Dr. Reinhart uses the language and conceptual paradigms of post-colonialism to present a morally simplified view of the Arab/Israeli conflict. She casts the early Zionists as European colonists and the modern State of Israel as the sole remaining colonial outpost in a post-colonial Middle East. She simultaneously casts the Arab Palestinians as a subaltern indigenous people whose fate was cruelly decided, whose land was cruelly dispossessed, and whose lives were cruelly trampled by European invaders.
By presenting the current Arab/Israeli conflict as an anachronistic throwback to the days of European colonialism, both her analysis of the current situation and her suggestions for the future appear reasonable and fairly obvious. The Zionist project - the notion of a Jewish State of Israel - should resolve itself in the same way France or England’s colonial designs ended. It should yield to populist forces, break ties to its oppressive regime, and evolve an independent national character.
Given Dr. Reinhart’s premises, her arguments sound reasonable. They have two significant problems, however. First, they are based on faulty assumptions, dubious comparisons, and contested evidence. Second, they are used by militant rejectionists to support a more radical agenda. Whereas Reinhart may not envision a future in which Jews will be driven from Israel, many who seize upon her research do.
Don’t be intimidated by Reinhart’s credentials and academic language. Though her presentations are couched in fancy rhetoric, she relates only a simplistic and unsophisticated morality tale with Israel as the bad guy.
Your Strategies:
1. Expose how marginal and biased Dr. Reinhart’s views are and how much she distorts the facts.
Example: Dr. Reinhart, you certainly don’t represent the Israeli mainstream. Your views are considered radically left wing in Israeli political discourse. You also don’t represent an impartial point of view. As one writer observed in the liberal daily Haaretz: “The ‘new historians’ have “a political-ideological axe to grind.” “It would be erroneous to call this ‘myth debunking’. The work done before our eyes is merely the rewriting of the one-hundred-year Zionist history in the spirit of its enemies and opponents.” Aharon Megged. Ha’aretz Weekly Magazine[1] Don’t you think you are invited to speak on campuses because you are an anti-Zionist (or post-Zionist) Israeli who only supports the Palestinian version of events, not because of new research you have done or expertise that you have?
Example: Dr. Reinhart, on November 8 2002, in a Znet interview, you claimed that Israel committed atrocities in Jenin, with “war crimes and mass graves.” [2] Yet six months before, by the end of April, Amnesty International[3] , Human Rights Watch[4] and the UN[5] all had confirmed nothing of the sort had happened. No massacres. No mass graves. No war crimes. Palestinian terrorists even boasted about how they had booby trapped homes and cars and had planned the battle.[6] The media went through serious soul-searching, trying to figure out how it could have made such ghastly factual errors. [7] Why then, six months later, were you still making these discredited charges? What purpose does it serve? How can we trust your analysis or facts if you deny clear-cut evidence?
Example: Dr Reinhart, in a lecture you delivered in Amsterdam in November 2002, you blamed Israel for the escalating violence of the Intifada, claiming “in fact, the first Palestinian terrorist attack on Israeli civilians inside Israel occurred on November 2, 2000.” Surely you know that terrorism against Israelis mounted dramatically long before that--from the time the Oslo Accords were signed in 1993. In just the first five years after Oslo (1993 to 1998), terrorists killed 305 Israelis, almost twice the number killed in the whole 13 years between 1980 and 1993 according to Peace Watch.[8] The first suicide bomber in the current Intifada detonated himself in Israel shortly after Arafat was given jurisdiction over Gaza-on April 13 1994. Why then are you misleading this audience? How can we trust your observations when you make such blatantly misleading comments?
2. When possible, challenge her language. Force her to explain the connection between the phrasing she uses and the actual events.
Example: Dr. Reinhart, in your work you refer to the Palestinian state proposed by Clinton as Bantustans. You are clearly implying that Clinton’s goal was to place Palestinians in the same situation as Black South Africans during Apartheid. Yet, according to encyclopedia.com Bantustans forced Black South Africans, the vast majority of the population, to live in small segregated villages making up 14% of the country. In light of Denis Ross’s testimony that the Oslo accords offered to introduce a sovereign contiguous Palestinian state, with open borders, making up 97% of the West Bank and Gaza, how do you justify this comparison?
