wodstar.com
Gabe Ende: Israel – Slogans Aside: Optimal Goals are the Answer
Ever since Binyamin Netanyahu began to address the goals of Operation Iron Swords, he spoke—often in opposition to the military leadership — of the need for no less than “total victory”. His supporters argue his position as such:
“We dare not relinquish this historic opportunity to destroy the Hamas and Hezbollah and relieve our people of the existential dangers which they represent–because if they are not eradicated, they will execute an even more violent massacre in a few years. If this means extending the war for additional months or years, so be it. We have capitulated in the past to the demands of hostile U.S. administrations and adopted the defeatist conceptions of containment, reliance on foreign supervision, and naïve expectations of peace nurtured by the Left instead of pushing on to complete victory and completing the job. We cannot allow this to happen again.”
Sounds convincing –but at the base of this position lies a historical sleight of hand. I have experienced enough wars and “existential crises” in my fifty-five years in Israel to understand that revolutionary groups with a strong popular base cannot be destroyed—and to appreciate that our interests in such situations have always been best advanced by the adoption of optimal objectives— striving for the best attainable goals under existing conditions–rather than insisting upon”complete victory”…I will cite five cases in point.
- The Yom Kippur War erupted in October 1973 and there were so many casualties in the first few days that Minister of Defense Moshe Dayan expressed the fear that “This is the end of the Third Commonwealth”. The IDF resurged, however, and two weeks later besieged the 30,000-strong Third Egyptian Army, with the capability of destroying the force. Popular sentiment in favor of “teaching the Egyptians a lesson” ran high. U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger immediately flew to the region to mediate a cease-fire, explaining to Prime Minister Golda Meir that should the Egyptian troops remain unharmed, the situation could be exploited to initiate a peace process between the two warring states, whereas destruction of the besieged force would lead to unending enmity. The suggestion encountered a good deal of opposition, particularly from the leadership of the Likud. When Golda announced that the government would accept Kissinger’s proposal, she was subjected to vitriolic condemnation for denying Israel “complete and undeniable victory”. I doubt whether any sane Israeli would condemn her decision in retrospect.
- In June 1982 Israel invaded southern Lebanon in what Minister of Defense Ariel Sharon, at the time the darling of the Israeli Right, cited as “an effort to push the PLO terrorists beyond the Litani—forty kilometers from the Israeli border– from which their artillery is incapable of hitting Israeli targets.” Sharon and Chief of Staff “Raful” Eitan had farther-reaching plans, however. They intended to continue to Beirut in order to join forces with the Falanges—the major Christian militia– help install their leader Bashir Jemayal as President, assist him in asserting his authority over the entire country, expel the remaining PLO fighters and promote a peace treaty between Israel and Lebanon. The Israeli Left announced its support for the more modest goals proclaimed at the beginning of the war and was excoriated for its “defeatist”—even “treacherous”—opposition to “complete victory”. Ultimately, however, everything went kaput and we were stuck in Lebanon for eighteen years with 1500 fatalities, retreating under ignominious conditions. That’s what happens when moderate voices are silenced by those demanding “total victory”.
- Researchers at the right-wing think-tank Forum Kohelet expressed the opinion that the Declaration of Independence doesn’t sufficiently guarantee Jewish interests in the Jewish state and that the democratic pole of our “Jewish and democratic” identity may ultimately achieve legal precedence over the Jewish side. Their solution was a legislative initiative detailing the specific responsibilities of the state to promote its Jewish character—and thus was born the Nation-State Law which, in contrast to the Declaration of Independence, carefully avoids a commitment to the equality of all Israel’s citizens. Critics contended that not only was the new law unnecessary. It also opened Israel to charges of racism and “apartheid”. Proponents paid no attention to the warning …And then it happened. A vocal protest movement emerged, led by Druze reservists, some of whom publicly returned their military IDs. The government responded with promises of amending the law. Some MKs even announced that they intended to renounce their support. The damage, however, was already done. Notwithstanding the absurdity of the “fears” of the law’s supporters, the issue indicates how the quest for “complete victory” can often prove extremely counterproductive.
- In the last few decades of the former century, hundreds of thousands of olim from the former USSR made their way to Israel’s shores. They were joined by tens of thousands of Ethiopian Jews. Everyone rejoiced, except for the Hareidi rabbinical leadership, who contended that many of them were not Jewish according to rabbinic law and would produce widespread intermarriage and “assimilation”. This sparked a demand to amend the Law of Return, permitting Aliyah only to those who could prove that they were Jewish according to halacha. Some MKs from the Right announced their support…”Are we a Jewish state or not?”, they railed… The demand ultimately subsided and everyone with a head on his shoulders appreciated the very substantial contribution of this wave of Aliyah to the country—including in the current war. The demand for “a completely Jewish people in the Jewish state” reflects the same faulted mentality as the “complete victory” slogan—and is morally abhorrent as well.
- In the past few decades, millions of Africans have migrated to the West as asylum seekers. 70,000–mostly from Eritrea– reached Israel via Sinai. After the construction of the security fence on the Egyptian border, their number fell to 50,000. Some were able to make their way to Germany, Sweden and Canada and by 2010 the number had further dropped to around 35,000. Instead of investigating whether each arrival was actually a bona fide asylum seeker—as demanded by international conventions to which Israel was a signatory– the government arbitrarily decided that they were all “work migrants” who would be expelled at the earliest opportunity. The asylum seekers dared not return to Eritrea, however, and a problematic stalemate ensued. The UN High Commissioner on Refugees was prompted to work out a plan—only for the refugees from Africa in Israel– which he presented to Netanyahu: We will facilitate the transfer of close to half the asylum seekers to safe western states within five years if Israel will grant the rest refugee status. Bibi warmly embraced the proposal, which he presented to the public at a press conference. There was a great deal of bitter criticism within the Likud, however, causing Bibi to renege within a day. The result? All the asylum seekers have remained in Israel. The long-standing slogan of “We will deport them all” paralyzed the government’s ability to act at “money time”.
In summation: Israel functions well when given rational, pragmatic and optimal objectives , not goals such as “complete victory”. The latter would lead us to fight endlessly, tear our society to pieces, leave us without a foundation for vision, for renewal, for a sense of normalcy, for hope. Israeli society cannot be pressed in the mold of Sparta or North Korea.
Our sages witnessed the danger of such a mentality in the three foiled rebellions against the Romans – and proclaimed that “He who seizes too much will end up with nothing”. And the author of Kohelet writes in his immortal words “There is a time to kill and a time to heal…a time to lament and a time to dance…a time to rend and a time to sew together…a time for war and a time for peace.
The conception of “total victory” doesn’t enable us to maneuver these delicate crossings, a skill of overriding importance for small people with a will to survive.
