The rebuke David Grossman delivered at the Yitzhak Rabin memorial rally in Rabin Square continues to echo. The more time that passes, the more it becomes a litmus test, assigning those discussing it to the "national" or the "peace" camps, to the right or to the left.

Grossman himself believes that "the differences of opinion today between right and left are not that great," but those in these two camps think differently.

Although Grossman's remarks were far from radical, the right has responded furiously to them and thundered over the fact that they raised inappropriate controversy at a rally intended to mend fences. The enthusiastic response on the left, which saw Grossman's remarks as cardinal, shows that he managed to express the feelings of the "peace camp" and define its positions clearly. In this lies their significance, which is cultural and social rather than political.

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His remarks again reflect the existence of the group of Ashkenazi, secular, veteran, socialist, nationalist Israelis, known by a Hebrew acronym coined by sociologist Baruch Kimmerling to describe the generation of the founders who bewail "what happened to the daring young country that was here" (in Grossman's words). They recycle the fantasy that "once, before the occupation" everything was good.

The children of the immigrant transit camps' residents do not share this nostalgia. They remember the discrimination and humiliation and see "peace" as the agenda of the group of the founders' children and its derivatives. The people of the periphery are also not party to Grossman's despair that "we have even lost the hope that we will ever be able to live better lives." Only an elite that has lost its reason for living can wallow in such despair, which in itself is self-indulgent and passes on the responsibility to others - "the people who lead Israel."

The leadership is "hollow" because it is unable to "link Israelis to their identity." Is it expected that Ehud Olmert, a political manipulator who reached his position by chance, "will open a new horizon," provide "portions of identity and memory and fundamental values"?

Where is the alternative leadership of the left? It is impossible to grant "any significance to the humiliating and desperate existential struggle" when the message being disseminated is one of "weakness and helplessness."

All this wailing, so stylish among the jabbering classes, comes in the wake of the last war. Not the hasty slide itself into an unnecessary war, not the brutal use of force against civilians, is the cause of the "deep crisis." Rather, it is the "failures of the management of the war." In this, the left joins those lamenting the loss of deterrent capability and those who call for a removal of the shame of the failure and those responsible for it, and to prepare Israel for the next round of battles.

The leaders of the "peace camp" will not stand at the head of the camp, now forming, that is grasping at normalcy, refusing to surrender to an agenda of preparations for the next war, and which does not bow down to the Moloch of "deterrence." They continue to seek the shade of the classic, battered and anachronistic peace plan that, the less relevant it is, the more it is perceived as inevitable - "a peace of no choice," as Grossman calls it: "the land will be divided, a Palestinian state will arise."

The essential changes that have taken place since this peace plan was first formulated, more than a generation ago, raise no doubt as to its practicability. Neither does the fact that it has been transformed from a formula to an arrangement to a means of oppression and fragmentation. And it is all a matter of Jewish "national consensus," as if the obstacle was internal, among Jews. And to overcome Palestinian opposition, Olmert, "hollow, lawyer-like and deceptive," is sent to explain what is good for them, above the heads of their elected leaders.

In the present reality, when the very concept of "peace" has become subversive, bringing it up again might be considered a stirring event and a cardinal text. But the passive stance taken by the spokesman for the peace camp should be noted: all that a fighter for peace has to do is preach to the hollow leadership.

Where is the call to join the struggle against the injustice of the security fence, the choke-hold of the roadblocks, the siege on Gaza, the killing of women and children, the destruction of the institutions of the Palestinian Authority, the deporting of Palestinian families "without documents"? After all, only these unheroic practical matters are important in the creation of life together in the land of Israel, and not "peace plans," on which endless controversies only enforces the status quo.

But how is it possible to demand a departure from passivity if the spokesman feels "how close we are to losing what we have created here"? Such poetic license should be prohibited even to a brilliant author, not to mention to the bearer of a political message. We are very far from losing what we have created here, and the peace camp will, once again, be making a fatal mistake if it leaves it to the right to hold up the banner of optimism and hope.