It was 1947, before the establishment of the State of Israel, on Jaffa Street in Jerusalem. A group of children leaving school encountered two Arab street vendors and subjected them to "physical assault and gross provocation ... one young and one old, with particular brutality." The incident was witnessed by Rabbi Zvi Yehuda HaCohen Kook, the spiritual father of religious Zionism. He was outraged. He sent a letter to the principal of the school the students attended.
"Not all of them ... I believe some of them even protested against it," he wrote, and he did not mince words. "I was distressed and ashamed ... The very occurrence of this incident, which pained and offended me, obliges me to draw your attention to the need for special and heightened educational vigilance to prevent such possibilities, both for the sake of Jewish teachings and ethics themselves and for the practical, communal and political importance of preserving peaceful relations and good neighborly ties."
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Car burned by extremists in the Palestinian village of Turmus Ayya
(Photo: Ammar Awad/Reuters)
It was a twofold message, both moral and political. And what about today? How is it that Rabbi Kook's letter has been forgotten and his teachings trampled? After all, malicious harassment of Arabs is becoming the norm in certain circles.
True, most settlers oppose these hooligans. But just two days ago, there was an incident in the village of Fallah, where Palestinians who had arrived with journalists and left-wing activists clashed with Jewish hooligans, leaving photographer Heidi Levine injured. She claims Jews beat her. The matter is under investigation. And yesterday, on the holy Sabbath, European diplomats visiting the Christian village of Taybeh were harassed.
What has changed between then and now? We are in the midst of a period of relentless violence and rioting. The regional military commander calls these attacks "Jewish terrorism." The IDF chief of staff is furious. But someone in the current government is tying their hands. It happens again and again and again, and nothing is done. There may be a handful of arrests, so few that a child could count them. That only encourages the hooligans to continue their rampage.
No serious person believes the Palestinian side is innocent. There is Palestinian terrorism. There are provocations. And yet, it is worth taking a broader view. Time and again, we hear that these are merely a gang of hooligans with no connection whatsoever to the settlers. It is true that most settlers despise these hooligans. But they are an integral part of the settlement movement.
Jewish extremists attack European diplomats visiting the Palestinian olive harvest in the West Bank
(Photo: Amit Orfali, Roni Federman)
Look no further than Rabbi Dov Lior, one of the leading figures of religious Zionism, who recently issued what amounts to a fatwa, or religious ruling, declaring that land held by Palestinians is "stolen property in their possession ... It follows that they did not acquire it by any means, and it remains the property of the people of Israel."
And if it belongs to Israel, then anything goes. This spiritual leader, who represents far more than a fringe minority, goes on to rule: "Even if we were to say that they deserve some compensation for planting the trees, they have already received more than enough through the fruit they have eaten over all these years until now ... Therefore, harvesting olives in the Holy Land is entirely permissible."
It is horrifying to read. One can assume that Rabbi Kook, too, is turning in his grave. This is not Judaism. This is not Zionism. This is encouragement of terrorism. We should not delude ourselves into thinking this is a marginal phenomenon. We are talking about a significant group numbering in the hundreds, perhaps thousands. Many of them are armed. They have no regard for the state or IDF soldiers. They do as they please in the territories. They have political backing. They do not merely seize property that does not belong to them. Sometimes, they also murder.
And as long as we continue to treat them as a "fringe minority," no serious action will be taken to stop those who have arisen from within our own ranks to bring destruction upon us.
It is worth looking at neighboring countries. When a fanatical group emerges with the backing of "spiritual leaders," arms itself and shows contempt for the state and the military, the outcome is a foregone conclusion: devastation and destruction. How is it, we complain, that the Lebanese army cannot bring Hezbollah under control? An excellent question. But we should direct it at ourselves. How is it that the strongest military in the Middle East cannot bring under control what is increasingly developing into a homegrown Hezbollah?
It is difficult to overstate the extent of the moral damage. And it is even harder to overstate the extent of the international damage. In recent days, I have heard senior administration officials, staunch friends of Israel, warning of sanctions that are drawing ever closer. But before we start naming Bernie Sanders, Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib, Candace Owens, Tucker Carlson, Hasan Piker and Abdul El-Sayed, a partial list of Israel-haters in influential circles, we should acknowledge that the far greater danger comes from within.
Nationalist crime is bringing sanctions closer far more than all the haters of Israel combined. And even if there was a Palestinian provocation, these criminals who brutally beat the photographer must be called by their true name: haters of Israel. They already know they are causing terrible damage. They simply do not care. They are putting into practice precisely the same ideology - racist, fascist and colonialist - that Israel's enemies attribute to Israel.
The rabbis of Tzohar have already issued a condemnation of Dov Lior's fatwa. They are far more representative of Judaism, Zionism and the people of Israel. But they did not appear on the news broadcasts of the world's leading television networks. The haters of Israel, people from within our own ranks, dominated the headlines and television screens.
These are cancerous cells. We cannot afford to wait. Because if we do not remove them from our midst, they will destroy the Zionist enterprise.