Generations of Hate, Generations of War
Hope for Israelis and Palestinians isn't even on the far horizon.
It was December, 1983. I was on a cold concrete floor in a dark subterranean cavern in a weapons-filled city in the north of Lebanon called Tripoli.
My assignment was to stick with Yasser Arafat, the head of the PLO, the Palestine Liberation Organization. Its very name was a statement of its mission.
Arafat was under attack. Not by his longtime enemy Israel, but by even more militant zealots from his own radical movement. Having made noises about pursuing a Palestinian state by negotiating with a Jewish foe he had once aspired to push into the sea, now he had his own people trying to kill him.
I ended up for part of that long night— trust me, not by choice— lying on the concrete floor right next to the guy. The gunfire from his adversaries above us and his defenders among us was ceaseless. I felt like anyone who got through the tunnels to kill Arafat would likely kill the rest of us too.
But, soberly cheering like I never thought I would for Yasser Arafat’s hired guns, they fought off their fellow Palestinians and the next day, under the protection of the United Nations, sailed with Arafat and thousands of his loyalists on Greek ferries from Tripoli’s port to Tunisia, where the PLO chairman then spent years in exile.
But when he came back to the Palestinian Territories, he picked up where he left off. He didn’t get where he claimed he wanted to go with a Palestinian state— as Israeli diplomat Abba Eban once said, the PLO never missed an opportunity to miss an opportunity— but looking back, that era was as close to a meeting of the minds as I think the Israelis and the Palestinians ever came.
Today, it feels like the good ol’ days.
From time to time, fear and anger in that roiled region build up and boil over. They did before that hopeful era; they have ever since. On the Palestinian side, the two intifadas— uprisings— were prototypes for the fury. Stones are thrown, fires are set, rockets are launched, bombs are dropped. Homes on both sides are destroyed. People on both sides die.
But this time, the escalation has gone beyond all that. It has gone to the ground with beatings— Arabs beating Jews, Jews beating Arabs— and more chilling, attempted lynchings by Arabs against Jews, Jews against Arabs. Even hardline Prime Minister Netanyahu acknowledged that anarchy emits from both sides: “Nothing justifies the lynching of Jews by Arabs, and nothing justifies the lynching of Arabs by Jews.” Bitter poison has poured into the streets, and it might be harder to put back in a box than an army invading the Gaza Strip.
All in all, not a good recipe for calm. Let alone co-existence. Let alone peace.
Human nature doesn’t help. For one thing, as a woman said on NPR two days ago from the war zone, “People are growing up on hate on both sides.” I didn’t even catch whether she was Arab or Jew and the thing is, it doesn’t matter. In my years of reporting from there, Palestinians and Israelis alike relied on resentments their parents had passed on to them, which their own parents had passed down to them. Those resentments dated back to the creation of Israel in 1948 and what each side did to the other. It was hostility from decades earlier, but it was in their DNA. Human nature had never let go.
What’s happening today won’t soften the hate. Human nature won’t let it. As bitterness builds, it has only one way to run.
Not a recipe for peace.
And when a population is under attack, human nature drives politics too. As I’ve seen in other countries as well, people in Israel will unify when their security— some say their very existence— is threatened. If history is any guide, Prime Minister Netanyahu— his political career already hanging on a thread for other reasons— will swing a strong sledgehammer until the threat against his country cools down.
His back is up against the wall.
Meantime on the Palestinian side, unity grows from the same perilous place. They see their security— and, as in Israel, some say their very existence— in the balance.
They have two leaders, and their backs are up against the wall too.
Arafat’s successor at the PLO, Mahmoud Abbas, is the president of the Palestinian National Authority, but he has never had the charisma within his community, nor commanded the authority, that Arafat had. Abbas urging young Palestinians to leave the streets would be wasted breath.
Which leaves the other Palestinian leader, Ismail Haniyeh, the chairman of Hamas.
Haniyeh doesn’t waste his breath. Or his bullets. His organization still aims to create a state in the existing Palestinian Territories but, as a sign that pushing Jews into the sea is still the goal, his state would fill the full measure of land between the edge of Jordan— the River Jordan— and the Mediterranean. That would mean the disappearance of Israel.
Backing from Iran will only prompt Hamas to inflame the conflict, not cool it down. What I’ve seen is, when young Palestinians feel no prospect of peace, human nature propels them toward the likes of a take-no-prisoners group like Hamas. Only yesterday, The New York Times reported, “In Jerusalem, tens of thousands of worshipers gathered at dawn outside the Aqsa Mosque, some waving Palestinian flags and a banner showing an image of Ismail Haniyeh, the leader of Hamas.”
Another non-recipe for peace.
All we can do now is watch. Watch to see what Israel does. Watch to see what the incompatible layers of Palestinian government do. Watch to see what Iran does. Watch to see what Arab states do— six now have diplomatic relations with Israel. And, watch to see what the United States does.
But no matter who gets involved, don’t bet on a rapid resolution. Now that the battles have gone to the streets, the leverage any of these parties could have on leaders and governments might be moot. Which is why we also have to watch to see what ordinary but outraged citizens do.
Those good ol’ days, those long-ago years of hope, aren’t even on the far horizon right now. It’s hard to even remember when they were.
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For almost five decades Greg Dobbs has been a correspondent for two television networks, a political columnist for The Denver Post, a moderator on Rocky Mountain PBS, and author of “Life in the Wrong Lane.” He has covered presidencies at home and international crises around the globe. He won three Emmys, and the Distinguished Service Award from the Society of Professional Journalists. Some of his essays also are published— with images— on a website he co-founded, BoomerCafe.com.
Very good , right on. you seen it all and unstand how people think and why they think one way or the other. time will tell Gil Dembo
Best article Greg... human nature again down to the streets and shelter on a concrete floor. Glad you aren’t there now... Adria