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David Horovitz: Savaged in the Lion嚙編 Den
David Horovitz

In a community somewhat under-equipped to speak up for Israel, Britain嚙編 Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks has been a beacon of intelligent comment these past two years. While not too many Anglo-Jewish leaders are able to articulate an appropriate response under hostile media questioning, and both the current and previous Israeli ambassadors were political appointees lacking fluent English, Sacks has confronted erroneous reporting of the current conflict -- rapidly and firmly debunking the widespread accounts of the massacre-that-never-was in Jenin, for instance -- and fielded harsh questions with dignified moral authority while reflecting the Israeli and Anglo-Jewish consensus.

Committed to airing Israel嚙編 case as widely as possible, he recently made a courageous but ill-judged foray into the media equivalent of the lion嚙編 den, the Guardian daily, anything but friendly to Israel, initiating a lunch with the newspaper嚙編 editorial staff and later consenting to an interview. He expressed anguish at the two years of bloodshed -- a conflict which, he made clear, was sustained by Palestinian terrorism and which Israel had sought to avoid. In that context, he also acknowledged his disquiet with aspects of Israeli behavior, noting that the "current situation" was "forcing Israel into postures that are incompatible in the long run with our deepest ideals" and there are "things that happen on a daily basis which make me feel very uncomfortable as a Jew."

Unsurprisingly, the newspaper highlighted those particular comments, under the dramatic headline "Israel set on tragic path, says chief rabbi." To the Guardian嚙編 discredit, however, it excluded from its initial reports some of Sacks嚙編 qualifying and contextualizing comments -- such as his insistence that Israel is striving to remain "compassionate, humane and committed to human rights" and his conviction that "the ethical tradition of the Israeli army, which is one of the most reflective of all armies," would prevail -- publishing them only three days after the original August 27 interview had led its front page. The rabbi, I have been told, feels that he was set up. Many Anglo-Jewish leaders feel that he could hardly have expected anything else.

Clearly, Sacks嚙編 Daniel act has backfired. The community elders, fuming that his comments will be coopted by every Israel-basher, are now trying to impose a vow of silence on the chief rabbi -- which he is unlikely to heed. But, firmly on the defensive, his office has been reduced to implausibly asserting that it is "absurd" to construe his comments as criticism of Israel. Subtly phrased and empathetic though they were, some of his remarks were an unmistakable critique of Israeli rule over the Palestinians. "You cannot ignore a command that is repeated 36 times in the Mosaic books," he said in the interview, applying to the Palestinian context the Torah嚙編 directive not to ill-treat or oppress a stranger.

To have Sacks hamstrung is not in the interests of Anglo-Jewry or of Israel. Neither is the misrepresentation of his thinking both by his detractors and his purported defenders within the Jewish world. On the right, where some jumped reprehensibly to urge his resignation, Sacks嚙編 assailants falsely charge that he ignores the fact that the current conflict was imposed upon Israel by a Palestinian leadership that rejected prime minister Ehud Barak嚙編 unprecedented offer of compromise. And they damagingly brush aside his well-founded concerns at the conflict嚙編 "corrupting" effects on Israel嚙編 culture. Equally culpably, some of his "defenders" on the left now falsely present Sacks嚙編 comments as endorsement for a unilateral end to Israel嚙編 presence in the territories.

But perhaps what is most regrettable about the controversy is that it is sidetracking the arguing Jewish sides in a period of genuine crisis, deflecting attention from Israel嚙編 need to steer a path out of the bitterness and bloodshed, to change the status quo. In a climate where homicidal hostility has long since filtered down to ordinary Palestinians, and is now seeping into the Israeli Arab community as well, Israel has to date failed to offer effective encouragement for Palestinian moderation. The Barak government proved incapable of conveying to ordinary Palestinians, over the heads of their murderous and manipulative leaders, its commitment to reconciliation. And while the current prime minister, Ariel Sharon, understandably refuses to enter substantive negotiations with a Palestinian leadership fostering terrorism against Israelis, he has given no firm indication of a readiness to work with any alternative Palestinian leadership, one that genuinely embraced coexistence, toward viable statehood. Arafat -- whose dismissal of Barak嚙編 peace terms and sponsorship of the terrorist onslaught was a clear-headed strategic rejection of Jewish sovereignty in the Middle East -- certainly has to go. But Israel嚙編 interests also demand that it do whatever it can to create a climate in which less, not more, radical forces succeed him.

Time is most definitely not on Israel嚙編 side. The national psyche is being battered by the terrorism, and a new generation brutalized. And fundamentally, of course, the demographics are working against Israel. Without the boon of the million-strong Russian influx this past decade, we would already be a Jewish minority between the river and the sea.

"The whole tremendous enterprise that we have established here is at risk," cabinet minister Dan Meridor, no political na嚙篆, is reported to have told his colleagues recently. As a participant at the Camp David summit, Meridor opposed some of the compromises Barak was contemplating. But he now says Israel must seek an agreement with the Palestinians for a partial withdrawal and a temporary border demarcation -- separation at all costs, urgently, for the sake of our democracy and our Jewish national character -- with a final border to be negotiated, or fought over, by Israel and the new Palestine. Meridor has "no illusions" and would "not rely" on the Palestinians to honor even such an interim accord. But if Israel followed his suggestion, he said, "we will be a Jewish state."

Whatever the merits of this particular avenue of thinking, it at least attempts to grapple with our untenable current situation. It was in a similar, creditable, attempt that Sacks -- using measured language, but in the wrong forum and in a sadly hysterical climate -- formulated some of his comments. Perhaps not from every platform, but the rabbi needs to keep on talking.