Jewish activist speaks on campus

Israel's current policies will force the country to choose between its identity as a Jewish state and its status as a democracy, Marcia Freedman told an audience of about 80 students, faculty and community members Monday evening.\nHer comments illustrated the sharp divisions within the American Jewish community over Israel's policies.\nFreedman, president of the national group Brit Tzedek v'Shalom, or Jewish Alliance for Justice and Peace, is an activist and a former member of the Knesset -- Israel's parliament. She lives in Jerusalem and Berkeley, Calif.\n"The situation (in Israel), as you know, has been going downhill for a long time now," Freedman said.\n"We do believe that there is hope, that we are not at the 11th hour, but that we are very close to the eleventh hour," she said.\n"If Israel holds onto the territories, it means that there would be four and a half million Palestinians and four and a half million Jews (in Israel)," Freedman said. "If Palestinians have equal rights, then Jews are perforce a minority in a very short time."\nShe said she believes as a result of this, Israel will lose its identity as a Jewish state. The alternative, she said, is equally disturbing.\n"Without equal rights for Palestinians, Israel would not be a democratic state."\nFreedman said a peaceful outcome to the Israel-Palestine conflict will require a two-state solution and a "Marshall Plan" for Palestine.\nBut the political leadership of Israel and of Palestine makes that outcome hard to achieve, Freedman said.\n"The agenda is being set and power being held on both sides mainly by extremists," she said. \nFreedman called the Israeli government under the leadership of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon the "most extremist, most right wing government" the country has had since its foundation in 1948.\nFreedman said she believes Sharon stands to the left of his own government. She said Sharon is "genuinely ready" for the establishment of a separate Palestinian state.\nBut in Freedman's view, the Palestinian state Sharon would like to see would be an independent state only by name.Freedman criticized the Palestinian authority's leadership as well.\n"The Palestinian political structure is very much fragmented," Freedman said. \nShe said the Palestinian leadership headed by Yasser Arafat imposed itself over an indigenous community receptive to democratic practices.\nA Palestinian state, Freedman said, could be one of the first Arab democracies.\nBut there can be no Palestinian state without a resolution to the struggle between Israel and Palestinians, Freedman said. \nThat resolution will take international cooperation, pressure from Israelis and the lobbying efforts of American Jews, she said.\n"I don't see any way the situation can improve without very, very strong international engagement," Freedman said. "We cannot talk about international engagement today with a single world superpower without understanding the U.S. holds all the cards."\nU.S. involvement alone will not be sufficient, Freedman argued, because Palestinians no longer trust the United States to act as an honest broker. She said other international actors like Russia and the European Union will have to be included as well.\nBringing about a peaceful resolution to the Israeli Jews will have to put pressure on the Sharon government to change its policies, Freedman said.\nShe argued that American Jews would have to lobby Washington to change its policies as well.\nSenior Joe Brown attended the lecture and disagreed with Freedman.\n"Sharon has the confidence of the Israeli people to make tough compromises with a longtime foe," Brown said. \nHe compared Sharon's potential to former President Richard Nixon's overtures to China, which Brown said was successful only because Nixon had the support of the American right.\nBrown also expressed doubt the international community would be willing to help Israel.\n"How are Jews to trust the rest of the world when the rest of the world abandoned us during the Holocaust?" Brown said.\nRobert Goldstein, a spokesman for Bloomington Friends of Israel, said that he also disagreed with Freedman's views.\nGoldstein said that Freedman was "an Israeli patriot." But he said he found it difficult to understand the emergence of peace groups like Brit Tzedek when, in his view, "the Palestinians have shattered the peace process with their escalating campaign of violence."\nIn her lecture, Freedman acknowledged the differences of views within the American Jewish community. She said she wants Brit Tzedek to speak on behalf of American Jews who want a peaceful end to the fighting. Brit Tzedek, she said, doesn't want to change the views of Jewish leaders.\n"I want to change my neighbors," Freedman said.\nFreedman's visit was arranged by the Bloomington chapter of Brit Tzedek.\n-- Contact staff writer Paul Musgrave at rpmusgra@indiana.edu.