Jeffrey Goldberg

October 30, 2006
Jeffrey Goldberg is a reporter for the New Yorker and the author of the book Prisoners: A Muslim & A Jew Across the Middle East Divide. He is the recipient of numerous awards including the 2003 National Magazine Award for Reporting for his coverage of Islamic terrorism. (the list and full bio here, get the book here ).

Our dialog here will be a second round for us a continuation of a previous dialog - and that's why it will be somewhat unusual. We discussed prisoners a couple of weeks ago in Slate in a series of exchanges you can read here. And since we will start where we left off in Slate, here's a short summary of some of the things we wrote to one another.

Rosner: Can a Palestinian Muslim and a Zionist Jew be friends?... Is a friendship between a Jew and an Arab that is maintained outside of the Middle East in any way be an indication of what might be possible within that war-torn region?

Regrettably, I suspect that it isn't.

But this is where I need you to enter and prove me wrong.

Goldberg: I do believe that peace is personal, as well as political, and I'll give you an example: checkpoints. I'm sure you've been to the army's West Bank checkpoints, and I'm sure you've been disturbed by the behavior of the soldiers who man them. I'm not arguing against checkpoints, by the way; they stop suicide bombers, and that is the important thing. But the crudeness and rudeness that is directed at the mass of innocent Palestinians by the 19-year-old soldiers at these checkpoints is not only maddening but also self-defeating.

Rosner: You say that Israelis don't have a sense of humor, because who needs one when he has F-16s. But don't American Jews have F-16s? America definitely has them, and if American Jews are part of America, it is fair to say that they have them, too; more of them, in fact, than Israeli Jews.

Goldberg: When I was in Ketziot, the Israeli prison camp in which I served, I always thought that America would never countenance the sort of petty cruelties in its own military prisons that we inflicted on the Palestinians. Then came Abu Ghraib, and I soon reached the conclusion, based on firsthand experience, that Israel would never countenance the kind of cruelty inflicted on Iraqis in American prisons in its own jails.

Now, after this long introduction, let's start with the dialog. If you have questions for Jeffrey, please send them to rosnersdomain@haaretz.co.il.

Dear Jeff,

At this point I will give my readers a chance to ask a question. We got a couple of emails and here's the first one.



A question to Mr. Goldberg.

You seem to think that the Palestinian issue is the one important thing Israel should be dealing with - but the truth is that the Islamic radicalism is much more threatening than the Palestinian problem. How can you apply this "let's all be personal friends and then everything else will be solved" approach to the existential threat from Iran?

Thank you for your reply.

Deborah Marks


Dear Shmuel,

Thank you for the question. Deborah Marks characterizes my beliefs as a kind of free-to-be-you-and-me "let's be friends" approach to solving the Middle East crisis. I don't know precisely where she gets this idea. I've never said that personal friendships can trump ideological, existential conflicts; in one case in the book, I argue that assiduous work, over fifteen years, has brought one Muslim and one Jew -- that Jew would be me -- to acknowledge that their friendship might possibly prevent them from murdering each other. But my book argues that sometimes the political isn't personal. To use just one example, I've been treated very kindly by Hamas leaders over the years -- tea, cookies, warm handshakes, the whole spectrum of Arab hospitality -- but I state rather plainly in "Prisoners" that this friendliness is all surface, without any meaning.

When you're talking about more moderate Palestinians, however -- and I include in this group a certain number of Fatah figures -- then I do believe that personal friendship does bring with it certain benefits. The goal, of course, is to get enemies to recognize the human in each other. Islamists (and Kahanists, and probably most settlers) are incapable of acknowledging the existence of pain outside the boundaries of their tribes. Islamists, of course, tend to see Jews as sub-human. The average settler doesn't view the Arabs as sub-human, but they do see them as something akin to barbarians, and assume, wrongly, that the Palestinians all revel in death, the deaths of Jews, and the deaths of their own children who die while killing Jews. I can say with certainty that many Palestinians loathe the Moloch-like aspects of their society.

On Iran, of course, I don't believe that friendship, or interfaith dialogue, or campfire bull sessions, will solve anything. The Iranian leadership is too cynical for that, and too deeply committed to a racist, genocidal brand of Islam. The Iranians, I assume, would interpret conciliatory Israeli gestures as signs of Jewish weakness, so I would hope that Israel would make no such gestures.

Best,
Jeff


Dear Jeffrey

Thank you for your answer. I knew you will not disappoint me, and that your replies will serve as an additional magnet for the angry readers this blog sometimes tends to draw (I also have many thoughtful and reasonable readers of course).

So let's move to my second question, and with it, back to the subject of your book, Prisoners. I already mentioned, many times, that I enjoyed reading it - but I only did it in Slate, so I think I should do it here as well.

What seemed quite strange to me when I went back to read our previous dialog as to prepare myself to this one, Is that we never really discussed in detail any issues concerning the current state of the Israel-Palestine conflict and spent most our time discussing more theoretical, even philosophical, questions.

