Harvard University Professor Ruth Wisse (Yiddish, comparative literature) is the author of "Jews and Anti-Jews," published today in the Wall Street Journal. Excerpts:
"...The attacks of Sept. 11 brought home to [Pres. Bush] the similarities between [the U.S. and Israel]... If America is duty-bound to strike the bases of those who threaten its security, no matter how far they are from its shores, then Israel, too, which constitutes the fighting front line in the war against terror, must root out the terrorists within and along its borders.
"Yet the White House still cannot bring itself to admit the true nature of the aggression against Israel. It still tends to treat the regional crisis as 'a conflict of two people over one land' that can be resolved by the creation of a Palestinian state. According to this view, since Jews and Arabs both lay claim to the same territory of Israel-Palestine, some division of the territory between them will bring about a peaceful resolution...
"Unfortunately, the Arab war against Israel is no more a territorial conflict than was al Qaeda's strike against America, and it can no more be resolved by the 'road map' than anti-Americanism could be appeased by ceding part of the U.S. to an Islamist enclave. From the moment in 1947 when Jewish leaders accepted and Arab rulers rejected the U.N. partition plan of Palestine, the Arab-Israeli conflict bore no further likeness to more conventional territorial struggles...
"Arab rulers did not object to Israel because it rendered the Palestinians homeless. Rather, they ensured that the Palestinians should remain homeless so that they could organize their politics around opposition to Israel...
"[In Arab nations] the Arab obsession with Israel grew increasingly destructive not only of its Jewish targets but also of [their own] regimes. Attacking Jews consumed energy that should have been directed at alleviating the misery of Arab subjects. Blaming the Jews postponed democratization, which begins with people taking responsibility for themselves... Anti-Semitism morphed into anti-Americanism - not because America supported Israel but because America represented the same challenges of an open, democratic, competitive society... America did not so much fight on the side of the Jews as find itself forced to tackle the anti-Jews...
"[U]ntil Arab leaders give up the crutch of anti-Semitism, they can make no real progress toward responsible self-government, and it is futile to pretend that obsession with Israel is compatible with Palestinian independence. Rantisi greeted the 'road map' by organizing major attacks against Israel, which he calls 'our land, not the land of the Jews.' America can't hope to win its war against terror while ignoring some of its major perpetrators and propagandists."
"...The attacks of Sept. 11 brought home to [Pres. Bush] the similarities between [the U.S. and Israel]... If America is duty-bound to strike the bases of those who threaten its security, no matter how far they are from its shores, then Israel, too, which constitutes the fighting front line in the war against terror, must root out the terrorists within and along its borders.
"Yet the White House still cannot bring itself to admit the true nature of the aggression against Israel. It still tends to treat the regional crisis as 'a conflict of two people over one land' that can be resolved by the creation of a Palestinian state. According to this view, since Jews and Arabs both lay claim to the same territory of Israel-Palestine, some division of the territory between them will bring about a peaceful resolution...
"Unfortunately, the Arab war against Israel is no more a territorial conflict than was al Qaeda's strike against America, and it can no more be resolved by the 'road map' than anti-Americanism could be appeased by ceding part of the U.S. to an Islamist enclave. From the moment in 1947 when Jewish leaders accepted and Arab rulers rejected the U.N. partition plan of Palestine, the Arab-Israeli conflict bore no further likeness to more conventional territorial struggles...
"Arab rulers did not object to Israel because it rendered the Palestinians homeless. Rather, they ensured that the Palestinians should remain homeless so that they could organize their politics around opposition to Israel...
"[In Arab nations] the Arab obsession with Israel grew increasingly destructive not only of its Jewish targets but also of [their own] regimes. Attacking Jews consumed energy that should have been directed at alleviating the misery of Arab subjects. Blaming the Jews postponed democratization, which begins with people taking responsibility for themselves... Anti-Semitism morphed into anti-Americanism - not because America supported Israel but because America represented the same challenges of an open, democratic, competitive society... America did not so much fight on the side of the Jews as find itself forced to tackle the anti-Jews...
"[U]ntil Arab leaders give up the crutch of anti-Semitism, they can make no real progress toward responsible self-government, and it is futile to pretend that obsession with Israel is compatible with Palestinian independence. Rantisi greeted the 'road map' by organizing major attacks against Israel, which he calls 'our land, not the land of the Jews.' America can't hope to win its war against terror while ignoring some of its major perpetrators and propagandists."
