What Goes Around Comes Around

The Jerusalem Post has an article this morning titled "Population Swap Goes Mainstream". It refers to the idea of taking away the Israeli citizenship of Arabs living in population centers surrounded by a majority of Jewish citizens, and transfering them to the Palestinian Authority. This fits in with the idea of the separation of the populations, which promoters of the security barrier believe in. First proposed by so called "right wing fanatics" and made even more popular by Avigdor Lieberman's party, the title refers to the fact that the idea is being discussed for the first time at an academic conference.

First, I have to say that I disagree with this idea, and I think it is wrong to change someone's citizenship solely based on the demographics of where he lives. But on the other hand, I also thought that it was wrong to force someone out of his home based on the demographics, which is what happened last summer in Gush Katif.

I also think the the security barrier is wrong, and I have been vehemently opposed to it from the beginning. There really won't be a "separation" between the populations, because there are already hundreds of thousands of Arabs already living in pre-67 Israel, and I think that the very idea of separation of populations is racist and wrong. If the point is to protect Israelis from terrorists, then you have to go to where the terrorists are and capture them. Putting up a dumb wall will only slow them down, not stop them, and meanwhile you are hurting hundreds of thousands of innocent people - both Arab and Jew.

But it is interesting to see how much this racist idea of separation of populations is really catching on in Israel, and if I were a left-winger I would be in a cold sweat right now. What goes around comes around eventually. The proponents of the disengagement used numbers on a piece of paper in order to justify expelling Jews from their homes, even though they lived there legally. Now more and more people are talking about the idea of using numbers on a piece of paper in order to change citizenship. Since they are not talking about expelling Arabs, I can see how some people would see this as an acceptable thing to do. After all, you are solving that horrible demographic problem.