(C) Daily Kos
This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered.
 . . . . . . . . . .



Lessons from Prof. Khalidi's books [1]

['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']

Date: 2024-10-18  

I recently read Rashid Khalidi’s wonderful book “100 year war on Palestine”, and his other wonderful book “The iron cage”. It helped me understand (or better understand… I am not even close to a full understanding) the Israel-Palestine conflict. From his book, I also gained insights on events that are missing in mainstream American media-led discourse. Some of those insights were counter-intuitive, and surprised me. This diary is my attempt to list some of them.

The first lesson: Palestine was created by Zionism. I suspect this is a lesson with a historical analogy that most Israeli Jews will appreciate. An examination of the migration patterns into mandate Palestine (1922 to 1948) reveals that Zionism had largely failed by 1932. More Jews were migrating out of Palestine than migrating in (or the net effect was essentially zero). This was despite the best efforts of the reigning superpower of the time (i.e. Great Britain). What turbo charged Zionism was… he who shall not be named… in 1933. Just like Israel was created by violent anti-semitism (i.e. mass scale violence directed at Jews simply because they are Jews), so too has Palestine been created by violence directed at Palestinians simply because they are Palestinians (i.e. those who lived on the lands desired by the Zionists). To understand this, you have to understand the “Palestinian” civil society. In the mandate period, the Palestinian civil society would debate the issue of self-determination (and Jewish immigration), and did not have a consensus on what the final outcome of that self-determination should be. Some favored pan-Arabism, some favored becoming subjects of King Abdallah (of Transjordan), some favored becoming Southern Syria. But there were no substantial arguments along the lines of “we are a people, and we should have our own state”. That feeling did not fully develop until well after the PLO was routed in Beirut in 1982…. i.e., during the first intifada. Palestinians noticed as Israel sought peace with all of it’s neighbors, but maintained a strict policy of disproportionate & violent response directed at Palestinians. Palestinians also noticed the duplicity (and complicity) of the reigning superpowers (first Britain, then the USA) in this violence directed at them. And their response has been something that Israeli Jews will recognize: we need our own state, with control over land/water/air/immigration/security.

The second lesson: Palestine may be winning the war, when viewed over a longer trajectory. At least, you can make an argument that this is happening. Whether or not this argument is the correct argument will be known only with hindsight. Consider the recent Israel-Hamas conflict, and Hamas’ apparent isolation in Gaza. But, Hamas is not completely isolated. It has “the axis of resistance” that is supporting it ~ this includes Hezbollah, the Houthis in Yemen, and Iran. This is not quite the same as the backing of a Superpower (as the Israelis have now), or the backing of both Superpowers (US and USSR) and also that of Great Britain (as the Israelis had in 1947). But…. It is a 100% more support than what the PLO had in 1982. And it is also a 100% more support than what Yasser Arafat had in 2004, when he was besieged in his Ramallah compound. Palestinians are acquiring a mastery over the narrative. In 1978, the Palestinian scholar Edward Said lamented that Palestinians did not have the permission to narrate their own stories. He argued that Western narratives often dominated the depiction of the Middle East and the Palestinian experience, overshadowing the voices of Palestinians themselves. The Western narratives would describe them as “migrants” (and thus not deserving of a state), “refugees” (i.e. a problem that may require some form of solution), or “terrorists” (who are definitely not deserving of a state). Prof. Khalidi recounts a 1967 demonstration held by pro-Palestine supporters outside a largely attended lecture being delivered by a Zionist figure. The pro-Palestine demonstrators had 4 attendees: Prof Khalidi himself, a Sudanese grad student, and 2 others. Or, consider the 1982 massacre of Palestinian civilians, carried out by Israeli allied LF militia as Israeli soldiers actively lit up the night sky with flares to facilitate the massacre. This massacre was in direct violation of a written commitment made by the US government (i.e. no harm would befall the Palestinian civilians if the PLO fighters withdrew). But there were no protests in Washington DC, and college campuses in the USA were quiet. Contrast that with the number of “pro Hamas” demonstrations on college campuses today. Or the fact that Universities are now finally setting up departments and offering courses on Palestinian-Arab history. Or that people are proudly wearing the Kuffiyeh, as a symbol of support for Palestinian resistance. In her recent DNC acceptance speech, VP Harris said this: “President Biden and I are working…..(so that)… the Palestinian people can realize their right to dignity. Security. Freedom. And self-determination.” This may not seem like much, but it is the most any US official has ever said. Since the 1967 conflict, US policy has been so firmly pro-Israel that Palestinian rights are generally not mentioned outside the context of Israeli security needs. The only real exception to this is President Carter, who did speak about Palestinian rights (including their right to a homeland), but he acquiesced with Israeli demands of a separate peace with Egypt, thereby putting the “ Palestinian problem ” on the backburner. President Clinton also spoke about “ peace with dignity and security ”, but not about self-determination. In the post Intifada era, it had become clear to Israeli leaders (Rabin in particular) that they could not continue to suppress the Palestinians… the visuals of Israeli soldiers breaking the bones of Palestinian civilians was destroying Israel’s international image. And so, they needed a Palestinian agency to solve this security problem. In exchange, they were willing to offer limited self-rule. Thus, self-determination was not ever mentioned by President Clinton; instead, he would describe “a state they can call their own”. And, as he made clear with his Camp David mediation efforts, “a state they can call their own” was not to include rights to the airspace, or the water, or the entry points etc… those would still be controlled by Israel. Palestinian self-determination is a truly radical concept for any US official to mention. Yitzhak Rabin recognized that Israel could not survive images of Jewish Israeli soldiers with guns shooting down teenagers with slingshots. This was the Israeli strategic motive for the Oslo process, and the Israeli endgame was to offload Palestinian policing onto the Palestinian authority. By contrast, at this point, most of the Jewish Israeli society seems to enjoy tik-tok videos of Jewish Israeli soldiers frolicking in women’s underwear while the rest of the world watches on in horror at various videos of Palestinian kids being barbequed in hospital tents.

