Udi Adiv In Factis Pax 2 (2) (2008): 268-281 http://www.infactispax.org/journal/ 268 Volume 2 Number 2 (2008): 268-281 http://www.infactispax.org/journal/ Political Pedagogy Vs Coexistance Education: The Case of Israel\Palestine Udi Adiv It seems that there is a well-high harmony of opinion within the critical portion of the Israeli scholars, according to which peaceful coexistence is, indeed, the only enlightened educational solution for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. However, one cannot be sure that this harmony is not somewhat the harmony of spheres to the ears of mainstream Israelis. My claim is that a coexistent education is impuissance at best, or perpetuation of the Israeli situation at worst, as, in the end, it rather accepts, consciously or unconsciously, the fundamentals behind the hegemonic Zionist ideology. That is, the exclusivist unmediated Jewish patriotism, which taking apart the mainstream Israelis from the Palestinians, and subsequently put them at a distance/ A distance which is the real driving force and the quintessence of the conflict. On the contrary, political pedagogy really declares a war to the knife against the conventional Jewish patriotism. Hence, as things stand, it is not to bemuse anyone of sound mind that very little attention has been paid to the radical political perspective and to the political pedagogy in particular, within Israeli educational systems. This paper presents the Israeli education system as a case study for examining and suggesting political perspectives of education in what Erik Hobsbawm called “the age of the extreme”. I will consider the general implications of the radical political approach vs. the critical and coexistence education, discussing how and to what extent they both trying to challenge the Zionist ideological message of the educational system. By that, I hope to elaborate on the advantage of the political idea of republicanism regarding education in general and the Israeli education system in particular. In Factis Pax 2 (2) (2008): 268-281 http://www.infactispax.org/journal/ 269 The Israeli Education System Historical developments have created a unique and complicated situation in the country. Hence, the most dramatic events, the expulsion of 700,000 Palestinians during the 1948 War1 and the demolishing of more than 400 of their villages, have given rise to hostile relationships between the two nations.1 This is the core majority- minority relationship, which obviously comes into play in the educational system and spirit. Two societies with two different political and cultural orientations live in the same state. These are the Zionist-Israeli immigrant society, who speaks Hebrew, though this language is not necessarily their mother tongue, and the local Palestinian society, whose mother tongue is Arabic, though most of them also speak Hebrew. In the course of time, various populations with different mother tongues and backgrounds have joined the Israeli society. Thus, a set of complicated relationships exists between the two main societies in Israel – the immigrant and the indigenous of the Arabic speakers: these two societies live separately and together at the same time. There are separate cities, small towns and villages for each community. Only a few cities have both populations, and even those generally inhabit separate neighborhoods, and community life also includes separate schools. Nevertheless, although the two societies interface in some areas – at work, in public institutions (hospitals, government offices, football stadiums, universities, etc.), through cultural events or, in some cases, in political activities – the basic general status is one of segregation. The educational system in Israel is basically public, and schools are controlled by the Ministry of Education2. Under this control and supervision there are two separate systems - one for Arabic speakers and one for Hebrew speakers. There are very few private schools for Hebrew speakers. Those for Arabic speakers are usually established by the churches and attached to them. This means that Palestinian citizens of Israel and the Israeli pupils are educated in separate schools, each with its own particular culture, religion and linguistic heritage. A few Arabic- speaking families choose to send their children into Hebrew schools (this appears to be on the increase), but the reverse is unheard of. However, there is no official record of numbers in respect of this phenomenon.2 There is also a variety of streams and divisions within each main sector. The Israeli (Hebrew) sector’s main division is of secular (state) and religious streams, while the religious schools are also divided into orthodox and state-religious. As concerns the Palestinian schools – their situation is one of divide et impera: Druze and Bedouin are separated from the general Arab sector. Additionally, for many years Arab teachers and educators were questioned by the security services in Israel about their political attitudes and activities before receiving permission to teach in the state system. Obviously, the separation also applies to teachers, parents and regular staff in schools, and impinges on the courses in teacher-training colleges. Education in Israel cannot be defined only by its degree of adherence to purely Jewish nationalism. There is, for example, a network of “democratic schools” across the country. To date, there are about thirty schools of this kind, two of which are Arabic L1 (first language). Although these schools claim their educational innovativeness from a democratic point of view and as respecting people on the basis of the universal 1 (Svirsky et al. 2007) 2 (Mor-Sommerfeld et al. 2007) In Factis Pax 2 (2) (2008): 268-281 http://www.infactispax.org/journal/ 270 Declaration of Human Rights, they work and act within the current system that separates Hebrew and Arabic speakers. The concept of segregation according to identities dominates education. Borders are, however, sometimes crossed, so that this division is not absolutely rigid. The school curricula: the ideology of Zionism Educational policies and curricula in Israel are derived from the Zionist origins of the State of Israel, and this is true for all sectors. Hence, Israeli school curricula identify Zionism and the State of Israel as the “telos” of the Jewish history. That is to say, Israeli history is read “teleological”, i.e., is read as a linear process, instead of being read bottom up, as an historical process that could be interpreted differently. The relevance and importance of this issue lie mainly in the context of mainstream Israeli education, according to which it was the Jewish people who single-mindedly determined the Zionist history and consequently established the State of Israel. A short survey of the Israeli historiographical and educational books, reveals that they claimed for Zionism what Hobsbawm (1989) calls “the status of a nation a priori”, or what Smith (1991) defines as “a community of common descent”. The State of Israel was thus classified as a spontaneous revival of the ancient people, by itself and for itself, independently of the social and political conditions of the first half of the 20th Century. Consequently, Israel is represented as a national revival deriving from East European Jewish conditions at the turn of the century. To use Max Weber’s typology, the establishment of the State of Israel is mainly defined there as a “value-rationale action”, i.e. is motivated by conviction of an absolute end “regardless of possible cost” (Weber, 1995). Accordingly, the Israeli settlers were portrayed as Halutzim (pioneers) precisely because they acted on their Jewish national convictions regardless of possible cost to themselves and, what is worst, to others. One of the earliest textbooks to put forward the Zionist ideological perspective was Toldot Hatzionut: Tnuat Hatekhiya Vehageula Beisrael (History of Zionism – the Movement of Revival and Redemption in Israel) published in 1940. The author, Baruch Ben-Yehuda, was a prominent figure in the Zionist educational system. In 1947-8, he headed the educational department of the Va’ad Leumi (the National Council) and later became the first director of the Ministry of Education and Culture. In fact, Ben-Yehuda, both as scholar and as a political activist, played a major role in what Hobsbawm (1989) and Gellner (1983) called “the invention” of Jewish nationalism, i.e., the Jewish nationalist doctrine of the State. He was among those who created the nationalist ideology as a writer, and practiced and disseminated this ideological invention as a pedagogue, headmaster and director of the Zionist-Israeli education system. As such, his study represents the nationalist-ideological orientation of the Israeli education system, shaping the Jewish nationalist viewpoint of further generations of Israeli scholars. Other examples are David Vital’s The Origins of Zionism (1975), and Zionism, The Formative Years (1982). Vital’s studies epitomize the “value-rationale” paradigm of the Israeli historiographical textbooks according to which Zionism is the fulfillment of the Jewish past. His first chapter is “Exile, Return and Redemption”. Zionism is perceived by Vital in terms of Jewish Messianism, the return of the Jews after years of exile, and their consequent redemption. He traces the origin of Zionism in Jewish history rather in the historical context of the Zionist movement itself. “The history of the Jewish People”, he argues in his preface, “is long and complex and does not lend itself to discussion in the terms in which the histories of other nations, however In Factis Pax 2 (2) (2008): 268-281 http://www.infactispax.org/journal/ 271 ancient, are, by conviction, conceived”. Vital obviously considers only the Jewish past, and consequently overlooks the autonomous involvement of the Zionist movement itself. In other words, Israeli history is glorified in the Israeli education system as the national revival of East European Jewry. Thus, its subject matter is the Jewish origins of Israel, rather than Israel\Palestine as a modern political society. Yet the difficulty with the presentation of these books is the modern invention of Israel as a metaphysical teleology of Jewish history. Zionism’s concern was to reconstruct the semi-feudal decentralized Ottoman province of Palestine, and transform it into a modern centralized nation-state. The historical past, inasmuch as it determines the present, is simultaneously determined by it. Hence, as a political phenomenon, Israel is inevitably the Jewish historical past articulated and re- articulated in terms of the historical context of Ottoman and Mandate Palestine in the first half of the 20th century. Post factum it is evident that, in reality, the Zionist settlers’ attitude could be better defined in terms of “rational expedient”, i.e. a type of action which corresponds rather more to a modern capitalist society than to the old- new