From Beirut to Jerusalem

In Israel, Friedman encountered variants of Judaism far different than the ones he knew in his Midwestern childhood. The first group he identifies are secularists who find fulfillment as Jews mainly by being citizens of Israel, without the need for religious observance. The second are religious Zionists who see the state and religious observance as two sides of the side same coin; this category also includes another variant of religious Zionists for whom the settlement of the Jewish state is a profoundly religious concern. The final group are the ultra-Orthodox who don’t place particular value in the state of Israel, as they are still awaiting the return of the Messiah. Disagreements among the groups could be tense, with each claiming to represent the true Israeli Jew.

Friedman visits a rock-n-roll music school with mostly Westernized and secular students, who believe that the founders wanted Israel “to be a country just like any other country” (291). Judaism still means a lot to them as a culture and a people, but in Israel they felt free to be Jewish in whatever manner they pleased, without having to add on the cultural requirements of another country. Friedman also visited the ultra-Orthodox town of B’nei B’rak, where extremist sentiments were on the rise. A local rabbi argued that the secularists failed to appreciate how hard Orthodox scholars had worked to keep the Jewish traditions alive over the centuries, and he insisted on “a Jewish state, run by Jewish law” that is not just a state for Jews (300). The rabbi conceded that they enjoy many of the perks of secularism without paying in (for instance, military service is extremely rare among the ultra-Orthodox). He shared that he was not opposed to leaving some land reserved for Arabs but insisted that Judaism without religious devotion was not real Judaism. Friedman notes that this article is particularly prevalent among recent immigrants from the US and Europe, apparently fleeing secular culture for a more authentic religious experience.

Friedman next recounts the story of religious Zionists who planned to bomb the Al-Aqsa Mosque (also known as the Dome of the Rock) in the belief that it would usher in the coming of the Messiah. Police discovered the plot just in time and further found the plotters guilty of murdering three Islamic college students. Friedman speaks to a rabbi who claimed the Orthodox spent far too much time studying when political action was in fact needed to hasten the Messiah’s coming. One of those preconditions is the settlement of all of Israel, without which Judaism itself is deficient. Friedman’s final stop was with a rabbi seeking to “integrate the best of Western thought with the classical Jewish Talmudic tradition” (313). This rabbi shares the Orthodox concern that Judaism cannot simply be another form of secular nationalism. However, the more religious cannot impose their vision of Judaism on secular Jews, especially if Israel is going to be a modern democracy. Now that there is a Jewish state, Judaism can feel free to interact with, and learn from, the knowledge of the outside world rather than regard itself as in desperate need of protection. Ultimately, the character of the people is what will determine holiness in Judaism, regardless of what texts they consult or what land they occupy.

Whenever Friedman told an Israeli that their country reminded him of Lebanon, they laughed him off, insisting that nothing like Beirut was possible, even in the occupied territories. From the Israeli perspective, settlements were gradually eroding the boundaries between “Green Line” Israel (demarcated at the 1948 ceasefire) and the occupied territories. Even Palestinians were, with some reluctance, finding themselves more and more dependent on Israeli corporations to provide work and Israeli infrastructure for travel and public services, often speaking Hebrew as they interacted with these institutions. Violence was relatively rare within the occupied territories since 1967, and so the footprint of the Israeli occupation was relatively light. With conditions tolerable and the PLO carrying on its militancy from Lebanon and then Tunisia, “it became very convenient for the Palestinians […] to accommodate themselves to the Israeli system, even profit from it” (330). Palestinian society itself was divided on the question of whether and how to achieve liberation, especially since the very idea of Palestinian nationhood was a response to the conditions which Israel had imposed upon them. Their territory may have been claimed by Jordan (West Bank) or Egypt (Gaza), but that meant little to the young in particular who never knew the realities of such allegiances. Furthermore, notions of being Palestinian varied largely between the two territories and those in the refugee camps or the wider diaspora.

Although Friedman regards the Israeli occupation as generally benign, he does listen to the stories of Palestinians, many of them teenagers, who feel profoundly alienated in their ostensible homeland due to the constant fear of harassment, arrest, or worse at the hands of the Israeli police and military. Even with the PLO far away, and violence in the territories sporadic at most, the label of terrorism “became a heavy cross they all had to bear wherever they traveled” (338). Friedman spoke to groups of Palestinian day laborers who were helping to build the very settlements that choked off their aspirations to political independence, and they insisted that they had to earn their livelihoods, adding “let Arafat do something for us” to eliminate that necessity (342).

