The Palestine Collection: '48 Never Ended - Gideon Levy
JAY:
What does Israel mean to you now?
LEVY:
Means my homeland. You means the place that that I belong to it. It means my memories, my presence, my friends, my culture, my parents, my children. It means also place which makes me many times feel very ashamed.
JAY:
Yeah. So can you tell me a bit about that? I mean, is it, you know, what does Israel mean to you? Sort of a hope of what it could become? And in the ways how are you feeling at the moment of sort of that trajectory that are you getting? Are you are you getting closer to it, even if it feels further away, or are you just kind of at a loss at the moment?
GEVY:
I'm not any more in a position that I think that it could have become something else. because the beginning was very problematic. Yeah. The establishment of Israel was very problematic. The basis is very problematic. And therefore whatever came after it cannot be healthy because the, the, the basic ground was, was ill. you see, my father came here on an illegal boat traveling half the year in the Mediterranean, detained in Beirut, Lebanon, 600 people on a small boat, without food, without anything. He was not a Zionist. He was hardly an active Jew. He hardly knew anything about Judaism. He had these lives in Europe, very promising lives. He came here because there was no other place for him. And and I think that it was a solution for the Jewish people. But the grounds to this being totally different than Zionism from the first, the came here not in order to live side by side with the Palestinians, but to take over. And that's that's the scene which we are paying the price until today, because Israel never changed its policy. What happened in 48 is happening ever since then.
JAY:
Yeah. I've been thinking more and more about this, framing, which has been popular and I subscribe to of a settler colonial relationship, at least from the Palestinians eyes. They didn't care who much was arriving in boats and taking their homes. It looks kind of the same to them, I suppose, but for someone like your father, you know, I grew up in an American Jewish household with stories of exodus from Europe, although mine went across another ocean. But I heard the same kind of stories and I've been I've and I have sympathy for them. Right. Of course there was nowhere to go and I've been thinking more and more about this notion of Israelis sort of being swindled a bit by the Zionist project, which they had not themselves forged or signed up for. I don't know if you could speak a bit to that. I am interested in this conversation with you and really digging through what you just said and the history of sort of starting this project down the wrong road and never finding the right place to turn. And now maybe heading off a cliff.
LEVY:
Yes. It took me, by the way, many years to realize all this because Zionism is not perceived in Israel as an ideology. Zionism and Israel is perceived like a religion. Yeah. And it's not a question of agreeing to be as honest or not. If you belong to Israel and you must be, there's no other alternative like being a communist in Soviet Russia. You have to adopt this ideology which is not perceived simply, say, or perceived as an ideology or and there is no room for anyone who put some doubts or questions about that. So we were brought up with this, and most of us never asked any questions, and most of us will never ask any questions. and in this framework, it's very hard to change your skin, as we say in Hebrew, and all of a sudden to look at it from a different perspective. it is by far too painful for most of the Israelis because what do you do?
JAY:
Yeah. What do you?
LEVY:
So we it's, you know, you grow with a certain identity that uses identity. and most of the people cannot change their identity. Yeah. And it's very hard to change your identity in this case. It's also an identity with some moral judgment. You know that to help an old lady to cross the road is perceived here as a zionist. To donate money for poor people. I mean, anything positive is only, it's not only about, you know, it's about daily lives. They say that what does Zionist activities do to help them? It's European immigrants who came here and assist them. I mean, what does this have to do with it? Zionism is a synonym here for being a good man, a good person. So how can you not be a good person?
JAY:
And when did you start to. You mentioned, you know, it took you several years. What were the first cracks in your clinging to this identity? Was it certain books or things you saw?
LEVY:
The very long process, yeah. Which starts in meeting traveling to the occupied territories as a journalist in the late 80s.And then gradually realizing that the occupation defines Israel and then gradually realizing that the information it’s there to stay. It's not temporary, as we were told. It's going to stay here. And Israel never had an intention to put an end to it. And then you come to the conclusion that Zionism means Jewish supremacy. And then you say, no, no, with any kind of ethnic supremacy, I cannot be part of it. This really happened only in the last two years, this conviction that Zionism is, you know, in the 70s the UN voted about “zionism as racism”. And we were so shocked. Oh there they and today to ask how else can you define Zionism?
