The following is a transcript of Episode 92 of the For Heaven’s Sake Podcast. Note: This is a lightly edited transcript of a conversation, please excuse any errors.

Donniel: Hi, this is Donniel Hartman and Yossi Klein Halevi from the Shalom Hartman Institute. This is the Hartman Institute’s podcast For Heaven’s Sake. Our special edition, Israel at War, and this is day 33. And our theme for today, is the day after. 

I know personally, I couldn’t have even dealt with this theme a week ago. It seems like a lifetime ago that our theme was the sword of Damocles. There still is a sword of Damocles, but at least I don’t want to give us an ayin harah, because I do believe in ayin harah. I was trained that there is superstition, but that ayin harah is not a superstition and evil eye. The sword of Damocles is still there, but it sits on the necks of literally millions of people in Gaza.

And for the last few days, there’s been some breathing. We’re looking at least some measure of success of our army. There’s some measure of calm, a little calmer. And we feel that it’s time not to rest, that the issue we have to talk about, and by the way, not just us, Yossi, the world is already talking about the day after. The President of the United States, all of our allies, Netanyahu, is being interviewed.

And the day after is the day after we destroy Hamas, or the day after we declare that some measure of our objectives were reached. And people are starting to ask, and we need to ask, it’s one thing to enter into a just war, it’s another one to ask, what are your plans? There’s a war of self-defense, but that doesn’t necessarily allow for all consequences. 

So, Yossi, first, let’s just talk about, what do we even understand, the question of the day after, to be before we talk about what it, what it should be? When someone says the day after, how does the chutzpah of even raising the question meet you, and what do you understand the question to mean?

Yossi: It’s a great question about the question. You know, for me, emotionally, it’s still October 7th. That’s the truth. I haven’t moved past October 7th, but I appreciate not just the legitimacy of raising the question. The urgency. First of all, because, as you say, the international community is raising the question and, and more than that, we need to have some idea of what the day after is. What does the morning after look like? 

But I have to tell you, Donniel, and I know that when that question is raised, it’s raised about Gaza. That’s the morning after. My sense is that the Gaza question is the morning after the morning after. That what will happen in Israeli society on literally the morning after is the reservists will come home and go straight to Netanyahu’s office. And in order for something to happen in Gaza, in order for there to be some kind of a positive direction, it can’t be done with this government. 

This is a far-right government, and there are people in this government whose intention is to resettle Gaza. They’re saying it openly now. So for me, the morning after is really about 2 things: Controlling the lunatics of the far right, and beginning the process of replacing the government.

And I had to say that. I had to put that on the table, before I can really address the question that I know you’re asking. 

Donniel: See, because Yossi, I love you, but it aggravated me. I appreciate it. I’m sitting here and I’m listening, but I appreciate because each one of us has a different day after. For me, your day after is the day after, after, after. But I appreciate it. We don’t have to be the same. This is just fine. Could you go to the other question?

Yossi: Yeah. Yeah. Look, the truth is that in all likelihood, it’s all going to happen simultaneously.

Donniel: That’s correct. 

Yossi: You know, Gaza and the world are not going to wait for us to get our political house in order. That’s the truth. I’m just telling, I’m just trying to answer you honestly, that when you ask me what, how I imagine the morning after, that’s my morning after, but it isn’t Gaza’s morning after and it’s not the world’s morning after. 

Donniel: You’re right. You’re right about that. But Yossi, you know, as you were talking, I was surprised, but I think there’s something really important that you’re reminding all of us, is that we could speak about the morning after. The question is who you speaking it with. And to forget who you’re speaking it with is not, when you talk about the morning after, you’re trying to bring some rationale, some measure of control and thoughtfulness and planning.

And I didn’t like your answer because, it’s aggravating me, because I can’t control it. So, but okay. And at any event, Yossi’s in the room. Yossi’s in the room. And I always want to be in the room that you’re in. But now could we, how do you shift to you to the day after? To the other day after?

Yossi: So the question about the question of the day after is, what do we mean by the future of Gaza? That’s the question that the international community is asking. And truthfully, and this is a big problem, it’s not the question we’re asking. It’s the question you’re asking, Donniel, and it’s really important. And the question is, what do we imagine happens?

Let’s assume the Hamas leadership is eliminated. Let’s assume further that we’ve liberated the hostages. What do we do about a devastated population? Two million people who have been turned, many of them homeless, refugees in their own, in their own country. What happens? What’s the day after? What do we do?

