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for implementation under current conditions. The details
of each proposal will no doubt be debated – but the frame
of reference is indisputably a propos, as plainly stated by
Michael Koplow of the US-based Israel Policy Forum in a
supportive piece: "There will be no real movement toward
two states until security is addressed in a comprehensive
manner, and it belies the evidence to blithely assume that
simply ending Israel’s presence in the West Bank will bring
quiet to Israelis... If you take two states seriously, then you
must take security seriously" (Koplow, 2016).
Time will tell whether and how these efforts succeed in
influencing policy; regardless, the reports are valuable
resources for civil society peace advocates. This is true in
terms of providing practical responses to security FAQs – but
all the more as a model of genuine, public reckoning with
current reality – which is a prerequisite for civil society peace
advocates to achieve broader resonance in contemporary
Israel.
Heshbon Nefesh
The Jewish concept of
heshbon nefesh
– literally, accounting
of the soul – offers a resonant framing for public discourse
surrounding the approaching fiftieth anniversary of the 1967
War. The term
heshbon nefesh
signifies a rigorous evaluation
of one's ethical conduct in the world, associated above
all with
Yom Kippur
, the sacred day of fasting, reflection,
and atonement for failings. Much activity in the peace and
human rights sphere is perennially aimed at inspiring such
a conscientious accounting in Israeli society regarding
the subjugation of the Palestinians and its impacts on the
Palestinians, on Israeli society, and on the region into which
Israel must integrate (Sher 2016). But pro-peace civil society
can also model
heshbon nefesh
, by using the occasion to
conduct our own internal reckoning. Fifty years of occupation
is a chance to evaluate what has been established through
decades of civil society work in incomparably challenging
circumstances – but most important, to analyze who our efforts
do not reach today, and to design strategies for building
broad support for the two state agenda in contemporary
Israeli society.
Prominent civil society voices are already encouraging
such a process. Yuval Rahamim, recently appointed
chair of the Israeli Peace NGOs Forum, the largest local
umbrella organization for the field – speaks forcefully of
the need to focus on Israeli society: "In the Israeli peace
movement, for many years we focused on our partnerships
with the Palestinian organizations, but neglected to develop
partnerships in Israeli society. The Peace Camp gave up on
leadership... we're [now] so small and weak, we don't even
believe in our ability to lead" (Rahamim, 2016). A longtime
activist in the Israeli-Palestinian Bereaved Families Forum,
Rahamim is today spearheading a transformation of the
Peace NGOs Forum, which has undergone significant
changes in the wake of founding Director Ron Pundak's
death from cancer in 2014.
The Peace NGO Forum worked for years as a joint umbrella
for nearly 100 Palestinian and Israeli member organizations.
In 2015, however, the Palestinian CSOs sought to more
effectively rebut "anti-normalization" critiques by publicly
aligning themselves with the Palestinian leadership (Salem,
2016); withdrawing from the Forum in order to operate
under the aegis of the PLO Committee on Interaction with
Israeli Society, led by Mohammed Madani (Rasgon, 2016).
Rahamim, in parallel, has stepped in to lead the Israeli
Forum with a vision of building coalitions and broadening
legitimacy in Israeli society, while maintaining close ties with
the Palestinians through the Madani Committee.
Rahamim is acutely aware of the limited reach of classic
anti-occupation discourse – and critical of what he sees
as a culture of protest for its own sake on the Left: "Protest
speaks to a very small and shrinking group of Israelis, who
read Haaretz, who have what to eat, secular, Tel Aviv – protest
against the occupation speaks to them. This is not a strategy
for change. I will not compromise my values, but I have to
check my strategy". The new Forum's flagship initiative has
been a seminar series on engagement with diverse sectors
of Israeli society, the first of which included a group of young,
female advocates of peace from the Haredi community. "The
Haredi activists were the attraction," Rahamim recounts,
"because no one had seen anything like that before. They
said hard things – but something new started – and we hadn't
even known they existed." He left profoundly encouraged,
stating that "there is an opening, for a new discourse, for a
new gathering. Instead of protest, let's connect to the Israeli
society. Mizrachim, Russians, Haredim, Arabs, Ethiopians,
traditional Jews, residents of the periphery – each group
is different."
A similar transformation has occurred to another veteran two-
state advocacy CSO. The One Voice movement traversed
the country over a decade building Palestinian and Israeli
grassroots networks advocating two states in parallel –
gathering hundreds of thousands of signatures for a proposed
agreement, assembling youth visions of their desired future,
establishing a Knesset lobby for two states (which remains
active) among numerous other projects. Before the 2015
elections, One Voice made a strategic decision to move to
formal politics, converting its impressive organizing resources
– seasoned and motivated campaigners, massive lists of
signatories and supporters, and major international donors
– into V15, an unprecedented Political Action Committee for
the Left modeled on the famed "ground game" of President
Obama's campaigns. The campaign helped inspire a surge of
energy andmomentum on the Center-Left, and to increase the
Labor Party from 15 to 24 seats, but Netanyahu nonetheless
emerged victorious, forming by all accounts the most Right-
wing government in Israel's history.
For longtime One Voice/V15 campaigner Polly Bronstein,
this clarified the need to focus their efforts on consolidating
a "moderate" majority rather than playing into the Left/Right
binary. To that effect, she and a group of colleagues have
formed "Darkenu" – Our Way. As she writes, "Israelis on the