JAY:
So I'm an American who grew up in a Jewish household. Although maybe like your father, not a lot of God talk, but this kind of tacit Israel worship. It was this third rail I couldn't criticize and I couldn't sort of touch it. How frustrating has it been for someone like yourself to maybe deal with this greatest superpower on earth, halfway across the world, which seems maybe I don't know how you would frame it to be, “tripping you up”? How does that relate to what your fate has been?
LEVY:
You know, so here I will be personal. When I was there as a child and in Tel Aviv, there was very little choice of clothes. I used to get packs of used clothes from the son of my mother's best friend, who happens to be, by the way, the aunt of Benjamin Netanyahu. She used to send us. I remember the smell of those packs, going to the post office and getting those packs. I think I was the guy in the first blue jeans in Tel Aviv. And the first, American shirts and t-shirts. And it carried the name of the cousin of Netanyahu because they used to send it to the laundry. So the name was printed on those pens. And for me, this aid from those rich friends in the United States, or rich uncle, even though we were no family, was part of my childhood. They send us aid. Then I started to meet them because they started to come to Israel, and this was really a different world because Tel Aviv in the 50s, in the 60s was a wonderful place, but quite a poor place.I remember first time going to the United States, this was in the year of 70 with a group of young Israelis, high school students. We were singing and dancing all kinds of Israeli songs for the Jewish communities in the East Coast, and we were staying with them in their homes. And I remember also going the first time to the home of the uncle of Netanyahu at seven Copper Beach Lane in Scarsdale, New York. I can still smell the smell of the private swimming pool. And all of those scenes were, for us, something from a different planet. So in those years, America was a dream, an unachievable dream. And I didn't see anything political about it. It was just the big brother who helps the small, poor brother to survive. That's the way I perceived it then, without any criticism. And when we were among the Jewish communities dancing for them the horrah, I felt that we are brothers and sisters. Obviously, I see it in a very different way to now.
JAY:
Yeah, I mean, tell me about today and how that relationship has formed. So I'll just tell you, I bristle when people make this defense of Israel, as you know, “it's there's only a few Jews in the world, and there's how many million Muslims.” And I think what they're trying to do in that sort of comparison is show the vulnerability of Israel as this tiny nation amongst a lot of them, in a really bad neighborhood. And of course, there might be some truth to that, but that tiny nation in a bad neighborhood has the backing and seemingly, maybe it's ending, but unconditional blank check support of the most powerful military and country on earth. And so talk about now how you maybe see that dynamic with America and maybe American Jewry as well.
LEVY:
I think America corrupted Israel. I think this so-called friendship is not a real friendship. It's more of a relationship between a drug addict and the dealer. America destroyed Israel in many ways because it taught Israel that Israel can do whatever it wants. There are no limits. We have the big brother to guide us automatically and blindly. By the way, in an unconditional way. Israel is getting more money from the United States than any other state in the world. And you ask yourself, is really Israel the most needed place, the poorest place, the place who needs so much money? And you can't avoid that. Part of it is because of the Jewish community. Not all of them, but the Jewish community is part of it. The Jewish community, the older generation. Because now, you know better than me, there is a huge shift, which leaves me with a lot of hope. But the older generation totally identify themselves with anything Israel is doing, again, blindly and automatically not thinking about the consequences. and the consequences we see now, because rightly so many progressive Americans are asking you questions. First of all, “is that the best way to spend the thanks payers money of the United States on this country who never listens to our advisors? Who ignores our advisors? Who humiliates our presidents one after the other. Is this really the interest of the United States?” And then when we talk about the Jewish community, this total identification with Israel and this blind automatic support means that when Israel is committing a mass murder or mass killing in Gaza, the American Jewish part of it, you can't run away from your responsibility to this. And when the result is anti-Semitism because of it, don't be surprised because you put yourself in this position. You see that everything that Israel is doing is.