We are going to, the tendency in Israel, and you know, this, it’s going to be to go inward, to look at our problems. But we’ve just left Gaza in ruins, and the international community saying, okay, what are you going to do next in Gaza? All we’re thinking about in Gaza is Gaza is a military problem. But it isn’t only a military problem.

Donniel: See, I think what I see, the challenge of the day after is shifting from a focus on our moral rights to our moral responsibilities. And when you go to war, it’s a very self-centered experience, and we’ve had people writing to us sometimes. And in our podcast, we’ve said, our job is to talk about how we as Israelis are feeling at this moment.

When you go to war, it’s about the evil and the harm that was done to you. It’s about the fears that you’re feeling. The essence of the day after requires a psychological and moral shift. And it’s not an easy one, because all of a sudden, a place which was, your objective was, in many ways, to neutralize any threat that emanated from it, regardless, in many ways, of the price. Our right to live take precedent, even over the rights of civilians in the midst of a combat zone. 

So to go to war in this context required of us to to shut down, even more than we normally shut down, because in Israel, we shut down in general about Gaza and about Palestinians, but here, it’s going to require this huge shift because when the world speaks about the day after, it’s challenging Israel on a far more profound level than on a policy level. 

There’s, what’s your policy? You know, there’ll be questions, what we should do, and we’ll talk about that in a moment, because I don’t think anybody knows what we should do. But they’re asking us, if you are claiming that this is a moral war and that you are a society founded on moral principles, what questions are you asking yourself on the day after?

And while I don’t want to necessarily go there right now, part of what that does is it doesn’t just stop in Gaza. We pretended as if Gaza is this place unto itself. It’s not. It’s connected to the Palestinian people in Judea and Samaria. And part of the day after is, what is your moral horizon? What is your plan for this, not simply for this not returning, for Israel not to be threatened again? 

And this is what many of Israeli spokespeople don’t understand when they go on the radios. All they’re talking about is our moral rights. And I think the day after is going to require of us to be open to another question.

And I’m frightened that Israel is going to be, we’re unprepared. We’re going to think it’s a public relations thing. We’re going to want to show some more pictures. And the day after is saying to Israel, as a Jewish democratic country, with 5 million people who aren’t your citizens, 2 million in Gaza, 5 million in Judea and Samaria, where do you want to go? Or do you just want to have just wars? 

I know you’d love them to live at peace with you. Just living at peace, in which you don’t solve the larger questions, is not going to be sufficient. I believe that these larger questions are coming down the road and I think Israeli society is so disconnected from them. And it also makes your first comment so profound, important, and troubling because it’s going to require a special leadership to be able to deal with this question.

Yossi: Exactly, Donniel. You put the dilemma so beautifully. We need to shift from an emphasis on our moral rights to our moral responsibilities. Looking at where Israeli society is at, looking at where, I’ll speak personally, where I’m at, I’m afraid that we’re too traumatized to take that challenge on.

And then you’d say, okay, that’s the responsibility, then, of a leadership. We don’t have that leadership. We may have it in the opposition. Maybe Benny Gantz would be capable of offering that kind of moral vision. I think he could. But we are so far from that with this government. And so the question that we really need to be asking, and which we’re not, I’d say is on two levels when we ask about the morning after in Gaza.

The first is the humanitarian aspect. The second is the political. What is the political horizon here? And I’m not speaking about a two-state solution. Nobody is going to be speaking about a two-state solution the morning after, at least not anyone who is serious about dealing with the morning after. 

But we need to have some political horizon. Who’s going to take control? And the lines are already being drawn. President Biden has already made clear that the US will not accept Israel taking control over Gaza. Nor do I think a majority of Israelis want that, even if there are those among us who are dreaming of a return to Gaza.

So there are so many complications here. And the question, you’re putting it in a deceptively simple and urgent way. And I think that we’re not even at the stage as a society where we’re asking the question, let alone trying to find the answer. 

So I see this, Donniel, as a preliminary and an essential beginning to that conversation. What are we even talking about? Why aren’t we talking about the morning after? Maybe the question we should be asking is what will it take to get us to ask the question about the morning after? How do we even begin that conversation?

Donniel: In the Institute and individually as a teacher, I’ve started to ask this question and we have all these leadership programs an our job as teachers is how do we help our people? And you’re right, people aren’t there. Even if some of our political leadership is there, I’m very frightened of a national unity government, like the Bennett one, in which we create a coalition on the basis of leaving all the important questions aside. And so, for the sake of, so, for the sake of

Yossi: Donniel, it almost worked. 

