Understanding Israel/Palestine TEACHING RACE AND ETHNICITY Volume 3 Series Editor Patricia Leavy USA International Editorial Board Theodorea Regina Berry, Mercer University, USA Owen Crankshaw, University of Cape Town, South Africa Payi Linda Ford, Charles Darwin University, Australia Patricia Hill Collins, University of Maryland, USA Virinder Kalra, University of Manchester, UK Marvin Lynn, Indiana University, USA Nuria Rosich, Barcelona University (Emerita), Spain Beverley Anne Yamamoto, Osaka University, Japan Scope The Teaching Race and Ethnicity series publishes monographs, anthologies and reference books that deal centrally with race and/or ethnicity. The books are intended to be used in undergraduate and graduate classes across the disciplines. The series aims to promote social justice with an emphasis on multicultural, indigenous, intersectionality and critical race perspectives. Please email queries to the series editor at [email protected] Understanding Israel/Palestine Race, Nation, and Human Rights in the Conflict Eve Spangler Boston College, USA A C.I.P. record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. ISBN: 978-94-6300-086-4 (paperback) ISBN: 978-94-6300-087-1 (hardback) ISBN: 978-94-6300-088-8 (e-book) Published by: Sense Publishers, P.O. Box 21858, 3001 AW Rotterdam, The Netherlands https://www.sensepublishers.com/ Printed on acid-free paper All Rights Reserved © 2015 Sense Publishers No part of this work may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, microfilming, recording or otherwise, without written permission from the Publisher, with the exception of any material supplied specifically for the purpose of being entered and executed on a computer system, for exclusive use by the purchaser of the work. ADVANCE PRAISE FOR UNDERSTANDING ISRAEL/PALESTINE Professor Spangler, sociologist and daughter of Holocaust survivors, has written an engaging, well researched, and provocative primer on Israel/Palestine. Her intellectual foundation lies in a belief in human rights for all, but her quest for historical and political understanding takes us on a brave and intimate journey into the consequences of Jewish privilege and Jewish victimhood, the agendas of imperial superpowers, and the Palestinian struggle for self determination. With sensitivity and candor, she challenges much of the dominant paradigm, examining the “complexities” of history, Islamophobia, as well as the price of political Zionism; the consequences of building a system of total subordination of Palestinians through settlement building, expulsions, pacification, and containment with the goal of creating an exclusively Jewish state. She finds “the parallels between the Back to Africa movement and Zionism … startlingly strong” and makes it painfully obvious that the US civil rights movement has indeed done far more for African-Americans than the existence of Liberia. There are important lessons to be learned. Professor Spangler challenges the reader with humor and an abundance of historical material and analysis to examine every sacred myth from indigeniety, race, Jewish existential fears, failures of Palestinian resistance movements, and the roles of hallowed organizations such as the Jewish National Fund, Jewish Agency, and Zionist organizations that began their work in the 1890s. Ultimately, she makes the case for the inherent dangers of establishing what is essentially a militarized Jewish ghetto in historic Palestine, based on systematic ethnic cleansing and sociocide, at a time in history when de-colonization, democracy, tolerance, and universal human rights are the basic standards for a civilized and sustainable world. Alice Rothchild, MD, author of Broken Promises, Broken Dreams: Stories of Jewish and Palestinian Trauma and Resilience, On the Brink: Israel and Palestine on the Eve of the 2014 Gaza Invasion, and producer and director of the documentary film Voices Across the Divide Just as one thought that all the primers that could be written about the Palestine- Israel conflict have already been published, Dr. Spangler proves us wrong with this sharp, poignant, well-documented dossier. Much more than merely a primer for newcomers to the issue, this factually-grounded overview buries tired slogans and provides readers with all the must-needed facts to grasp the conflict and get involved. Above all, knowing this comes from a researcher who understands that the current state of affairs are being propagated “in her name” gives hope that she can light the way for others in the Jewish community to reclaim their history and sense of social justice and contribute to realizing human rights, freedom and independence for all, including all Palestinians. Sam Bahour, co-editor of Homeland: Oral Histories of