Thursday, December 15, 2011

WW I and I

My dear Newt Gingrich,
I am Sid Harth.
Now that American Media, whatever that means to the average jobless citizens not yet granted American citizenship due to some of America's most porous borders with other contiguious countries, such as Canada on the North and (drugs transition country) Mexico, is putting extra hours, extra manpower, extra rolls of papers, extra zeal and extraordinary guts and gumption, not to forget extra ad-space, already full to the brim, are already annoying the dumb readers and anointing your holy  hysterical highness, as the next (Rich Republican) Moses, Oops, Messiah, I am ready, I am willing, I am wanting to be the next historian, after your coronation, come January (cold, Oops) hot 2013.
Newt, sincerely, I heard stories that you are some kind of an ancient historian. The word ancient refers to you and definitely NOT, the history. Tell me all about it. I am ready whenever you are.
"Conscience" Two Soldiers, Two Pacifists, One Family_A Test of Will and Faith in World War I
Louisa Thomas
The Penguin Press New York 2011
ISBN 978-1-59420--294-0

Sunday Book Review

 

From New Haven to Northern Montana

By LOUISA THOMAS
Published: September 2, 2011
In one chapter of her new memoir, “This Is Not the Ivy League,” Mary Clearman Blew splices the story of a shooting spree in Moscow, Idaho, into an account of raising her children while going to graduate school: “When cornered, I lashed out, if not with a rifle, and then turned the blame on myself.” This is extreme, to say the least, and Blew admits it. But she insists the comparison holds.
Charles E. Steinheimer/Time & Life Pictures — Getty Images
A lone patron sits in a Montana bar.
THIS IS NOT THE IVY LEAGUE
A Memoir
By Mary Clearman Blew
214 pp. University of Nebraska Press. $24.95.
Things get worse once she finds her first academic job, at Northern Montana College, in Havre, in 1969. She had actually been to the town once before, in hot pursuit of a stolen milk cow, and she never expected to return. In fact, she’d gone to graduate school partly to escape the Montana ranch where she was raised. But damned if she was going to pass up this job at the insistence of her almost-ex-­husband, who wanted her to run their household while he hunted elk and went fishing. Stuck in a “no-exit world,” Blew rebelled. She devoted herself to the school’s theater program, drank until the bars closed, slept with students. “Looking back at that anger and self-pity and despair, I ask myself what I would have told that young woman (if I had known her then, I almost write).”
The conceit of any memoir — the conceit of memory — is that a person can turn the ambiguous distance between “that young woman” and “I” into a credible story. “This Is Not the Ivy League” (part of the American Lives series edited by Tobias Wolff) is broadly framed as Blew’s coming of age as a young professor in a claustrophobic place. But that’s not what it really is. Blew’s memoir is a kind of anti-memoir — an incredulous account, a catalog of confusion. She doesn’t just look back at her anger and self-pity and despair. She looks back with anger and self-pity and despair.
On the surface, the gulf between the narrator and “that young woman” is obvious. While grading thousands of freshman English papers, Blew felt she had no future. Now she’s an accomplished professor and novelist, and the author of a previous memoir, “Balsamroot.” She can describe the vast differences between the expectations she faced and those women face today. She can also see how naïve she was, how stubborn, how filled with conflicting desires. But Blew is still the same woman who showed up for her interview at Northern Montana College wearing false eyelashes when all she needed was proof of a Ph.D. (The place had accreditation issues.) She still can’t quite make sense of two broken marriages and her failed relationship with her son, as well as a mother who both derided and defended her. And then there are the snake-pit faculty meetings, her sense of being left behind intellectually, incapable of making heads or tails of Derrida. She still wants to blame her ex-husbands, her in-laws, her colleagues — the world — for demanding that she subordinate herself to men, for expecting her to become the kind of woman she would not and could not be.
Blew is as hard on herself as she is on those around her. “A long-ago night, a long-ago bar scene: I’m in tears, I’ve had too much to drink, and I’ve given way to self-pity for my failures in love and marriage, which I blame on being born with a brain and then insisting on educating that brain — ‘I’m a freak!’ I sob.” Her friend, a student named Trev, who happens to be a dwarf, dryly laughs. “Don’t feel like you’re the only one.”
Blew’s unflinching self-scrutiny is to her credit, and it’s hard not to be sympathetic. Still, it’s tough to trust so resentful and bewildered a narrator. Take the chapter on her son. Blew didn’t want to become pregnant and didn’t make her children the center of her life, but she loved them. Then one day her son left. She hasn’t spoken to him in 25 years. Trying to piece together their shared history, she recalls sneaking him into "Last Tango in Paris" when he was a teenager, interactions with her former husbands, childbirth. Her recollections can be charming, accusatory, wistful and defensive, but they end in confusion. “What am I missing here?” she asks at one point. I sometimes found myself asking the same question.
Blew has used her life wonderfully as grist for fiction and as a way to understand her family’s history. Perhaps writing about other people provided some necessary distance. Here she suggests that creative writing was her way out of an unhappy situation, literally and figuratively. (She not only becomes a successful author but helps found a creative writing program at the University of Idaho.) But when she writes about herself more directly, she still seems trapped. Her struggle plays out in the text itself. Decades move forward and back. “She” becomes “I” before turning “she”-ward again. Occasionally Blew argues with herself.
It can be frustrating to read. Then again, there’s something fascinating about the notion of the anti-memoir. Paradoxically, it’s honest. Who can justify her own life? When a snooty Northern Montana College professor would say, “At Yale, we used to . . . ,” Blew’s colleagues would hoot, “This is not the Ivy League!” It makes a terrific, defiant title. If Blew learned anything, it was to doubt that anyone had all the answers — including herself. “I don’t know if I did the best I could,” she writes. “I am who I am, and I did what I did.”
Louisa Thomas is the author of “Conscience: Two Soldiers, Two Pacifists, One Family — A Test of Will and Faith in World War I.”
A version of this review appeared in print on September 4, 2011, on page BR8 of the Sunday Book Review with the headline: Look Back in Anger.

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“Daring … The thrust of this enthralling book lies with its title: through the experience of her forebears, Thomas examines how conscience fares when society considers it subversive.” — Alan Riding, New York Times Book Review
“Every once in a while the story of one man or one family is so well told that it becomes a vehicle for exhibiting an entire age. So it is with this triumphant work. Through the prism of the four Thomas brothers, the dramatic years at the turn of the twentieth century are recreated with such vitality that they seem to have happened only yesterday.”
— Doris Kearns Goodwin, author of Team of Rivals
“This is an unforgettable saga of four brothers, each fighting for freedom in his own way. With powerful narrative writing, great historical sensitivity, and a wealth of poignant letters, Louisa Thomas explores the bonds of family and the nature of conscience. This gem of a book is both a wonderful story and a guide to the nature of moral commitments.”
— Walter Isaacson, author of Einstein: His Life and Universe and Benjamin Franklin: An American Life
“With originality, insight, and grace, Louisa Thomas has given us a brilliant book about big things: war and love and family and principle and passion. This is an important, illuminating, and finally moving account of a particular mother and her sons grappling with the most universal of forces–forces that resonate still, and always will. An excellent and entertaining piece of history and biography.”
— Jon Meacham, author of American Lion: Andrew Jackson in the White House and American Gospel: God, the Founding Fathers, and the Making of a Nation
“In the home I grew up in, Norman Thomas was something of a household god. Yet the story his great-granddaughter tells with such a sure touch is a revelation to me. I’ m not sure which is more moving: the strength and courage of the Thomas brothers’ clashing convictions or their profound respect and concern for one another despite their differences. Conscience, the story of a family and a nation in a time of testing, is a remarkable achievement.”
— Hendrik Hertzberg, author of ¡Obãmanos! and Politics
“Louisa Thomas recounts with both tenderness and a critical eye the moving story of a remarkable family and of how Norman Thomas became the great kind and gentle Socialist.”
— John Milton Cooper, Jr. author of Woodrow Wilson: A Biography
“Conscience presents both a vivid account of a tumultuous moment in world history and a reflection on democratic citizenship that speaks powerfully to our own time.”
— Joseph Kip Kosek, author of Acts of Conscience: Christian Nonviolence and Modern American Democracy
“Amazing…. [Thomas] captures a time of national tumult, historic figures ranging from Eugene Debs to Billy Sunday, and furious national debates about the philosophical bases of war and of conscientious objection. Besides issues of conscience for nations and persons that resonate to this day, she presents the intimacy of family unity in the face of disagreement.” – Booklist (starred review)

Op-Ed Columnist

Newt, Mitt, Bibi and Vladimir

By
Published: December 13, 2011
I have a simple motto when it comes to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. I love both Israelis and Palestinians, but God save me from some of their American friends — those who want to love them to death, literally.
Josh Haner/The New York Times
Thomas L. Friedman

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That thought came to mind last week when Newt Gingrich took the Republican competition to grovel for Jewish votes — by outloving Israel — to a new low by suggesting that the Palestinians are an “invented” people and not a real nation entitled to a state.
This was supposed to show that Newt loves Israel more than Mitt Romney, who only told the Israeli newspaper Israel Hayom that he would move the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem because “I don’t seek to take actions independent of what our allies think is best, and if Israel’s leaders thought that a move of that nature would be helpful to their efforts, then that’s something I’ll be inclined to do. ... I don’t think America should play the role of the leader of the peace process. Instead, we should stand by our ally.”
That’s right. America’s role is to just applaud whatever Israel does, serve as its A.T.M. and shut up. We have no interests of our own. And this guy’s running for president?
As for Newt, well, let’s see: If the 2.5 million West Bank Palestinians are not a real people entitled to their own state, that must mean Israel is entitled to permanently occupy the West Bank and that must mean — as far as Newt is concerned — that Israel’s choices are: 1) to permanently deprive the West Bank Palestinians of Israeli citizenship and put Israel on the road to apartheid; 2) to evict the West Bank Palestinians through ethnic cleansing and put Israel on the road to the International Criminal Court in the Hague; or 3) to treat the Palestinians in the West Bank as citizens, just like Israeli Arabs, and lay the foundation for Israel to become a binational state. And this is called being “pro-Israel”?
I’d never claim to speak for American Jews, but I’m certain there are many out there like me, who strongly believe in the right of the Jewish people to a state, who understand that Israel lives in a dangerous neighborhood yet remains a democracy, but who are deeply worried about where Israel is going today. My guess is we’re the minority when it comes to secular American Jews. We still care. Many other Jews are just drifting away.
I sure hope that Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, understands that the standing ovation he got in Congress this year was not for his politics. That ovation was bought and paid for by the Israel lobby. The real test is what would happen if Bibi tried to speak at, let’s say, the University of Wisconsin. My guess is that many students would boycott him and many Jewish students would stay away, not because they are hostile but because they are confused.
It confuses them to read that Israel’s foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, who met with Prime Minister Vladimir Putin of Russia last Wednesday, was quoted as saying that the recent Russian elections were “absolutely fair, free and democratic.” Yes, those elections — the ones that brought thousands of Russian democrats into the streets to protest the fraud. Israel’s foreign minister sided with Putin.
It confuses them to read that right-wing Jewish settlers attacked an Israeli army base on Tuesday in the West Bank, stoning Israeli soldiers in retaliation for the army removing “illegal” settlements that Jewish extremists establish wherever they want.
It confuses them to read, as the New Israel Fund reports on its Web site, that “more than 10 years ago, the ultra-Orthodox community asked Israel’s public bus company, Egged, to provide segregated buses in their neighborhoods. By early 2009, more than 55 such lines were operating around Israel. Typically, women are required to enter through the bus back doors and sit in the back of the bus, as well as ‘dress modestly.’ ”
It confuses them to read a Financial Times article from Israel on Monday, that said: “In recent weeks, the country has been consumed by an anguished debate over a series of new laws and proposals that many fear are designed to stifle dissent, weaken minority rights, restrict freedom of speech and emasculate the judiciary. They include a law that in effect allows Israeli communities to exclude Arab families; another that imposes penalties on Israelis advocating a boycott of products made in West Bank Jewish settlements; and proposals that would subject the supreme court to greater political oversight.”
And it confuses them to read Gideon Levy, a powerful liberal voice, writing in Haaretz, the Israeli daily, this week that “anyone who says this is a matter of a few inconsequential laws is leading others astray. ... What we are witnessing is w-a-r. This fall a culture war, no less, broke out in Israel, and it is being waged on many more, and deeper, fronts than are apparent. It is not only the government, as important as that is, that hangs in the balance, but also the very character of the state.”
So while Newt is cynically asking who are the Palestinians, he doesn’t even know that more than a few Israelis are asking, “Who are we?”
 
A version of this op-ed appeared in print on December 14, 2011, on page A35 of the New York edition with the headline: Newt, Mitt, Bibi and Vladimir.

412 Comments

Share your thoughts.
    • Brian Smith
    • Toronto, Canada
     
    The myth of Arab Muslim victimhood in the West Bank and Gaza is Islamic history revision propaganda stemming from the failed Arab attempt to destroy Israel and drive its Jewish population "into the sea." It is funded by the wells of oil money flowing from wealthy Arab Muslim dictatorships such as Saudi Arabia & Iran, and perpetuated by leftist activists repeating an Anti-Israel Soviet line, which is itself an outdated relic from the Communist support of Arab Nationalist dictatorships in Egypt, Syria and Iraq.
    • Brian Smith
    • Toronto, Canada
     
    Palestinian nationalism has always been nothing more than ongoing promotion of Islamic history revision, a transparently phony justification for terrorism that has always come before nationalism. Palestine was never a country or a state. It was the name given by the Roman occupation forces to a region they were administering, a region far larger than modern day Israel. There was never an Arab Palestinian king or ruler until Arafat. There was never a separate country called Palestine. The Post WW1 Palestine Mandate in the 20th century was used to create two states, an Arab state, Jordan, and a smaller state, Israel.
    • HKC
    • Los Gatos
     
    Well Tom now you are in real trouble :

    Mr. Friedman’s Diatribe Against Israel
    Posted on Wednesday, December 14, 2011 by Elliott Abrams
    http://blogs.cfr.org/abrams/2011/12/14/mr-friedmans-diatribe-against-isr...

    Maybe you can join hands with Walt and Mearsheimer. It has only been 6 years since they pointed this all out.

    Welcome to the club.
    • audiophileguy
    • St. Paul, MN.
     
    Israel, AIPAC and the GOP are in bed together with a plan that will certainly destroy all that is wonderful about Israel. Americans who actually care about the future of Israel (I consider myself a staunch supporter of Israel) must speak loudly and clearly about the failure of current Israeli and GOP policy and direction, lest we lose all that we love and appreciate about Israel's original goals and aspirations.

    As for Gingrich: he has no more right to call himself American than the Natives who lived here long before his ancestors arrived. Palestinians have lived and farmed the region now known as Israel, and were living there long before the state of Israel was founded; Newt is (as usual) wrong in both substance and spirit.
  5.  
    Mr. Friedman, this was an interesting opinion piece. Could you also please outline the ways American Arabs are confused by what they read about the actions of the Palestinians?
  6.  
    As usual, insightful, measured, articulate. Tom: where are you when we're forced to watch those silly debates?
    • Anne Marie
    • Bryn Mawr, Pa.
     
    Newt needs to read the book: "The Invention Of The Jewish People" by Israeli Schlomo Sand. One look at the average Palestinian versus the average Jew would clear up at once just who the real biological children of Abraham are, and who are the descendants of Eastern Europe.
    • zach49
    • TX
     
    The stridency of the Likud & its cohorts is magnificent - "the 'Palestinean people' were invented", but the Israeli state was an "approved invention". There is no confusion, or self-loathing, for this Jew, about his responsibility - speak Truth to Power, in Israel, Syria, America, or Russia.

    It's not an accident that this retrenching of democratic principles is happening precisely when the Arab Spring has occurred, nor is there surprise at US politicians undermining social safety nets precisely when they genuflect to Netanyahu, when the long-term demographics show which way the wind is blowing. Beware a paper tiger precisely because it is in denial of the world it confronts. There are no off-ramps from the responsibility of declaring, "Never Again". This applies whether the aggressor is anti-Semite or Palestinean or Jew. No exemptions.
  9.  
    Good article by Friedman. Also brave statement on the influence of the Israel lobby on US politics.

    But I believe it takes an objective person, one not a Jew or Palestine to point out the typical faults in an Israel supporters position.

    First, the German holocaust does not 'justify' displacing another people, particular people who had no responsibility for it, to create a nation for Jews.
    Second, the idea of the tiny country of Israel as a safe haven for Jews in the event of world anti semitism is absurd. Thatt tiny country would be no protection against world anti semitism. It in fact would make them sitting ducks.
    Third, the Israelis have had a choice for a long time...to either cease confiscation of Palestine land and stop illegal settlements as a basis for peace or to continue them. It has continued them.

    It is up to the Jewish people to accept the truth. That it was unjust to usurp another's land to begin with--and admit, not withstanding that first truth, that Israel could have done it differently over the years...not been expansionist, not been a confiscator of others land and resources for their own benefit.
    If the facts aren't acknowledged and dealt with, then others in the world will eventually step in and address it despite them....because Israel as it now will without doubt go "too far" to be tolerable to the larger world any longer.
    Israel was built on a house of sand, for it to last it has to have better foundation, one acceptable to the world.
    • jjjbbb
    • Germany
     
    Are we talking about Fantasy Island or Israel?
    This week, Paul Krugman is highlighting the growth in frustration and extremism in (now stll unified) Europe. His claim, is that the Euro currency that has unified Europe is now tearing it apart, and at the same time extremism is on the rise. Yes, I am a New Yorker living in Germany and I agree with this observation. What has this to do with Israel Tom? Well, after WWII the allies realised that different people or nationals cannot live in peace amongst other nationals. The era of "displaced people" started. It turns out that this measure propelled Europe into its longest period of peace.
    Since the fall of the wall, the flow of migration within Europe has pushed each country into an identity crisis and fears of losing culture heritage. We are talking about the most sophisticated and educated region in the world next to the United States. Come on, do you really think that the Israelis and Palestinians can even come close to what Europe has achieved in more than 60 years of diplomacy without the use of force? Europe was at war for almost 400 years up to 1945! It took another 50 years to tear down the borders and give up some sovereignty.
    You need good, strong fences to build good relations to your neighbors. Once those borders are respected, we can talk about a diversified population within one’s boundaries. We need 2 distinct countries for 2 distinct people.
    • A Really Hot Chick
    • America
     
    People need to start reading about the history of this tragic conflict. Simly labeling Palestinians as terrorists or invented does not advance Israel nor the Palestinians interests.

    Suggested reading for those who wish to understand this conflict is "Blood Brothers" and "We belong to the Land" by Father Elias Chachour. Also read "The Lemon Tree" by Sandy Tobin. None of these books are pro arab or pro jew. They lay out the history of the confict and ways for peace. Should be able to find them at your public library.
  12.  
    Thank you, Mr. Friedman, for recognizing the New Israel Fund for its important work in promoting and safeguarding democratic values. NIF’s work helps to ensure that a democratic Israel will reflect democratic values – values that Americans, Israelis and people the world over hold dear.
    • herzliebster
    • Connecticut
     
    What Friedman doesn't mention, and the comments (at least as many as I've read) don't seem to realize, is that It's not the JEWISH vote that Romney and Gingrich are pandering to. It's the fundamentalist-Christianist vote out there in the Heartland -- those Biblical-occultists who (a) are scared witless of Islam and "Sharia law" and (b) want to bring in the second coming of Christ and the Millennium by fully restoring the ancient kingdom of Israel, at which point they are confident that the Jews and Muslims will both go up in smoke and only the Christians will be left.

    There are millions of these hysterical crackpots in the Republican Party. The unholy alliance between them and Likud -- each of them playing on the other's bigotries for their own purposes, with US taxpayer money -- is truly scary.
    • C. Richard
    • NY
     
    I am very often disappointed in Mr. Friedman's columns, those where he tackles economic problems and solutions, but this one today is magnificent in its wisdom and humanity. Bravo, Mr. Friedman.
    • Baz
    • New Zealand
     
    Dan, The term Palestine can be traced back to Hadrian in 132 CE - it is Greek for Philistine. Professor Maxime Rodinson, Professor of History at the Sorbonne University in Paris, and he is Jewish, stated in 1968: “The Arab population of Palestine was native in all the senses of the word, and their roots in Palestine can be traced back at least forty centuries.” The British historian, H.G. Wells, responding to the Balfour Declaration, stated: “If it is proper to ‘reconstitute’ a Jewish state, which has not existed for two thousand years, why not go back another thousand years and reconstitute the Canaanite state? The Canaanites, unlike the Jews, are still there.”
    • Lance Lee
    • Pacific Palisades, California
     
    Whether the Palestinians are a created people through historical contingency, or not, they are accepted as a people now, and both sides know that for there to finally be peace in the region, one day a peaceful state of Palestine will have to cohabit the area with Israel.

    But, since Rabin, no one on either side has had the stature or toughness to take the necessary steps, and he was shot for contemplating it by an Israeli extemist. Instead, both sides has behaved in a manner, however justified in fact or fantasy, that has perpetuated violence and difference.

    Israel is all Friedman and we know it to be, a modern, technologically advanced democratic society of deeply admirable achievements amid a sea of enemies. But one has to wonder, what if it embarked on a good neighbor policy? What if it flooded the Palestinains with aid, built schools, supported universities, medical centers, business and trade, regardless of the extemists on either side? Should those people be allowed to set policy?

    What if it did all in its power to raise their standard of living, and give parents hope for the future of their children, and a deep stake in stability and support of peace, and power within their own societies? Both sides have tried the opposite for 60 years: is this where they want to be?

    At some point the cycle of violence has to be challenged. Its continuation points to the failures of politicians, and the absence of statesmen.
  17.  
    I respect Tom Friedman and read his column however I was more focused on the considered opinion of FM of Israel Lieberman. He is originally from Russia, so to dismiss his analysis of the Russian election as fair and democratic misses the point. Who are we to disagree with one of the most vigorous defenders of Israel's freedom and future, in analyzing Russia's election. I question whether our own government has seriously examined the alternatives to the United Russia regime. For example, do we want a return of the Communist Party in Russia, the winner of second place in these recent elections? This may be an example of 'be careful what you wish for you may get it' and I worry about our State Department and its allies in the media not thinking clearly. I think FM Lieberman has it precisely right. He is in a position to know and Israel has a great deal at stake in how it turns out in Russia. I wish we had such far sighted thinkers in our government.
    • David Amitai
    • Los Angeles
     
    I don't like Bibi because he is too full of himself and a demogogue. However, I do respect him because he served and fought in the Sayaret Matkal - the elite commando unit of the Israeli army. He is no "chicken hawk" like Bush, Chaney, Gingrich, and Olmert. He put his life to risk for his principles and that is becoming more and more rare. Too bad he didn't stay in the army!!
    • R Wall
    • St. Augustine, FL
     
    Americans are an invented people, too.
    • Tim K
    • Long Island, New York
     
    As a non Jew I always felt that somehow my Jewish friends would look at me as anti-semetic for my feelings about the expansion of Israels borders and the injustice perpetrated on the Palestinian people. I see now that this is not the case and that even Jews have these feelings. Listening to these GOP candidates throwing gasoline on the fire of this troubling conflict brings to light how ill informed we really are.
    • PreservingMiddleEastand
    • America
     
    We also have to ask who we are. The system of law that is in place in America is one which we by and large value, and which millions of people around the world would move to live under. This is a system that allows for being religiously inspired, but it is also a system that by law ensures that religious visions for life remain a private endeavor. We must work harder to make both the Jewish Israeli society and the Arab Muslim societies more accountable for their policies and actions. This can range from cutting off aid to simply repeatedly bringing up important questions. We cannot criticize one alone, as they are both dealing with the same tensions. All feel under attack. They are looking for our material and moral support. We in turn, must make sure that we do not reward the excesses of those individuals or parties who have the arrogance to believe that they can carry out God's law on earth. That is valid for both Jewish and Muslim societes/states. Both have a great deal to offer.
  22.  
    In today's America, it takes immense courage to call out Israel for what it is.

    However, given the number of people in the media and indeed the formation and continued existence of an organization like J-Street shows amply how the tide is changing.

