Israelis aren’t right-wing radicals, they’ve just abandoned a delusion
According to one recent poll, 67 percent of Israeli voters support a peace deal with the Palestinians. Even on the right, a majority said they back the prospect of two states for two people, with 57 percent of Likud supporters backing such a deal and 53 percent of those likely to vote for Bennett’s Jewish Home Party also favoring the two-state solution.
Still, as much as Israelis want peace with the Arabs, they are skeptical of that happening anytime soon. Israeli voters are as rational as voters in any liberal democracy—and in this case, Israel is a liberal democracy that has come under repeated attacks from its neighbors.
The popular belief that Israeli public opinion is moving radically to the right “is profoundly untrue,” said Dan Schueftan, a visiting professor at Georgetown who advised Israeli prime ministers from Yitzhak Rabin to Ariel Sharon. Instead, they’ve adopted the central paradigms of both the left and the right. “Most Israelis are very pessimistic about reaching a peace deal with the Palestinians, and the Arabs in general. This is a core paradigm of the right,” Schueftan told me. “And yet a majority is willing to reach a compromise that would partition the land into two states for two people. This is a core paradigm of the left. They’re not saying we don’t want peace, but that even if they make concessions they don’t think it will lead to peace.”
Israelis haven’t abandoned the dream of peace; they’ve faced reality and are refusing to continue to pay lip service to an illusion.
Blowback
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Something that we ought to do here. However, I fear that we’re actually headed the opposite way at the moment.
Given the cyclical nature of the course of human events, things will improve eventually. The question is, what will it take?
Atlas on January 17, 2013 at 9:54 PM
Something far worse than 9/11.
I can only pray it results in more dead liberals than conservatives, simply because they need the biggest wake-up call.
MelonCollie on January 17, 2013 at 10:02 PM
Maybe the Israeli left. Over here, an increasing number on the left want one state with universal suffrage – since that would result in a majority-Arab state and hence the destruction of Israel.
sadarj on January 17, 2013 at 10:16 PM
Israelis want it both ways. Americans suffer from the same popular contradictions… they want to reduce the the debt and deficits but there is no majority behind any serious cuts in spending. The Israelis like the notion of a two state solution but the government is struggling to prevent that ever happening. You can’t say you want a two state solution while expanding settlements rendering that option impossible. I’m not sure how you can come to the conclusion that they are being at all realistic wanting peace while expanding settlements. They are simply failing to confront their own extremists just like the Palestinians.
lexhamfox on January 17, 2013 at 10:18 PM
Lexham I love how the problem is the Israeli GOVERNMENT…I’d instead posit, “You can’t say you want a two state solution when…you scream ‘Death to the Joooos’” Or are you saying those rockets from Gaza are merely carrying peace proposals, but those dastardly Likudniks are using Iron Dome to prevent their delivery?
JFKY on January 17, 2013 at 10:28 PM
I love how people like yourself make up a position I haven’t taken when responding to my comments on Israel rather than addressing the point I raised.
lexhamfox on January 17, 2013 at 10:40 PM
Well what IS your position, that there’d be a two-state solution with Hamas? If you believe that I can’t help but conclude you are an idiot!
Israel is surrounded by folks who have spent an inordinate amount of time, money, effort, and blood to eliminate them…the fact that Israel builds settlements is irrelevant to that fact! And please note the Israeli government, Left and Right HAS given land to the Palestinians? And there are still the rockets.
JFKY on January 17, 2013 at 10:43 PM
Why does that make it impossible?
Arab Muslims live in Israel and that doesn’t make it impossible, so why is it impossible that Jews live on the West Bank? Would it be because the Palestinians can’t stand the idea of Jews being in the same area without trying to kill them?
sharrukin on January 17, 2013 at 10:48 PM
My position is that Israel tolerates and gives in to the demands of its extremists just like the Palestinians. My position is that continued expropriation of Arab lands occupied since 1967 makes a two state solution less and less likely. Israel has every right to defend itself from attacks from Hamas. The Palestinians have every right to oppose the occupation and fight for their own nation.
lexhamfox on January 17, 2013 at 10:52 PM
As their notion of their own nation means NO ISRAEL, I’d say that your position is fundamentally unsound.
JFKY on January 17, 2013 at 10:58 PM
The majority of Palestinians are willing to live side by side with Israel just like Israelis are willing to live next to an Arab Palestinian state.
lexhamfox on January 17, 2013 at 11:03 PM
Let’s just look at Eretz Ysrael’s neighbor’s shall we Lexham, how many Jews reside in Egypt, Jordan, the West Bank, Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Tunisia, Sudan, Iraq, or Iran?
How many Arabs reside in Israel?
Do you see any problem with your formulation?
JFKY on January 17, 2013 at 11:04 PM
1) That’s not what the rockets and shaheeds say.
2) It’s not what the public opinion polls say either.
How does one arrive at your position, ignorance or naivete?
I love how you conflate Israelis “extremists” with Palestinian, ones…the difference being the Palestinian ones are running the Palestinian nation, in Gaza, in Lebanon, and the West Bank.
And Jewish “extremists” are building apartments, the Palestinian ones are shelling Israel and plotting to kill Israelis. Beyond that I see how you can confuse the two.
JFKY on January 17, 2013 at 11:07 PM
JFKY on January 17, 2013 at 11:07 PM
That’s exactly what the polls say. Majorities in both populations.
lexhamfox on January 17, 2013 at 11:12 PM
It’s not a conflation. They have the same mindset. They are also minorities in both populations.
lexhamfox on January 17, 2013 at 11:13 PM