JAY:
Yeah. That will be hard. Yeah, that would be hard for some of them to hear. I'm thinking of my mom in my head right now who's worried about those expressions and has the boogeyman of the Holocaust returning at any time. But I thought something you said there was so interesting about America corrupting Israel in that way, because there's this quote, speaking of the older generation, from Joe Biden going around when he, from the 90s I think maybe the 80s, when he was declaring his strong support of Israel. And he said something like, “If Israel didn't exist, we would have to invent it to serve our interests in the region.” He's saying exactly what you just said. It wasn't, I don't know why people haven't picked up on this more, He's not saying “because we support democracy everywhere” or “because these are our brothers” or “we have some kinship of the values.” No, he's saying to put our interest in the region. So I don't know. I mean, playing Israel. And this is an interesting tactic I'm trying to take. I am quite upset as I think you are about Israel and its current behavior. I'm carefully trying to think about Israelis, modern day Israelis now, as a bit of victims of their own, and we've already talked about sort of the Zionist project, but maybe of their own, you know, being hooked on American money or their own hubris or their own specialness in some ways. What do Israelis know about their own history in your estimation?
LEVY:
First of all, I must say that American Jewry really is now in a very late stage of recognizing that Israelis don't appreciate them at all. They look at them upside down. They think they are stupid. And they want only their money. I'm generalizing it, oversimplifying it, but you can see it everywhere. This attitude in which you are our ATM, you are our bank accounts, but nothing more than this. And we don't want to hear your views. We are not interested in it. Now, getting back to your question.I think that Israelis know nothing. I mean, the level of ignorance mainly among the young generation will shock you. I mean, they know nothing about nothing. I'm shocked by the level of ignorance among the high school students. Obviously, there's always a small group who knows a lot, but most Israelis don’t know stories. Now, when I was a child. I knew many things. I didn't know anything about the history of the state. And what I knew was totally biased. today they know nothing about anything.
JAY:
Can you give me a specific example? I don't want to cut you off, but this is so interesting. And in the previous episode, I'm going through a lot of the history. So as an example, when did you learn and how did you learn about the existence of the Irgun or the stern Gang or something like that.
LEVY:
I knew the Irgun and the Stern Gang. But I never heard the word Nakba. I was maybe 20 or 25 when I first heard the word not. We saw all those ruins along the roads. Palestinian houses. We never ask “where are the owners of those houses?” What happened to them? Why aren't they not in their homes? Well in 67 when I was 14 I went with my parents to the to the West Bank. I remember so many exciting scenes. I don't remember seeing one Palestinian. I mean, we knew about us more. We knew nothing about what happened to the people who lived here. We really believe that “the people without the land came to a land without the people”. We really believed that we were the weak one, the David, and they were the Goliaths. And we really believed that they all ran away and we didn't expect anyone. We never asked. For example, why didn't we let them come back? Let's say they all ran away. Why can someone not get back to his property even if he ran away in it? In the the Gulf War, I took my family and went to Eilat because I had a baby of three months then and I couldn't stay. I was in fear of chemical weapons? I lost my property? I couldn't get back to my home? Sure I could! Why couldn't the Palestinian get back to the properties? Even if they ran away? So all those questions were not in our vocabulary. And above all, we never met a Palestinian. We never met an Arab. You live in Tel Aviv in the 50s, in the 60s, in the 70s. You don't meet any Arab. I remember when I was 17, I met once a Druze. This was the maximum. We were totally separated. So it's a mixture of ignorance and bias and a lot of separation. We didn't mix it all, and the outcome was that we really believed that we are the only one around and we are the victims and we are the chosen people, and we have the right to do whatever we want after the Holocaust and nothing else. But that's a typical systematic brainwash system.
JAY:
And today the youth in Israel, you're saying they might learn something like the Irgun or the Stern Gang or something like that, maybe as freedom fighters.
