Gershom Gorenberg: If you believe Israel’s future depends on ending the occupation, “for God’s sake, say it!”

On February 8, 2009, American-Israeli journalist, author and blogger Gershom Gorenberg spoke to a packed house at the Jewish Community Project Downtown in New York.

Sponsored by the New Israel Fund and co-sponsored by Meretz USA and American Prospect magazine, and entitled, "The Israeli Elections, Israel's Future, and American Jewry," Gorenberg's talk included the following remarks:

As in any war, Gorenberg opened, the recent Gaza war was seen in Israel through a "telephoto lens", one which focuses in on the small details, but lacks perspective and depth. Unfortunately, what's needed most during wartime is a "panoramic view", which offers a broader vision, and a sense of movement and time.

Although recognizing Hamas' rocket attacks in mid-December as provocation, Gorenberg was skeptical with regard to the clarity and wisdom of Israel's military reprisal. If Israel's aim was to turn Hamas into a non-militant organization, then certainly its response was misguided, as military force never converts anyone to a dovish position. Similarly, if the goal was to encourage Gazan Palestinians to oppose Hamas, then Israel's expectations of the popular response were completely off target. Finally, if Israel's purpose was to overthrow Hamas, then it needs to recognize the folly of such an approach, since Hamas' fall could easily be followed by an al-Qaeda-dominated Gaza.

Gorenberg suggested that both sides missed political opportunities to forestall the war. Hamas, he noted, had rejected overtures in November to re-establish a unity government with the Fatah and PLO that would have prevented the escalation. Israel, for its part, could have made clear - but didn't - that it was interested in a Palestinian unity government and was willing to engage with it diplomatically.

Looking toward Israel's future, Gorenberg submitted that various parts of Israeli society were pursuing three different political goals for the country: Israel as a Jewish state; Israel as a democracy; and Israel in control of the entire biblical land, including the West Bank. Unfortunately, Gorenberg noted, the three could not all go together.

For example: Israel's existence as a Jewish democracy required that Israel not control the West Bank. A democracy that controlled the West Bank would cease to be Jewish. And an Israel that maintained control of the West Bank and insisted on Jewish dominance would cease to be a democracy.

As a result, Gorenberg stressed that the occupation is the strategic threat to the State of Israel, and that the most patriotic Israelis are those who oppose the occupation. Arguing that Israel had correctly maintained a strong army (‘we're not the shtetl and our neighbors aren't the Cossacks,' he quipped), Gorenberg stated that Israel's strength must be utilized so that the country could make the correct political decisions.

Of course, the role of American Jews in opposing the occupation, Gorenberg admitted, was much more complicated than the role played by Jews in Israel. In Israel, a Jewish person had the luxury of not having to serve as the country's defender. He or she could criticize the government at will.

American Jews, on the other hand, also had to consider the question of solidarity with Israel: In their criticism of Israel, they do not want to sound like anti-Zionists. And many American Jews, he said, still haven't fully appreciated how strong Israel had become, and tend to view it as weak and defenseless. Gorenberg urged American Jews to, "get used to [Israel's] success".

Gorenberg also complained that many American Jews, including prominent ones, privately hold a dovish view of the conflict, but feel they need to show a more hard-line face in public. But in light of the strategic threat of continuing occupation, Gorenberg suggested that the pro-Israel/anti-occupation forces start speaking louder: If you believe Israel's future depends on ending the occupation, he enjoined, "for God's sake, say it!".

Gorenberg also noted that while Israel was a help for Diaspora Jewry in many ways, Diaspora Jews could assist Israel by keeping alive Israeli Jews' memory of what it means to be a minority. Coupled with a wartime mentality, he said, the majority status held by Jews in Israel - although itself a positive development - had undermined sensitivity for minority rights.

War-related fear, he added, also weakened the foundations of democracy, and this helped to explain the growing threat to Arab civil rights, as well as the rampant socio-economic inequality in Israel, following two decades of unbridled, fundamentalist capitalism.

Gorenberg's presentation was an instructive reminder that, in Israel, "the peace issue" cannot be artificially separated from the questions of civil and human rights and social justice. All these issues are interdependent. As a result, progressive American Jewish engagement with Israel also needs to be holistic in nature. Rather than plying a one-issue course, progressive American Jews need to engage with Israel on the entire gamut of challenges facing the country - from war and peace to the environment, from women's rights to Arab rights, from religious pluralism to poverty to the status of the LGBT communities.

Summarized by Ron Skolnik