World bows as Peres gets his
ON THE Jerusalem hill where Israel buries its leaders, they mourned him as a peacemaker and a father; as a man steeped in history who was always looking to the future; and as a statesman who influenced the great and the good across the world but considered himself “shy”.
There were delegations from 70 countries on Mount Herzl to watch Shimon Peres go to his final resting place, close to past presidents including Chaim Herzog and Yitzhak Navon. They came from as nearby as Egypt and Jordan, and as far away as Australia.
Among the eulogies were long labours of love, such as Barack Obama’s highly emotional tribute. Many tears were shed as the powerful voice of David D’Or singing Avinu Malkeinu from the Rosh Hashanah service echoed around Mount Herzl. It was one of Mr Peres’s favourite songs.
Notwithstanding some spats over the seating plan, with some MKs feeling they deserved to sit closer to the front than had been planned, it was a reflective event. Mourners discussed Mr Peres’s legacy, and his successor as President, Reuven Rivlin, adopted a humility rarely seen in Israeli politics. A right-winger who himself spoke harshly of the Oslo process, he said that those who opposed Mr Peres’s peace efforts went too far: “Shimon, I unashamedly confess, on the eve of the Jewish New Year, Rosh Hashanah, at your graveside among the graves of the leaders of our nation, your forgiveness must be asked... There were years in which red lines were crossed between ideological disputes and words and deeds which had no place.”
Bill Clinton paid tribute to Mr Peres as a “wise champion of our common humanity” and “Israel’s biggest dreamer.” Mr Obama likened him to other “giants of the 20th century” including Nelson Mandela and Queen Elizabeth. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called him a “senior partner in the national rebirth of the Jewish people”.
In surprisingly brief speeches, Mr Peres’s children captured the softer side of their father. Yoni Peres spoke of his “sensitive and caring” character, Chemi Peres mentioned the adoration he had for his grandchildren, and daughter, Tsvia Walden, recalled her childhood. She said: “He was described as a great negotiator, as someone who always found a way to get what he wanted. To me he was a young man who used his creative skills to get us to eat, who cut sandwiches into triangles and diamonds. ‘Try this. It’s a Burmese sandwich.’ My father pulled out all the creative stops and used every trick of the trade to tempt us to open our mouths and eat and grow.”
Later, at the graveside, Dr Walden changed the words of the Kaddish prayer. God should bring peace “to us and all of his people, Israel”, she said, using the normal liturgy, and then added: “And to all humankind.”
Despite Dr Walden’s heartfelt prayer, there was a recognition that the chances of Mr Peres’s peace efforts being translated to reality were limited. The author Amos Oz asked in his eulogy where today’s brave leaders were, saying: “Where are Shimon Peres’s successors?”
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas attended in the face of inevitable outrage among Palestinians and shook hands with Mr Netanyahu, but few observers saw this as a symbol of improving bilateral relations. Meanwhile, the tensions between Jews and Arabs in Israel were underscored by the fact that politicians from the Arab political faction in Knesset, the Joint List, stayed away from the funeral.
Diaspora leaders who flew in for the burial included Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis, who said afterwards: “We saw at the cemetery the depth of feeling for this man among so many people — royalty, presidents, and normal people.”
The most high-profile mourner from Britain was Prince Charles, who wore a royal crest kippah at the cemetery. He told Mr Rivlin afterwards about his “very fond memories” of meeting Mr Peres, who “tried so hard to achieve the peace that is badly needed.”
Prince Charles used the Israel trip to pay a visit to the grave of his grandmother, Princess Alice of Battenberg, who helped save Jews during the Shoah and asked to be buried in Jerusalem.
Prince Charles received a warm welcome in Jerusalem, but his hastilyarranged trip — reminiscent of his visit for Yitzhak Rabin’s funeral — revived frustration among Israeli officials that they cannot persuade British royals to make a scheduled visit.
At Mount Herzl, Lord Polak, the Conservative peer and former director of Conservative Friends of Israel, was full of praise for Prince Charles for making the trip, but added: “However much it is appreciated that they come for a funeral, they should come when there isn’t a funeral.”
