Thirty Years Since the Death of the Prophet of Israel

A few words on Yeshayahu Leibowitz

When I was a student at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem in the early 1980s, I used to take the morning bus Route 4 to Mount Scopus, and, often, on that bus, there was a certain Orthodox philosopher, Professor Yeshayahu Leibowitz, who taught at the university. He would always carry the Yediot Aharonot newspaper, and I would look at him from the corner of my eye; the way he removed the Sports section, tucking it between his seat and the bus wall, and then intensely reading the news, anger visible on his wrinkled face.

Yeshayahu Leibowitz: The Prophet of Israel

Immediately after the 1967 Six-Day War, Leibowitz published an essay titled "The Territories," in which he predicted a hellish future for the Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and Gaza and for Israel too:

`The Arabs would be the working people and the Jews the administrators, inspectors, officials, and police—mainly secret police. A state ruling a hostile population of 1.5 to 2 million foreigners would necessarily become a secret police state, with all that this implies for education, free speech, and democratic institutions. The corruption characteristic of every colonial regime would also prevail in the State of Israel. The administration would suppress Arab insurgency on the one hand and acquire Arab Quislings on the other. There is also good reason to fear that the Israel Defence Forces, which has been until now a people's army, would, as a result of being transformed into an army of occupation, degenerate, and its commanders, who will have become military governors, resemble their colleagues in other nations.’

Sadly, he got it right.

Here’s an interview with Leibowitz. It is not of good quality, but you can read the subtitles.