Miranda was in the mood for a soliloquy. Christine wanted to speak but Gerald intimated to her that Miranda should have the floor if she wanted to. Christine decided that if Gerald dozed off, she would wake him up and let him suffer the full speech.
Miranda’s thought experiment
M: “Thought experiment: Imagine Israel already in the 1950s had applied a different thinking. Allow me to paint you a picture.
Prelude:
Think in terms of faults lines in understanding and cultures. Like when we as workers speedily agree that the managers have no inkling about how problems in their company really get solved. Alone we can think it. Together we can voice it and produce something new: Cultural awareness.”
C: “It becomes a meme. A thing.”
M: “Yes, something that becomes a reality of its own. This is reflected in the phenomenon we can observe when we replace the word or the thing with its definition or summary. The feeling that you somehow didn’t manage to inscribe the concept completely. That is because it no longer can be reduced to just the original example. A name for something is easier to implicate in new meanings, and thus begins the journey from real events to synthetic reality.
I am not trying to be pretentious.”
G: “We know Miranda.”
M: “I need to explain what I mean by the explanation I give… I trust that is okay?”
C: “Have we said otherwise?”
M: “My experiment presumes the rule that political identities outranks most other social forces. When asked “who are we closer to morally? USA or Soviet?”, our answer will constrain our options for actions.”
C: “By constrained you mean that we self-monitor to make sure we are in line with previous claims?”
M: “Yes… Well, don’t we?”
Awkward silence.
C: “I guess so.”
M: “Sometimes this is untrue, such as when Israel must make a strategic choice. If they choose to base that choice on “who is strongest or who stands to gain from supporting us” rather than “who do we share values with”, then it makes less sense.”
G: “Very broad discussion here. Are doctrinal planners any more rational and impervious to rhetorical traps such as those you describe than the rest of the population? We feel an obligation to be faithful to our core values. But what you describe is the nature of a very unreflected person. Someone who surprisingly hears himself say that he believes in such and such, because it made sense at this juncture in the conversation. I doubt you will find that at the highest levels of society.”
M: “A politician pressured by a journalist will gladly offer his principles as a defence. He will be utterly unswayed by any journalist who tried to steal the argument by reinterpreting the events to be in contradiction with his statement. I agree so far. The rules of engagement in journalism differs from those prevailing in Internet fora.”
Let’s imagine:
C: “Miranda… your experiment…”
M: “The experiment: If Israel had thought to itself that the real major incentive across the board of Arab countries was anti-colonialism, then perhaps they should make effort to appear anti-colonial as well.”
C: “How? By denying it? I think they did, actually.”
G: “Nonsense. They severed connections with Soviet and that was the clearest language you could imagine. The giant wicker man called US which is nothing but a constitutional ragdoll shielding imperialist forces versus the country that sacrificed their own government in a people’s revolution. That may very well have been what Arabs saw in the 50s, but of course that picture got very tainted as time went by. But Israel decided on which wide to stand early on.”
C: “Miranda, should Israel have severed connections with US and also Britain and France?”
M: “Internally in Israel that would have been hard. A leadership may be able to see a strategy, but they must build their government on the overall sentiments of the people to retain legitimacy. The natural reaction of a people under attack is that “they all want Israel obliterated from the map.”
This fixation on “Arab intransigence” proved to be an Achilles heel. The asymmetry between Arabs seeing Israel as a colonial extension of France and Britain and later USA and the Israelis seeing in Arabs merely a foe wanting their extinction and a second Holocaust has proved to be an engine for enmity over decades.
There is no way around the fact that the dispute over land is quite material and concrete.
But if you look at the reasoning behind wars, often you see how far more than the material realities determine the course of action.
History:
1956 Suez War:
Both Egypt and Israel read motives of aggression into the Czech arms transfers to their enemy. We have seen how at least one Israeli official (Allon) have talked about two wars being preemptively started by Israel in response to Arab aggression (1956, 1967).
The notion of preventive war is of course a disastrous manoeuvre as it directly flips the sign of aggressor/defender while feeding the preexisting narratives on both sides (“They want to kill us, so we must strike first. AHA! Look how angry they became! They really DID want to kill us!” Versus “We knew we couldn’t trust them! They claim to be victims and yet they launch an offensive war!”)
1967 War:
Israel could not read Nasser’s deployment of troops in Sinai and the closing of the Straits of Tiran as a necessary posture to appear tough against the colonial threat his people (and he himself, perhaps) believed was present against Syria at the time. Israel reacted with a preemptive war as they reasoned that owning enough security zone north and south would diminish the temptation of Arab countries to attack an easy prey. Remember that Israel felt vulnerable also after the Six Day War, as we talked about some days ago. The Allon Plan and defensible borders and all that.
1973 War:
Israel analysing their environment through this lens blots out the reality in the Egyptian and Syrian world. The reality was obviously that Egypt and Syria felt humiliated after the attack on their sovereignty in 1967 (disregarding themselves crossing Israeli red lines which is always a tender subject to discuss today). The ensuing Israeli unwillingness to yield any of the conquered lands back locked both countries into a political course where their leadership would face either delegitimisation or take back the initiative.
The very fact that the Kissinger post war negotiations inaugurated by UNSC Resolution 338 managed to reach agreements apparently impossible for Golda Meir in the years preceding 1973 shows that prejudices will cloud the judgement of a politically savvy leadership as well.
But imagine that Egypt in Israel had at least seen a country also struggling for independent existence under nobody’s terms, not Soviet, not USA, and that Israel had expressed support for the North African countries’ attempt to overthrow foreign rule as well.”
The jury’s verdict and the defendant’s defences
Christine felt less than convinced. But Gerald repurposed all of Miranda’s thinking.
