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PARTISAN REVIEW
Jews exist. Only a (bold) handful of friends did not desert those who
turned into pariahs, and expressed solidarity.
On our return
to
Jerusalem, we found a traumatized society facing a
society sunk in a collective barbarity of suicide for the sake of murder.
The number of Palestinians offering themselves for suicide attacks was
higher than the rate of explosive belts that could be prepared. The mar–
tyr
shahids
became elite Palestinian fighters. Their families enjoyed
financial grants, Palestinian leaders and intellectuals praised their acts of
murder, and in a breach of Muslim tradition, women also became
shahids.
Mothers even blessed the deaths of their sons.
In
the ritual of
sacrifice that was taking place, Hagar no longer lifted up her voice and
wept, and Sarah did not die of grief at the moment of the Binding of
Isaac, as described in the midrash. The silence of the mothers removed
the last barrier, and murder turned from deviancy into normality.
Only force could stand against the outburst of barbarity. And so,
after seven years of autonomy and seventeen months of limited military
response, the Israeli army again entered the Palestinian cities. A night–
mare that seemed
to
be over was recurring! The peace process crum–
bled, and an army once again faced a civilian population, with tanks in
the streets, soldiers in the houses, cities under siege. And the back and
forth, day after day, between attacks and warnings of more attacks;
between terror for the safety of Israeli soldiers and horror and shame for
the suffering and death of Palestinians. And once again, bloody attacks
and mourning the dead, day after day.
SIMULTANEOUSLY, "THE STORY WAR" goes on. The mobilization of reli–
gious and mythic images was a deliberate strategy since the start of the
Palestinian offensive in the autumn of
2000.
The religious connotations
of terms were activated in the triangular mythical arena according to the
various target audiences-Palestinian, Israeli, or Western-and accord–
ing to tactical considerations emphasized or disguised in national or
humanitarian terms. Vis-a.-vis the Western and Christian sensitivity, this
armed, planned Palestinian offensive was presented as an outburst of
popular revolt, led by stone-throwing children. But it soon became clear
that standing behind the children were Palestinian armed forces
exchanging fire with soldiers of the Israel Defense Forces, and behind
them were the habitues of cafes, who go on drinking and smoking; and
with them television crews quickly transmit pictures in live broadcasts
(as described by Thomas Friedman in the
New York Times) .
But even
awareness of this careful staging does not minimize the force of the
images.
In
national semantics: David is facing the warrior Goliath
