|
|
||
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
|
The Passover
War and "Shalom" By Reuven Koret March 31, 2002 In 1973, as the people of Israel were fasting or in synagogue for Yom Kippur, the most solemn day of the Jewish year, the armies of Egypt and Syria launched a surprise attack. Within days Israel was confronting a threat to its existence as enemy forces broke through our border defenses and threatened our civilian heartland. Israeli forces, led in Sinai by Gen. Ariel Sharon, eventually regrouped and turned the war around. The Passover night bombing in Netanya represented such a turning point for Israel, after eighteen months of low-level fighting initiated by Yasser Arafat and the Palestinian Authority. As news filtered in about the latest attack, as Israelis sat to celebrate their liberation, retelling the story of the Children of Israel from bondage in Egypt, the realization dawned of the dreadful significance of such an attack on one of Judaism holiest days, during the festival in which we recall our ancient liberation. Then is now. Jews around their seder tables in Israel felt: It could have been any one of us. No place is safe. Our civilian heartland is under incessant attack. The subsequent days of Passover, with a bombing each day in each of our cities, have only confirmed that grim reality. In every generation our mortal enemies rise up to kill us. They are now trying to do it again. The attack today was, unbelievably, in a place called the Matza Restaurant, a popular roadside diner by a gas station in Haifa. Matza, of course, is the unleavened bread that, our tradition tells us, the Children of Israel baked when they left bondage in Egypt. It is to the Matza that we point when we tell the story of Passover. The message now, as then, is we, the people of Israel, must separate ourselves from those whom our government has belatedly recognized as our enemies. From left to right, the citizens of Israel agree on this. The only disagreement is where we draw the line. The military operation dubbed "Defensive Wall" is aptly named. Right now there are virtually no effective defenses to prevent Palestinian Arabs from infiltrating our cities. We must create secure borders dictated exclusively by our security concerns. The first step, at last underway, is conquering the Palestinian-controlled territories and utter destruction of infrastructure. Our forces must sweep city-to-city, village-to-village, house-to-house, confiscating all armaments, arresting or eliminating all terrorists. When the Israel Defense Forces are in total control of the territories and have undone some of the terrible damage of the Oslo catastrophe, then our task will be to establish favorable separation lines and fences around Palestinian population centers. At that point, we will have painful decisions to make. The new lines must separate all Palestinian Arabs from all Jewish Israelis. That means that a mutual exchange of populations will be required: Jews in settlements inside the new lines of Palestine must leave. Arabs in villages outside those lines must move inside. Access between Palestinian enclaves and connections between the Palestinian enclaves and other nations must be strictly under Israeli control. But Israel alone must draw the lines. The "occupation" will be over and the Palestinians will have their independence. The Palestinians would have their demilitarized state with autonomous control over their affairs, and we Israelis would have a modicum of security. They may not like the lines we draw, which no doubt will be considerably less favorable than those offered by Barak, and Clinton, and rejected by Arafat in Camp David. There would need to be no "transfer" of people outside our current borders, only a mutual exchange of populations within them. The moment the Palestinian Authority rejected peace negotiations and started down the road of suicide attacks, and especially now, as they endorse and embrace them as a nation, they have left Israelis with no choice. The minute they sent teenagers and women to blow themselves up in our midst, they forced us to protect ourselves and our loved ones by physically separating our civilian population from theirs with a "defensive wall." It is important to say a word about non-Jewish Israelis, who represent one-fifth of our population. Yesterday was Land Day, in which some Arab citizens of Israel demonstrate their attachment to the land and their nationalist sentiments. Tens of thousands marched, some flying Palestinian flags and shouting anti-Israel slogans. Some called on Hizballah Sheikh Nasrallah and Saddam Hussein to hit our cities with missiles. Arab members of Knesset led the marches and expressed some of the most extreme sentiments. Not all Arab citizens hate Israelis or hate Israel. Indeed, many non-Jews - Bedouins, Druze, Circassians, and Christians - bravely and loyally defend their nation. Arab Israelis own the Matza Restaurant, Arab Israelis were among the victims of its destruction, and an Arab Israeli citizen (a Palestinian who married an Israeli Arab) committed the massacre. And other "Israeli Arabs," who increasingly define themselves as Palestinians, have supported, collaborated in, and carried out previous suicide bombings. Each citizen of Israel, and each Member of our Knesset, now will need to decide where their loyalties lie: with Israel or Palestine. And then, if they find themselves on the wrong side of the border, they must vote with their feet and move to the other side of the wall. For the foreseeable future, Palestinians and Israelis have demonstrated that they can no longer live together. We have irreconcilable differences. The divorce and separation of property must be total. Those who want us dead must get out of our lives completely. Only good fences will make good, or at least tolerable, neighbors. This is Israel's second war of liberation. We are fighting to be free from the constant threat of death. To be free of those who want to kill us. To be, once again, a free people in our own land, our only land. And then set our enemies free within their own borders. Unlike the first Passover, the children of Israel have no place else to go. Our sworn enemies, and those who support their struggle to destroy us, do. The time has come at last for Shalom. Not as in "peace." As in "goodbye." Views expressed by the author do not necessarily reflect those of israelinsider.
|
|
 
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
© 2001-2002 Koret Communications Ltd. All rights reserved. Terms of Use. |
