[lbo-talk] Hitching a ride on the magic carpet by Prof. Yehouda Shenhav in Ha'aretz

[Bryan Atinsky]

This is a new article from  Tel-Aviv University Professor of Sociology
Yehouda Shenhav.  He is active in the ha-Keshet ha-Democratit ha-Mizrachit
(The Mizrahi Democratic Rainbow).

http://www.hakeshet.org/


Bryan

----------------------------------------------


http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=329736&contrassID=2&su
bContrassID=15&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y

Hitching a ride on the magic carpet

Any analogy between Palestinian refugees and Jewish immigrants from Arab
lands is folly in historical and political terms

By Yehouda Shenhav

An intensive campaign to secure official political and legal recognition of
Jews from Arab lands as refugees has been going on for the past three years.
This campaign has tried to create an analogy between Palestinian refugees
and Mizrahi Jews, whose origins are in Middle Eastern countries - depicting
both groups as victims of the 1948 War of Independence. The campaign's
proponents hope their efforts will prevent conferral of what is called a
"right of return" on Palestinians, and reduce the size of the compensation
Israel is liable to be asked to pay in exchange for Palestinian property
appropriated by the state guardian of "lost" assets.

The idea of drawing this analogy constitutes a mistaken reading of history,
imprudent politics, and moral injustice.
[...]

A few months ago Dr. Avi Becker, secretary-general of the World Jewish
Congress, and Malcolm Hoenlein, executive vice chairman of the Conference of
Presidents, persuaded Prof. Irwin Cotler, a member of Canada's parliament
and an expert on international law, to join their campaign. An article by
Becker published a few weeks ago in the Hebrew edition of Haaretz (July 20),
entitled "Respect for Jews from Arab lands," constituted one step in this
public campaign. The article said little about respect for Mizrahi Jews. On
the contrary - it trampled their dignity.

[...]

The World Organization of Jews from Arab Countries (WOJAC) was founded in
the 1970s. Yigal Allon, then foreign minister, worried that WOJAC would
become a hotbed of what he called "ethnic mobilization." But WOJAC was not
formed to assist Mizrahi Jews; it was invented as a deterrent to block
claims harbored by the Palestinian national movement, particularly claims
related to compensation and the right of return.

[...]

The Arabs were not the only ones to object to the phrase. Many Zionist Jews
from around the world opposed WOJAC's initiative. Organizers of the current
campaign would be wise to study the history of WOJAC, an organization which
transmogrified over its years of activity from a Zionist to a post-Zionist
entity. It is a tale of unexpected results arising from political activity.

`We are not refugees'

The WOJAC figure who came up with the idea of "Jewish refugees" was Yaakov
Meron, head of the Justice Ministry's Arab legal affairs department. Meron
propounded the most radical thesis ever devised concerning the history of
Jews in Arab lands. He claimed Jews were expelled from Arab countries under
policies enacted in concert with Palestinian leaders - and he termed these
policies "ethnic cleansing." Vehemently opposing the dramatic Zionist
narrative, Meron claimed that Zionism had relied on romantic, borrowed
phrases ("Magic Carpet," "Operation Ezra and Nehemiah") in the description
of Mizrahi immigration waves to conceal the "fact" that Jewish migration was
the result of "Arab expulsion policy." In a bid to complete the analogy
drawn between Palestinians and Mizrahi Jews, WOJAC publicists claimed that
the Mizrahi immigrants lived in refugee camps in Israel during the 1950s
(i.e., ma'abarot or transit camps), just like the Palestinian refugees.

The organization's claims infuriated many Mizrahi Israelis who defined
themselves as Zionists. As early as 1975, at the time of WOJAC's formation,
Knesset speaker Yisrael Yeshayahu declared: "We are not refugees. [Some of
us] came to this country before the state was born. We had messianic
aspirations."

Shlomo Hillel, a government minister and an active Zionist in Iraq,
adamantly opposed the analogy: "I don't regard the departure of Jews from
Arab lands as that of refugees. They came here because they wanted to, as
Zionists."

In a Knesset hearing, Ran Cohen stated emphatically: "I have this to say: I
am not a refugee." He added: "I came at the behest of Zionism, due to the
pull that this land exerts, and due to the idea of redemption. Nobody is
going to define me as a refugee."
[...]

Any reasonable person, Zionist or non-Zionist, must acknowledge that the
analogy drawn between Palestinians and Mizrahi Jews is unfounded.
Palestinian refugees did not want to leave Palestine. Many Palestinian
communities were destroyed in 1948, and some 700,000 Palestinians were
expelled, or fled, from the borders of historic Palestine. Those who left
did not do so of their own volition.

In contrast, Jews from Arab lands came to this country under the initiative
of the State of Israel and Jewish organizations. Some came of their own free
will; others arrived against their will. Some lived comfortably and securely
in Arab lands; others suffered from fear and oppression.

The history of the "Mizrahi aliyah" (immigration to Israel) is complex, and
cannot be subsumed within a facile explanation. Many of the newcomers lost
considerable property, and there can be no question that they should be
allowed to submit individual property claims against Arab states (up to the
present day, the State of Israel and WOJAC have blocked the submission of
claims on this basis).

The unfounded, immoral analogy between Palestinian refugees and Mizrahi
immigrants needlessly embroils members of these two groups in a dispute,
degrades the dignity of many Mizrahi Jews, and harms prospects for genuine
Jewish-Arab reconciliation.

Jewish anxieties about discussing the question of 1948 are understandable.
But this question will be addressed in the future, and it is clear that any
peace agreement will have to contain a solution to the refugee problem. It's
reasonable to assume that as final status agreements between Israelis and
Palestinians are reached, an international fund will be formed with the aim
of compensating Palestinian refugees for the hardships caused them by the
establishment of the State of Israel. Israel will surely be asked to
contribute generously to such a fund.

In this connection, the idea of reducing compensation obligations by
designating Mizrahi immigrants as refugees might become very tempting. But
it is wrong to use scarecrows to chase away politically and morally valid
claims advanced by Palestinians. The "creative accounting" manipulation
concocted by the refugee analogy only adds insult to injury, and widens the
psychological gap between Jews and Palestinians. Palestinians might abandon
hopes of redeeming a right of return (as, for example, Palestinian pollster
Dr. Khalil Shikai claims); but this is not a result to be adduced via
creative accounting.

Any peace agreement must be validated by Israeli recognition of past wrongs
and suffering, and the forging of a just solution. The creative accounts
proposed by the
refugee analogy turns Israel into a morally and politically spineless
bookkeeper.

Yehouda Shenhav is a professor at Tel Aviv University and the editorof
Theory Criticism, an Israeli journal in the area of critical theory and
cultural studies.