once I realized that I must show sympathy towards Arabs who are convinced that Israelis are pure unadulterated evil, I found myself also showing sympathy towards Israelis holding that same view towards Arabs.

I think that’s admirable & it’s a state of grace I aspire to. With some commenters here who disagree but do so in a civil way, I don’t have such hot disputations. It really depends on someone’s tone. If they come across as self-righteous then I tend to reply in kind. If their tone sounds insulting or demeaning I respond similarly. I guess I like a good mahloket. But I should pay more attention to yr perspective (shared by my wife btw) that kindness, sympathy and tolerance go farther in their way than rapier wit.

I do not have sympathy for anyone who has convinced themselves that Arabs are pure unadulterated evil.

I can certainly understand this view of yours. I used to subscribe to it myself not so long ago. However, once I realized that I must show sympathy towards Arabs who are convinced that Israelis are pure unadulterated evil, I found myself also showing sympathy towards Israelis holding that same view towards Arabs.

Most Israeli blog readers reading English lang. blogs are Anglo-Israelis, whose politics unfortunately skews rightward.

Try reading the Hebrew talkbacks on Ha’aretz or Ynet some time. You may find that the Anglo-Israelis are very mild. :-(

That said, I think that many comments here are not right-wing. They reflect one aspect of the Israeli way of thinking – even of those who vote for center or even left-wing parties. Remember, though, that it’s only a partial view.

I wrote a blog post some months ago about a Pew survey of world opinion

Thanks – I’ll check it out.

How do you convince such a person to learn to look left and try again? I doubt that shouting at that person that “you’re an incompetent fool” will do much good. Please forgive my criticism, Richard, but your answers to Israeli comments on this thread are a bit close to this sort of response.

I completely agree w. yr analogy. Israeli ARE traumatized by their experience of war & terror. I empathize w. this fear. I know a great deal about the Jewish history & suffering you refer to. I do not call Israelis “incompetent fools” for being afraid for their lives.

But Israeli readers of this blog who support a Likud or settler agenda are a diff. story. I do not have sympathy for them. I do not have sympathy for anyone who has convinced themselves that Arabs are pure unadulterated evil. I do not have sympathy for anyone who refuses to take any risk for peace at all & says it’s up to the other side to give in before they’ll be ready to make peace.

I have a good number of Israeli readers who are not supporters of Likud or the settlers, but they are in the minority here. The reason is that most Israelis who are left of center are reading & writing Hebrew blogs, not English lang. blogs. Most Israeli blog readers reading English lang. blogs are Anglo-Israelis, whose politics unfortunately skews rightward. So though you may see these right leaning blog readers as a microcosm of Israelis themselves, I tend to see them as a skewed sample of a true Israeli panoply of political views.

Are you basing the statement that this view is not held by the majority of Arabs on any concrete statistics?

I wrote a blog post some months ago about a Pew survey of world opinion which included opinions in the Arab world. It doesn’t measure attitudes toward Zionism, but it does measure Muslim attitudes toward the west & toward Islamic fundamentalism. Therefore, it’s instructive. I’ll do some more searching for some more solid statistics on this subject.

Just because you’re paranoid, it doesn’t mean they aren’t really out to get you

Yes, I agree. But my personal corollary to that Delmore Schwartz quotation is: “Just because they’re out to get you doesn’t absolve you of responsibility to try to find a way to turn them from enemies to something less threatening.”

Is this paranoia justified? I don’t know, but it stems from the Pogroms, the Holocaust, the Prao’t, and the war of independence. It is constantly strengthened by intentional attacks on Israeli civilians – whether with knifes, guns, bombs, suicide bombers, Katyusha rockets, Scud missiles (and Palestinians dancing on rooftops when the Scuds fall) and now with Qassam missiles. It is further entrenched by declarations of Muslim leaders about Israel not having a right to exist, and by attempts of those leaders to obtain nuclear weapons. Can you blame Israeli Jews for being paranoid?

Richard, you praised my empathy towards Palestinians. You’ll gain a lot by showing empathy towards Israeli Jews (including those in the right wing).

BTW – Just because you’re paranoid, it doesn’t mean they aren’t really out to get you… ;-)

Look, you or I could get killed crossing the street tomorrow. But will it happen? Unlikely.

Kudos for the optimism :-).