LEVY:
Now they know even not about that. Nothing. If they would know who was David Ben-Gurion, it will be a great achievement. They know the name because there are so many streets on his name, but there will not be sure. Was it the president? Was the Prime Minister? What was Moshe Dayan? They never heard about him. Now they know nothing about nothing. And they are much more nationalistic than we were.
JAY:
So when they're dropping bombs and fighting and massacring or whatever, we are going to frame it as in Gaza at the moment, what's running through their heads? How would you characterize it? How are they able to be doing what they're doing? It's interesting. I'm trying to take sort of a sympathetic view, I'm calling them ignorant in the most charitable sense of the word. Right. In their worldview, this is some evil made up fake refugee problem? Maybe a reincarnation of the Nazis? It's just old anti-Semitism and something like that? I mean, is that the level that we're at at the moment?
LEVY:
You said it all. First of all, we don't have to guess because we have very concrete expressions in this war. For example, unlike other wars in Gaza, there are no soldiers refusing to serve. For sure. Not publicly. There were some who did it silently, but this is meaningless in formal laws. We had petitions of pilots and petitioners of soldiers who said we don't want to serve then. this time nobody even dares to think about it. Secondly, you see the enthusiasm, you see the footage, you see the video of their shooting. They are still proud about what they are doing, and that's an outcome of decades of their humanizing the Palestinians. You say, did they see the Nazis? I think it's even worse. They don't see them as human beings at all. And therefore everything is allowed. Nothing is forbidden. And you really see obviously the older they are, the more reluctant they are. But most of the soldiers are 18, 19 year old guys, 20 they are really doing it with a lot of enthusiasm like they're doing for many years now in the West Bank.
JAY:
So in my emails, you, you know, I made a film with Sam Harris and I've been obviously very, dismayed at his current sort of expressions on the topic, but I don't think they're rare. And so even people in my family who were always supportive of Israel always would make sure they would point to the settlements and say, “oh, but I don't agree with the settlements. I wish, you know, I wish those would stop.” This is probably something you've heard a lot of, like, you know, “Israel has a right to exist. And, you know, I think the problems are exaggerated at those settlements. But I do disagree with them.” How do you respond to this kind of, I don't know, wanting to somehow separate that problem as if it is not linked to the entire situation. I don't want to put words in your mouth. I'm frustrated with it clearly. How do you respond to it?
LEVY:
You are rightly doing so were frustrated about it. I can compare it to another phenomena which is more updated. “It's only about Netanyahu.” “We only if we get rid of Netanyahu everything will…” And that's on a smaller scale because the settlements are a bigger problem… Because Netanyahu will, you know, exit the stage, disappear. The settlements will not. But it's in both cases, the same, focusing on a relatively minor phenomena. “This we can somehow handle while we justify the entire project.” But the entire project is the problem, not the settlements. And again, a very late realization of mine five years ago. I'm not sure what this told you today. I know the problem is 48 not 67. For many years I said “if we just pull out from the occupied territories, everything would be great”. Not anymore. Maybe it was possible, but not anymore. Now it's all about 48. I give you a personal example. Again, I don't buy any products from the occupied territories, from the settlements. Very good. I feel very good about myself. But you understand that I cannot live here and not buy Israeli products. But I know it's very hypocritical and when people from abroad ask me. I always tell them, don't make the separation because we are all settlers. First of all, we all support the settlement project. But, you know, also Tel Aviv is a settlement. And I don't say this that we have to dismantle Israel and send 10 million people, 7 million people, 7 million Jews, back to Europe. This is impossible.But we have to realize that the problem is 48, because 48 never stopped.