Example: You have compared the Arab-Israeli conflict to other post-WWII decolonization movements, suggesting that Zionist communities in Israel were similar to French colonies in Angola. Could you please explain how such a comparison can be made or what definition you are using given that there was little similarity between them? Zionist communities were not supported by a foreign colonialpower, they were not vassals of a colonial power, and they did not exploit a native population. Zionist Jews were largely refugees expelled from countries in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. The countries they fled did not support them and they were not defended by any standing army. Zionist Jews purchased land at exorbitant prices-they did not conquer it with arms-and they worked it with their own hands instead of exploiting labor. This is not colonialism by any accepted definition of the term. How then can you use it-or have you redefined colonialism?
Example: You have argued thatIsrael is imperialistic. Could you please explain what definition you are using given that Israel’s behavior cannot be described as imperialistic by accepted definitions of the term. Israel has demonstrated that it has no territorial designs on Jordan, Egypt, and Lebanon. It has done so by withdrawing from the lands it acquired from those countries. In the case of Jordan and Egypt, it did so in exchange for recognition and peace. In the case of Lebanon, it did so in the hope that withdrawal would make the way for a negotiated peace. Israel still has a presence in the West Bank and Gaza, but that is because the PA refused to negotiate an agreement about what those borders should be, and because Israel has had to defend itself against the terrorist war launched in September 2000. How can this behavior be described as imperialism-unless you have redefined the term?
3. Alert the audience to the fact that Dr. Reinhart’s ideas did not evolve in a vacuum and that, once formed, they did not remain an intellectual argument presented only within a safe academic context. They are used in the propaganda war against Israel. Challenge her associations. She contends to be a neutral source. Point out that a number of very militant individuals, intellectuals and fundamentalists alike, associate themselves with her.
Example: “I understand that you support the Palestinian struggle for an independent state. Do you also support the abolition of the State of Israel, the downfall of the U.S. and the radical terrorist groups HAMAS and Hizbullah? I ask this question because excerpts and favorable reviews of your work appear in websites that do advocate these positions.[9] For example, IslamicDigest.net features your work along side other authors who proclaim, 'Death to America' was, is and will stay our slogan’.[10] ”
Example: Your claims about Israel’s Eurocentric colonial roots and modern imperialistic character originated within the Palestinian national movement and were nurtured by groups like the PLO and HAMAS. Likewise, these same groups capitalize on such theories and evidence to justify their violence. Many militant pro-Palestinian sites either excerpt quotes from your work or link to your articles. By using your work--a Jewish, Israeli--to substantiate their claims and grievances, groups that advocate radical actions believe that they appear reasonable. Aren’t you concerned about how you are, in effect, abetting terrorism, contributing to the irredentism that is wreaking havoc on the lives of ordinary Palestinians and Israelis, and giving anti-Israel forces the ammunition to carry on with their 1948 enterprise-denying the right of a Jewish state to exist within any borders?
4. Alert the audience to the fact that Reinhart’s ideas are woefully simplistic morality tales that have little to do with reality. An evil, expansionist, militaristic Israel is always intent on ethnically cleansing the Territories. All Israeli government actions are interpreted in this explanatory framework. Palestinians and Arab states are always victims, never actors with hostile intentions toward Israel and never provoke Israeli responses.
Example: Dr. Reinhart, I find your descriptions of Palestinians rather racist-even orientalist-and insulting to Palestinians. You deny them all agency, describing them as helpless victims of the events of 1948 and of subsequent events. But they were organized and had a strong leadership in 1948 that defied a UN compromise,launched a war against the proposed state of Israel and called for the extermination of Jews. Once Israel got control of the Territories, they were offered self-government in 1967-69, in 1979, in 1993 and again in 2000 but refused each time. Why are you so dismissive of the choices they made, why don’t you at least grant them the deference and respect to acknowledge they made choices…even if they may have been self-destructive choices?
Example: Dr. Reinhart, historian Benny Morris wrote recently that Israel faces three intertwined battles: the fight over future territorial boundaries, the larger fight against extremists who want to destroy the Jewish state and the Jews, and the global fight against Islamofascism. Yet you repeatedly claim that the conflict is just about the first of these battles and you advocate immediate deployment from the Territories. How would that possibly resolve the larger battles that Morris described? Isn’t your view rather limited and unrealistic?
Example: In your article: “Israel: The Military in Charge,” in May 2002[11] you stated that the “Palestinian resistance will continue as well, and as everyone knows, nothing can stop desperate people from turning to terror.” Today the evidence has piled up that terrorism was not spontaneous resistance, but rather supported and financed in large part by Yassir Arafat. For example, a crisis erupted publicly in June 2004 because Arafat had cut off Al Aqsa Martyr Brigade salaries.Journalist Khaled Abu Toameh reported “[A] senior Fatah official in Ramallah confirmed that the Aksa Martyrs Brigades members are no longer receiving monthly salaries from the PA.”[12] Given this new evidence, have you changed your views about the causes of the terrorist war launched against Israel?
