Michael Walzer Attempts A Waltz And Stumbles

Michael Walzer, who doesn't "have much respect for Netanyahu", he admits, gets caught:

Web Letter: In Response to Michael Walzer's “What Does Netanyahu Think He Is Doing?”

To the editors:

Michael Walzer offers a stunning remark:

Palestinian leaders would be happy to accept an Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank, but they are in no way ready to end the conflict...Their strategic goal is what I am afraid it has always been: the creation of a Palestinian state alongside a Jewish state that they don’t recognize and with which they are not reconciled.

I’m your ordinary mainstream liberal and have always assumed that the Palestinians are basically OK folks, just like us, and all they care about is a roof over their heads, their own national anthem, and then we’ll all break matzah and eat falafel together and sing Kumbaya.

Yet Walzer’s remarks suggest that even if the Israelis concede a genuine Palestinian state, the war is likely to continue.

With that in mind, does it make sense to give the Palestinians a base upon which to wage further war? Doesn’t that simply reinforce Netanyahu’s recalcitrance? That the idea of a greater Israel—i.e., to the Jordan River—actually makes sense? That there is not enough room for two peoples? And that the extreme right-wing Israeli stance is correct? If the outcome of a Palestinian state is likely to give the Palestinians an enhanced ability to make war against Israel, then why cooperate?

Horrifying and dismaying as such ideas may be, don’t they lead from Walzer’s view, above?

-David Sucher

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Since the Israeli occupation of the West Bank is a moral and political disaster for Israel, and since it is oppressive and humiliating for the Palestinians, the end of the occupation and the establishment of a Palestinian state would be a great gain, even if it didn’t end the conflict. This Israeli withdrawal would not be like the withdrawal from Gaza. Under President Obama’s proposal, it would be negotiated with the Palestinian Authority; it would result in a demilitarized state; Israel would remain the dominant military power in the region. Mainstream liberals in the United States would be free to sing Kumbaya.

-Michael Walzer

Nevertheless, Walzer thinks "Netanyahu’s rejectionism seems crazy" to him.

Walzer is free to deal in issues of "morality" and "politics" and judge whether there is a disaster stemming from those quite subjective considerations.

However, an objective analysis of Israel's security and survival requirements would behoove Israel not to adopt the American Jewish position as expressed by Walzer.

With the Pals., it is not a matter of negotiations but of simple agreement - and they are unwilling and incapable of providing that.

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