When Peace Is Not Enough: How the Israeli Peace Camp Thinks about Religion, Nationalism, and Justice PDF
Preview When Peace Is Not Enough: How the Israeli Peace Camp Thinks about Religion, Nationalism, and Justice
When Peace Is Not Enough When Peace Is Not Enough How the Israeli Peace Camp Thinks about Religion, Nationalism, and Justice ATAlIA OmeR The University of Chicago Press Chicago and london Atalia Omer is assistant professor of religion, conflict, and peace studies at the Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies and the Department of Sociology at the University of Notre Dame. She is also a faculty fellow at the Notre Dame Center of Religion and Society. The University of Chicago Press, Chicago 60637 The University of Chicago Press, ltd., london © 2013 by The University of Chicago All rights reserved. Published 2013. Printed in the United States of America 22 21 20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 1 2 3 4 5 ISBN-13: 978-0-226-00807-3 (cloth) ISBN-13: 978-0-226-00810-3 (paper) ISBN-13: 978-0-226-00824-0 (e-book) library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Omer, Atalia, author. When peace is not enough : how the Israeli peace camp thinks about religion, nationalism, and justice / Atalia Omer. pages cm Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-226-00807-3 (cloth : alkaline paper) — ISBN 978-0-226-00810-3 (paperback : alkaline paper) — ISBN 978-0-226-00824-0 (e-book) 1. Arab- Israeli conflict—1993—Peace. 2. Peace movements—Israel. 3. Arab-Israeli conflict—Social aspects. 4. Group identity—Israel. I. Title. DS119.76.046 2013 956.05'4—dc23 2012044799 a This paper meets the requirements of ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992 (Permanence of Paper). For Dan Omer (1940–84) and Oscar Mareni (Herlinger) (1906–2011) Contents Acknowledgments / vii Introduction / 1 ONe / Peace, Justice, and the Zionist Consensus: Peace Now and the Blind Spots of Peacemaking / 23 TWO / Bridging Disciplines and Reimagining “Who We Are” / 65 THRee / Critical Caretakers: The Hermeneutics of Citizenship and the Question of Justice / 93 fOUR / Returning to Sinai: The Religious Zionist Peace movement / 115 fIve / Rabbis for Human Rights and Reclaiming Alterity / 143 SIX / Subaltern visions of Peace I: The Case of the Arab Palestinian Citizens of Israel / 183 SeveN / Subaltern visions of Peace II: The Case of the mizrahim / 227 CONClUSION / The Hermeneutics of Citizenship: The missing Dimension of Peacebuilding / 271 Notes / 285 Index / 361 ACknowledgments my late father, a journalist, a poet, and a social critic, lived a short and brave life on the radical margins of Israeli society. I am profoundly indebted to him for his legacy. This book is grounded in my memories of his struggle against religious and political coercion, against the occupation of Palestin- ian territories, and for social justice and equality. As much as my father was a principled critic of Israel’s ethos, my late grandfather was a stone in its foundation—Zionist Congress delegate, cel- ebrated veteran of Britain’s Jewish Brigade during World War II, resistance fighter against the British mandate in Palestine, and the first post–Israeli independence treasurer of the municipality of Jerusalem. my earliest memo- ries are of their frequently fierce opposition to one another, unyielding, but loyal. I carry this dual legacy with me today; out of a deep sense of gratitude and love I grapple with it across the pages of this book. I have been involved with the Israeli peace movement my entire life, and I remain committed to the overarching vision of the movement. Yet it is with a desire to assess and transform the premises of peace activism in Israel that I write, realizing potential implications of this case for questions of peace and justice in other zones of conflict. Only after I completed my military service and moved away from Israel to pursue my higher education in the United States did I begin to systematically question what had consis- tently puzzled me earlier: What is the meaning of a Jewish national identity? How might it be reconciled with secularity? How might rethinking Jewish- Israeli nationality relate to the “peace process” with the Palestinians? This line of questioning led me to explore the case of Israel with the intention to think more acutely about religion, nationalism, and the transformation of conflicts largely defined by identity claims. It has been an odyssey that
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