    Unfortunately, unless you are Jewish yourself, you are likley to destroy your career in one stroke if you tell the truth about Israel. We are in the first step of the tide to truth.

    The Jewish intelligentia is speaking out, starting with Robert Cohen in the Washington Post and now Mr. Friedman.

    Its about time that American Jews placed the interestes if their country, the USA before that of a foreign nation built on fables and mass displacement of native peoples.

    This 2011 and not the dark ages.
    • Ronnie
    • Los Gatos, CA
     
    Much of the tenor of these comments demonstrate the quandary American Jews find themselves in. Like most secular American Jews, I very much support both Israel and a two-state solution, and I absolutely hate what Likud has been doing to Israel since the late 70s. Yes, I fully agree that Israel's policies in the West Bank are unfair to the Palestinians and counterproductive for peace.

    But I am also aware of three other facts:
    1. Israel gets an unfair amount of blame for the situation. People ignore the fact that in 2000, Israel offered the whole of the occupied territories and all Arab sections of Jerusalem, including sovereignty over Temple Mount in exchange for peace, and the Palestinians responded by refusing and starting the Second Intefada. The reason there hasn't been an independent Palestinian state for 11 years now is that Arafat said "no," not because Israel has refused to make peace. It appears that Arafat was attempting to use the Oslo process to negotiate victory, not peace.

    2. Very large sections of the Palestinian population do not appear to want peace. When Israel unilaterally withdrew from the Gaza Strip, violence against Israel increased. A populace that wanted peace would have tried to build on the withdrawal.

    3. Israel cannot afford to lose any war. It is inconceivable that a victorious Arab army would implement a 2-state solution--they would kill the Jews. So as much as we may disagree with what Israel is doing, we cannot abandon her.
    • Brian Smith
    • Toronto, Canada
     
    The left continues to pander to the irrational bigoted demands of the region's Arab Muslim majority to suppress the region's only non-Muslim state, in favor of yet another Arab Muslim country. That blatant disregard for the rights of anyone who is not an Arab Muslim is precisely the reason why the Jews of Israel had to fight for national independence. It is likely why the Kurds in the Middle East will have to fight for independence as well.
    • harvey berger
    • charleston, s.c.
     
    As a 75 year old "secular Jew", it is past time for us to send a clear message to Isreal that we can support the state without supporting its policies. In Israel as will as the rest of the world, it's time for the old guys to get out of the way. The arab spring is only a beginning. Isreal needs to get on the change bus.
    • benploni
    • san francisco
     
    Israelis are not asking who we are - we know and know that we are a mottled group full of internal dissent. We're not looking for a single answer. Despite his years in Israel as bureau chief, Tom Friedman's book "From Beirut to Jerusalem" shows he knows little about Israeli society. He may hob nob with politicians and English-speaking immigrants, but he doesn't speak Hebrew or Arabic and has limited understanding of what 'regular' Israelis think.
    • Brian Smith
    • Toronto, Canada
     
    That facts remains. Palestine is a region, not an Arab nationality. It is not an Arab word, but a corruption of a word meaning Philistine. At no time has there been a Palestinian Arab kingdom, state or political entity, until it was created by Israel as part of a treaty with Arafat. Palestinian nationhood is a fraud that none of the Arab powers who endorse it believe, as they themselves proved when they annexed or ruled the land that would become the so-called "Occupied Territories", a term they would only begin using once Israel recaptured it in the Six Day War in 1967. Over two decades, no Palestinian state was ever created when Judea, Samaria and Gaza were in the hands of Egypt and Jordan. Only after two major military defeats caused the Arab powers to abandon future wars with Israel, did they decide to endorse that particular bit of Islamic History revision.
    • Spencer
    • Washington DC
     
    What Newt said is a valid historical question. The Palestinians claim to be descended from the Canaanites. This is of course totally ludicrous and inconsistent with any educated study of settlement in the area. It is an invented connection the sole purpose of which is to claim palestinians settled there before the jews arrived.

    The historical facts are complex, but what is not even controversial is that arab nations refused to take in the arab refugees who were outcomes of a war Israel never wanted. What is not even controversial is that Israel accepted a small piece of the holy land and this was rejected by every arab nation. All Israel wanted was a tiny piece of land, and they were attacked many times over it.

    One consistent story in human civilization is that there are consequences to wars. Every country in existence today is the outcome of war. The same arguments could be made for the US to give up Texas. Why isn't this an issue as well?

    There is no way to make an intellectually consistent argument about the legitimacy of the the Palestine state without also making similar claims against every country on Earth. That is why this issue is so obviously about more than territorial claims. People need to look themselves in the mirror and ask themselves why they are so passionate about Palestinian rights to the Holy Land and not Mexican rights to Texas.
    • John Pozzerle
    • Katy, Texas
     
    I can't care less about the Israeli-Palestinian problem. What I care about it's my tax money going to support Israel, and a bunch of other countries in order for them to behave and either recognize Israel or keep quiet about it. With so many Americans practically on the street, for lack of jobs and losing their homes, we need all that money to help them, not the jews.
    • Shimon F.
    • Jerusalem
     
    The fact remains that Israel has, again and again, offered the Palestinians terrific deals for peace, only to have them rejected. We pulled out of Gaza, only to receive rockets and missiles aimed at civilians. After Oslo, we basically pulled out of the entire West bank, only to get horrific terror and widespread racist murder. We have every right to be cautious - it's our lives that are on the line here, and our homeland, of which we are the indigenous people, that is at stake. Our right wingers are as crazy as anyone else's, but pose no real threat to our extremely robust and very representative democracy. I am much more worried about the Newts, Rushes, Roves, Bachmans and Palins - those folks are really scary, really hypocritical, and really have no respect for the law, the truth, common sense or common decency.
    • Rob B
    • White Plains
     
    I await Mr. Friedman's similarly probing piece on the PA and the battles Palestinian society, which, more more than Israel, relies on our good will for their survival.
    As for the US serving as Israel's ATM,this is patently false, and you know it Mr. Friedman -- the aid we give Israel has for some time simply been boomeranged back to US defense contractors for goods sold (and US jobs created), not to speak of the benefit we have gotten from the reverse technology transfer form Israel's innovative arms industry in modifying these weapons. Your shrillness clearly shows your anger at Israel's daring to swing rightward on you, after experiencing so many disappointment in their engagements with the Palestinians and the Arab world (e.g., withdrawal from Lebanon, Gaza, in search of peace -- and they simply got missiles).
    • Robert Arnow
    • a Middle Eastern democratic nation
     
    P. Lanier has without doubt never spent appreciable, if any, time in Israel.
    He reminds me of someone who recently said, "I know Russia- I can see it from my house." I have taught Arab doctors in a university in Israel. The pharmacist at my local pharmacy is a Beduin Arab.Muslims are in schools, work places... I'm not going to waste more time with examples which insult anyone with real experience in Israel. It's a nation with minorities, it is not the Garden of Eden without impoverished towns and citizens- need I go on, to open some delusional fellow citizen's mind just a crack? Goodness, how ignorance flourishes in some people.
  33.  
    "I sure hope that Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, understands that the standing ovation he got in Congress this year was not for his politics. That ovation was bought and paid for by the Israel lobby."

    Disgusting anti-Semitic remark written by a disgusting, self hating Jew for a disgusting, anti-Semitic rag.
    • Americanguy
    • New York, NY
     
    I strongly disagree with Mr. Friedman's remark that Prime Minister Netanyahu's warm reception in Congress was "bought and paid for by the Israel lobby". That disturbing remark ignores the sincere and widespread support for Israel by millions of American Christians and Jews. These Americans have every right to participate in the democratic process and elect Congressman and Senators who reflect their support for the free and democratic state of Israel. That's not lobbying - it's democracy.
    • r
    • US
     
    The outrage over Newt is contrived.

    The Israelis have waged a 60 year effort to erase Palestinian identity and self-determination, assisted with billions in American dollars and weapons, unstinting support of the Israeli aggressors and land thieves and an ongoing program of demonization of Palestinians through our mainstream media.

    Newt is speaking for status quo US and Israeli attitudes and accompanying policies of dehumanization.
    • Yoda
    • DC
     
    "The real test is what would happen if Bibi tried to speak at, let’s say, the University of Wisconsin. My guess is that many students would boycott him and many Jewish students would stay away, not because they are hostile but because they are confused. "

    No, Mr. Friedman. We would all be applauding. You are viewing the world through your Katsa colored glasses and, as a result, are unable to see reality. Newt was right, like Sharon was. The so-called "Palestinians" are nothing more than Arabs. Nothing more, nothing less.
    • TTFN
    • New York, NY
     
    One of the best columns you've ever written. At last, some facts about Israel that would be called (totally wrongly) anti-Semitic if expressed by a gentile.
    Truly, it's tiime to call it what it is in the case of Israel. And thankfully younger Israelis are doing just that.
    No more hiding in plain sight.
    Jews should feel more than "confused" by what's going on in Israel. They should ask themselves if the world's most oppressed people can really square themselves with the oppression that is visited -- for whatever claimed reason -- on the Palestinians.
    It goes against their professed beliefs, about themselves and others.
    When the oppressed become the oppressors then something's gone horribly wrong.
    • Tim Kane
    • Mesa, Arizona
    • Trusted
     
    Basically there are four possible solutions to the Israel Palestine situation.

    1) A single state that is pluralistic
    2) Two states that are Nationalistic
    3) A single state with Jewish Jewish Israeli's Ascendant
    4) A single state with Muslim Palestinian's Ascendant

    The United States is a pluralistic nation. This is our ideology. Therefore the easiest thing for us to embrace would be a single pluralistic state.

    Because of our affinity for and sensitivity to the Jewish people and their unique history and victimization, we are willing to stretch ourselves and back a two state solution along nationalist lines. However, in no way or manner of thinking can the United States back a single state with one nationality ascendant over all others.

    The subtext here is the possibility of 'ethnic cleansing' by one of the ascendant nationalities. This is a very real danger because the traditional homeland for the ancient Israelites was not on the coast, where most of current day Israel is located, but in the inland hills where the rain falls and agriculture is possible, that is to say, the West Bank.

    The irony is that nationalism and the German policy of ethnic cleansing in Eastern Europe is what drove many Jews to settle in the former Palestine Mandate after World War II. I can't help but believe that many Jewish people are uncomfortable with a nationalist single state solution because it is simply a reversal of roles for them - and altogether immoral. This is a very complex issue.
  39.  
    To paraphrase Bill Clinton, on your comment: "Israel lives in a dangerous neighborhood yet remains a democracy",

    "Depends what you mean by 'democracy' "

    QED
      • Brian Smith
      • Toronto, Canada
       
      If the Egyptian and Jordanian Arabs camped out in Israel's backyard actually wanted to exercise their "National Rights", they could have done so over the past 19 years. Instead all they've done is try to kill Israelis on behalf of their Arab and Persian backers. After billions of dollars in international aid, the only thing that works in the Palestinian Authority are the AK-47's.
      • Orrin Schwab
      • Las Vegas
       
      The Israelis are an invented people. Was there such a thing as an Israeli in the year 1900? Don't think so.
    • Dan
    • New York
     
    For a change, can the liberal NYT readers please forget about what they want to believe and deal with the fact that Gingrich is right. His statement about the Palestinians was entirely accurate. At the end of 1920, the "Palestinian people" was artificially carved out of the Arab population of "Greater Syria." "Greater Syria" included present-day Syria, Lebanon, Israel, the Palestinian Authority and Jordan. That is, the Palestinian people were invented 91 years ago. Moreover, as Gingrich noted, the term "Palestinian people" only became widely accepted after 1977.
      • friedmann
      • Paris
       
      Friedman is right. America is harming the future of Israel by injecting home made political games into a dead-serious issue. If Israel continues on this course, it will not only lose the support of reasonable gentiles in democratic Europe and in the US, but also of many secular Jews will give up on a country, which rejects fairness, separation of church and state and democratic values. Let's remember that secular zionism was strongly influenced by the enlightment philosophy, which still reigns politically in western democracies. May Israel not reject the ideals of Ben Gurion's generation.
      • Hz
      • Illinois
       
      Does this mean that Syrians, Lebanese, and Jordanians are invented as well? They were all carved out of this "Greater Syria." If they are all "Arabs" (which can mean many things), is there a state of "Arabia" that they must all return to?

      My recollection of history also is that Israel was established as a state in 1948. Before that, the area was known as historic Palestine. Are Israelis invented?

      We could extend the argument to the creation of the US or any other nation.

      Stop, think, and lay off the kool-aid!
  41.  
    My take is that Mr. Friedman understands things just fine, thank you, and far better than the last correspondent, steinel. Friedman's points show a sympathy for Israel's difficult situation, yet an equal understanding of the ugliness of its overbearing right wing political leaderships and its orthodox nationalists.

    My only disagreement is in calling Israel a true democracy when it's more of a theocracy, where, in reality, only Jews have full rights. And only right wing Jews, at that, since moderates and liberals are marginalized. No wonder the Bush administration got along so well with them.

    The sad reality appears to be that neither the legitimate Palestinian leaders (vs the Gaza "rocket scientists") and the right wing nationalist Israeli leaders couldn't recognize a fair deal if it hit them between the eyes. Enough is never enough for either one. A Palestinian doctor said as much to me years ago when he told me, "I know there are good people in Israel and there are good people on our side. But, we will never have peace, because there are too many on both sides who don't want to see it." Amen.
      • Yoda
      • DC
       
      "My only disagreement is in calling Israel a true democracy when it's more of a theocracy, where, in reality, only Jews have full rights."

      This is not true. Goyim in Israel do have the legally protected right to own property, practice their religion, etc., much as Jews do in the U.S. This makes Israel as much a democracy and multi-cultural society as America. Why do you deny it?
    • J
    • USA
     
    Tom, we're used to your constant bashing of the democratically elected Israeli government. Israel is the only country in that region that does elect their leaders democratically. I don't see much from you about the Syria massacre and the ongoing human rights violations across the middle east. It's always Israel with you.

    Four successive Israeli prime ministers have made serious peace offers to the Palestinians. Starting with Rabin, then Barak, then Sharon withdrawing from Gaza and Olmert expanding on the Barak offer. Many offers have been made none were accepted. There are no partners for peace. For making concessions, Israel has received rocket fire on it's towns and full scale war from Hamas and Hezbollah.

    It's no surprise then that Israel has moved to the right. Peace offers and concessions haven't worked while Iran arms Israel's enemies and Turkey becomes Islamified. Another war is inevitable and Iran will soon have nuclear weapons. But for some reason you continue the ongoing criticism of Israel. I wonder if you would be happy with anything less than Israel committing suicide if only to assuage your own guilt for Israel needing to be tough in a tough neighborhood.

    As for Newt's remark, the Palestinian people were part of the Transjordan land mass that was carved up in the partition. Modern Jordan is nearly 70% Palestinian but ruled by a minority. While they are not invented, many of them already have a country called Jordan.
      • Yoda
      • DC
       
      "While they are not invented, many of them already have a country called Jordan."

      This hits the nail on the head. As they already have a nation they do not need a second.
      • Wesley
      • FIshkill
      NYT Pick
       
      And we have 50 states in the United States. So if Canada takes a couple, Mexico takes a few, well we stil got 40 states! No problem. All those Californians, Texans, Mainers, and New Hampshirians will just have to leave. They got plenty of other states to move too.

      Get real: the Palestinian people have a centuries-long heritage in Palestine, just as the Jews have a long heritage in Israel. It's ludicrous and offensive to suggest that the Palestinians should just leave because they don't belong there, just as it is offensive to suggest that all Israelis should leave.
      • Tim Kane
      • Mesa, Arizona
      • Trusted
       
      While not invented, many Jewish people already have a country, called the United States.
    • Judith Stoloff
    • Seattle
     
    You caught my spirited confusion in this piece Mr. Friedman. We hope for a more enlightened Israeli leadership--recognizing that our distance blurs some of the critical issues Israelis are facing. And we can work hard for a rational, fair government in the U.S. One that does not pander while supporting a Jewish State--and a Palestinian State--in a peaceful middle east.
    Ken Yehi Ratzon
  44.  
    "I sure hope that Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, understands that the standing ovation he got in Congress this year was not for his politics. That ovation was bought and paid for by the Israel lobby."

    Wow! This is an insult to everyone, jews and non-jews. Mr. Friedman, what else is bought and paid for by Israel lobby? Perhaps you can list all grievances routinely expressed by anti-semites in the US and elsewhere. Your statement is right up there, close to the top of the list. What a shame!
    • Stafford Smith
    • Seattle
     
    Newt's suggestion that Palestinians are an "invented" people is simply softening us up for his next announcement, which I understand is slated for release in South Carolina a few months down the road. Based on his own exhaustive historical and scientific research Newt will explain that by "invented" he means that Palestinians are directly and uniquely descended from Hanuman langurs and thus not really people at all. This fact, he will argue, provides Scriptural sanction for denial of Palestinian civil rights, the Israeli wall and unfettered Israeli confiscation of Palestinian lands -- although as a matter of compassion he may propose that Palestinian families should be given a two-year supply of peanuts upon eviction.
      • Yoda
      • DC
       
      Mr. Smith, the so-called "Palestinians" are an "invented" people. They have no history before the establishment of Israel (unlike the Jews). You need to face reality and facts, not arab propaganda.
      • Ron Brandt
      • NJ
       
      Very immature response.

      The Arabs themselves did not recognize a Palestinian people untill after the '67 war, when they were made convenient pawns
  46.  
    There is a map of Israel and the West Bank that NYT featured a few months back detailing what various settlement deals would entail, but more chillingly, in my opinion, showing where all the Jewish settlements are in the West Bank. It's not four, or five, or eight, all located close to the Israeli border, it's dozens. They dot the land like pox marks. These are the settlements, well behind established territorial lines that are continuing to spread. How can any proffered plan to make the West Bank and Gaza sovereign Palestinian territory be taken seriously while these settlements remain? How can the Palestinians possibly move forward in good faith if Israel is unwilling to check these de facto invaders?
    • BJS
    • San Francisco, CA
     
    It has long seemed to me that the radical wing of the Israeli population is doing to the Palestinians most of the things that were done to the Jews in past centuries just as a child who is abused will very often become an abuser as an adult.
    • Shoshana Halle
    • San Francisco
     
    And Gingrich calls himself a historian?
      • Ron Brandt
      • NJ
       
      Why not?

      He is right
    • Elishay Moushkatel
    • Israel
     
    On Saturday I saw interview in Israeli channel 2 from Saban forum with Mr. Tomas Freidman and Mr. Martin Indyk. I felt so angry, that I have to write down some remarks.
    Mr. Indyk who was ambassador in Israel has some understanding of Middle East, both of them are so naive. From them you could understand that our neighbors here are at least WestPoint graduate with officer word of honor. When my friend in America or the Jewish student from Wisconsin university pronounces such opinions I can deal with that. I will explain, I will take him to a tour .he will understand that the picture he see from there, is not the picture he will see from here. When people with influence are thinking like this, it is good reason to be worried.
    Mr. Freidman is criticizing Mr. Gingrich claim about Palestinians people, because of the consequences of this claim. Mr. Freidman, be concentrated .Argue with the claim. Even it is uncomfortable, Mr. Gingrich said the true. Palestinian nation is the best successful marketing exercise of the 20 century and I'm apologizing that this comment is not the right place to prove it.
    Mr. Freidman is claiming that if Israel will continue hold Judea and Samaria, it will lead her to apartheid. But if Israel will agree to the Palestinian demand of refugees returning to Israel (this is uncompromised Palestinian demand), isn't it the same problem (7 million Jews and 5 million Arabs)?
    Mr. Friedman, you are in a very hard Vertigo situation. Wake up.
    • JMulholland
    • Media, PA.
     
    Great well-reasoned column! The extent to which American politicans pander to tiny Israel is so embarassing in front of the whole world, especially when it's behaving badly! Thank you for your sensible analysis.
    • r
    • US
     
    No one in their right mind supports Israel any more.
      • Brian Smith
      • Toronto, Canada
       
      The cult of Islamic Supremism insists that only Arab Muslims have national rights in the Middle East. Israel serves to deny that, and to instead proclaim the national rights of the indigenous population of Israel, a country and a people that predate Arab colonialism, and will outlive it as well.
  52.  
    Why is it that religion and God seem to create so many problems in this world? What are humans doing wrong? Can we, will we, ever get it right?
    • Jeanie
    • New York City
     
    Fundamentalism of any kind, anywhere, is wrong. It is dangerous. It is also rampant. No country is perfect, no people faultless. Peace is only possible if others tolerant human imperfection and promote tolerance (as a minimum) and mutual respect.

    What's wrong in Israel is also wrong with the Republicans in this country, and is getting worse all the time. We will be in very deep weeds if Newt runs for POTUS and wins.
  54.  
    OBTW, Newt, Israelis and Georgians are "invented people", too.

    It's our Zealots trying to out Zealous each other to secure campaign donations from the Zealot friends of the Israeli Zealots - both are oligarchic Authoritarian personality types. Likud & friends are just the Republicans of another country.

    What would possess any American of Jewish heritage to vote Republican is a mystery like the Higgs Boson.
    • Matt
    • NYC
     
    Excellent article Mr. Friedman! How many more articles need to be written, world wide (including in Israel) that manifestly demonstrate that Israel does not want a two-state solution, before we wake up?

    If I were the CEO of an oil company that just spilled oil into the Atlantic Ocean, I'd want to hire AIPAC (The US-Israeli lobby). They have an uncanny (albeit immoral) ability to spin apartheid into democracy, lemons into lemonade.

    The sooner our politicians stop pandering to this, the better we all shall be.
    • Noam
    • Washington
     
    Thank God that progressive Israeli forces are still pushing for Israel to uphold the shared values underlying the U.S. Israel relationship.

    We should be asking: How can we help them keep Israel on the right track?
  57.  
    Romney says he'd move the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem because Israel recognizes Jerusalem as its capital --- just as Palestinian Arabs regard it as the proper capital of Palestine. Former Nat'l Security Advisor Brent Scrocroft has suggested that when the Embassy is moved, it should be dual-accredited to both the Palestine Authority and to Israel. In fact the land in Jerusalem owned by the U.S. for the Embassy was illegimately confiscated by Israel from its Palestinian owner, then sold at fire-sale prices to the U.S. Maybe the U.S. should pay the P.A. a market price for that land?
      • GAM
      • Winnipeg and Medellin
       
      Jerusalem was always the capital of Israel, from biblical times to the present It was never a capital of any Arabian country and wasn't mentioned once in the Koran, so where do the Palestinians have a right to make it their capital? There is also the fable that Mohammad flew to heaven from the El Aksa (sp?) mosque in Jerusalem even though the Koran says it was from a distant mosque and El Aksa wasn't built until after Mohammad died.

      It's amazing how these completely false claims are swallowed whole by so many.
    • Glenna
    • Laguna Beach
     
    Thank you, Thomas Friedman, for a splendid, morally centered column. That it came from a prominent American Jew makes it all the more important.
    • max
    • NY
     
    I don't remember Gingrich saying that the Palestinian people don't deserve a state. It is possible to be an 'invented people' and to deserve a state (not saying that is my opinion)
      • Yoda
      • DC
       
      They do have a state - it's called Jordan. Why don't they just move to it? They will have all the rights they claim they are denied in Israel (and their self-determination). The fact they don't move shows the farce that this claim is.
    2.  
      He said it in the context of being asked about American policy towards the Israeli-Palestinian issue. Not sure what purpose it would serve to make the comment if he wasn't signaling a shift in American policy away from a two-state solution if he became President.

      I guess it could have merely been political pandering for the evangelical and right-wing Jewish votes. With Newt that is always a possibility.
  60.  
    All 'states' are inventions.
    Why are Americans so afraid of Israel?
    • Fred D. Horse
    • NJ
     
    The Middle East and its issues are complex and convoluted, with centuries of tribalism, religious hostilities, and anger at their base. While Mr. Friedman certainly knows that during presidential primaries, candidates are want to overstate positions as a way of distinguishing themselves. Obama did the same in 2008 while whipping Hillary - how many of his overstatements about Israel turned out to be blatant lies? From the actions of his administration in alienating Israel in so many ways, I guess the answer is MANY!

