This week, Alpher discusses why Israeli Druze leaders are lobbying the government to help the Syrian Druze; does Israel have any special reason to get involved; if the Syrian Druze friendly to Israel; what Israel should do; and if there are other minority issues in Syria that should concern Israel.
Tel Aviv is enchanting. As I wandered through the artistic, sun-soaked streets of Neve Tzedek,
walked on the glistening beaches of the Mediterranean, and meandered through its bustling downtown on my most
recent visit to Israel, I became entranced. With its balance of relaxation and excitement, I couldn’t help but
be lured in by the magic of the city.
However, I wasn’t in Israel for vacation. I was there as staff with Americans for Peace Now on its study tour to Israel and the West Bank to learn about the complexity of achieving a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Usually, the tour is based in Jerusalem, a contentious city that many consider the epicenter of the conflict. Though staying in Tel Aviv distanced us from the heart of the issue, it taught me an important lesson about the attitude of Israelis toward the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and how difficult it is to persuade the Israeli public that the occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip threatens Israel’s existence.
By obscuring the uniqueness of the Israeli colonialist regime, BDS is giving Israel an escape hatch; instead, boycott movement must focus on occupation and settlements, stop blurring lines between Israel and Territories.
If the BDS movement didn’t exist, Benjamin Netanyahu’s government of occupation and settlement would have had to invent it. For contrary to the popular notion in Israel, on the international scene BDS is serving as one of the most effective factors in perpetuating the Palestinians’ national enslavement.
Both the boycott movement and the present Israeli government – as made clear in Deputy Foreign Minister Tzipi Hotovely’s fundamentalist speech to Israeli diplomats – are striving to imprint in international consciousness the inherent identification between the State of Israel and the Israeli military regime in the occupied territories, a single organic Israeli unit. Put another way: There is basic consent between the BDS movement and the Israeli government regarding the conception of the geopolitical space between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean, as a single state called Israel.
The dispute between the boycott movement and the occupation and settlement government has to do with the moral character of that single “Israel” between the river and the sea. While BDS describes it as a criminal colonialist entity whose international legitimacy is in doubt, the Israeli government sees it as a legitimate partner in the family of nations that gives just expression to the Jewish people’s right to self-determination.
Americans for Peace Now (APN) welcomes the Supreme Court ruling rejecting efforts by Congress and
outside groups to wrest control from the Executive Branch over foreign policy-making by legislating the status
of Jerusalem in isolation of the context of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations.
As an American Jewish, Zionist, pro-peace organization, APN was alone in the Jewish organizational world weighing in against the law in question, going so far as to submit an Amicus Brief to the Supreme Court when it considered the case for the first time in 2011.
This week, Alpher discusses whether the past week’s BDS developments are a “strategic tsunami;” what does it mean for Israel that a pro-Kurdish party in Turkey has won enough votes to prevent the ruling AK Party from gaining a majority in parliament and President Erdogan from changing the constitution to give himself extensive executive powers; why the death of Tareq Aziz, foreign minister and deputy prime minister under Saddam Hussein, is a significant milestone in today’s Middle East; whether Assad’s regime is really threatened.
Dear friends,
In these tough times, I want to share with you a few thoughts that
give me hope and that, I believe, will give you hope as well.
President Obama is speaking our language of linking Jewish values to the quest for peace. In recent days, President Obama has shifted, in a very positive way, his discourse on Israel-Palestine. Today, he is speaking OUR language – a language that directly connects core progressive Jewish values (OUR values) like democracy, pluralism, equality, tolerance, and peace – with the imperative to achieve a two-state solution that resolves the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. He juxtaposes these values with the pernicious policies and practices of Netanyahu and his government(s) – policies and practices that promote not democracy but proto-fascism; not pluralism but racism and divisiveness; not equality but discrimination; not tolerance, but bigotry; not peace, but, rather, ever-deepening occupation. By shifting to a values-focused discourse, President Obama is today eloquently articulating the strong bond between core American values and progressive Jewish values, and expressing his frustration – and the frustration that exists equally in the hearts of most American Jews – with the growing gap between these values and those that are increasingly manifesting themselves in Israeli public life.
On June 3, 2015, APN hosted Israeli historian and journalist Tom Segev, the author of 1967:
Israel, the War, and the Year that Transformed the Middle East, to discuss the 48th anniversary
of the Six Day War and the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza that unfolded after the war.
Q: Mr. President, thank you so much for having us at the White House.
THE PRESIDENT: Wonderful to have you here.
Q: Here’s what you said just a few years ago: “I had the impression that Prime Minister Netanyahu is not interested in just occupying a space, but is interested in being a statesman and putting his country on a more secure track.” And even -- also, you said, “I believe that Prime Minister Netanyahu wants peace. I think he’s willing to take risks for peace.” Would you repeat those very same words today?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, I think it’s always difficult to put yourself in somebody else’s shoes. And I think Prime Minister Netanyahu -- I’ve gotten to know and worked with since almost the beginning of my presidency -- is somebody who loves Israel deeply. I think he cares about the security of the Israeli people. I think he recognizes the history of hostility and anti-Semitism that makes it very important to him and his place in history to preserve Israel’s security. And I respect all that.
I think that he also is someone who has been skeptical about the capacity of Israelis and Palestinians to come together on behalf of peace. I think that he is also a politician who’s concerned about keeping coalitions together and maintaining his office.
This week, Alpher discusses Israel's near-suspension last week from FIFA and what are the broad strategic ramifications of this phase in the global BDS campaign against Israel; how the new right-wing Israeli government, with its heavy pro-settlement bias, can successfully confront this campaign; whether Tony Blair’s departure is a turning point and who will coordinate economic and infrastructure aid to the Palestinians and state institution-building in his absence; whether last Tuesday's firing of a rocket by Islamic Jihad from the Gaza strip towards Ashdod was a blip on the radar screen or an event with strategic ramifications; and the possibility of an Israel-Hamas dialogue.
This photo of me at age seven, sitting on a Jeep taken by Israeli soldiers during the Six Day War, was taken in June 1967, just outside my home in Jerusalem, a couple of days after the war ended. During the weeks and months that followed, my family, like many Israelis, rushed to explore the liberated land of the Bible.
In our old Susita, an Israeli-manufactured clunker with a Ford engine and a fiberglass body, we traveled to Bethlehem, Hebron, Jericho, and the Judea desert. And through the torn-down wall that separated West Jerusalem from East Jerusalem, we walked to the Old City. We pressed prayers into the cracks of the Western Wall and climbed the Mount of Olives. My parents, who had both been Bible teachers, put the scenery in a historical context. We felt that our country was finally whole.