By and large, however, religious Zionists have not adapted to the unfolding reality on the ground and continue to think of the conflict with the Palestinians and with the Arab world in mythological, timeless terms. They exist in a finite, temporal state, perhaps, but also in a place (and through a history) that is regarded as transcendent, and it is this belief that gives the movement broad appeal. Throughout the Gaza disengagement, the leadership of the religious Zionist movement cast Arabs in general and Palestinians in particular as the latest incarnations of Amalek, the arch-enemy of Biblical Hebrews. They marched holding placards displaying photos of the Lubovitcher rabbi, Menachem Shneerson, with captions written in Biblical language that read, “Gentiles must leave the land of Israel, so that they shall live. “In the rhetoric of the rabbis and right-wing leaders prior to the disengagement, Jews were consistently depicted as “the chosen people “and the “light unto nations “or they were spoken of as Holocaust victims who must now rise and avenge themselves.
At the enormous protest in Kfar Maimon preceding the Gaza pullout, a rabbi claimed that the nations of the world would simply stop existing were it not for Israel. Made with a straight face, such statements smack of a dangerous nationalism and are, in a sense, laughable. Measured against the actual reality of life in the Middle East, the rabbis struck many secular Israelis (and certainly foreign journalists) as rubber figurines promoting a heightened sense of paranoia and condemning Israel to neta zar, an inimical or alien element. But with their rhetoric sounding from bullhorns, the rabbis soldiered on, and, upon reflection, I realized that it was not nationalism to which they were speaking, but rather it was the dream of redemption.
What is fascinating about the more extreme rabbis is just how incapable they are of curbing their impulse to wax on about security issues, even though very few of them have taken the trouble to educate themselves on such matters. When I interviewed Dov Lior, the chief rabbi of Kiryat Arba, it was clear that he was a military junkie. After he laid out a particularly grim assessment of the Palestinian Authority, I asked Rabbi Lior if he considered himself an expert on Arab terror. He responded that he knew next to nothing about such things but, not two minutes later, he was again dishing out advice on security matters. Rabbi Lior seemed unable to control himself not because he lacked personal discipline, but because for him the concept of redemption is inextricably welded to national politics, and he is unable to distinguish between the two.
When Rabbi Lior spoke directly about geula (redemption) his eyes lit up, communicating a sense of excitement that was palpable and intoxicating. He seemed to feel that we would all be better off if we could only believe that the simple, physical act of settling Israel is the expression of a preternatural process that will end with the rising of the dead and peace on earth. If one could only let this idea serve as the marrow from which meaning flowed, then the problem of leading a meaningful life would be solved. The symbols and mythic elements that constitute the language of redemption—through which religious Zionists extend ancient mythology into the present—prop up such a belief. And without the seminal idea of Greater Israel, it is doubtful that Zionism itself would have the mass appeal that it does. The pillar of fire may not have arrived, but the pillar of Israel is Greater Israel itself.
Ariel Sharon realized that religious Zionism is timeless and immutable, that it might bend but that it will never break. As such, the Gaza pullout was a gamble. When settlers accused their former champion of being a “turncoat,”of “exiling Jews under fire, “Sharon replied that “things had changed.” The religious Zionist leadership responded that things had not changed, and that they never will. But of course Sharon’s gambit ultimately worked, and the movement has suffered a mighty body blow.
At the Bar Ilan conference, Nissan Slomiansky, an nrp member of the Knesset, spoke about the three pillars of religious Zionism—Eretz Yisrael, Torat Yisrael, and Am Yisrael; the land, the holy books, and the people of Israel. Claiming that they are all woven together and must be respected and advanced by every generation of Jews, and taking direct aim at Sharon, he continued: “The nails which hold these three elements together are hammered in just so, and to lose one element is to lose them all—have the edifice in its entirety dissolve. This is just what Arik wanted and did. During the disengagement, the prime minister raped us. He forced us to choose between the three things we loved equally. It was a black day, but we finally chose Am Yisrael, the nation, which is why there was no undue violence during the disengagement. But we must also admit to ourselves that the battle over Eretz Yisrael, the land of Israel, was lost in August of 2005.”
While damaged, religious Zionism is not without answers, not without agendas. As Slomiansky put it, “We expected that hundreds of thousands of Israelis would come down the Gaza settlements and embrace the settlers. But not more than a trickle made their way down to the settlements to support us. Why Because we religious Zionists had not embraced the people of Israel properly in the first place. We must take a deep look at ourselves, think about new ways of embracing the nation more firmly, more unshakably, more lovingly. We must win over the hearts and the minds of the people.”
Slomiansky’s mea culpa resonates strongly among the kipot srugot, including the mayor of Gush Etzion, Shaul Goldstein. He is a short, squarely built man with blue eyes set in a boyish face. In a former life, he was a contractor who did well for himself by developing land in the West Bank. Born into a secular family in Jerusalem, he built his own home in the settlement town of Efrat and now presides over the oldest settlement bloc in the West Bank. Goldstein has received considerable notoriety by declaring his position on the Security Wall. “No one wants it, “he told me even before I asked. “The International Court at the Hague has declared it illegal. The Americans, the Europeans, the Palestinians all want construction to stop. So why is it still going up “But Goldstein’s opposition to the wall comes from a different set of concerns than those expressed by the international community. Whereas the UN and EU worry about entrapping Palestinians, Goldstein is anxious about the Jewish settlements that may find themselves on the wrong side of the wall.
This much notwithstanding, the Israeli media has had a field day with the issue: “Anarchists Against the Wall recently received a new recruit,” one newspaper article began. Goldstein was not amused, but took the opportunity to put forward his own view of the disengagement defeat, which he happily repeated for my benefit. “After the disengagement, a large segment of our public suddenly realized that the flag we had waved all these years hadn’t forged a connection with anyone. We were the vanguard, leading a non-existent camp. We ran alone, we charged ahead, and when we looked back, we saw that there were no armies, that they simply weren’t there. So I proposed to my friends in yesha that we announce that there is no longer a yesha Council, that in its place is another council, one that can embrace other values...that in order to hold on to Tekoa and Karmel Tsur [two isolated encampments in Judea] we need to build outposts in Tel Aviv, Beer Sheva, and Afula.”
Besides the Slomiansky/Goldstein approach, there are at least three other reactions to the Gaza defeat worth mentioning. Moderate religious Zionists are prepared to let bygones be bygones, arguing that the disengagement is a fait accompli. “No amount of tears will bring back our beloved settlements,” one rabbi told me. “We can only hope and pray that God will not allow another such campaign. And by the way, it does not hurt one bit that Sharon is pretty well finished.”