JAY:
And it seems that, I mean, to back it up even earlier than 48. I mean, the train seemingly had left the station on Zionism in Palestine prior. Let's say maybe not 1897 but certainly by 1917 and the Balfour Declaration. You had people like Hannah Arendt and Albert Einstein who were facing a real threat in Europe and were interested in the Zionist project, going to conferences and whatnot. And very early on, in the 30s, stepping away slowly, being like, “this is already taken over” by what they, in their words, were calling “Nazi and fascist ideas”. And so, again, I mean, I think that train left the station pretty late. I do have sympathy. A lot of people always point to the Jews who were expelled from Arab nations after 48 as being caught up in this thing, and yes, all caught up in a train that left the station before 1948. But I do get your point about 1948, you know, and those settlements… because you said something else interesting there. And I totally agree with your analysis there. Where for you, would you now looking back on it, think that the window to, let's call it a two state solution with West Bank and Gaza or something, when did that window close for you as being a feasible facts on the ground possibility?
LEVY:
But now, I realize that this window was never opened. But interestingly, it happened after two visits to South Africa. I was twice there. Once it's Mandela's funeral. And before this, as a guest of the South African Foreign Ministry. And something in those visits really taught me that we have to go for one state solution like South Africa went for a one state solution and all the problems in South Africa, and there are many, South Africa basically today is much more in just place to live in than 25 years ago. And also that the unthinkable can happen because I remember talking about the bloodbath that all the whites will be slaughtered and there's no chance for a democracy in South Africa. And, you know, very few whites were slaughtered, if at all. So somehow it was there when I realized that we have to stop it, losing ourselves and cheating ourselves, because I always felt that a two state solution, there is something fake in it. How we resolve the problem of the refugees in a two state solution. How will we solve the problem that this Palestinian state will be a burden to them? Because is it to be militarized. Why should it be demilitarized? Israel is militarized. Who is going to protect them? They have to count on the goodwill of the Israeli army? So all kinds of questions. And then all of a sudden I realize it's all about the one state which existed for years. Well, and we just have to change you. It sounds very simple, but it's a very, very long way to go.
JAY:
Yeah, I think it's going to be a bumpy ride to get to it. What do you say about, and this is a tough one because again, I don't know if you know the kind of people I've worked with, but they focus a lot on religious violence in particular. And the comparison to South Africa and always this overblown fear. I mean, it was the same argument that slave owners made being like, “we can't release the slaves because they'll kill us, because I know how hard I've been beating them.” And it's almost always an overblown fear. But there's people in my intellectual orbit who always point towards Islam as being a particularly potent form of religious violence. That might be a different variable in this equation. I don't know how you respond to that. It also, of course, ignores that there has been Jewish violence. But let's hear your response to that fear and the analysis that something like jihad. Or even if, you know, Iran is supporting it, they have their own networks that are “a different animal” than something like black South Africans who've been discriminated against.
LEVY:
First of all, even if it's true, it wasn't true 20 years ago. The Palestinians were the most secular, Arab peoples, very secular. There were no Islamists. So first of all, if they would have said that 20 or 30 years ago for this danger, wouldn't appear at all. Instead, I believe that the Palestinians seem more secular than all the other Arab countries. Yes, they go to mosques, but I don't see them as jihadists. But it is changing. I can, you know, see these trends. For Israel, it was enough that on the 7th of October to prove it, even though, you know, you can ask yourself one thing: has barbaric wars created so much hatred? How much hatred should create 50 years or one year of brutality? But in any case, it is a danger. I don't want to say there's none. You see, my partner, she's Swedish, and they are facing it in Sweden now. Sweden was one of the most generous countries to absorb refugees, mainly Muslim refugees. And Sweden is changing now and suffering and paying a hell of a price with it now facing realities that it never faced in its history. Gangs of of of violence, of people using missiles in the streets. I mean, in certain neighborhoods, obviously. And it is a problem. I don't want to say that it's not, as the Israeli right wing is always saying, “not all muslims are terrorists, but all the terrorists are Muslims”. But I can't ignore the fact that when you open a TV and you hear about violence in the world, most of it is Muslim.
