Lessons From Shfar’Am: Looking Toward a New Israel
Lessons From Shfar’Am: Looking Toward a New Israel
Jerusalem, Israel
August 9, 2005
Last Thursday, 19 year old Israeli Eden Natan-Zada boarded bus number 165 at the central station in Haifa, Israel’s third largest city. He wore an Israeli army uniform and carried an Israeli Army issued M-16. The young man probably started his day in his adopted home in the Israeli settlement of Tapuah in the west bank. The bus headed toward the Israeli Arab town of Shfar’Am in the Western Galilee.
As the bus entered Shfar’Am, Natan-Zada lifted his gun and began to shoot. Four were killed including the bus driver. At least 20 others were seriously wounded as the bullets shattered many of the windows and shards of glass flew everywhere. By the time the shooting ended a crowd began to gather at the bus. Within a short amount of time, the crowd stormed the bus and beat Natan-Zada to death.
Sh’far Am is located in Israel proper. That is, it is not on land captured by Israel in the 1967, six day war, and is not part of what is formally considered Occupied Territory by mainstream Israelis and Pealestinians. Shfar’Am is an ancient Gallilean city. It is mentioned in the Talmud and was even the seat of the SanHedrin (The Jewish high court) in the second century. Today, there are approximately 27,000 Arab inhabitants of Shfar’Am, and the population is a co-existing mosaic of Christians, Muslims, and Druze.
Eden Natan-Zada had been AWOL from the Israeli army for at least one month. Army representatives had looked for him at his parents’ home but, apparently did not consider him enough of a risk to make his capture a priority. This is only one of many questions that need answering. It is not at all clear why the IDF did not make more of an effort to at least recover the IDF issued M-16 in Natan-Zada’s possession. It is also unclear if the lynch could have been prevented?
While Natan-Zada was obviously deranged and the IDF should initiate a series of investigations so as to minimize the possibility of this recurring, the real question about this terrible incident is how this kind of extremist activity is allowed to exist in Israeli society?
Natan-Zada lived in the extreme right-wing settlement of Tapuah for approximately two years. Tapuah, Hebrew for “apple,” is a notorious haven for ultra right-wing Jewish settlers. Among the people who live there are members of the outlawed Kahane Chai party. Kahane Chai was outlawed as a terrorist group by the Israeli government in 1994. Natan-Zada was a troubled Israeli youth who began to find meaning in the hateful words of settlers from Tapuah that he read on the internet in chat rooms. They essentially recruited him to come to live in Tapuah and prepared him to carry out this attack. Sound familiar? To me it sounds an awful lot like the suicide bombers in London last month who went to Pakistan to receive training.
This is the time to call a spade a spade. There is a paradox that has been at play in Israeli society for years. The paradox lies in the fact that although the majority of Israelis have long viewed land for peace as an acceptable and viable exchange with the Palestinians, this same majority has delayed and complicated such an exchange by fostering the development of the settlements.
For decades, Israeli Prime Ministers and the IDF have built up their position in eventual negotiations with the Palestinians by creating Jewish facts on the ground in the form of building settlement after settlement in the West Bank and Gaza. While some Israelis moved to the settlements to cash in on government offered economic incentives, these settlements also became a safe haven for extremist Jews. Instead of rooting them out and marginalizing them, Israeli society actually lauded them as pioneers and as the frontlines of Israel’s defense.
The right-wing extremist Israeli settlers were legitimized because they were the only ones willing to leave the coastal cities of Israel for the rough and tumble Occupied Territories where they became a de facto buffer between the Palestinians and the majority of Israel. All Israelis, including myself, want to protect the security of Israel and ensure the state’s eternal existence, but we have to take a hard internal look and do a lot of work in order to fulfill the promise of being a “light unto the nations.” Of course, the Palestinians have a lot of work to do as well if they are to be capable of building their own, peaceful state.
If we can learn anything from Eden Natan-Zada’s reprehensible actions it is that our own brand of extremists are no less terrorists than the Hamas suicide bombers. They believe in an ideology or theology that entitles them to take innocent life. But all of Israel shares the collective guilt for Natan-Zada’s actions. We let these people exist. We let them settle, expand, and teach hatred. The upcoming disengagement from Gaza is just the beginning of Israel’s coming to terms with the unfortunate expansionist mistakes of the past. Yes, the extremists on both sides of the conflict must be eliminated, but ultimately, all of Israeli society will have to bite its collective lip and accept blame for letting our own extremists exist in the first place.