    Most Americans are smart enough to understand, without spending too much time on the issues, that Israel is our only friend in the Middle East and that the Arab countries will always work to harm the US and its interest. In the end, we are better off standing with the Jews in Israel than trying to reach an accomodation with the Islamic world!
    • Hank
    • West Caldwell, New Jersey
     
    The w-a-r that Friedman refers to within Israel is the same w-a-r that is being fought internationally in many countries, and within the U.S.

    The w-a-r is between progressive thinking and regressive thinking (policies). The battle lines in the U.S. are already very clear. We also see such regressive forces in the EuroZone. Sometimes such w-a-r-s break out into hot wars, and sometimes the regressive forces hold power for years and years.

    Remarkably, many people who side with the regressive policies do not understand what they are supporting. They are driven only by their own fears and self interests, and little sense of fairness. Such shortsightedness ought to be shocking to those who are more open minded, but by now it is no longer shocking. The pursuit of narrow self interests at the expense of others is as old as human history.

    The important question to ask is "how can there be an end to this w-a-r between progressive and regressive policies. It would be wonderful if there were an easy answer, but there is not an easy answer. However, it is a question that should be wrestled with. What we have to show for centuries of regressive thinking is hot wars and political w-a-r-s, as well as imposed suffering and affliction imposed on the innocent. Progressives should never abandon their will to promote and keep their idealism. For those who believe in such a better world, it is the only way forward.
    • Mohammed Yunus
    • Calgary, Canada
     
    This question cannot be solved by individual politicians. It has now been taken over by the historical process that will solve it in its own tortuous uncharted way.
    • Delta
    • Auburn Hills, MI
     
    Interesting that Newt is a hostorian but doesnot understand that most nations are "invented" people. By the logical extension of his logic, the U.S.A. has no more right to exist as a nation than does Palestine...
    • EJM
    • Bradenton, FL
     
    Bless you, Tom, for speaking truth. Newt is a nut, given to pronouncements he intimates are profound historical truths, but which are actually dim-witted conclusions of a muddled mind. Alongside most Jews, I (a Quaker) believe that the Jewish people are entitled to a homeland, and I long ago accepted Israel as a fitting location for it. But I also believe Israel needed the legendary wisdom of Solomon in order to co-exist with the Arabs who have long called the same general area their homeland. To date Israel has not shown Solomonic wisdom in this essential task, and their clumsy efforts to do so have not been helped by their "friends" in America, both Jews and gentiles.
    • Doug McLaren
    • Seattle
     
    That Newt's absurd statements warrant any mention at all stems from Israel's condition of self-truncated sovereignty and unwillingness to stand on its own feet as an independent state with self contained policy, finance, defense and justice structures. This quasi colonial condition depends on confrontation with Palestinians and other neighbors in order perpetuate its dependency on external benefactors in the US and elsewhere, in essence holding itself hostage to its own shortsighted goals. The disastrous settlement policy (which would be called "human shields in houses" anywhere else in the world) could not exist without the US government defense umbrella and support from various US NGOs. It's an embarrassment to both Israel and the US that the GOP candidates are falling all over each other in support of Israel in order to fill their campaign coffers and also to capture the heart and minds of evangelicals in Iowa waiting for the rapture.
    • rbbrown
    • Kiowa, Colorado
     
    It's good to see Tom Friedman pointing out how pandering to the Israel lobby by the leading Republican presidential candidates serves the interests of neither the United States nor Israel. It should be noted, however, that if, as seems likely, Gingrich or Romney are nominated Mr. Friedman's concurrent support of the efforts of America Elects to place a so-called "radical centrist" on the ballot increases the likelihood that one of these irresponsible clowns will become president.
    • Rikard Baric
    • Croatia, Split
     
    Israel is the key/indicator of humanity. By virtue.
    • Sy Rifkin
    • Boynton Beach, fl
     
    In listing the alternatives facing Israel with regard to the Palestinians you neglected to mention the solution Anerica has with the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico

    Puerto Rico is a self-governing commonwealth in association with the United States. The chief of state is the President of the United States of America. The head of government is an elected Governor. There are two legislative chambers: the House of Representatives, 51 seats, and the Senate, 27 seats.

    Puerto Rico has authority over its internal affairs. United States controls: interstate trade, foreign relations and commerce, customs administration, control of air, land and sea, immigration and emigration, nationality and citizenship, currency, maritime laws, military service, military bases, army, navy and air force, declaration of war, constitutionality of laws, jurisdictions and legal procedures, treaties, radio and television--communications, agriculture, mining and minerals, highways, postal system; Social Security, and other areas generally controlled by the federal government in the United States. Puerto Rican institutions control internal affairs unless U.S. law is involved, as in matters of public health and pollution. The major differences between , its lack of voting representation in either house of the U.S. Congress (Senate and House of Representatives), the ineligibility of Puerto Ricans to vote in presidential elections, and its lack of assignation of some revenues reserved for the states.
      • mole
      • san diego
       
      sounds like Puerto Rico should just become a state and get over itself... because we know that they don't want to lose the benefits of being associated with the U.S. The question of sovereignty has been put to them before.
    • David
    • Silver Spring, MD
     
    Friedman sententiously derides Gingrich's point that the Palestinians are a "made-up people." Of course, he doesn't actually address the point-- Friedman takes his own opinions as revealed truths, and spends most of his column space abusing people who don't share them.

    In fact, in 1920, "Palestinian" leaders were insisting that Palestine was merely part of "greater Syria," and that the notion of a Palestinian state was merely a Jewish plot. There has never been an Arab country called Palestine, nor was Jerusalem ever an Arab capital. The Palestinian population of today is composed in large part of Arabs who moved there in the last generation or two from elsewhere. They are a made-up people. Deal with it.
      • Chester
      • Ellicott City, MD
       
      "The ... population of today is composed in large part of [people] who moved there in the last generation or two from elsewhere."

      Hmmm. Sounds a lot like Israel.
      • TTFN
      • New York, NY
       
      Think you got that one wrong, King David. It's the Jews who "moved there in the last generation or two from elsewhere."
      And Palestinians have lived in Palestine since the beginning of the CE, and before.
      And just like any other people, many are of mixed race, not exclusively Arab at all.
      Check your Bible, David. And if that won't work for you, try this one:

      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_people

      And if Herodotus got it right, so should you.
    • Jordan Davies
    • Vermont
     
    "Since the beginning of the year more than 500 Palestinian homes, wells, rainwater harvesting cisterns, and other essential structures have been destroyed in the West Bank including east Jerusalem, displacing more than 1,000 Palestinians," a joint statement by 20 human rights and aid organisations said.
    "This is more than double the number of people displaced over the same period in 2010, and the highest figure since at least 2005," it added, citing United Nations figures.

    This from a report issued recently. While many of the outrages committed by Israel you cite are very disturbing, the above is equally horrible. We are hostages to the Israeli government and pay for it in money dearly.
    • DD
    • Michigan
     
    Thanks for this article! Too bad you didn't mention that ultra-orthodox in NY are doing the same, abominable thing with public transportation in the US. How anyone can support this kind of treatment of women, here in the US or in Israel is unbelievable to me, and these people need to be called on it! Fundamentalism of any stripe is abhorrent, and this is a form of abuse of women. The US should not be funding it here or through aid to Israel, abroad.
  73.  
    Thank you, Mr. Friedman, for this great article. In my long life I have seen a decrease in anti-Semitism in the U.S. but I fear Israel's actions have put this in jeopardy.
    • r
    • US
     
    Why denounce Newt and not the SOURCE of this vile opinion, namely the loathsome racist Golda Meir?
    1.  
      Golda Meir isn't running for President this year. That's why.
      • r
      • US
       
      Sure. But the reason he made this well-calculated statement, (virtually a verbatim parroting of Golda Meir), is because he knows this is what every Israeli (except Amira Hass and Gideon Levy) actually believe.
  75.  
    Friedman, when he wants to, can explain things very simply. He can also confuse, distort and twist; this column is of the pretzel kind.

    Gingrich did not dispute that there are now 4 million Arabs in Gaza and the West Bank who think of themselves as Palestinians. He merely pointed out that their homeland demand only arose in 1967 after the Egyptians, Syrians and Jordanians, launched a war from the Golan Heights, W/B and Gaza, to destroy Israel. It ended with Israel in control of those territories.

    While Egypt and Jordan governed them, those Arabs did not feel occupied or thirst for independence. They saw themselves as members of the Arab nation, or at most as south Syrians. Before 1967 they had not written a single book on Palestinian history, sociology, literature, etc. There was no Palestinian literature, no Palestinian fairy tales, no Palestinian sport heroes. They had no songs, recipes, poems, myths, jokes associated with a unique national identity. They did not think of themselves as a unique people. But after 1967 they were suddenly denied their national destiny.

    Gingrige's point was that the root and motivation of the Palestinian cause is a deliberate trick to pretend the conflict is about Palestinians yearning for a homeland when it is in fact about Arabs who refuse to tolerate a sovereign Jewish state in their midst, because that contradicts the Koran.

    But Friedman throws sand into our eyes with talk about Jewish settlements and Putin.
    1.  
      The pretzel seems to be in your response.

      Newt was speaking of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process when he brought up the "invented people" argument. He was simply trying to make the Palestinian demands for a homeland illegitimate, and thus one side of the entire peace process.

      The Palestinian demands today concerns Gaza, the West Bank, and the Arab portion of Jerusalem. Those areas have a predominantly Arab population. If Newt denies those Arabs right to independence on their own land, than as Friedman rightly puts it, the only other roads are apartheid or ethnic cleansing.
    • Patricia
    • Connecticut
     
    Bravo Mr. Friedman - and bravo to many of the comments here - especially "A Really Hot Chick's" comment. I fully agree. I am disgusted with the way our politics are these days and they way they are treating this issue - creating a bad environment and trying to demonize the other side using this issue. Thanks Tom, keep writing what you do. My only hope is that people like you and the ones reading these comments will be the ones voting in the next election.
      • A Really Hot Chick
      • America
       
      Thank You Patrica. You are correct. If we stopped demonizing the Palestinians and Israelis there can be peace in that region. I have travelled extensively to Israel and Palestine and met many wonderful people there. The Arabs there would give the shirt off their back to help me when needed. I met some Israelis who are truely disgusted with their governments behavior towards the Palestinians. The Palestinians truely want to just live in peace and dignity just like Americans want. They are no different than we are in America. Good day and lets not vote for Newt nor Mitt in 2012.
    • Gloria Johnson
    • Key Biscayne, FL
     
    Thank you Mr. Friedman for your brilliant analysis and for the information most people are not aware of.
    • Matthew Graber
    • Philadelphia, PA
     
    "As for Newt, well, let’s see: If the 2.5 million West Bank Palestinians are not a real people entitled to their own state..."

    So now there are only 2.5 million Palestinians? The most horrifying treatment of Palestinians occurs in Gaza, where the people don't have sufficient access to food and water, where all of their borders are patrolled by Israeli troops and if they step into those 'buffer zones' then they are shot on sight.

    In fact, Newt's ideas are commonplace in Israel. IDF troops don't see Palestinians as people, but as 'threats'. So when Israel invaded Gaza in 2008-09, the troops were instructed to shoot any one of the 1.6 million people there on sight (breakingthesilence.org).

    Friedman, there's been a culture war going on over which people count. Do all people count, or just white male Jews? I'd suggest you start getting to know some Palestinians.
  79. NYT Pick
     
    What Mr. Friedman and most of the commentators have left out of the equation is the strong support for Israel, right or wrong, coming from the Evangelical Christians of the GOP and Tea Party base. For reasons to do with their (mis)reading of Revelations, they want Palestine to belong exclusively to the Jews so that the prophecies will be fulfilled and Armageddon can arrive on time.

    Efficient and well-oiled as the Jewish lobby is, it is not them that people like Gingrich and Romney are trying to convince of their pro-Israel bona fides. Rather it is the fundamentalist Christians who have hijacked the GOP party, removing all its democratic values, its sense of decency and its common sense..
      • mole
      • san diego
       
      the Evangelical movement's embrace of Israel is pretty awkward. i thought Christians didn't like Jews, or was that just Catholics and Orthodox?
  80.  
    I think it's clear that "the Newt" doesn't care about Palestinians--or Israelis for that matter. All he cares about is the American Jewish vote and getting elected. What we are witnessing is ambition run amok.
    1.  
      Bingo. American politicians actually don't care about anything but getting (re)elected. Our system has created this monster. Term limits, term limits, term limits. Oh, and only public funding for elections. Then we'll see who really cares about Israel, Palestine, Mexico or their own constituents.
  81.  
    Newt and Mitt take pandering to the Jewish lobby to a new level. And they want to be President of the United States? What a joke!
    • Hypocrisy
    • St. Louis
     
    So it isn't just the U.S. that is using a 'culture war' and fear of foriegners/terrorists to restrict freedoms. “anyone who says this is a matter of a few inconsequential laws is leading others astray. ... What we are witnessing is w-a-r. This fall a culture war, no less, broke out in Israel, and it is being waged on many more, and deeper, fronts than are apparent. It is not only the government, as important as that is, that hangs in the balance, but also the very character of the state.”
    You could just as easily change Israel to the U.S. in that statement. Someone once gave democracy a 200 year shelf life, and I fear we are passed the expiration date. The occupy movement is a good first step, but as long as roughly 30 % of our country view 'war as peace' and 'slavery as freedom', I fear that the movement will run out of power. All the oligarchs have to do is wait and control the purse strings to make the leaders dance to their tune.
    • Bill
    • Cleveland, Ohio
     
    The oppressed have become the oppressors. The U.S. should have no part of it. Our continued support is both financially untenable and continues to produce more enemies among 1.6 billion Muslims. We must dump Israel.
    • Michael Kaiser
    • Levittown, NY
     
    Winston Churchill was known to have said something to the effect that democracy is really a terrible form of government until you start comparing it to everything else around. It usually takes 2-3 steps forward and one step backward. Its' current state of affairs exemplifies this. The current actions of the far right in Israel parallel that here in the US. It is doomed to fail. Like any other democracy Israel has built in provisions from the Supreme Court declaring laws unconstitutional to voting the current government out of office. While its' wonderful for Tom Friedman to love the Palestinians, it still takes two to tango. We are still waiting for Abbas and Hamas to reciprocate.
    • Robert Croog
    • Chevy Chase, MD
    NYT Pick
     
    Thanks for reminding your readers that Jews (both here an abroad) are all over the map when it comes to most public issues---including Israel's rightward lurch. Maybe the last time Jews were (nearly) united on any topic was at the start of the Yom Kippur War--- nearly 50 years ago. We Jews are a pretty fractious bunch; we love to argue, most of all with each other. Those, like Newt, who see us as a bloc of votes are doing the same stereotyping that is the practice of bigots everywhere.

    There are Jews who have long believed that Israel's policies, combined with its demographics, seriously endanger its democratic values---their views tend to be voiced by the J Street group. And yes, I'm sorry to say that there are Jews who behave like racists when it comes to the subject of Palestinians and arabs in general.
    It's high time for both politicians and journalists to start viewing Jewish Americans more realistically, as thinking individuals with cultural and historic ties to their coreligionists, but with minds which are decidedly their own as to America's policies in the Mid-east and Israel's future.
    • Ismail Muhammad
    • Los Angeles, CA
     
    Mr. Friedman, I don't agree with you often, but this column was spot on. I applaud you for having the courage to call out bigotry where few others in the media have, and I respect you for raising questions about the Israeli government's conduct, both with respect to the Palestinians and its own people.
    • David Posner
    • Brooklyn
     
    It's not as simple as "confusion". Positive identification with Israel on campuses is more widespread than one might think. All students identify much more significantly with Israel and Israelis than with Palestine and Palestinians, but most won't agree that "Palestinians are an invented people." Jewish student identification is much higher than non-Jewish, but the depth of understanding among all students about the overall situation is thin.

    One could think otherwise based solely on the 10 or so campuses with demonstrable anti-Israel activity, but actual research on campuses shows that Israel resonates much stronger than Palestine. But the opportunity to deepen that identification can be squandored if Israel continues down an anti-democratic path.
      • TTFN
      • New York, NY
       
      "Positive identification with Israel on campuses is more widespread than one might think."
      Not when one is aware that Israel-based organizations are doing everything they can -- money no object -- to bring as many U.S. college students to Israel as they can so they can see the "positive" side of Israel, including introducing young females to some of those strapping Israeli soldiers.
      And I'm not making this up. Of this I have extremely personal knowledge and experience.
      The Jewish lobby will do anything it can -- and it certainly can -- to brainwash U.S. kids without showing them any of the negative things that Israel represents. Paying for group trips to Israel is just one of them, and it's happening time and time and time again.
      As someone who was brought up as a brainwashed Roman Catholic, I know of what I say.
      The Jewish lobby is relentless. And it's time to call it out.
  88.  
    Well at least someone is willing to admit in print for the world to read that disagreeing with and not aligning yourself with Israeli politics does not mean one hates Jews.

    But if you go along with the Israeli exclusive politics then you're admitting that you have no tolerance for and don't care about the plight of the Palestinian people.

    I have many friends who live in Telaviv who count amongst their best friends many Palestinians. The intolerance and hatred is coming from the right-wing just as it does in the United States then those same right-wingers are quick to call a person antisemitic if you disagree with them pretty much like the U.S. Republicans and Tea Partiers and Christianity.

    I'm still angry and appalled at Netanyahu's little arrogant LOBBYING display in front of the Republican congress this year. He and the Republicans are hypocrites, he was lobbying them in return for what? More money, campaigning against our sitting President?

    My take would be to cut off all aid to Israel until their politicians do learn the meaning of the word "compromise" something the GOP has yet to figure out themselves.
    • Julie
    • Illinois
     
    The cruel thing about Newt is that all of the things he claims he is "inclined" to do that would please Jewish voters, he would not do if he got into office and he knows that. He is a cruel tease. But you are cruel also, Mr. Friedman, because you have chosen political correctness over truth. The Palestinians are an invented people, created to be tool of the Arabs to destroy a Jewish State rather than to build a Palestinian State. The actions of both the Arabs and the Palestinians testify to this. But the fact that the Palestinians were invented is independent of their worthiness for statehood. Perhaps, once (if ever) they decide that they no longer wish to be a acrificial tool to destroy aJewish State, that is when, they may be worthy of a state of their own.
    • Alice Miller
    • Moss Beach, CA
     
    If the Palestinians are an invented people, how much more are the Israelis?
    • Mary V
    • West Texas
     
    Thank you for writing this much-needed, balanced column. I hope we can look forward to a series of them on the Israeli-Palestinian issues.
    • Newbie
    • US
     
    So, if many are worried, and the other many are drifting, does that mean half and half? Or is this a Venn diagram.
    • koi
    • Mormor, UT
     
    A good column here by Friedman. Well -intentioned and biting.
    • steinel
    • NY
     
    Hogwash. There are other solutions to the problem which Friedman ignores (I can only assume willingly, in order to be demonize the Israelis and Newt).

    The West Bank can be carved up between Israelis and Arabs, with the land Israel is willing to give up for peace, federated with Jordan. Any fair minded negotiations should consider this approach.

    Freidman, are your three “other” solutions, ignoring the fourth a willing or unwilling gap in your understanding or do you think the solutions you put forward are preferable. Or is your point that your proposal for peace between the Arabs and Israelis (I do hope you agree that Israel should not be expected to give up land/security without a real peace) upon which its presuppositions have been negotiated for decades, must continue through more and more bloodshed?
    • Russell Grayson
    • Palm Beach, FL
     
    What I find most heartbreaking of all is that most Israelis and most Palestinian Arabs desire a good life in peace. These two peoples are easily the best educated, most industrious and highly motivated, yet detested people in the region. They each contain a large portion of the regional educated professional class--yet the extremists in each camp control the morality of their respective societies. They teach hate and intolerance, and negate the humanity of the "other"--their neighbors upon whom they're interdependent.

    Regional Arab governments hate the Palestinians second only to the Jews. What happened to Palestinians in Kuwait after the first Iraq war? Why do Arab governments and the spiritually bankrupt charlatans at the UN continue to allow for a THIRD generation of refugees living in squalid ghettos in Arab countries? Because it serves their political expediencies, THAT'S why! King Hussein even stripped Arabs west of the Jordan of their Jordanian citizenship and passports in the late 80s to punish them collectively for Arafat's treacheries.

    Governments use each as a cudgel against the other, manipulating fears and hatreds against both. No doubt, Palestinian leadership has largely consisted of a bunch of self-serving, self enriching clowns. Now it appears that Israeli right-wingers are beginning to get into lock-step with them. Abraham's children had best begin to throat a rising, unified voice shouting "forget the past" to seek a common future of respect & dignity.
    • Palmer1619
    • Warminster, PA
     
    Israel has been a great boon to the middle east. But with the rise of fanatical ultra orthodox Judaism, and their having garnered enough strength to win an election, Israel has fallen down on its own desire to live in peace and prosperity. Regardless of where the fanaticism comes from, it will always, always cause incredible unrest in society. And that's what has been happening in Israel. For the American Jews, I would suggest that this is an internal Israeli-Palestinian issue that they must deal with. American Jews need to remember which country they live in. Seeing what has happened in Israel since the last election and subsequent coalition, the Israelis will go to the polls again and hopefully get back to working on what they really want for their citizens.
    • Mark L.
    • Milwaukee, WI
     
    I can tell you what would happen if Bibi were to speak at the University of Wisconsin.

    A group of hard-core Israel supporters would attend, hanging on his every word as if they were Denver Broncos fans listening to Tim Tebow. An equally hard-core group of Palestinians and their allies would loudly protest as close to the room as they were allowed to get. The campus police would stand around to keep the protest from escalating into violence, all the while wishing they were somewhere else. And most students would just avoid the whole mess because going to class and studying take priority over proxy-fighting a conflict going on thousands of miles away in another country.
  98.  
    You were writing about Israel, right? If you change the names and the location, you would be right on about America, too.

    We are certainly not in any position to throw stones at any other country, especially Israel. When the US leads the world in clean elections, eradication of poverty, and equality for everyone – everyone, has a self-sustaining economy, and plenty of employment; we can preach to the world. Until then we need to shut up and clean up our glass house.

    I am getting tired of the “What’s wrong with everyone else” articles and opinions. We have sufficient problems in this country. We should focus on these and let the world fend for itself for a while. When you divide you attentions among too many problems, none of them is solved. We should invest this energy at home, not abroad.
      • Robert Cicero
      • Tuckahoe, NY
       
      I take exception to the inference that the United States does not lead in equality.
      Please, tell us what group of citizens does not have full rights in the US.

      Honestly, your implication is delusional at best.

      I will agree that the US should stop worrying about what is going on in other nations.
      We have our hands full right here.
    • Technic Ally
    • Toronto
     
    I'm always irritated to read "American Jews think ...", or references that make it appear that Jews are any kind of a bloc in America.

    Thanks for raising the point.
    • R. Bader
    • Boston, MA
     
    I am an American-Palestinian, and for Newt to say I am invented person, how would that feel if he was my president?
    Israel runs this country and dictates this countries foreign policy. Why do all presidential candidates have to make a speech to AIPAC before the election? This is lowering the value of American citizen's importance. Why do we fund Israel with milllions and millions each year, money and milittary technology? When we can use those funds for our benefits, especially when we arent doing so well economically.
    Our government might be supporting Israel for biblical reasons but this shouldnt be an excuse for what they do especially at the cost of lives and 63 years of occupation. If Israel does nothing wrong humanily, why does US veto everytime they are brought to the UN security council and courts? Its because they are an inhumane government that would expose their wrong doings, which is supported by our government.
    US wanted the Palestinian ppl vote for their ruling party and they did,Hamas won And since they oppose Israel, they are terrorists, is that right?
    US gov't advertises how democracy is a great thing and wants countries to follow, especially middle eastern countries. Here is a great way how you can do that: call Saudia Arabia and tell them to be a democracy. Instead of being allies with a country that kills its own for people for speaking out and no rights for women.
    Only solution to the Israel-Palestine conflict: One state with equal rights for everyone.
      • nadia
      • East Jerusalem
       
      Um no, the one state idea is the not the idea, its a delusion
  101. NYT Pick
     
    A stopped clock is right twice a day. Newt was actually right on this one; the Palestinians are an invented people. Just because the Palestinians are an invented people does not mean that the two state solution is dead, if the Palestinians were actually to offer peace for land (they haven't) then such a solution might be implemented. Israel has made such an offer a number of times, counter proposals have not been forthcoming (but violence has).

