The fractured triangle: Australian Jews, Israel and the Left

But contrary to the arguments of some critics, the motion was not a one-sided statement of support for Israel and neglect of the Palestinians. It also called, on three separate occasions, for the establishment of an independent, viable and sustainable Palestinian state alongside Israel. This two-state position received the support of virtually all ALP MPs except for long-time anti-Israel campaigner Julia Irwin.

Yet the attack from the anti-Zionist fundamentalists came quickly and aggressively. A group of Palestinian Australian organisations organised a full-page advertisement in The Australian newspaper on March 12, 2008 condemning the Australian Parliamentary motion, and describing Israel’s existence as a “triumph of racism and ethnic cleansing”.

They argued that the “Israeli people and its leaders” were responsible for the dispossession and ongoing suffering of the Palestinians. They also used inflammatory language alleging that Israel had “poisoned our (the West’s) relations with the whole of the Arab and Muslim world”.

This language implied that Israel was somehow responsible for both September 11 and the Bali bombings. Overall, the advertisement was not a critique of Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip in 1967, but rather a rejection of Israel’s establishment in 1948. It implied that Palestinians could only acquire justice via the destruction of the state of Israel, rather than the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside Israel.

The advertisement was also signed by a number of other left-wing groups and individuals including approximately 30 Jews mainly associated with Antony Loewenstein’s Independent Australian Jewish Voices group; a number of socialist, peace, refugee action and women’s groups; and a handful of unions including most notably the Maritime Union of Australia (MUA) and the Construction Forestry Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU). The left-wing AJDS dissociated themselves from the advertisement, citing its extreme and one-sided language.

Representatives of the CFMEU later argued that criticisms of Israeli government policies did not make them anti-Israel just as criticisms of the policies of George Bush did not make them anti-American. But this qualification seemed to miss the point that left-wing critics of Bush were generally not calling for the dissolution of the US state.

In contrast, the ACTU formally rejected the advertisement, noting their support for Israel’s right to exist and a Palestinian State alongside Israel. In addition, Paul Howes from the Australian Workers Union blasted the advertisement, and affirmed his union’s solidarity with the democratic institutions and free trade unions of Israel.

A further article by ex-ABC journalist Peter Manning - one of the signatories to the earlier advertisement - in The Sydney Morning Herald on April 29, 2008, presented similar hardline arguments. Manning argued, without even a hint of subtlety, that the Palestinian refugee tragedy or Nakba had “poisoned Western-Islamic relations around the world”. He also claimed, citing far Left Israeli academic Ilan Pappe, that Israel had utilised the famous Plan Dalet to ethnically cleanse the Palestinians in 1948, but failed to acknowledge that the interpretation of these events was the source of enormous contention amongst serious historians.

In contrast to Pappe, the Israeli historian Benny Morris - who provided the first book length study of the causes of the Palestinian refugee problem back in 1987 - argues that it is simplistic to blame the Israelis in isolation for the creation of the Palestinian refugee tragedy without reference to the broader political and military context.

According to Morris, the exile of the Palestinians occurred during a brutal war in which the Palestinian leaders and the Arab states openly threatened to destroy the newly founded State of Israel and massacre its population. This was a zero-sum conflict which the Israelis won and the Palestinians lost.

Plan Dalet was not an Israeli master plan to expel the Arab population, but rather a series of military measures to defend the borders against invading Arab armies. It is also easy to forget that this war took place only three years after the Holocaust, and almost 6,000 Israelis - that is nearly 1 per cent of the entire Jewish population of Israel - died in the conflict.

A relatively more moderate contribution was provided by Arab community activist Joe Wakim in Adelaide's Advertiser of March 14. Wakin urged Prime Minister Rudd to also acknowledge the dispossession and suffering of the Palestinians. While Wakim’s arguments were heavily biased towards the Palestinians, he still called for acceptance of Israel’s existence, and mutual recognition of each other’s narratives. These were sentiments that many Jews would have endorsed.

The arguments of the ACTU, Joe Wakim and others on the moderate Left suggest a positive way forward for Jews and the Left to find common ground. Many can agree that a two-state solution based on Israel and Palestine as neighbours rather than Palestine instead of Israel is the desired solution. Perhaps they can now join together in common activities to identify practical political strategies that help make this solution a reality.