Israel And The Zimbabwe Model

In a world of perfect justice, the Arabs would prevail in the conflict over Palestine. Or, in this hypothetical just world, there would be a secular state in the region in which adherents of all religions could coexist in political and economic harmony.

The impossibility of a Jewish "national homeland" existing in an Arab context was well understood by the founders of the Zionist Movement more than a century ago. Regardless of public pronouncements over the decades preceding the independence of Israel, the private position was clear: Only a clear and permanent Jewish majority could assure the permanence of the Jewish state.

And, make no mistake about it, despite the European socialist background of the first generations of Zionists and Israelis with its post-Enlightenment legacy of the secular oriented, multi-religious state, the goal was always the formation of a Jewish state in which the levers of power would remain for all time firmly in the hands of Jews. Adherents of other religious traditions would be tolerated but kept firmly in a minority position.

As David ben-Gurion wrote (privately) some seventy-five years ago, there were two problems which would confront the Jewish state in perpetuity. The first was the numerical inferiority of the Jewish population in comparison with the Arab Muslims of Palestine and surrounding areas. This problem would exist even if every Jew in the world returned to the Homeland--a clear impossibility then or now. The second problem was the "violent nature of Islam."

Ben Gurion correctly identified the ground truths of Islam. It was a totalistic belief system governing every aspect of human existence both personal and collective. It was immune to compromise except in the most narrowly defined tactical manner. Finally, it calls for violence against the non-believer generally and the Jew in particular.

Of course it would have been impolitic in the extreme to have made this position in a public forum. Ben Gurion and others of the founding generation relied on the Arabs to do the job for them. To reject compromise as in the myriad partition plans. To resort to violence whether in the riots of the late Twenties and Thirties or in the military misadventure of the Arab states upon Israel's declaration of independence.

It was not surprising that the Zionists and Israelis alike resorted to a form of ethnic cleansing. Before 1948 this was accomplished through the purchase of land and the removal (with the full cooperation of the British Mandate authorities) of the tenant farmer population. With the coming of the War of Independence, violence and threats of violence were employed to remove Arabs from the territory of the borning state.

With a degree of stupidity and arrogance which almost boggles the mind of the retrospective observer, the Israeli efforts at population removal were encouraged and assisted by the various Arab States which assumed without any basis in reality that their forces would speedily drive the Jews into the sea and the displaced population could return. The Arab leaders were wrong and thus share responsibility in creating the Mother of All Palestinian Problems--the fate of the refugees and their descendants.

None of this was just or fair or ethically justified in an absolute way. But, history shows to a nauseating extent that neither fairness nor justice are often observed conditions in the human experience. It is also fair and accurate to say that the two problems highlighted by Ben Gurion still exist.

Israeli Jews still hold the short end of the demographic stick. That end would be made even shorter should Israel agree to some sort of "law of the return" for either the refugees of the earlier wars or their descendants. Likewise it would be shortened if Israel were to reestablish an occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The Israelis do swim in a very hostile sea.

The hostility is not only that of Arab nationalism which rose in parallel with the Zionist movement in the wake of the dismantlement of the Ottoman Empire. Arab nationalism is and has been alive and well for nearly a century now. And, the Arabs of the West Bank and Gaza Strip are in no way immune to its inherent appeal.

Arguably nationalism is not the only or even the most important force at work in the irredentist position of the Gaza and West Bank population. The pride of place rightfully belongs to where Ben Gurion put it--Islam.

Ben Gurion was right on both of his points. And Israelis, even those of the most peace and justice loving persuasion know it. They are perfectly well aware of what would happen even in the event of a peaceful solution to the current hostilities.

Admittedly the probability of a peaceful solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict resides closer to the realm of myth than the cold world of reality. But, assume for the moment that it comes to pass, that a plan along the lines of that put forth by Saudi Arabia on behalf of the Arab League were to be put in place.

The Saudi plan includes a "right of return" clause. Now assume that a fraction of those eligible under its provisions come back to homes and lands in Israel.

Reside in Israel. Work in Israel. Vote in Israeli elections.

That's where the Zimbabwe model comes into play.

Consider it for a moment or two.

When Robert Mugabe and his guerrilla force outlasted the political will of the isolated white minority regime in Rhodesia and took power, the economic base of the country was the export oriented, white owned agricultural sector. For nearly two decades the efficient agricultural sector and the equally white agricultural support businesses kept Zimbabwe in both food and foreign exchange.

But, finally, to keep his kleptocratic hands on the levers of power and depending upon the "democratic process," Mugabe ousted the white farmers. The result was both obvious and immediate.

White flight. Loss of agricultural productivity. Loss of foreign exchange. Finally, in just a handful of years Zimbabwe went from plenty to poverty. Starvation stalked a land which had formerly been a net food exporter of note.

The early Zionists were scared to death of democracy. They feared and resisted any move to place the original Palestine Mandate with the United States in accurate apprehension that the US would insist on installing a reasonable form of democracy which would of necessity assure that the Arab majority would hold power.

That fear is just as alive and well today with the Israeli population. If anything the frightful example of events of the past decade in Zimbabwe have stoked the fear. It is utterly inconceivable that Israel will ever accept any sort of peace which dilutes the Jewish majority.

This means that the Arab population of both the West Bank and Gaza Strip have few options beyond accepting that they have been (as they continuously and loudly and correctly) assert the recipients of injustice. The injustice is inherent to the efforts not simply of the visionaries of the Zionist movement and the guilt over the Nazi slaughter afflicting the West in the aftermath of World War II.

It exists as well as a result of the overly ambitious nationalism of Arabs throughout the region. It exists as well as a direct result of the basic tenets of Islam and the interpretations placed upon these by a vast and terrible legion of clerics.

Just or not, fair or not, the reality remains, Israel will not go away. It is a large, potent and determined "fact on the ground." In a real sense, the people of Israel have no choice. They are not about to get on boats and leave. They will not sit with folded hands and allow themselves to be slaughtered.

Neither will they commit a slow suicide by democracy in action, allowing an Arab majority to vote for a local version of the Zimbabwe model. The combination of demographics and democracy has been seen too well and too long to be allowed. The Saudi initiative is and always will be dead on arrival.

The Arabs of the West Bank and Gaza Strip have to decide if they have killed and been killed enough so that nationalistic ambitions powered by Islamist rhetoric have run on too long and with too little result beyond blood in the streets. They will have to decide if the better course of action for themselves and their children is a Forever War or a peace which will allow some sort of future better than martyrdom operations without success.

The Arabs of the West Bank and Gaza Strip will have to decide which parts of the Quran should be observed more fully. The verses which celebrate life and progress or those which focus on death and killing.

No one else can make the decision. No Syrian, no Egyptian, no Iranian can make the choice. Neither can any Israeli. Not even President Obama can make the choice. Only the men and women of Gaza and the West Bank are able to decide.

Suffering from the historian's occupational disease--cynicism--the Geek bets hair they will make the wrong one.