THK y i KSTtO\ OK PAI.F.ST1NK inferior) had intensified. In Zionism , the liberal West saw the triumph o f reason and idealism, and only that (because that is what liberalism wishes principally to see); in liberalism, Zionism saw itself as it wanted itself to be. In both cases, the A rab was eliminated, except as trouble, negation, "b a d '’ values. This is surely a unique instance o f ideology overriding simple economics. For to this day on purely econom ic grounds (and considering the vast amount o f aid given to Israel and Zionism ), Israel is a disaster, yet its triumph o f pioneering reason justifies more and more aid, more and more affirmation— with the grounds for affirmation shrinking gradu­ ally. Niebuhr and Edmund Wilson date from the forties and fifties, respectively. In the decade following the June [967 war, Israel’s borders expanded enormously; a large population of approxim ately one million Arabs was accum ulated as a result. No on e, least o f all Israelis, could dodge the problem of this new Palestinian actuality. The word “ A ra b ” no longer served to describe everyone who was not Jewish. There were the “ o ld ” A rabs in Israel, the new W est Bank-G aza set, the militant liberation fighters (later the P L O ), and the various communities scattered in Lebanon, Jordan, Syria, and the Arabian G ulf. For over ten years now, Israel has been in military occupation o f actual territories and people. It is true that the W est Bank is designated as “ Judea and Sam aria,” but the people there will not be so easily dissolved, at least not yet. T herefore the new obstacle for Zionism -libcralism is the problem o f the occupation. Israel will have it that military occupation really means “ living together,” a conccpt congenial enough to The New York Times on occasion as to warrant wholesale approval. On May 2, 1976, the paper’s lead editorial denounced “ A rab propagandists" for all sorts o f abominations (chief am ong them, attacking the occupation o f A rab territo­ ry), then— echoing the official Israeli line— proclaimed the military occupation o f the West Bank and G aza as “ a model for future cooperation" between Arabs and Jews in former Palestine. In no other context could such a statement be made. A military occupation was taken as representative o f good