Columbus sailed to find a way to India. He did not dream of discovering a new continent. KarlMarx wanted to create a humane, egalitarian and just society, and did not dream of Stalin andthe Gulag. Theodor Herzl, the founder of Zionism, dreamed of an ideal Judenstaat, and not ofthe State of Israel that exists today, the one that is about to celebrate its 52th birthday.
Herzl scorned the idea of resurrecting the Hebrew language. He ignored the existence of thenative people of Palestine, as well as the existence of Oriental Jewry. He vowed to keep therabbis in their synagogues and the army officers in their camps. If he would rise from the deadthis week, he would be surprised, and perhaps shocked.
Indeed, if we, the generation of 1948, the founders of the state, had been told 52 years ago whatwould happen in our state in the year 2000, we would have been surprised, perhaps shocked.
We could not have dreamed that a huge Haredi (orthodox) camp would come into being and that thestate would dance to its tune. In 1948, the Haredim were a tiny, negligible and scornedminority. The other religious Jews, too, were then but a marginal, tolerated minority.Everybody knew that the Haredim had violently fought against Zionism, and that all the greatrabbis of his day – both Hassidim and anti-Hassidim – had denounced and cursed Herzl and hisfollowers.
David Ben-Gurion, the man who laid the rails on which the state is rolling until this very day,has given the Haredim many “presents” (exemption from the draft, independent schools etc.).This generosity stemmed from the belief that the religious Jews posed only a temporaryproblem, that this irritation would disappear in time by itself. Indeed, we all thought so. Inour eyes, Jewish religion was a matter for old people. The old ones would die and the problemwould go away. After all, it was unthinkable that healthy young people would becomereligious, not to mention Haredim.
This disdain is bearing bitter fruit now. Who did dream that Ben-Gurion’s presents wouldresurrect the religious-Haredi community, and in a much more extreme,nationalist-Kabbalist-aggressive mould to booth, changing the very face of Israel?
The disdain for the Palestinian people prevented any serious attempt at achieving peace.Peace looked like a marginal matter, not worth attaining at the price of the return of even ahundred thousand refugees. Not to mention the recognition of the Palestinians as a nation andagreeing to the setting up of a Palestinian state next to Israel (as provided for by the UNresolution). As a result, the war goes on to this very day. Not only were the army officers notkept in their camps, as Herzl had decreed, but they became a decisive factor in the state. Onlylast week we saw how he officers-in-uniform dictate policy to the officers-out-of-uniformwho dominate the government.
We did not dream that on the 52th anniversary, the state would live in the shadow of the riftbetween Ashkenasi and Oriental Jews. In Herzl’s time, Europe was the center of Jewry. Even inhis most dreadful nightmares, he did not dream of a Holocaust, that would destroy most ofEuropean Jewry. Zionism was an Ashkenasi movement.
Here, in the country, on the eve of the founding of Israel, “Sephardis” were a small minority(even if most of the rich belong to this community). We did not see a problem. We were convincedthat Ashkenasis and Sephardis would marry each other, that the differences would disappear,that the New Israeli would be free from all this nonsense.
Therefore, the new state was not psychologically prepared for the absorption of great massesof Jews from the Islamic countries. Grievous mistakes were made, not out of bad will but(worse) out of contempt, arrogance and ignorance.
At the end of his days, Herzl came to realize that there is a people in Palestine. In his lastbook, “Altneuland” (Old-New-Country), he produced a decorative Arab, who lauds the Jews fortheir wonderful treatment. When Beh-Gurion (after a stormy but secret debate) decided togive the Arab inhabitants of Israel citizenship and the right to vote, he did not dream ofMuhammad Barakeh, Azmi Bishara and Ahmad Tibi. By the end of its 52th year, the state has not yetfaced the fact the every fifth Israeli is a Palestinian Arab.
All these rifts and gaps are clouding the horizon of Israel at the beginning of its 53 th year.But the state exists and has a strong, solid foundation. Contrary to the vision of Marx, whichbroke down and was disproved by reality, the vision of Herzl is alive and kicking.
Columbus made a great mistake but discovered America. Herzl made many mistakes, but the Stateof Israel is there. Our next task is to turn Israel into a state in which we can live and of which wecan be proud: to correct the mistakes, eliminate the injustices, overcome the rifts, achievepeace with the Palestinian nation and set up a modern, progressive, secular and democraticsociety.
For this, the famous motto of Herzl can still serve us: “If you want it, it is no fairy tale!”