almost Judeo-Nazis... You do not actually say that Israel is Nazi Germany, but you come very close. You say that Israel is pre-Nazi Germany. Israel is Germany up to the Nazis.” Burg doesn't disagree. “Yes,” he says, and then explains: Israel has “a great sense of national insult; a feeling that the world has rejected us; unexplained losses in wars. And, as a result, the centrality of militarism in our identity.” His proof is the way Arabs are treated, the separation fence and other defensive measures. He compares the occupation of the West Bank to Hitler's Anschulss (the forced 1938 union with Austria). He doesn't like the comparison to Nazism, though, a term he says is extremely charged, but accepts the comparison to “National-Socialists” to me a distinction without a difference.

If he's right, we Zionists are proto-Nazis, which is why I, an avowed card-carrying Zionist, am practicing my Sieg Heils. But wait! What if Burg is wrong? What if we are not sliding down the slippery slope to a fascistic State of Israel. (Burg says we are already there—Q: Are you concerned about a fascist debacle in Israel? A: I think it is already here.) What if we are surprised when the Knesset doesn't “prohibit sexual relations with Arabs.” What if Burg is wrong and the Jews don't “use administrative means to prevent Arabs from employing Jewish cleaning ladies and workers... like the Nuremberg Laws”? He predicts, he states with the authority of the zealot, that “all this will happen and is already happening!” But, but, but, if we don't start treating Arabs as untermenschen sometime soon I'll have wasted all my goose stepping practice—and it wasn't easy to learn to goose step. Have you ever tried it? Gevalt. My thighs were killing me.

Burg's sense of honor does not distract him. When he was denied a pension for his chairmanship of the Jewish Agency because of his attacks on it (the pension is for NIS 200,000 annually—just shy of $50,000—plus a chauffeur driven limousine) he sued saying he's been deprived of a basic right. Although he's taken French citizenship he appears to want to be Labor's candidate for prime minister. That'll happen when I learn to ejaculate the words that began this column.

In a similar, though less obnoxious, vein Adam LeBor, in the Times (June 18), argues that Hatikvah should be changed, just a wee bit. Instead of referring to “nefesh Yehudi” (Jewish soul) the anthem should speak of “nefesh Israeli” (Israeli soul). This he contends would allow Christians, Arabs, Russians etc who are Israeli citizens to have a sense of inclusion in the Israeli state. “Updating 'Hatikvah' could be the start of a psychic shift among the country's Arab and Jewish citizens about what it means to be Israeli.”

LeBor is obviously whistling Dixie. No matter how conciliatory the Jews of Israel are, by changing the national symbols all they will accomplish is to water down their resolution to survive. About a fifth of the population is Arab. To my knowledge none are fleeing to Syria, but shall we put a crescent moon and star in the center of the Mogen David on the flag to keep them? And if the one wee change is made what shall we do with these lines? “Our hope is not yet lost, The hope of two thousand years, To be a free nation in our own land”? LeBor's proposal is a prescription for suicide. It will not be seen as an attempt at reconciliation, but as appeasement, as were withdrawal from Lebanon and the Gaza with nothing to show in return. Israel is the Jewish state, open to others to live in. Or to move from.

Reflections on the Six Day War, 40 years after

I've been reading “The Seventh Day,” David Remnick's essay in “The New Yorker” of May 28. It's a discussion of Israeli revisionist history. Remnick, who sees Israeli villains under every bed, argues that:

It [The Six Day War] was a war that Israelis regarded as existential in importance––defeat could well have meant the end of the state after less than twenty years––and yet winning had Pyrrhic consequences. Out of it came forty years of occupation, widespread illegal settlements, the intensification of Palestinian nationalism, terrorism, counterattacks, checkpoints, failed negotiations, uprisings, and ever-deepening distrust. What greater paradox of history: a war that must be won, a victory that results in consuming misery and instability.

Relying on the revisionists, Remnick denies the necessity of the war. He quotes Israeli leaders (without giving the context) who argued against going to war, and those who even afterwards said it was unnecessary. He claims that Prime Minister Levi Eshkol was wise in his reluctant ditherings; that the military forced him to go to war. Yes, he concedes, Nasser had the UN remove its peace keepers from the border so that Egyptian forces could bring their tanks and warplanes within striking distance of Tel Aviv. But even Israel's friends, the Americans and the British and the French warned Israel against striking first.

But could Israel listen to Britain and France? In 1938 they had given the same sort of advice to the young republic of Czechoslovakia with disastrous consequences. (By incredible coincidence, in 1938 Czechoslovakia was 19 years old when it was sold down the Danube; Israel was 19 years old when the same dynamic duo of appeasers tried to sell it down the Jordan.)

On June 5, 1967 Israel did attack. By placing his air force so close to the border, Nasser brought it within striking distance of Israeli fighter jets, which essentially destroyed his air capability and lost him the war. King Hussein of Jordan honored a recent pledge to Nasser and struck at Israel and lost the West Bank in exchange. (I suppose it's necessary to point out that the West Bank was part of the remnant of a proposed Arab state, one rejected by the Arabs as they invaded Israel. Gaza was the other remnant, occupied by Egypt since 1949. There never was a Palestinian state—there should have been one, one far bigger than the current West Bank and Gaza, but... As to Jerusalem, occupied by Jordanian forces since 1948, that was supposed to be an international city, open to all. Unlike Muslims permitted to pray at their holy places under Israeli rule, Jews were denied access to their holy places under the Jordanians. I just thought you would like to be reminded.)

Remnick is a fine writer, but he's fallen victim to “The Zeitgeist,” the spirit of the times, which lures historians to ruins against the rocks of misunderstanding. At first I wondered why he began with a seemingly superfluous reference to George W. Bush who called critics of his war policies “revisionist historians” but then it became abundantly clear. The spirit of Remnick's times (and mine and at last count of 70% of America's) is that the war in Iraq is an unnecessary adventure, that currently and in the future the US is and will be paying the penalties for Bush's arrogance. What Remnick forgets is that history is oracular, not predictive. It tells us truth (if we are honest) but it's never repeated. Israel in 1967 was not the United States in 2003. America's war is foolishly opportunistic, Israel's wasn't. Had Eshkol waited, a massive Arab attack would have driven the Jews into the Sea. Nasser was saying: “Our basic objective will be the destruction of Israel...The critical hour has arrived.” Control of the air was essential. Either Israel had it or Egypt. There was no choice. The enemy was across an invisible line in the sand, not thousands of miles away. Nasser and his Arab allies had the ability to destroy Israel in a way that Saddam never could touch us. Al Qaeda attacked us; we attacked Al Qaeda's enemy. It was stupid. When Israel attacked it was necessary for survival. Sadly, the long term consequences are as Remnick describes them, but there would not have been a long term had Israel waited, had it not avoided being another Czechoslovakia.