Jewish community. The categorical falsity lies here, in trying to explain Israeli society in terms of Jewish ethnic identity and Biblical historical past. However, from a rather more critical point of view it is quite clear that it was the Zionist hardliner militaristic leadership that prevailed in the unique historical circumstances of the Second World War, the power struggle against the forces of the Palestinian national movement, as well as against the other more enlightened and moderate Zionist currents. Israeli history should thus be read politically, i.e., in the context of what Gramsci (1991) called “the unity of the historical process”, rather than ideologically, in terms of the dominant Jewish national discourse Indeed, the founders of Zionism were inspired by the notion of a Jewish nationalism. But, Jewish national identity, “like everything which is historical” should inevitably be interpreted and reinterpreted objectively, i.e., in terms of its realization in Mandat Palestine, rather than by its initial subjective idea. Following 1967 War, there has been an on-going attempt by the mainstream writers to revive and reconstruct the old Zionist ethos, and simultaneously, an attempt by the critical writers to undermine that ethos. That is to say, a critical attempt to redefine the Israeli identity as it became after 1967 vis-à-vis the Palestinians. Thus, the 1967 War aroused an internal dispute that has ever since divided the Israeli intelligentsia. Mainstream still defines the State of Israel in the spiritual terms of Jewish historical past while the critics see it the other way round, i.e., they explain Israeli identity in the light of the new military occupation that was created by the 1967 War. Critical approaches to the Israeli education Since the early 1980s, critical approaches – humanist pedagogy, critical or resistant pedagogy and multiculturalism – to education in Israel have been discussed by researchers and educators.3 Let us examine these approaches. Aloni (1997) tries to suggest the humanist idea, as a trans-historical setting as well as a transcendental telos and\or an utopian scope for the Israeli education. Such a normative high standard seems to be a critical perspective, indeed. Quite certainly 3 (e.g., Aloni 1997; Gur-Ze’ev 1999 Yona 1998 and others) In Factis Pax 2 (2) (2008): 268-281 http://www.infactispax.org/journal/ 272 vis-à-vis the positivist utilitarian realization of Neo-liberalism as well as against the subjective unmediated self-love of Multiculturalism. However, in one way or another, Aloni fails to notice that his criticism should also and mainly applies to the hegemonic idea of Zionism as another type of the unmediated appearance of patriotism. Instead, he mainly argues against the absence of the love of wisdom, and subsequently, the unmediated particularism of the post-modernist school. Moreover, Aloni pays tribute to all the humanist philosophers since Plato and Aristotle. Yet, he overlooks the main difficulty of the philosophers since the days of Socrates, vis-à-vis the real world. Likewise, his humanist idea is not reflective enough and is presented in too general and quite naïvely. However, the main problem has remained – after more than 60 years in which Israel is still in a constant state of war and conflict- as Plato once asked, who would educate the people? Certainly, one cannot humanize and enlighten Israeli society single handedly. It seems that instead of describing the humanistic perspective as the “must” and “ought” of the Israeli education or its telos, the best thing would be to analyze and to explain the “is” of the Israeli political circumstances, that is, the circumstances which determine the education and prevent it to realize the humanist ideal. The “resistant pedagogy” or critical pedagogy is advanced as a kind of radical critique of the current state of the Israeli affairs. Following Adorno (1970), Gur-Ze’ev (1997) criticizes Israel’s political practice from a theoretical standpoint. That is to say, he views the very existence of education as the manifestation of the primacy of theory over politics, and consequently as a negation of the existing Israeli circumstances. However, we have to remember that Adorno’s Negative Dialectics (1990), which propose criticism for the sake of criticism, as an end in itself, led Socrates to an inevitable tragic end precisely because politics, and especially republican politics, does matter. Yona proposes Multi-culturalism to challenge the hegemony of the Zionist ideology with the cultural identity of the Orient (Yona 1998). Alony and Gur Ze’ev at least try to play the Socratic role by using the philosophic elenchus to put the kibosh on the unmediated patriotism and the simple, false-happiness of the Israeli people. Yona, on the contrary, not so much engaged in the philosopher role. Instead, following Said and Gayatri Spivak, he simply calls upon the Oriental Jews to represent themselves, quite in accord with Spivak (1988) who asks, “Can the subaltern speak?” Similarly, in his Orientalism, or with Edward Said (1978) that criticizes Marx for disregarding the “subalterns’” ability to represent themselves. The main difficulty with this approach lies in the absence of the philosophical dimension as a normative standard by which one would be able also to value what the “ subaltern speak?”