Nicholas Kristof wrote the following in a New York Times editorial a few days ago:
Yet it is also here [in Judea and Samaria] that you see the very best side of Israel. Israeli human rights groups relentlessly stand up for Palestinians. Israeli women volunteer at checkpoints to help Palestinians through. Israeli courts periodically rule in favor of Palestinians. Israeli scholars have published research that undermines their own nation’s mythologies. Many Israeli journalists have been fair-minded toward Palestinians in a way that Arab journalists have rarely reciprocated.
Whoa, whoa, whoa, raq rega! The best side of Israel is when “Israeli courts periodically rule in favor of Palestinians”? That doesn’t make any sense: the rulings of a court say nothing about its country, and everything about the merits of its cases. Why is basic legal fairness one of Israel’s best points? Why is Israel only good when it takes sides against itself? Kristof’s subtext seems to insinuate, “Israel is immoral except when it is helping Arabs”.
Don’t get me wrong, human rights volunteers and fair minded journalism are wonderful things; I’m not saying Jews should practice brutality against the Arabs. But I can think of a few things better about Israel than “Israeli scholars…undermin[ing] their own nation’s mythologies”. What about Magen David Adom? What about Technion? What about the way the IDF kept Israeli casualties miraculously low during the 2006 Lebanon war? What about the groundbreaking environmental and social work being done at places like Kibbutz Lotan, or the Temple Institute’s inspiring fusion of science and faith? I think the symbiotic (though not without conflict – we are Jews after all) coexistence of Haredim and secular Jews certainly qualifies as a demonstration of Israel’s best face.
I am sick and tired of anti-Zionist rhetoric masquerading as sensitivity to human rights. I, and I hope every Zionist, takes Jewish morality a little more seriously than to coopt the language of compassion for bigotry. Helping Arabs does not make you a good Israeli; helping people makes you a good person, helping Israel makes you a good Israeli.
Oh, and speaking of the best side of Israel, let’s not forget falafel.
