Crisis in the Middle East: A Message to Scholars

By Luis Fleischman
Image by Pexels from Pixabay

Anti-Israel activities in universities and support for the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) are widespread. Such a campaign has not only involved students but faculty as well. The Anthropological Studies Association, the American Studies Association, the Asian American Studies Association, and the Association of Humanist Sociology are among those scholarly groups that decided that the complex Israeli-Palestinian conflict can be reduced to a Manichean concept of weak v powerful, being the Palestinians the former and the Israelis the latter. Furthermore, such a delusional approach ended up exonerating the Palestinians and indicting the Israelis even after Hamas carried out a murderous attack on the Israeli south that destroyed large communities, burned families, beheaded babies, and kidnapped more than 230 men, women, and children of all ages. 

One example is the letter “Sociologists in Solidarity with Gaza and the Palestinian People.”, signed by close to 1,700 scholars and Ph.D. candidates. The letter, although signed by individual sociologists, represents the views of many in academia, not just at the student level but at the faculty level as well.  

The letter, which intentionally avoided a condemnation of Hamas, begins by saying, “Sociology as a discipline is rooted in a recognition of relationships of power and inequality.”

Is power and inequality something that justifies murder? The signers of the letter would probably deny it. However, abstaining from condemning Hamas sounds like a justification. The United Nations took a similar position. However, we expect more from thinking scholars than from an assembly of crooked nations.

 Sociology is a discipline that is not only about recognizing relationships of power and inequality but also analyzes any social interaction between people, the meaning of social and political action, the relation between individuals and structure, the role of ideology, the law, and so on. So, while Sociology is also about power relationships and inequality, good sociologists are supposed to understand that it is more nuanced and profound than that. 

The said letter fails to mention and condemn the fact that Israel faced a monstrous massacre, comparable to atrocities committed during WWII and medieval times, which included the burning of families, beheadings of babies, rape, and kidnapping of men, women of all ages, including toddlers and older people. 

But more importantly, respected scholars need to check the facts or the nuances before they judge. The role of social scientists is to understand how we arrived at this situation, not to sign resolutions or letters that are the product of an organized campaign.  

In the past, Israel encountered several wars with Hamas, ending in a cease-fire that Hamas never respected. The October 7 massacre was the ultimate act of cruelty that disclosed the murderous nature of the group. So, as the United States proceeded to eliminate Al Qaeda after 9/11, Israel legitimately is moving to destroy Hamas to hopefully make room for a new, more reasonable Palestinian government in Gaza. 

Likewise, the Palestinian leadership rejected Israel’s offers of territorial concessions, including East Jerusalem and the creation of a Palestinian state. They rejected different peace proposals made by former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak (2000), then-President Bill Clinton (2001), and former Israeli PM Ehud Olmert (2008). Finally, the Palestinian leadership rejected a peace proposal by one of their only allies in the White House: President Barack Obama. The Palestinians responded to Obama’s offer by signing a deal of unity with Hamas and taking steps to remove the United States from the peace process altogether. (2014).

The Palestinian Authority’s (“PA”) rejectionist attitude towards these multiple offers is due to its inability to exercise control over the population in the Palestinian territories, particularly the subversive and well-armed Hamas. Hamas is a competing power in these territories, waiting to remove the PA at the first opportunity. The PA cannot exercise the monopoly on the means of violence and, as a result, preferred the status quo and the protection of the security cooperation with Israel rather than succumbing to a Hamas coup, as happened in Gaza in 2007.  

 As the peace process unraveled due to the violent second intifada initiated by Hamas, Israel decided to unilaterally withdraw from Gaza (2005) to begin a unilateral separation from the Palestinians. 

Terror ensued, and this justified the continuation of the blockade not just by Israel but also by Egypt. Finally, Hamas violently removed Fath from power in Gaza in 2007 and intensified its attacks against Israel. 

 “The occupation.” has become a cliché that everyone uses, but very few understand. The best-kept secret is that “the occupation” constitutes a trap for the Israelis as well. If Israel withdraws from the West Bank, as it did in Gaza, it runs the risk of more terrorist attacks on its population again. 

I agree with those criticizing Israeli PM Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the settlement policy as unhelpful and counterproductive. However, the collapse of the peace process is primarily due to Palestinian rejectionism.  

Israel’s goal of eliminating Hamas is legitimate. In the past, Israel restrained from doing so, and the group repeatedly violated cease-fires. However, Hamas’ October 7 murderous attack made it impossible to sustain past containment policies. 

The sociologists’ letter accuses Israel of violations of all types, some of them highly inaccurate (e.g., Israel’s use of phosphorous). It also mentions Israeli “genocide” without considering that if Israel indeed were committing genocide, Hamas would have disappeared a long time ago.  

It is precisely the fact that Israel considered civilian lives that allowed the genocidal Hamas—an organization that openly advocates for Israel’s destruction—to survive.

The sociologists’ letter exempts any Palestinian entity from responsibility. Such attitude is consistent with a systematic propaganda campaign conducted in Western academic institutions that defames Israel and has produced an increasing number of antisemitic incidents. The letter ironically dares to mention that Palestinians are constantly threatened and harassed while ignoring that on American campuses, Jewish students are intimidated and harassed daily. 

Hamas counts on letters such as the one written by the sociologists. They want to provoke Israelis and then rely on Western academia, media, and others to justify Hamas’ actions by vilifying Israel. 

Israel’s elimination of Hamas may eventually contribute to a final peace agreement. Sometimes, wars serve a just purpose. I discussed a post-Hamas order elsewhere. 

About Luis Fleischman

Luis Fleischman is a professor of Sociology at Palm Beach State College, the co-founder of the think-tank the Palm Beach Center for Democracy and Policy Research. He is also the author of “Latin America in the Post-Chavez Era: The Threat to U.S. Security,” and the author of the book, “The Middle East Riddle: The Arab-Israeli Conflict in Light of Political and Social Transformations in the Arab World,” to be published by New Academia.”