Members of the Israeli Defense Forces engaged in a hostile take-over of humanitarian ships in international waters in an operation that left nine activists dead. The ships were organized as part of the Free Gaza Movement and were trying to breach a long-standing blockade on Gaza that has been sucking the life out of its residents.
As expected, in the aftermath of the conflict, Israel came up with a version of the story of what happened that is vastly different than the account of the activists, or what their recorded videos seem to indicate. But regardless of whose account one is inclined to believe, it is safe to say that the focus of most commentators, journalists, bloggers and politicians has remained on the details of this incident.
However, this is only the latest instance in a series of deadly acts on the part of a nuclear state that is vastly and growingly more paranoid with effects that are no longer contained in the Middle East. Israelis attacked the ships in international--not Israeli--waters. The people it has snatched are mostly from countries that have historically been some of Israel's strongest allies, such as Turkey, which until recently was Israel's strongest ally among Muslim majority countries. Another individual who remains detained as of the time of this writing is the best-selling Swedish author, Henning Mankell. And when such incidents happen, they become tools by which Al Qaeda and other terrorist organizations recruit terrorists to attack us and any other country that unconditionally supports Israel.
When the explosion at the BP platform in the Gulf Mexico resulted in a burst pipe that began gushing a significant amount of oil into the waters (which still continues), only part of the ensuing conversation focused on the details of events that led to this specific incident. But most of us understood that we could not look at that incident in isolation, and that we had to look at it as part of a larger context and decades of assault on the environment that have been making our planet warmer, drier and more toxic. This led President Obama to the correct decision of suspending all deep water drilling, an action that showed the president's ability to see the incident in its historical context.
Similarly, we can no longer look at various hostile actions on the part of Israel in isolation. Instead, we have to see this latest incident as only a part of a growing series of acts. Accordingly, we as a country and as a global community need to begin a conversation about long-standing issues that have kept Middle East in turmoil for over sixty years, and in doing so, the new generation of Americans who did not have any say in the original matter but are now paying the price of old policies with their treasure and security should try to answer a series of critical questions on Israel for themselves.
One of those questions is: Has the creation and defense of a theocratic state as a remedy for atrocities against Jewish people in World Word II contributed to--more than it has hurt--the global peace, justice and harmony?
In the post WWII world with holocaust and other atrocities and justified sense of guilt fresh among many nations, the idea of a Jewish state made sense. But this is a vastly different world, and with the benefit of the hindsight, we are able to see the consequences of that decision. At the time, the supporters of Zionism may have envisioned a peaceful Israel that Jewish people could call homeland as a just idea. But sixty years later, not only has Israel proven incapable of gaining the recognition of most of the Middle East, but through decades of oppression of Palestinians--the original inhabitants of modern-day Israel--continued illegal occupation of the West Bank, settlement building and horrific restrictions on movement in direct violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention, middle-of-the-night strikes or open-day assaults and wars on various countries in the region without regard to international law, fierce espionage on many countries, including many of their allies such as the United States, and their obtainment of what is now estimated to be about 400 thermonuclear weapons while refusing to sign on to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty have left Israel deeply isolated in the global community.
What makes Israel's sustainability even hard to imagine or support on paper is the fact that it is structured and accepted not as a secular, but a Jewish theocratic democracy. Such a system is counter-intuitive for two reasons: 1) While it is designed to be a remedy for the persecution of Jews over centuries, it is based on the belief that Jews can ultimately not be safe anywhere else other than a country designated for them. Such a belief, in effect, accepts anti-Semitism as a reality that can never be eradicated, rather than one that condemns and strives to eliminate it. It also allows for constant branding of any criticisms from the outside world as instances of anti-Semitism, even when those criticisms are legitimate. 2) Despite its constant claim that it is the only democracy in the Middle East--a title that belongs to Turkey--it is a state where Jews are subject to one set of laws, and non-Jewish people to a different set of laws. If a child is born into a Jewish faith in East Jerusalem, her passport indicates, "born in Israel." If an Arab child is born in the same building, her passport names Jordan as a place of origin. Even under the disreputable Iranian regime, when a Jewish baby is born in Iran, she has the same citizenship status and rights as a Muslim child. This theocratic underpinning is fundamentally incompatible with the notion of a secular democratic modern state that does not recognize the establishment of a religion, or a kind of state that the United States could strongly support without undermining its own legitimacy on the global stage.
In this context, just as a surgeon doesn't try to fight a body that is rejecting an implanted organ, should the world continue to disregard the amount of bloodshed, violence and instability that the creation of this theocratic state of a little more than five million people has created for over six decades? In other words, should we continue to automatically support the continued existence of Israel in its current form and regardless of its disregard for international law? Or should President Obama and the modern generation of American policy-makers at least condition that support to the implementation of a series of fundamental changes in Israeli actions and behavior, such as its complete withdrawal from the occupied territories, payment of reparations to all Palestinians whose homes Israel has demolished over the years, permission of humanitarian care for Palestinians, termination of their don't-ask-don't tell policy on nuclear weapons and declaration of all of their possessions, and the gradual transformation of their state from a Jewish to a secular state?
Regardless of how one may answer these questions, thinking about them and similar questions would have to become part of our ongoing conversation and how we think about permanently addressing this long-standing conflict.