Donniel: It almost worked. So, for the sake of unity, which we’re all going to feel, and in order to engage in rebuilding the economy, the lives of hundreds of thousands of Israelis who have been uprooted and destroyed, their livelihoods, that we’re going to have an internal Marshall Plan, and we’ll all get together and be business people about it, when the challenge of Israel is very often to recognize that we’re not just another ghetto living by ourselves. And we’re going to be in the midst of a conversation, very different, also from the conversation of Jews around the world, who are subject to this conversation, who are subject to criticisms, which you can’t just simply discount as anti-Semitism.

Now, part of the problem is that none of us know what to do. Like, what are we talking about the day after, who are we going to talk to? So everybody’s now looking for a despot, who could be our despot to control Gaza? Like this is literally, if we get cynical, this is what we’re talking about.

Who could be? Now, Palestinian Authority, ah, he’s not good enough, because he doesn’t even control Judea and Samaria.

Yossi: And he’s regarded, almost universally in Gaza, as inauthentic, corrupt. 

Donniel: Right. And Hamas is corrupt. So who is there? And part of the frustration of a day after is, I do believe there is a Palestinian people. Of course, there’s the Palestinian people. And I believe that the Palestinian people have a right to sovereignty, like I do. And I yearn for a two-state solution where we could live side by side in peace and security.

But you’re right. Nobody’s even talking about it. Because you don’t make peace between people. You need a formal leadership. Who could you trust? So, the one hope that I have, and I wonder how this plays with you, is that Israeli society has shifted from an executive leadership focus to a national collective leadership focus. 

That the same people who changed the discourse around the Supreme Court and the judicial reform, the same people who took, for the first few weeks, and replaced the government in managing the country. There is a people power in Israel. And that people power is going to hopefully be open to asking questions, which is going to force our leadership to at least consider policy issues. 

So the day after is coming and there’s very big questions and our immediate needs are going to be to rebuild, and part of what we’re going to have to be thinking about it is not rebuilding. And that was the shift of the last 10 months, where we didn’t define the needs of Israel solely on the basis of our security and economic concerns. We asked ourselves, this was the real revolt. What type of country do we want to live in? What does a Jewish democratic state mean? 

And if, as a Jewish democratic state, we asked, what are the rights of Israelis, part of the challenges of being a Jewish and democratic state is going to be to ask, what are the rights of Palestinians? And people are going to be looking to us, rightfully so, and saying, what is your opinion about that question? The war’s over. You won. Do you have anything to say about that? And how do we develop that type of conversation is going to be a major challenge in our society.

Yossi: Look, I think you’re right that there’s been a fundamental shift in Israel over the last 10 months. We were demonstrating to preserve our democratic institutions, but the real shift that happened is that we became a participatory democracy in the deepest sense, and we all became amateur experts in the law. We all began to take responsibility for what the institutions of this country are all about. And on a deeper level, what the ethos of this country is about. 

So I think that you’re raising a terrific, option for us. Where you and I may disagree is on the timing. The morning after will be too soon for that to happen, for several reasons.

The soldiers are coming back from the front. We all know what that’s like, the morning after a war. And again, the energy of the streets and the energy of the grassroots is going to be turning to political housecleaning, as I believe it must. 

What you’re laying out is one of the most hopeful, I won’t say long-term, it may be sooner than that, but really one of the most hopeful scenarios, it won’t happen right away and it won’t be, right away, an answer to the morning after.

My thinking about the morning after is much more technical and it’s not in the direction of creating a business-like approach. Alone. It is that. But it does have a political dimension, and that is to immediately renew our connections with the Saudis with that part of the Arab world that’s ready to engage with us, and to see whether we can’t do this together. 

That would be the beginning of a basis of a real transformation in the region, in Israeli-Palestinian relations, and that seems to me a practical place from which to begin.

Donniel: As a teacher, I believe that the day after has to be a day in which certain questions are asked. You’re correct that it’s going to take time for the answers to come. But right now we have to ask and start beginning to think about the Israel of tomorrow. How do we engage in rebuilding and beginning to think. We need answers for the day after, but we also need questions.

This is For Heaven’s sake — Israel at War — Day 33. For more ideas from the Shalom Hartman Institute about what’s unfolding right now, sign up for our newsletter in the show notes, or visit shalomhartman.org/israelatwar. 

And Yossi, maybe a little bracha is that maybe we have the ability to even continue to talk about it, because by the time this podcast is aired, maybe this question will be a luxury that was really chutzpahdik to about. But for an hour, for an hour it felt normal. 

Yossi: Be’ezrat Hashem. 

Donniel: Thank you. Yossi.