Israeli cyberspace is a large and eclectic place, including Israel
government sites, sites of political parties and movements, on-line
editions of Israeli and Jewish newspapers and magazines such as
Ha'aretz, The Jerusalem Post and The Jerusalem Report, personal
pages, and Jewish organizations in the United States and around the
world, as well as a number of e-mail services providing news and
views. These present the "Israeli side" and the "Jewish side" in
the broadest sense, covering religion, history, business and
tourism in Israel, anti-Semitism, the Holocaust and Holocaust
denial, the workings of the Israeli government, Zionism, peace
efforts and the Palestine-Israel conflict, and spanning opinion
from the extreme right to the extreme left. This review focuses on
the presentation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and peace
issues.
Distorted View
Reality in the Middle East includes much hypocrisy and fanaticism,
punctuated by quixotic idealism. The presentation of the Israeli
side of the Palestine-Israel conflict on the Internet reflects this
reality in a distorted way. It includes the glib materials prepared
by the government; the well-funded, slick but often shrill
arguments of the Israeli right; and also the persistent voice of
the Israeli peace camp, joined, in some cases, by Palestinians. The
centrist mainstream ("Labor-Zionism") is barely heard from at all.
The case for Israel, in terms of positive achievements, is covered
rather briefly in histories of Zionism. The positive case for
Greater Israel is presented by only a few organizations, but they
do so in revealing and nakedly chauvinistic texts. Terror is
featured widely as the major, if not the only, Israeli security
issue.
The most effective propaganda put out in the battle of the
government and Greater-Israel groups against the peace process has
been documentation of Palestinian extremist statements and acts,
taken from Palestinian National Authority (PNA)-controlled media.
The Palestinian Covenant (the original version including clauses
about the destruction of Israel) and the Hamas Charter are featured
prominently. PNA television shows and Fateh summer camps, where
children are urged to be shaheed (martyrs) and taught to reconquer
Beersheba and Haifa, are major attractions at more than one Israeli
or Zionist Web site. These items portray the Palestinian people as
a group as bloodthirsty terrorists, who will use any land returned
to them as the base for a staged plan to destroy Israel.
The Israel Government Sites
The Web site of the Prime Minister's Office:
http://www.pmo.gov.il/english/index.html is a good place to begin a
tour of Israeli cyberspace. Here you will find abundant pictures of
Prime Minister Netanyahu and his family, greetings from the prime
minister (audio, visual or text), Government Press Office press
releases, presentations of the cabinet and/or past prime ministers,
guidelines of the Israel government, background papers on Hebron,
the refugee issue and much more. You can also write to the prime
minister at pm@pmo.gov.il. The treatment of the refugee issue is
illustrative of the government's position. The background paper on
refugees cites Arab sources to prove that the Palestinian refugees
left of their own accord in 1948, encouraged by the surrounding
Arab countries. The paper reminds us that Israel has absorbed
nearly 600,000 Jewish refugees from the Arab countries.
Correspondingly, the government guidelines suggest that the
solution of the refugee problem must be undertaken upon the
responsibility of the Arab countries.
At the Israel Foreign Office site (www.israel-mfa.gov.il), you can
find a guide to the Middle East peace process (significantly, it
was last updated in October 1997), a rather detailed, if not
exhaustive list of Israeli Web sites (hidden under the title Hot
List at www.israel-mfa.gov.il/sites.html), and news about Israel
under Updates. When there is good news (for Israel), Updates is
updated. There is also an extensive history of Zionism, detailing
the beginnings of the Zionist movement, the Holocaust, the struggle
for independence, the ingathering of the exiles, the achievements
of the fifty-year-old state, and the various wars. There is a Web
page devoted to the memory of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, with
touching quotes from youths who visited the grave site, but with no
mention of why he was assassinated. The history of the 1948 war
manages to avoid the refugee issue entirely.
At the Knesset Web site (www.knesset.gov.il/knesset/engframe.htm),
you can learn about the workings and history of the Knesset
(Israeli parliament), send e-mail to members of the Knesset (you
will probably not get an answer), and view the Beilin-Eitan
agreement concerning the conduct of the peace process. All Israel
government sites also provide links to sites of the other
government offices.