Palestine and Palestinians and business development consultant and activist based in Palestine Of the tens – or is it hundreds? – of books about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that have seen the light of day in the past few years, this one is exceptional! It recounts a historical tale; it provides theoretical underpinnings; it does comparative work; it examines all the details and aspects of ongoing debates; and it brings all to life with real-life stories. Eve Spangler melds all of these together with spectacular sensibility and incomparable personal integrity. She is not afraid to take risks and to tell her readers the unpleasant, sometimes devastating, truths about the history of Zionism and the intractable, current situation in Israel-Palestine. She doesn’t hesitate to take the side of the weak against the strong and the victim against the victimizer. And she is not shy about offering an explanation and a resolution for it all through the construct of human rights. Still, the wonder of this book is its insistence on hope – not a naïve, idealistic hope, but one accompanied by a tool-box for concrete action that might right the wrongs of this tragic tale. Anat Biletzki, Professor of Philosophy, Tel Aviv University and Albert Schweitzer Professor of Philosophy, Quinnipiac University; Chairperson of B’Tselem, 2001–2006 Eve Spangler’s attempt to understand Israeli and Palestine and to convey its treacherous, incompatible histories is an ambitious and necessary work of stunning hope and humility. With a sharp pen and a keen eye, and above all with evident compassion for those about whom she writes, Spangler engages her students and readers in a journey that dares to break with familiar myths, while insisting on restoring the centrality of human rights as the universal guide to understanding the Israel/Palestine conflict. This is a work that is at once compelling and sobering. There are few like it. Irene Gendzier, Professor Emeritus Boston University This book is a monumental achievement. It sets the bar for subsequent writing on Israel and Palestine. Dr. Spangler wastes no time in addressing the core issue – Zionism – boldly naming it as the tragedy that it is, for Jews as well as for Palestinians. Cutting through the dangerous myths about Jewish safety and the equally damaging assumptions about the nature of Jewish identity that have driven attitudes and policies on Israel, Spangler takes on these core issues with stunning accuracy, directness, conciseness, and clarity. It is dawning on all but the most stubborn adherents to the vision of a Jewish national homeland that political Zionism is a tragic, if understandable, mistake, an unsustainable anachronism that is responsible for one of the most longstanding violations of human rights in the world today. As the daughter of Holocaust survivors, Spangler understands that the citizens of Israel deserve better, and that as a global community we are called, as we were when we brought South Africa into the community of nations, to liberate Jew and Palestinian alike from the evil of apartheid in our day. Besides serving up one the clearest descriptions of Zionism from the inside, Spangler’s crucial achievement is placing the Palestinian case in the global context. In her final chapter, Spangler draws the entire argument of the book together in making this fundamental point: this is a human rights issue. Her discussion of how the colonization of Palestine is a part of the nexus of globalization, and its relation to the spiral of oppression and powerlessness afflicting so much of the world today is alone worth the price of the book. This is bigger than Palestine. Spangler’s message is one that we ignore at our peril. Mark Braverman, Ph.D. Executive Director, Kairos USA. Author of Fatal Embrace: Christians, Jews and the Search for Peace in the Holy Land, and A Wall in Jerusalem: Hope, Healing and the Struggle for Justice in Israel and Palestine Oriented firmly around a human rights perspective, this book will be an extraordinary introduction to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict for many, as well as a good resource for those with some background in the conflict. This volume is both extremely well researched and admirably grounded, as much of it draws upon Spangler’s experiences taking student study groups to the occupied Palestinian territory of the West Bank and to Israel. Both the analytical sections and the narrative sections are eloquently delivered. Spangler masterfully brings many voices into the text, including those of prominent Palestinians and Israelis, Palestinians whose everyday experiences of conflict are rarely recognized, and Americans who encounter this issue from multiple perspectives and experiential