In Praise of Cassandra Arno J. Mayer There is no understanding the infernal Israeli-Palestinian imbroglio and its world­ wide repercussions without exploring the dialectics of the vexed “Arab Question” in the unfolding and consummation of the Zionist project. For Martin Buber this ques­ tion concerned, in essence, "the relationship between Jewish settlement and Arab life, or, as it may be termed, the intra-national (intraterritorial?) basis of Jewish settlement.” From the outset in the 1890s, eminent Zionist voices in both the Diaspora and the Yishuv criticized the Zionist movement’s principal leaders for their benign but stub­ born neglect of this problem. Eventually Judah Magnes sadly concluded that the fail­ ure to make Arab-Jewish cooperation a major policy objective was Zionism’s fatal “sin of omission.” Rather than take the true measure of the majority Arab Palestinian population most Zionists of the first and early hours ignored, minimized, or distorted its reality and nature. Above all, with time they either denied the potential for an Arab awakening or dismissed Arab nationalism as an inconsequential European import. Martin Buber is emblematic of the crit­ ics—Ahad Haam, Yitzhak Epstein, Chaim Kalvarisky, Judah Magnes, Ernst Simon— who from the creation of modern Zionism insisted on the weight and urgency of the Arab Question, and on the importance of not only addressing the fears and anxieties of Arab Palestinians but also respecting their political aspirations. Buber became ever more convinced that the Arab Question would be the supreme test and ultimate “touchstone” of the Zionist project. He deplored the early settlers’ “initial failure” and “basic error”: by neglecting to “gain the confidence of the local Arabs in political and economic matters...they gave cause to be regarded as aliens, as outsiders” disinterested in “achieving mutual trust.” Buber took to task Zionism’s “political leadership” for “paying tribute to traditional colonial policy” and being “guided by inter­ Jack Sherman national considerations” to the exclusion of attention to “intra-national” affairs. On the ment will be oorrupted, maybe forever.” ing catastrophe.” He claimed that as the would be the equivalent of suicide,” largely whole, Zionist policy not only neglected This spur-of-the-moment reaction carried embodiment of “Cassandra” in their time this because “an unstable international basis Arab-Jewish relations inside Palestine but the germ of the idea that informed the foun­ “spiritual elite . not merely uttered warn­ could never make up for the missing intra­ also outside, where it failed to “relate the dation of Brit Shalom (Alliance for Peace) in ings but tried to point to a path to be fol­ national one.” Alone an “agreement between aims of the Jewish people to the geographic 1925, later renewed by Ihud (Union). The lowed, if catastrophe was to be averted.” In the two nations [in Palestine] could lead to reality in which these aims had to be real­ members and fellow travelers of these two “speeches which were so many deeds” it Jewish-Arab cooperation in the revival of the ized.” As a consequence, the nascent Jewish societies of dissidents formed an influential indicated an alternative road likely “to lead Middle East, with the Jewish partner concen­ commonwealth in Palestine became ever but powerless opposition focused on the to a Jewish revival in Palestine” and to the trated in a strong settlement in Palestine.” more “isolated from the organic context of Arab Question, and emerged as the racked “rescue of the Jewish people.” The far-sight­ Ironically, Buber expected the logic of the the Middle East, into whose awakening it conscience first of Zionism and then of ed “spiritual elite,” of which Buber was one “geopolitical situation” to favor the reemer­ [needed to] be integrated.” Israel. By virtue of being severely marginal­ of the most forceful voices, put forward a gence of “national universalism,” the Jewish As early as February 1918, Buber ized, these faithful critics were unable to program for “a bi-national state” aiming “at a people’s “unique truth,” to fire the “struggle demurred when Zionist maximalists advocat­ inspire and encourage their Palestinian and social structure based on the reality of two against the obstacles chauvinism places in ed “creating a majority [of Jews] in . Arab counterparts, who were as weak and peoples living together.” Buber and his com­ our way.” [Palestine] by all means and as quickly as beleaguered as they were themselves. panions, supported, among others, by the left In October 1948, in the midst of the first possible.” Fearing that “most of today’s lead­ In 1947-48, at the creation of the problem­ Zionist Hashomer