Two Principles

All of my writing is informed by two principles. The first, both logically and rhetorically, is that there is no moral principle more important than the value of preserving the Jewish people. This is axiomatic for me: if we don’t agree on this, then there is no point to continue the discussion.

This means that preserving the Jewish people is more important to me than anything else, including democracy or even considerations of human rights. Not that I think that there is a conflict between the continued existence of this people and the legitimate rights of others; I do not. But if, in any particular case, I have to choose between Jewish survival and the good of others, I will choose Jewish survival.

Some say that this disqualifies me as an “objective” observer of events. Actually, it makes me like everyone else. We all have loyalties that override universal obligations to humanity. Who would sacrifice their immediate family in order to protect the rights of others?

The second principle is the necessity of a Jewish state. If the Jewish state were to disappear, so – in short order – would the Jewish people. Unlike the first principle, this is an empirical one. The early Zionists who called for a Jewish state did so to a great degree because the history of the treatment of the Jews in the Christian and Muslim worlds impelled them to the conclusion that a sovereign state was necessary to ensure the continuance of their people despite persecution and assimilation. Subsequent events – the Holocaust among them – provided evidence that they were correct.

So what are the consequences of these principles?

Here is an example: Hezbollah has 130,000 rockets aimed at Israel. If they were to be launched, they would kill thousands in Israel and imperil the continued existence of the state. Therefore I believe that a preemptive attack on the launchers, even if it would kill numerous innocent Lebanese civilians, is morally justified (whether such an action is a good idea from a military or political standpoint is another issue, which I am not discussing at this point).

Another example: the geographic characteristics of the State of Israel require that she maintain control of the high ground of Judea and Samaria and the western ridge of the Jordan Valley in order to have defensible borders. Therefore, regardless of political considerations, these areas cannot be transferred to Arab sovereignty. If you believe that Israel’s holding on to these territories poses a demographic threat to her Jewish majority, then you must find the solution in reducing their Arab population rather than in Israeli withdrawal.

I do not believe that the Arabs who call themselves “Palestinians” have a valid legal claim on the area called Eretz Yisrael. But even if I did, I would be opposed to them realizing it, because it is in direct opposition to the continued existence of the Jewish state. In other words, I am not impartial on this question. I do not give equal weight to Jewish and Arab aspirations in our little land.

That’s enough for many people to declare me a “racist” whose opinions are worthless. But there is no human being who does not privilege some group over others, even if it’s just their immediate family. The ideal of valuing all human beings equally always breaks down at some point. This is unsurprising. We are not abstract entities, we are animals, and like all living creatures we function according to evolutionary rules established by forces far more powerful than our reason (incidentally, this isn’t an anti-religious statement: halacha was developed with this in mind). Family feeling, tribalism, and peoplehood are not things that can be erased.

Here is the reality: it is not Jewish paranoia to think that much of the world opposes Jewish self-determination, and sometimes the existence of Jews themselves. It is not paranoid to notice that Jews living in the diaspora are facing more antisemitism and anti-Jewish discrimination and even violence from day to day. And neither is it paranoid to think that the Palestinian Arabs would kill, enslave, or expel all the Jews from the land if they had the ability to do so. Indeed, they’ll gladly tell you so.

I am not going to argue for the value of the existence of the Jewish people. And we don’t need to convince anybody. What matters, as Ben Gurion said, is not what the nations think, but what the Jews do.

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4 Responses to Two Principles

  1. nudnikJR says:

    Victor,
    Your cri de coeur is right on.
    However, let us take your last statement quoting BG that it is what the Jews DO that matters.
    The demographics of Israel today indicate that 20% (virtually all the Moslem Arabs and many of the Christian Arabs) actively oppose the State’s existence. Another 15% (the Haredim) march to their own drummer and for them a temporal State is largely irrelevant.
    Which leaves us with 65%.
    Of these at least 25% are, at best, post Zionists, if not anti.
    The remaining 40% seem to be so conflicted that they seem incapable of taking a common stand – witness the in-fighting among Likud, Religious Zionists, New Hope and Yamina.
    So who and where are the Jews who will take a stand in this existential crisis and do what matters?

  2. Shalom Freedman says:

    I once had the same feeling about the Jewish people and in a way still do. But in a sense it has changed for me and ‘the Jewish state of Israel’ now seems to me in some way more important than ‘the Jewish people as a whole’. Why? Because I feel unlike you that the Jews could survive, God forbid, without Israel. A minor historically, irrelevant, dhimmi, fossil people to use Toynbee’s objectionable term, living in their own closed powerless world. Tolerated and persecuted from time to time wherever they are, and concentrated in the ‘democratic states’ where mass-killing of a people is not on the agenda. Israel represents more than ‘survival’. It represents Jewish dignity, freedom, power and independence. It represents Jews being a part of humanity It represents Jewish courage and Jewish ability to defend ourselves. It is also for me and you and many others are where our families our, and their projected future is. So Israel’s survival strength and independence are what are most important to me.

  3. Stuart Kaufman says:

    Whenever I post a column by Abu Yehuda on Facebook, I find it interesting that no one ever comments on it. Suffice it to say that I almost never disagree with him. For all intents and purposes, he says what I think. This particular column lays it out plainly, simply… and controversially. He says some outrageous things, and I agree with each and every one of them.

  4. Leon Kushner says:

    Perfectly stated Victor! I am sick and tired of hearing Jewish leaders timidly beg the world to please leave us alone and stop hating us, condemning us, attacking us, lying about us, murdering us and interfering with us. What we say matters a lot but as BG said, what we do matters more. You said it right but we need Jewish leaders to do the right thing. So far I’m not convinced that they are. I see a weak Jewish leadership. Without a strong Jewish leadership we are in trouble. Much like without a strong Israel us diaspora Jews are also in trouble.
    I am a secular Jew but strong in belief. I feel like I’ve won the lottery being born Jewish. Speaking of value, Judaism is not something I can put a price tag on. As a result I won’t sit quiet when I see us attacked, be it in Israel or here in Canada where I live!

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