Israel: The Way Out

Most eyes are focused now on Gaza, for good reason. The catastrophe is there for all to see. But I want to begin with the Palestinian village of Mu‘arrajat, in the Jordan Valley on the occupied West Bank. In mid-March I stayed overnight there with other activists, in what we call “protective presence”—a concerted effort to protect Palestinian villagers from the rampages of armed Israeli settlers who are terrorizing them day and night. Mu‘arrajat now has two settler outposts at its throat, one deep in the grazing grounds of the Palestinian shepherds (forbidden territory for them since the war in Gaza began) and another on the hill above the village. In October settlers from these outposts were stopping Palestinians’ cars on the highway and telling their occupants that they had twenty-four hours to leave their homes and that they would be killed if they refused. A few weeks ago these settlers came into the village and dug a row of empty graves near the school—a sign of what they want to do to the people of Mu‘arrajat.

Violent intrusions by masked, heavily armed settlers, often together with soldiers, are by now routine. The honorific term “soldiers” in the Jordan Valley and the South Hebron Hills really refers to paramilitary units, in uniform, made up of settlers who have been armed by Itamar Ben-Gvir, the convicted criminal and Jewish supremacist whom Benjamin Netanyahu appointed minister of national security in November 2022. They are a law unto themselves.

The settlers’ mantra—“Get out or we will kill you”—has been repeated in nearly all the villages in the Jordan Valley and the South Hebron Hills. Most of our friends in the villages have heard it. Usually it is uttered in the course of attacks on Palestinian homes, sheep pens, food supplies, water tanks and wells, wind turbines, and anything else the invaders can wreck. Sometimes these settlers shoot at the villagers and kill sheep and goats. We know of at least sixteen Palestinian villages that have been evacuated over the last few months because of ceaseless settler violence backed by the army; many more are barely hanging on. International pressure has had some meaningful impact on the situation, but for the most part the settlers are winning this miniwar. They tend to be fanatical men or adolescent boys, brainwashed, apocalyptic, and messianic, who have emerged from the dark and brutal undercurrents of religious Zionism. They want to rid the West Bank of all non-Jews (and maybe some secular Jews as well) in order to hasten the arrival of the Messiah, who is scheduled to turn up as soon as this campaign of ethnic cleansing is completed. But the ideological motivation is only part of the story; we who have seen these people in action, who have met them in the field, can confirm that many of them are driven by sheer sadistic pleasure. See my “A Bitter Season in the West Bank,” The New York Review, December 21, 2023...

I'm exhausted by this interminable conflict. IDGAF anymore.

By now there is no need to rehearse Netanyahu’s failings. They are evident to anyone with eyes. It is, however, relevant to the current debacle to state clearly that he bears responsibility for what has happened, and that he characteristically refuses to acknowledge that responsibility. He fomented profound internal divisions in Israel with his attempt to undermine the supreme court and, in effect, the entire legal system, which provoked mass protests and created the conditions for the Hamas attack—since Hamas correctly noted that Israeli society was unraveling. Netanyahu also chose to ignore urgent warnings from the highest echelons of the army and the security forces that such an attack was imminent.....

The New York Review of Books.

Consider the source. They miss Stalin.

The Israelis aren't going anywhere and the shouldn't. They played by everyone else's rules for 2,000 years, enriching every country they lived in, all they got was death and exile. They've had enough of this shit. They're playing by their rules now.

[quote]since Hamas correctly noted that Israeli society was unraveling.

Israel is still there. They're strong enough to protest Netanyahu. Iran and its proxies mistook that for an unraveling country. Instead, it is a country strong enough to withstand disagreement.

What a load of revisionist history bullshit, OP.

[quote] What a load of revisionist history bullshit, OP.

Truth hurts, I know dear. Feel free to refute any statements though. Since you can't, just call the author a self-hating Jew.

It's not truth, R8. It's revisionist history bullshit.

R5 Let me fix that for you: Playing by their rules now using other countries' money.

Bump