Walled Israeli Society at an Impasse

by Cypel, Sylvain

• ISBN13: 9781590512104
• ISBN10: 1590512103
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2007-06-17
• Publisher: Other Press

Summary

An award-winning journalist explores the culture of denial in Israeli and Palestinian societiesand its lethal consequences. Walled examines the contemporary state of mind of Israel's citizens, tracing the history of the State of Israel back to the Jewish national movement and the beginnings of Zionism. Sylvain Cypel offers a lucid analysis of the Israeli-Palestinian situation and powerfully demonstrates that the wall of protection erected in the West Bank by Israel is the most visible symptom of a society in peril. Those who are walled, Cypel argues, are first and foremost the Israelis themselves, who have chosen to ignore rather than acknowledge the existence and rights of their neighbors. Through the study of political discourse, intellectual controversy, and national institutions such as the army and the educational system, Cypel illuminates the mechanics of the culture of force that has led Israeli society into its current impasse. Walled combines historical, cultural, and sociological analysis with personal testimonies and a delightful Jewish wit, offering a cogent and gripping portrait of two peoples walled by denial: Israeli society and its "other," the Palestinians.

Author Biography

Sylvain Cypel

Sylvain Cypel, senior editor at Le Monde, joined the paper in 1998 as deputy head of the international section, following a five-year tenure as editor in chief of Courrier International and a stint as deputy editor in chief at the journal Les Echos. Cypel has long worked for the daily Le Matin de Paris and as a freelance journalist for France 2, Libération, and other media outlets, often covering the Middle East. He holds degrees in sociology, contemporary history, and international relations, the last of which he earned at the University of Jerusalem. He lived in Israel for twelve years, and is now based in Paris. Walled was originally published in French; the Spanish translation of the book has been awarded the 23rd "Francisco Cerecedo" Journalism Prize from the Association of European Journalists.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	p. XV
Introduction	p. 3
The Victim Position	p. 5
The Role of Denial	p. 9
Israel Real, Israel Disembodied: The Journalist, Honesty, and Emotions	p. 19
Memories, Self-Images, Images of the Other
Tantura: The Repressed Floods Back In
May 23, 1948: Was There a Massacre?	p. 25
The Katz Affair	p. 29
What the Katz Affair Reveals About Its Protagonists	p. 33
An Old Technique: Challenging the Opponent's Legitimacy	p. 37
An Inadmissible Reality from the Past?	p. 40
The Expurgated Memory of the 1948 Generation	p. 45
The "Purity of Arms": How to Escape from An "Ocean of Lies"
An Official Version: The Israelis as "Just, Absolute, and Sole Victims"	p. 49
Primary Elements of the Initial Israeli Denial	p. 52
The Missing Past in Literature	p. 59
"The Palestinians Don't Exist," nor Do the Refugees	p. 62
David and Goliath	p. 64
Moral Superiority over the Enemy	p. 66
Tzadkanut: Systematic Self-Justification	p. 73
"A Villa in the Jungle": The Israelis' Perception of their Environment
The Keyword Bitakhon: Security	p. 76
Institutional Paradoxes of Israeli Society	p. 85
National Unity and Centrifugal Tendencies	p. 92
The Colonial Question	p. 94
The "Animal Nature" of the Arab	p. 102
Teaching Contempt	p. 104
"These Semites- They are Anti-Semites": We are What We Were Born to Be
Sources of Israeli Orientalism	p. 107
The Influence of Ethnicism on the Jewish National Movement	p. 112
Very Old Arguments Still in the News	p. 119
Discounting the Other	p. 129
"Something Like A Cage": The Dilemmas of the Israeli Historian
Israeli Orientalism Applied to History	p. 137
"There Is No Partner"	p. 143
Benny Morris, an Israeli Historian Torn Between Ethnicism and Historical Truth	p. 145
Tom Segev vs. Gideon Levy: The "Immunization" of Israeli Students
What a Young Person in Israel Can Know	p. 158
The Vicissitudes of Authorized Historiography: A Study of a Recent Textbook	p. 169
The Impossibility of Returning to the Former Historic Order	p. 177
An "Artificial State": Internal Palestinian Obstacles to Understanding the Israelis
The Palestinian Relationship to the Israelis	p. 182
The Naqba: A Catastrophe, but Not a Defeat?	p. 188
Israelis, Palestinians: The Temptation to Do the Worst
Mute Oracles: The Transformation of Israel After the Six Days' War
The Emergence of the Bloc of the Faithful and Its Impact	p. 199
1967: The Establishment of Omnipotence	p. 205
Establishing the Routine of Occupation	p. 214
The Mechanisms of Colonization	p. 218
The Paradoxes of the Occupation	p. 222
"We Missed An Extraordinary Opportunity": The Great Waste of the Peace Talks
The Oslo Upheaval (August 1993)	p. 228
Seven Years to Negotiate a "Just and Comprehensive" Peace	p. 236
The Camp David Fiasco	p. 248
Taba, Geneva: Camp David Laid Bare	p. 253
"Serial Liars": Creating a Useful Image of the Enemy
The Steamroller after Camp David	p. 263
The Palestinian Uprising and Its Retroactive "Conception"	p. 270
The Function of Hasbara, Official Communication	p. 282
"Sharon is Sharon is Sharon": The Creeping "Pied-Noirization" of Israel
Ariel Sharon and the Palestinians	p. 291
The Intifada and the Israeli "Matrix of Control"	p. 296
The "Algerianization" of the Israelis	p. 303
The Lexicon of Occupation	p. 309
"Terrorism: Tell Arafat to Stop this Nonsense": The Failure of the Palestinian Authority
Either Armed Struggle or Secret Diplomacy	p. 315
The Palestinian Authority at Work	p. 324
Arafat: Muteness, Corruption, and Absence of Democracy	p. 328
Indiscriminate Suicidal Terrorism	p. 336
Demonization of the Israeli and Anti-Semitism	p. 350
The Brutalization of Israeli Society and the Radicalization of Nationalism
The Nationalist Bloc	p. 357
Pluralism Up, Democracy Down	p. 360
The University, the Media, and the "Traitors"	p. 363
The New Role of the Military	p. 373
The "Settlers' Party" and the Development of the National-Religious Movement	p. 382
"An Insane Logic, A Form of Suicide": The Israelis Confront Their Moral Failure
The Emergence of the "Moral Camp"	p. 392
The "Soft Underbelly" and the Temptation to Leave	p. 404
"The Hidden Plot of Our Lives": Competing for Victimhood
Israelis, Nazism, and the Shoah	p. 411
Appropriation of the Memory of Suffering	p. 416
Turning the Shoah and Nazism into Abstractions	p. 421
The Vision of Present-Day Anti-Semitism	p. 430
Palestinian "Victimization"	p. 436
Forward: Israeli Society After the Evacuation of Gaza
The Withdrawal from Gaza: A "Prehistoric Event"	p. 445
Reasons for the Withdrawal	p. 448
Drawing up the Balance Sheet of the Withdrawal	p. 453
Victors and Vanquished	p. 456
A New Political Map for Each Side	p. 461
Conclusion: Salvation through Defeat	p. 471
Getting Out of the Impasse	p. 473
The Price of Reconciliation	p. 483
Afterword: Haim Gouri	p. 489
Notes	p. 493
Bibliography	p. 523
Selected Readings	p. 531
Index	p. 533
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