Rousseau in Palestine

I seem to recall some pieces during the dying days of apartheid exploring what Roussea-ian political theory could say about that conflict and its resolution. One of the things that came out was the warning that living under the distorted political regime of Late Apartheid would significantly affect the ability of many young men in particular, to properly adjust and practise their duties and rights as citizens in a ‘conventional’ democratic way. In a sense not exactly an unforeseen consequence but a new angle on a serious problem. The deeper contradiction, or potential one, as I understand it, is that democracy, particularly that of a Rousseau-ian nature, won’t necessarily reduce or eliminate conflict; especially when two ardent nationalisms clash over a finite piece of territory with strong ethnic and religious readings of history which have become quite antagonistic to each other. Increasing democracy, here could very well increase the intensity of conflict – I assume this is part of the thinking behind the willingness of the Israelis and the US/international community to overlook the flawed elections to the PA in the past which guaranteed Arafat a comfortable position. Of course with the peace process derailed now, the issue of political reform has very much come back on the agenda. There may well be an unpalatable choice to make here between the deepening of democracy and the capacity to achieve a sustainable peace; for both sides, it is debatable as to whether a democratic consensus on the compromises needed to achieve peace within a two-state framework may exist. On the other hand, opinion and belief has shifted around a lot within both camps, so all that might be needed is a set of leaders that have broadly the same goals and who maintain a level of trust necessary in the Other to make the initial steps.

What nonsense. The right of return is a fundamental one acknowledged by the world. Israel’s “right” to create a Jewish state *in Palestine* (as opposed to the other places that were considered in the C19th) was a creation of the Zionist movement. These are not just two competing assertions of equal weight. That Palestinians have a right to their homes seems fairly uncontroversial to most people.

Nice formulation on democrtatic vs majoritarian, BTW. Who will decide what are legitimate views (democratic) and what are the product of evil indoctrination (majoritarian)?…. Israel?

Anyway, any attempt to proceed on a basis other than at least an acknowledgement (if not complete implementation) of the right of return is doomed to failure and, sadly, more senseless violence on both sides.

Lee,

Perhaps my history is faulty. As I recall, before WWII, the area called Palestine was under British control. It had some Jews living there and it had a lot of Arabs (Palestinians) living there.

After the war, more Jews started moving to the area. The British decided to divide the land between the two groups living there, creating one “Jewish” state and one “Palestinian” state.

This plan was brought to the United Nations, voted on, and approved. Under international law, that by itself should validate the “two state solution”.

Almost immediately, almost all Jews living outside the new Israel in Arab countries started getting persecuted and fled to Israel out of fear. Many Arabs living in the new Israel either fled out or fear, or left assuming they could return when the Arabs defeated Israel in the 1948 war. When that didn’t happen and Israel became permanent, the Jews who fled to Israel became “Israelis” and the Arabs who fled from Israel became “refugees.”

Aside from the imprimatur of the UN, I don’t know what the Israelis should (or could possibly) have done to gain their “right” to a country in your view other than living there. National borders are inherently arbitrary, and it makes sense that if two groups don’t get along, when you’re drawing the arbitrary boundaries you should put them in separate countries.

Isn’t this only a paradox if you understand democracy purely as the electoral system? It is pretty clear to me that neo-cons are using ‘democracy’ as short-hand for, at a minimum, the following: rule of law, freedom of speech, freedom of association, independent judiciary, freedom of contract which are supposed to make a functioning democratic government possible. Democratization is an end product, not a “one man, one vote, one time” affair.

Rv agnos,

I don’t want to start a huge historical debate about the rights and wrongs of the whole Israeli-Palestinian issue but I think there are some points that could be clarified on what you have said. The main problem was that the British had basically promised Palestine to two different sets of people, both the Arabs and the Zionists in WWI with an eye to maximising their support and then went through a troubled Mandate period paying for this. They managed to alienate at different points of time, both sets of Nationalists, sparking off an Arab revolt in 1936 and periodic Jewish resistance culminating in a guerrilla campaign at the end of WWII. I don’t think it makes much sense to refer to the UNSCOP mission plan since I doubt whether either side was going to respect it and neither side was happy with Partition, having desired Palestine in its entirety. The Zionist leadership not having won recognition at a significant level for a Jewish state, decided to accept the plan while the Palestinian Arabs refused; however, even the UN plan would have left a large Arab minority (40%, I think) in the new Jewish state, which still had to absorb Jewish immigration, in an area smaller that modern Israel. This in effect would have created a de facto bi-national state and have caused a severe problem for Zionism as a state ideology. The later transfer of populations, ameliorated this problem, but only through substantial levels of ethnic cleansing; as aside from the urban professional populations; the mass of the Arabs in the rural peasantry were hard to move otherwise. The Zionist flight you refer to from Arab countries began somewhat later, one of the largest Jewish communities in the region in Iraq, left between 1950-52, somewhat after the founding of Israel and aided in some part by activities of a Zionist underground network which created series of false incidents but for the major part by the discrimination of the Iraqi govt at the time and the opportunist manipulation of anti-Jewish sentiments.

I cannot stress strongly enough that the UN does not have the right to ‘create’ a country and neither does Israel owe some sort of debt to the UN at the time for passing the partition plan; the right of a nation-state to exist can be judged on a number of different criteria, the adherence to democratic principles and enhancement of the life-opportunities given to ALL its citizens being the main ones in my opinion. Nationalist sentiment had become quite entrenched by the end of the 1930s on both sides and the likelihood of conflict was high, no matter which what the UN would have decided.

National border is indeed arbitrary but they need to be respected by state actors and nationalisms. While the Labour wing of the Zionist movement has been much more pragmatic in its willingness to accept demarcated borders, the ambiguity with which Israeli elites have been willing to take advantage to ‘adjust’ to newly created facts and situations on the ground is quite notorious. I suggest that it is essential for a nationalist consensus to emerge very early on in the existence of a state as to what its sovereign boundaries should be and that having designs or annexing parts of other state-territories or expressing long-term intentions to do so, are not conducive to a solution that is particularly democratic or peaceful.

If there was a mixed Jewish-Muslim state
in Palestine who would be elected Prime
Minister? If strictly along ethnic
Sharon would win and Arafat would lose.

And then Arafat would no longer have the
protection of the International Community
to shield him against being brought to
trial for his terrorist crimes.

And do you think the Israeli Defense Forces
would tolerate its new fellow citizens –
Hamas; Islamic Jihad; Tanzim – with all
those weapons? History tells us they
would not.

No way the current Palestinian leadership
would allow a single state solution.

On the other, individual muslim citizens would
joyfully want to be citizens of that sort of
state. Look to the Polling numbers of current
Israeli Arabs when asked if they would
voluntarily subject themselves to the rule of
the current Palestinian Authority. Heavily
against such an idea.

“Be careful what you ask for. You may get it.”

>Isn’t this only a paradox if you understand democracy purely as the
>electoral system? It is pretty clear to me that neo-cons are using
>`democracy’ as short-hand for, at a minimum, the following: rule of
>law, freedom of speech, freedom of association, independent judiciary,
>freedom of contract which are supposed to make a functioning
>democratic government possible. Democratization is an end product, not
>a “one man, one vote, one time” affair.

Democracy according to the dictionary

“1. Government by the people, exercised either directly or through elected representatives. 2. A political or social unit that has such a government. 3. The common people, considered as the primary source of political power. 4. Majority rule. 5. The principles of social equality and respect for the individual within a community. ”

So the neo-cons have simply stopped speaking English. That explains a lot. After all in that case when the neo-cons use words like “rule of law” and “independent judiciary” they might not be using the typical English meaning of those words either.