A taste of my own medicine

This post is directed at those apathetic, self-hating, post-Zionist, latte drinking, draft-evading lefty Tel Aviv Israelis I insulted a few months back.  I've owed you this for some time... and yesterday the check finally came due.

A coworker of mine came into my office yesterday, red in the face and clearly agitated over something.  He and I are good friends and have become quite close while traveling abroad together on business.

I asked him what was wrong and he began nearly yelling at me in a rant that went something like this:

"What's wrong with you settlers?  Why is it that you think the law doesn't apply to you?  Don't you realize that the Arabs are people too?  Are you so simple-minded as to think that by beating up women and children you are hurting the terrorists?  Do you think that acting this way will ever bring peace???!

I was completely taken aback by his outburst and didn't have the slightest idea what he was talking about.  I waited for him to finish venting and then asked him to sit down and explain what had happened to get him so upset.

He didn't want to sit.  He just stood with his hands on his hips and said, "You mean to tell me you don't know about the settlers from Susiya who beat up the Arab shepherds... women!, children!... you didn't hear about it?"

I was still drawing a blank.  Susiya is community along my commute and I consider myself pretty up-to-date on news from my area... but I had heard nothing and hadn't seen a hint of the story in the news.

"Did this just happen?" I asked him, already reaching for my computer mouse, "because I check the news every couple of hours and I didn't see anything about this!"  As I said this I surfed over to the Jerusalem Post site... then Ynet and finally Haaretz. 

Nothing.  Not a whisper or hint about such an incident.

He had finally calmed down enough to take the offered seat next to me and he explained that the incident had happened the previous week but he had been too upset to talk to me about it until now.

That kind of freaked me out because he had been close to throwing stuff when he walked into my office, so I couldn't imagine how angry he'd been a week ago.  Also, it worried me that something fairly serious had apparently happened in my neck of the woods and I had completely missed it.

When I told him I couldn't find any mention of it on the regular news sites he explained that someone had sent him a link to a video on the ISM (International Solidarity Movement... a pro-Palestinian organization) web site.  I did a Google quick search using the words 'Susiya' and ISM and bingo... within seconds was looking at the film of the incident on the ISM site.

The brief 'facts' presented there were as follows:

"On Monday 9 June six masked Jewish settlers from the nearby outpost of Havat Ya’ir, armed with automatic weapons and cudgels, attacked a small group of Palestinians, mainly women, in their tent village in the Susiya location of the South Hebron Hills."

For the purposes of full disclosure I am posting it here so everyone is on the same page with what I have to say about this.  Go ahead and watch it... I'll wait.

OK, so I watched the film with my angry coworker/friend sitting next to me.  When it was finished I looked at him and asked a few questions:

Me:  First of all, there were four men, and not six as stated on their site.  Also, the attack seems to have taken place in a meadow and not in a tent village as the site indicates.   But what makes you so sure these were settlers?  You can't see who they are... They aren't wearing tzitzit (the ritual stringed garment that religious Jews wear under their shirts), no kippot on their heads... they aren't speaking Hebrew. What makes you so sure they are Jews, much less settlers?

Him:  Well, it says so on the ISM site.  I assume they looked into it.

Me:  OK, but if they didn't catch these guys why should we take ISM's word for it.  It could just as easily been a violent dispute between Arab clans, right?  That happens all the time.  Also, it says right here on the ISM web site that the settlers are carrying automatic weapons as well as clubs.  Did you see any weapons other than the clubs the four men were carrying?

Him:  Well no... but they could have left them at home.

By this time I was starting to feel some of my own anger welling up.

Me:  Do you hear how crazy that sounds?  You show me less than 45 seconds of shaky film that could be anyone - including Arabs - beating up these shepherds... and you want me to believe the written commentary on the ISM site about them being automatic weapon-toting settlers when there is no sign of automatic weapons... no sign of them being settlers... in fact, no sign of them being Jews!

Him:  [~silence~]

Me:  Think about it... why didn't something like this make the news?  It doesn't even pass the laugh test over at Haaretz!  Believe me, when it comes to accusing settlers of bad behavior the mainstream Israeli media isn't particular about fact-checking... but the only place I see this story is on sites like ISM, Peace Now and B'Tzelem.  If this had even a whiff of credibility it would have been in the headlines and stayed there for days!  I guaranty you that if anyone did report it in the MSM, it was pulled very quickly because there isn't a hint of it anywhere right now and it is less than a week later.

Him:  OK, but you have to admit that settlers are doing this sort of thing all the time. 

That's about the time I lost my mind.

"Are you kidding me?  You come in here and act as though you've just seen me personally beating up your children.  When I point out to you that there is a lot of room for disagreement about what the film actually shows, your answer is to say that even if it isn't settlers this one time... that the evil settlers are doing this sort of thing all the time! Is that really what you're saying???!!!"

"That would be like me wagging my finger in your face every time some drug-addled teenager gets stabbed in a Tel Aviv night club... or when a grenade gets thrown at a Gush Dan politician... or for that matter, I should have stormed into your office and screamed at you when that lawyer got blown up in his SUV last week in Tel Aviv!  I mean seriously... What the hell is wrong with you secular Tel Avivis... Why is it that you think the law doesn't apply to you?"

He didn't miss a beat before answering, "But those things you are talking about were done by criminals... they don't represent me or anyone else from the Merkaz!"

I immediately made that Israeli 'Ah!' sound that is roughly equivalent to the English 'Ah-Hah' to let him know that his statement could also be used to defend my position.

"Don't you see", I replied, "that  even if that film had shown settlers acting criminally - and you have to admit there is no evidence that it was settlers - they are criminals!  Why would you think it's fair to appoint four criminals to represent more than a quarter million hard-working, law-abiding, tax paying Israeli citizens who just happen to live over the green line?"

By now I was nearly breathless with anger.  But with my last outburst I began feeling the beginnings of a new feeling bubbling to the surface; shame.  As my angry words were still echoing off the walls of my office I began thinking about the countless times I've made sweeping generalizations about secular Israelis from the center of the country... and tagged them as if they were some sort of monolithic Golum.

To his credit, my coworker immediately apologized for his unfair generalization.  He admitted that he didn't have a particularly high opinion of the whole settler enterprise and that it had colored his opinion of settlers.  He also pointed out that since I was the only settler he knew he had unfairly unloaded on me.

We shook hands and went back to work.

Since my coworker was big enough to not only take ownership of his personal prejudices, but to also apologize to me... I figure the least I can do is come clean for some of my past mis-deeds.

So I would like to take this opportunity to publicly apologize for my unfair characterization of people from the center of the country as apathetic, self-hating, post-Zionist, latte drinking, draft-evading lefties.  Statistically we may be part of groups that reside on different sides of many issues.  But I have assigned some pretty unfair things to you as a group, while ignoring the fact that people on both sides of the green line (and those various issues) are good, bad, secular, religious, left, right... and most importantly; individuals.

Please accept my apology.  I'll try very hard not to do it again.