In December 1986, a teenager attacked an Israeli soldier with an axe (causing only a minor wound) and, to the horror of his interrogators, revealed that no PLO faction had ordered the attack—he had acted alone. Such spontaneous acts of violence were becoming more common, a threat which Israel’s technologically superior military could do little to solve. While the Israeli left called for the liberation of the occupied territories, and the right called for their total conquest, most people “simply learned to live with the situation” (351), happy to view Palestinians as a source of cheap labor.

Such indifference was not possible for many Palestinians, who starting in 1985 could be detained without cause or charge for upwards of six months. Israel developed a highly sophisticated legal system for managing its many Palestinian suspects, but its actual conduct owed more to a tribal feud than the actual rule of law. Even after the Israeli judiciary started looking into the systematic abuse of prisoners, intelligence officials engaged in elaborate deceptions to keep such stories under wraps. Still, Friedman finds that “Israelis were fighting a war with another community living right next door—a community that itself was not playing by any rules” and that both were doing what they needed to survive (360). A bizarre situation of tense and often violent intimacy went on for years, and many thought it would either go on forever, or if it changed, it would be Palestinians demanding full entry into the Israeli state.

In November 1987, the Arab League met without any discussion of the Palestinian issue, with King Hussein of Jordan expressing skepticism about whether the PLO would ever take direct part in peace talks with Israel. Arafat petulantly warned reporters, including Friedman, that the people in Gaza and the West Bank would never stand for this, and this statement proved prophetic. In early December, an Israeli truck driver accidentally killed four Palestinians. Within hours, Palestinian youths were throwing stones at Israeli soldiers, and when the army sent reinforcements, they encountered large, hostile crowds: “Before anyone knew it, virtually all the Palestinians under Israeli occupation were engaged in a spontaneous primal scream that would be heard around the world” (372).

In Friedman’s understanding, it was a howl of collective rage rather than a means to achieving any discrete political end. Over time, however, it matured into a kind of political program, and the term associated with the riots, “intifada,” means “to shake, to shake off, shake out dust off…be finished with, to rid oneself of something” (375); even if Palestinians were not coordinated or under a central leadership, they were expressing their urge to separate themselves entirely from their Israeli occupiers. The connections were too deep for such an effort to succeed with ease, but Palestinians spoke openly about a long-term effort to decouple themselves entirely from Israel. They would also have to assert their distinct national identity, with homemade flags appearing everywhere and unprecedented cooperation among the various PLO factions. The mere act of resistance, whatever its ultimate effect, engendered a newfound sense of “dignity and self-worth that they had never previously enjoyed” (382).

One major point of disagreement within the Intifada itself was whether it aimed at allowing Palestinian access to all of Israel or the creation of a state within the occupied territories. Victory of any kind would depend on Arafat. Negotiations would go nowhere, however, unless the PLO recognized Israel’s right to exist. But just as many Palestinians were too angry to be in a negotiating mood, many Israelis responded to the Intifada with rage and violence of their own, a desperation to keep a people in their place. A terrible dilemma emerged where only Palestinian violence would ever pressure the Israeli government into making concessions, but that same violence made such concessions unthinkable in the public imagination. Friendships between Palestinian Israeli citizens and Israeli Jews within ‘Green Line’ Israel were strained, with parents forbidding play between children.

Arafat formally recognized Israel at the end of 1988, while also declaring a Palestinian state of uncertain borders. This declaration made surprisingly little impact among Israelis, who “don’t need Arafat to tell them” they have a right to exist (404). Even among those who saw Palestinians as victims of injustice, what was done cannot be undone. Besides, even the appearance of backing down in the face of a perceived terrorist threat would be the end of any Israeli government and perhaps lead to violence within Israel itself. The Palestinians would have to carry on a massive, sustained campaign of civil disobedience, while planting the seeds of its own political institutions, in order to change the Israeli calculus. The public’s dependence on Israel was too acute for so many people to forego basic needs for uncertain gains. Back in the United States, Friedman found Arab Americans cheering on the Intifada, “living out all their fantasies of power and dignity through the Palestinian rock-throwers, the same way American Jews had lived vicariously through Israel’s military achievements” (418). Meanwhile, thousands of Palestinians were scrambling to get visas into the US.

In closing, Friedman speculates that the Palestinians’ self-discovery must include a genuine encounter with the Israelis, since “the most Palestinians can hope for is some form of real autonomy under Israeli rule in the short run and a mini-state in parts of the West Bank and Gaza Strip—without Jerusalem—in the long run” (421).