Jeff Halper Writes: “Peter Beinart Doesn’t Go Far Enough”

Writing in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz (July 13, 2020), Jeff Halper argues that Peter Beinart “does not go far enough” in his article, “I No Longer Believe In A Jewish State.” Halper is an Israeli anthropologist, heads the Israeli Committee Against Home Demolitions and is a founder of the One Democratic State Campaign.

He writes: “A single State is the only alternative to what exists today, and what annexation plainly offers for the future: apartheid...The One Democratic State campaign has formulated a political program that calls for a single democracy of equal rights, the homecoming of the refugees and the emergence of a shared civil society.”

To the question, “Will Israeli Jews buy into it?” Halper provides this assessment: “0f course not. Why would they? To such a degree do they enjoy the benefits of an apartheid regime that the occupation and Palestinian rights have been reduced to a non-issue. ...The refusal of most white South Africans to willingly dismantle apartheid resembles that of Israeli Jews. So Palestinians and their few Israeli partners that share the vision of a shared society must take a leaf from the ANC. (African National Congress) playbook....Like the ANC, we must create a direct link between the international public, for whom Palestinian rights is a major issue ( including among a growing proportion of young Jews) and our one-State movement. In that way, we render Israeli apartheid unsustainable, as the ANC did in South Africa, finally bringing the Israelis into the transition process when they have no choice but to cooperate.”

Halper concludes: “Are we going to become actors in creating a state for all of us living in this country, in which we enjoy both democratic rights and, within that framework a national life in our country shared with others, or will we have to be dragged unwillingly into it? In my view, and maybe Beinart’s, the former is the ‘Zionist’ answer.”

Another Israeli who is giving up on a two-State solution is Gershon Baskin, a columnist for The Jerusalem Post. In a 2019 column, he wrote: “Those of us in Israel who have supported and struggled to bring about a two-State solution are now forced to accept the new reality that Netanyahu will create, and we will have to join the ranks of the people who will fight for democracy and equality in a non-nation-non-ethnic secular state.” Writing in The Nation, Eric Alterman declares: “Liberal Zionism is a contradiction in terms.” **