This is a response to the op−ed piece "Balancing the narratives: Israel and Palestine" featured in the Oct. 14 issue of the Daily by Sean Smith.
I agree that too often, one narrative of the Israeli−Palestinian conflict is defended at the expense of the validity of the other. A balanced view that not only pays lip service to the legitimacy of the other side's claims but that also empathizes with them is an imperative advancement to the road to reconciliation and peace. Unfortunately, each side is still too busy protecting and molding its version of the truth, its own sense of historical justice. And in this conflict, injustice is paid for in blood. So we must be careful about the kinds of behavior we condone because of the supposed sense of justice they claim to represent. Yes, there are historical and present−day justifications for why Hamas leaders feel morally unrestrained or even obliged to launch rockets indiscriminately at an Israeli city full of civilians.
But while such actions can retroactively be justified, they must not be excused. Excusing such behavior is tantamount to believing that violence is a valid path toward some sort of resolution. Such hypocrisy hides behind the slogan of unbiased, objective balance but fails to proactively side with the passionate moderates who desperately and honestly desire to see a cessation of violence.
Recognizing the traumatic experience Sderot residents have had to endure should not be seen as a denial or a dwarfing of the Palestinian narrative. Tufts Sderot Awareness Day was about people siding against political recourse to violence under the pretense of justice. By publicly stating that solidarity against violence fails the test of impartiality, Sean is getting too close to playing the blame game. It is dangerous to say that a stand against Palestinian violence is imbalanced when it doesn't discuss Israel's role in stoking the violence. It entails an accusation that Israel bears the guilt for the Palestinians' response while also relieving them of the burden of their transgressions.
Balance is a very sensitive subject because of how historically loaded this conflict is. What might Israelis say in response to Sean's appeal for balance? Gaza is no longer occupied Palestinian territory. Israel unilaterally withdrew from Gaza in August 2005, leaving behind an economic infrastructure that yielded products worth billions of dollars and that, instead of being appropriated by the Palestinians and used for their benefit, was promptly looted and rendered unusable. Israel signed an agreement on movement and access with the Palestinian Authority to ease economic restrictions that had been in place since late 2000, at the start of the second intifada. This easing was reversed after Hamas won the 2007 election that made it the governing authority in Gaza.
Hamas is a group that is responsible for at least 15 years of suicide bombings and other deadly attacks against Israeli civilians, justified on the basis of the occupation, not on an economic blockade on Gaza. It is the same group that is responsible for kidnapping an Israeli soldier and keeping him captive for the last four years, for attacking the border crossings that they emphatically argue should be open, and for unabashedly launching rockets from Gaza at civilians for nine years. The "imbalance" that Sean raises can be reapplied back and forth to no end. But a diminution of either narrative threatens to provoke a sense of injustice and historical obtuseness in what we already know is a cycle of "he said, she said."
Is it a coincidence that the accusation of a "serious imbalance" directed at the observation of Tufts Sderot Awareness Day emanates from a member of a group called Students for Justice in Palestine? If Sean is serious about balance and its role in advancing the prospects for peace, why not change the name of the group to "Students for Justice in Palestine and Israel"? Doesn't this group's interpretation of history lay most of the blame for Palestinian violence on Israel? Many would agree with this judgment that Israel, as the stronger of the two parties, bears the responsibility for creating such a bleak Palestinian reality so as to convince us that there really is no other choice but Palestinian violence. But to do so would ignore the complex and detailed historical evidence. To ignore all the violence that has been waged against Israel as a result of an absolute stance against coexistence is to be naive and hypocritically uninformed.
This is a two−way street. Excusing the violence Israel wages against the Palestinians, even when such action can be considered just, only perpetuates the cycle of violence. To break free of it, we must overcome past grievances, and this means sacrificing a portion of each side's claim to absolute historical truth. Mutual sacrifice is an inevitable part of any future resolution. There are people who would vehemently disagree on this point and argue that such an attitude amounts to appeasement — that it signifies weakness and means either an Israeli surrender to unconditional hatred or a Palestinian betrayal of core principles. But this rigidity gives credence to a state of perpetual war that none of us would like to see continued. Courage, leadership and pragmatism: These should be the guiding values which pave the way forward, not ideology and unrepentant pride, or more concisely, politics as we know it.
We can't always expect every group, every protest and every political stump speech to fully recognize and balance all the moral and historical truths that play their part in this conflict. What we can do is denounce violence and other destructive forms of action which hinder the prospects for a peaceful solution in the near future. If there is any hope for a respectful resolution to this exhausting conflict, most people agree it has to happen fast. So before frustration makes the moderates throw in the towel, we should be even more careful of tiring out ourselves talking about the past and worrying about the supposed imbalance in identifying with victims of spontaneous rocket attacks. We should not elevate the narrative of one side over the other. But when it comes to balance, we must be sensitive enough to know the difference between standing up for a position which both sides have in common and rejecting the kinds of behavior we would like to see relegated to the footnotes of history, irrespective of the actor who leads the charge.
Common understanding is essential, but to achieve real peace, shouldn't our efforts be directed at moving closer to the center instead of adding weight and tension to either side? Is this not the essence of compromise and reconciliation? History will judge if we are able to sacrifice pride, even a pride rooted in two different interpretations of historical justice, for the sake of peace.
More practically, don't some of the activities that Tufts Friends of Israel and Students for Justice in Palestine engage in focus exclusively on the justice of each narrative, wallowing in historical grievances, instead of moving forward together against what both sides should unconditionally condemn as destructive behavior?
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