Double Standards?

I don’t like double standards or – as someone who was very uncomfortable when confronted with his own double standard once called them – different standards…and if you can figure out the difference, please enlighten me.

I’m in favor of a Palestinian State, assuming that it will be a state where Jews and everyone else can also reside, just like Arabs, Christians and Muslims can reside in Israel.

I am not in favor of a Palestinian state that will be Judenrein, no more than I am in favor of an Israel that is free of non-Jews, or any other ethnically cleansed place

I am not in favor of a state that is sworn to Israel’s destruction.

I love that there is an organization of Rabbis for Gaza. I’d really love it if there was an organization of Imams for Sderot. And I’d be ecstatic if there was a Palestinian or other Arab chapter of Peace Now (Shalom Achshav in Hebrew) with an Arabic name.

I don’t buy the argument about the importance of contiguity – have you ever heard of Alaska? If there are peaceful relations, people can cross each others’ borders safely and easily… or at least as easily and safely as we can cross through Canada on our way to/from Alaska.

Boycotts of Israel? When Elvis Costello doesn’t play the U.S. because of how Native Americans are treated, I will begin to take him seriously. For now, I’m boycotting him – although I have not yet deleted the Squeeze songs he was involved with (speaking of which, I truly believe that there are many closet Squeeze fans.) And when Alice Walker laments the treatment of women, much less gay women, in Saudi Arabia – or GAZA! – as passionately as she speaks out about Palestinians, I will pay more attention.

I don’t believe in unbalanced pre-conditions in negotiations. If you are going to impose a pre-condition on one side, there should be a pre-condition on both sides. Otherwise you are creating an imbalance and who wants to enter a negotiation under those circumstances?

I – along with anyone who stops to think about it – know that there is a proven pathway to peace between Israel and its neighbors, and it has nothing to do with settlements or freezes. In fact all it takes is for the other side to recognize Israel as a Jewish State (can we still be talking about this 60+ years later? Talk about a double standard!) and to renounce violence.  Egypt did it – settlements were dismantled, very painfully – and Jordan did it, and there’s peace with both. It has been tried twice and it has worked both times, so why not focus on an approach that has a perfect record of success, as the first, best path forward.

On the other hand, complete Israeli withdrawal from all of Gaza, and abandoning every settlement there led to nothing but ongoing rocket fire in to Israeli territory that virtually nobody (save those sworn to Israel’s destruction) believes is disputed. The Gaza withdrawal was so thorough that even Jewish bones were removed from the cemeteries! So it is quite certain that simply making any place entirely “sanitized” of Jews does not lead to peace.

I do not condone every action ever taken by Israel. If mistakes were made in Gaza they should be investigated and dealt with appropriately. In fact, there are investigations ongoing and actions have, and are, being taken. Likewise, Hamas or the PA or whoever is the ruling force in Gaza should find people firing rockets in to Israel and take proper action. I have not heard that is happening in any way by anyone.

No rational person can dispute that if there were no rockets from Gaza, there would have never been any incursion to Gaza!  In fact it literally took years of rocket fire before Israel took action. Where was the international outrage? Or screams for investigations? Or demands that perpetrators be found and tried? Where was the UN?

I yearn for a just peace, a peace where Israel lives with its neighbors like other countries do – why would, or should, Israel “settle” for anything less?

Double standards are essentially an insidious, if subtle, form of prejudice, and they don’t work.