JAY:
Yeah. I think there's historical reasons for that, which I, I'm speaking about in the previous episode, but, yeah, I mean, I also think, you know, moving to a one state will take some courage and some things might blow up and, and and it shouldn't derail the entire project. And I know that's such a crass thing to say, but I think that's the path. And like you said, it didn't have to be this way. I'm 41. I've been thinking about this a lot since I was 13 years old and about to get my bar mitzvah. I've been warning about this day. Of like, you're going to reach this point of no return, where you're choosing to go the hard path. You're choosing to go down the painful path with a lot of death and a lot of problems. And it seems we've chosen that path, and Israel chose that path. And it's just going to take some, some courage. It didn't have to be this way 20 years ago, 30 years ago. It's not much comfort to people who are like, well, what do we do now? How much of that do you think was, quite intentionally engineered? You know, a lot has made about Israel supporting and funding Hamas to de-legitimize the Palestinian state, embarrass Arafat, all that kind of stuff. I mean, how serious do you think that charge is and holds up to scrutiny?
LEVY:
My tendency is usually to of think that Israel and Israelis are less sophisticated than we tend to think. Because I don't see a grand plan in Israel at all. We hardly know how to conclude this war in Gaza. No plan. Nothing. Nobody knows how to finish it. What will be the day after? So I already know that some others believe that it was all planned. So there are some evidences that yes, there are some documents, some of them protocols, some, some hearings that you hear with people spoken about it, but I'm not sure there was a very dramatic plan. But it happened and saying so now I still refuse to believe that everything was planned here. But Israel, I think it was more improvised, like Israel usually does. But it's very clear the spirit of all of it was this thing that this I mean, too many Israelis believe until this very day, and for sure, in the first days of their nation, that the only real solution is ethnic cleansing. There is no other real solution. All the other solutions are not solutions. Temporary solution, but not final one. The real solution is to make this land Jewish. And you can't deny that's a solution. You could be totally against it. Obviously, you can think it's a Nazi way of thinking, but you know, and I'm saying that the solution is the back is in the back of the mind of generations of Israelis and Zionists, even though they know that it's not possible, or at least not possible for the time being. But they were all waiting, and still they are for the moment it will become possible.
JAY:
And October 7th is an opportunity, certainly to justify it. Yeah. so, how would you frame, I want to talk about, censorship in Israel. You know, you've been able to write for, for quite a while, how we hear about military censors in Israel and, how pervasive is sort of censorship and freedom of press to write about these things?
LEVY:
It's much worse than you think because it's not about censorship. The military censorship is very limited. It's about self censorship, which is much worse. Right? Really nothing to do with censorship. The government, the army, the secret services, they can put very, very little pressure or prevent very, very few things to be published. The problem is that most of the media, if not all of media in this war, it is really almost all, it chooses to censor itself, not because of ideological reasons, only because of commercial reasons. But is this wall to wall agreement? Everyone wants certain things not to be published. The readers don't want to know, and the reporters don't want to report, and the publishers don't want it to be reported and the government and the Army don't want it to be reported and everyone is very happy. You see the coverage now, I don't know how much you are aware, to the most shameful coverage of Gaza in Israeli media. Yeah, you know that for days, for weeks, for months you don't see Gaza at all. Only through the eyes of the soldiers. No suffering in Gaza, no starvation, no replaced people, not nothing. That's not because the government told the media not to touch points. They can as much as they want. It is because they don't want to bother our readers and our viewers. I participated in a panel on Israeli TV for many years now in a very liberal program, and they stopped my participation ever since the war started, nobody told them to do so. They just know that my presence there might create problems with the viewers not with the government. And this is much worse in my view.
JAY:
I live in Spain at the moment now, so I get what I get here. But the LA times just a couple days ago put out a story about children showing up in a hospital in Gaza with sniper bullets in their head in succession. A pretty awful story, obviously, but a, you know, piece of really telling evidence of some pretty untoward behavior and targeted intentional killing of children. It gets published in the LA times, which might be something surprising, as it were. Maybe like we said, things are changing in America, as you said, because of the commercial interests in America, people have to sell papers and younger people are not on board with the old message, at least of “let's not question Israel.” But what would happen if that gets published in the Jerusalem Post, say?