For example, I never asked you this: Do you think Israel should talk to the Hamas government? As your book deals quite extensively with Islamic radicalism, you know everything there is to know about this dilemma. And more questions can be asked: Would you release Palestinian prisoners as to secure the release of the abducted Israeli soldier? Or: having seen what has happened after the withdrawal from Gaza, would you do the same in the West Bank?

Maybe I should be asking this in a more generalized way: What's your recipe for the road ahead if one wants to reignite the so-called peace process?

Best

Rosner

Dear Shmuel,

So, now that I've announced my distaste for American Jews who have the temerity to tell their brethren in Israel how to lead their lives, you want me to tell my brethren in Israel how to lead their lives?

I'll take you up on the invitation, of course. I mean, how could I resist? Israel is too interesting and important to me to pass up a request to tell Israelis what to do. (I spend a fair amount of time telling Israelis where to go, but that's a different issue). I'm sure you've noticed this, by the way, but American Jews are much more interested in the lives of Israeli Jews than Israeli Jews are in the lives of American Jews. The reason isn't a secret: Israelis are the real players in modern Jewish history. But I've beaten that subject to death already.

You ask, should Israel talk to Hamas?

It depends what you mean by Hamas. With Khaled Meshaal and the Damascus-based leadership of the group, I would have to say no. These men are deeply unrealistic, psychotically violent, and terribly cynical. I do believe, however, that the leadership inside the territories is different. I hesitate to use the word "moderate" to describe people who believe that Jews bake matzah with Christian blood, but the Hamas men in Gaza and on the West Bank do tend to understand the resiliency of Israel in ways that their colleagues in the Palestinian Diaspora don't, and this leads them to certain conclusions, namely, that Israel is an unmoveable object, and must be managed, not merely fought. Please don't get me wrong -- Hamas wants Israel eliminated. But I've argued since this summer that the Hamas leaders in Gaza are different from Meshaal -- and most noticeably, from the leaders of Hezbollah -- in that they believe that Israel cannot be removed by force. This might lead them to negotiate a hudna, a long-term cease-fire. And my hope is that a long-term cease-fire could lead to the enfranchisement of the Palestinians in ways that permanently moderate the behavior of a group of people not previously known for their moderation.

But as you know, I'm a pretty naive guy.

The reason I believe that Israel might one day negotiate with Hamas is that Israel has already negotiated with the P.L.O., something a generation of Israeli leaders swore they would never do.

Something else Israeli leaders swear they never do but do anyway is exchange Palestinian prisoners for Israeli hostages. And here is a case where I don't feel qualified to offer an opinion. Let me rephrase: I don't believe I have moral standing enough to weigh in on this question, because I won't suffer the consequences of Israel's decisions. Obviously, if Israel releases prisoners in exchange for Gilad Shalit, this will teach the men who ordered his kidnapping that kidnapping works. On the other hand, I think about Gilad Shalit everyday, and wish to God that someone would do something to get him out of Gaza. As you know, I've been to Gaza quite a bit, and was kidnapped there once (twice, actually, but the second time was more of a misunderstanding than a kidnapping). Luckily, I got out in a day, but I had enough time, during my detention, to think about what it would be like to be held there for months. I would find it hard to blame a prime minister for exchanging Palestinian prisoners, even those with blood on their hands, for Shalit.

Finally, you asked for a recipe to reignite the peace process. I don't have a recipe for that, but I do know a good recipe for malawach. I'm not saying I can make malawach, but I know a good recipe. On peace, I have no recipes. Maybe we can forge ahead tomorrow on this question, because I do have some notions about how to lift Israel out of its current predicament, but everytime someone tells me they know how to achieve peace in the Middle East, I question whether they've ever even been there at all.

I will say this, however: Israel has to do something that's nearly impossible: It has to stand ready to make violence against its Islamist enemies, and at the same time, it has to be entirely open to the idea that not all Palestinians seek the death of the Jewish national project, and it has to be ready to assist those Palestinians in all sorts of uncomfortable ways.

Do you, by the way, have any such recipes?

Best,

Jeff

Dear Jeffrey,

In this dialog, unlike the one we had in Slate - I'll try to say less and ask more.

In your recent Slate installment you wrote something with which I'd like to start, as I have some questions to ask about it. You wrote:

"After all, you [Israelis] are central to the Jewish future, and we [American Jews] are not. (Here's where I annoy my American co-religionists who think that America truly is the Promised Land. It is not. It is a wonderful refuge, but it is ultimately peripheral to the Jewish story.)

Despite your understanding words about American Jews and their complicated relationship with Israel, you know, as well as I do, that our relationship contains elements of vicarious thrill-seeking, and that we are, in fact, not overly committed to the idea of Israel, because if we were, we'd be there and not here."

Assuming that you aren't just saying this for the sake of annoying "your co-religionists," this statement demands some explanation. After all, Diaspora Jews were not peripheral to the Jewish story, they were actually THE Jewish story for 2000 years, so why can't they keep playing a major role in it?