Problem is, if I may continue the analogy – suppose someone has a tendency to look only to the right before crossing the street. Having already been run down twice, this person has developed a severe paranoia of crossing streets, and can’t even get near a sidewalk without trembling with fear and the memory of pain. How do you convince such a person to learn to look left and try again? I doubt that shouting at that person that “you’re an incompetent fool” will do much good. Please forgive my criticism, Richard, but your answers to Israeli comments on this thread are a bit close to this sort of response. I’m only saying this because I realize you mean well, and I hope that you can find a way to truly communicate your thoughts to Israelis.

But the former set of beliefs is not held by the majority of Arabs & we shouldn’t overstate the hatred, strong as it may be, that Arabs might feel for Zionism.

Are you basing the statement that this view is not held by the majority of Arabs on any concrete statistics? I base many of my views on gut feelings and hearsay, so I would really find such statistics helpful. Can you point me at them? BTW, I’m not talking just about hatred – I’m talking about Arab people “knowing for sure” that the “true purpose” of the Zionist movement is to conquer the Arab lands (regardless of hating or not hating zionists for this).

I have heard from many Arabs that Israelis and Zionists are the devil, and that the purpose of the Zionist movement is to conquer the entire Arab world.

That is certainly possible just as many Israeli Jews believe that the Islamists want nothing short of conquering the entire world including the west. But the former set of beliefs is not held by the majority of Arabs & we shouldn’t overstate the hatred, strong as it may be, that Arabs might feel for Zionism.

Simply returning the Golan will not change that.

It certainly will. Clearly this is what the Assad regime wants. When Syria gets this territory back & reciprocates by ending its state of war with Israel & recognizing Israel, the environment will change radically for the better. You don’t have to believe me if you don’t wish to. But mark my words when it happens because it will.

What is to stop them from attacking Israel in order to defend themselves from this threat?

Look, you or I could get killed crossing the street tomorrow. But will it happen? Unlikely. I know that the possibility of a war with Syria is more weighty than my example, but the comparison is still apt. Can anyone promise you a sure thing regarding Israeli Arab peace? No. But the chances are very strong that land for peace will work.

Israelis don’t realize that the Qassam missiles originate in Palestinian despair and in the Palestinian ignorance of the effect of those missiles on Israelis.

I want to thank you for the empathy that this comment shows. I too deplore the Qassam attacks. They are a bankrupt tactic. And I understand that they create hatred among Jews for Palestinians. I wish the barrage wasn’t happening.

I do think in a way that Hamas is goading Israel into invading Gaza because if the IDF invades then Hamas realizes that all of Gaza will united behind them as the chief resisters of Israeli military might. If the IDF stays outside Gaza then Hamas starts to look like just another Palestinian cabal greedy for power & willing to decimate their fellow Palestinian supporters of Fatah.

The problem is not only that you don’t trust the Arabs, but you don’t want to trust them.

I personally believe that the problem is much deeper than trust. It’s a problem of understanding. We don’t understand the Arabs, and they don’t understand us. And I’m not talking about language – I’m talking about understanding the fundamental way of thinking. Understanding the motivations. This lack of understanding is the root of distrust – for both sides.

Sure, anything can happen after Israel returns the Golan. But will it? No.

Why are you so sure of that? I have heard from many Arabs that Israelis and Zionists are the devil, and that the purpose of the Zionist movement is to conquer the entire Arab world. Simply returning the Golan will not change that. They will see such a tactic move in the plot to conquer their land. What is to stop them from attacking Israel in order to defend themselves from this threat? To us, this threat seems ridiculous. To them it is a very real one.

In fact, you’d rather believe that they’ll knife you in the back before they’d settle for peace.

Richard, the Qassam missiles that are being continuously fired on Sderot these past few days do much to strengthen this belief for the vast majority of Israeli Jews. I don’t think Israelis would “rather” believe Arabs will knife us in the back. It is the lack of understanding of the motivation – or actually, the misinterpretation of motivation – that strengthens this belief. The Israeli narrative is “we returned Gaza, and look what we got in return”. This is immediately extended to the Golan. Israelis don’t realize that the Qassam missiles originate in Palestinian despair and in the Palestinian ignorance of the effect of those missiles on Israelis. We automatically associate those missiles with the declarations by Hamas that Israel doesn’t have a right to exist, and label them as “acts of terror” and “antisemitism”. BTW, most Arabs believe Israelis will knife them in the back rather than settle for peace, but Israelis don’t usually understand this, because we interpret this way of thinking as “antisemitic propaganda”.