The 3rd lesson I took from Rashid Khalidi’s book is that Palestinians have been actively searching for a winning tactic for a long time. They have tried non-violence, supplications to superior powers (i.e. the US, and before that Britain), stones, symbolic raids into Israeli assets, suicide bombings, other forms of terror attacks, and outright military confrontation. Except for the stone throwing during the first intifada, every other tactic was ultimately deemed to be counter-productive. And even with the first intifada, the advantages gained by the stone throwers were quickly frittered away by poor strategic vision (on Yasser Arafat’s part), and an inept negotiating team at Oslo II (led by current PA chief Mahmoud Abbas). The lesson they learnt from these failures has led them to revise their diagnosis of Israeli society: Israel is a settler colonial state, but Israelis are unlike any other previous colonialist society in that violence tends to unite them and make them more determined (this is an exact sentence from Prof. Khalid). For all other colonialists, with the proper amount of violence, you can divide the colonial society and make them less determined. For Israelis, the response has been the exact opposite. Any violence directed at Israel from any source makes them more united, and invites a disproportionate response. Any violence directed at Israel from a Palestinian source invites a particularly disproportionate response. Yitzhak Rabin’s “break their bones” policy in response to the stone throwing, is an example of this. Palestinians have understood that this may be due to Israel’s uniquely traumatic experience with the Holocaust. But this leaves them with a problem: Israeli society also responds with violence to non-violent criticism from Palestinian civilians. So what tactics should they use in their resistance? Prof. Khalidi has a distaste for any type of violent method; but I think he underscores the fault-lines that Hamas is trying to exploit. Israeli society is built on an alliance between liberal Zionism (those who believe that everyone is equal) and messianic Zionism (those who believe that Jews have been specially endowed by God). This alliance works only when those who are being displaced by Zionism acquiesce in that displacement. If the Palestinians acquiesce, then liberal Zionists can carry on under the “no harm no foul” formula. So, the search for a winning Palestinian tactic involves simultaneously ensuring that (1) you refuse to acquiesce (2) your refusal is made known to the world in a manner that cannot be ignored (3) it does not result in a unification and hardening of Israeli society. Viewed in this light, I think Sinwar’s tactic of hostage taking is an attempt to find a winning tactic… i.e., one that divides Israeli society, and isolates it from its main international backers. The idea is that if you hold Jewish hostages for long enough, then the primacy given to Jewish life will divide Israelis society into liberal vs messianic camps, empower the hardline right, and isolate it from international support. In essence, that is what is happening today. But…. is that a winning tactic? We will have to wait for hindsight. Note: I am not making any comment on the morality of hostage taking, or of any of the other tactics (including non-violent ones). The question I am raising is whether those tactics are effective , as defined by how quickly it depletes the main Israeli assets (i.e. Israeli unity and international support) vs how quickly it depletes the main Palestinian assets (i.e. lives of Palestinian civilians, the willingness of those who remain to continue to support their leaders etc.). Also, when viewed in this light, Yahwa Sinwar’s end makes a lot of sense. He chose his own ending to be one that maximizes the likelihood of success for his tactics.

