Massachusetts Rep. Seth Moulton acknowledges the contradiction between democracy and a Jewish state.
BY PHILIP WEISS
MONDOWEISS
REP. SETH MOULTON (D-MASS) ON WEBINAR WITH J STREET ON MARCH 22, 2022, DISCUSSING HIS VISIT TO ISRAEL AND PALESTINE WITH THE GROUP IN FEBRUARY 2022. SCREENSHOT FROM ZOOM.
Rep. Seth Moulton, a Massachusetts Democrat, says he rejects one state in Israel and Palestine, even if it’s a “democracy,” because Palestinians outnumber Jews and they will end the Jewish state.
In a webinar talk last month, Moulton said that he questions the “viability” of the two state solution, but he remains committed to that outcome because it is the only way to preserve a Jewish state:
One of the simplest ways that I found to look at is that if you actually had a true one state where Palestinians and Israelis had equal rights– a democracy, right?– then demographically the Palestinians are probably going to take over the Israelis in relatively short order, they would outvote them, and that means you would really lose the concept of a Jewish state. It would be some sort of coalition government, I’m sure, but for everybody who advocates for a Jewish state and the right for the Jewish people to have a Jewish state in the world, it’s hard to see how that works under a truly democratic single state as one would be necessarily constructed here. And that’s something that people don’t like to talk about frankly. I think that’s a hard truth for a lot of people to face. It’s something a lot of people especially in the Israeli government don’t like to admit.
As someone who believes in the right for the Jewish people to have a Jewish state in the world and also believes in democracy, in the primacy of democracy as a form of government, it’s hard to see how this works…A two state solution is hard to envision now, but a one state solution is even harder.
Moulton spoke on a webinar hosted by J Street after the liberal Zionist lobby group took him to Israel and Palestine in February, his fourth visit to the country.
Rep. Seth Moulton, a Massachusetts Democrat, says he rejects one state in Israel and Palestine, even if it’s a “democracy,” because Palestinians outnumber Jews and they will end the Jewish state.
In a webinar talk last month, Moulton said that he questions the “viability” of the two state solution, but he remains committed to that outcome because it is the only way to preserve a Jewish state:
One of the simplest ways that I found to look at is that if you actually had a true one state where Palestinians and Israelis had equal rights– a democracy, right?– then demographically the Palestinians are probably going to take over the Israelis in relatively short order, they would outvote them, and that means you would really lose the concept of a Jewish state. It would be some sort of coalition government, I’m sure, but for everybody who advocates for a Jewish state and the right for the Jewish people to have a Jewish state in the world, it’s hard to see how that works under a truly democratic single state as one would be necessarily constructed here. And that’s something that people don’t like to talk about frankly. I think that’s a hard truth for a lot of people to face. It’s something a lot of people especially in the Israeli government don’t like to admit.
As someone who believes in the right for the Jewish people to have a Jewish state in the world and also believes in democracy, in the primacy of democracy as a form of government, it’s hard to see how this works…A two state solution is hard to envision now, but a one state solution is even harder.
Moulton spoke on a webinar hosted by J Street after the liberal Zionist lobby group took him to Israel and Palestine in February, his fourth visit to the country.
Moulton’s comment that the contradiction between a Jewish state and a democracy is a “hard truth” people don’t like to face is important, because activists on the left have long pushed this contradiction, and now it’s being discussed in the mainstream. Lara Friedman said last week that recent reports accusing Israel of apartheid have caused embarrassment to Democrats by “saying the quiet part out loud — we want Israel to be a state which gives supremacy to Jewish citizens at the cost of what is democracy and equality and anti-racism and anti-discrimination. We want that but we still want to be called a democratic state but if we have to pick we’ll pick the supremacist state… There’s a cognitive dissonance for a lot of progressives who have long believed .. if you wrap yourself in this cloak of I-support-negotiations, I-support-two-states, that somehow that inoculates you from being responsible for essentially being supportive of a regime that isn’t democratic in any real way except for Jewish citizens of Israel…Saying Israel is democratic for its Jewish citizens is not saying it’s a democracy in any serious way.”
Here are some other excerpts of Moulton’s webinar, which was attended by many in Massachusetts. (A friend shared the Zoom password link with me).
Moulton admitted that Congress is on Israel’s side, thanks to the Israel lobby.
