Palestine-Israel and A Moral Dilemma Concerning War Crimes— An Analysis (15 September 2024) by Lawrence Davidson
Part I – Missing Pieces of History
Most American Jews perceive the conflict between Jewish Israelis and Palestinians according to some variation of the Zionist narrative. That is that Israel’s creation was a legitimate response to historical antisemitism and particularly the Holocaust. The Palestinians are classified in much the same category as the American Indians. That is, the struggle is between a modern democratic society (Israel) vs. primitive, religious, anti-democratic society (Palestine). Even many of those who now condemn Israel’s genocidal actions in Gaza believe this lashing out by Israel is just a product of a tactical wrong turn—an unfortunate, though more or less understandable, reaction to that “unprovoked” sneak attack on 7 October 2023.
According to a Pew Research Center survey released on 2 April 2024, some of the relevant numbers, indicating Jewish attitudes, break down this way:
—93% of adult American Jews believe “the way Hamas carried out its Oct. 7 attack was unacceptable.”
—52% think the way Israel is conducting itself in Gaza is acceptable. For those over 50 years old the number goes up to 68%.
—77% of all Jewish adults responding think Hamas’ reasons for fighting Israel are not valid. 89% see Israel’s reasons for fighting as valid.
—Nine in ten responding have a favorable view of the Israeli Jewish people. Four in ten have a favorable view of Palestinians.
What this all suggests is that, despite the really courageous actions of Jewish organizations such as Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), and Not in My Name, and despite the really brave Jewish protesters on many American campuses, most American Jews still retain the visionary perception of Israel they were raised with. Such people and the groups that represent them (main line American Jewish organizations) resist all revision of their views and dismiss as antisemitic any facts that conflict with their beliefs. This supports a position that excuses Israeli violence as just acts of “self defense.”
Others, such as members of JVP, have come to realize that the story they have so long been told is true is, in fact, seriously flawed. When this happens, they may well actively support new positions that could help lead to a just resolution of conflict.
Yet there is a third position that can be taken, one that is attractive to many liberal American Jews because, among other reasons, it sidesteps an historical situation in which the Israeli Jews have begun to resemble their own past persecutors. This position asserts that there exists moral absolutes that all sides are failing to adhere to and thus, all sides are equally guilty. This is a proposition that demands that historical context must be set aside when it comes to judging historical behavior. It is to an example of this claim that we now turn.
Part II — A Moral Dilemma
As American Jews go, Peter Beinart, professor and liberal political commentator, is a remarkably open-minded fellow. He readily admits that Israel has a bad case of racist ethnic-nationalism, and is now engaged in wanton ethnic cleansing. I often listen to Beinart, if for no other reason than to be reminded that there are a number of Jews who are willing to support Palestinian rights.
Yet, alas, Peter Beinart has chosen to assert moral absolutes into the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. This, in turn, creates a common moral dilemma—one that might in fact be unsolvable. Beinart, unknowingly, set out this dilemma in the opening of a brief monologue he delivered on line on 1 September 2024. It was entitled “To Save the Remaining Hostages, End the War Now.”
Beinart began by listing the six Israeli hostages recently found dead in Gaza. Then he continued, “The first thing, which I think should be obvious, is that the responsibility for their deaths lies with Hamas, which should never have abducted them in the first place, and that to do so, to abduct, to kill civilians is a war crime. Period. … What Hamas did on October seventh or what Hamas has just done now, are war crimes. … In my mind, [in so doing, Hamas] abdicates the moral responsibility that any group of people, no matter how brutal their oppression, is obligated to maintain” [my emphasis]. He does go on to say that the Israeli government shares responsibility due to their refusal to agree to a cease fire.
Ok. So what is the moral dilemma here? Let’s try to tease it out by considering the following point:
—Beinart posits an absolute. He asserts that “any group or people” are morally obligated to act in accordance with international law prohibiting war crimes. On the face of it, this seems to be a reasonable goal.
—However, in this regard, he asserts that context and circumstances do not matter. “No matter how brutal their oppression” one cannot escape this obligation. Here, one is reminded of the Ten Commandments. Yet, it is to be noted that not even God gets full compliance.
—Beinart then identifies Hamas as the party that has “abdicated its moral responsibility” in this regard by taking civilian hostages and then (allegedly) killing them. Both acts are war crimes.
