Muslims and Jews: Common Ground

It's been often noted that a key reason for the intractability of the conflict between Jews and Muslims in the Middle East is that both sides operate with a mutually exclusive set of assumptions about the history of the dispute.

Jews view the state of Israel as the triumph of a dispossessed people who waited 2,000 years for a return to their homeland. If violence has accompanied that return, it is solely because of Arab intransigence; Jews were willing to settle peacefully among their Arab neighbors, but the latter were hostile to a sovereign Jewish entity in the Middle East and declared war against it from its inception.

Save & Share Tag This Article  Saving options 1. Save to description:  Headline (required)  Byline 2. Save to notes (255 character max):  Blurb 3. Tag This Article

Muslims view the state of Israel as the most egregious example of Western colonialism and imperialism, a foreign body inserted into the Middle East for the purpose of furthering Western domination. Any violence is solely the fault of the Jews and their Western allies. The Jews were able to take possession of the land by violently displacing its inhabitants, and they have succeeded in holding on to it with the help of Western military support.

What has been lost is the fact that both Jews and Muslims have a great deal in common in the way they perceive their respective histories. Each community has an understanding of its history that is much broader than that defined by this conflict, and we gain much insight into the nature of the dispute by comprehending those larger frameworks.

First the Jewish side. To understand modern Jews and their attachment to Israel, one has to remember that the Jewish people have been around for 3,000 years and that for the majority of that time they have been ruled by foreign powers that have often persecuted them. In biblical times Jews were dominated by a series of empires, and their kingdom was destroyed twice. In the Middle Ages they lived in Christian lands and were frequently subjected to violence.

In Muslim countries, Jews were treated much better -- as a protected minority. But they were never equal to Muslims, and medieval Jewish literature often expresses feelings of humiliation because of Jews' lack of power in Muslim lands. And even there, Jews sometimes experienced violence.

The ultimate violence, of course, came in 20th-century Europe with the Holocaust. Jews created the state of Israel in the belief that they would finally be able to live in security and dignity. It is a project that has succeeded only in part. Certainly, Jews now have sovereignty in their ancient homeland, as well as a powerful army. But Israel is surrounded by tens of millions of Muslims, many of whom oppose its existence. One must keep in mind that there are only 14 million Jews in the world, and almost half of them live in Israel.