What do advocates of “saving Israel from itself” mean?

Most important and significant is that Magnus predicted that even if the “Jewish state” that was in the process of being established won the war, other wars would break out, and there would be no end to it. When the battles of the 1948 war began, he tried to stop the implementation of the General Assembly’s resolution...

In the midst of the genocidal war waged by Israel against our Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip, and these days entering its sixth month, voices have risen in Israel calling for saving the “Jewish state” from itself under the weight of the bestial feelings of revenge that control the instincts of its political and military leaders and its public opinion for the most part. In response to the Al-Aqsa flood operation.

New to these voices, finally, is the former diplomat and director of the J Street organization in Israel, Nadav Tamir. J Street, as it defines itself, is a political organization loyal to Israel and for peace, and includes among its ranks American Jews who want Israel to be safe, democratic, and “a national home for the Jewish people.” It also encourages joint policies that would advance American, Israeli, and Jewish interests. Then, strengthening democratic values, leading to a two-state solution and ending what it describes as an Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

What should be noted is that these voices, as exemplified by Tamir in an article published in the Israeli newspaper Maariv yesterday (Tuesday), focus on the need to save Israel from itself on two levels: First, the level of its obsessive adherence to the occupation in the 1967 territories, which in its opinion is the main factor for the intensification of the return of ( And the influence of religious Zionism and the Messianic movements, which together with the current Israeli government are at the top of the pyramid of the political establishment, in addition to the expansion of their influence and even their dominance over the leadership of the Israeli army and the security establishment.

The second level is to save it from the rule of the extreme right, which seeks through systematic and specific practices to make Israel an ethnocratic and theocratic state.

However, the phrase “self-saving” with regard to Israel was linked to a large degree before the 1967 occupation with the efforts of the last quarter-hour made by the President of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, Yehuda Lev Magness, in the American administration’s forums in order to prevent the establishment of Israel and avoid the outbreak of the 1948 war. According to his diary, Magnus was ill at the beginning of April 1948.

Despite this, he decided to travel urgently to the White House in Washington, in order to try to stop the ongoing war in Palestine, and he did not represent anyone, except for a group of professors at his university. He also had close relationships with senior officials in the US administration. His main goal of traveling was to persuade US President Harry Truman to impose a ceasefire, prevent the implementation of the Partition Resolution of 1947, and prevent the establishment of the Jewish state.

Most important and significant is that Magnus predicted that even if the “Jewish state” that was in the process of being established won the war, other wars would break out, and there would be no end to it. When the battles of the 1948 war began, he tried to stop the implementation of the General Assembly’s resolution regarding the partition of Palestine and push the idea initiated by the US State Department, which was for the United Nations to freeze the partition resolution and temporarily impose a “trusteeship system” on both sides and form an interim government, until the conditions were ripe for implementing another agreement.

He believed that this idea was an opportunity to stop the deterioration of the situation, in the hope that, in the meantime, an understanding would be reached and a dialogue would become possible. He told the American consul to inform Magness that if the trusteeship system was not established before May 15, 1948, Palestine would enter “a period full of dangers and bloodshed.”

“There is a need for a courageous and constructive approach like mine,” Magness wrote in his diary on April 12, 1948. “The time has come for me to travel with others or alone to the United States to pass on this message.” He hoped that the United States would impose sanctions on all of Palestine if the establishment of the State of Israel was announced. He later told American officials that “you cannot fight a war without money and ammunition,” but the United States was quick to recognize Israel. Less than five months later, Magnes died in the United States and was buried in Jerusalem.