These sites are intended to give an impression of an open democracy
at work, pursuing peace and constructive goals; however, in the
guidelines of the government, we read that the State of Israel is
the state of the Jewish people, whose democratic government
guarantees equality for all its citizens. Yet, under the Government
Press Releases Media section, there is an article by Nadav Ha'etzni
entitled "Another Ticking Bomb," reprinted from Ma'ariv, suggesting
that Arab and, particularly, Bedouin citizens of Israel are
becoming increasingly disloyal under the influence of Islamic
fundamentalism. Some visitors may wonder why a democratic
government posts an article that casts aspersion on large segments
of its own citizenry.
We can also read in the government guidelines that freedom of
worship and access to the holy places will be guaranteed to members
of all faiths. However, the guidelines continue: "The Law of
Conversion shall be changed so that conversions to Judaism in
Israel will be recognized only if approved by the Chief Rabbinate."
Apparently, Reform and Conservative Judaism are not included in
"all faiths," and do not come under the protection of "freedom of
worship."
The Israel Foreign Office site, the Zionist organizations of
America and various press services relate in detail the
inflammatory contents of PNA television programs, newspaper
articles and official pronouncements, reminding us that all of
these are violations of the Oslo Accords. In the many pages devoted
to this topic at the Israel Foreign Office site, we can find quotes
such as the following:
"They brought Russian Jewish girls with AIDS to spread the disease
among Palestinian youths." - Abdel-Razek Al-Majeeda, Commander of
the Palestinian General Security Services in Gaza, quoted by the
official PNA newspaper Al-Hayat Al-Jadeedah, May 15, 1997;
"Laboratory tests made on seven brands of Israeli gum smuggled into
the West Bank and Gaza showed they contain a sexually stimulating
adrenaline substance." - Saleh Abdulal, Director of the Inspection
Department of the PNA Ministry of Supplies, quoted by the official
PNA newspaper Al-Hayat Al-Jadeedah, May 26, 1997.
Political Parties, Rightist Organizations
Several of the Israeli political parties maintain Web sites, though
they do not always update them. You can view the platforms of the
Likud and Labor parties (www.likud.org.il/) and
(www.inter.net.il/~avoda/) in English. If you understand Hebrew,
you should also visit the sites of Meretz (www.meretz.org.il/) and
Hadash, the Israel Communist party (www.gezernet.co.il/chadash/).
The differences in platforms are instructive, particularly for
those who believe there aren't any differences between the Likud
and Labor. The Likud platform does not discuss returning any land
to the Palestinians and specifically rules out a Palestinian state.
Moving leftward, the Labor party mentions a Palestinian state, and
extending Israeli sovereignty over 10-15 percent of the West Bank.
Meretz favors a state and withdrawal from "most or all" of the West
Bank and Gaza, while Hadash favors withdrawal from all territories
occupied since 1967.
Right and Center
Mainstream opinion usually echoes the opinion of the government in
power. In the current circumstances, Jewish and Israeli political
opinions are usually those associated with the right. "Virtual
Jerusalem" and its links at http://www.virtual.co.il/, features the
Web news service of the settlers' radio station, Arutz-7. A good
site for links is the Complete Guide to Israeli Internet (it isn't,
but they try) at www.iguide.co.il/english/. Politics and Peace
pages at this site provide a wide variety of opinion from different
political parties and movements, as well as links to numerous
memorial pages honoring the late Prime Minister Yitzhak
Rabin.
Do not miss the Web site of the Zionist Organization of America
(ZOA) at http://www.zoa.org/. The titles of successive ZOA press
releases taken at random show a remarkable tendency to focus on the
same issues - PNA violations of the Oslo agreement and terror: July
22, 1998 - ZOA to Congress: "Palestinian Legislative Council
Visitors Have Records of Extremism"; July 15, 1998 - ZOA: "PA's New
Scholarships for Relatives of 'Martyrs' Glorifies Anti-Israel
Violence"; July 15, 1998 - Oslo Accords Architect: "Upgrading of
PA's Status at UN Is 'Flagrant' Violation of Oslo"; July 14, 1998 -
"Achille Lauro Mastermind Says Klinghoffer 'Provoked' Terrorists to
Murder Him." While you are at the ZOA site, you will not want to
miss the study by President Mortimer Klein which purports to show
that the Deir Yassin massacre never took place, and was largely an
invention of the Israeli left.
Several sites deal with so-called security issues, like IRIS
(Information Regarding Israel's Security: www.netaxs.com/~iris/).