The 4th lesson I took from Rashid Khalidi’s books is one that I think Eastern European Jews (and their descendants) will appreciate. My family’s background is similar: I have a lot of migrants in the generations that precede me, with a fair amount of violence (nothing comparable to the Naqba, or the Holocaust) and even I resonated with this point: Having been driven from their homes multiple times, Palestinians have come to value the one thing that cannot be taken away from you when all your belongings are destroyed.. and that is education. Prof. Khalidi fondly describes the UNRWA run schools that enabled this transformation. This is not all that different from the experience of Eastern European Jews, who came to value education similarly. And, as the experience of Eastern European Jews should teach us… it is very hard to destroy a people who value education to that extent.

Concomitant with an increased focus on education, there has been a radical shift in Palestinian society, proceeding in roughly two steps. Prof. Khalidi is scathing in his assessment of Palestinian leaders in the 1924-1948 era. They were insecure, and thus afraid to build an organization that could turn against them. They were feudal (having come to their positions of power largely because of their inheritance), and thus mostly incompetent and/or cowardly. It is therefore not a surprise that they were completely outplayed by the Zionists. As an aside, I found this criticism to be very courageous… some of those being criticized (albeit indirectly) were his ancestors (he comes from a prominent Jerusalem family). The first transformation happened in the immediate aftermath of the Naqba. The feudal leaders were replaced by those who were more competent.. as gauged mostly by how courageous they were in resisting Israeli occupation, and their ability in creating a resistance organization. This change is what produced Yasser Arafat, and also Mahmoud Abbas. Arafat’s primary skill was in managing the relationships with Arab leaders, and he can be credited with an occasional strategic success (such as in helping create the Iranian revolution, which turned Iran from a pro-Zionist to an anti-Zionist state). But Prof. Khalidi is fairly scathing in his criticism of Yasser Arafat as well ~ he lacked strategic vision, was unduly supplicant to both the Israelis, and the Americans, and did not know how to negotiate. The absence of strategic vision resulted in several disastrous decisions. Prof. Khalidi is scathing when describing three such decisions: (1) effectively supporting Saddam Hussein during the Kuwait invasion, (2) accepting American guarantees of safety for Palestinian civilians in Beirut and (3) relying on American/Israeli desires for peace while accepting UNSC resolution 242 to launch Oslo. Underlying this criticism, I detected an attitude that I recognized from my peers, and my parents’ generation growing up in India. When you are conquered and colonized by another race (or ethnic/religious group), there is a sense of racial inferiority, which necessitates a degree of respect for those who are supposed to be of superior racial stock. The assumption is that your colonizers must be of superior racial stock (how else can you explain the fact that a small number of colonizers have dominated your society), not just in military might, but also morally. Thus, even as Yasser Arafat was leading a militant movement, he had one eye on (non-violent) appeals to the goodwill of superior Israeli and American society. The second transformation happened after the downfall of the Oslo process. At this point, Palestinians do not believe in American or Israeli goodwill, or superiority. They now believe that they are “equals”… i.e., deserving of the same rights to the same rights (to use a phrase used by some Israeli peace activists). This is the Hamas led transformation. Or, rather… it is the transformation that has produced Hamas.

[END]
---
[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2024/10/18/2277788/-Lessons-from-Prof-Khalidi-s-books?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=more_community&pm_medium=web

Published and (C) by Daily Kos
Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified.

via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds:
gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/