. Hence, in spite of some radical tones, Yona just replacing the hegemonic Jewish patriotism with Jewish Orientalism, as just another type of Jewish cultural patriotism. It is quite simplistic distinction which is presented as the arbitrariness of the state ideology from above and the authentic unmediated Jewish oriental identity from below3. The Coexistence Education For quite a number of years, and especially since Oslo agreement in 1993, a lot of common activities and gathering between Israeli and Palestinian youth, citizens of the In Factis Pax 2 (2) (2008): 268-281 http://www.infactispax.org/journal/ 273 State of Israel, have been taking place4. One could say, quite certainly, that these meetings and common activities have reflected the political developments during that period. Apparently, they were an attempt to reconstruct and to carry out the political message of peace in the field of education in order to create a model of coexistence between the two people. Simultaneously with the educational activities has been developed and expanded the theoretical research in the field of peace education.(Smooha, 2004; White Stephan, Hertz-Lazarowitz, Zelinker and G. Stephan, 2004; Bar-Tal, 2004 ; Salomon, 2004 ;Halabi and Sonneschein 2004). According to these researchers and scholars, the root of the conflict is the very existence of two different national groups, namely, the Jewish and the Arab peoples, which assemble and sit on the same piece of land. Subsequently, in the light of this assumption, they try to suggest their model of coexistence that will help the two peoples to live together to the degree of optimal harmony and peace. Sammy Smooha of Haifa University seems to be the main scholar who has reconstructed and recommended the sociological background for the idea of coexistence education. The starting point and the basic assumption of all his many articles and books is the definition of Israel as a state with a predominant “Jewish majority” and a small intransigent “Arab minority”. The problem, as he sees it, is that “the Arabs and the Jews demanded almost exclusive rights over the same strip of land5.” However, the solution he suggests is what he calls “ethnic democracy”. That is to say, Israel is still defined by him as a democratic state which takes account of “the status of the Arab Minority in Israel”6 and subsequently guaranty the peaceful coexistence between the two people. The main difficulty with Smooha’s “solution” is that it simply reiterates the official definition of Israel as a “Jewish state”. That is, the very national definition which, in actual fact and ipso facto, just instigated the conflict and continue to sustain it ever since. More over, theoretically speaking, Smooha’s definition is an obvious case of a particular unmediated type of “speech action” rather than what Habermas calls “a communicative action”, that is, an autonomous mediated type of action by means of which one could communicate the Palestinians and consequently solve the conflict in moral universal terms. To put it differently, Smooha starts from his particular Zionist definition of the state. Yet, he does not seem to notice that the main thing is to test his definition vis-à-vis the Palestinians, rather than only to declare it in and for itself. Smooha, certainly fails to provide evidence for his definition by means of “a communicative action”, and subsequently, as a positivist sociologist, he validates it by empirical facts. Smooha, again does seem to be familiar with what Edward H Carr said about the historical facts, that “it is he (the historian) who decide to which facts to give the floor and in what order and context.7” Quite obviously, Smooha gives the floor to the dominant facts, rather than to the critical and the latent ones. Besides, what is exactly a socio-political fact. Quite certainly not only what Smooha hears ,impromptu from his 500 intervieweds about their identity. 4 Until 2002 about 300 such program existed and over 150,000 were engaged in structured coexistence activities within Israel. (Abraham Fund, 2002). 5 Sami Smooha, Inddex of Arab-Jewish Relations in Israel 2004 (Haifa: Unuiversity of Haifa, 2005), P. 11. 6 Smooha Sami, "Minority Status in an Ethnic Democracy: The Status of the Arab Minority in Israel", Ethnic and Racial studies, 13,3 (July), 1990,pp. 389-413. 7 E.H Carr, What is History (New York: Vintage Books, 1961),pp. 9. In Factis Pax 2 (2) (2008): 268-281 http://www.infactispax.org/journal/ 274 In the light of Smooha’s definition, White Stephan, Hertz-Lazarowitz, Zelinker and G. Stephan, also starts with “a brief history” of the conflict, i.e., with the historical facts, rather than with a reflective analysis of their own Zionist ideological discourse. Thus, in their terms of reference, they describe 48 War as “the first open military clash between the two national movements, Zionism and Arab nationalism8.” In another place, with regards the origin of the Palestinian refugees, they propose that “many Arabs were forced to or chose to leave their home and land9.” As to the very definition of the Palestinian people in Israel, “we label the Israeli Arabs to distinguish it from the other Palestinian people in the region [as] partners with the Israeli Jews in Arab-Jewish coexistence efforts.” Needless to say that none of the above is purely historical facts that could be a common point of reference, or an introduction to a genuine coexistence between the Israelis and the Palestinians. Quite the opposite, it is rather more a brief illustration of the unmediated Israeli hegemonic discourse, which is the main root and the quintessence of