Talmudist, religious Jew, Doctor of Chemistry, biochemist, doctor of neurology, historian of science, philosopher was one of the most significant minds of Israeli thought. Editor-in-chief of the Hebrew encyclopedia, he was also the winner of the Israel Grand Prize. In the sixties, I had the opportunity to follow the courses of this great chemist at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, not suspecting that he was such a free spirit.
Indeed, a critical agent of Israeli policy, he declared in 1967-68 after the 6-day war that it was urgent to renounce the occupied territories to prevent Israeli democracy from perishing (see Wikipedia):
“The Arabs would be the workers and the Jews the administrators, inspectors, civil servants and the police, mainly the secret police. A state governing a hostile population of 1.5 to 2 million foreigners would necessarily become a secret police state, with all that this implies for education, freedom of expression and democratic institutions. The corruption characteristic of every colonial regime would also prevail in the State of Israel. The administration would suppress the Arab insurgency on the one hand and acquire Arab Quislings (traitors) on the other. There is also good reason to fear that the Israeli Defense Forces, which until now have been a people’s army, following their transformation into an army of occupation, will degenerate, and that its commanders, who will be become military governors, resemble their colleagues from other nations”. An Arte film is also dedicated to him :
Ultimately, 2 generations later, this prophecy is coming true before our eyes. Netanyahu’s government and its racist fanatics want to expel all Arabs, dominate the country’s supreme court (like Orban who inspires them), and prohibit any challenge to their policies while allying themselves with all dictators and illiberal leaders including when they are notorious anti-Semites (Orban, Bolsonaro etc.) because accusations of anti-Semitism are simply an asset to be exploited when it serves their purposes.
When an Israeli diplomat wordlessly tears up the UN report on Palestine in front of an audience of stunned diplomats, we better understand the contempt that Israel gives to all these bodies and the morality they represent.
The chief gravedigger of 2 cemeteries in GAZA works from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m., burying 200-300 corpses per week including torn children, pregnant women and babies, entire families are crushed, newborn twins are killed with their mothers by a missile when their father was going through the birth formalities of the babies…
You must watch these videos attesting to the seriousness of the destruction in Gaza
or this chilling, unbearable testimony from a US doctor returning from Gaza speaking at the Democrats’ meeting in Chicago, members of the panel had to leave the table in tears…
An Israeli school principal states it outright, they (Arabs) are dust, that’s Israeli culture, and that’s also why we crush and kill them.
Civilians used as human shields by the Israeli army. These forced scouts are on the front line facing explosive devices or snipers, explains the Israeli newspaper “Ha’Aretz”.
When 6 soldiers are accused of raping a Palestinian prisoner, fascist ministers and members of parliament come to the prison to demand that they be released immediately because they are heroes. The Minister of Finance is appointed Gauleiter of the West Bank with full power and does not hesitate to encourage massacres and illegal occupations by settlers with the help of the army. The massacre of October 7 was possible because the army was almost absent from GAZA but very present in the occupied West Bank to satisfy the demands of the settlers and their extremist leaders.
Beyond any moral judgment, it is certain that Leibowitz was right and that it will become impossible to say that Israel is a democratic country, it is quickly becoming an illiberal theocratic country with a prime minister who must be sent back to The Hague.
