DON'T BLAME THE NATIONS Gustav Hendrikssen Editor's note: In the September 1995 issue of Nativ magazine, an exchange appeared between Gustav Hendrikssen, professor emeritus of Bible Studies at Sweden's Uppsala University, and Mordechai Nisan, lecturer in Middle East Studies at Hebrew University's Rothberg School for Overseas Students. Professor Nisan had drawn up an appeal to the international community, urging the nations of the world not to press Israel to make decisions that endangered its very existence. Nisan couched his appeal in 35 rhetorical questions, asking how other states would have acted, had they been in Israel's place. The following is an edited version of Hendrikssen's response to Professor Nisan's appeal to the nations. To Mordechai Nisan, Greetings ("greetings" and not "shalom"--a word which I have ceased to use since the awarding of the last Nobel peace prize) Why the editor of Nativ sent your emotional appeal to me, an aged and bitter Gentile in the remote areas of the North, I do not know. Maybe he sent it first to the Secretary-General of the United Nations, and the latter, given that organization's traditional hostility toward your people, refused to respond. Your appeal lies on my desk. I have, of course, not received authorization from the nations of the world, which would have made my answer to your appeal official. I hope you will forgive me. Since I am what is known as a "friend of Israel," a remote relation to the Wallenberg family, perhaps that will cover this deficiency. Recently, I find myself thinking frequently about the concept "friend of Israel." I do not know if I completely understand it. For example, somewhat more than a year ago, my colleagues and I formulated a modest manifesto against giving the Nobel prize to Yasser Arafat. You probably know that immediately after the 1938 Munich conference, Gertrude Stein, a marvelous hostess and an obsessive scribbler, turned to a number of intellectuals--no, not all of them Jews--who signed an appeal urging the Nobel prize committee to give Hitler the Nobel peace prize. The committee rejected this proposal politely but firmly, citing among their reasons the attitude of the Nazi regime toward the Jews. If you ask me how I know this--I was a member of that committee. Arafat is the heir of Hitler and the Palestinian Covenant is a more disgusting document than the Nuremberg laws. In contrast to 1938, this time the committee did give the Nobel prize to one of the most despicable figures in our century, a century with the distinction

of producing more monsters in human attire than all previous ones. This miserable butcher crawled out of the human sewer and his entire purpose in life is to destroy the people of Israel in its land. When I saw the Prime Minister of Israel and its Foreign Minister standing next to this murderous clown, I had to think again about the meaning of the term "friend of Israel." Forgive me the long introduction. But the Gentile had no hand in this victory of poisonous anti-Semitism. It is entirely the deed of the Jewish people. That is why I called up the memory of that lady who preceded by about 50 years her spiritual heirs, Messrs. Shimon Peres and Yitzhak Rabin. To Stein's credit, it must be said that the terrible precedent of the Holocaust was not before her. Therefore, any comparison between her and them is a serious insult to her memory. Now to the refutation of your arguments: You write and ask, "Would you have us rely on the promises of the same European states who refused to allow American airplanes carrying vital supplies to Israel to land and refuel in their territories?" Why such a question? After all, these very nations took part in the destruction of your people 30 years before. At the end of May 1967, they held their breath with hope that finally the memory of the Jews in the Holy Land would be erased and the Jews return to a life --in the words of that great humanist Thomas Aquinas-- "of poverty and humbleness, suffering and contempt forever --a punishment for rejecting the message of Jesus, a testament to the truth of the Church." I remember in May 1967, my wife, who is active in public life, received a letter. Would we be willing to take in war refugees from Palestine? Perhaps an orphaned boy, or maybe a widow who escaped by the skin of her teeth? If you could only know how generous was the response of those who received the letter and how The Jewish people digs its grave with its own hand... bitter was our disappointment after two weeks. But between those days and the 1990s is a gap that makes your rhetorical questions anachronistic. For indeed, as I said before, the Jewish people digs its grave with its own hand. Even the devil that dances on its grave is of its own making. Perhaps you know and perhaps not, but as a believing Protestant (I was even ordained for the ministry a long time ago), who has reconciled himself with his creator, Israel was for me more than a piece of land and a nation that struggles for its existence. For a Christian who has managed to divest himself from hatred of Jews (a difficult undertaking but not impossible), Israel was a divine message. It was testimony to the hope that maybe (Continued on p.8)

Outpost               - 4 -               November 1995