According to a report in The Jerusalem Post of November 22, Baram was asked in a radio interview, "What if the Palestinians continue to attack us even if they do get enough money to rehabilitate Gaza?" The question poses a quite plausible scenario. After all, the problem, from the Palestinian-Arab point of view is not whether to live or die in Gaza. It is whether to accept or reject Israel's existence. This has been their issue since the creation of the PLO in 1964, and even before. 1964. Three years before the Six Day War. Three years before Israel controlled the Gaza strip. And before 1964, Palestinian-Arab terrorism from the Gaza Strip and Judea and Samaria was worse than it is today, at the height of the Intifadah. I would logically assume that the ability of the Palestinian-Arabs to control their own lives in Gaza will not remove any part of the reason for attacking Israel or Israelis.
Finally, it seems as if increasing proportions of the Israeli media are realizing that regardless of Israeli concessions, given without any corresponding concessions from Arafat, Palestinians will still delight with every Israeli death. This increasing media awareness is gratifying, if only because of the increased embarrassment it will cause the government. What is not so gratifying, however, is the apparent willingness of the government to continue being embarrassed. Baram replied to the question by saying, "I'll go to the American Consulate and apply for a visa."
Over the past few months, Canadian immigration officials have come under a barrage of hostility from the Canadian Jewish community over its liberal refugee determination process, which is granting immigrants from Israel refugee status so that they can take advantage of our social security system after having rejected Israel and Zionism. But what legitimacy does the Canadian Jewish community have in launching these attacks when the Israeli tourism minister has now stated his willingness to become one of the refugees?
Come to think of it, what is the Israeli tourism minister doing turning his back on the millennia-old dream of his people to return to Zion and build it up regardless of opposition? This is a dream that his own generation, and the one immediately before his has realized, and he now gives it all up because Palestinian-Arab terrorists tell him to.
Since the signing of the Oslo Accord in Washington last September, 108 Israelis have been murdered in cold blood by such terrorists. The latest was a 19-year-old female soldier named Liat Gabai who was hit from behind with an axe. When the blade of the axe got stuck in her brain, the attacker let go of it and fled. He was chased down by bystanders and held for police. During interrogation he said that he had evaded an army checkpoint on the highway and entered Afula in order to kill soldiers. The same way you or I go for a Sunday drive. Palestinians are increasingly showing that they have no conscience to bother them about committing murder in the most heinous ways.
But Liat Gabai is not the only victim. There were 107 others. More Israelis have died at the hands of Palestinians since Oslo than at any other time in Israeli history. But Yasser Arafat, now the best friend of the Israeli government, has not said a word of condemnation. He has not arrested any of the attackers, nor has he allowed Israeli authorities to arrest them instead. On the contrary, he has blessed them and commended their "heroism". Once again, therefore, it is heroic to kill Jews. The government continues to negotiate with this man, and the tourism minister has given up on the Zionist dream -- which was supposed to ensure that such heroism was never again idolized.
Liat Gabai, and 107 other Israelis, will never be able to leave Israel in order to seek the safety and security that has been denied them by the policies of their government. They never wanted to. Uzi Baram, whose job it is to attract more people to Israel, instead would rather leave than insure that Israel once again becomes a safe place to live and visit.
Uzi Baram's attitude is not Zionism, it is self-hate. It is not heroism, it is cowardice. It is not Israeli, it is the Diaspora. If that is where Uzi Baram wants to be, he is more than welcome to it. At the very least, it will mean one less person with whom the real Zionists -- the real lovers of Israel -- will have to contend.
Copyright 1994. Reproduction in electronic or print format by permission only.