LEVY:
It would be a huge wave of canceled subscriptions, protest of readership even for less than this. And even haaretz in this war is more cautious than former wars, even though it's still the best of the best if you compare it to the others. But the private media will not be able to to stand it. Look, I published in 2014, I published an article about the Israeli pilots. My newspaper lost, I mean that day, I don't know how much money, but it was in millions of tickets in terms of cancellation. Because of one article, cancellation of subscriptions and cancellation of advertisement.
JAY:
Can you give me your predictions? How you see this. Give me to one year and then the ten year way this is playing out because I'm kind of at a loss. But believe it or not, I'm also optimistic in the ten year vision. I think the walls will fall one day and we'll have that one state. but it's going to be a really bumpy ride to get there. But how are you projecting this to go?
LEVY
I really don't know. I not only I don't know, I cannot portray one optimistic scenario. I don't know from where to think it will make it happening. The world, who is very indifferent in many times, blind and has little interest. And I'm afraid the interest will just decrease. The Israelis will wake up one morning and say, no, no, this is not nice what we are doing. Let's change the way the Palestinians, who are getting weaker and weaker and weaker and more divided than lacking leadership and lacking spirit of struggle and they are really lost and above all, lonely. Nobody really supports them except of lip service and demonstrations. But that's it. So they are. So who is going to be the game changer? I don't see it happening. But on the other hand, if we would have met in the late 80s and I would have told you that within months, you are not living then, but within months the Berlin Wall, apartheid and Soviet Russia are all going to fall without even no bloodshed. You would have thought that I'm out of my mind. So we have to really leave some room for the unthinkable. But in thinkable terms, I cannot see any, any, any.
JAY:
Well, I was alive. I was born in 82, but I don't remember much of it, but. Yeah. Yeah, but do you think things are changing in America? For sure, which is something we mentioned early in this conversation about the analogy to, you know, a drug dealer. Maybe that's where I'm drawing some of my optimism that this can't… I don't know how that changes the game... If the blank check stops. I think unfortunately, Trump or Biden won't change anything. Trump might make a bigger blank check, as it were. But this, you know, I'm on board with the projection that this is likely the last Democratic candidate ever to be unconditionally supportive of Israel. And I think that's an interesting change. I don't know that Israel has never existed as a place without this security blanket, as it were. Maybe that's where I'm drawing some optimism that it is out of necessity of survival it has to change a bit. You know, I don't know if there's a moral awakening there, but, maybe that's where I'm drawing some of this, necessity? The Palestinian people may be weaker, but I think they have a resolve that, you know, why give up now? They've stuck it out so long. So, I mean, I don't know how you think if you play out that scenario, let's say Trump wins. And for four years it's probably pretty awful with a bigger blank check. And Saudi Arabia will likely normalize relations because it's all about money. But then but then things really shift in American stance or American leadership in the world generally does that does that get us closer to optimism? I don't know, but maybe I'm fishing here.
LEVY:
No, no, no, that's the only source of hope. Yeah. The only source of hope is the shift in America, both, by the way, in the Jewish community and in the general community. And it includes also the Jewish community. Yeah. The only source of hope. But for me, it is. So, yeah. Because I had my expectation already when Barack Obama was elected. His heart was in the right place. He's going to do it. And then 20 years later and we are in the same place or even in a worse place. So I hope this will happen soon, but it will not be in my lifetime anymore. because look, also America, we always say that it changes its directions always very, very slow. Takes years and decades to change this huge, huge carrier that changes direction. But that's the main source of my hope. Because if the United States will change, Europe will be the first one to follow. I don't know why they are living in such fear from the United States, and they are following whatever the United States is doing blindly. But once America will change the EU will change immediately, they are just looking for the opportunity.
JAY:
I'll give you one, one last one that maybe is food for thought of. If I gave you a time machine and you could go back and and change something in this entire trajectory, you could go back to 1897 and tell them, hey, maybe you the Uganda Plan is the one to go for here, or what would you what would you have done to prevent the situation that we're in? I mean, I'm trying to draw some sort of hope out of the situation we're in, but it's difficult. So what would you have changed about this entire endeavor?
