Israel does not have an answer for the Third “Stabbing” Intifada. For that reason, it will continue.
The ease with which we have gotten used to the almost daily slaughter of Jews stems from the fact that everyone realizes that Israel does not have a solution. As a result, people relate to these murders and attempted murders as routine occurrences – like traffic accidents that can’t be prevented.
All that the Right’s dream coalition – Netanyahu, Kachlon, Bennet, and the Ultra-Orthodox – had to do when Jewish blood began to flow was wait two weeks. The Jews got used to it. Even when they have fighter jets, tanks, and submarines – they get used to it. Jews adapt quickly to bad situations.
The rightist coalitions have served the Peace Industry established by the Left in exchange for the perks associated with ruling. The arrangement works as follows:
From the establishment of the State of Israel until 1977, the Left (Mapai) determined the national agenda and also allocated comfortable jobs to government cronies. From 1977, the arrangement has been more “just”: The political agenda remains in the hands of the Left, while the jobs go to the Likud. It is a perfectly fair arrangement. The Right doesn’t have an agenda anyway, and there is no lack of comfortable government jobs for the Left.
It all works well, except for the taxpayers who have to foot the bill for all these “jobs” and “arrangements.” And except for those who were slaughtered yesterday or will be slaughtered tomorrow. In other words – one way or another – all of us.
The Peace Industry somehow managed to sweep the Second Intifada’s exploding buses and restaurants under the carpet of thousands of security guards, intelligence, soldiers, and cement roadblocks. It managed to sweep the rockets from Gaza under the carpet of advanced technology and regularly paid protection: tens of millions of shekels – in cash – and free water and electricity for Gaza. And more.
In the first two intifadas, the Peace Industry had terror organizations upon which it could apply pressure, bribe, or neutralize. There was always a return address – Hamas or some other terrorist entity with which to “do business.” As long as it was still possible to pour one trillion shekels (10 percent of the state budget annually) into maintenance of the great lie of Oslo and as long as it was still possible to practically double the defense and police budget (making the citizens poorer) in order to maintain the Peace Industry and the thick layer of cream that was built on its back over the past 20 years, the investment paid off.
Who knows? Maybe it will be possible to sweep the Stabbing Intifada under the carpet as well. Perhaps Israel’s innovative defense industry is working at this very moment on a personal Iron Dome for every citizen. Perhaps it will come up with an amazing detection system that will sense the knife as it is being pulled out, identify the Arab’s “Allah Akbar” call, smell the murderous frenzy of the murderer, instantly aim a rubber bullet at the blade, and simultaneously neutralize the martyr wannabe with non-lethal tear gas. The entire system can be installed into a fashionable hat suitable for men or women and for various sectors as well. Any businessmen interested?
What? It costs another trillion shekels. So what? Who pays for it? Shimon Peres?
This idea may sound like a joke, but it is not far-fetched at all. And if the technological possibility were to exist, Netanyahu would adopt it.
Lucky for us, there is no such option. Why does that make us lucky?
Because the more we sweep the glowing embers under the rug, the higher the price we will have to pay somewhere down the line. The piles of embers and carpets are already threatening to burn the entire house down with the fire of de-legitimization of our very existence. It is a fire that will slowly but surely eat away at our defense capabilities; it is a fire that will eat away at our territorial and essential sovereignty – at our most basic will to live.
Remember, Jews easily adapt, and every loss of sovereignty is another step on the downward path.
The grand Director of History has been very kind to us. He has brought a strange type of intifada upon us – an intifada for which the Peace Industry cannot find a technical solution (which doesn’t destroy the Oslo process). He is being kind to us when He paints us into the corner from which we will ultimately be forced to deal with the truth and provide realistic answers to the challenges that the state of Israel faces.
You surely want to ask, “What is your solution, Feiglin?”
I have a solution and I have written about it extensively. But that is not what is important now. What is important is to understand that no solution will succeed when it is built on the false premise that we set here 20 years ago with the Oslo Accords.
We will afford the human rights so easily stripped from our brothers in Gush Katif (for the sake of the “peace”) to anybody who recognizes Israeli sovereignty. But no solution for the Stabbing Intifada will succeed as long as we do not reaffirm the two basic truths that we uprooted in Oslo: One, that the Land of Israel is the Land of the Jewish Nation – exclusively. Second, that the State of Israel is the state of the Jewish Nation – exclusively.
It is not a state of all its citizens. It is not two states for two peoples. It is one state for one nation in one land. As long as we do not internalize this, we will have to keep adapting.