ONE OF the biggest question marks hanging over the funeral of Israeli founding father Shimon Peres was whether any Arab leaders would attend. As luminaries from 70 countries headed to Jerusalem, people wondered: Would Egypt’s President Sisi attend? He sent his foreign minister. Would the Palestinians send a representative? They did: President Abbas himself.
Alongside this speculation, however, was a potent reminder of rifts within Israel that endanger the country’s future every bit as much as the frozen peace process. While condolence notes poured in from far and wide, including from Jordan’s King Abdullah, the largest grouping of parties representing Israel’s Arab minority, the Joint List, announced that it would shun his funeral.
“The Arab public’s memory of Peres is different than the narrative about him in recent days,” Joint List leader Ayman Odeh stated.
“To Peres’s credit, he pursued peace while building a partnership with members of the Arab public, and the evidence is that 90 per cent of the Arab public voted for him in the 1996 elections.” But, he added: “There is strong opposition in Arab society to the architect of the occupation who introduced nukes to the Middle East, and I regret that, as president, he elected to support Netanyahu and his policies.” He also cited Peres’s early enabling of the settlements.
The response to this was one of dismay from most quarters. MK Erel Margalit of the left-wing Zionist Union party said that “the decision of the Arab parties not to respect the moments of bidding farewell to… one of the leaders of the peace camp and pioneers of the peace process, makes one wonder who exactly they represent.” Even those on the right, like Education Minister Naftali Bennett, who virulently opposed Oslo, had joined in the public eulogising.
“You were the big hope for coexistence,” Odeh — who became leader of the party in 2015 — was told on a TV panel show a few hours after the funeral. By shunning the ceremony, one TV analyst told him, Arabs had missed a chance to “be human beings.” The Joint List was slaughtering a much-cherished sacred cow. The move showed just how delicate the relationship between Israeli’s Jewish majority and its 20 per cent Arab minority is, and just how far Jewish and Arab perspectives can diverge when it comes to national symbols like Peres. Such differences relate to the very nature and history of the state, to decades of bad blood.
Hoping that these differences will not get in the way in moments of national crisis or mourning, will only entrench them further.
While he shared in the grief of Peres’s family and friends, Odeh explained, on a “political level, this is national mourning. I have no part in it. Not in the narrative, not in the symbols that exclude us.” On October 1, Israeli Arabs commemorated clashes in northern Israel in 2000, in which 13 Arab protesters were killed. “Can anyone feel our pain, or doesn’t anyone care,” he asked, adding, “I try to feel the historical pain of the Jewish people — the Holocaust, the pogroms… I’m asking Jews to feel my historical pain.”
Not so long ago, before Israel was established in 1948, Arabs and Jews were fighting each other under British Mandate rule in territory that now makes up the state. Violence between Arabs and Jews, inside and outside the Green Line, has continued throughout Israel’s history. Mohammad Barakeh, head of the High Monitoring Committee for Arab Citizens of Israel, said at a rally marking the 2000 clashes: “We are excluded from all events, and all of a sudden it’s important for Israel if we participate in the funeral of Shimon Peres?”
This fraught relationship can easily tip into outright tension, and sometimes violence. We saw it when, on election day last year, Netanyahu warned that Arabs were heading “in droves” to vote. We saw it during the 2014 Gaza war, when most Arabs opposed the war, while most Jews supported it. Alongside peace with the Palestinians, working for a two-state solution, and forging ties with states in the region, Israel needs to heal these rifts for the sake of its future. Peres’s successor, incumbent President, Reuven Rivlin, is one of the only public figures who has made this issue a priority.
At the funeral, novelist Amos Oz said that “peace is not only possible, it is inevitable because we have no other place to go, nor do the Palestinians.” Neither do Israel’s Arab citizens, many of whom identify more with the Palestinian narrative than the Israeli one.
For true, long-term stability, Israelis must face these internal divisions. They are as dangerous for the country’s future as the continued impasse in negotiations.
Can anyone feel our pain, or doesn’t anyone care?