LEVY:
I didn't think about it, but, maybe I would have prevented Hitler, and then I wouldn't be here if most of the Israelis wouldn't have been here. If it's not Hitler, there's the state of Israel. and if it's not a state of Israel, there is maybe a problem in Europe with the Jews, but on a much smaller scale. And maybe we would have overcome this problem. I would be now, German speaking, European, because I had secular parents, and I think I would have had quite a nice life. Second option is to replace Ben-Gurion. and to start the whole thing in a different way, because I think it could have started different.
JAY:
Yeah. Can you finish on that note? Because it is, I think history is so crucial to this. Tell me about Ben-Gurion and who wish we could have had.
LEVY:
Look, in the 20s already. because we were we spoke we spoke before. What did it start in the 20s? There are speaking about conquering the labor, the labor market in other way, in other words, pushing the Palestinians from their jobs. They spoke about it openly. They started to push the Palestinians from their jobs and replace them. This could start in a different way, because if you speak to the old Palestinians and old Jews from the 20’s 30s, 40s, they were quite good relations. It could continue, if we will, if the whole attitude of Zionism wouldn't have been such a colonialist attitude in which we know better. Everything belongs to us. We have the right about this land, and only we have the right of all this land. And there is no room for any compromise. So I think if the whole project started in a different way, we could have been today in a quite prosperous nation state, Jews and Arabs together. What's wrong? What's wrong today? To start it is much, much more complicated.
JAY:
So now we're at a place where all of that we wish would have happened, didn't happen. And it seems that we're running into the…. this is a bad American phrase, but the “shit or get off the pot” phase where it's either ethnic cleansing or one state. Actually do this the way it should be, even though it's way more painful than it ever needed to be. Or maybe this fantasy of a two state, but it seems that we're at the end. We're at the end of the line. It cannot continue to be going the way it was going. Or do you think we're going to go right back to October 6th? I don't. I don't see it happening. I think this is the moment we have to choose as a people. And obviously my vote is for one state… as painful as it's going to be. We have to be hopeful. And like you said, I take a lot of solace in how fast history can turn. I always point to when people are feeling pessimistic about this kind of stuff. I always point to the idea, if, you know, if I told you in the year 1968 that Vietnam would be the hottest tourist destination for Americans in just 30, you know, you would have laughed me out of the room. But it's a beautiful place. And Americans are drinking. You know, Mai Tai is on the beach now. Things can change and things can change really quickly. So, you know, let's just hope for some of that optimism that we, we don't give in to our deepest fear because I think the worst possible psychological story that we could tell is the victims, people like your father or my relatives, but particularly yours in Israel, the victims of the the Black Death and the Holocaust and the extermination effort of Jews in Europe would, within just 1 or 2 generations, be on the other side of an overt ethnic cleansing campaign by whatever name you want to sanitize it as. That's a pretty shitty story, if that's what it turns out to be. And I think, if anything, that we can do as thinkers and philosophers and humans with courage is to try to steer the future towards better stories about the kind of people we are. But to do that, we have to be honest, as you've done so beautifully in your work, with what we're capable of doing. And even Jews, even Westerners, even whites are capable of these things. And I think that's something we're going to have to reckon with about ourselves and about history. But maybe I'm more optimistic than you. I'm a bit younger than you, so maybe I'll live to see it. but I, I hope I do, and I obviously hope you do, too, because your work is courageous and important. And keep the fire alive as much as you can. I hugely appreciate your time. Like I said, you're probably one of the most sought after people on Earth at the moment. But try to find some more reservoirs of energy and keep writing, keep witnessing and keep up the good work. So thank you, Gideon.
LEVY:
Thank you so much for having me and for me. It was really a very unique experience to talk with you. I was looking for points in which we disagree and they couldn't find them. it's very rare these days that I talk to people that I can see in myself, totally identifying with what they say, especially not in Israel. I'm a little less optimistic than you. But why spoil the party when you end like this? It is such a nice and really hopeful way. Okay, let's hope you are right.
JAY:
Okay. Thank you.