The moral dilemma is created by the two-sided nature of the situation presented above: (1) on the one hand, the fact that laws forbidding war crimes are absolutes. That is, they are not the sort open to compromise or attenuated by circumstance. (2) On the other hand, historically, no one (except perhaps saints) has ever consistently acted in such an absolute way when “brutally oppressed.” Positing an absolute is like positing an ideal. They are great standards to aim for, but in the long run, ideals don’t shape our behavior as much as do circumstances. In the present case, we are caught between a morally powerful ideal not to commit war crimes and “brutal oppression” that itself involves war crimes. What then are the Palestinians to do?
Part III — Right & Wrong
It is not that Beinart is wrong in terms of morality. The definitions of war crimes he cites are accurate and their criminal nature is beyond doubt. However, he misjudges what is actually possible is when he demands, or expects, that people who are suffering “brutal oppression” follow such imposed rules. Historically, there is no precedent for such voluntary surrender of the use of violence (violence that approximates the kind used by the oppressor) in the process of resistance—except in particular cases where the victims have been rendered totally defenseless. For instance, isolated groups of slaves, concentration camp inmates, ill-treated prisoners in well-guarded confined spaces. But large numbers of “brutally oppressed” people are hard to monitor effectively. And, as suggested above, even if they recognize the depraved nature of crimes against humanity, they are not generally going to refrain from using such criminal tactics if the same are being used consistently against them. Put another way, if given the chance, the violence of the oppressed will rise to the level of the violence of the oppressor. Historically, this is just how things go.
The positing of an absolute ideal of moral behavior leads to a position where the oppressor and the oppressed must be judged as equals. The slaver and the slave, the concentration guard and the inmate are not to be judged by the power differential that defines their circumstances, but by an absolute code of conduct. That is what Peter Beinart’s “Period” implies. The slaver and the guard might toss all moral codes to the wind and savagely oppress away, but in theory the victim remains bound, not only to his bondage but to the moral restrictions that hem in his or her allowed reactions. Now, what once sounded reasonable, sounds unreasonable.
Nonetheless (and here is the dilemma again), it remains true that good ends (say the realization of Palestinian rights under an egalitarian and democratic government) should not be seen as justifying bad means (the use of terror tactics in the process of resistance) because, as Aldous Huxley once observed, “Good ends … can be achieved only by the employment of appropriate means. The end cannot justify the means, for the simple and obvious reason that the means employed determine the nature of the ends produced.” Thus, even if the Palestinians somehow escape the clutches of the Israelis, it is doubtless the case that a century of ruthless struggle to resist their oppressors will have changed them (and not necessarily for the better) both as individuals and as a national collective.
Part IV — Conclusion
Peter Beinart is a well meaning and intelligent man. He knows the Israelis are in the wrong. He knows that their errant ways are not the product of one corrupt prime minister, but go deeper. Yet, he does not know, in practical terms, how to reconcile this knowledge with his moral principles—and here he is certainly not alone.
When good people are faced with this sort of situation, they tend to fall back on their personal ethical standards, the ones that supposedly maintain their own propriety, and they project them out onto the world as a whole. The problem with this is that such folks almost always live in an environment that allows them to practice a modicum of morality, while the environment shaping their area of concern (in this case the area in which the Palestinian resistance operates) allows no such luxury.*
In the end being morally correct is not enough. In the year 1520, Martin Luther told the German peasants that their only option to “brutal oppression” was “passive resistance.” That was not, and is still not, a convincing, let alone effective argument. It has been replayed multiple times throughout history and it has never worked. Now Peter Beinart asserts a morally correct imperative and says that’s it. “Period.”
It is unreasonable to insist on obedience to the law when the authorities themselves rank among the worst criminals. At that point the absolute ideal is rendered null and void. We do this to ourselves, usually in the name of “national security” or some such rallying cry. The resulting moral dilemma would seem to be unsolvable. In the meantime, it is the Palestinians who must be defended.
*Sometimes there are exceptions. It should be noted that while the Israelis consistently destroy hospitals, shoot up ambulances and torture Palestinian doctors, the Palestinian resistance has, at least to date, refrained from using the same tactics. They have not attacked the medivac helicopters or ambulances called in to evacuate wounded Israeli soldiers.