As you might imagine, the conversation in the Congress tends to be fairly one sided. There is a remarkably effective p.r. effort from the Israeli government and from advocates here in the United States to present their side of the story, and the Palestinians don’t have that kind of effort. Ultimately I think this does impair the resolution of the conflict. Make no mistake, I am a very strong Israel supporter. I spent four years of my life fighting terrorism in the Middle East… I’m no softy here when it comes to being pro Israel but at the same time only seeing one side of a conflict makes it very difficult if not impossible to resolve.
Moulton, 43, a former Marine captain, said the world sees Palestinians as a “monolithic terrorist organization” and he has pushed Palestinian leaders since his first visit to change the script.
I asked leaders of the P.A., You have such a more compelling case to the world community if you just stop shooting the damn rockets. I asked the same question on this trip… When that’s what the world sees and that’s what Israeli families have to worry about with their kids, it’s very easy to paint the Palestinians as one big terrorist organization, and you don’t understand that there are a lot of… innocent Palestinians as well and that’s why just to get to the heart of this question, it gets hard to convince people that we should be so focused on protecting Palestinians, when there’s this view that it’s just a monolithic terrorist organization.
Moulton said that today even members of Congress are questioning the viability of the two-state solution.
One of the things that’s been floating around in the press and in discussions but in the halls of Congress [too]… is what is the actual viability of the two state solution. And even on the trip we heard people who really questioned whether that remains viable. Certainly it’s been tested a lot in the last couple of years particularly under Netanyahu’s leadership. There were people who said you know it’s just not going to work. There are other people who said it was essential.
The J Street delegation met with Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid, a centrist, and Lapid said that the two-state solution was the best way to end “this horrible ongoing conflict,” but he couldn’t say so officially.
It was fascinating to hear him say that and then also explain that he cannot make that position a part of the platform because he wouldn’t be able to put together his coalition government if he took that position.
Moulton found that sad.
It’s very sad to be there, and having been there three times before, to feel like we’re further away from that than we have been in times past. But at the same time I think it’s the best solution that we have out there.
The Israeli government’s opposition to the two-state solution is influencing Congress against it. Moulton pointed out that Rep. Andy Levin is sponsoring a two-state bill in Congress that has the support of liberal Zionists, but only 46 Democratic Congresspeople– because it’s become “controversial.”
I understand that this bill has been painted by a lot of people to be controversial, and I think that’s in the context of a lot of people shifting away from advocating for a two-state solution including leaders in Israel like Netanyahu saying that’s not a viable way forward and ultimately they don’t think that is in the best interests of the Israeli people. I just don’t believe that to be true. I think there’s a reason why longstanding policy has been in favor of a two state solution…
Moulton said that the “tenuous” support for the two-state solution in Israel has made it unpopular in the Congress.
This position represented by Rep. Levin’s bill has become so tenuously popular, so tenuous in Israel that the governing coalition can’t even accept it as part of its platform. And I think fundamentally that’s why it’s controversial back here. But if you actually read the [Levin] legislation… there’s nothing that’s radical or revolutionary as far as what the U.S. position has been, for a number of years.
Moulton said that “things are moving in the wrong direction,” so he has decided to push for small actions that can “nudge” the discussion toward a two-state solution. For instance, after seeing ample documentation of settler violence against Palestinians, he pressed Yair Lapid over the “really strange” policy in which Israeli soldiers back the settlers. Lapid denied this.
We saw numerous examples, even saw video and met with some targets of settler violence and came to understand this really strange policy where the IDF is not allowed to intervene to prevent settler violence, they’re only allowed to protect the settlers. So I asked the prime minister [Lapid is actually alternate prime minister] about the position that this puts not just the country of Israel morally, but the position that it puts the troops in… That exchange was worthwhile because it could actually lead to a policy change as something that we can follow up with a letter to hold the prime minister accountable for what he pledged to us in a meeting, which is essentially that this is not the policy and it wouldn’t happen. Of course we saw something different out there on the ground.
The chat during Moulton’s talk was not very sympathetic to the congressman. Many called on him to do more for Palestinian rights or to support a one-state solution. Janette Hillis-Jaffe, a senior official at J Street who was a host of the discussion, said that these are the views of “folks from other organizations” who support a one state solution, and she asserted the J Street line: that given the acrimonious history of the conflict, a one-state solution “is more of a recipe for a civil war than anything else right now.” She said J Street believes in “a peaceful separation, maybe a confederation,” where the two states exist side by side, “E.U. style.”
A second J Street official, Adina Vogel-Ayalon, then seemed to correct Hillis-Jaffe, saying that “confederation is not an alternative to two states, it is a way to two states.”
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