כניסה סטודנטים / בוגרים
Amid the reckless pacifism and universalism of the post-Christian West and Islam's monistic aggression, Israel alone remains faithful to its responsibility and tikkun olam.
In the recent military action in Gaza, as in previous ones, Israel found itself fighting on two fronts: while it fought to defend its citizens against Islamic murderousness – on the battlefield and on the home front – it was, and is, under attack in the diplomatic arena as well, with condemnations and legal threats issued by the Christian West – including by our so-called greatest ally.
The key to understanding this hostile attitude is not Obama, nor his Muslim father; rather, his mother. The transnational Christian who turns up in Kenya and Indonesia – the one from the Sixties who sang with her friends "make love not war" till her senses were dulled – represents a universal vision, like the Newtopia propagated by revered icon of the day, John Lennon: no countries, no religion, nothing to kill or die for, everyone sharing the world equally and safely.
This universal vision, which Obama imbibed with his mother's milk, he was to glean with greater clarity as an adult – from the intellectual elite at Harvard and Chicago who shaped his identity. He would then relay this vision in countless eloquent speeches, like the one delivered in Cairo:
Any world order that elevates one nation or group of people over another nation or group, will inevitably fail. So whatever we think of the past, we must not be prisoners of it. Our problems must be dealt with through partnership; progress must be shared.
This "end of history," as Obama's fellow Chicagoan Francis Fukuyama termed it, is also the sweet dream of Europe's Left, driven by neo-Marxist ambitions: a world where justice and equality will abolish social classes, identities, and religions.
These dreams of the new Comintern are premised on two ancient Christian principles that still reverberate in the secularized West: universalism, born with the nullification of Israel's chosen-ness and the opportunity for any individual to join the community of believers, the church; and the elimination of commandments and of man's obligation to take action to repair himself and the world at large. This world is born in sin, so the tenet goes, and salvation of the soul is only in the next world. In the interim all one can do is atone, as Jesus did on the cross, by self-sacrifice and indiscriminate acts of loving kindness – including turning the other cheek to evil and to the enemy, as Jesus commanded in his Sermon on the Mount.
Religion of Submission
Against these Christian doctrines, Islam has made a powerful comeback in recent decades. It is not a local movement and is no longer employing the post-colonialism argument against the West; it has a universal vision of its own, in which the universe becomes Dar al Islam.
In this vision, the great and remote God is the only leader. Man is obligated in one thing only: to be a Muslim or, literally translated, to be submissive – a total surrender; to fulfill the commandment of God, and to recognize his greatness; not to partner with God, and certainly not to argue with the Divine decree, as Abraham did in the Biblical story of Sodom. Grace, which in the Protestant version is manifest in economic success and can bring innovation and creativity, does not exist by the Muslim's merciful God. On the contrary, devout monotheism is translated into monarchic regimes – the power of the individual – without dialogue or harmony with the masses.
The Caliph, like God, is the most powerful of all, aggressive and oppressive, holding all the keys in his hands. This is the antithesis of democracy, our legacy from the French Revolution, and the authority given to man in the American constitution in the spirit of "We the people": the rule of Allah, by Allah, for Allah. The path to the Islamic utopia is not through missionizing and persuasion but by the sword and jihad. "The rule of Islam is by the sword" is a theological statement, in addition to being a clear historical fact.
Israel's Vision
In the midst of this clash of civilizations today stands a small country, Israel, representing a great civilization in and of itself. The real mother is, paradoxically, attacked by her two daughters as the sole remaining obstacle to the world's redemption: the Muslim daughter sees Israel as the little Judeo-Christian devil that took root in the heart of Dar al Islam, an outpost of Western corruption that is preventing Allah and his Sharia law from being imposed on the world; and the Christian daughter sees in Samaria the raison d'être of the nuclear reactor in Bushehr, and perceives Israel's existence as violating her hopes for world peace.
Israel, too, has a universal vision, in which the wolf dwells with the lamb. But the realization of this vision requires man and the world to undergo a process of repair; otherwise, as in the well-known joke, the lamb will have to be replaced every day. The obligation to repair the world stems from Judaism's recognition of man's potential destructiveness and the understanding that even the Garden of Eden can become a living hell if left untended. Indeed, for centuries the Jewish people has experienced firsthand this potential for evil.
The modern State of Israel embodies a moral sensitivity, evident in its incessant demand of a high moral standard of itself. Even if this moral standard is sometimes expressed in exaggerated forms, it is premised on the quest for truth and justice, on the assumption that these do indeed exist and are not simply a type of moral relativism that lacks truth and is used to justify any narrative; nor the absolution of man's moral obligation in the name of Allah. On the contrary, Israel represents faith in man as being capable of demanding truth and pursuing justice; as such, it obligates man to actively contend with injustice and evil – in actions and, sometimes, in an all-out war to wipe these out and thus repair the world.
Each stage in the development of Israel, only recently arisen from the ashes of the Holocaust, is a herald of tikkun olam, from the manufacturing of agricultural equipment to human rights organizations; the small "Silicon Wadi" that is slowly catching up with the great Silicon Valley; and on to masterpieces of literature and philosophy, all aimed at bettering society and our individual lives. They represent a religion and culture wherein man is viewed as a partner with the Creator, Who wishes to see man's development and prosperity, not his total submission as in the Muslim version or his despairing of the world as the Catholics would have it.
Years of Muslim infighting and bloodshed, and the resounding failure of the Arab dagger against Western science and technology in the modern era, have not brought scholars of Islam to reflect anew on the principle of the sacred sword. Millions of people killed in world wars in the post-Enlightenment twentieth century have led Western intellectuals to develop postmodern paradigms concerning man and society, which effectively promote the next clash and delay that universal dream from being fulfilled.
Examining Israel's struggles and how it has risen to the occasion can contribute new and essential religious thought paradigms to humanity, as regards man's mission of repairing humankind and Israel's role within this mission.
Israel is not the problem. It is the solution.
Amit Halevi is Founding Director of the Jewish Statesmanship Center in Jerusalem. The article was originally published in Hebrew in the Israeli media.