How do Israelis view current developments in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict? The key term appears to be ignorance. Except for a few hundred peace activists Israelis have no idea of the realities of occupation: they have at best an extremely vague idea of what the checkpoints, the siege, the apartheid wall or the economic catastrophe in the territories look like. It is an institutionalised ignorance: it has been Israel's policy for at least 10 years to keep the Palestinians out of Israeli consciousness.
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The physical separation is complemented by the media. Israel's public television channel has not nominated a "territories reporter" for three years. Ha'aretz is the only Israeli newspaper which regularly gives good information about the occupied territories, but it is marginalised even within this small-circulation daily.
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The Israeli consciousness -- what Israelis know, what they don't know, what they think they know -- is shaped to a large extent by the army, which has successfully placed agents in key positions in government (prime minister, minister of defence and downwards), in various political parties, in the media, and elsewhere in Israel's power centres, with the Ministry of Finance (reporting directly to Washington and the IMF) as the single exception. Unlike Turkey, where the army's excessive involvement in politics is openly faced and perceived as a national problem, the fact that Israel is run for the most part by the army is totally denied, and the country is still represented at home and abroad as if it were a Western democracy.
Ran HaCohen Al-Ahram Weekly 7 - 13 August 2003