Hatzair, advanced their bi­ Arab-Israeli war, Buber questioned the credo ing Zionists (and probably also most of those atic and contested all-Jewish state, Buber national scheme as an alternative to the that since the Jewish State had been attacked who are led) were thoroughly unrestrained reflected on the creed and role of those pub­ “Jewish state,” as envisaged by Theodor it was “engaged in a war of defense.” Ever nationalists,” he forewarned that unless “we lic intellectuals who, “equally free from the Herzl and his political heirs. They cautioned attentive to the “Other,” Buber asked, succeed in establishing an authoritative megalomania of the leaders and the giddi­ that “any [Jewish] national state in the vast [Zionist] opposition, the soul of the move­ ness of the masses, discerned the approach­ and hostile [Middle Eastern] surroundings continued on page 9 page 2 The BOOKPRESS November 2003 Penelope's Confession These poems are from a longer cycle of The Twelve Women Athena's Bargain poems called Penelope's Confession that I began writing before the invasion o f Iraq. As While she lay in a drugged sleep, She had always thought it strange the war continued, and those of us who had like a lion that has killed a farmer's ox, Athena should be a goddess opposed it felt increasingly impotent, the its chest spattered by the blood that drools of war and weaving, of craft Penelope poems were a way of keeping a from its jaws, Odysseus stood, monstrous, and carnage. Now, Penelope woke sense of outrage alive. As the poems pro­ mired in gore from feet to armpits. from muffled sleep and understood gressed, / found myself re-reading and trans­ The women were told to clean up. lating passages from the last books of the she'd been shielded from the worst. Odyssey. Some of these passages / later They entered the great hall keening, How could she look him in the eye incorporated in the poems. and wept as they dragged the bodies outside. otherwise? The slaughter of the suitors Next he told them to soak sea sponges was work of man and goddess in water, clean the tables and chairs who held the world in balance; soiled by the blood of men they'd known as lovers, boors, gluttons, friends men at war, women weaving, knitting, making and carry out the filthy scrapings from the floor. bread, babies, fingers When the room was cleaned to his satisfaction busy, eyes averted. he told his son to take twelve women Are the gods to blame? who had slept with the suitors to a narrow place A Souvenir between two buildings with no escape She'd quietly kept his house, and kill them like beasts with his sword Still fuddled by sleep preserving the wisdom of a bargain she walks out of the courtyard struck in her name. She'd surrendered to The Wooden Horse But Telemachus thought this death too clean to where the woman lie the pleasure of her craft, a mastery Before that night the horse for the women and strung a ship's hawser threaded like linnets that matched his with the bow. was a high-point of minstrel's tales, across the courtyard tightening it enough on a hunter's belt. especially that part when the belly so no foot could touch the ground. Should she have refused to keep splits and instead of entrails And as when long-winged thrushes Flies crawl in their nostrils her half of the bargain? Defied the Greeks spew out or doves come to roost in a clump and open eyes; she tastes Athena? An owl hooted into the sleeping streets bile and speaks their names outside her window, waiting and take Troy by stealth, o f bushes and find instead a snare, one by one, as if naming for a reckless mouse to move. ending the nine-year siege. the women's necks were placed in nooses were a way to keep them safe so their death would be most miserable. Penelope took the shuttle The poets don't mention the sound Their feet twitched for a while reminding him from rough hands: Hero, thrust it across the loom, the city made as it died of how they'd seemed to tread the air Hermione, Iphigenia, Eirini, back and forth, weft or the smell that rose from its streets dancing to the flute on summer nights. Phaedra, Batia,, Marpessa, piercing warp, fingers after the soldiers had satisfied Leda, Leucothea, Eryso, faithful servants of her anger. their lust for blood and turned Europa, Maia - soft souls to sex. Last night her house —Gail Holst-Warhaft was a mini-Troy, its rooms caught in the snare of their own shrieking, its killer her spouse. desires. She kneels to remove a slipper that has taken the shape Next morning by the sea of a foot, each toe mounded she raises her sticky shift as if by a burrowing mole. over her head and swims, letting her mind and body drift This is all that will last under the brightening sky.