Ben Gurion's Fall SIR,—Allow me first to call into question
the extra- ordinary complacency and the not so uncommon (in Israel) self-righteousness of Mr. Sherman's letter about my November 12 'article ('Ben Gurion's Fall') by pointing out that I do have a 'sound grasp' of spoken and written Hebrew. Why Mr. Sherman should assume that I do not escapes me.
No less bewildering is the failure of Mr. Sherman to appreciate the very marked change in Arab atti- tudes towards Israel, of which President Bourguiba's repeated proposals throughout this year are only one indication. As for Al-Fatah: surely Mr. Sher- man will not compare these pin-prick incursions, condemned among others by Jordan's King Hussein, with the murderous terrorism of the pre-Sinai fedayeen who operated with the• open blessing of Nasser and other Arab leaders? And with what relish Mr. Sherman contemplates the possibility (which appears remote to me) of 'a big blow-up over Al-Fatah . . . which will make Qalqiliya look like a picnic by comparison'!
My comparison of the two Kalkilich raids w'as intcnded to illustrate the fundamental difference of approach between Ben Gurion and Eshkol. Mr. Sherman's statement that 'there were raids without loss of life then and there have been quite high Arab and Israeli casualties in reprisals under Eshkol' is no answer to this. In the February 28, 1955, raid on Gaza thirty-eight Egyptians were killed and thirty-one injured; on April 5, 1955, fifty-six Arabs were killed and 103 injured in the shelling of Gaza; on December 11, 1955, at least fifty-six Syrians were killed and nine wounded. . . . The real significance of the recent elections lies in the fact that Begin and Ben Gurion together did not win enough votes to form a coalition which would have restored the 'activist' principle in the conduct of Israel's rela- tions with her Arab neighbours. The prima facie possibility, despite long-standing personal antagon- ism, of such a coalition is suggested by the numerous municipal coalitions between RAFI and GAHAL which have been formed in the past few weeks.
As for the Oriental question: Israeli Europeans have been talking since at least 1948 about 'merging the communities.' This is nothing new. What it means is that the Europeans want to Europeanise the Orientals, whom they will only accept as equals on these terms. The presence of Orientals in party lists (there will be twenty Orientals in the 120- member Sixth Knesset, although Orientals constitute over 50 per cent of Israel's Jewish population) means nothing: they are no more representative or respon- sible than the 580 RhOdesian chiefs who recently announced their support of UDI. I mentioned the Look article only in the context of the election cam- paign. Ben Gurion• who claimed to have sent a cable to Look demanding an apology and retraction of the statement, is now somewhat embarrassed to read reports in the Israeli press quoting a Look spokesman to the effect that he did make the state- ment and that no cable from Ben Gurion was ever received by Look. Mr. Sherman is wrong in sug- gesting that the ex-Premier's record in this respect 'speaks for him.' Ben Gurion, more than anyone else, was the initiator of the current Israeli policy of cultural genocide against the Orientals; it is he, moreover, who coined the term `Levantinisation' to denote the bogey frightening European Israelis which makes it so difficult for them to see themselves as a part of the Middle East.
POB 10, Jerusalem
MICHAEL srt 7ra
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