    It does mean that the descendants of the Arabs who fled the Arab attack on Israel in 1948, the poor people locked up for 6 decades in camps in Lebanon, Syria, etc., should be given citizenship in the Arab countries in which they reside. They are not a separate people, they are Arabs. Had the Arabs been successful in 1948, there would be no Palestine, the land of Israel would have been divided between Syria, Egypt and Jordan. Solving the so called refugee problem would be one of the first steps towards settling the Arab-Israeli conflict.

    Recognition of the fact that the Palestinians are an invented people does not mean that the two state solution is further off, it might make it a little closer.
    • Dave
    • North Strabane, PA
     
    What I was going to say was already said by the Winning Progressive, and said well. Newt is so far off base on this issue that he has squandered any chance that a rational person would vote for him.
    • Sal
    • Evansville, IN
     
    Mr Friedman, thanks for a well balanced commentary. Now duck! and wait for the hate mail and ugly comments from all sides. As a Jordanian I lived the Israeli Palestinian conflict from the mid 1940s on. When I immigrated to America in 1964 I came to the simple conclusion that with friends of Israel like our politicians and TV Evangelists here and the so called friends of the Palestinians like the Arab dictators and their ignorant born again extremists Moslem supporters no enemies are needed. The Israelis are here to stay and so do the Palestinians. The world will not allow genocide, at least in that part of the world and only through the establishment of a peaceful Palestinian State with defined borders next to also peaceful Israel with defined border this world might be saved from a nuclear conflict.
  104.  
    No, Mr. Friedman, it's not that American Jews don't care, it's that we're conflicted. We would very much like to see the Palestinians get their own state. As a people they are deserving of all the rights granted to us by our Creator, first and foremost of which is the right to live under a government of one's own choosing.

    But we also worry that people don't feel that way about Israelis. We worry about people, like many of the commenters here today, who place the entirety of the blame for the current situation on the Israelis; we worry that criticism of Israel from us will necessarily ally us with them.

    We worry about the rise of anti-Semitism in the world today, and how opposition to Israeli policies is being used to fuel it. We worry about the people who are ostensibly fair and open-minded, but then go on to say things like "all would be well but for the domination of the government and media by the Jews."

    So, Mr. Friedman, we have a tightrope to walk. We want to do what's right, and pushing the Israeli government to accept Palestinian statehood is clearly what's right. But at the same time we have to be concerned that such action will ally us with people whose motives spring from hatred of the Jews more than they do from concern for the Palestinians or a desire for peace. We remember that the hatred that engendered the Holocaust is still alive, and avoiding a repetition is the most important thing, whether the source of the hatred is anti-Semites or Israelis.
    1.  
      "So, Mr. Friedman, we have a tightrope to walk. We want to do what's right, and pushing the Israeli government to accept Palestinian statehood is clearly what's right. "

      If you do the right thing you will be safe. If you don't you won't.
      The source of most resentment of Jews today is that they are seen as putting themselves "first and above all others" even to the point of moral turpitude and inhuman treatment of others....as shown by Israel's actions in Palestine and it's attitude.
      You will never live in any pleasant way until you settle for being Equal, not Special, not more Entitled Victims than any others.
      So it's up to each individual Jew to choose what is more important to them....Exactly Equal to all others and peace, freedom from anti semitism, ...or continuing to demand they be considered More Special, More Protected than any other people and the delusion and false pride of Israel.
      This is how the world works and how human nature works. People will not and do not respect people who demand more for themsleves, at the expense of others, than they willing to grant others. So the choice is strictly up to the Jews who are conflicted about Israel and fear anti semitism.
      This is the best . ..most honest advice you will ever get from a non Jew who wants you to make the right choice.
    • PaulAdler
    • Wash, DC
     
    Mr. Friedman--Good column, but I would make one correction. Gingrich isn't pandering to Jewish voters, he's pandering to the Christian right in Iowa. And it's probably been quite successful in outflanking his opponents on the Israel issue.
    • Agreed
    • USA
     
    I have a Jewish daughter, aged 17 months.

    She can move to Palestine tomorrow and get tax subsidies for a nice apartment.

    Meanwhile those who have lived there for generations cannot.

    What is wrong with this situation?
    • Jeffrey Lovell
    • NY,NY
     
    It's not enough to continue using the cliche that Israeli's live in a bad neighborhood. Israel is in a "bad neighborhood" because it's neighbors chose to make it so from the first breath Israel took. There has never been a moment of good faith negotiation on the part of the Palestinians or their arab allies. They show one face to the world and pledge to Israel's demise in private, in the text books they give their children to read and the miisiles they launch indiscriminately into Israeli towns. Every move every move Israel makes is based on the security of its people. This is not an Israeli problem it is a problem of good faith on the part of the Palestinians and that is in very short supply.
      • r
      • US
       
      Nope. Israel is what MAKES the neighborhood bad.

      They have proven again and again that they have no right to be there whatsoever.
    • Beatrix2
    • Seattle, WA
     
    Newt never said that he didn't believe in a Palestinian nation. In fact, he supported one. All he said was that there had never been a Palestinian nation or people in the past, which is true.

    The conflicts Friedman describes in Israel just shows that it continues to be a viable democracy, one with a left, right and center, rather than a left, left and left. BTW, the Palestinians have a few conflicts of their own.

    AIPAC owns congress? Boy, they use the $5.00 I send them every year well.
    • Mark
    • Hartford
     
    Palestinians are an invented people? If Palestinians are really Arabian wouldn't the logical solution be for all Arabia to unite into a single culteral nation state? Is that really what you want Newt? Do you think Israel could survive as an enclave surrounded by a hostile unified Arabia that controls most of the worlds oil? And what if Arabia decided to define itself as Semite? Hmm. Newt is not a historian; he is a history cherrypicker.
  110.  
    Bravo Tom Friedman!

    The "invented people" comment by Newt Gingrich should disqualify him from being president. Disgraceful.
    • Mark L. Dobias
    • Sault Ste. Marie, MI
     
    Modernity is required of all involved in this matter. Including Americans.
    • Kevin Katz
    • Wooddstock NY
     
    Thank you. I am an American Jew- in that order. Why are the likudnik interests of a foreign power superceding that of The United States? The tail wags the dog. And each presidential election cycle we witness candidates outdoing one another to promise total subjegation of American interests to the Israeli Right.
    It is especially offensive how AIPAC has managed to conflate being Jewish with unthinking allegiance to whatever outrageous policies are pursued by the Israeli Govt. I am an American Jew- in that order.
      • Robert Croog
      • Chevy Chase, MD
       
      To my ear, "American Jew" emphasizes the noun "Jew" as the principal identity with American to describe the type of Jew, i.e., a Jew who happens to be an American one. I label myself as Jewish American---i.e., principally I'm American, but I happen to be a Jewish one.
    • ROP
    • Atlana, GA
     
    Someone said, "Fighting for holy land is like fornication for virginity's sake". This dispute has been going on for thousands of years. Why does the US think that we have the money or political influence to stop it? They must sort out their own problems.
  114.  
    Thank you for a great article that makes it clear that religious conservatives come in all flavors, but scratch below the surface for any one of them and get the same acrid taste.
  115.  
    From an historical point of view, there is no Palestinian"people". However as many state above the Muslims living in mandate Palestine are as much Palestinian as are the polyglot citizens of the United States, American. Besides why is this issue important? These people, regardless of name, are a cohesive cultural group at present and deserve a state of their own,regardless of the rantings of the Newt Gingriches. It will happen. It is however not for the US or any other country other than the principles to negotiate this issue.
    Israel is as Israel is. It is for the Israelis to decide what kind of society they want. If their choices are sustainable so be it. If not, history is full of failed political experiments. You will never convince the religious zealots whether Muslim or Jewish to alter their views because they both believe they are acting out God's will as they see it. Another instance where religion counters good sense potentially leading to agony and death.
    • John F.
    • Reading, PA
     
    I am a confused American.
    I have a Tea Party neighbor who wears a military style T shirt that says
    "Israel - We Got Your Back".
    She and her friend have never traveled out of the country except to Israel to hear a Glen Beck speech.
    I thought I was somewhat politically aware but this really confuses me.
    Your editorial sheds some light on a very confusing issue. I'm sure there is even more insanity at the bottom of this political passion.
    • JEH
    • Sag Harbor
     
    There is truth in every comment expressed here - irrespective of the position. That may be the problem: not seeing the forest for the trees. There is an overriding truth, however, that time is running out. Popular discontent is sprouting everywhere. Something is bound to happen, making the responsibility of the powers that be huge. Get to it or else.
    • Haddad
    • TN
     
    The only viable peaceful solution to the Israeli Palestinian conflict is to treat the Palestinians, Christians and Muslims as equal citizen in the newly invented democratic nation of Israelistin.
    • Frank
    • Phoenix, Arizona
     
    Wrong: Nothing occurring in Israel confuses me. The situation is crystal clear: Bibi & Co. are leading the country down the road to destruction. The ascending fascist and religious elements have acted with impunity. Unless the people grasp the reality or unless a sensible leader with the strength of Sharon emerges, history will soon record another blip of Israelite existence. Mazel tov!
    • Meyer
    • Queens, New York
     
    Friedman once again seems eager to point to the warts rather than the triumphs in describing Israel. What is Israel? It's the country that sends its skilled engineers, medics, and searches to areas all around the globe hit with devastating earthquakes. It is the only country in the Middle East where gays and lesbians enjoy rights guaranteed and protected by law. It is the only country in the region where holy sites of all religions are protected and maintained by the government. It is the country which has given the world Noble Prize winners and leaders in medical research. And it is the country which endures thousands of missiles and rockets aimed at its citizens while the world looks the other way. Who is Friedman kidding, other than himself, to think that Israel's supporters on campuses in the USA are not met with hostility and aggression. Friedman may support a Jewish State, and may concede that the neighborhood is dangerous, but in his book it's always Israel's fault.
    • S. Longo
    • Tampa, FL
     
    Excellent column. Thank you. Could someone please explain the words semite, semitic, antisemitic.
    • hadarmen
    • NYC
     
    Excellent ,

    Bibi has to read this article and concerned alot about what is laying ahead for Israel.

    I am not a jew, But I believe and trust Israel and their people to be in their country after millenias of homelesness.

    Bit I believe Israel as a nation only when they follow the modern and civilized western style democracy.

    As Friedmann put correctly, segragation of busses reminds me only one thing, Radical islamist agenda. Yes religious freedom is ok unless they are not governing the the country.

    Israel , day after day under Bibi government, walking the same way Iran islamic republic.

    Tell me that, segragation of busses nothing but same as when sharia laws dictated role of women in islamic countries.

    Israel is astraying from democratic western style government to dictatorial middle eastern style country.
    • James J. Connolly
    • Waterford, Connecticut
     
    Clear-sighted and courageous essay, Mr. Friedman It is difficult to continue to make sensible arguments on these matters, because many people in the United States (both Jews and non-Jews) have decided that whatever happens Israel's government must be supported reflexively. The gentile opportunists, like the Republican candidates for US President, are contemptible, particularly because they further complicate the culture war in Israel where secular Western democratic values are increasingly under siege.
    • OldRafe
    • Westchester, NY
     
    I'm not confused, because I know that we Jews are not better than any other people. Nor any worse, of course.
    .
      • TTFN
      • New York, NY
       
      But you're God's chosen, no? And that, I believe, is what lies at the bottom of the whole Jewish-gentile conflict.
      It's not just that some gentiles seek to distance themselves from Jews. It's that for many fundamentalist Jews that is just what they want.
      Historically, Jewish men wre circumcised not for health reasons, but to distinguish themselves in the eyes of their god (sorry, g-d).
      Religion is at the base of every conflict in the world. And in the Middle East it's religion in spades.
      Can't fully quote George Carlin here, but as he rightfully put it: "It's all -- and it's bad for 'ya." And never was truer word spoken.
    • A physician
    • New Haven
     
    The whole issue is moot. Palestinians, Israelis, Jews, Chrisitians are all tribal inventions, as are the boundaries and conventions that have been established. Reconciliation is also a practical invention and is a rational, non-faith based solution to the problems of the region. It really is time to get to work on it .
  126.  
    Even as I think about my reaction to Friedman's comments and the responses here, I'm torn. Israel has every right to exist safely and lives in a very hostile environment. Whether or not the Palestinians are one or many peoples, Israel doesn't have any right to the West Bank land it has and continues to take. In fact, the more settlements it builds, the more hostility it generates. Plain and simple.
    Treating other people(s) in a way that would draw outrage if applied to them, destroys Israel's moral credibility.
    As much as my head wants to support Israel, my heart says maybe and I'm left conflicted and confused.
  127.  
    I am not confused. Israeli's inviting Glen Beck to Tel Aviv to address the Knesset and then stage an event that would restore courage in Israel. Boca Raton Jews for Alan West? The Sofla Jewish vote is up for sale to anyone but Obama. I am not confused, this happening. Religious zealots have high jacked Judaism. Not confused, but surprised and very disappointed.
    • Khalid
    • New York City
     
    Thank you for having the courage to speak up. There is no doubt that certain people and groups want this conflict to go on forever as it suits their agenda. But for world peace and US security, Israel-Palestine conflict must end. For decades, the American public has only heard one side of the story. Thank you for shining the light on the other side.
  129.  
    One thing that absolutely staggers me - a point that no Op-Ed columnist, nor anyone the Sunday morning circuit has apparently made:

    Newt Gingrich says the Palestinians are an invented people. Why is that bad? About 235 years ago, so were the Americans.

    The hypocrisy is mind-blowing.
  130.  
    It should be no surprise to anyone that the Israeli war (covert and overt) against the Palestinians has been so enabled by all of us in the US that it has escalated on every front so that, today, anyone can say with a straight face that there are no Palestinians, no Palestinian land, and, therefore, no Palestinian rights.

    Even those who have no religious belief cynically quote the Bible to make the case that all the land, all the West Bank, all of Jerusalem, belongs to Israel. If God has given all the land to Israel, how can any "mere mortal" question Him! So we now have another religious war.

    Why not chuck our American constitution and live by biblical law . . . God's law?

    Everything that has happened, we have supported, every crime committed has our name on it, and every consequence is, and will be, our own doing.

    It is not at all off the subject to say, in response, that we need to get money out of all our elections. If that takes a constitutional amendment lets get started tomorrow. Public elections use public money. No personal fortunes, no corporations, no foreign lobbying groups . . . not a dime. Until we get control over the overwhelming voice of money we will have no real foreign or domestic policy that represents the overwhelming majority of Americans.
    • Shiveh
    • Los Angeles
     
    It took the western hemisphere many trials and a long time to establish a democratic system. The idea is imported to countries and people with little history of democratic governance. In these newly liberated countries, the concept is stripped of all its safeguards protecting societies from the dictatorship of the majority and is left with only the basic concept of one man – one vote. This elections without the needed safeguards is morphing democracies to a caricature of what they intended to be. In the US it is fast changing to be all about money and access. In Israel it is about the demography. Ultra-Orthodox groups are reproducing much faster than the general population (3:1). So Israel is gradually moving to the right of center. New laws are offered and passed to cater to this new reality. It is democracy in action! And a catch 20 situation that democratic systems have no answer for.
  132.  
    Three cheers for you Mr. Friedman for having the courage to speak out the elephant in the room that essentially all members of Congress lack the backbone to confront. The real villain here is the Israeli lobby.
    1.  
      Friedman does not deserve praise. For decades he has virtually ignored the realities of the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territory and the degraded status of Palestinian Israeli citizens living in Israel proper.

      As an Israeli citizen I find that If, on occasion, he does acknowledge that reality he finds a way to spin it in favor of Israel.

      He is now jumping on a train that has been out of the station for years. His statements about the development of Israeli anti democratic policies, unbridled settler violence and ultra orthodox power have already been exposed by many other journalists.

      He says nothing original. And what he states is too late in coming.
    • Jeff Green
    • Boston, MA
     
    Kol HaKavod! This was a much needed op-ed. We don't expect the far right to reconsider its dogma on this matter, but when the persuadable middle recognizes they are being played by AIPAC (for their money) and the Republican Party (for their votes), we will then have real traction for these more rational views.
    • JAS
    • W. Springfield, VA
     
    Israel's future vis a vis the Palestinian people will be determined by the reality of what is developing among and between its neighbors. The U.S. can no longer play the role of superpower protector. There must be compromise for peace. That will come because the majority of Israelis understand that apartheid is not the answer.
  135.  
    Our initial financial support of Israel was intended as an effort to get the country on its feet. It was not to be seen as a permanent entitlement.

    In the US Constitution religious freedom is guaranteed. Why then, are we sending American tax dollars to a theocracy where religious freedom is denied to any but those of the Jewish faith?

    The US must step aside and allow the Israelis to put their own house in order. If cutting financial aid to Israel did not result in this very action I would be surprised. Currently, there is actually negative incentive to come to grips with establishing a Palestinian State and the increasing encroachment over moderate Israelis by those who support a theocracy led by the radical rabbinate.

    Why should it be branded anti-Semitism to say that the US Government should concern itself with Americans first, before it routinely disperses billions of US tax dollars abroad? Americans are out of jobs, losing their homes, unable to afford food or proper medical care. And they are told it is because there is no money to help. This is risible. Why is the Government not targeting their needs in the budget? If American Jews wish to make up the dollars cut from the Israeli 'budget' that is their right. But Americans should not suffer by its government spending billions to support the politics and religious convictions of others before addressing the needs of its own people.
    • oteg
    • Big Bear City, CA
     
    Where Newt's argument stands:

    All human factions, from nations to so-called individuals, are mythic:

    Genetic science has proven race mythic. Some single bands of chimpanzees display more genetic diversity than the entire human species and yet we don't suggest that these troops are divided into various "races". If the myth of race is debunked - scientifically, if not in our collective mean pea-brain - then what the heck have our factions been fighting about throughout history?

    Culture? Obviously, no culture offers Truth entire, but only skewed perspectives delivered by regional pressures and hubris offset by modicums of understanding. If culture's predominantly mythic also, CAN it be the cause of our battles? Yes. To the degree we insist that such fictions as race and culture (rather than unity and hard-won ACTUAL insight) are true we'll be citing said myths in order to continue exploiting and murdering each other for ideological-territorial power.

    "The Gulf War Never Happened." America never happened. Neither Palestine nor Israel ever happened. And, best of all by a huge margin, Newt never happened.
    • Ezekial
    • san jose, ca
     
    The Arab world has been rightly condemned for it's efforts to delegitimize Israel over the years. Now it seems we have a presidential candidate who is doing the same thing to the Palestinians. After Newt's comments, we hardly heard any dissent or rebuttal from the other candidates or media. Tom is to be commended for this clear-headed and courageous analysis.
    • Mary
    • Montana
     
    thank you, Tom Friedman. also, cd. we start with stopping settlements BEFORE trying again to obtain a peaceful resolution? It seems clear that insisting on building settlements in Palestinian territories is anathema for peaceful intentions.

    As for recognizing Israel as a Jewish state, I think it has been recognized as an Israeli state by the Palestinians but they cannot agree that it is a Jewish state for fear that the Palestinians (including Christians) will be tossed out in a "Jewish state."
      • Jason
      • New York
       
      This is not an accurate statement. Hamas still calls in their charter for the destruction of Israel.
      • Sarah
      • NJ
       
      And the Jewish state of Israel has welcomed non-Jewish citizens since it was created. This is in contrast to the Palestinian leadership, which has stated quite clearly that Jews will not be allowed to live in Palestine.
    • Ken
    • St. Louis, MO
     
    The growing power of the right wing and of religious zealots in Israel troubles American supporters of Israel, especially the majority who are Democrats or otherwise left of center.

    But in most cases, it doesn’t erode their support for Israel. Why not? There are three reasons.

    1. They understand the fundamentally important need for, and value of, the Jewish state of Israel, even if they dislike some Israeli leaders and disapprove of some of their policies.

    2. They understand that the Israelis live in a very dangerous neighborhood, and that Israel would be in even greater danger if the United States were not such a steadfast ally.

    3. They read comments about Israel, like many that are posted on nytimes.com, that are filled with relentless contempt and rejection of all things Israeli, and they feel compelled to stand up for the Israeli targets of unfair, one-sided, deeply prejudiced vitriol.

    If you want peace, justice, and an independent state for the Palestinians, that’s great. If you think that rejecting and vilifying Israel is the best way to get there, that’s not great. To the contrary, it’s a serious mistake. There’s a better way. It includes treating Israel like a partner, not a pariah.
      • Ken Belcher
      • Chicago
       
      For the Ken of St Louis who thinks Israelis live in a very dangerous neighborhood, you need to do a little fact checking:

      The CIA factbook reports Life Expectancy at Birth in the US total population: 78.37 years (ranked 50th) while in Israel it is 80.96 years (ranked 17th) compared to the rest of the world.

      But take a closer look around where you live. You are much more likely to be murdered in St. Louis than in Israel or almost anywhere else!

      St. Louis had the highest crime rate among US cities in 2010 (NYC was 269th of 411 cities listed - http://os.cqpress.com/citycrime/2010/City_crime_rate_2010-2011_hightolow....

      More specifically, St Louis had 144 homicides in 2010, (which works out to 45.1 per 100,000 people, vs 4.8 for the US and 2.1 for Israel. from Wikipedia Crime_in_St._Louis,_Missouri
      and List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate)

      Israel likes to portray itself as a dangerous place to live, but it is ultra-safe compared to where you live, or for that matter compared to almost anywhere else in the U.S.
    • A Really Hot Chick
    • America
     
    Bravo Mr Freidman. You care more for Israel than Newt or Mitt ever will. Israel will soon be a bi national state. There is no way around this. The facts on the ground has made a two state solution impossible. It is time for Jews and Palestinians to work towards a better understanding of each other, come up with a constitution that protect everybodys rights and live happily ever after. This is possible.
    • Robert Cicero
    • Tuckahoe, NY
     
    I have to say that I'm greatly gratified that Mr. Friedman has come out and said what American goyim have been saying for decades; that Israel buys the influence of our politicians through the American- Israeli lobby.

    I'm suprised that Mr. Friedman is frankly acknowledging that there is an awful lot wrong with Israel and even that a lot of American Jews are no longer supportive of Israel.

    Mr. Friedman even went the last mile and stated that Israel uses the US Treasury as its ATM!

    So now that we all, at long last, agree that we really don't like Israel very much, can we now ask ourselves and our government exactly why does America continue to provide support to Israel?

    Let's leave your swipes at the GOP contenders aside. All US politicans are beholden to Israel, including the current administration. Remember that Obama failed to support the Palestinians at the UN. I never thought there was anything he could have done to get my vote, but had Obama supported the victims of Israel at the UN, he would have my vote today.

    Mr. Friedman is still supportive of Obama. Consider this, Tom; if not for Israel, your guy would have my vote today.
    • Bruce
    • Dallas
     
    "Confused" is not really the correct term here. "Repulsed" is more like it. I am not sure Israel can be called a democarcy at this point. It is a gated community. Newt probably cares very little about Jewish votes, knowing full wll that that demographic will stay away from him like the plague--or the 10 plagues. He is after the Evangelicals.
  143.  
    Newt's "invented people" concept is not a new one but it is a racist one. Iraq, Syria, Jordan, all these were carved into the map by the British. Tell those folks now they are all just so many Arabs, or better yet, build a foreign policy around the idea. Or tell the Germans to go live in Spain, Finland and Belgium because they are all Europeans, as Germany is relatively new as a nation compared to those.. Just because WE only saw "Arabs" in Palestine (and the entire Middle East) we shouldn't be so foolish as to believe they or the rest of the world see no greater distinction. Great column, Mr Friedman, and please don't let up on this issue, we Americans need to hear reason on this issue, again and again and again.
      • bones327
      • Miami
       
      Sorry, but you have bought into arab propaganda.

      In March 1977, Zuheir Mohsen, a leader of the PLO Executive committee gave an interview to the Dutch newspaper, Trouw. This is what he said:

      The Palestinian people does not exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct Palestinian people to oppose Zionism.

