The 'nobody to talk to' thesis ...

by Yuli Tamir
Ha'aretz
October 22, 2003


One of the failures of holistic theories, says Karl Popper, is that they are impossible to refute since any argument against them can be changed to fit the desired world view. The more heated the debate around the Geneva understandings, the more it becomes clear that the assumption that `there's nobody to talk to' falls into that Popperian definition of a theory that cannot be disproved because it changes form according to need.

Setting out the various ways used to rebuff the argument there is someone to talk to, might help make clear the nature of the dead end that public discourse has reached. The following arguments come up every time there is hope that there is someone to talk to. The Palestinian ready to sit down and talk with Israelis about the future of the region - let's call him or her the "speaker" - is immediately ruled out through one of the following arguments or a combination of several of the following:

* The speaker is still alive. In the past, whoever spoke with Israelis about significant issues, for example Dr. Issam Sartawi, was murdered by Palestinians. The fact that the speaker is still not dead is proof of his utter inconsequence, so therefore whatever he says cannot be taken seriously; or he's not telling the truth, which is why he hasn't been killed.

<snip>

* Finally, the strongest argument of all is made by Ehud Barak, who says the Palestinians, like all the Arabs, "are the product of a culture in which to tell a lie does not cause them any dissonance,' so even if they talk and even if they sign, one should never believe them.

It should be noted that the invention and development of the "nobody to talk to" theory was a matter of political genius. Through it, the assumption that we are fated to fight the Palestinians forever will last for us, our children, and our children's children. It guarantees eternal Israeli deafness to new voices and messages coming out of the Palestinian camp unless those voices and messages are accompanied by the ricochets of gunshots or the reverberations of explosions. And most of all, it enables the Israeli public to continue grasping the "no alternative" theory in which we, of course, want an agreement, but there's no choice, because until some worthy interlocutor comes along, we don't have to make any decisions about our future, because there's nobody to talk to.

http://zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=22&ItemID=4377