The more extreme sites are more outspoken in their advocacy of the
cause of Greater Israel. From Americans for a Safe Israel
(www.covesoft.com/afsi/), we find out that "Judea, Samaria, Gaza
and the Golan are integral parts of Israel." And according to
Professors for a Strong Israel (www.aquanet.co.il/web/psi/), "The
Land of Israel is the Homeland of the Jewish People: Judea,
Samaria, Gaza, and the Golan Heights are integral parts of the Land
of Israel. Every Jew has an inherent right to live in security and
under Israeli sovereignty in any part of this land." They are
joined by many others, including the Organization of Rabbis for the
People of Israel (www.virtula.co.il/org/orgs/ichud/irindex.htm),
where one can learn that "the people of Israel are the Chosen
People... The land of Israel, blessed with a unique sanctity, was
given by God to the Jewish people for all generations... It is a
Torah commandment for all generations to conquer the Land of
Israel, to settle it and to preserve it."
Lest anyone mistake which part of Israel is intended, the Rabbis
have on display a halachic ruling regarding return of territories:
"...in the area held and controlled by the IDF, the commandment to
settle the Land of Israel is being fulfilled. The areas abandoned
by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) fall under the yoke of non-Jews
and this is an arrogation of a positive commandment."
The Rabbis may be unaware that their statements exactly parallel
similar statements concerning Palestine and Islam in the Charter of
the Hamas movement. The site of the Amana settlement organization
at www.aman.co.il offers little ideology. Instead, it boasts a
cutesy-cosy applet of a house that you can click on to choose a
town in which to settle in "Judea and Samaria." Presumably, this
offer is limited to members of the "Chosen People."
A number of sites, some with considerable resources, and all
rightist or ultra-rightist, specialize in gathering and presenting
newspaper and media reports, and there are several e-mail news
services, including JTA and Arutz-7 (Settlers' Radio) that can be
accessed from the Virtual Jerusalem site, and the Freeman Center
and Media Watch. Titles of sample reports: "Biased Information at
CNN and Time Magazine" (July 1998); "Biased Report about Hebron by
the Israeli Press" (July 1998); "Anti-Semitic/Anti-Religious
Cartoons in Israeli Media" (regularly updated), June 1998.
The IMRA service run by Likud stalwart Aaron Lerner provides
excerpts from the Al-Ahram English weekly newspaper, as well as
interviews with Israeli and PNA officials and public figures. These
materials are archived at
http://join.virtual.co.il/cgi-win/imra.exe. The service is
available by e-mail and other media.
The Fringe
Two sites deserve special attention because they represent the
extreme of right-wing political opinion that is beyond the pale of
respectability and legality in Israel. One is the site of the
Kahane Hai (Kahane Lives) organization, successor to the party
founded by Rabbi Meir Kahane, at www.kahane.org. They publish the
Judean Voice, an e-mail journal that includes an electronic
petition asking that their party, currently outlawed as racist, be
allowed to participate in Israeli elections. Women in Green (Women
for Israel's Future) also has an impressive site at
www.womeningreen.org. The highlight is a fantasy by founder Nadia
Matar about Israel in the year 2048, relating that after the
Israeli peace movement advised the PNA to use terror to advance its
cause, the Israeli government arrested and executed Yasser Arafat
and jailed Shimon Peres for life.
Peace, Cooperation, Dialogue
Israeli cyberspace is not completely devoted to the government line
and right-wing organizations. There is a large and varied selection
of sites devoted to peace, including sites of Israeli peace
organizations and cooperative Palestinian-Israeli efforts. The
Ariga site (www.ariga.com) is devoted to "Business, Pleasure and
Peace" in Israel. Robert Rosenberg, who has placed selections of
his own writings on view, hosts a number of Israeli and joint
Israeli-Palestinian peace pages and has assembled links to sites of
virtually every group in the Israeli peace movement and joint
Israeli-Palestinian efforts, to personal Web pages devoted to
peace, Palestinian and Arab sites, a variety of joint Jewish-Arab
and Israeli-Palestinian ventures, important documents, such as the
Oslo Accords at the Herzog Center and the Copenhagen Declaration,
and to different peace foundations. In these sites, you will find
information and statistics, scholarly articles, dialogue, political
action initiatives and petitions, documentation of land
expropriation, house demolition, the plight of the refugees. When I
visited the main Ariga peace page, the features items were an
invitation to join in Gush Shalom's petition for sharing Jerusalem,
and links to BiBiWatch (an incisive commentary on the government,
now discontinued) and PeaceWatch (successor to BiBiWatch, produced
by the PEACE dialogue group).