conflict as it is. Certainly, the writers can not transcend the conflict in terms of reference of the dominant Israeli side. Daniel Bar-Tal of Tel Aviv University is another well-known scholar who strongly maintains for coexistence education. He begins with the definition of the concept of coexistence as a theoretical model as well as an educational tool, as a gradual way out of the conflict. According to his definition coexistence requires mainly “a recognition in the full equality of the other groups.” Yet, he admits, that after a long history of bloodshed, exploitation and discrimination coexistence is only the necessary condition and an important phase in a long continuous process towards a real reconciliation between the conflicting groups. In consequence of his theoretical model of coexistence he comes back to the reality of Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Thus, he points out that at the peak of the conflict “neither the Israeli Jews nor the Palestinians recognized the other’s self determination10.” It is therefore the challenge of the education for coexistence to raise the society members of both groups to the higher phases, “that are in line with the ideas of coexistence.” It is quite clear that Bar-Tal, too, still views the conflict in accordance with the Israeli mainstream, mainly because he seems to be so familiar with the Zionist discourse about two essentially different national groups which happened to live on this land. For this reason, his “ideas of coexistence” do not seem to be so relevant to the reality of the conflict, and therefore they are by no means historical, since eventually he does not tell us how and in which way these two antagonistic national groups could rise above their historical and geographical enmity without relinquish and underestimate their very existence as essentially different national groups who live one on the land of the other11. In addition, he does not seem to notice that in the beginning of all history there was a conflict and that coexistence 8Stephan C. W, Hertz-Lazarowitz R, Zelinker T, Stephan W. G, "Introduction to Improving Arab- Jewish Relations in Israel: Theory and Practice in Coexistamce Educational Programs", Journal of Social Issue, Vol. 60, No. 2, 2004, p. 239. 9 Ibid. 10 D. Bar-Tal, "Nature, Rational, and Effectiveness of Education for Coexistance",Journal of Social Issue, Vol. 60, No. 2, 2004, p. 259. 11 In the autumn of 1997 I guided two reporters of the BBC who prepared then a program about Israel\Palestine towards the 50th anniversary of the State of Israel . At the time of the Independent Day, in April 1998, the program was broadcasted and was entitled "Your Land is My Land." In Factis Pax 2 (2) (2008): 268-281 http://www.infactispax.org/journal/ 275 and reconciliation came always at the end of day. Likewise, the celebrated Hegelian- Marxist scholar Alexander Kojev explains that “in his nascent state, man is never simply man. He is always, necessarily, and essentially, either master or slave.” Hence, historically, it is only by the dialectic of master and slave, that man could, by means of synthesis, to transcend his initial particular position as either master or slave and became “a self-conscious man who recognizes another man and is recognized by him12.” The difficulty with Bar-Tal’s model of coexistence lies as well in its theoretical and a- historical character, in the sense that he completely overlooks the modernist context of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. That is to say, the root of the conflict is not simply, as Bar-Tal put, the domination of one nation over the other national group. All together it should be viewed in the historical context of modern European colonialism. As R. Inden put: it: To became modern is to be emancipated from the constraints, inhibitions, whims, exploitation and oppressions of the mediaeval or traditionalism[..] The problem with so-called Third World countries is that they have not yet attained the permanent and absolute transcendence possessed by the “advanced” nations13. To paraphrase R. Inden, the fundamental problem of the Palestinian people at the time was that it had not yet attained that modern transcendence possessed by the Zionist settlers. Subsequently, as for today, the Palestinians should fully attain that level of modern transcendence by political means, as a sine qua non for any real coexistence and reconciliation with the Israelies. Gavriel Salomon, the head of the Center for Peace Education, Haifa University is another advocate of coexistence education. In an article entitled “A Narrative-Based View of Coexistence Education” he put forward the concept of “collective narrative” as the major explanatory category as well as the main driving force of the conflict. However, concurrently, he argues that as such it “can play an equally central role in facilitating coexistence14.” In the beginning he did mention also what he calls “the sociopolitical aspect”, that is, the real historical causes of the conflict, such as land, independence and military might. Yet, on the whole he relates mainly to the “Sociopsychological aspect”, that is, to the subjective ideological motives of the conflict. Thus, he seems to argue that the conflict is primarily a matter of the way the two peoples think and envisage each other. Accordingly, the solution is impromptu, a self amendment of the two respected collective identities and the ensuing sublimation of their attitude towards each other. The main difficulty with the concept of “collective narrative” is precisely the attempt to define it separately from the “sociopolitical aspect” of the conflict. As if a collective could amend its thoughts and feelings as well as sublimate its attitude, only by and for itself, independently of its “sociopolitical aspects.” In one of his early writings, young Marx criticized the rightwing Hegelians for quite the same kind of idealistic argument. He wrote: 12 Alexander Kojeve, Introduction to the Reading of Hegel (Ithaca: Cornel University Press), p. 8. 