Was I Wrong About Peace?

For many years I have lobbied elected officials, organized events, and written newspaper opinion pieces urging a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Some of my fellow-Jews called me naive. The Palestinians want to kill Jews, they said. A Palestinian state would be a terrorist state. I believed that denying basic civil rights to millions of people was an unsustainable strategy. Even with Israel’s far-right government making peace seem further away than ever, I continued my advocacy. 

For most of this year I focused on Israel’s democracy movement, opposing Prime Minister Netanyahu’s extremist policies. Much of my wife’s family is Israeli and we visit them often from our Brooklyn home. During a recent trip I marched with family members in Jerusalem. I also attended several rallies in New York. The energized crowds filled me with optimism that Jews could unite under a pluralistic vision of a Jewish State. My hope was that the protests would morph into a movement that addressed the occupation.

The democracy protests have since been put on hold. Organizations that were promoting the rallies are now leading efforts to help Israelis through the war with Hamas. The murderous antisemitism unleashed on October 7 raises uncomfortable questions for liberal Zionists like me. Americans championing the “resistance” movement in Gaza must also face a reckoning.

Some activists will undoubtedly change their politics. Others will perform intellectual summersaults to justify their belief system. We have already seen examples of the latter, with pro-Palestinian college organizations and some other groups downplaying the suffering of Israelis and blaming the Jewish State for Hamas’s bloodletting. A Harvard/Harris poll shows that 35% of self-identified American liberals think the October 7  massacre was justified, with half of 18 to 24 year-olds supporting Hamas.      

I imagine it is far easier for them to double-down on their beliefs than to upend their political identity by admitting that they had been supporting terrorists rather than freedom fighters — to reconsider their conception of right and wrong. I can imagine their internal angst because I have gone through a similar process since the antisemitic rampage. 

The sadistic nature of Hamas’s massacre left me wondering whether the voices calling me naive had been right. In a recent blog post the writer Daniel Gordis wrote about the 1929 slaughter in the West Bank town of Hebron, where Arabs brutally murdered dozens of Jews. He noted there was no Israel in 1929 and no occupation. His implication was that the hatred Palestinians hold for Jews is part of their national character.

I know that the vast majority of Palestinians have never engaged in terrorism, and that many support a two-state solution. Yet the long history of violent Arab antisemitism, underscored by October 7, makes me wonder whether Palestinians can be peace partners.

I know that the vast majority of Palestinians have never engaged in terrorism, and that many support a two-state solution. Yet the long history of violent Arab antisemitism, underscored by October 7, makes me wonder whether Palestinians can be peace partners.

Taking sides in the debate over Israel’s future defined where I stood within the Jewish community, giving substance to my ethnic identity. I now feel adrift on shaky ground, unsure of which direction to walk in. Even as I reconsider my commitment to a two-state solution, I remain steadfastly opposed to the occupation. The ascendancy of the West Bank settler movement has predictably led to a harsher, more triumphalist political environment in Israel. And what happens in Israel does not stay there? The momentum of Israel’s political and religious right has energized their counterparts in the United States, while pluralistic, egalitarian minded Jews are being drained of enthusiasm for their heritage.

My liberal-Zionist identity, which has defined so much of my day-to-day life, may soon have nowhere to reside.

As a result of these shifts I have an increasingly difficult time relating to where Judaism and Jewish life are heading. My liberal-Zionist identity, which has defined so much of my day-to-day life, may soon have nowhere to reside. That is why I was enthusiastic about the democracy movement. While the protests were not aimed at the occupation, they targeted the right-wing fanatics who were seeking to redefine Israel’s political, social, and cultural makeup.

Despite my doubts about the Palestinians, coexistence may still have currency. According to the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, Israel’s Foreign Ministry planning department concluded that a two-state solution is the best way out of the current morass. Given that the war is expected to last months, if not years, people like me will have time to reassess our politics around peace. 

My fear is that Israeli extremists will sell a narrative that Hamas’s butchery validates their program of oppressing Palestinians. Instead, the political right should be made to account for their hateful ideology. My hope is that the democracy protestors will eventually return to the streets here and in Israel. The future of Judaism and the character of the Jewish people will turn on the resolve of liberal-Zionists like me to continue our fight.

Ben Krull’s work has appeared in The New York Times, Washington Post, New York Daily News and other publications.