Example: Ms. Reinhart, you said in an interview with Znet (Sept 11 2003) that 60% of Israelis would support removing the settlements in exchange for peace.[13] Isn’t the problem that there is no reciprocity? According to polls taken in April 2003, 48% of Palestinians believed the goal of the Intifada should be some form of one-state solution-i.e. eliminating Israel as a sovereign Jewish nation-(Palestinian polling organization, Jerusalem Media and Communications Center)[14] and in an October 2003 poll,“ 59% of Palestinians believe Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad should continue their armed struggle against Israel even if Israel leaves all of the West Bank and Gaza, including East Jerusalem, and a Palestinian state is created,” according to the Public Opinion Research of Israel and the Palestine Center for Public Opinion.[15] How can there be peace if the Palestinian public will not cease its violence no matter how many concessions are made?
Example: Dr. Reinhart, in your interview with Znet (Sept 22 2003), you described “[Sheik Ahmed] Yassin,[as] the major spiritual leader of Hamas” and called Israel’s efforts to eliminate him a “direct provocation.” [16] Are you aware that this spiritual leader helped inspire Hamas’ 1988 Covenant which calls for the “obliteration” of Israel, demonizes all Jews, claiming they caused all the evils in the world, from the French Revolution on, denounces any negotiations or compromise and calls for jihad until all of Palestine-and even Spain-are reclaimed. Hamas has been responsible for a majority of the suicide bombings in Israel and in essence advocates and helped carry out genocide. Do you really think this man deserved protection? Would you also have opposed efforts to kill Hitler and current efforts to kill Osama Bin Laden?
[1] Aharon Megged, “The Israeli Suicide Drive,” Ha’aretz Weekly Magazine, June 10, 1994, pp. 27, 92.
[2] http://www.tau.ac.il/~reinhart/political/08_11_02_Znet_Interview.doc
[3] Cited in the Washington Post at http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A24668-2002May2?language=printer
[4] http://www.hrw.org/reports/2002/israel3/israel0502-01.htm#P49_1774 and Jerusalem Post, April 28, 2002
[5] http://www.un.org/peace/jenin/
[6] Al-Ahram Interview April 2002, reported by MEMRI at http://memri.org/bin/opener.cgi?Page=archives&ID=IA9002
[7] http://www.upi.com/view.cfm?StoryID=20052002-032952-3644r
[8] Peace Watch figures cited at http://www.eretzyisroel.org/~jkatz/oslo.html
[9] http://www.islamicdigest.net/id5/article.php?sid=1239
[10] http://www.islamicdigest.net/id5/article.php?sid=1343
[11] Tanya Reinhart, “Israel: The Military in Charge?” OpenDemocracy, May 24 2002, at http://www.opendemocracy.net/debates/article-2-46-230.jsp
[12] Khaled Abu Toameh, “Arafat Invites Aksa Brigade,” Jerusalem Post, June 12 2004 at http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename="JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1087025356512&p=1078027574121
[13] Reinhart interview with John Elmer, “A Slow, Steady Genocide,” Zmag, September 11 2003 at http://zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=22&ItemID=4180
[14] Reported at http://www.imra.org.il/story.php3?id=13885
[15] http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1066799672944
[16] Reinhart interview with John Elmer, A Slow, Steady Genocide, Zmag, September 11 2003 at http://zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=22&ItemID=4180
Questions to Ask the Speaker
1. Dr. Reinhart, you don't represent the Israeli mainstream. Your views are considered radically left wing in Israeli political discourse. You also don't represent an impartial point of view. As one writer observed in the liberal daily Haaretz: "The ‘new historians' have "a political-ideological axe to grind." "It would be erroneous to call this ‘myth debunking'. The work done before our eyes is merely the rewriting of the one-hundred-year Zionist history in the spirit of its enemies and opponents." Aharon Megged. Ha'aretz Weekly Magazine[1] Don't you think you are invited to speak on campuses because you are an anti-Zionist (or post-Zionist) Israeli who only supports the Palestinian version of events, not because of new research you have done or expertise that you have?
2. Dr. Reinhart, on November 8 2002, in a Znet interview, you claimed that Israel committed atrocities in Jenin, with "war crimes and mass graves."[2] Yet six months before, Amnesty International [3] , Human Rights Watch [4] and the UN [5] all had confirmed nothing of the sort had happened. No massacres. No mass graves. No war crimes. Palestinian terrorists even boasted about how they had booby trapped homes and cars and had planned the battle.[6] The media went through serious soul-searching, trying to figure out how it could have made such ghastly factual errors. [7] Why then, six months later, were you still making these discredited charges? What purpose does it serve? How can we trust your analysis or facts if you deny clear-cut evidence?
