IsraelThe Naked
Turkey

FP 11. Juni 2013

Haaretz Jun.11, 2013

The end of the Israeli colony
Sefi Rachlevsky

Israel's settlement policy is swallowing it up whole, and it accepts the craziness as if nothing were wrong. The wake-up call, only a matter of time, is going to hurt.

Excerpts:
During the last century, all the colonies were evacuated except one. They ended the same way, too. There was no detailed peace treaty. Nor was there a difficult evacuation of the settlers, compensation or complicated arrangements.

When the regime and its people decided, for moral or utilitarian reasons, that they had had it with the colony − sometimes after centuries of settlement − rule was transferred in a more or less organized manner to the occupied people, their army and their regime, and the occupier’s army and regime left the colony.

And what about the settlers? The smart ones left early. The majority − of the 1.4 million French people in Algeria, for example − fled when the army left, in small boats, hoping for refuge in sovereign France. That was all.

Twenty years ago, Israel took in approximately 1 million citizens of the Soviet Union. They did not receive a house in Israel in exchange for a house in Moscow. They received an absorption package, help with a mortgage, apartments at the cost of construction − which were also granted to other Israelis by Yitzhak Rabin’s government − and they acclimatized magnificently.

Today, we are talking about a mere 140,000 people who placed themselves in the heart of the colony of Palestine. This is one-tenth the number of French people in Algeria, and as a proportion of the population, about half the percentage that the latter constituted in proportion to the population of France.

A well-known story by the Ba’al Shem Tov tells of a prince who thought he was a turkey. He therefore sat down naked under the table, clucked and ate table scraps. Not a doctor was found anywhere in the realm who could cure him. Then, the king called upon the Ba’al Shem Tov. The latter also undressed and sat naked on the floor under the table with the prince, claimed that he, too, was a turkey, and fought with the prince over the scraps − until, slowly but surely, the prince set aside his turkey persona.

In Israel the same thing has happened, only the other way around: An entire country has been dragged along after the abnormality and become the turkey.

That’s the way it is with everything here. Is only Orthodox marriage legal in Israel, and are Jews barred from marrying non-Jews? Instead of correcting the distortion, we contort ourselves around it as if it were an edict from on high and invent “solutions” for people who are “barred from marrying” under Jewish law. Do the ultra-Orthodox not want to serve in the army? We bend things around them, as if for a black hole − creating entire units where young men will see nary a woman.

The smart ones among the settlers in the heart of Palestine will leave in time. No, of course they will not get the bribes that the colony in Gaza did, but they will receive a generous absorption basket, more than the people who came to Israel from the Soviet Union got.

Those who choose, like most of the French in Algeria, to wait for a miracle, and get out only at the last minute, when the Israel Defense Forces return home, will not need rickety boats. They will be welcomed in Israel, only their absorption basket will be smaller.

Readers to whom these words seem provocative should look closely at themselves. What is self-understood in the Declaration of Independence is not supposed to be replaced by “turkeydom.”

Full article:
Someone has gotten very confused. The world has known plenty of colonies. They all start out the same way. A country conquers a place and settles its people there as citizens under the protection of its army. The occupied people remain noncitizens living under different laws.

During the last century, all the colonies were evacuated except one. They ended the same way, too. There was no detailed peace treaty. Nor was there a difficult evacuation of the settlers, compensation or complicated arrangements.

When the regime and its people decided, for moral or utilitarian reasons, that they had had it with the colony − sometimes after centuries of settlement − rule was transferred in a more or less organized manner to the occupied people, their army and their regime, and the occupier’s army and regime left the colony.

And what about the settlers? The smart ones left early. The majority − of the 1.4 million French people in Algeria, for example − fled when the army left, in small boats, hoping for refuge in sovereign France. That was all.

Twenty years ago, Israel took in approximately 1 million citizens of the Soviet Union. They did not receive a house in Israel in exchange for a house in Moscow. They received an absorption package, help with a mortgage, apartments at the cost of construction − which were also granted to other Israelis by Yitzhak Rabin’s government − and they acclimatized magnificently.

Today, we are talking about a mere 140,000 people who placed themselves in the heart of the colony of Palestine. This is one-tenth the number of French people in Algeria, and as a proportion of the population, about half the percentage that the latter constituted in proportion to the population of France.

A well-known story by the Ba’al Shem Tov tells of a prince who thought he was a turkey. He therefore sat down naked under the table, clucked and ate table scraps. Not a doctor was found anywhere in the realm who could cure him. Then, the king called upon the Ba’al Shem Tov. The latter also undressed and sat naked on the floor under the table with the prince, claimed that he, too, was a turkey, and fought with the prince over the scraps − until, slowly but surely, the prince set aside his turkey persona.

In Israel the same thing has happened, only the other way around: An entire country has been dragged along after the abnormality and become the turkey.

That’s the way it is with everything here. Is only Orthodox marriage legal in Israel, and are Jews barred from marrying non-Jews? Instead of correcting the distortion, we contort ourselves around it as if it were an edict from on high and invent “solutions” for people who are “barred from marrying” under Jewish law. Do the ultra-Orthodox not want to serve in the army? We bend things around them, as if for a black hole − creating entire units where young men will see nary a woman.

But the affair of the racist, messianic colony that threatens to swallow Israel is much worse. In this case, after all, there is a conscious and specific plan to add more and more settlers to the colony, until the point is reached where no government “will be able” to remove them. And an entire country and an entire world accepts this craziness. What can we do? How will we evacuate 140,000 naked turkeys? How will we manage? Perhaps we’ll fight naked over the scraps?

The thing is, we won’t. When the last colony in the world comes to an end, and the regime and the people in Israel have had their fill of the last racist occupation, for either moral or utilitarian reasons, then the matter of the 140,000 turkeys will be the least of Israel’s problems.

The smart ones among the settlers in the heart of Palestine will leave in time. No, of course they will not get the bribes that the colony in Gaza did, but they will receive a generous absorption basket, more than the people who came to Israel from the Soviet Union got.

Those who choose, like most of the French in Algeria, to wait for a miracle, and get out only at the last minute, when the Israel Defense Forces return home, will not need rickety boats. They will be welcomed in Israel, only their absorption basket will be smaller.

For a few, like Rabbi Dov Lior, who are involved in incitement to racism and violence, attempts will be made to arrange a “third country” − which will certainly treat them with greater generosity than Israel, which has been corrupted by the values of the racist colony, treats its African migrants, who have committed no sin. And that is all.

Readers to whom these words seem provocative should look closely at themselves. What is self-understood in the Declaration of Independence is not supposed to be replaced by “turkeydom.”
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