By LUDWIG WATZAL
Jeremy Milgram is a member of “Rabbis for Human Rights” and a participant in the inter-religious dialogue in Israel. He lives in Jerusalem.
Ludwig Watzal: What do you think of Israel´s handeling of the Gazean freedom flotillas?
Jeremy Milgram: Pretty bad. Excessive use of force. We have known this for a long time when it comes to demonstrations by Palestinians. This time it was an excessive and inappropriate use of force against Europeans and Internationals. The people today did not do anything illegal. They tried to get into Gaza. These are terrible moments in Israeli society.
My feelings are that Israel`s reckless reaction to the boats should make a lot of people very nervous, as well as the fact that Israel continues to posses atomic bombs. This was poor policy by Israel in terms of responding to a non-threat in case of the boats. Just imagine the reaction if there would have been a real threat from Iran.
Why does the Israeli government react to every crisis with such ferocity?
The idea of always using force and to be the first in using force as a last resort, has to do with the identities of those who are in charge, the group of seven who make the decisions [the so-called security cabinet L. W.] Of those seven, three were military commanders: Netanyahu, Yaalon, Barak, Lieberman and Yihsai are off-the-wall: they are people to whom you don´t want to give any power. We have a very inadequate leadership.
Has the reliance on force anything to do with the holocaust trauma?
There is an abnormal amount of fear. I think of the fear that is being manufactured from above. By this fear, any anger regarding what we suffered in the holocaust is redirected from Christian Europe to the Muslim Middle East. I think this is a manipulation. But I think also that Israelis are really afraid. The Palestinian resistance, which has also taken violent forms has been a catastrophe because it hardened Israeli attitude. Israelis are thus afraid to make any change, such as to relinquish any piece of land or accord the Palestinians any geographic advantage, even if they have a bad conscience.
Full interview-Counterpunch
Netanyahu a military commander?
ReplyDeleteHe was once made the mistake of calling the bemedalled generals running the Labour Party "cowards". As a result his service record entered the public domain. Not exactly a draft-dodger, more a George Bush type of warrior who was there in spirit if not physically present.
The only time he couldn't wriggle out of active service was during the Six-Day War when they made him a tank commander. He mounted up and navigated his machine in the opposite direction from the fighting. Then he turned up when the fireworks were over, claimed he'd got lost in the desert, but wasn't he a brilliant officer for bringing his full crew back alive.
Thanks for the light shed on Netanyahu's commander's prouesses. I had no idea he had a carrier in the military to start with.
ReplyDeleteBroadly speaking all (non-Arab) Israelis have to do military service, and spend so much time per year in uniform, until they're past military age. According to his biography Netanyahu would turn up at his posting on the appointed day, say "I'm Binyamin Netanyahu, I'm engaged in important work, give me a waiver." And they always did. I think "important work" was code for "I've got powerful friends, don't mess with me."
ReplyDeleteI believe he also spent some time in Mossad, sitting at a desk directing murder squads to their assassination targets.