3. Dr Reinhart, in a lecture you delivered in Amsterdam in November 2002, you blamed Israel for the escalating violence of the Intifada, claiming "in fact, the first Palestinian terrorist attack on Israeli civilians inside Israel occurred on November 2, 2000." Surely you know that terrorism against Israelis mounted dramatically long before that--from the time the Oslo Accords were signed in 1993. In just the first five years after Oslo (1993 to 1998), terrorists killed 305 Israelis, almost twice the number killed in the whole 13 years between 1980 and 1993 according to Peace Watch.[8] The first suicide bomber in the current Intifada detonated himself in Israel shortly after Arafat was given jurisdiction over Gaza-on April 13 1994. Why then are you misleading this audience? How can we trust your observations when you make such blatantly misleading comments?
4. Dr. Reinhart, in your work you refer to the Palestinian state proposed by Clinton as Bantustans. You are clearly implying that Clinton's goal was to place Palestinians in the same situation as Black South Africans during Apartheid. Yet, according to encyclopedia.com Bantustans forced Black South Africans, the vast majority of the population, to live in small segregated villages making up 14% of the country. In light of Denis Ross's testimony that the Oslo accords offered to introduce a sovereign contiguous Palestinian state, with open borders, making up 97% of the West Bank and Gaza, how do you justify this comparison?
5. You have compared the Arab-Israeli conflict to other post-WWII decolonization movements, suggesting that Zionist communities in Israel were similar to French colonies in Angola. Could you please explain how such a comparison can be made or what definition you are using given that there was little similarity between them? Zionist communities were not supported by a foreign colonial power, they were not vassals of a colonial power, and they did not exploit a native population. Zionist Jews were largely refugees expelled from countries in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. The countries they fled did not support them and they were not defended by any standing army. Zionist Jews purchased land at exorbitant prices-they did not conquer it with arms-and they worked it with their own hands instead of exploiting labor. This is not colonialism by any accepted definition of the term. How then can you use it-or have you redefined colonialism?
6. You have argued that Israel is imperialistic. Could you please explain what definition you are using given that Israel's behavior cannot be described as imperialistic by accepted definitions of the term. Israel has demonstrated that it has no territorial designs on Jordan, Egypt, and Lebanon. It has done so by withdrawing from the lands it acquired from those countries. In the case of Jordan and Egypt, it did so in exchange for recognition and peace. In the case of Lebanon, it did so in the hope that withdrawal would make the way for a negotiated peace. Israel still has a presence in the West Bank and Gaza, but that is because the PA refused to negotiate an agreement about what those borders should be, and because Israel has had to defend itself against the terrorist war launched in September 2000. How can this behavior be described as imperialism-unless you have redefined the term?
7. "I understand that you support the Palestinian struggle for an independent state. Do you also support the abolition of the State of Israel, the downfall of the U.S. and the radical terrorist groups HAMAS and Hizbullah? I ask this question because excerpts and favorable reviews of your work appear in websites that do advocate these positions.[9] For example, IslamicDigest.net features your work along side other authors who proclaim, 'Death to America' was, is and will stay our slogan'.[10] "
8. Your claims about Israel's Eurocentric colonial roots and modern imperialistic character originated within the Palestinian national movement and were nurtured by groups like the PLO and HAMAS. Likewise, these same groups capitalize on such theories and evidence to justify their violence. Many militant pro-Palestinian sites either excerpt quotes from your work or link to your articles. By using your work--a Jewish, Israeli--to substantiate their claims and grievances, groups that advocate radical actions believe that they appear reasonable. Aren't you concerned about how you are, in effect, abetting terrorism, contributing to the irredentism that is wreaking havoc on the lives of ordinary Palestinians and Israelis, and giving anti-Israel forces the ammunition to carry on with their 1948 enterprise-denying the right of a Jewish state to exist within any borders?
9. Dr. Reinhart, I find your descriptions of Palestinians rather racist-even orientalist-and insulting to Palestinians. You deny them all agency, describing them as helpless victims of the events of 1948 and of subsequent events. But they were organized and had a strong leadership in 1948 that defied a UN compromise, launched a war against the proposed state of Israel and called for the extermination of Jews. Once Israel got control of the Territories, they were offered self-government in 1967-69, in 1979, in 1993 and again in 2000 but refused each time. Why are you so dismissive of the choices they made, why don't you at least grant them the deference and respect to acknowledge they made choices…even if they may have been self-destructive choices?
