Israel's Cassandra

Dedicated to the memory of Pierre Vidal-Naquet

The contribution of Hamas and Hezbollah--irresponsibly said by Tel Aviv and Washington to be inspired and masterminded by Tehran and Damascus, even Al Qaeda--to the latest Israeli-Palestinian crisis is neither excused nor minimized by nevertheless insisting that it is deeply rooted in the history of Zionism. And one may ask, then, whether the barbarous assaults on Gaza and Lebanon have not revealed the bankruptcy of nearly sixty years of Israeli policy.

To the extent there is an axis of anti-Zionist, allegedly anti-Semitic holy warriors, Israel's leaders bear a heavy responsibility. Since the founding of the state in 1948, they have fomented the rise of Palestinian extremism and its international supporters by pursuing a unilateralist course, by impeding good-faith negotiations and by failing to encourage moderate Palestinians. The political-military caste, trusting inordinately in the sword and under the aegis of an imperial superpower, began, precipitated or all but invited five cross-border wars and has waged its internal war against the Palestinian resistance with a brutal indifference to innocent civilians. With Goliath-like hubris and a self-righteousness nourished by the Holocaust complex, Israel's governors and, by and large, its Jewish citizenry are unmindful or dismissive of anyone questioning some of the central premises of the Zionist-Israeli project and policy. Yet these were once challenged by a loyal opposition of public intellectuals within the fold.

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