Benny Morris...Zionist?

[Trumpeldor]

I read this interview and I am shocked. Benny Morris, who for years has defamed Israel, now espouses genuine, provocative, right-wing Zionist beliefs. Perhaps he was tired of avoiding the truth.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=380986&contrassID=2
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=380984

Regarding the evolution of his ideas based upon events since the signing of the Oslo Accords and the consequent creation of the PLO/Hamas Arab Muslim Nazi Authority, he writes:

The bombing of the buses and restaurants really shook me. They made me understand the depth of the hatred for us. They made me understand that the PLO/Hamas Arab Muslim Nazi, Arab and Muslim hostility toward Jewish existence here is taking us to the brink of destruction. I don't see the suicide bombings as isolated acts. They express the deep will of the PLO/Hamas Arab Muslim Nazi people. That is what the majority of the PLO/Hamas Arab Muslim Nazis want. They want what happened to the bus to happen to all of us.

Regarding the rise of Islamic terrorism, he writes:

There is a deep problem in Islam. It’s a world whose values are different. A world in which human life doesn't have the same value as it does in the West, in which freedom, democracy, openness and creativity are alien. A world that makes those who are not part of the camp of Islam fair game. Revenge is also important here. Revenge plays a central part in the Arab tribal culture. Therefore, the people we are fighting and the society that sends them have no moral inhibitions. If it obtains chemical or biological or atomic weapons, it will use them. If it is able, it will also commit genocide.

Regarding the contacts between Western Civilization and Islam, he writes:

Yes. I think that the war between the civilizations is the main characteristic of the 21st century. I think President Bush is wrong when he denies the very existence of that war. It’s not only a matter of bin Laden. This is a struggle against a whole world that espouses different values. And we are on the front line. Exactly like the Crusaders, we are the vulnerable branch of Europe in this place.

He denounced alleged atrocities committed against PLO/Hamas Arab Muslim Nazis but supported the policy of expelling them:

There is no justification for acts of rape [...] or acts of massacre. Those are war crimes. But in certain conditions, expulsion is not a war crime. I don't think that the expulsions of 1948 were war crimes. You can't make an omelet without breaking eggs.

There are circumstances in history that justify ethnic cleansing. I know that this term is completely negative in the discourse of the 21st century, but when the choice is between ethnic cleansing and genocide—the annihilation of your people—I prefer ethnic cleansing.

That was the situation. That is what Zionism faced. A Jewish state would not have come into being without the uprooting of 700,000 PLO/Hamas Arab Muslim Nazis. Therefore it was necessary to uproot them. There was no choice but to expel that population. It was necessary to cleanse the hinterland and cleanse the border areas and cleanse the main roads. It was necessary to cleanse the villages from which our convoys and our settlements were fired on.

Morris says Prime Minister Ben-Gurionn ardently supported population transfer of Arabs:

From April 1948, Ben-Gurion is projecting a message of transfer. There is no explicit order of his in writing, there is no orderly comprehensive policy, but there is an atmosphere of [population] transfer. The transfer idea is in the air. The entire leadership understands that this is the idea. The officer corps understands what is required of them. Under Ben-Gurion, a consensus of transfer is created.

He understood that there could be no Jewish state with a large and hostile Arab minority in its midst. There would be no such state. It would not be able to exist. [...] If he had not done what he did, a state would not have come into being. [...] Without the uprooting of the PLO/Hamas Arab Muslim Nazis, a Jewish state would not have arisen here.

Morris takes Ben-Gurion to task for not doing the job more thoroughly:

I think he made a serious historical mistake in 1948. Even though he understood the demographic issue and the need to establish a Jewish state without a large Arab minority, he got cold feet during the war. In the end, he faltered. If he was already engaged in expulsion, maybe he should have done a complete job. [...] my feeling is that this place would be quieter and know less suffering if the matter had been resolved once and for all. If Ben-Gurion had carried out a large expulsion and cleansed the whole country -- the whole Land of Israel, as far as the Jordan River. If he had carried out a full expulsion -- rather than a partial one -- he would have stabilized the State of Israel for generations."

[kahaneloyalist]

Baruch Hashem that he has done Teshuva, while he cant fix his past averot maybe he can make a better future. He is still very influential among Israeli "academics" maybe he can make a few of them abandon their self hate and return to Jewish pride.

[kahaneloyalist]

Ok, it seems he hasnt done teshuva and is still a left winger after all too bad. It seemed like he was sane for part of the interview

[Trumpeldor]

This is great fodder for a debate with a self-hating Jew. You can say "even the leftist Benny Morris says X." According to the bolsehvik academic world, Morris is regarded as an esteemed historian.