Published in the Jerusalem Post, 4 April 2023
On Sunday, March 19, he
participated in a gala evening in Paris, organized by "Israel is
Forever," a French Jewish association close to the far right. When he rose to speak, he stood behind a
lectern displaying a flag depicting a greatly expanded Israel which included the
occupied West Bank, Gaza, and most of Jordan.
That
alone, without taking into account what he said, sparked immediate protests
across the Arab world, and a diplomatic incident between Israel and Jordan. Smotrich's
spokesperson claimed that the flag was "set decoration" arranged by
the conference organizers, and that Smotrich was only a guest. All the same,
next day Jordan summoned the Israeli ambassador to Amman to protest Smotrich
endorsing the map. Jordan's foreign ministry warned that Smotrich's actions
violated the Jordanian-Israel peace treaty. Israel's foreign ministry responded
by asserting that it fully recognized Jordan's territorial integrity and stood
by the treaty. Later Tzachi Hanegbi, head of Israel's National Security
Council, spoke with Jordan's Foreign Minister to reaffirm Israel's commitment
to the treaty.
Two wrongs do not make a right, but it is perhaps worth pointing out that leading Palestinian organizations do precisely the same, in reverse. Examine the flags of Fatah or bodies like the Palestine Liberation Front, the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine or the Islamic Jihad movement, and they all feature maps of Mandate Palestine as a solid unit, with no sign of Israel. They portray their desired outcome to the Arab-Israel dispute, namely a Palestine “from the river to the sea”. Protests in support of the legitimacy and sovereignty of the State of Israel have been notable by their absence.
Smotrich
caused outrage, also, by his remarks denying the existence of a Palestinian
people. He maintained that the idea of
Palestinian nationhood was invented in the past century in response to the
Zionist movement to found modern-day Israel.
“Who was the first
Palestinian king?” he asked, rhetorically.
“What language do the Palestinians have? Was there ever a Palestinian currency? Is
there a Palestinian history or culture? Nothing. There is no such thing as a
Palestinian people.”
The following day US National Security Council spokesman John
Kirby objected to the comments, saying they would not help to calm tensions in
the region.
“We utterly object to
that kind of language,” he said. “We
don’t want to see any rhetoric, any action or rhetoric – quite frankly – that
can stand in the way or become an obstacle to a viable two-state solution,
and language like that does.”
Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian
Authority president, called Smotrich’s remarks “racist,” and “an attempt to
falsify history.”
The term “Palestinian”, though perfectly valid and comprehensible in contemporary terms, carries with it a whiff of political controversy. Those sensitive to it point to the 1947 UN General Assembly Resolution 181. In proposing the partition of Palestine into two states, it describes them as “independent Arab and Jewish States”. The term “Palestinian” does not appear. In fact this is scarcely surprising since, until Israel’s Declaration of Independence, all the inhabitants of this land were Palestinians. In the 1930s the country’s radio station was called the Palestine Broadcasting Service (PBS), while its English-language newspaper did not change its name from “The Palestine Post” to “The Jerusalem Post” until as late as 1950.
This is why people of Smotrich’s persuasion describe the current emphasis
on Palestinian identity and nationalism as a recent phenomenon. The argument
has some validity. Both historically and in more recent times, the Arabs living
in the area were regarded both by outsiders and by their own spokespeople as
without a separate or distinct identity.
Yasser Arafat, for
example, regarded as the father of the “Palestinian people”, followed a pan-Arab
line. The 1964 PLO charter defined the Arab inhabitants of Palestine as
“an integral part of the Arab nation”.
In 1996 Hamas leader Mahmoud al-Zahar said: “Islamic and traditional
views reject the notion of establishing an independent Palestinian state. In
the past there was no independent Palestinian state…This land is the property
of all Muslims.”
In 2002 Azmi Bishara,
founder of the nationalist Balad Party, which had seats in the last Knesset but
not in the current one, said: “My Palestinian identity never precedes my Arab
identity…. I don’t think there is a Palestinian nation, there is [only] an Arab
nation…. “
Today it is clear that the
concept of Palestinian nationalism, having emerged, has flourished and become a
political reality. It has in fact
overtaken the views of Arab leaders, expressed only comparatively recently,
which have been submerged in the tidal wave of Palestinian nationalism. Nowadays the Palestinian leadership downplay
pan-Arab nationalism and exploit what has taken its place.
It is precisely because
Smotrich and other far-right politicians refuse to recognize political
realities that, perhaps to their surprise, they engender such controversy. Extremists in any field – political,
religious, social – are so convinced of the justice of their cause that they
reject the very concept of compromise, and feel justified in forcing what they
believe to be the only correct course on others, regardless of what others
think or feel.
Steam-rollering
extremist ideologies, without regard to the effect on the beliefs or
aspirations of others, is not acceptable in a 21st century democracy. Persuasion
is the correct way, and if persuasion fails, then acceptance of the best
compromise available. Beliefs, however
strongly held, are not ipso facto self-evident or immutable. A little humility can go a long way.
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