By Tal Ben-Shahar
September 24, 2005
Watching the short IDF-produced film on the Disengagement, it is impossible to remain indifferent to the human drama unfolding on the screen. Soldier and settler engaged in an embrace, each offering the other a shoulder to cry on. At the same time, it is impossible to detach the drama from the larger picture -- these soldiers were removing civilians from their homes, and there was always the threat of a gun looming in the much-anticipated case of settlers' non compliance.
The purpose of the film was to illustrate the humanity of the IDF soldier. It is probably true that no other combatant in the world would behave with such compassion toward a population it was sent to displace. But the united tears and joint prayers cannot -- should not -- mask the inhumanity of the actions committed by Ariel Sharon's emissaries. Humane means can never justify an immoral end.
The ends of the Disengagement plan were and are immoral. No group, even when supported by the majority, has a right to forcefully uproot a peaceful population. And the settlers are a peaceful population -- certainly compared to the Palestinian Arab population today, and before 1967 and before 1947. Surely there are violent, immoral settlers who hurt innocent Arabs, but there are also violent, immoral Tel Aviv residents who hurt Arabs and Jews, and yet no Israeli (well, almost no Israeli) is calling for transferring the Jews of Tel Aviv out of their homes. For the same reason that, today, it is immoral to transfer innocent Arabs from their homes -- in Jaffa, Haifa, Jenin, or Rafah -- it is immoral to transfer innocent Jews from theirs -- in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, Karnei Shomron, or Elei Sinai.
Transgressing individuals, whether Jews or Arabs, regardless of where they live, deserve to be punished, but that's where the authority of a moral legal system ends. Some of the most immoral regimes of the 20th century came to power democratically and then carried out their crimes with an official legal stamp of approval. Small crimes defy the law; large crimes make use of it.
Not only is it immoral to uproot settlers out of their homes, it is also impractical. Just because the Arabs, whose leaders have time and again chosen violence over peaceful coexistence, want their territory Judenrein does not mean Israel needs to comply. The history of the 20th century clearly demonstrates that pacifism, when dealing with an immoral regime, begets more violence.
In the conflict with the Palestinians, every Israeli concession to date has led to more aggression, more deaths -- and there's nothing to suggest that this time will be any different. The transfer of Jews from their homes is already interpreted by the terrorists as a victory, and will embolden them and their "armed struggle." In the five years following the 1993 Oslo agreements, more Israelis were murdered by Palestinian terrorists than in the preceding twenty-six years; between 2000 and 2004, following Ehud Barak's offer of a Palestinian state, Palestinian terrorists murdered more Jews than they have in the fifty-two years since 1948.
Gaza, since the disengagement, has become a terrorist haven, and it is only a matter of time before the Israelis -- and the Palestinians -- pay a dear price for the Israeli government's folly. To err is human, and Oslo could be construed as an honest mistake; but to make the same deadly error a second and a third time borders on criminal negligence.
Historically, the Left has justified using immoral means by pointing to the allegedly moral end it was trying to achieve. The Israeli Left is taking a different approach, trying to justify an immoral end by pointing to its allegedly moral means. But just as the attainment of a utopian egalitarianism does not justify the murder of innocents and doing away with freedom, neither does the display of compassion justify the removal of innocents from their homes and doing away with freedom.
The Israeli Left's march of folly must end. Israel, unlike Russia, cannot afford to wait seventy years to realize its grave, immoral error.
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