      For tactical reasons, Jordan, which is a sovereign state with defined borders, cannot raise claims to Haifa and Jaffa, while as a Palestinian, I can undoubtedly demand Haifa, Jaffa, Beer-Sheva and Jerusalem. However, the moment we reclaim our right to all of Palestine, we will not wait even a minute to unite Palestine and Jordan.

      So, the racists are the Arabs. They invented the concept of the "palestinian" to make political claims for the Land of Israel. They are the ones who will not accept a Jewish presence as a peaceful neighbor.
    • sapereaudeprime
    • Searsmont, Maine 04973
     
    Judaism gave us, after centuries of tribal conquest, a compassionate deity. Zionism has turned that deity back two and a half millennia, and resurrected Him as a tribal real estate agent. Insofar as Israel is a democracy, its interests coincide with ours. When it becomes a vehicle for racial or religious oppression, its interests are directly in conflict with ours, and those American politicians who support it are flirting with treason. AIPAC should be registered as a foreign lobbying agency; most of my Jewish friends see it as an anachronism. Personally, I think that Jerusalem, Mecca and Vatican City should be placed under the control of an international, multi-religious council of rabbis, priests, ministers and imams, whose principal qualification must be ecumenism. I'll have more sympathy for Zionist settlers when American Zionists return their American lands to the descendants of those Native Americans who were the rightful owners.
      • Bathsheba Robie
      • New England
       
      Why should the the Vatican (Roman Catholic) and Mecca (Moslem) be run by "multi-religious councils"? I agree completely that Jerusalem (Christian, Jewish and Moslem) should be run by all three religions. Just do it.
    2.  
      "Judaism gave us a compassionate deity?" Ever hear of Akhneton? Ever hear of Baha'ism?

      Seems to me that a compassionate Deity gave us Judaism, and several other religions.
      • Yoda
      • DC
       
      AIPAC IS NOT a foreing lobby. Why should it register as such? It is a pro-Israel lobby representing all Americans (both Jews and Gentiles) who believe in a strong Israel and just solution to the problems of the Middle East. It is not an "Israeli" front, contrary to the views of so many anti-semites.
    • FPC
    • Seville
     
    Gingrich pretends to be a historian but does not know that countries are not permanent entities but are created by men and circumstances. They can be created by military occupation, by purchases (as in parts of the US) but more naturally by a group of people who acquire the consciousness of being one people (Italy in the 19th century). As a matter of fact, such consciousness, plus historical developments, is precisely what created Israel. The people who live in Palestine and their ancestors have been there since the 7th century and they have just as much right, if not more than the Israelis who had not been there for two thousand years., to create a state. If Gingrich shows this kind of historical ignorance, may Allah and Jehovah help us, if he becomes president.
      • bones327
      • Miami
       
      sorry, but the Arabic people living in the Holy Land have not been there for centuries. Most moved into the region from Syria in the early 20th century to benefit from the Zionists who were building a country there.

      Zuheir Mohsen, a leader of the PLO Executive Committee stated that the "palestinian" identity was created to wage a political war against the Israelis. Look him up in wikipedia. There is a direct quote there from his March 1977 interview with the Dutch n ewspaper, Trouw.
      • Bathsheba Robie
      • New England
       
      Bones need to bone up on some real, non-partisan history. The claim that the Palestinians are somehow recent imports to the area now called Israel is ludicrous.Really, don't rely on Michelle Bachmann, Glenn Bech and Gingrich for historical accuracy. There have been Jews living in the land now called Israel for centuries. I have an Israeli friend whose mother is the descendant of Jews (Rabbis) who have lived in Safad since before the Crusades. However, the proportion of native Jews to native Moslems is microcsopic.
      • jharris99
      • Healdsburg, CA
       
      The people who live in present day Palestine have been there since the 10th Century BCE or before. Philistine? Canaanite? Check out the various "Tel" digs across Israel. These are the forefathers of the modern Palestinians. BTW - Israelis are just as "made up" as the Palestinians. Judaism is a religion - not a nationality.
    • surgres
    • usa
     
    Newt Gringrich said something that is historically accurate. Friedman, and others like him, distort his point in order to create straw man arguments against him. They are reduced to such deceptions because they know Obama's policies have been a disaster.
    Obama is now saying he should not be judged against expectations, but he won the Nobel Peace Prize! This discussion should now be based on which person should replace Obama, and it is a disgrace that no democrat is stepping forward to challenge him.
      • serban
      • Miller Place
      • Trusted
       
      Historically accurate? The people in Palestine do not exist? Whether they happen to have called themselves Palestinian in the past or not is completely irrelevant to the question of whether they have a right to live where they live and whether they have a right to call themselves Palestinians if they so wish.
      • Bathsheba Robie
      • New England
       
      Technically, Newt is correct in the sense that the state of "Palestine" did not exist until the allies carved up the Ottoman Empire (rather arbitrarily, see "Iraq") after WWI. So, there were no "Palestinians" pre 1920 because there was no Palestinian state. But to say that Palestinians are an "invented" people who somehow have no rights to the land of their ancestors is like saying that "Americans" were "invented" when the Treaty of Paris was signed in 1783, converting what were formerly British colonists to Americans.
    3.  
      The Palestinian people were invented in the refugee camps that their Arab brothers consigned them to so as to be used as political pawns.
    • Jonathan Levi
    • Farmington Hills, MI
     
    Mr. Friedman is right, Phyllis Kahan is dead wrong. The truth must be spoken, not suppressed, even if it causes those of us who speak it to be ostracized by much of the Jewish community.
  148.  
    As much as I agree with the overall thrust of Mr Friedman's piece here, I think he is also oversimplifying the issues and typecasting its participants as much as he accuses the Israelis and Newt Gingrich of doing.

    I agree that Mr Gingrich' recent statement is not helpful and I was also so horrified by Mr Romney's statement I first believed he had been misquoted (he wasn't). That there may have not been a Palestinian national identity throughout history is no more relevant than pointing out that Israel did not exist a century ago. Both national identities now exist and we must deal with them as such. But for Mr Friedman to overdramatize the consequences of Mr Gingrich' misapprehension is uncalled for, as the unspoken alternative is for Palestinians to be subsumed in Jordanian nationality as they had been prior to 1967.

    But where Mr Friedman really fails here is where he takes the actions of certain individuals or groups and allows their extremism to color his perception of all of Israel. Similarly to how we can find racist bigots spouting off on our street corners or violent political extremists behaving badly, yet such does not truly characterize us, Israel also has its fringe elements. Yet the majority of Israelis support a two-state solution as do we. Should we hold everyone in a democracy accountable for the actions of its least responsible elements? Isn't this what authoritarian states do when they insist we curb protests of individuals among us?
    • Danny
    • Albany NY
     
    I would NEVER vote for Newt Gingrich...I find his past and his politics hard to stomach, to put it generously. That being said, he does occasionally, as do many politicians I normally disagree with, speak a truth, even if it is to further his political agenda. He has spoken what so many in the world have been afraid to say, that the "emperor has no clothes", that the Palestinian Arabs are a contrived people, used by their leaders & other Arab nations throughout the last 80 years for their own purposes and gains. The Palestinian Arabs have been kept impoverished & forced into permanent refugee status, NOT by Israelis, but by their own Arab brethren & by an oil-hungry, self-righteous world too eager to swallow the revised Arab "blame the Israelis" narrative about the causes of Palestinian Arab problems. What Mr. Gingrich has pointed out is the truth about the situation but no one wants to acknowledge the elephant in the room: that it is the Arab peoples that put & have kept their fellow Palestinian Arabs into their situation. Until they all accept that Israel is the Jewish State that is here to stay & begin to build acceptable peaceful relations with Israel, Israel cannot keep offering concessions & more than it already has in the interest of peace. Much as I dislike Mr Gingrich's politics, I thank him for restoring accuracy to the historical narrative & placing responsibility for the suffering in the MIddle East where it has always belonged: on the Arab leadership.
    1.  
      Only an extremely small percentage of Palestinians (way less than 1 percent) ever engaged in terrorist activities. Mr. Gingrich's characterization of Palestinians as terrorists is about as accurate as characterizing all fundamentalist Christians as terrorists because of Timothy McVeigh and the so called Christian Militias. Many Palestinians are Christians, although quite a few have left Palestine to escape the occupational behavior of the Israelis. Genetically, Palestinians are more closely related to the ancient israelites than are most Israeli Jews. Look it up. Both people are the descendants of Abraham, and as such have a right to live in that area of the Middle East. No Arab, Muslim or Christian, had anything to do with the Holocaust. Why should they lose their homes and land because of something the Germans did? Jews occupy a prominent place in American politics, finances, sciences, and the arts. We need their talents over here. We are a lot bigger and stronger than Israel, and we exert more influence in the world. American Jews need to stay in America and focus on making America better. The U.S. is a very effective alternative to Israel. Palestinians should leave the West Bank and immigrate to Jordan? What's sauce for the goose...I think that American Jews in Israel should leave Israel and come back home.
      • Mark Ryan
      • Long Island, NY
       
      You ignore the fact that the Palestinians became refugees in the first place due to their expulsion by Jews from their proper homes in Palestine.
      • Peter Tenney
      • Lyme, NH
       
      I am curious. In what way are the people (many new arrivals from Europe) of the Israel of 1948 NOT a contrived population of an invented state? I have nothing against Israel becoming a nation in that year. I rather like the "promise" of an Israeli democracy in the Middle East. But I have everything against the Israeli "apartheid-ation" of their non-Jewish neighbors. FPC, from Seville, above, has it just right. To Gingrich-ish Christians who applaud his provocation, I say "What would Jesus do?"
    • George L.
    • New York
     
    Newt (Bombshell) Gingrich says: "The Palestinians are an invented people". Well, then let me answer him with what is considered anathema here.

    What are we here in US if not an invented people? About 400 years ago we did not even exist (and 400 years are nothing in human history). Since then, our ancestors came from all over the place, cherishing all kinds of ideas and traditions.
      • Halmay
      • Toronto
       
      Touche! (to a degree) The purposes differ vastly. America, though in sad decline now, came into being for positive reasons and had positive effects. The Palestinian invention had and has one purpose: the total destruction of the only Democracy in the Middle East. An establishment of a nation that has incorporated freedom seekers from around the world would be impossible under Islam which is has a Fascist ideology. Come to think of it, your attempted analogy fails.
    • R. Karch
    • Silver Spring, Maryland
     
    You imply by your hypothetical: " ... If the 2.5 million West Bank Palestinians are not a real people entitled to their own state ...", that any honest or decent person should regard them as exactly that. So you are saying the very foundation stones of Israel as a state should not have in the first place been set, that is, in the way that happened. When Israel was begun as a state, it was in fact promoted by the U.S. At the time, how much did Americans care about what would happen to the so-called Palestinians? Those were the people who had inhabited the area for perhaps many generations, and only a few more than 1 million people began the state of Israel as such. Why could these people not live at peace with each other then? The Arab states were against it. The decision to found Israel was made nonetheless.

    Unless we can answer that question, why imply they ought to be able to live at peace with each other now? I am not saying there should be no peace, not saying there could be none, but how this started, how Israel was begun as a state, should be considered in any solutions. There is no 'slate wiped clean' enough that anyone on either side can be exonerated from blame in this mess.
    • ALFREDO BORRAS
    • LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM
     
    Brilliant, absolutely brilliant !!!. One of the most powerful articles I have ever read about the subject. And with a dash of humour. So, the USA might become an ATM to Israel if one of those guys become president. That's fantastic and, unfortunately, according to their words, so true. .. Thank you, again, Mr. Friedman
      • MB
      • New York, NY
       
      The US is already Israel's ATM. We have been unconditionally financing segregationist policy for years.
    • Peter Perlmutter
    • Lynnfield, MA. 01940
     
    Dear Mr. Friedman:
    Just want to let you know that as an American and as a Jew,
    I am not confused. The present Israeli government is playing to the basest elements of Israeli and American citizens.

    The Israeli government is rejecting the history of the founding of the modern state of Israel as well as the moral foundation of Judiasm.
    Israel has not experienced peace since its founding, with a history of several major and many ongoing minor wars and that cloud realty and block opportunities for peace. If this course continues, there will be no prospects for peace and perhaps the future of the state of Israel itself.
    As an American and a Jew, the Israeli government's
    stance is frustrating and insulting.
      • LOUIS ADESSA
      • NEW YORK
       
      Sorry Pete, I'm an American, not a Jew, and I'm neither confused, frustrated or insulted. Israel is experiencing [or should I say the Arab constituency in total with Palestinians as front man and fall guy are experiencing] a hard line backlash from Israeli's who have never been offered anything less than total destruction from the other side. So rightists, religionists, militarists and others are carrying the day. Why should they cooperate with people who do not seek it. ? That's insulting ? To who?
      • Peter B.
      • Lima, Peru
       
      Mr. Adessa, I am not sure I understand your thinking, but I believe you are saying that the Arab side has never offered anything other than "total destruction". I refer you to the 2002 Arab Peace Initiative, rejected by Israel.
      • LOUIS ADESSA
      • NEW YORK
       
      You can refer me to anything you want, but the day to day facts speak for themselves. You don't. Sorry.
    • Thomas Rashman
    • New York
     
    I am someone who will not be voting for Newt Gingrich. However, you have entirely misquoted Mr. Gringrich for the sake of filling your weekly deadline.
    • Gene DePoris
    • Sarasota, FL
     
    In 1967, I was in the front lines with Israeli soldiers, as a young newsman . As a New Yorker with a Jewish family background, I was immensily proud of the incredible job Israel did defending itself against a much larger collective foe.

    The war ended. Everyone was elated. "We had won!".

    And it was understood by all concerned that holding the buffer zone seized during the 6 day war was a mere expedient, to be given back to its rightful owners once the dust settled and the danger was over.

    That was not to be.

    Instead that land became the pawns of xeonphobic "settlers" and calloused, calculating political hacks, willing to keep the land at all costs -- particularly if "they" bore those costs and not "us".

    To try and justify, even for a moment, that this land is Israeli land, is dishonest and baseless.

    I was in the front lines in places like Jenin and Nablus. These were pretty, British colonial towns with a populace that cared as much about fighting Israel as the citizens of Xenia, Ohio. They happened to live in quiet, quaint little border towns, that had no value to Israel - economically or strategically. They were just there, in the way when the war broke out.

    Why did these brave Israeli soldiers die? To build shopping malls and illegal villages? To please xenophobic Jewish fundamentalists? Cynical politicians in Israel, America and elsewhere?

    Any idea what life in a Palestinian refugee camp is like?

    As a Jew whose heart was once with Israel, I am ashamed.
      • LOUIS ADESSA
      • NEW YORK
       
      Your shame is misplaced sir. The xenophobes and cynics have traction because the need for a "buffer" has never gone away.
      • GAM
      • Winnipeg and Medellin
       
      "Instead that land became the pawns of xeonphobic "settlers" and calloused, calculating political hacks, willing to keep the land at all costs -- particularly if "they" bore those costs and not "us".

      I agree with you about the settlers. They are definitely a millstone around the neck of Israel, but what you seem not to know was when Israel made peace with Egypt they asked Egypt to take back the Gaza strip, but Egypt declined. When Israel made peace with Jordan they asked them to take back the West Bank, sans Jerusalem of course, and Jordan declined. So it wasn't Israel's desire to be stuck with these regions, even though the Jewish religious fringe desired it.
    • JOE HUBER
    • PLANTATION, FL.
     
    Newt, Mitt, Bibbi and Vladimir. Sounds like a Friday Night Poker Group.
    1.  
      They probably think they are a Friday night Bridge group, but they have no idea that the Bridge requires a flexible situational thinking - in Bridge like in this complex situation one has to improvise an "it all depends" approach - with clear understanding of well founded principles. Unfortunately, they have no clue.
  157.  
    Thank you, Mr. Friedman, for this heart-felt and illuminating column. It is a real friend who will try to stop you when your course is headed straight off a cliff, and a real enemy who, in such a situation, tells you, "You're doing great."
    • JBL
    • Detroit, MI
     
    As a Jewish American with family ties in Israel dating back to 1948 I thank you for your comments. They all ring true.
    • Bruce Cox
    • San Antonio, TX
     
    Thanks again for clarity....... by presenting those facts often avoided by one side or the other.
  160.  
    When Newt Getrich says something like 'the Palestinians are an invented people' it doesn't bother me, because it's coming from someone who is an invented presidential candidate. What bothers me more (than what confuses the Israelis about their governments' actions) is what confuses American students about their government's inactions. You are spot-on, Mr. Friedman, in your article, by pointing out that there are confounding things afoot globally. We should look elsewhere for our leaders. Perhaps, a reality show will one day produce our future leaders. And why not, television has proven that it can produce just about anything and get away with it. 'Statesman from the Stars', anyone?
    • R.
    • New York
    • Trusted
     
    Tom knows in his heart of hearts that the Arabs will never accept Israel as a Jewish state.
  162.  
    At what point do Isreali outcries about security become propaganda?

    It seems to a lot of Amercans that the Israelis have policies to provoke Palestinians who have had their land taken into some kind of reaction so that the Israelis can in turn say they need more security.

    This is so blatant it's mind boggling. A large part of the problme is that the radical Israeli groups feel that the land is their ancestral homeland. Except of course they don't have any deeds.

    It's not possible to measure civil rights by Jewishness anywhere.
  163.  
    Thank-you. My son is Israeli and I am extremely worried how the ultra-conservatives have taken over Israel. Of course, a different strain is hoping to do the same here.
    • Intrepid6
    • Poughkeepsie
     
    My lament as an American lies back in 1995 when the last sane voice for peace was assasinated - Rabin and since then there has only been an armed truce. In all democractic countries, it seems the right wing has a lock on seeking intra national solutions. It is also there in our domestic politics with such people as Newt Gingrich and others around the world. We should make sure the international right wing doesn't achieve total control of the world political stage, because what is happening in Israel will only be a side show to serious confrontations.
    • PB Friedman
    • Cleveland, OH
     
    I think you're mistaken to believe you're in the minority of secular U.S. Jews who, in your words, "strongly believe in the right of the Jewish people to a state, who understand that Israel lives in a dangerous neighborhood yet remains a democracy, but who are deeply worried about where Israel is going today."

    The problem is the concatenation of right-wing politics, religion, and money both in Israel and the U.S. One cannot express the passionate belief that neither the U.S. nor Israel have done a sufficient amount to further the only conceivable outcome for the state of Israel we believe in -- the creation of a Palestinian state. One is denounced for saying so as an "anti-semite."

    Which is really, really remarkable since it's West Bank Settlers who are actively committing treason against Israel by attacking Israeli troops (not to mention threatening the worst should their some or all of their settlements be removed in order to accomplish the only reasonable outcome).

    It's not much of a difference to be called an anti-semite for caring passionately about Israel's future than it is to hear "serious" presidential candidates start to spout vile cant the way Gingrich has or even, a la Romney, to speak as if standing up to the current Israeli government on any issue is objectionable.
  166.  
    Women in Israel have to enter at the back of the bus and 'dress modestly'. Oh, yeah, that sounds like a really fair democracy that we're pouring billions of dollars into and they can do whatever they want and the US is always supposed to support them unquestioningly or would be considered anti-semetic?

    I'm 60 years old and not affiliated with any religion and over the years have learned to despise Israel and the box it keeps America in.

    Time to change.
    • ccgasp
    • Mata de Platano, Costa Rica
     
    A 'theocratic democracy' is not a democracy".

    Coveting the west bank and not giving equal rights to the indigenous people living there
    Border fence
    Withholding water
    Putting people of different religious views on different buses
    Putting women at the back of buses
    Establishing more illegal settlements and treating them as if they were legitimate
    Wiping out existing neighborhoods to create more Jewish neighborhoods
    ... and the list goes on...

    What a rat's nest.
    What hypocrisy on the part of-primarily-the Israeli government; and certainly the 'Israeli lobby'.
    Palestinians-with their own share of 'ostriches with their heads in the sand'-want the same peace Israelis want.
    They want the same rights.
    There are Muslim fanatics;
    just as there are Jewish fanatics.
    But the average person-Palestinian or Jewish-just wants what a Real Democracy offers:

    Equal rights.
    • historylesson
    • Norwalk, CT
     
    Newt Gingrich and I don't agree on anything, so I was shocked to agree with his remarks about the Palestinian people being a made-up people. Prior to the creation of Israel, and for many years afterward, the conflict was referred to as an Arab-Jewish conflict, not a Jewish-Palestinian conflict. When did it change? And why? It's an effective public relations tool. Americans respond with automatic sympathy to a "people" robbed of "their" land. But they weren't. When Palestine was partitioned, giving Arabs a state, the Arab League immediately declared war on Israel. When Israel accepted the UN partition and reluctantly agreed to
    Jerusalem being an open city controlled by the UN, the Arabs said "never" and went to war. And set in motion the Arab refugee problem that is now known as a
    "Palestinian people." There is a true "Palestinian people." It's made up of everyone living in the area called Palestine under the control of the Ottoman Empire, and then the control of the British after WWI. Muslim Arabs, Christian Arabs, Jews, and Christians were all "Palestinian people." In 1948 there was a two-state solution. I have no crystal ball and no way of knowing if the two state partition of the UN would have worked.However, the facts are clear as to which side wouldn't give it a try. The Arabs can't seem to win wars, so they have turned to a war of disinformation, a war of words. When someone says "It was the Palestinian's land and Israel stole it" fact, history and humanity lose.
      • Peter B.
      • Lima, Peru
       
      And your point is? Call these people what you want, they lived there for centuries. They stupidly went to war- this does not mean Israel has no right to conquer land and keep it.
      • A Really Hot Chick
      • America
       
      Your history lesson is really flawed. After the UN partitions Palestine, it was the European Jews who started village by village evicting the inhabitants and taking the houses for Jewish immigrants. The Jewish immigrants also did not want to partition Palestine. Ben Gurion even said this in his memiors.

      There is a really good book for those who really want to learn about this tragic conflict. It is called "The Lemon Tree" written by Sandy Tobin. It is historically documented fact and there are pleanty of footnotes as to where the information came from. It is most public libraries.
  169.  
    As a secular American Jew, Friedman expresses my feelings exactly. Who are we? I have clung to the belief that there is something special that ties the tribe together, but I'm not sure that I take much pride anymore in what Israel has become.
    Defending the Israeli government in its actions towards the Palestinians as it cedes more power to the religious right for political reasons, comes close to pushing me over the edge. Were it not for Iran, I would wash myself of any further interest in the Middle East.
    • Steven Dolinger
    • Bethpage
     
    The Palestinian state is Jordan. 70%of the population is Palestinian. The Jewish state is Israel. Jordan needs an "Arab Spring" to move it from a monarchy to a democracy and then declare that it is the Palestinian state.
      • Mike L.
      • Baltimore, MD
       
      Steven Dolinger, you understand nothing of Jordan. I did research there for 10 months this past year. Neither the 60% of the population who are Palestinian (AKA West Bankers) nor the 40% who are "Jordanian-Jordanian" (AKA East Bankers) would ever seek to declare Jordan a Palestinian state. The Palestinians because it is not Palestine, and the Jordanian-Jordanians for obvious reasons. This is an Israeli fantasy.
      • RK
      • NJ
       
      Sorry, Mike L.- your studies in Jordan, notwithstanding, do not qualify you as a mid-east expert. "Trans-Jordan", as Jordan was known as prior to 1948, was set aside specifically for the Palestinians. It was the rejection of Israel's creation that caused that plan to fall off the table. But the facts remain- Jordan is Palestine.
    • Mark
    • New York City
     
    AIPAC exerts massively disporportionate influence over US foreign policy (and other areas of US life). Just sayin.
    • malik
    • NY
     
    Given its history in the region, people are skeptical of peace process mediated by the US. It is also difficult to see the US as an "honest broker" in this conflict. More often, the US has sided with one state, set up hurdles in the way of progress, and vetoed numerous UN resolutions. Just recently, the US punished UNESCO for accepting Palestinian membership by withdrawing its funding. The President of Hope failed to stop Israel from settlement building while the Congress gave better reception to Israeli leader than their own. One cannot simply rely on the leaders to deliver peace, it is going to take a grass root movement where the citizens pressure their leaders to make the right decisions. This is where folks with influential platforms -Mr. Friedman, Amira Hass, G. Levy, Rabbi Lerner, and others- play a crucial role in raising a mirror to their respective states and their citizenry. Thank you for this article.
    • DS
    • Toronto
     
    Whether Palestinians are a people or not the question is irrelevant. Since the second world war their property has been seized without compensation and they have been driven from their homes. Terrorism exists on both sides. The man who ordered the murder of the UN arbitrator, Count Bernadotte, went on to become prime minister as did the man who ordered the attack on Deir Yasin, an example of ethnic cleansing by terror induced flight.

