Israelis and Palestinians have mentalities toward the other that are both weird and unique, wildly out of sync with reality, and equidistant from the norm for parties to a conflict. Given their relative strengths, Israeli and Palestinian positions reverse what one expects; Israel should be demanding, Palestinians pleading. One can debate long into the night which of them is the more absurdly inappropriate. Their origins go back nearly 1½ centuries.
At the very start of the Zionist enterprise in the 1880s, the two parties to what is now called “the Palestinian-Israeli conflict” developed distinctive, diametrically opposed, and enduring attitudes toward each other.
Zionists, from a position of weakness, making up a minute portion of Palestine’s population, adopted conciliation, a wary attempt to find mutual interests with Palestinians and establish good relations with them, with an emphasis on bringing them economic benefits. Symbolic of this mentality, Israel is the world’s only country created not through conquest but via the purchase of land. David Ben-Gurion eventually turned conciliation into communal policy and major Israeli figures such as Moshe Dayan and Shimon Peres continued with variants of it.
Not only has the passage of time not moderated rejectionism but it becomes more florid and extravagant than ever, celebrating the death of Israelis in a spiral of perversion.
Palestinians, from a position of demographic strength and usually with great power patronage, adopted rejectionism, a resistance to all things Jewish and Zionist. Evoking the spirit of Muslim supremacy, under the guidance of Amin al-Husseini it became more extreme with time, indeed genocidal and even suicidal. Just as Zionism celebrated the land in which Palestinians resided as unique and sacred, rejectionism followed suit, insisting on the uniqueness and sacredness of that land to them via Islamic Zionism. Major Palestinian figures, such as Yasir Arafat and Hamas leaders, continued with variants of this ideology.
Varying ideologies, objectives, tactics, strategies, and actors meant details varied over the next 150 years, even as fundamentals remain remarkably in place, with the two sides pursuing static and opposite goals. Much has changed over time—wars and treaties come and go, the balance of power shifts, the Arab states retreat, Israel gains vastly more power, its public moves to the right—but rejectionism and conciliation remain basically unchanged. Zionists purchase land, Palestinians make selling it a capital offense. Zionists build, Palestinians destroy. Zionists ache for acceptance, Palestinians push delegitimization.
Positions further hardened over time, leaving the two sides ever more frustrated. Palestinians realize the uniqueness of their perversion, take pride in it, and even sexualize it. Palestinian Authority TV responded to violence coming from Jenin with “Jenin is our beautiful bride, which perfumes herself daily with the scent of martyrdom.” Using the same metaphor, a Hamas newspaper published an article proclaiming: “The Palestinian joy has its own fragrance; it is completely different from every other kind of happiness.” What might the author be alluding to? The murder of Israelis, of course. Not only has the passage of time not moderated rejectionism but it becomes more florid and extravagant than ever, celebrating the death of Israelis in a spiral of perversion.
Israel’s conciliation also grows more extreme. On conquering the West Bank and Gaza in 1967, the security establishment sought to win Palestinian favor through good will and economic prosperity, a process that intensified with time, culminating in the Oslo Accords. Israel then urged funding for the PA and (until October 7) for Hamas.
Thus does the Palestinian-Israeli conflict consists of endless, wearisome rounds of violence and counter-violence, neither of which ever achieves its purpose. The Palestinians invariably begin the hostilities with an attack on Israelis or Jews, usually unarmed. Israel responds with retribution. The two sides reiterate a spiral of Palestinian aggression and Israeli punishment, going around and around, making no progress. Palestinians suffer from poverty and the pathologies of a radicalized society, including oppression by their own leaders. Israel is the only modern, democratic, and rich country that cannot protect itself from being regularly assaulted by its neighbors.
Palestinians can damage Israel through acts of violence and by spreading an anti-Zionist message, but they cannot prevent the Jewish state from ascending from one success to the next. Israel can punish Palestinians for their aggression, but it cannot quench the rejectionist spirit and its ever-more depraved expressions.
That rejectionism is not temporary, does not bend to the pressure of carrots and sticks, and does not moderate over time explains the general inability to understand it or formulate a response to it. The mentality bewilders contemporaries as something hitherto unknown, a new phenomenon that prior experience cannot explain, like the French Revolution or Soviet Russia.
The uniqueness of the two legacies confuses observers in various ways. First, they vainly try to stuff the two peoples into known categories. Palestinians are viewed as a colonized people, though they were no more conquered by Zionists than are Europeans at present by Muslims arriving as illegal migrants in the millions and hoping to become the majority population; both are non-belligerent large-scale immigrations. Israelis are routinely compared to imperialists, even though they moved in as civilians and created history’s only country through purchase, and did so in their ancestral homeland. Terms like imperialism and apartheid betray an incomprehension of two unique legacies.
Second, unusual behavior misleads observers. Rejectionism’s persistence convinces some of its truth: White-hot fury and willingness to suffer imply a morally justified cause. Surely no population can be so consistent, so angry, so fanatical for so long without good reason. Israeli efforts to document atrocities have limited impact. Contrarily, Israeli conciliation implies a sense of guilt; why else would a more powerful actor behave so timidly?
Third, would-be peacemakers attempt to resolve the Palestinian-Israeli conflict through conventional diplomatic means, which predictably fail. The Oslo Accords, for example, came between such breakthroughs as the ending of South Africa’s apartheid regime between 1990 and 1994, the Soviet Union’s dissolution in 1991, and Ireland’s Good Friday Agreement of 1998; surely compromise would work here, too. In this spirit, U.S. Presidents Clinton and Obama each separately dispatched George Mitchell to build on his diplomatic success in Ireland; of course, his Palestinian-Israeli efforts ended in total failure.
Resolution in this case requires either Palestinian acceptance of Israel or Israel’s destruction—not compromise. Martin Sherman correctly notes that, “We are talking about a clash of two collectives with competing and mutually exclusive narratives that are irreconcilable—and only one side can win.” This abnormal conflict cannot be ended through compromise. One side must win, the other must lose.