10. Dr. Reinhart, historian Benny Morris wrote recently that Israel faces three intertwined battles: the fight over future territorial boundaries, the larger fight against extremists who want to destroy the Jewish state and the Jews, and the global fight against Islamofascism. Yet you repeatedly claim that the conflict is just about the first of these battles and you advocate immediate deployment from the Territories. How would that possibly resolve the larger battles that Morris described? Isn't your view rather limited and unrealistic?
11. In your article: "Israel: The Military in Charge," in May 2002 [11] you stated that the "Palestinian resistance will continue as well, and as everyone knows, nothing can stop desperate people from turning to terror." Today the evidence has piled up that terrorism was not spontaneous resistance, but rather supported and financed in large part by Yassir Arafat. For example, a crisis erupted publicly in June 2004 because Arafat had cut off Al Aqsa Martyr Brigade salaries.Journalist Khaled Abu Toameh reported "[A] senior Fatah official in Ramallah confirmed that the Aksa Martyrs Brigades members are no longer receiving monthly salaries from the PA."[12] Given this new evidence, have you changed your views about the causes of the terrorist war launched against Israel?
12. Ms. Reinhart, you said in an interview with Znet (Sept 11 2003) that 60% of Israelis would support removing the settlements in exchange for peace.[13] Isn't the problem that there is no reciprocity? According to polls taken in April 2003, 48% of Palestinians believed the goal of the Intifada should be some form of one-state solution-i.e. eliminating Israel as a sovereign Jewish nation-(Palestinian polling organization, Jerusalem Media and Communications Center)[14] and in an October 2003 poll," 59% of Palestinians believe Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad should continue their armed struggle against Israel even if Israel leaves all of the West Bank and Gaza, including East Jerusalem, and a Palestinian state is created," according to the Public Opinion Research of Israel and the Palestine Center for Public Opinion.[15] How can there be peace if the Palestinian public will not cease its violence no matter how many concessions are made?
13. Dr. Reinhart, in your interview with Znet (Sept 22 2003), you described "[Sheik Ahmed] Yassin,[as] the major spiritual leader of Hamas" and called Israel's efforts to eliminate him a "direct provocation." [16] Are you aware that this spiritual leader helped inspire Hamas' 1988 Covenant which calls for the "obliteration" of Israel, demonizes all Jews, claiming they caused all the evils in the world, from the French Revolution on, denounces any negotiations or compromise and calls for jihad until all of Palestine-and even Spain-are reclaimed. Hamas has been responsible for a majority of the suicide bombings in Israel and in essence advocates and helped carry out genocide. Do you really think this man deserved protection? Would you also have opposed efforts to kill Hitler and current efforts to kill Osama Bin Laden?
[1] Aharon Megged, "The Israeli Suicide Drive," Ha'aretz Weekly Magazine, June 10, 1994, pp. 27, 92.
[2] http://www.tau.ac.il/~reinhart/political/08_11_02_Znet_Interview.doc
[3] Cited in the Washington Post at http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A24668-2002May2?language=printer
[4] http://www.hrw.org/reports/2002/israel3/israel0502-01.htm#P49_1774 and Jerusalem Post, April 28, 2002
[5] http://www.un.org/peace/jenin/
[6] Al-Ahram Interview April 2002, reported by MEMRI at http://memri.org/bin/opener.cgi?Page=archives&ID=IA9002
[7] http://www.upi.com/view.cfm?StoryID=20052002-032952-3644r
[8] Peace Watch figures cited at http://www.eretzyisroel.org/~jkatz/oslo.html
[9] http://www.islamicdigest.net/id5/article.php?sid=1239
[10] http://www.islamicdigest.net/id5/article.php?sid=1343
[11] Tanya Reinhart, "Israel: The Military in Charge?" OpenDemocracy, May 24 2002, at http://www.opendemocracy.net/debates/article-2-46-230.jsp
[12] Khaled Abu Toameh, "Arafat Invites Aksa Brigade," Jerusalem Post, June 12 2004 at http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1087025356512&p=1078027574121
[13] Reinhart interview with John Elmer, "A Slow, Steady Genocide," Zmag, September 11 2003 at http://zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=22&ItemID=4180
[14] Reported at http://www.imra.org.il/story.php3?id=13885
[15] http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1066799672944
[16] Reinhart interview with John Elmer, "A Slow, Steady Genocide," Zmag, September 11 2003 at http://zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=22&ItemID=4180
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