Q&A: Liberalism versus Discrimination
Liberalism versus Discrimination
Question
You argue that you support adopting liberal values and modernity.
On the other hand, I’ve been going through what’s written here, and I haven’t found a single post against the policies of occupation and separation carried out by the State of Israel in the territories it captured in 1967.
I have no complaints against the Hardal people and Rabbi Kook’s students—they believe in the “beginning of redemption,” the commandment of inheriting the Land, the holiness of the state, and so on.
But you, precisely because you don’t really recognize those concepts, and even argue that liberal values should be adopted, ought to be the first to speak out against the occupation and the separation in the territories of Judea and Samaria.
By the way, separation and discrimination on a national basis have nothing at all to do with whether there is terrorism or not; they have always existed. And even if there were not the slightest peep of terrorism, nobody is fooling himself that tomorrow morning the residents of East Jerusalem would get blue ID cards and go vote in the elections.
So what’s the deal with your liberalism—is it just lip service?
Answer
It’s true that there are many stupid liberals, but not all of them are like that. There is no liberal obligation whatsoever to treat with tolerance and inclusiveness an enemy that wants to destroy us and whose core identity is that he wants to disinherit us. Unfortunately, the left takes the term liberalism as synonymous with stupidity, and that is not so.