    Time is not on Israel's side. The last thirty years have been wasted on internal political self indulgence. Now time is running out and in addition King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia's successor is quite violently anti-Israel to make matters worse.
  174.  
    The dispute between Jews & Palestinians is in a rut and continuing the current US policies offers no potential for compromise or any solution. The US has not been able to do anything but help both sides dig in while the dispute deepens and incentives for compromise disappear.

    The US is not omnipotent. We haven't had "the answer", nor are we likely to offer one acceptable to both sides. It is past the time that we should stop all subsidies, stop trying to dictate to people who won't listen, stop assuming that we know how to do anything except enable both sides to resist changing positions. It is time to let then find their own answers.
    • Jerry
    • St. Louis
     
    I don't know how anyone can call Israel a democracy when their government is so obviously a theocracy split between moderates and fanatics. Of course, the republican conservatives would also like to have a christian theocracy in this country if they could get away with it, so I guess that is why they are such pro israel zionists.
    To Americans in general: Get a history book or two about the area and quit believing all the propaganda in the bible.
    • usaf-vet
    • Massachusetts
     
    I guess Newt's stuck with wife #3.

    There's no divorce in the Catholic church..

    Unless, of course, Newt pronounces his marriage to Calista to be "invented."
    • ted
    • palm beach, fl
     
    As someone who grew up in a Jewish household, I am glad that you are addressing this issue, i believe the conversation should be extended to the image being created in our own country, there has seemingly emerged an entire culture of financial miscreants, think Blankfein, Fuld, etc. who are seemingly bent on destroying the world economy for their own enrichment. This is in stark contrast to the Jonas Salks and Albert Einsteins of earlier generations. Is this how we want the world to perceive us?
    • bill
    • WI
     
    Let me ask a question: why is it that in more that 65 years Israel has not manage to make one true friend in the middle east?
      • emguttcb
      • Cincinnati, Ohio
       
      The reason is that many of the countries and other political entities (Hezbollah and Hamas) have sworn to destroy Israel. These are not exactly freindly gestures on their part.
    • ROP
    • Atlana, GA
     
    Israel: Who are we? No amount of political backing (foreign aid) is going to help them sort this out. On the contrary, it reinforces their lack of actions and position. Israel is a 'house divided'. Send all the money we want, 'you can't push a rope'. Israel is fine with the status quo and we back them. Want change? Stop sending the money and let Israel take care of itself. One judges the future by the past. Unfortunately the history in the middle east is a bloody one. What is the US to do to stop this millenniums old conflict? We can be proud of our governments efforts over the past decades to get these two parties to agree to a treaty; but to no avail. It is up to the Israel to get it together domestically and the Palestinians and Israel to come to an treaty. We obviously cannot force either side to do much of anything. Let's be even handed with both sides and stand aside and let them sort it out. Maybe then they will all negotiate realistically after they get good and sick of bloody conflict, if that is what it takes.
    • Jussmartenuf
    • dallas, texas
     
    Tom,
    You are a great journalist and i really appreciat your insight. However, in this article you mention the issues discussed "might put Israel on the road to apartheid". Israel has had an apartheid policy toward the Palestinians for a decades. I have seen it, Carter has written about it, you talk of the potential of it, it all adds up to a subjugation of a people into less than equal human beings by Jewish extremists who steal whatever property they wish from the Palestinians.
    The Israeli government and state is corrupt yet accepted and overlooked by many, very like New Gingrich is corrupt yet is accepted and overlooked by many Americans.
    • jcunard
    • davenport
     
    I tire of this American election being hung on Israelu- Palestine foreign policy. The Israelis are there to stay.The Palestinians and their friends will never be placated until the Jews and the West stay out. Land for peace will never work. Let's turn the election toward those things that America as a nation needs to solve for itself , and there is alot of that!
    • Sarah Lane
    • Laytonsville, MD
     
    Excellent piece, Mr. Friedman, but I'd like to clarify one point: as a young-ish American Jew (though I prefer the term Jewess ;-), I am in no way "confused" about what's going on in Israel. I am appalled. Every since Rabin was murdered in cold blood by one of our own, and apartheid-esque policies towards Palestinians have increased, it has been increasingly obvious to a ever-growing number of American Jews of my generation and other Jews of good conscience that Israel is not a place where our tax dollars should be spent. I say we start withdrawing $1 billion in aide every time the Israelis issue a building permit in East Jerusalem or the West Bank. Maybe that will get their attention.
    • adp
    • Newton, NJ
     
    Israel already has 1 million Muslim and Christian Arabs living within its borders, so the "apartheid" argument is ridiculous. It is up to the Palestinians, not the Israelis, to invent -- or reinvent -- themselves as a modern, tolerant, respectable, self-governing society. That this has not yet occurred reflects entirely on the Palestinians.
      • bones327
      • Miami
       
      I have been to Israel and you are wrong. Arabs and Jews live side by side throughout the country.
      • adp
      • Newton, NJ
       
      What "policies"? Arabs serve in the army and the Knesset. How many Jews similarly serve in Arab countries, where they were until recently significant minorities. Sure there is segregation, but not *de jure*. No worse than the "segregation" that occurs in Paterson, NJ, among whites, blacks, and Arabs.

      The Arabs whose land was taken -- actually most abandoned it thinking that the victors of the 1948 war would come back and slaughter them (they forgot they were not living under their co-religionists) -- are mostly dead. The "palestinians" living today are their distant descendants.

      The Volga Germans, the Hindu Pakistanis, the Italians in Trieste, and on and on, have moved on from events that occurred 60-70 years ago. Only one displaced group has not.

      I wonder, if the Palestinians' adversaries had been fellow Arabs and not Jews, if anyone except for scholars specializing in extinct populations would have even heard of the term "Palestinian."
    • Howard64
    • New Jersey
     
    I look forward to Tom's column but what is happening in Israel is pure democracy. If a government could be formed without the "settlement parties" then it would happen. In the US, the Republican House must agree (pass) legislation before the democratic president can sign it into law. Similarly, in Israel, the Prime Minister cannot override the parties that allow him or her to form a government. If the majority of Isaelis want a change then they must vote their candidates in and help form a government. But that will not happen while the palestinians are led by dictators in the west bank, terrorists in the Gaza and the Arab nations continue to refuse to grant self declared palestinians citizenship and force them to live in camps. Oh and it would help if palestinians would do something to show that they value their own lives more than they value the death of Israelis.
    • Charlie in NY
    • New York, NY
     
    Newt Gingrich's comments are historically accurate in that the basis of many Arab polities is tribal and not national and, additionally, that a significant part of what now constitutes the Palestinian Arab community came from elsewhere. See, e.g., http://elderofziyon.blogspot.com/2011/12/invented-people-in-18th-century.... That is not to say that today the Palestinians see themselves as a people, though certain polls suggest they self-identify as Muslims and Arabs first. The sad part is that their identity has been forged as a negative (opposition to Israel and rejection by their fellow Arabs) as opposed to a positive (distinctive history or culture). Their entitlement to a state, however, is a matter of international law and, for the moment and absent a settlement with Israel, that remains a future goal. On a separate point, Friedman's list of consequences omits one alternative option: a Palestinian federation with Jordan (assuming the local Beduin groups can get over their hatred) which could then enter an economic union with Israel. If such a thing were to come to pass, then the Middle East would perhaps finally know some peace but certainly it would benefit from economic improvement.
    • Alierias
    • Airville PA
    NYT Pick
     
    Americans are far more an "invented people" than Palestinians.

    We, ourselves and our ancestors, came here to become Americans.
  187.  
    Well, Iraq (apart from a brief stint a few millennia ago) was an invented nation, after centuries as an administrative backwater of the Ottoman Empire. We plugged in a Saudi-style Westernized sheikh as king, to manage our oil pipelines: then some Socialists overthrew him, so we overthrew them and installed a military dictator named - wait, wait, don't tell me - Saddam Hussein. Then we financed and propped him up for 30-odd years, including a war against the neighbor who overthrew another one of our friendly oil-pipe manager kings. Then he got grandiose - who knew? and inconvenient and embarrassing, so we overthrew him. Now his liberated and grateful countrymen have been blowing each other up for almost 9 years.
    You call that a nation?

    While on another page, we read that Israeli settlers ("This land is mine, God gave this land to me") are stoning Israeli soldiers. So it seems what you're asking is, "You call that a nation?"
    • Erich
    • West Dover, VT
     
    I don't think anyone is confused at all, Tom - Israel is a theocratic apartheid, that's all. There's nothing at all confusing about any of it.
    • Burn Wall Street Burn
    • New York NY
     
    Israel is no more a democracy than we are. Neither government represents its people anymore. They represent a small segment that is increasingly hostile and rotting the collective majority and society.
  190.  
    If i'm not mistaken "Americans" are an invented people as well.
    • CHARLIE
    • BOSTON
     
    Maybe Tom, Newt ,Mitt or anybody can tell us how to cut the Gordian knot in the Middle East so that peace can be approached rationally without divine intervention.
    • f.azzarto@03parknyc
    • Newton,MA
     
    Mr. Friedman I admire your efforts to make some sense of the Israeli-Palestine situation, one of global significance. With the numerous solutions it is like applying the Fibonacci series to a“world problem”. The sum of the solutions become the next solution and it goes on and on as if because of the nature of who the Jewish and Palestinian people are, is destined to approach an irrational solution-a fact of nature. It is as if the solution to what happens to God’s chosen people has no rational conclusion. It is the way it is. It is in the physiology of animals and in one sense defines the Jewish people and Palestinians and also defines human behavior.
    In Israel Palestinians are second class criticizes as with Afro-Americans here in the Boston area and as with Latinos in the South; human behavior is wired to act a certain “God modeled” way. Orthodox Jewish efforts to have Egged buses segregated by sex as is done in the synagogue is one step from the US today- in reality when it comes to how we treat those different from us.
    It would in some sense be good for the US to ask ourselves “who we are”. And maybe that is Bibi’s point in all this.
    • Jon
    • Marin County
     
    Show me a country and I will show you invented people! Some like Chinese, Iranians and Indians, Japanese, Greeks, Italians and Palestinians were invented thousands of years ago. Some, like Americans, Canadians were invented a couple of hundred years ago. However, no people were invented more precariously than the Israelis. While the Jewish people have been around for thousands of years the Israelis have come to existence since the creation of Israel in 1948.

    What I am pointing out does not involve the right of any people to exist, but the absurdity of Gingrich's comments.

    The emperor Newt is pole dancing in the nude and it ain't pretty!
      • bones327
      • Miami
       
      The arabs themselves say the palestinian people were invented, not out of some nationalistic sense, but out of a desire to use some arabs as a tool to fight against the existence of Israel.

      Are Israelis invented? The concept is absurd. Israelis are called Israelites in the bible. Spend a minute and look it up.
      • A Really Hot Chick
      • America
       
      Bones, Israel is an invented country, created by the UN. The same UN that recently rejected Abbas request to be recognised as a nation. You cannot say Israel and not come up with Hypocrisy in the same breath. The world knows this.
      BTW, modern day Israel is not to be mistaken for biblical Israel. Most Israelis trace their ansestory to Europe, not Palestine. Look it up.
      • Jon
      • Marin County
       
      @bones327
      Firstly, Arabs don't say that about Palestinians, Neo-Cons do!
      Secondly, nations by definition are invented constructs; they are "man" made.
      Thirdly, bible was written by man/men.
      Fourthly,Theodor Herzl's book Der Judenstaat, (The Jewish State), is where the concept of creating a country for Jews (He doesn't call it Israel!) in Palestine was first formulated but wasn't the first to do so; Joseph Smith's the 'Book of Mormon', predates Herzl's by more than 50 years. Perhaps if Herzl had read the Book of Mormon, US would have been the promised land and and instead of Israelis they would have been called Jaredites!

      ...and lastly, saying Israelis and Israelites are the same is like saying Caucasians [a made up word to refer to white people in the US and to replace the tainted word Aryan (another made up word), after World War II] are all from Caucasus, a country north of Iran!

      Spend some time and look them up!
    • bob tichell
    • rochester,ny
     
    Just as with fair economics, government out of bedrooms, and protection of the environment, the Repubs are on the wrong end of the Israeli -Arab issue. Israel has a right to exist and the Jews have a right to never again be subject to the pogroms and massacres that existed in Europe until the mid-twentieth century. The Arabs have the right to recognize these principles and then develop a place for the Palestinine-Arabs who displaced themselves and somehow can't find any room in the giant Arab territories to live.
  195.  
    Tom, I used to think you were a friend of Israel even when I disagreed with you. However, you showed your true colors today and it wasn't a pretty sight. "...bought and paid for by the Israeli lobby." This line could have been written by Patrick Buchanan. The truth is that the American people know when a nation is under assault. Newt spoke the truth. The Palestinains were invented when Arab refugees were locked in camps by their Arab brothers to be used as a political pawns.
    • Carl Ian Schwartz
    • Paterson, New Jersey
     
    This article soundly outlines the craziness right-wingers are crafting on policy--both Israeli and American. The segregation of publicly-owned buses seems OK to those who would demonize Shariah law, and also exposes the basic hypocrisy of those who would allow Beth Din for Orthodox Jews but deny other Orthodox rules their own religious courts or pracetices, not to mention not allowing the religious practices of less "observant" people.

    Newt's moral hypocrisy is symptomatic of this, not to mention all of the things the so-called "religious right" wants to do here in America.

    Both in America and Israel, "conservatives" want to eliminate the Constitutional balances and practice what, in effect, is a renewed fascism, but calling it "religious."
    • Speculating Ike
    • New York
     
    Riddle me this ... what do you call a Jews in his traditional homeland on the west bank if he/she is outside an army protected settlement. The answer, a corpse. How can we, or any civilized nation, support the statehood of a people who are already practicing ethnic cleansing?

    The reason many American Jews are torn is not the actions of Israel, but the actions of the Palestinian people who have sworn (and continue to swear) to destroy Israel. We want a two state solution for, not just because it is just, but because it is in the best interest of Israel.

    As for the actions of a few political extremists in Israel, they are no more upsetting than the actions of extremists here in the USA.
    • Jerry
    • Dover NH
     
    The ultraconservatives will ultimately lead to the destruction of the state of Israel. Pray that the hot heads there do not drag the US into another war in the region.
    • Shaun Narine
    • Fredericton, Canada
     
    Mr Friedman

    Two comments on this: first off, right now, the effective role of the American government in dealing with Israel is to, as you say, "just applaud everything Israel does, serve as its ATM, and shut up." The Obama Administration has been completely neutered in its ability to control Israel or pursue American interests in the Middle East. This impotence will only get worse as the American election season unfolds. Israel is in the unique position of being the tail that wags the American dog, and this is largely the result of American electoral politics -i.e., the influence of the Israel Lobby. This has been happening for years and is becoming more and more obvious. The fact that the Republican candidates are now spouting extreme and incredibly irresponsible and destructive positions on Israel and yet are seen as part of the American mainstream is a testament to just how far and how profoundly this issue has distorted American domestic and foreign policy.

    Second, what you describe in Israel has been happening for the past few decades. To anyone who has been paying attention there is nothing new or surprising here - indeed, it's the predictable outcome of following increasingly nationalistic policies and the almost complete refusal of the Israeli political system to give up Occupied land. When you become used to brutally oppressing one group of people, you will, inevitably, begin to employ those tactics within your own community.
    • Nan Socolow
    • Cayman Islands, British West Indies
     
    The ignorance of Newt Gingrich is astounding - re his remarks that Palestinians are an "invented people". Despite his claims of possessing superior knowledge of global history despite his reinventing himself and his abysmal personal history over and over, he doesn't know Shinola about the Middle East. He is killing Israel with his protestations of love, as are other ignorant GOP desperate contenders for the Presidency. All the Republican candidates (so far) are clowns.
    • Agreed
    • USA
     
    "I’d never claim to speak for American Jews, but I’m certain there are many out there like me, who strongly believe in the right of the Jewish people to a state..."

    No. If you think any Americans are entitled (a "right") to a second state, you should move there yourself. Otherwise you should realize that Judaism is a religion, American is a political identity, and that makes you just like every other American here who has a religious identity.
    • Kota
    • Brockton, MA
     
    Gingrich is not disputing the fact that Palestinians are people. Obviously they are.
    He is merely pointing out the equally obvious fact that when the Jewish people and the Palestinian people were offered a state by the UN in 1948, the Jewish people accepted the offer and the Palestinians didn't.. The Palestinian people and their
    supporters then launched a war against Israel which is still going on. This is terribly sad,
    of course, but none of it is "confusing."
      • a teacher
      • ny,ny
       
      The Jewish people from Germany and Eastern Europe were offered a state in Palestine, on Palestinian land, on land in which the Palestinians had lived for 1500 years, maybe a millenium longer, if you believe as some do, that they are descendants of the Caananites. That's the rub. Now what do we do? Get congress to stop bowing to AIPAC, ask them to support peace and justice in the ME, give the Palestinians a fair deal instead of crumbs. It is the Israelis themselves, and American Jews who must lead the way. Congress will follow.
    2.  
      @ Kota

      Alas, you, and many other posters here confuse 'Jews' in the mix with the 'Born-Again', viz. Bachmann, Perry, Santorim & Co.

      Their constituency is the real target of [Mittens- and] Newt-like 'pandering'. Many more votes. Much less 'liberal' heritage. At least Judaism historically teaches scholarship and disputation!
    • Disappointed
    • Toronto
     
    Mr Friedman, while you say that you love both Israelis and Palestinians, you seem to take issue only with Israel and not a single word about missiles that landed this week in Southern Israel from Hamas controlled Gaza, or the news today in NYT about Hezbollah financing their war with drug money..Israel may be guilty of not playing by all the rules of our Western democracies, but the neighbors are thugs who don't have any riles, let alone democracy. If this was a condo, you seem to ask one tenant to lower their voice, while the other neighbors are dealing drugs and mugging people.
  204.  
    As an American citizen, I am continually ashamed by the cowardly groveling of the US government and the American political establishment towards the State of Israel. If America would just treat Palestinians as if they were human beings and the rest of the Arab world as if they were something other than a giant oil reserve for American profligacy and egotistical devouring of planetary resources for the purposes of 24/7 mall shopping, we could have avoided 911 and the senseless wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as much of the current problem with Islamic jihadists. It's way past time for America to cease being a vassal and bondservant of Israel at a cost of its integrity, not to mention the thee billion dollars a year the US taxpayers blindly fork over to sustain Israel's obscene illegal occupation of Palestinian lands. Or are Americans just an invented people?
  205.  
    Did Newt ask who are the Americans? You know, he's right. They are just a bunch of (mostly) Northern Europeans who could easily go elsewhere.

    There was no United States in the beginning, back a few centuries, and we should really run the clock back to see his true Anti-American colors. The Spaniards and French and Native Americans have a greater claim to this territory than these johnny-come-lately Brits. "Yankees" and "Georgians" are an invented people, and should all go home.
    • Pauline
    • NYC
     
    Israel is turning in on itself in a self-destructive megalomania not dissimilar to Newt's.
    The self-described victim, on getting a taste of power becomes addicted, grandiose, turning into a victim-aggressor monster.

    Egged on by politicians eager to prove AIPAC creds for votes (let's wrest those Jewish vote from the Dems people!), and flush with cash and weapons courtesy of the Washington munitions lobby, Israel is becoming a spoiled, nasty, overfed, international schoolyard bully. Israel will eventually overstep (just like Newt has *already* done with his talk of an "invented people"" and will be brought back to earth by either its own internal strife, or an international blowback similar to the one South Africa got.

    Right now, all bets are off on Israel. Forget the neighborhood, its own worst enemy is itself.
    • Richard Grayson
    • Apache Junction, AZ
    NYT Pick
     
    I'm an American Jew born a few years after Israeli independence. I can recall getting off the Flatbush Avenue bus on the night in June 1967, when Israel had won the Six-Day War. A band at the subway station at Nostrand Avenue was playing "Hatikvah," the Israeli national anthem and my eyes started tearing over.

    Then the occupation of the West Bank began. I also began to read more and understand what I was taught in Hebrew school about Israel -- "a land without a people for a people without a land" -- was not correct. Over the last decades, with the exception of a few moments like those when Rabin and Arafat announced the agreement forged in Oslo, I became increasingly dismayed with and alienated from Israel and its policies.

    I got tired of being pounced upon as a "self-hating Jew" when I would criticize Israel -- when I signed a petition against the early 1980s war in Lebanon, I got a letter from a rabbinical court in Lynn, Massachusetts, purporting to excommunicate me -- so I eventually just disengaged. In Mr. Friedman's words about American Jews, I've just "drifted away."

    Israel is just another foreign country to me now. That I can go there and get citizenship while Palestinians whose families go back generations in that land which I have never set foot in are a people -- not invented -- without either Israeli citizenship and rights or a country of their own -- is ludicrous and disgusting to me, based on my understanding of the Jewish values I was brought up with.
      • emguttcb
      • Cincinnati, Ohio
       
      FYI, Those Arabs (Palestineans) who remained in Israel after Parttion in 1948 are Israeli citizens. Many even serve in the Knesset (government). Those who fled were confined to camps because the surrounding Arab countries refused entry to them, although many had come from Egypt and Syria.
      • emguttcb
      • Cincinnati, Ohio
       
      In addition, are you aware that Jews living in Arab countries were expelled from their homes where they had lived for generations.
      • Yoda
      • DC
       
      Mr. Grayson, you are a self-hating Jew for even believing in the myth of Palestian peole. As Ariel Sharon has correctly pointed out, quite clearly, they are nothing more than Jordanians. You need to recoginze reality.
    • Eliora Ofri
    • Israel
     
    In stating that Gideon Levy is a "powerful liberal voice", Mr. Friedman exposes his ignorance of the distinctive difference between extreme left and liberal views in Israel. I risk saying that no one in Israel thinks Gideon Levy holds liberal views, and by statinng this to strengthen his argument Mr. Friedman raises doubts as to his understanding of the complexity of the situation, not to mention his conclusions.
    • Bahij Bawarshi
    • Beirut, Lebanon
     
    If Mr. Gingrich truly believes that the Palestinians are "an invented people", he's horrendously ignorant of the Middle East; if he knows better but was shamelessly begging for the Jewish vote, he's a fake. In either case, would Americans really want him for President?
    • shedhair
    • usa
     
    Conveniently, Friedman completely ignores the reality of the " historical" truth that Israel is surrounded by virulently anti semitic countries and culture.

    Not radical minorities in each country, but mainstream enough that the Protocols of the Elders of Zion plays on national TV. This was there long before the partition.

