Love of the Land: Take your money back

Take your money back

Avi Trengo
Opinion/Ynet
31 March '10

Senior New York Times commentator Tom Friedman is not an anti-Semite and will never be one. He wholeheartedly believes that he is objective and genuinely wishes to help Israel. Yet even a real friend like him is inspired by the “commander-in-chief’s spirit” these days.

In February 2002 I reviewed his peace initiative with astonishment: Full Arab world recognition of Israel’s right to exist in exchange for a full withdrawal to the 1967 borders. As an Israeli leftist, I lauded the fact that a senior commentator realized the problem is not merely Israeli-Palestinian, but rather, has to do with the Arab world’s unwillingness to accept any sovereign Jewish state in the Middle East.

February 17th, 2002 is a day I will never forget: It was during the Intifada, with the worse still ahead of us. I participated in an intimate Peace Now demonstration as an active member. For more than 30 years, I shared Friedman’s view that a return to the 1967 borders is a magical solution. Yet during the rally, we were informed that a suicide bomber killed two children at a pizza parlor. The protestors observed a moment of silence, before the next speaker, a Palestinian “moderate,” took the stage. His speech focused solely on accusing Israel while going back to the Nakba and early days of Zionism. The terror attack at the pizza parlor in Karnei Shomron was not mentioned at all. I left the rally with a sense of disgust.

The next day, I read in the New York Times that the Saudi ruler, who was preoccupied at the time with a PR effort after “fine Saudi boys” carried out the September 11 attacks, adopted the Friedman initiative and turned into the “Saudi peace plan.” Friedman must have noticed that the Saudis added a condition that no Israeli could accept: The immigration of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians (“1948 refugees”) to Israel, thereby amending its demographic character. Did Friedman fail to understand back then already that this is a symptom of the problem: The Muslim world’s unwillingness to accept Jewish sovereignty in the Middle East?

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Love of the Land: Take your money back