The Ideology Matrix - Politics and Political Goals

With most issues of public policy, you can predict people's stances based on their general political leanings. This is certainly true of the left and right in Israel, where their positions, especially on the "peace process," can be entirely predictable.

Therefore, it is fascinating when there is an issue that somehow falls in between the sides, and you get to see people wrestle with the issue, and often have people of wildly opposite politics reach the same policy conclusion.

The best example is the security fence. Let's look at the arguments:

Left: Let's build a fence on the Green Line, to unilaterally establish a Palestinian state.
Right: No fence - we don't want a Palestinian state.
Left: We aren't establishing a border - it's just for security.
Right: OK, if it's for security, we agree to build it, but let's include all the settlements.
Left: No, we don't want settlements - we oppose this apartheid fence!
Right: OK, no fence. Just one big Israel.
US: No fence - it pre-determines a border.
Right: Who is the US to tell us not to build a fence? We want a fence!
Left: No fence - the US is right, it's a racist fence!

It's never really clear the exact goal of the fence - everyone has a different goal, and tries to use the fence to accomplish it.

Now, there comes along a parallel issue - the "one-state solution." The UN originially suggested a two-state solution (two states west of the Jordan). Jews accepted, Arabs rejected. The Arabs continued to pursue the one-state solution (one Arab state) via terrorism and war. After 1967, Israel started to pursue a one-state solution of their own (a Jewish state). Then Oslo came, and took us back to the two-state solution. Now that everyone realizes that the Oslo process was a terrible failure, the one-state solution is coming back into vogue.

There are three forms that the one-state solution takes: the right-wing Israeli one, which involves Israeli sovergeinty over all the land. One such proposal is Benny Elon's proposal. (It's actually a two-state solution, but one of the states is Jordan.) Arabs have always been pursuing a one-state solution - an Arab state.

Lately, there has been a third proposal: a bi-national state, shared by Jews and Arabs. This idea can take two forms: The first the Canaan plan (the Jewish Week had an article about this in their last issue). They hope for a return to a multi-national population in Israel, where I suppose they hope that nationalistic Jews will be like grasshoppers in the eyes of giants. The goal of the plan is to eliminate the Jewish state and any bias towards Jews in the land. This is an easy sell to the leftists of the world, since it can be phrased in terms of democracy, equal rights, and racism.

The other plan, I just heard about yesterday, in the Jerusalem Post. The plan is a right-wing Israeli plan for the same thing - a bi-national state, but with a constitution guaranteeing that the state will remain Jewish. They use Lebanon as a model, which they say guarantees Christian, Sunni, and Shiite representation at the top of the government. I think that if I were looking for a model nation, I would not start with Lebanon. But that's just me. Obviously, the goals of those presenting the plan is to keep the state Jewish - it's just hard to imagine how they think it would work.

What's the point of this long post? That the right and left in Israel, as well as the Arabs, have a clear goal in mind. For the right, it seems like the goal is to get or keep as much land as possible. For the left, it seems like the goal is to jettison as much historically significant land as possible. For the Arabs, it seems like the goal is to expel and/or kill as many Jews as possible. No one says these goals outloud, but they try to make them come to fruition by wrangling with these hot issues, trying to somehow frame them in their favor. The right wants a fence if it will help them keep land, but not if it will prevent that. The left wants a fence if it will help them jettison land, but not if it prevents that. The Arabs want a fence if it will help them kill Jews, but not if it will prevent that.

All the above-mentioned goals are stupid and short-sighted. To have a more reasonable dialogue, and a reasonable progress, we need to be forthright about our goals. What is Sharon's goal? No one really knows. He certainly never says. What is the goal of the Left? It can't just be peace, or they would stop pursuing policies that lead to more bloodshed. THe Arabs are the ones who are clearest about their goals, but somehow, we don't listen.

First we need to state our goals clearly. When we do, I think people will realize that they are silly. Then, we need to start stating better goals. One organization that is trying to do this is Manhigut Yehudit, with their Jewish Road Map. Whether or not the details of their plan are the best details, the overall goal there is the best (and clearest) goal: for Jews to build an exemplary state, an or lagoyim, in our land, as discussed by our prophets (see, for example, Yeshayahu chapter 2).

This goal is a consistent message throughout Tanach, and it is in fact the goal of many Jews to be an or lagoyim. We can be a light to individual people by living a moral life on our own, in exile. But we can only be a light to the nations if we, as a nation, build a moral society in our land. Jews can be part of this light by moving to Israel, and helping to build our young state. When a million Jews go komemiyut to our land - optionally, not running away but running forwards, then we won't argue about whether the fence goes here or there. We will argue about a lot, but no one will argue the best survivalist tactic to preserve our hold on the land. It will be clear to everyone - Jew and Gentile - that Jews have returned to their land to fulfill their historical role: "Ki mitzion tetzei Torah, udvar Hashem m'Yerushalayim."