Cynics Unlimited

Do combatants in the middle east want peace?

As the violence in the middle east flares up once again, pundits and the public are intensifying the war of words over who is the blame for the cycle of violence. The only thing that most people can agree on is that, despite the indisputable human rights offenses on both sides, there is 1 side that is definitely in the right and justified in their uncivil response. For years I’ve battled both Pro-Arab and Pro-Israeli types who did not take kindly to the suggestion that their respective sides have no interest in peace.

But what is peace? When many people (myself included) speak of peace, we envision one more more identifiable groups/individuals coexisting harmoniously. Conflicts are resolved with words rather than guns. A mutual respect exists between all parties, as their special beliefs are secondary to some common principle that governs all groups. As the following quotations demonstrate, this westernized and romanticized view of peace can be the furthest thing from the minds of Arabs and Israelis alike:

Alleged Quotes from Arab/Muslim Leadership:

“Peace for us means the destruction of Israel. We are preparing for an all-out war, a war which will last for generations.”
–Yasser Arafat, El Mundo, Caracas, Venezuela, February 11 1980

“We may lose or win [tactically] but our eyes will continue to aspire to the strategic goal, namely, to Palestine from the river (i.e. Jordan) to the sea (i.e. the Mediterranean). Whatever we get now cannot make us forget this supreme truth.”
–Faisal Husseini, PA Minister of Jerusalem Affairs, Al-Safir (Lebanon), March 21 2001

“Hamas still wants Palestine from the river to the sea — and believes in retaking the land from Jordan to the Mediterranean, including Israel”
–Yasser Mansour, Hamas candidate from Nablus, The Boston Globe, 17 January 2006

“Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it.”
–Covenant of the Hamas, Preamble, 1988

Alleged Quotes from Israeli/Jewish Leadership:

“We must use terror, assassination, intimidation, land confiscation, and the cutting of all social services to rid the Galilee of its Arab population.”
– David Ben-Gurion, May 1948, to the General Staff. From Ben-Gurion, A Biography, by Michael Ben-Zohar, Delacorte, New York 1978.

“Let us not ignore the truth among ourselves … politically we are the aggressors and they defend themselves… The country is theirs, because they inhabit it, whereas we want to come here and settle down, and in their view we want to take away from them their country.”
– David Ben Gurion, quoted on pp 91-2 of Chomsky’s Fateful Triangle, which appears in Simha Flapan’s “Zionism and the Palestinians pp 141-2 citing a 1938 speech.

“Israel should have exploited the repression of the demonstrations in China, when world attention focused on that country, to carry out mass expulsions among the Arabs of the territories.”
– Benyamin Netanyahu, then Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister, former Prime Minister of Israel, speaking to students at Bar Ilan University, from the Israeli journal Hotam, November 24, 1989.

“It is the duty of Israeli leaders to explain to public opinion, clearly and courageously, a certain number of facts that are forgotten with time. The first of these is that there is no Zionism, colonialization, or Jewish State without the eviction of the Arabs and the expropriation of their lands.”
– Ariel Sharon, Israeli Foreign Minister, addressing a meeting of militants from the extreme right-wing Tsomet Party, Agence France Presse, November 15, 1998.

All of these quotes can be found from various sources on the web and in many cases have proper citation. Some of the speakers cited have at least publicly moderated their views but continued to support movements that operate on the same sentiment.

So let’s revisit the question – do combatants in the middle east want peace? The answer could actually be yes, since peace can by definition mean the absence of civil disturbance. For Hamas, Hezbollah and other militants stationed in Gaza / Lebanon, peace might mean 6.5 million Israelis swimming in the Dead Sea and the remaining population held under oppressive Islamic rule. For Israeli expansionists, peace could mean Palestinians displaced and under severe lock down similar to the apartheid enforced by one-time Israeli ally South Africa. Both scenarios would constitute genocide or a level of oppression that the West finds unacceptable; however both extreme outcomes would be “peaceful”. Obviously there will be peace if foes are completely subjugated or eliminated outright.

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