Several Israeli and Jewish organizations devoted to promoting peace
and dialogue are represented on the Internet. These include, among
others, the Shimon Peres Peace Center at
http://www.peres-center.co.il/; the Giv'at Haviva Center at
www.inter.net.il/~givat_h/givat/g_table.htm; the Re'ut/Tzadaka
Arab-Israeli youth group at http://www.israelpages.co.il/reut/; and
Neve Shalom/Wahat Es-Salaam, a community of Jews and Arabs in
Israel that promotes dialogue and hosts dialogue groups at
http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/nswas/.
The Israel-Palestine Research Institute (IPCRI), run by Dr. Gershon
Baskin and Dr. Zakaria Al-Qaq, researches issues related to the
peace process and economic cooperation. Their site at
http://www.netaxs.com/~expweb/peace.html features position papers
and results of research about the refugee problem, attitudes
concerning a final settlement and Jerusalem. MERIA (Mid-East Review
of International Affairs), edited by Professor Barry Rubin, is a
scholarly review devoted to economics and peace. The journal and
free books are on display at the MERIA Web site
(www.biu.ac.il/SOC/besa/meria.html) and available by e-mail. The
Palestine-Israel Journal is available at www.pij.org.
Peace Movements
You can view the pages of the several Israeli and joint
Israeli-Palestinian peace movements from links at Ariga, or
directly. These include B'Tselem, Bat-Shalom, Dor Shalom, Gush
Shalom, Peace Now and others. Peace Now and American Friends of
Peace Now are represented at www.peace-now.org and
http://www.peacenow.org respectively. Peace Now is the oldest
Israeli peace movement and claims to be the largest. Their
Settlement Watch reports give details of new settlement
construction and expenditures on the settlements. Other postings
deal with issues of Jerusalem and Har Homa/Jabal Abu-Ghneim.
Dor Shalom (Generation of Peace) was set up after the assassination
of Prime Minister Rabin and is headed by his son, Yuval. The
presentation at their site, www.dorshalom.org.il, appeals to the
Israeli center. It reminds us that there are still positive goals
to be attained, and that Zionism is not necessarily synonymous with
the Greater Israel Movement. It speaks of the values of peace,
tolerance, democracy and social justice, so that citizens of Israel
will be able to live in peace, among themselves and with their
neighbors, but doesn't mention efforts of Dor Shalom for
peace.
The Gush Shalom group, hosted by Uri Avnery, has an impressive Web
site at www.gush-shalom.org where they publicize activities, such
as their boycott of products made in the settlements, and their
campaign against house demolition, which includes rebuilding
demolished houses again and again, as well as letter-writing and
demonstrations.
A visit to the peace camp side of cyberspace should include the Web
pages devoted to dialogue in Israel and throughout the world. Len
and Libby Traubman, founders of the California Living-Room Dialogue
group have assembled an impressive set of documents, press releases
and links at http://www.igc.org/traubman/. The Jewish-Palestinian
dialogue in Basle, Switzerland, has a site at
http://www.access.ch/isra-pal-peace/ that includes a jointly
prepared declaration regarding principles of a final settlement
that visitors can sign. The PEACE Dialogue, co-founded by Ameen
Hannoun in Jordan and Ami Isseroff in Israel, has sister Web sites
at http://members.tripod.com/ash74/index2.htm and
www.geocities.com/Capitol/Hill/Senate/5455/; in a manner of
speaking, "Israeli" cyberspace has invaded Jordan, and "Arab"
cyberspace has invaded Israel. Professor Ada Aharoni of the
Technion has a homepage devoted to dialogue through culture at
http://tx.technion.ac.il/~ada/home/html.
Parting Thoughts
Different visitors will see Israeli cyberspace through different
eyes. The messages I got from the major portion of Israeli
cyberspace, including Israeli government sites, was that Zionism
was synonymous with opposition to the peace process and with
concessions to the Palestinians; that the major justification is
fulfillment of the Commandments of the Lord; and that Israel's
security and welfare require, and are almost solely dependent upon,
the retention of all the occupied territories beyond the 1948
borders. As a Zionist of a different school, I was appalled. I was
struck by the dreary symmetry of arguments offered by extremists of
either side. The pronouncements of the Organization of Rabbis for
the People of Israel exactly parallel those of Hamas, and those of
groups such as Professors for a Strong Israel might be adopted by
any secular Palestinian extremist group, simply by substituting
"Palestine" for "Israel" as appropriate. The sites of the peace
camp and those representing cooperative efforts provide a bit of
light in this dark space of cyberspace.