By Moshe Feiglin
18 Adar Bet, 5771March 24, '11
An uncomfortable feeling filled me in the face of the Itamar massacre. Everyone is in shock. I feel horrible pain. But I am not shocked.
Shock is the result of surprise. And I am not surprised by what happened. I honestly don't understand why others are surprised, either. We didn't read what they did to the bodies of the 35 Gush Etzion martyrs? We didn't live through years of suicide bombings? Just recently, Israel released the terrorist Samir Kuntar, who smashed the skull of 4 year old Einat Haran on the Nahariya beach years ago. What is the difference between this murderer and the murderer of Hadas Fogel? What has changed? This is how the Arabs act. There is nothing to be surprised about.
The shock most severely affected those people who, with all their might, insisted on deceiving themselves. They convinced themselves that we are in a peace process; that all the Arabs want are political rights, sovereignty, self-definition and the like. They wanted so badly to be normal. On the way they fashioned an enemy for themselves who demanded what they wanted him to demand. Now they are shocked. For a moment they had to face the truth: This enemy is not normal and his goal is not what their Western minds are trying to force into reality. Logical goals like self-definition and other palatable concepts are not part of the true picture.
Slaughter of a sleeping baby is unacceptable as a tool in the struggle for any type of liberation. It comes from a dark place, from a place that simply wants to destroy you. It is Ukrainian, Polish, German behavior. Actually, it is behavior with which we are quite familiar - behavior that says to the shocked Israeli, "What are you talking about? I do not want you out of Shechem and Ramallah. I have them, anyway. All the money that you invest there will not make me like you. I simply want you out of this world. Go back to the Ukrainians, the Polish, the Austrians and the Germans. Let them take care of you. I did not slaughter the baby because she is an occupier on my sovereign soil. I slaughtered her because she is a Jew."
This is the source of the shock: The understanding that there is nobody with whom to make peace, because they do not want to. The Arabs simply cannot stand the fact that we live anywhere in the world - certainly not in the Land of Israel.
In the past, the leftist elite managed to deal with the shock engendered by terror attacks. Their quintessentially demagogic and confusing slogan, "We will not let the enemies of peace achieve their goal" (and so we will continue with the retreats euphemistically known as the peace process) worked quite well on the public. But now it seems that something is starting to change. The massacre in Itamar shocked Israeli society more than similar attacks in the past because it no longer has anywhere to hide from the conclusions. The Oslo-spin no longer works.
The Itamar massacre was perpetrated on the backdrop of the collapse of the regimes in Arab lands. Mubarak's ouster revealed the fragility of our peace agreement with Egypt. It brought to the surface the fact that the dictators sold us the illusion of peace in the lowest dosage possible to keep us ignoring how their countrymen really felt about Israel. Suddenly, in Tahrir Square, the photograph of the hated dictator is waved high with the symbol most despised by the masses: Not the swastika, but the Star of David. Suddenly, the Jordanian Minister of Justice praises the murderer of the young girls from Beit Shemesh. When the nation is out in the streets, the murderer is no longer a crazed soldier. And if we no longer have peace with Egypt and Jordan, what can we possibly expect from the murderous animals in Awarta? The bottom line is that the Arab world is changing. What we are witnessing now is just the beginning. We are well on the way to becoming once again a "nation that dwells alone."
That is what made the Itamar massacre so shocking, brought all our top statesmen to the funeral, created the new perspective in the reporting of the tragedy and the live coverage on Army Radio.
"And so, since yesterday, I sit here in the corner, frustrated and frightened, internalizing that it is possible that in the end we will not have the peace that we dreamed of," wrote Guy Maroz in Ma'ariv after the massacre.
He even gives a tongue in cheek clue as to the only hope that he can think of: "Since yesterday, I want to hide under the wide Messianic dress of (settler leader - mf) Daniella Weiss."
We are at the threshold of a new reality. On the one hand, we are still firmly meshed onto the Western, Oslo playing field. We do not attack, but only retaliate. We are completely subordinate to the Western values that always force us to try to prove that we are the most miserable victims on the block. We are still very far from the ability to substantially change direction. On the other hand, though, the entire playing field is crumbling away.
Never fear - the shock will dissipate and Guy Maroz and all his friends will revert to their "peace" consciousness. Soon they will demand the destruction of the settlements. After all, this is reality, not a feel-good Hollywood movie. The consciousness of a nation does not change overnight. But within all the events and upheavals, there is a major change taking place: The virtual Oslo ground is crumbling under the feet of the elites that are nurtured by it. The new playing field is going to be "Daniella's wide dress."
Well, not exactly Daniella. We do not expect to win a political victory that will allow us to change the rules of the game in Israel. On the contrary. The game itself is about to change. The only relevant players in the new game will be those of us who have toiled throughout the years for a genuinely Jewish state.
We are at the threshold of a new reality. On the one hand, we are still firmly meshed onto the Western, Oslo playing field. We do not attack, but only retaliate. We are completely subordinate to the Western values that always force us to try to prove that we are the most miserable victims on the block. We are still very far from the ability to substantially change direction. On the other hand, though, the entire playing field is crumbling away.
Never fear - the shock will dissipate and Guy Maroz and all his friends will revert to their "peace" consciousness. Soon they will demand the destruction of the settlements. After all, this is reality, not a feel-good Hollywood movie. The consciousness of a nation does not change overnight. But within all the events and upheavals, there is a major change taking place: The virtual Oslo ground is crumbling under the feet of the elites that are nurtured by it. The new playing field is going to be "Daniella's wide dress."
Well, not exactly Daniella. We do not expect to win a political victory that will allow us to change the rules of the game in Israel. On the contrary. The game itself is about to change. The only relevant players in the new game will be those of us who have toiled throughout the years for a genuinely Jewish state.
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