13 R.Enden, "Identity and Transcendence in Mediaeval India and the Modern and Postmodern World", A draft apaper sumitted by the auther in a conference on Identity, Modernity and Politics at the Department of Political Studies, SOAS, September 1994, p. 37. 14 Salmon Gavriel, "A Narrative-Based view of Coexistance education", Journal of Social Issue, Vol. 60, No. 2, 2004, p.274. In Factis Pax 2 (2) (2008): 268-281 http://www.infactispax.org/journal/ 276 Once upon a time a valiant fellow had the idea that men were drowned in water only because they were possessed with the idea of gravity. If they were to get this notion out of their heads, say by avowing it to be a superstitious, a religious concept, they would sublimely proof against any danger from the water.15 However, one should not be a Marxist in order to recognize the difficulty that lies in Salomon’s attempt to give “the collective narrative” a-priority over the political attitude of the collective itself. The solution is rather to set the two aspects dialectically together, as two element of a single political whole16. Halabi and Zonnenschein seem to be well aware that their intergroup encounters in Neve shalom\Wahat al-Salam cannot change the reality of the conflict. Nevertheless they still argue “that the intergroup encounters can change the participants’ awareness of the reality in which they live17.” Yet, I wonder what is, after all, the advantage of awareness if it does not allow people to change the reality which they live in? Halabi and Zonnenschein seem to overlook Marx’s well known phrase written on his tombstone, in which he criticized the philosophers who tried only to understand the world, but not to change it. Moreover, the very idea of coexistence education relates, in one way or aother to the mainstream American theories about conflicts management and conflicts resolution (Dahl,1956;Schelling, 1967; Lijphart, 1977). The underline assumption of these, mainly American, theories is taken from the Hobbsian philosophy, according to which there are, as a natural given, only individuals and particular groups, who try hard to improve their fortune. However, Hobbes himself simultaneously suggested a way out of this wolfish world. Hence, in his Leviathan State low and order are prevail and the people live in peace. On the contrary, according to the mainstream American political scientists people are destined to live in a wolfish world. That’s why the role of the scholars is mainly to provide the people with the rational ways how to manage and to do better in this world, rather than to teach them how to transcend it18. Quite the opposite, I mean to suggest a genuine solution to the Israeli- 15 Karl Marx, The German Ideology (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1976) p.30. 16 Salomon seems to overlook the whole discussion about the origin of the modern "collective narrative" which relate to what Gustave Le Bon call the "psychology of the mass". As an educator he should, at last mention, the well known interpretation of Freud in which he highlight the role of the leader as he stimulates the Libidinal impulse of the mass. If this is the case, that collective attitude is determined by a libidinal impulse, how on earth it could be amended and transformed? Beside, it seems that "collective narrative" is not that simple as it has been literally presented. It is rather more the power elite who introduced its authority over the mass by means of the narrative. Another quotation could illustrate my point: "The vested interests - if we explain the situation by their influence - can only get the public to act as they wish by manipulating public opinion, by playing either upon the public's indifference, confusions, prejudices, pugnacities or fears. And the only way in which the power of the interests can be undermined and their maneuvers defeated is by bringing home to the public the danger of its indifference, the absurdity of its prejudices, or the hollowness of its fears; by showing that it is indifferent to danger where real danger exists; frightened by dangers which are nonexistent." Sir Norman Angell 1872 - 1967 17 Halabi. Rabah and Sonnenschein Nava, "The Jewish-Palestinian Encounter in a Time of Crisis, Journal of Social Issue, Vol. 60, No. 2, 2004' p. 374. 