    Friedman can obfuscate or confuse the issues all day long, or until Israel is gone, but nothing will happen until we deal with that and the Palestinians stop teaching “ terrorism”.
  211.  
    It is so damaging and dishonest to say that Palestinians are invented people. What is Gingrich trying to do, make peace impossible? Get elected at the expense of truth and justice. This is one of the most blatent panderings I have witnessed. I am sure that American Jews, except AIPAC members, cringed when they heard this despicable denial of Palestinian history and humanity.
    The USA should consider withdrawing from direct involvement in Israel/Palestine peace efforts and withdraw military and economic support for Israel. Let Israel negotiate and come to common terms with Palestine without US intrusions. Let the UN vote on Palestine soverignty without threat of US veto.
    Newt and his GOP right-wing radicals will cause further misery by giving Netanyahu the sense that he can continue to take more territory and treat Palestinians any way he chooses without US criticism.
    AIPAC, and the members of Congress they own by virtue of their financial contributions, need to become loyal the the interests of the USA and the American people. If they do not, they need to register as agents and lobbyists of the State of Israel. This should start with Eric Cantor.
      • new moniker
      • Miami
       
      Gandalf
      It may be damaging to say that Palestinians are an invented people, but it is not dishonest. It is a historical truth.
      You seem to be given to extreme opinions, calling both the GOP and Gingrich radicals and accusing Congress of being in the pocket of AIPAC is not only extrteme but comes under the column of anti-semitism of the ruddest kind.
    2.  
      Eric Cantor is the most obvious and obnoxious of the Right-wing Orthodox stooges in the U.S., and long since a traitor to his [U.S., to be clear, or at least nominally ;-) ] country's interests... and the 'unintended consequences' can only produce more revulsion and collateral 'anti-semitism' as he, as a nominal leader in the US Congress, continues his blind pandering to the Zionist Enterprise. Sad. QED
  212.  
    I quote Mr. Friedman: "As for Newt, well, let’s see: If the 2.5 million West Bank Palestinians are not a real people entitled to their own state, that must mean Israel is entitled to permanently occupy the West Bank & that must mean — as far as Newt is concerned — that Israel’s choices are: 1) to permanently deprive the West Bank Palestinians of Israeli citizenship & put Israel on the road to apartheid; 2) to evict the West Bank Palestinians through ethnic cleansing & put Israel on the road to the International Criminal Court in the Hague; or 3) to treat the Palestinians in the West Bank as citizens, just like Israeli Arabs, & lay the foundation for Israel to become a binational state. & this is called being “pro-Israel”? "

    The root of the problem, Mr. Friedman, was the attempt to forcefully create an ethnic state in Palestine -- as (hopefully) the last European colony. This began in the 1940's & has continued now for seven decades. Those with vision, such as Mohandas Gandhi, foresaw that no good result could come out of this. They have unfortunately been proved right many thousands of times over, as counted by measures -- such as violent deaths -- overwhelmingly of Palestinians, but also of Jews. States defined by ethnicity are destined to generate perpetual ethnic conflict until those of the wrong ethnicity -- relegated, at best, to effective 2nd class citizenship -- are expelled, annihilated or able to create a multiethnic state -- in this case, in their own homeland.
    • Michal Goldman
    • Newton, MA
     
    Thank you thank you. And though I usually would be writing these or other words from outside Boston, I'm now writing them from inside Cairo, Egypt, where I've come to develop a film about Nasser. When I read your description of the Egged segregated buses I thought of the Cairo Metro, which I took yesterday; the Cairo Metro has cars reserved for women, which we can ride in or not, as we choose.
    • Ari
    • South Africa
     
    I suggest option 3 : A Binational State

    I live in a binational state and it is awesome
  215.  
    I don't think that you would ever advise the US to follow the dangerous advice you continually give Israel. In particular to take a major risk for every Israeli man, woman, and child and make some kind of temporary peace right now with the Palestinians, even if the Palestinians were willing to come to the table (unlikely). In light of the totally unstable situation in the middle east at this moment, and with every so called democratic election in the region so far producing a majority for the Islamic parties. This is particularly worrisome in Egypt where the Salafists garnered 25% of the vote and the Islamic Brotherhood won 40% giving the Islamists a super majority of 65%. The Islamic Brotherhood, which is supposedly more moderate than the Salafists, have many times in the past said they would cancel the peace treaty with Israel if they came to power. The Salafists are vehemently against this treaty to begin with. Hamas, which may form a political union with Fatah , is a direct outgrowth of the Islamic Brotherhood. When the new democratic government of Egypt is formed, the peace treaty with Israel may be in serious jeopardy. Adding to the uncertainty to Israel is the instability of Israel's other closest neighbors Syria, Lebanon, and Jordan. If either Mexico or Canada, the US's closest neighbors, were in turmoil right now and had elected an anti American government, would you seriously be recommending that the US take risks for some kind of temporary peace. Tom really!
    • DEL
    • Haifa, Israel
     
    That the Palestinians are an invented people is as fact as facts go. That nowadays all but Newt Gingrich accept Palestinians as a genuine ethnic-political entity -- even Zionist Israelis such as myself acquiesce with it -- shows only that, in the century-long Israeli-Arab conflict, one more battle have been won by the Arab side.
    • Anderson
    • Tours, France
     
    No, guys like Newt don't care what some Israelis are asking. He cares about the checks coming in, and the potential votes from the revelations crowd. Whether something is good policy is irrelevant.
  218.  
    Mr. Friedman is confused because he and many on the Left suffer from Moral Relativism which is neither able nor willing to speak about truth.

    Friedman’s motto claiming to “ love both Israelis and Palestinians” is disingenuous. One can’t love Israel and also love those who have been truthfully, trying to annihilate her for over 60 years.

    AIPAC didn’t pay Gingrich nor Romney to grovel and support Israel These Core American Values that are shared with Israel. Also something the confused Friedman fails to understand.

    As the Russians, Chinese stand by their Dictatorial allies in the Arab world we must stand with Israel.

    Friedman says “I’d never claim to speak for American Jews”. He doesn’t Thank God. This article is focused on Israel’s perceived failings while glossing over its attributes Would a Friend of Israel devote 1 paragraph out of 13 to Israeli rights?

    Friedman is so sensitive to the plight of the Palestinians and disregards the 900,000 Jews in communities that go back up to 3,000 yrs, have been 'ethnically cleansed' from 10 Arab countries but their narrative has all but been ignored. Unlike Palestinian refugees, they fled not war, but systematic persecution. Seen in this light, Israel, which absorbed most of the Jewish refugees, is the legitimate expression of the self-determination of an oppressed indigenous, Middle Eastern people.

    Friedman and the NYTimes are constantly quoting Haaretz . Israel's most vehemently anti Israel daily paper? Why?
    • C. Hofman
    • Netherlands
    NYT Pick
     
    Thomas Friedman is confused about how Newt, and actually most US politicians, can be considered "pro-Israel" when the consequences of the policies they support are clearly destructive for Israel and its inhabitants (including the Jewish ones.) This confusion comes about because especially left-wing commentators think this is about the Jewish vote. But this is wrong. This is about the core evangelical Christian vote. This is a much larger group, and much more radical when it comes to Israel, and they are indeed strongly "pro-Israel". That group generally does not know much about how people (Jews and Arabs) live in Israel, and quite frankly don't care much about it. What they care about is the biblical story, and the territory it encompasses. And that includes the West Bank. They want it to belong to Israel, and by proxy to them, or at least a the west. They do support the Jewish people in Israel, in name, because of the biblical narrative, but they don't really think much about what it means for those Jews. It's those people that Newt is talking to. Once you realize that, the discussion about Israel, especially on the right, makes much more sense.
    • Jason
    • NY
    NYT Pick
     
    Why is the third option "to treat the Palestinians in the West Bank as citizens, just like Israeli Arabs, and lay the foundation for Israel to become a binational state" not an option? Why is that not "pro-Israel"? Young American Jews take Israel for granted, but not necessarily as a Jewish state. We were educated about the American virtues of separation of church and state, so why should it be different in our 'homeland.' Young American Jews drift from being pro-Israel, because as Americans we laud integration and despise segregation. The "separate but equal" two-party state solution rubs against all our generation has been taught to strive for.
  221.  
    I'm glad to see Tom Friedman coming around to a reasonable point of view on a subject where reasonable views are only too few. But in that meeting between Putin and Avigdor Lieberman, I should think Mr.Lieberman would be happy to be received by any head of state, let alone Russia's. But that doesn't make him ready for prime time. Which, at the rate Lieberman's thinking has progressed, may never happen.
    • John Nanasi
    • New Jersey
     
    All know that Newt was not asking who are the Palestinians. He like Tom and most others know who they are. Pre 1948 all who lived in Palestine were called Palestinian on their identity cards - the Jews and the Arabs. Nonetheless they were not Palestinians; they were Jews and Arabs. There was no country Palestine. Palestine was simply a place administered by the Ottoman Empire and later by the British Empire. Was Gingrich's statement inflammetory; probably. Was it true, certainly. Of course his statement has no affect on the 2 state scenario regardless of one's position on it's possibility or it's method of implementation. It was Newt saying we have start saying the truth to advance the peace echoing Netanyahu's remarks at the UN. The truth would also remediate the confusion of Jewish students as well as Jewish op-ed writers.
      • M. Imberti
      • Stoughton, MA
       
      " There was no country Palestine. Palestine was simply a place administered by the Ottoman Empire and later by the British Empire"

      By your reasoning, pre-1948 there was no country "Israel", nor a people called Israelis. In fact, the great majority were Jews who came from Europe after WW2, and only turned into Israelis after the state was created. Which, by the way, so does any Jew moving to Israel, regardless of what country he/she comes from. Somone might conclude that Israelis are invented, too.
  223.  
    I have a simple motto when it comes to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict: never forget that Palestinians deny Israel the right to exist.
    1.  
      The Palestinians have denied Israel's right to exist as a Jewish state. But Israel has denied that Palestinians have a right to exist as a State. Why is this surprising?
      • Stephanie G
      • Boston, MA
       
      I think that's a terribly simplistic view, since they have reversed that policy, and yet Israel continues to deny them the right to have a state.

      When viewing this conflict, if you look through the lens of a single incident, on either side, you will never be able to begin to understand the whole. Both sides are wrong, and both sides are right. That's why this is complicated, not simple.

      The situation has put Israelis in an awkward place, constantly defending their actions before they can come to terms with what they've done. I don't think this is what most Israelis want, and I wish them something better in the future, but they will have to work towards it.

      I also wonder how the Israeli lobby benefits America. I don't think it represents me, and for that reason I'm concerned that it holds so much sway over my elected officials.
    • Cbuff
    • Arusha, Tanzania
     
    I'm not confused; I am worried that Israeli politics are putting all jews in danger. The Israel lobby is a menace and does not represent me
    • pgd
    • thailand
     
    It has been clear for a long time that the absence of progress in the Middle East peace efforts is due to the fact that, both in Israel and in Palestine, the extremes hold sway .

    That US politicians, for electoral purposes, would regularly and automatically side with even the most reactionary Israeli governments' policies is grossly reprehensible and totally predictable . Iran's and Syria's support of extremist groups in Palestine is equally disgusting and equally predictable .

    That Tom Friedman's voice is that of reason and moderation is admirable . But when did reason and moderation last have a place in the Palestinian-Israeli debate ?
    • Liberty Lover
    • California
     
    "There are no Palestinians." So said Golda Meir, prime minister of Israel. There has been a decades long propaganda effort by Israel's friends to de-legitimize the ethnic identity of the Palestinians, defining them as nothing more than Arab immigrants from Arabia with no historical claim to any part of Palestine. Newt was just mouthing what he had heard from the right wing zealots.
    • Markk
    • Seattle
    NYT Pick
     
    I am pro-Israel. I want her to exist in safety and prosper as a nation among nations. For that reason, I do not support the reactionary policies of Netanyahu and the ultra-right in the Knesset.
    I am not naive - Israel will always be resented and at some risk from some factions in the Muslim countries surrounding her. That cannot be changed. What can be changed is a general rapport between Israel and her neighbors. This needs to happen through negotiation.
    It poses no risk to Israel to negotiate with Arabs who deny Israel's right to exist. Negotiation is for parties who are in disagreement. To make a pre-condition for negotiation that all participants accept Israel's right to exist is, in reality, a guarantee there will be no negotiations. Warring factions are not dangerous to each other at a conference table. Until they face each other in negotiation, no one's stance on Israel's right to exist (or anything else) will change.
    Neither Gingrich nor Romney are friends of Israel. Their course of action would continue escalating unending conflict between Israel and her neighbors.
    • Shalom Freedman
    • Jerusalem Israel
     
    Tom Friedman should not be guessing. His assertion that the majority of Americans are drifting away from Israel should be backed up by evidence. This is a claim which has been long made. But there is of evidence which says precisely the opposite.
  229.  
    Amen. As well they should be! Let us have faith that President Obama is re-elected!
  230. NYT Pick
     
    Confused is the right word to describe how I feel about this situation. I am a student studying abroad in Israel, and while I call myself a zionist, I find myself increasingly worried about the direction that this country is moving in. When Jerusalem bans advertisements depicting women or when the IDF prevents Palestinians from leaving their villages during Jewish holidays, it becomes increasingly hard to defend against those who question Israel's legitimacy. I am also find myself embarrassed when I see fellow Jews attacking Arab villages or military bases (as of this past weekend).

    I am not naive enough to believe that if we give up the West Bank (where I was this past weekend), the situation will go away and that the Palestinians will accept Israel. I really do not have an answer. But I know that we are not moving in the right direction, and that peace will not come from Netanyahu. I am committed to the long-term stability of Israel, and I am afraid that these politicians- in Israel and the United States- are jeopardizing that future here. We need to redefine the term "pro-Israel" so that it is not synonymous with hardline military policies and violations of civil liberties.
    1.  
      And, Jeff, your thoughts, as viewed from where you are at the moment located, on 'J-Street' please.
    • Aharon Meytahl
    • Vestal, New York
    NYT Pick
     
    Newt Gingrich did not invent the question about existence of the Palestinian nation. Many Arab leaders believed that the Great Syria should include Syria, Lebanon, and the territories of the former British Mandates. King Abdullah of Jordan, a Saudi by the way, also supported the idea of Great Syria provided that he would become its King. In 1948 Jordan annexed the West Bank. Formally Israel does not occupy a Palestinian territory but a part of Jordan. Be that as it may, speaking about invented Palestine, Newt Gingrich had his potential electorate, not necessarily Jewish, in mind. This is true however about almost every statement of all potential candidates and the incumbent President in an election year.

    If Palestine is indeed a potential nation state, it should be not only loved but treated as one by its supporters. Absence of freedom of speech, antisemitic textbooks, death penalty for selling land to Jews should concern the supporters of Palestine.

    It is hard to know whether spurn of Mr. Putin is caused by lack of democracy in Russia or by support of Mr. Avigdor Liberman. The big winner so far in the elections is the Communist Party, which is a mixture of Stalinism and nationalism. Contrary to Ms. Clinton, Europe so far did not condemn the elections in Russia. The alternative that may result from free elections could be much worse than Russia governed by a friend of Mr. Liberman.
    • Linda Milazzo
    • Los Angeles
     
    Thanks, Thomas, for speaking the truth. As an American, I'm appalled that AIPAC controlled candidates for US office are more concerned with Israel's welfare than that of the United States. It was always my belief that those serving America should serve America's interests FIRST - not those of a foreign nation - particularly a foreign nation as counter to America's interests as Israel. As a matrilineal Jew and supporter of human rights, I'm ashamed of the Israeli government's mistreatment of Palestinians and reckless incursions in the region. Sadly, the United States has enabled Israel's pernicious behavior and garnered global disfavor in the process. Fanatical ideological supporters of Israel are hurting Americans, Israelis and Palestinians and eroding any possibility of peace.
    • james
    • santa cruz
     
    I agree with Friedman that the conservative american pro-Israeli lobby is frightening. The flag-waving AIPEC, with its well-funded treasure chests and vitriolic contempt for any Palestinian interest, have conservative republicans completely in their hands. Their message is one of doom and gloom, rather than peace and solution, can be inferred from their own google listing:

    "AIPAC - AMERICA'S PRO-ISRAEL LOBBY. With Israel facing unprecedented threats, your involvement with AIPAC is more important than ever before".

    J Street on the other hand, is another american jewish lobby that is much more middle of the road, and holds out hope for a peaceful solution, as seen in their leader's response to newt's recent anti-palestinian comments, also from google:

    "J Street President Jeremy Ben-Ami released the following statement in response to Republican Presidential candidate Newt Gingrich’s recent remarks about the Palestinians: “Newt Gingrich’s comments about the Palestinian people and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict are ill-informed, irresponsible and frightening."

    It seems clear cut which side is, as Friedman's last sentence above states, "evenhandedly and objectively work(ing) to reign in the radicals on both sides and push both sides towards peace. Such an approach would truly be “pro-Israel” and “pro-Palestine.”
      • bones327
      • Miami
       
      J Street is as middle of the road as the USSR was friendly to all religions
  234.  
    Newt's and Mitt'sdeclarations re Israel should be the source of major concern to , primarily, American voters!
    Not only in that they imply an American de facto withdrawl from the role of a major power on the international arena but equally in that they plainly advocate seconding American interests to Israeli interests and the adoption of Israeli policies and designs as America's!
    • M. Kraishan
    • Kuwait
     
    Professor Newt opens the door to all kinds of virtual realities where peoples around the world are “invented.” The Kurds, the Alawites, the Berber, the Tibetans, the Copts…. are all invented people by applying his twisted logic. That’s a quick and easy method of solving America and the world’s problems. When it is too complicated, say it is invented and move on.

    He is the only genuine article of course!

    To many of us, Newt embodies the word: repugnant.
    • Ricardo
    • Cupertino, CA
     
    Truth to be told, there was never a sovereign Palestinian state. And Jerusalem was a sleepy town in a corner of the Ottoman Empire on the early 1900s, with a tiny population of Jews, Moslems, and Christians .... It wasn't until Jewish immigration from Europe that started yielding some wealth from hard labor in the fields that Arabs started flocking to the region as well. And after the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948 both Jordan and Egypt were sitting pretty on the territory that PA in theory wants to build a state - the infamous 1967 borders that include Gaza and West Bank. Only AFTER 1967 that Palestinians started demanding a home, and only because Israel took the territory over.

    So, Dr Tom Friedman, what Newt Gingrich says might not be politically correct, might not be what you want to hear, and is the last thing Obama wants to hear, and might even not be the best recipy for Peace in the Middle East, perhaps not even is best for the Israelis, but someone has to stand up and say out loud that Newt Gingrich is just telling the truth that no one (or very few) want to hear
    1.  
      First let me say that when I was about 8 years old (I am 74 now) the map in my Hebrew afterschool class labeled the area now known as Israel, as Palestine. It has been around for 3,000 years, along with ancient Jewish tribes. Remember Abraham. Secondly, let's be realistic. It no longer matters what went on years and years ago, what matters is what is happening now. The Palestinians are a people - they lived in those areas in now Israel. old great grandpas are still holding on to their deeds to their property - their farms, their grapevines. Unfortunately the two peoples who have a long history of grievances must learn to get along. How many more years of killing must we have? There are terrorists on both sides - though the Palestinians terror is government sanctioned. The Israelis are now fighting their own people. All I ever wish and pray for is Peace. Now Soon.
    • Roger
    • Norway
     
    Excellent analysis again by one who really hopes that Israel will survive. Unfortunately for Israel, time has probably run out. Outside the U.S., the over 100 countries that have recognized Palestine within the 1967 borders, have left Friedman and the U.S. behind. The mostly ex-soviet Russian speaking settlers who Lieberman represent, are so blatantly racist that the International community gags on their pronouncements. You won't find a word about it in American media, but Iceland's parliament just voted to recognize Palestine. Discussions are underway in leftwing political parties in other Western European states to do the same. And Israel should welcome this move instead of fighting it, because the alternative is no Israel at all.
    • shamus271
    • Jackson Heights, NY
     
    This was an extremely uplifting article. Mr. Friedman is 100% correct about Congress. .I am pleased that he sees the Congressional slobberfest with Netanyahu and the encore by the GOP presidential contenders for what ther are: disgraceful. These events highlight the real reason we do not have peace in the Middle East and we never will as long as our "leaders" remain pathetically indentured servants to a foreign lobby. When it comes Mideast policy, long gone are the days when we could expect Congress to put US interests ahead of those of Israel. It is approaching the point where Congress is actually giving prostitution a bad name!

    Ask to Friedman's points about "confusion," there shouldn't be any: the present policies of the Israeli government are unmistakable. Those of us who have any familiarity with Netanyahu and his family background know that he has absolutely no intention of ever making peace with the Palestinians.
    .
    When it comes to shared values, we have less and less in common with the majority of Israelis every day. It is time for Americans to wake up to that fact.
    1.  
      Actually we have a great deal in common with at least half of all Israelis. They are quite a divided country much like our extreme, right wing conservatives, and more progressive, liberals, and middle-of-the-roaders. People should read more, study more, talk more to many sources including Israelis who actually live there. This is a democratic country struggling against an insular, narrow-minded, group of ultra-orthodox Jews who are fighting against more ordinary Israelis - Much like the problems here in Rockland County, Town of Ramapo, which has a giant Hasidic population causing many problems. There are no easy and quick answers - and not enough people understand the complex facts of the matter.
  239.  
    There are two important things about Israel, Americans need to understand.

    The first is the make-up of American Israeli lobby. There are 5 million American Jews and 20 million Evangelical Christians. The former is dominated by Diaspora Jews; not Zionists. Diaspora Jews believe that immigration, before and after the Temple fell in 70 AD, was God's plan to spread the faith and assimilate. Zionists believe that faith can't be separated from geography. On the other hand, Evangelical Christians, strongly believe in the literal interpretation of the Old Testament. These Christians believe they can't be "saved" until all Jews are allowed to return to Israel.

    The second thing is Israel started out as a young naive democracy. But today their demographics have changed dramatically. They may fear "bomb throwing Palestinians" but they are more fearful of Israeli Arabs getting an electoral majority in the future. Even with a wall, Israeli Arabs have more children, than Jewish Arabs. That leaves them with two options: let nature take its course or turn into a faux-democracy like Russia, with repression and gulags to keep the "wrong people from voting".

    Either way the play does not end well. History is not kind on regimes that try to engineer their survival by coercion. And sticking to a legal democracy leads to an end of Zionism. The former ends in a bang and the latter ends in a whimper.

    Vitriol pandering by American politicians will have no impact on the ending of the Zionist play.
    1.  
      They are also fearful of their ultra-extreme religious Jewish groups who are undemocratic and demanding that everyone live the way the live - they believe the only true way. - Women, modestly dressed, sit in the back of the bus.!!! Do you want this for your country - I sure don't want it here or in Israel.
    • Ricardo
    • Cupertino, CA
     
    Truth to be told, there was never a sovereign Palestinian state. And Jerusalem was a sleepy town in a corner of the Ottoman Empire on the early 1900s, with a tiny population of Jews, Moslems, and Christians .... It wasn't until Jewish immigration from Europe that started yielding some wealth from hard labor in the fields that Arabs started flocking to the region as well. And after the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948 both Jordan and Egypt were sitting pretty on the territory that PA in theory wants to build a state - the infamous 1967 borders that include Gaza and West Bank. Only AFTER 1967 that Palestinians started demanding a home, and only because Israel took the territory over.

    So, Dr Tom Friedman, what Newt Gingrich says might not be politically correct, might not be what you want to hear, and is the last thing Obama wants to hear, and might even not be the best recipy for Peace in the Middle East, perhaps not even is best for the Israelis, but someone has to stand up and say out loud that Newt Gingrich is just telling the truth that no one (or very few) want to hear.
    • Robert B
    • Brooklyn, NY
     
    Friedman raises important issue but his analysis is flawed. He falls into a trap that he, of great Middle East experience, should avoid. He oversimplifies and conflates. He lambasts Republican Presidential candidates for seemingly cynical, possibly venal, and certainly unrealistic views of the status of Palestinians and seamlessly segues into the sins committed by diverse Israeli factions which he shoehorns into a centralized Israeli right-wing. Friedman knows these factions run the range from secular hawks, to religious Ashkenazim, to equally religious Sephardim, and what they have most in common is mutual contempt. He points to some overarching and unified conservative Israeli agenda when in reality these are piecemeal initiatives by diverse and fractious groups. This doesn't mean there is not a real threat to democratic Israeli institutions; but it is certainly not a result of central planning or an effort to destroy progressive Israeli identity via a unified cultural war. In conflating the rhetoric of Republican candidates and initiatives by disparate Israeli groups Friedman draws inaccurate and dangerous conclusions. The rhetoric of American right wing politicians is meant to appeal primarily to Christian Evangelicals, not to American Jews or to Israelis. The upshot of Friedman's argument is that Israel's right wing elements make gains because of American demagogues while the Israeli right has a large impact on U.S. rhetoric. Neither is true nor causally connected.
    • edbaker1
    • Madrid, Spain
     
    Cynicism aside, and it is no easy task to set it aside, when Newt Gingrich states that the Palestinians are an invented people is is doing nothing but repeating a slur that the Israeli right has been retailing for decades.
    • Notasheep
    • Springfield, Missouri
     
    Demography dooms Israel from within, e.g., very high birth rates of Israeli Arabs and, especially, of non-productive and aggressive fundamentalist Jews, I only pray their American promoters, who who appear to care more about a foreign country than about our own country's security, lose their stranglehold on our political process before that, so we won't be dragged by their ultraconservatives into World War III.
  244.  
    How will the Israelis and Palestinians ever reconcile?

