Benjamin Netanyahu’s remarks on the tragic occasion
of the deaths of three Israeli teens at the hands of Palestinians reverberate further
than he might think. Understanding their implications is even a key to what the
late Jonathan Schell called “the fate of the earth.”
"’They
sanctify death, we sanctify life,’ Netanyahu asserted, comparing the teens to
those who killed them. ‘They sanctify cruelty, and we mercy and compassion.
That is the secret of our strength.’ A short
time later -- after the burials of Eyal Yifrach, 19; Gilad Shaar, 16; and
Naftali Frankel, a 16-year-old dual U.S.-Israeli citizen, in Modiin—the Prime
Minister spoke again about the three before a security cabinet meeting, saying,
‘May God avenge their blood.’” (CNN)
If only mercy
and compassion truly were the secret of Israel’s, or any modern nation’s,
strength. Instead, we see an unworkable policy of revenge at work. Presumably
the Prime Minister was referencing Deuteronomy, where God reserves vengeance to
Himself alone. Later in the Bible that commandment to leave things to God is complemented
by references to the necessity for us to consciously put away wrath and cross
over into forgiveness. But ending the cycle does not require forgiveness. It merely
requires awareness that vengeance as policy is futile.
Mr. Netanyahu
tries to separate “us” and “them” into distinct moral universes, as if Israelis
and Palestinians were not equally human and fallible. Looking down upon adversaries
from a moral high ground—just as they do him—contradicts the mercy and
compassion he affirms as the presumed basis of Israeli superiority,
rationalizing the continued game of tit for tat. Where is the mercy, or
justice, in bulldozing the houses of the murder suspects?
Lest we elsewhere in
the world think we are not subject to the corrupting spirit of vengeance, think
again. It is the exceptional leader who, at a moment of violence like the ISIS
beheadings of American citizens, summons the political courage to refuse to
give in to revenge, and urges the rest of us to follow suit.
Since 9-11 vengefulness
has corrupted our thinking about the “Muslim world,” a phrase corrupted already
by the falseness of thinking of that world as a monolith. Long before the twin
towers fell, vengeance was firmly in place as the implied modus operandi of a
potentially omnicidal international system: nuclear deterrence. What else is
deterrence if it is not a cold calculated version of passionate hot revenge,
the logical opposite of the merciful and compassionate Golden Rule? If you plan
on doing evil to us, think carefully, for we are ready to give back far worse—even
if we risk destroying ourselves in the process.
Sensible ways out of
this thicket of paradox can seem eccentric indeed. Remember when Ronald Reagan
proposed to Mikhail Gorbachev that the U.S. share with the Soviets the
technology of missile defense? So reasonable, yet so far-fetched, because it
assumed Soviets cherished their grandchildren as much as Americans. Reagan
understood the endlessness (until the world itself ends) of the revenge cycle.
No matter how
profoundly antithetical it would be to the “never again” history of Israel to
suggest that they rely on their Iron Dome missile defense system alone for
protection and refuse to retaliate when attacked, in the long run lives would
be saved on both sides if they did. This life-giving principle of defensive non-revenge
applies as well to the search for viable international security norms by the
United States and other nuclear nations—applies for that matter to any conflict
anywhere. Abandon the policy that the best defense is a good offense. Categorically
declare no first use. Aggressively advocate for treaties that further cut
numbers of warheads. Declare
deterrence immoral and unworkable for all parties. Emphasize true defense, like
Israel’s anti-missile system. Most of all replace the vicious cycle of vengeance
with a virtuous cycle that begins when any one party has the maturity to affirm
with Gandhi that “an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.”