18 Shlomo Avinery, perhaps the most well known spokesman of the mainstream Israeli political science, argues, in a spur of moment, that the transformation of the paradigm from "conflict In Factis Pax 2 (2) (2008): 268-281 http://www.infactispax.org/journal/ 277 Palestinian conflict. A solution which will transcend the two separate ethnic nationalisms and will put them politically together on the higher level, in a political state as a realization of the “idea of good”. Coexistence education is certainly an expression of good will. Even so, as Kojeve teaches us, at the beginning, at least in its origin, man is either Master or Slave. As such, the fundamental question is still how and who will educate man to be in line with this level of initial good will? Or, as Marx put it, in his well known thesis, “who will educate the educators?” Political Pedagogy A person is a political animal, and the Polis, the modern state, is the realm in which s/he can express her/his potential as a self conscious being. Historically, it was by means of popular culture and religious belief that people raised themselves to higher levels. It was by the religious medium, as Plato explains us in the Protagoras, that people were able to transcend their Hobbesian individuality and to find some self-satisfaction within the political world. However, religion became, in the course of time, but a “false consciousness” to what Hegel calls “unhappy consciousness”, i.e., a lack of recognition and ipso-facto of objectification”, under the Leviathan state. As Tacitus summarized it, “slavery brings always slavishness” and “civil religion” (in some of its manifestations) is but the manifestation of slavishness. Today, like then, people appears to be subjectively free; now, it is culture in and for itself that takes the place of religion. Now, the illusive “freedom” is not of the “I” against the state, via the all-importance of God; now, it is rather the imaginary “freedom” of the “I” against the state, via the all-importance of culture. These words of the great commentator of Hegel are applicable to the critical, cultural option of nowadays as well: in the past, people were still only conscious “in-themselves”, precisely because individuals were only subjectively and spiritually “free” and consequently were not recognized as such (Hippolyte, 1971). In opposition to the cultural and religious subjectivism of the past and the present, I consider the old-new idea of republicanism, by means of which people could transcend their subjective unmediated “self love” by the conscious political realization. The modern nation-state, or, as Gellner (1983) called it, “the marriage of politics and culture”, is simultaneously, philosophically speaking, the historical unity of subject and object. To rephrase Hegel, politics is the real incorporation of being with thought, the finite with the infinite. Towards a political approach in education in Israel This paper presents the Israeli education system as a case study for examining and suggesting the political republican perspective, rather than Zionist ideology, as the single alternative way, to transcend the oppressive hegemony of Neo-liberalism and globalization.. Education, as I see it, can be the medium by which republican resolution" to "conflict management" does not mean necessarily approval of the status quo. It rather means a continuation of the effort to minimize the conflict between the two sides ( Ha'aretz, 8\7\08). In Factis Pax 2 (2) (2008): 268-281 http://www.infactispax.org/journal/ 278 orientation can and should happen; and for Israel, this transformation is most urgent and crucial. Evidently, what is lacking in Israeli education, and in the world at large, is that republican political perspective as the realization of the “idea of good”. Thus, the Jewish-Arab dichotomy, as the dominant discourse in Israeli education, is indeed specific and divisive as compared to MacDonald’s and Toyota. However, only an Israeli\Palestinian republicanism could be a unifying and a progressive force against the antagonisms of Jewish and Arab patriotism on the one hand, and the hegemonic power of American globalization on the other. Thus, political education means constant efforts to rear our children in the rational critical spirit, manifesting itself in the republican political perspective. Indeed, historically and conceptually, it is only the social-states in the second half of the 20th century that succeed in controlling the capitalist system and to set it in harmony with a moral-political perspective. As Hebermas (1991) put it, against the “instrumental” and “strategic” action which characterized the capitalist globalization, these states represent a communicative rationality action that is aimed at mutual understanding, conceived as a process of reaching agreement between speaking subjects to harmonize their interpretations of the world4. Likewise, coexistence education is not a synthesis, but consists rather of thesis and antithesis which negate and oppose each other as either-or, but not as an Aufhebung. As such, it is not a critical, but a conservative theory, precisely because of the absence of any truly universal political perspective by means of which the two side could bring themselves together. In Israel, the task is to create a Palestinian\Israeli patriotism for which the state embodies “communicative action”, a realization of the “idea of good”, a patriotism that replaces both American globalization and the particularism of Jew versus Arab nationalism. A “no” to segregation in education could be a first step towards this goal. In Factis Pax 2 (2) (2008): 268-281 http://www.infactispax.org/journal/ 279 Bibliography Benedict Anderson, Immagined Communities, (London: Verso, 1991) Udi Adiv, "The challenge of globalization for the left: Marxism, post- colonialism or republican nationalism", Discourse of Sociological Practice, 7, no, 1/2 (2005). Theodor Adorno, Negative Dialectics (London: Roputledge, 1973 ). Homi K. Bhabha, Location of Culture: Discussing Post-colonial Culture (London: Routledge, 1996). Ake Clod, "Dangerous Liaisons: The Interface of Globalization and Democracy" In Hadenius, A. (Ed.). Democracy's Victory and Crisis ( Cambridge University Press, 1997). Gavriel Almond, "Comparative Political Systems," Journal of Politics, xviii, 3 (1956). Bar-Tal Daniel, "Nature, Rational and Effectiveness of Education for Coexistence, Journal of Social Issue, Vol. 60, No. 2 (2005). Benjamin Barber, Jihad vs. MacWorld: How Globalism and Tribalism are Shaping the World (New York: Times Book, 1995). Edward. H Carr, What is History? (New York: Vintage Books, 1961). Robert A. Dahl, "Development and Democratic culture" in L. Diamond et.al,.