The Israel-Palestinian Conflict

By: Chet Lake

I will be straight-forward and admit that I do not understand the full context, nor do I know all of the relevant facts about the recent events in Gaza. I will, however, do my best to analyze different perspectives in the ethical/political debate that surround it. It should be understood that this is by no means a comprehensive analysis of the conflict (which could not be done in one blog post, let a lone a volume of literature), but rather a brief analysis and introduction of different perspectives.

One of the central questions that people ask and attempt to answer is "who has the greater moral claim"? This question divides people across the political spectrum with some falling on the side of Israel, others on the side of the Palestinians, and the rest (including myself) sitting on the fence.

(Before I go any further, let me first explain something very important. As a libertarian, no matter who is in the right, or the wrong, I believe the United States should remain neutral. She should not fund Israel, nor should she fund Israel's enemies. The question of which side has the greater moral claim is completely separate from the question of whether or not the United States should be offering support and to whom. It should also be understood that when I say "Israel" I mean the state of Israel, not the people of Israel as a whole.)

First let's examine the pro-Israel side:

Austin Petersen of The Libertarian Republic presents the Israeli perspective when it comes to a possible Palestinian state solution by linking and summarizing a video of a 28 year old Ben Netanyahu:

"Netanyahu argues that it is unfair to again partition Israel for the purpose of creating a new Palestinian state when there are already 21 Arab states in existence and that Arab nationalist leaders have already admitted that Jordan is a Palestinian state. "

Is it true that it would be unfair to ask Israel to give up more land in order for there to be a second Palestinian state (22nd Arab state)? In my opinion, Netanyahu does make a very strong case as far as a balance of power goes.

Would the creation of a Palestinian state be a net gain or a net loss for liberty? Should liberty minded folks (morally) support Israel or the Palestinians? Steve Horwitz, blogging for Bleeding Heart Libertarians, says it would be a net loss for liberty to weaken Israel and that some liberty minded individuals should rethink their support for the Palestinian cause and their desire to leave Israel out of the picture. He challenges some libertarians by asking them whether they are anti-state or pro-liberty:

"The conflict in the Middle East is the residue of centuries of history, culture, language, and religion, and it is a tangled mess of claims and counter-claims of God’s will, property, and colonialism.  There is no simple assignment of blame or corrective process.  There is blame to go around for all parties.  To really understand it, we need a much thicker libertarianism that actually goes out and reads a whole lot of history and tries to carefully untangle the knot..."However, saying that all parties have moral culpability, does not mean that all parties have equal moral culpability.  Just because it’s a mess, doesn’t mean we can’t come to some tentative conclusions about who bears more or less of the blame.  And more important:  even if libertarians agree that “all states are bad,” that does not mean that all states are equally bad...

"This brings me to my key point.  One problem with too many libertarians, and this is true of a variety of issues, is that they are 'anti-state' before they are 'pro-liberty.'  What I mean by that is that their intellectual-political reflex is to oppose vigorously anything governments do without doing the double-entry moral bookkeeping required to know whether opposing this state action will actually, over time, forward the thing we supposedly care about, which is liberty..."

In summary, my interpretation of Horwitz is that libertarians, or people who care about liberty in general, should not be so quick to side with the Palestinian cause and dismiss Israel as nothing but a no-good state. Why? Because aside from all of Israel's sins and misdeeds, Israel is a secular democracy (please don't get hung up on the term), and weakening Israel doesn't seem to have consequences as far as a net gain in liberty. In fact, it would likely result in more theocratic rule and despotism.

Now let's examine the Palestinian side:

In response to Horwitz, John Glaser argues the following:

"Mr. Horwitz’s first mistake is to conclude that, beyond demanding that the US government 'keep its military and our money out of' the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, he’s 'not sure how much libertarianism, at least of a thin variety, can say' about it. This thinking leads him to approach the issue in a vacuum, forgetting one vital strain in libertarian thought that I think is instructive.

"As things stand, and as everyone knows, the US is not a neutral player in the conflict. Israel receives over $3 billion in aid from Washington every year, not including the mountains of military hardware and expertise that the Israeli Defense Forces are now unleashing on the Palestinians. As Noam Chomsky, a harsh critic of US foreign policy and the intellectual mentor of many a bleeding heart libertarian, said, 'my own concern is primarily the terror and violence carried out by my own state.' There are two reasons this is instructive in the case of Israel-Palestine. First, Israel’s violence and abuse of the Palestinians – supported with unparalleled US backing – is immeasurably greater than Palestinian violence towards Israel, and therefore rightly attracts far more criticism. Secondly, Americans are supporting and giving sanction to Israel’s violence towards Palestinians, and therefore a simple moral calculus leads us properly to focus on that violence, as opposed to any that we are not directly responsible for. 'And that is a simple ethical judgment,' according to Chomsky. 'That is, the ethical value of one’s actions depends on their anticipated and predictable consequences.'"

Glaser goes on to describe the atrocities, crimes, and injustices committed by the state of Israel. The main point that I take from Glaser is that Israel has brutally oppressed the Palestinians for years and that it is unfair to judge the Palestinian cause as a whole based on the actions of a criminal and radical few. When it comes to net suffering, casualties, and the general balance of power, the Palestinians keep getting the (very) short end of the proverbial stick.

Final Thoughts

As I have said before, I don't know who has the greater moral claim in all this. Though, I must admit that I do tend to sympathize a little more with the Palestinians. Even so, I can see the merits of all sides of the debate. The problem is this issue is so incredibly complicated, it may have to end up coming down to ceasing to assign blame while coming to the best solution(s) for everyone involved. Unfortunately, I am extremely skeptical that one can even be reached. I have advocated a two-state solution in the past, but I am not really sure if that is a feasible option or not. I suppose all I can do is remain neutral and instead of trying to decide who has the greater moral claim, I should focus on advocating a neutral and non-interventionist foreign policy--especially when it comes to the Israel-Palestinian conflict.

For those who would argue from a Nozickian/neo-Lockean historical perspective, i.e., arguing who has the legitimate claim of land ownership, it should be understood that an argument could be made for either side, but again, this specific part of the issue is so complicated that coming to a definitive conclusion is next to impossible. It should also be noted that from this point of view (especially Nozickian historicism; see  Robert Nozick's entitlement theory) it could be argued that no one is entitled to the land, especially Israel, as it was acquired unjustly several times throughout its long and complicated history. To see what I mean, most of the land in the United States belongs to the Native Americans. If one is to be consistent, the people with the highest moral claim would then be the Native Americans and not those of European descent.