Rene -- RELIGIOUS ZIONISTS SPEAK OUT AGAINST OCCUPATION
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RELIGIOUS ZIONISTS SPEAK OUT AGAINST OCCUPATION
A six-page manifesto of religious Zionist dissidents was published in
Israel's largest paper, Yediot Aharanot, and in Ha'aretz on May 9.
Religious Zionists are the ideological bulwark of the settler movment,
and the 170 signatories to the manifesto have been the subjects of
further interviews in Israel. The Manifesto reads, in part:
"The fact that Israel maintains its rule over more than three million
people against their will, denying their basic rights, raises difficult
moral issues. Already for more than three decades it denies Israel the
possibility of seriously dealing with basic existential problems such
as the relations between religion and state, the education of the
young, the gap between rich and poor and other issues defining the life
of Jews in their own country. All these issues have disappeared from
the view of the leaders and rabbis of Religious Zionism, who raise the
single flag of settlement in Judea and Samaria and are captives of the
pseudo-religious view...that [views] settlement as the be-all and end-
all. Few scholars dare to look reality in the face, and their voice is
hardly heard.
"In the absence of a worthy Religious Zionist leadership at this time,
we have no choice but to take the initiative: We call upon the
Religious Zionist public to recognize the necessity of giving up our
rule in the Territories and turn its energy to dealing with the
pressing and neglected issues on its own and on the general Israeli
agenda..."
The following personal account, included with the manifesto, is from
signatory Shlomo Wagman, 28-year-old economic consultant:
"Most of my life was spent at Alon Shvut, a settlement in the Etzion
Bloc south of Jerusalem. Thousands of times I have passed army
checkpoints. Thousands of times I saw, without really noticing, the
young Arabs crouching at the roadside, waiting for the checking to
end so that they could pass through. They were a kind of transparent
part of the landscape. I saw them but did not feel any deep empathy...
And then, one day, I saw at a checkpoint an old man with a young girl
child. They were not being specially mistreated. They were just told to
wait and obeyed with weary resignation... And suddenly something
clicked into place in my mind. I suddenly understood that this was not
an issue of security. That all this enormous military activity was
needed so that I could live in a beautiful villa, with a terrific view
from the windows... That hundreds of thousands of human beings--old
people, women, children, people who are no kind of security risk--had
to pay the price for our life there. That they had to endure
checkpoints, searches, closure and curfew so that I could have a quiet
life as an observant Jew in my beautiful settlement. I decided to stage
my own unilateral withdrawal. I left Alon Shvut very soon afterwards,
though I knew I would miss a place which I love. I now live in an ugly
urban center inside the Green Line. I can't explain my own past
blindness and the present blindness of my family and friends who still
live there. We just don't see the same reality."
Ilon Langbeim, teacer and physics student in Jerusalem:
"When I saw the violence of these settler youths, I felt that I must
cry out: I am not one of them. It hurt me when people see me wearing a
skullcap and automatically assume I belong to the extreme right. I did
not refuse to serve in the territories. I went to the checkpoint and
tried to show empathy to the people which I had to check, not to keep
them too long in the sun. Then I heard an officer talk about me: 'This
useless softie with his scruples, I did not expect such behavior from
somebody like him.' I teach in in two Religious Zionist schools in
Jerusalem. I got hints already that my signing this manifesto may cost
me my job, but I am willing to pay the price."
(David Bloom)