(Eds) Consolidating the Third Wave Democracies (The John Hopkins University Press, 1997). Helena S.Desivilya, "Promoting Coexistance by Means of Conflict Education: The MACBE Model", Journal of Social Issue, Vol. 60, No. 2 (2004). Enden R, "Identity and Transcendence in Mediaeval India and the Modern and Postmodern World", A draft paper submitted by the author in a conference on Identity, Modernity and Politics at the Department of Political Studies, SOAS, September 1994. Frantz Fanon, Wretched of the Earth. New York: Grove Press, 1968). Michel Foucault, The Archeology of Knowledge (New York: Pantheon Books, 1972). Thomas Freidman., The Lexus and the Olive Tree.( Port Moody, Canada: Anchor Publishing, LTD, 1998). Paolo Freire Pedagogy of the Oppressed (New-York: Seabury Press, 1970/1990). Ernest Gellner, Nations and Nationalism (Oxford: Blackwell, 1983). Shafir Gershon, Land, Labor and the Origins of the Israeli Palestinian Conflict (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989). Hans H. Gerth & C. Wright Mills (Eds.) From Max Weber (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1974). Antonio Gramsci, Prison Notbook (New York:: Columbia University Press, 1991). In Factis Pax 2 (2) (2008): 268-281 http://www.infactispax.org/journal/ 280 -------------------- Selections from the Prison Notebooks (London: Lawrence and Wishart, 1991). Jurgen Habermas, Communication and the Evolution of Society (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1991). Stuart Hall, The Hard Road to Renewal (London: Verso, 1988). Eric Hobsbawm. Nation and Nationalism since 1789 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989). Jan Hippolyte, Figures de la pensee philosophique.. Quadrige: Presses Universitaires de France, Tome 1 (1971). ----------------------, "Identity Politics and the Left", New Left Review, (1996). Hans Kohn Prelud to Nation States:The French and German Experience, 1789-1815 , (Princton: Van Nostrad Company, INC, 1967) Alexander Kojev, Introduction to the Reading of Hegel, (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1967). Arend Lipjhart, Democracy in Plural societies (New Haven: CT, 1977). Karl Marx, The German Ideology (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1976). Ralph Miliband, “Debates on the State”, New Left Review 138, (1983). Mor-Sommerfeld, Aura, Azaiza Faisal, and Hertz-Lazarowitz Rachel, "Into the future – towards bilingual education in Israel – manifesto", Education, Citizenship, Society Journal. Vol 2(1) 5–22 (2007). Plato, The Republic (New York: Mineola, 2000). Rabah Halabi and Nava Sonnenschein, "The Jewish-Palestinian Encounter in a Time of Crisis, Journal of Social Issue, Vol. 60, No. 2 (2005). Richard Rose, Northeren Irland: A Time of Choice.(London:Press Ltd, 1976). Edward Said,. Orientalism (New York: Vintage Book, 1978). Salomon Gavriel, "A Narrative-Based view of Coexistance education", Journal of Social Issue, Vol. 60, No. 2 (2005).. Sami Smooha, “Class , Ethnic and National Cleavage and Democracy in Israel”, In L, Diamond and Shprinzak, E (Ed.) Israel Democracy Under Stress, (Boulder: Lynne Rinner Publishers, 1993). -----------------. Israel: Pluralism and Conflict (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978). Schelling T.C "What is Game Theory?" in J C. Charlesworth (Ed.)(1967) Contemporary Political Analysis (New York: Free Press). Anthony A. Smith, National Identity (London: Penguin Books, 1991). Spivak, C. Giatri, Can the Subaltern Speak? In Nelson, C. and Grossberg, L. (Eds). Marxism and the interpretation of Culture (Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1988). Stephan C. W, Hertz-Lazarowitz Rachel, Zelinker T and Stephan G, "Introduction to Improving Arab-Jewish Relations in Israel: Theory and Practice in Coexistence Educational Programs, Journal of Social Issue, Vol. 60, No. 2 (2005). In Factis Pax 2 (2) (2008): 268-281 http://www.infactispax.org/journal/ 281 Svirsky Marselo, Mor-Sommerfeld Aura, Azaiza Faisal, Hertz-Lazarowitz Rachel. Bilingual education and practical interculturalism in Israel. The Discourse of Sociological Practice, 8 (1) (2007). Taylor Charles, "The Dynamics of Democratic Exclusion", The Journal of Democracy, Vol.9, No. 4 (1998). Uri Ram,.The Changing Agenda of Israel Society (New York: State University of New York Press, 1995). David Vital, Zionism, The Formative Years (Oxford: Clarendon, 1982). David Vital, The Origins of Zionism ( Oxford: Clarendon, 1975). Yiftachel. Oren, “Ethnocracy: The Politics of Judaizing Israel/Palestine”, Constelations, Vol. 6, No. 3 (1999). Bekerman Zvi, Complex Contexts and Ideologies: bilingual education in conflict- ridden areas. Journal of Language, Identity & Education, 4 (1), 2005. ------------------- , "Potential and limitations of multicultural education in conflict- ridden areas: bilingual Palestinian-Jewish schools in Israel". Teachers College Record, 106, 3, (2004).