Jerusalem, Israel
August 9, 2005
Last Thursday, 19 year old Israeli Eden Natan-Zada boarded bus number 165 at the central station in Haifa, Israel’s third largest city. He wore an Israeli army uniform and carried an Israeli Army issued M-16. The young man probably started his day in his adopted home in the Israeli settlement of Tapuah in the west bank. The bus headed toward the Israeli Arab town of Shfar’Am in the Western Galilee.
As the bus entered Shfar’Am, Natan-Zada lifted his gun and began to shoot. Four were killed including the bus driver. At least 20 others were seriously wounded as the bullets shattered many of the windows and shards of glass flew everywhere. By the time the shooting ended a crowd began to gather at the bus. Within a short amount of time, the crowd stormed the bus and beat Natan-Zada to death.
Sh’far Am is located in Israel proper. That is, it is not on land captured by Israel in the 1967, six day war, and is not part of what is formally considered Occupied Territory by mainstream Israelis and Pealestinians. Shfar’Am is an ancient Gallilean city. It is mentioned in the Talmud and was even the seat of the SanHedrin (The Jewish high court) in the second century. Today, there are approximately 27,000 Arab inhabitants of Shfar’Am, and the population is a co-existing mosaic of Christians, Muslims, and Druze.
Eden Natan-Zada had been AWOL from the Israeli army for at least one month. Army representatives had looked for him at his parents’ home but, apparently did not consider him enough of a risk to make his capture a priority. This is only one of many questions that need answering. It is not at all clear why the IDF did not make more of an effort to at least recover the IDF issued M-16 in Natan-Zada’s possession. It is also unclear if the lynch could have been prevented?
While Natan-Zada was obviously deranged and the IDF should initiate a series of investigations so as to minimize the possibility of this recurring, the real question about this terrible incident is how this kind of extremist activity is allowed to exist in Israeli society?
Natan-Zada lived in the extreme right-wing settlement of Tapuah for approximately two years. Tapuah, Hebrew for “apple,” is a notorious haven for ultra right-wing Jewish settlers. Among the people who live there are members of the outlawed Kahane Chai party. Kahane Chai was outlawed as a terrorist group by the Israeli government in 1994. Natan-Zada was a troubled Israeli youth who began to find meaning in the hateful words of settlers from Tapuah that he read on the internet in chat rooms. They essentially recruited him to come to live in Tapuah and prepared him to carry out this attack. Sound familiar? To me it sounds an awful lot like the suicide bombers in London last month who went to Pakistan to receive training.
This is the time to call a spade a spade. There is a paradox that has been at play in Israeli society for years. The paradox lies in the fact that although the majority of Israelis have long viewed land for peace as an acceptable and viable exchange with the Palestinians, this same majority has delayed and complicated such an exchange by fostering the development of the settlements.
For decades, Israeli Prime Ministers and the IDF have built up their position in eventual negotiations with the Palestinians by creating Jewish facts on the ground in the form of building settlement after settlement in the West Bank and Gaza. While some Israelis moved to the settlements to cash in on government offered economic incentives, these settlements also became a safe haven for extremist Jews. Instead of rooting them out and marginalizing them, Israeli society actually lauded them as pioneers and as the frontlines of Israel’s defense.
The right-wing extremist Israeli settlers were legitimized because they were the only ones willing to leave the coastal cities of Israel for the rough and tumble Occupied Territories where they became a de facto buffer between the Palestinians and the majority of Israel. All Israelis, including myself, want to protect the security of Israel and ensure the state’s eternal existence, but we have to take a hard internal look and do a lot of work in order to fulfill the promise of being a “light unto the nations.” Of course, the Palestinians have a lot of work to do as well if they are to be capable of building their own, peaceful state.
If we can learn anything from Eden Natan-Zada’s reprehensible actions it is that our own brand of extremists are no less terrorists than the Hamas suicide bombers. They believe in an ideology or theology that entitles them to take innocent life. But all of Israel shares the collective guilt for Natan-Zada’s actions. We let these people exist. We let them settle, expand, and teach hatred. The upcoming disengagement from Gaza is just the beginning of Israel’s coming to terms with the unfortunate expansionist mistakes of the past. Yes, the extremists on both sides of the conflict must be eliminated, but ultimately, all of Israeli society will have to bite its collective lip and accept blame for letting our own extremists exist in the first place.
posted by AWR | 12:28 PM
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