Also, can't you be truly committed to Israel without living there? Reading your book and your part of our previous dialog, I suspect that you're a good example of a Jew who's really committed to Israel without living there. You definitely care for its future and its people. You worry about it and think about it quite a lot. One might suspect that it is the guilt for not succeeding in living there that ignites all the provocative statements you make, and I do agree that for many American Jews who care for Israel but chose to stay here there's an element of guilt.

So please, try to explain in more detail the two conclusions you have drawn.

Best,
Rosner

Dear Shmuel,

Thank you for inviting me to your illustrious blog. You ask probing questions - important questions - so let me try to answer them as best as I can.

I wasn't, by the way, saying what I said about the peripheral nature of the American Jewish story to the Jewish story as a whole merely to bug my American coreligionists, although annoying my fellow American Jews seems to be a vocational interest of mine.

I was saying it because I believe it. You are right, of course, to assert that the Diaspora was the crucial story of the Jewish people for a very long time, but that is only because it was the only story. Don't get me wrong - there would be no Israel today if Diaspora Judaism had let itself expire, or had been completely expired by force.

And the 2,000-year exile is one of the most remarkable stories in human history. Who else but the Jews believed so much in themselves, and in their message, and in their God, that they kept themselves going through a hundred generations of misery?

But now the story has shifted back home. It's an often-repeated cliche, but it makes it no less true: The Jews of Israel are actors now in history. They are not merely acted upon, as was the case for the Diaspora.

Israel is, in so many ways, the salvation of the Jewish people. It is not a coincidence that, for the first time in nearly 2,000 years, there are no captive Jewish communities on the face of the planet (Iran being a small, partial exception). The reason that Jews are free is simple: There is a Jewish homeland that has taken in oppressed Jews, second-class Jews, refugee Jews. It bothers me when people ask the question: Is Israel still necessary? They can only ask that question because Israel is a victim of its own success. Israel has achieved one of its core missions, to be a refuge, a rescuer, and a protector of persecuted Jews.

There is another, more banal, but also more convincing, argument for the centrality of Israel in Jewish history. Israel's Jewish population is always growing; you can't say that about any other country's Jewish population, including America's. As I've said, America is a sui generis Diaspora experience. It is the most generous and open country in the history of the Diaspora, and this is why its Jewish population is slowly shrinking. You know as well as I do that half of all American Jews have more or less shed their Jewish identities already, and this is a trend that will be nearly impossible to stop. Maybe it will slow, but the tug of assimilation is strong.

The answer to your first question, I think, also helps answer your second question. Because I believe that the Jewish future will take place in Israel, and not here in America, I tend to think that those people who are truly, deeply committed to this future are the ones who pick themselves up and make aliyah.

I don't mean to cast aspersions on the two or three million Jews in America who involve themselves in the affairs of our community - these are good, sincere, concerned people - but theirs is ultimately a vicarious experience. If Israel fails to thrive, or, God forbid suffers an apocalyptic attack, it is not American Jews who pay the price.

American Jews, I argue, haven't earned the right to participate in the politics of Israel (and I mean this in a non-partisan way; I have problems with both Peace Now supporters in America, and with Likud supporters). I have no problem, of course, with tree-planting and other such activities, but really, who are we to tell you, or even advise you, on what decisions to make? We haven't earned the right. You have, by putting your lives on the line for our people.

Best,
Jeff

Thank you Jeff

And this one is from the reader Brian Jordan:

Israel is so vulnerable strategically that it seems to me that it is important to have a strong, vibrant, Jewish community here in the U.S. so as to ensure the future of the Jewish people in case of some catastrophe (God forbid, I hope this will never happen). American Jews might seem to you marginal now, but if there is a problem with Israel they can instantly become the only important Jewish community in the world. That's why I think that deep down even most Israelis will say that it is better to have a strong Jewish community in the U.S., rather than have all the Jews coming to Israel. Wouldn't you agree?

Shmuel

I can't disagree with Brian Jordan's statement. I would calibrate my response, though, by saying that the American Jewish community is today in a kind of supporting role; the Israelis are the stars of the Jewish drama, but this doesn't mean that their show could continue without help from America. I think Israelis actually don't give enough thought to this. And here I'm not merely talking about the good and not-so-good work of AIPAC; I'm talking about the whole range of non-political support American Jews give charity and tourism, among other things.

On the question of a mass aliyah, I would say this: Don't worry. Israel will never have to grapple with the problems posed by the decamping of American Jews to Israel. We're not coming. I think I know what Brian Jordan is talking about here: It's the Nasrallah argument. You recall that Sheikh Nasrallah, the leader of the Hezbollah, once said, in his typically obnoxious way, that it would be fine, from Hezbollah's position, if all the Jews came to Israel, because then the forces of Islam could deal with them all at once (And they call Hezbollah a social service organization! If this is true, then so was the SS). I, too, think that it's not a bad thing to have a Diaspora, in case, God forbid, something truly awful happened to Israel, because Judaism would survive elsewhere. On the other hand, I don?t even want to think about something like this.

Jeff