G: “The Achilles heel in your experiment is an indefensible dependence on narratives as instinct. It muddies the very overt calculations underpinning these narratives. A display of defiance by a leader is not the view of a man whose feelings bid him to raise his fist, but a political language saying to his spectators and constituency, »I will be the defiant one – will you join me«… It’s an offer and an attempt to start an avalanche of expressed agreement. Accepting the offer, which is what the acolytes and epigones are doing, is also a calculated act. They may find him disgusting, but predict a calculated advantage of allegiance.”
M: “So? You describe it as calculation and hence insincerity. Though insincerity is really just throwing your heart into the battle with some reservation. It is still a heart. Let me ask this in response: If your half-hearted plans fail, do you feel anger, misery or disheartened? Why would you feel anything at all? Regroup and run the calculation again, right?”
G: “Disappointment can still hurt.”
C: “Which advantages?”
G: “Come again…?”
C: “If people opt in on a political project because of an outlook to gain certain political advantages, what are those? I assume they are disjoint from the actual narrative according to your argument. And don’t tell me that honesty is one of them … as in »we are honest when we say something. They are dishonest and manipulative«. That won’t fly.”
G: “Palestinians when they rally behind a terror organisation is such an example. It doesn’t mean they want to be terrorists, but when looking at Israel, they want Israelis to read their intentions as »we support these guys«. That is their true statement.”
C: “That’s not calculation! Rallying is not calculation. I will say Miranda’s account holds true, with the caveat that the real reason may not be aligned with the hardline narrative that we vote for at conferences. No, I will take that up a notch: We lose faith that there even is a reality that we can be honest about. Even our own. Discussion becomes fencing and we learn the fast moves.
In the end, we know full well that those across the table also have reasons and are probably reasonable people deep down. But circumstances has forces us into opposite corners and once the game is afoot, it’s about winning.”
For some reason without saying anything new, Christine made Gerald think for a while.
G: “Accepted. I will modify my stance: An elected, designed and refined narrative is for plain reasons calculated but contains a share of genuine emotions. And yes, when someone attacks our position - however refined and tailored for the occasion - we see it as an attack on our very selves.”
M: “The real or fake perennial discussions that seem to fester in foreign policy literature provides fuel for diplomatic crises. When CFR (Council for Foreign Relations - an atlanticist think tank) mentions in an article about the Non-Aligned Movement in 2012 that Iran is a dubious country to host a summit, they provide a colouring but fuzzy way of saying that Iran is dishonest about its motives as favouring balance between global North and South. They spread the habit of never directly accepting anything Iran says. Once completely developed, their readers will hear a liar talk whenever an Iranian official opens his or her mouth.
In this phase, the wider audience has been indoctrinated with a reflex to dismiss statements by Russia, Iran and their ilk as disinformation. This becomes a coded word signifying »STOP! Cognitive minefield. Wear protective gear and exit the area as fast as possible«.
Try talking with our colleagues about the Russo-Ukrainian War or The War on Terror.”
G: “Good, then we can separate the chaff from the grain. Anybody unwilling to entertain the notion that Iran is speaking in partial or even full congruence with their intentions has imbibed themselves on bad cognitive habits.
I can vouch for the fact at least the Iranian constitution is brimful of anti-colonial safeguards. The fact that they base those safeguards on Islam to function as not only a fourth but a prime branch of government, that is just what it is.
Later we can talk about the constitution, but as I have said earlier, it comes across as immensely modern.
Let me rephrase that: I believe that Iranians believe in their constitution, purpose and ideology. If they struggle to confer on us the idea that we are the unwanted colonisers, they are not to blame. We ought to have picked up the message by now.”
But history…?
M: “Okay, so lukewarm enthusiasm about my idea.
At this point, it seems that we agree that:
- Official statements are speculative.
- They also may or may not hide real genuine content.
- Dismissing or calling them out as bluff may lead to a diplomatic crisis.”
G: “With that out of the way, I think this is an excellent opportunity to take your theory out for a test drive.
When should Israel have crossed over?
Rewind to 1948 when they declared themselves a state following the Arab rejection of UN Resolution 181 proposing a new map that includes Israel. Then Egypt, Syria and Jordan declared war. Heck, Soviet even recognised Israel before the Cold War heated up and all the manuals got written. And Israel before 1948 was fighting the British mandate! The tides of war turned and Israel was suddenly winning. Then the Nakba seared into the collective Arab memory. That one is hard to paint over.
Forward to 1950s and emerging Non-Aligned Movement, Nasserism, Pan-Arabism, all movements for which the name of Israel already radiated with association with USA, Britain and France.
By 1967, the free Arab world’s struggle against imperialism and monarchism was starting to seem like a lost cause. The bad guys were winning. Soon the major Arab players would downsize their global revolution and focus on their own national borders. Does that sound like a climate in which to come out with your colonial gender change?
By the time of Kissinger after 1973, Israel as anti-colonial partner was getting irrelevant anyway. Why not just see Israel as any other country. At least Egypt did. Only those who were revolutionary at their inception would have the old mindset baked into their constitution.
My take: As long as Israel would have to invest heavily in its own security it would also be impossible to deafen the array of Arab voices framing it as plans for aggression.”
C: “Well, isn’t that interesting. So can we once again return to the hackneyed question of what comes first, material reality or ideology?”
G: “Sure! And how would you answer that? Why invest in defence unless you were listening to your own columnists and agitators or those of the enemy and were convinced that war is imminent?
There is no beginning. Conviction breeds action that breeds conviction over and over.”
Miranda sighed.
The three of them still disagreed, but all their reading had managed to do was to take their disagreement to a higher level. Now they could really kick the ball around.
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