Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, September 14, 1993 TAG: 9309140167
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: SUSAN SACHS NEWSDAY
DATELINE: JERUSALEM LENGTH: Medium
With the stroke of a pen Monday, Israelis and Palestinians both readjusted their national goals and dreams. By choosing mutual recognition and peaceful reconciliation, they charted a course that forswears the claim by many religious Zionists who believe God gave the land of the ancient Jewish kingdom to the Jews forever.
The agreement signed in Washington provides for an immediate Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank town of Jericho, site of an ancient Jewish synagogue, as well as the Gaza Strip. More important, it commits Israel to granting autonomy to the 2 million Arabs living under occupation in the rest of what was once the biblical land of Judea and Samaria. It also puts the status of Jerusalem, a holy city for both peoples, on the negotiating table for the future.
As their country contemplates a future of narrowed borders and separation from the captive Palestinian population it has ruled for 25 years, many Israelis are trying to adjust to the shock to their national and religious identity.
Some say holding the occupied territories has distorted Israel's basic moral and democratic values. Others, followers of the messianic settlement movement born in the euphoria following the Six-Day War, believe giving up the land is a deviation from a divine calling.
For a large number of Israelis who did not participate in the settlement of the territories, the prospect of withdrawal signals a return to the true meaning of Zionism. Redemption of the Jewish people, they say, will come through peace and security, not by holding onto the West Bank, even if those dusty hills encompass the towns where Abraham and Joshua walked.
Said Yeshiyahu Leibowitz, the 91-year-old philosopher who for years has thundered against Israel's occupation of Palestinian land: "What is the meaning of Zionism? It's that Jews are fed up with being ruled by `goyim' [non-Jews]. And now we have the right and opportunity to commit our own follies and our own crimes and to be responsible for them."
Keeping the territories, he added, erodes the human values that should be the foundation of the state. "Dominating another people brings about barbarism," Leibowitz said. "Our problem right now is to liberate the state of Israel from the occupied territories and the Palestinian people."
But other Israelis see in the Israeli-Palestinian agreement a perversion of Zionism, the century-old movement that inspired the scattered Jews of the world to seek a homeland of their own.
Opponents of the agreement plastered the walls of Jerusalem with black-bordered death notices. "To our great sorrow," the posters read, "we must announce the passing away of Zionism, which was murdered by Israeli government."
To them, Jewish settlement of the West Bank was a messianic vision and the true embodiment of modern Zionism.
The Zionist ideal, based on equal parts religious fervor and political pragmatism, has vastly different meanings for different people. For the majority of Israelis, who have long supported the idea of territorial concessions in exchange for a life in peace, the vision that created Israel has little to do with real estate and shrines.
"From the point of view of securing the future of the Jewish people, this is a Zionist agreement through and through," said Moshe Halbertol, a Hebrew University philosopher. "We exhausted so much of our spiritual and cultural energies in a conflict with the Arabs that we feel was imposed on us.
"What we always dreamed about is a life of prosperity and security in which we can develop our own Jewish culture," he added. "Now we will go back to where we were, a Judaism that stresses the value of life. It will be the end of a religious nightmare."
by CNB