    One has its religion telling them they're eternally entitled to that land, and the other has generations of living memory to prove otherwise.

    Let's say the God of Abraham were to grant Israeli rightwing hardliners their wish and the Palestinians were to disappear, become the "mythic people" they assert they are...then what?

    Israel would still be smack in the middle of a hostile region amid a three-way nuclear arms race.

    There is no way this will not end badly for Israel.

    Israel was a great idea in the wake of WW2 and remains a great idea, today...but it would have much better to have given the Jews the most fertile third of Bavaria in way of reparations or half of Long Island as an act of American munificence, than going with the Biblical solution.

    WW2 might have ended with its most poignant epilogue in the [over-]Promised Land...but there's a material chance WW3 might have its birth smack dab in the same spot.

    Also, long-term, as American voter demographics continue to change, will Israel be able to count on continued, unquestioning American patronage?

    Eek.
    • Anne
    • Washington
     
    Israel is headed in the wrong direction. Saying so in public is not anti-semitism. Bet you will get blasted for this, however.

    Some Jews cannot tolerate even a whiff of criticism of Israel in ordinary conversation. This blind support doesn't do either our country or Israel any lasting good.

    Thanks for pointing ths out so eloquently.
    • Neighbour
    • U.S.
     
    I'm an American and an Israeli, and If Friedman is recommending Gideon Levy from Ha'aretz it shows how much he's out of touch with Israel. Few Israelis read Ha'aretz and even fewer read or like Levy's pro-Palestinian screeds. He's the favorite of the anti-Israel Left.
    I don't recall Friedman ever going after the Palestinians like this for their refusal to recognize Israel as a Jewish State.
    And saying that the Israeli PM's ovation in Congress was "bought and paid for by the Israel lobby" approaches anti-Semitism. Yes, I said the horrible word. Friedman conjures a rich contolling image that echoes the Protocals of the Elders of Zion. But he also insults the American people who, polls show, support Israel in 4 to 1 or larger margins. And Congress represents their views. Why do Members of Congress who have few Jewish constituents and receive no political contributions from pro-Israel sources support Israel? Because it's in American interest.
    • AJC
    • Manila
     
    All Settlements are illegal. Israel's problem is that it's government gets to decide what is "illegal" and what is "legal".

    This results in the obvious action of the Settlers trying their best to get their own elected. As such, all Settlements will be legal as defined by Bibi.
  248.  
    Nice column, but I disagree that Republicans "grovel for Jewish votes." Rather, they display near-treasonous fealty towards Israel to motivate their evangelical Christian base. Your average secular Jewish voter takes a more nuanced view towards Israel than those eagerly awaiting Christ's second coming. Hard right Israelis and their sympathizers know this and generate lots of hot air regarding so-and-so's recognition of Israel: no Israel = no Jesus = no compromises.
  249. NYT Pick
     
    The moment is truly arriving when we must ask ourselves if Israel's interests - as an extension of their tortured internal politics - are diverging too dangerously against US interests. By its diplomatic recalcitrance, its militaristic actions, and its internal restrictions on the rights of non-Jews, Israel is painting itself into a corner - or should we say onto the edge of a cliff?

    I have been a strong supporter of the state of Israel's right to existence for over 40 years, but I no longer believe that it can continue to exist as a "Jewish" state. This is a 19C notion and it is leading to "ethnically pure" solutions now as it did then. It is exclusionary by nature, worsening relations with neighbors or at least locking them into permanent conflict. This will only be perpetuated by a two-state solution. I reluctantly conclude that Israel's only hope for survival is to create a bi-national state, Friedman's third option and by far the least likely.

    Reaching this conclusion has been a difficult journey for me. Indeed, I cannot even discuss these opinions in depth with my many Jewish friends, some of whom suspect that I am an anti-semite or too "radical" if I attempt to even broach the subject - when we have been friends in some cases for 50 years. This kind of polarization is unhealthy, precisely the political geography that demagogues like Gingrich find so inviting.
    • Kevin Rothstein
    • New York
    • Trusted
     
    The problems that Israel face go back to its birth and have never been resolved. The far right in Israel is very similar to the far right in America. One part theocratic and one part fascist with the two parts not mutually exclusive. I applaud Mr. Friedman for having the courage to write the truth, even at the expense of being labeled a 'self-hating Jew' by the same group who condemned President Obama for purely ideological reasons. I believe the Israelis and Palestinians want peace. On what grounds and to whose benefit is the stumbling block. Since the Israeli government is based on the parliamentary system, Netanyahu has had to keep together his far right and religious allies or risk winding up like Yitzhak Rabin. I understand that since its infancy, Israel has had to fight for its survival and has been threatened by its neighbors with extinction; however, that threat has been used by religious and political ultra-nationalists as an excuse to occupy and oppress another nationality. Considering the fact that the state of Israel was created as a safe haven for Jews from Europe and other countries who were the victims of genocide, the irony of Israel's West Bank occupation is a tragedy of Shakespearean proportions. For my fellow American Jews who fail to understand and appreciate the irony, I can only hang my head in shame. Yes, Einstein was a Jew; and Werner van Braun was a rocket scientist.
      • bones327
      • Miami
       
      the "palestinians" have been offered peace and their own state by Israel since the 1990s, and certainly by Ehud Barak and Bill Clinton in 2000.

      Have they accepted this state, which they say they want? No, they have not.

      Why have they not accepted the state they say they want, living in peace, side by side with Israel? Because they do not accept the existence of the Jewish state as a neighbor.
      • Kevin Rothstein
      • New York
      • Trusted
       
      They want Jerusalem as their capitol and the settlements to be abandoned. Other than that, you are correct.
    3.  
      Beautifully said. Thank you!
    • Phyllis Kahan, Ph.D.
    • New York, NY
     
    You know, Tom, why the heck don't you leave Israel alone? Instead of trying to prove what a balanced, fair, impartial and judicious observer you are -- as opposed to the Yiddish stereotype of total emotional chest-beating of the old immigrant Jews -- the ones, who like Philip Roth's grandmother, I think, interpreted all of history, in terms of whether it was "good for the Jews or bad for the Jews," it would be refreshing if you, as a Jew, just exhibited a little love and prejudice toward Israek, instead of being, or trying to be so "even-handed." [I know, you would probably say that this is the crux of your article, love for the Jews and whether it is good or bad for them.] Try a little "cavanah" for once [Hebrew for heartfelt passion and dedication] to your own people. Be a little prejudiced in their behalf. And realize that the sophomoric simplicity and modern impartialty that you try to bring when writing about Israel deny a real grasp of its complex history or its archetypal emotional character. Leave the little country alone to work out its own problems. And love the Jews a little bit more than the Palestinians.
      • Yael Liber
      • Boca Raton
       
      Thank you much Phylis for standing by our people and for putting Tom Friedman in his rightful place. I stopped reading his column a long time ago.

      Liberals express what they consider forward-thinking opinions by appalingly simplifying reality on the ground. Israel has fought for its existence each day of its 63 years of existence, and has had a need for a true friend on its side. The entire nation is behind the IDF and justifies its neccessary actions to protect the citizens and ensure a continuation of Israel's exsitence. If you live in that country you realize the strength it takes to withstand a relentless barrage of condemnation by liberals such as Mr Friendman, and do what is necessary and right.
      • Jack
      • Las Vegas
       
      Just because Israel has a "complex history" and "emotional character" does not mean it can deny millions of people right to have their homeland. If Israel does not change the direction it is going, someday the ineffective rockets will become nuclear weapons exploding on Tel Aviv. Don't think bombing Iran will stop that. Compromised solution is the the only way for all.
    • johndann
    • vancouver
     
    Thomas,I remember first hearing about the conflict in Palestine/Israel, now forty years later I still hear about every day. In a few days it is the third anniversary of the invasion of Gaza with a thousand people killed. Over the decades this conflict has encomapssed the entire world in a quagmire. It has gone on from WWII through the Korean War, through the Vietnam war, through Gulf War I and Gulf War II.
    Israel has been supported by the west with money, weapons, technology and etc. The Palestinans have nothing, they are villified as terrorists, virtually imprisoned in Gaza . WB land has been stollen, homes destroyed, livelyhood destroyed, and lives and life occupied.

    Your article is commendable. You are beginning to see with unveilled eyes. But ask yourself this: if you were a twenty year old hearing about this for the first time now, where would things will stand in 40 years time?

    If things do not change drastically, if people do not see and speak the truth about what is happening, then in 40 years the Palestinians in the WB will be in a walled ghetto, Gaza will be even more a living hell than it is today and the US and Israel will be villified by much of world.

    To confused Israel I say: don't worry about yourself, Gasans need your help. Build a school,hospital, greenhouse, plant a tree, give them your love your respect. You who have food, warmth and succour to spare, share it with your Palestinian brothers and sisters. Peace! If not, let us jelp them.
    1.  
      I wouldn't say "Palestinians have nothing". They get arms and weapons and other kinds of assistance from many countries in the middle east and even beyond. Look at these recent ships trying to bring supplies and maybe even more weapons, to Gaza. Sure, the Israeli army has made mistakes - the killing of Turks on that ship - but who are we to talk - our armies, soldiers, and drones have made plenty of mistakes too. And by the way, I often read of Israeli hospitals helping sick Palestinians and their children in Israeli hospitals. You need to read more in depth articles - not just the 5 minute reports on network television. And stay away from FOX News. They are so biased, it's disgusting.
      • emguttcb
      • Cincinnati, Ohio
       
      Don't forget that Gaza has a border with Egypt. Why doesn't Egypt accept these Palestineans as citizens?
      And, I still haven't heard Hamas (Gaza/s governing body) agree to recognize Israel as a Jewish State.
      • Fiona
      • NY
      NYT Pick
       
      When Israel withdrew from Gaza, uprooting whole communities of Jews, and not leaving one settle or one soldier behind, it left hospitals that Israel had built, the first ever Gazan university that Israel had founded and funded, it left whole rows of beautiful houses that used to belong to the Jewish residents there. It also left greenhouses, the very same that had netted millions of dollars to Israeli farmers there. The greenhouses were torched within hours of Israeli retreat, the University teaches hatred, the houses were taken by the Hamas security officers and the hospital was where the Hamas leadership hid during Israeli campaign on Gaza, when Hamas used to shell Israeli towns daily, and almost on an hourly basis. Peace? - Please examine the facts and see who is against it, exactly.
    • Yisrael Medad
    • Shiloh, Israel
     
    Friedman allows but 3 options to Israel: permanent deprivation of Israeli citizenship for Judea & Samaria Arabs (which they had and could easily rebecome Jordanians which they were until 1988) which is not apartheid or to evict them through ethnic cleansing which is what the Arabs did to Jews between 1920-1948 and want to repeat (and which didn't work in Gaza) or treat them as Israeli citizens and bring about a binational state. What happened to autonomy which Pres. Carter signed on to with Begin and Sadat? And with demographic trends, binationalism is fading.
    He notes that persons attacked an Israeli army base but that is done all over including recently in Bangor. That is upsetting but not unusual. As for "democracy in danger", to overly trust Gideon Levy, who is not a liberal but a non-Zionist progressive, is not being a friend of Israel. Tom has been "loving" Israel since his student days in the radical "Breirah" group which sought to undermine Israel's security, so let's temper that - as what it really is: "tough love" and disappreciation.

    Yes, there is competition for social, cultural and economic fairness, pluralism and stability in Israel, all the while under real security threats and a grand identity theft move by its "peace partner" who wishes to deny Jewish history and heritage on Jerusalem's Temple Mount, Rachel's Tomb, Hebron's Patriarch Cave and Shiloh's Tabernacle site in addition to those bothersome rockets. That's what's tough.
    • Skeptical
    • New York
     
    Friedman's editorial strikes me as being one of the most accurate and balanced portrayals of Middle East politics seen in a long time. Well done.
    • Haight St. Landlord
    • San Francisco, CA
     
    Indulging the Israeli right will inevitably lead to a two-state solution: Gaza on one side, the rest of Mandate Palestine on the other. Likud's hope is that by stalling the peace process and speeding settlement, Jews will achieve a majority in a new greater Israel, as well as system of apartheid supported by majority rule: a Jewish democratic state.
    • Ricki bobbi
    • Midwest
     
    Wow, even a plutocratic, mono-maniacal, weak liberal windbag like Friedman is starting to get sick of unconditional/unquestioning support of all things Israel. Its about time, what does it take, this PEP (progressive except palestine) sensibility is helping no one. The right wingers aren't the problem, they're a symptom. In one hundred years, historians will ask how this little rump of a country had so much influence on the world stage, how its weird exceptionalism was hardly questioned. (nuclear weapons, a jewish democracy, its apartheid settler colonialism). As a jew, I have strongly resented how zionism and Israel have completely interpenetrated my cultural and religious sensibilities. Why should there be anything but a secular democracy in the Israel/Palestine, for all its people? This seems obvious, warts and all, and it will eventually happen, grudgingly perhaps, but inevitably.
      • Yoda
      • DC
       
      "Why should there be anything but a secular democracy in the Israel/Palestine, for all its people?"

      This is a very easy question to answer - Israel is a Jewish state (not Christian, not Muslim, not Hinud, etc. but Jewish)!!
    • Maryanne Conheim
    • Philadelphia
     
    Bravo! Plenty of thinking American Jews find Newt's and Mitt's groveling for Jewish votes as cringeworthy as you do. One can only hope that those who have succumbed to the misguided blandishments of these two panderers will wake up, read the Times' Op Ed page, and smell the coffee.
    • LJ
    • London
     
    Why would any American be confused by any of this behaviour? This is simply the logical conclusion of the establishment of the State of Israel.

    The same self-imposed exclusionism, exceptionalism and sense of cultural and religious supremacy has always characterised a small part of the Jewish community. This has seen them ostracised and occasionally victimised wherever they have lived, all throughout history.

    Now they've finally got a state where they can run things and we're surprised that they're unpleasant, bullying, heavy-handed and illiberal? What right do we have to surprise or confusion?
    • MI
    • NYC
     
    Confusing? There is nothing confusing at all about the situation.
    • RK
    • NJ
     
    I suggest that Friedman read Joan Peter's monumental work on Palestinian identity. The fact is that it is certainly a made up identity. Arabs, relatively recently emigrating to Palestine from neighboring countries, have invented this nationality called Palestinian. Only Jews are Palestinians, and this is from 3,000 years of living and dying for the land of Israel. Bravo to Newt for bravely pointing this out.
      • sallyb
      • chicagoIL
       
      What about those of us in the US? Are we not also a 'made-up identity?' Most of us are not indigenously American.
      • Bathsheba Robie
      • New England
       
      More accurately,

      "Jews relatively recently emigrating to Israel, a land virtually devoid of Jews for centuries, have invented this nationality called Israeli.Only people who have lived in the land now called Israel for generations are Palestinians."

      Please explain the anomalous statement that Jews have been dying for 3,000 years for "Israel", an invented state created by the UN in 1948.
  261.  
    The majority of this represents thoughts on American Jewish politics and has not been my concern for decades.
    However, one misconception regarding Israeli journalism should be corrected.
    Gideon Levy, the Ha-Aretz columnist is not "a powerful liberal voice". He is not liberal but "radical" and mostly radically against mainstream Zionism. He is certainly not "powerful" in Israel. He is rather on the fringes, even in Israel, except in radical left-wing circles.
    What he does do is confuse, and confuse mostly those outside of Israel who are not aware of the intracicies of israeli journalsim, nor of the relatively low standards, even of what are considered top-notch journalists or columnists. Facts (without politics) are not their daily fare.
    I remember I lecture of his at "Limmud" in the UK when Mr. Levy said to his UK-Jewish audience that security issues were really not that serious and the situation could be described as "normal". He brushed aside my querry as to how normal is it when your neighbor from time to time fires missiles at you.
    A good deal of what Mr. Friedman describes in Israel now is disturbing, but can mostly be described as "stupidity". It is not "w-a-r" or "war", except perhaps in Mr. Levy's mind. Alas, we know too well what real war is.
      • BC
      • Boca Raton, FL
       
      I agree, Friedman, Cohen and Kristof seem only to read Haaretz which is really published for an international audience lusting after Israeli anti-Israel 'news'. It's the equivalent of reading The Nation or Counterpunch as the only representation of American politics.
    • A.K
    • Denver
     
    What American Israelis see is that Newt does not have the best interests of Israel at heart- but only his own interests. Similarly the Republican Party cynically abuses the Israel lobby to flash its religious credibility to a very credulous part of its voting base while supporting the oil lobby whose profits fund Israel's enemies. It is the Israel lobby who is being used... and they believe they are in charge! Conservatives have much more in common with those who ejected Jews from their communities throughout the ages and only asked them to return when they desperately needed their skills and money.
  263.  
    I have lived in Israel for 5 years and I go there on the average of once every two years. I never go to Israel as a tourist. I go there to work or do serious things. I did research for one year in Israel and went to professional school in Israel for 4 years.

    The "Palestinians" have a homeland. It is Israel. They need to become loyal Israeli citizens and Israeli Jews need to wake up and start talking to the Arabs living right next to them and also rediscover the synagogue, because Israel, even as it stands today is largely an anti-religious country full of Jews who don't care anything for their heritage and Arabs who, ironically, are extremely good at inventing their own.

    As far as I am concerned, everyone living in Israel should shut up and just get along for mutual benefit. At their core, Israeli Jews are nice people and at their core Israeli Arabs are nice people.

    By the way, Netanyahu is very good for Israel. Why? Because he only cares about Israel and not what the EU or the US thinks. Friedman needs to respect the guy and stop bashing him.
  264.  
    See Dowd's column. It appears that deep-down Gingrich is just a science fiction writer. In that mode, he HAS to invent people and it comes to him naturally to call real people 'invented'.

    I a afraid, however, that some Jewish settlers see them the same way. Do they deserve a presidential contender that supports their point of view? Perhaps.

    Am I correct understanding that some Jewish settlers would like to see all pesky Arabs moving to Jordan or beyond? Difficult to understand the finer points of a sizeable minority of Israelis with a major influence on Israeli government.
      • bones327
      • Miami
       
      I guess you do not believe what the "palestinian" people say about themselves. In March, 1977, Zuheir Mohsen, a leader of the PLO Executive Committee gave an interview to the Dutch newspaper, Trouw. This is what he said:

      The Palestinian people does not exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct Palestinian people to oppose Zionism.

      For tactical reasons, Jordan, which is a sovereign state with defined borders, cannot raise claims to Haifa and Jaffa, while as a Palestinian, I can undoubtedly demand Haifa, Jaffa, Beer-Sheva and Jerusalem. However, the moment we reclaim our right to all of Palestine, we will not wait even a minute to unite Palestine and Jordan.
  265.  
    You can say anything you want to say, Mr. Friedman about Israel, Palestine, Gingrich, American Jews (who don't always understand where their interests lie). There is one major barrier to any piece agreement between Israel and Palestine: Palestinians refuse to accept the existence of Israel. With this huge barrier, there can never be any negotiations, whoever is Israel's Prime Minister, or PLO leader. How can you possibly negotiate with a party that wants to destroy you? So get back to basics, Mr. Friedman and look at things realistically. You can't negotiate with people who want to erase you from the map.
      • John W.
      • Katrina coast
       
      So, waht's your solution? Keep the Palestinians under occupation until they agree to (a) emigrate, or (b) become Israeli second-tier citizens with no civil rights? If you don't like the 2-state solution, remember that time & demographics are on the side of the Palestinians.
    • Val
    • Marin County, CA
     
    At this point it seems that only AIPAC has the clout to make the Israeli government see reason. I would love to see it use its influence to push for a sensible solution to the Palestinian problem and to push those Orthodox right-wing extremists, who are the cause of most problems, out of the government .

    During the recent debacle with the "come home to Israel before you lose your Jewish values" ads developed by Israel's government, we saw that the only Americans they will listen to are members of AIPAC. I hope they start to use their clout on other issues as well and get Israel out of this tragic impasse over the Palestinian state, as it is in Israel's self interest to do so as soon as possible.
    • garyr
    • california
     
    Yes Mr. Friedman it is obvious that Israel has internal problems of its own but that doesn't answer the question of whether the Palestinians are really a people unto themselves or are they just the rejected offspring of many Arab nations? You seem to make fun of Newt for suggesting this but don't really shine any light or offer a refutation. I would like the Palestinians to get their own state just so they would no longer have Israel to blame for their economic problems and to see whether they could cobble together an effective government. I'm not betting that these West Bank and Gaza Palestinians will be very successful in creating a country that infuses their citizens with rights and privileges and economic goodnesses or whether they will continue to be an angry and violent people.
    • lofie
    • Fairfield, Connecticut
    NYT Pick
     
    I am a lifelong conservative Republican, some might say a right-winger who disagrees with most of President Obama’s policies but I support what I know of his Middle East policy. To be sure I am not happy with our support of a country that essentially imprisons several million people. But more importantly perhaps I am troubled by the opportunities being lost by the Israelis to become the catalyst to help their neighbors do for them what the Israelis have done for Israelis. Sure it will take a century or more to achieve. But 60 years has now been wasted. The Israelis are a talented people who can emerge as leaders for good if only they will realize that military force is their worst enemy. They have the intellectual power to do diplomatically what Great Britain, a country the size of Oregon has done i.e., maintained its position as a respected world power in spite of its relatively small size.

    I would normally have a knee-jerk reaction and fall in line behind Newt Gingrich. However his “invented people” statement might reflect something more than election rhetoric. A United States policy that ignores Palestinian rights will cause endless trouble for the United States and a scar on the national conscience. Incredible as it sounds to me, Newt, my once-hero has lost my vote.
    • Another Voice
    • NJ
    NYT Pick
     
    Friedman is correct about the choices Israel faces under the Gingrich plan. Where is it written that you have to be part of a "people" (invented or not) to be entitled to human and civil rights, to say nothing of a little respect for your personal self-identification and culture?
    • Nikkei
    • Montreal, Quebec
    NYT Pick
     
    Unfortunately, neither Newt nor Mitt is in the least bit concerned by the long term damage that might be caused by shameless short-term pandering to the Israel lobby. To paraphrase Upton SInclair, it's hard to get a Republican presidential wannabe to understand something if his prospects in the upcoming primaries depends on him not understanding it.
    • GRH
    • New England
     
    Sadly, thanks to the actions of the last decade, including GW's shameless enabling and endless kow-towing, the time for a two-state solution is past. Israel has lost that opportunity through its actions. The prized Israeli "facts on the ground" have now made it clear that the only solution is one single democratic state with equal rights for ALL of the people in the land Israel controls. Many Americans are finally waking up to this. The apartheid smears are ugly if you ever traveled to South Africa in the 80's or before but unfortunately not too far off now. Too bad GW didn't have the backbone or guidance of his dad and James Baker.
  272.  
    While Romney's pandering is par for the course for him, I would have thought Gingrich would be better informed about what is going on in Israel, about the things you described.
    • Gaston
    • San Francisco
     
    To me the most disturbing thing about Mr.Gingrich's remark is that it verges on the anti-Semitic by the contempt it shows for the intelligence of Jewish people.

    Newt, Einstein was a Jew; they are not a stupid people; show them a little respect.
  274.  
    It's time to admit it. The majority of the “average Moshes and Shoshes “ in Israel acquiesce to all the damaging elements that are eroding Israeli democracy and alienating world support, whether Gentile or Jewish. The lack of outrage against the Lieberman Doctrines, the strengthening of the religious parties efforts to create a theocracy bit by bit through laws or quiet coercion of business practices , the right wing nationalist terrorism permeating throughout the country - all these maladies are accepted by the vast majority of Israelis , today. To be liberal and speak your mind in Israel is becoming rare and often dangerous...........
    • RF
    • Maryland
     
    Always amusing to hear the whining and criticism of Israel from left wing American Jews. Every transgression by Israel, large and small, every questionable action by even the smallest segments of the population is trotted out for condemnation. But somehow the big picture is usually ignored: the Palestinians in particular and the Arabs in general want Israel to be destroyed and will use any violent means they can to accomplish that end. And the left wing American Jews from 5,000 miles away appear to have no trouble advising the Israelis how to behave and what would really be in the best interests of Israel.
...and I am Sid Harth@sidileaks.net
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