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During summer, the world watched as Israel began its historic disengagement from the Gaza Strip. News media broadcast images of sobbing families leaving their homes and buildings being bulldozed to make way for Palestinian apartment buildings. For better or for worse, it was clear that the disengagement would have a drastic impact on Israeli and Middle Eastern societies.
A lecture presented by San Diego State's Lipinsky Institute Sunday attempted to address this issue, but had mixed reviews.
"Israel Divided: The Impact of the Gaza Disengagement on Israeli Society" was the title of the 21st annual Glickman-Galinson Symposium held at Congregation Beth Israel in University City.
The symposium featured two speakers - Asher Arian, a professor of political science, and Ranan Kuperman, a lecturer in international relations, both from the University of Haifa in Northern Israel.
Arian began the talk with a lecture titled "The Separation from Gaza and the Future of Israeli Politics," discussing the upcoming election and possible political consequences of disengagement.
"One of the things that keeps hold in Israel is the knowledge that there are no military solutions to difficult political considerations," he said. "That's not easy to understand."
Arian tied this aspect of Israeli politics to recent events in the United States, such as the political consequences of 9/11, highlighting the balance between goals of security and liberty, saying this question of value between the two has dominated Israeli politics and will be an important issue in the future.
"To gain security means paying a price in terms of liberty and human rights," Arian said. "The question is: where do you draw the line?"
Kuperman, the institute's visiting Israeli professor for the fall semester, spoke on "The Israel Defense Forces and the Withdrawal from Gaza," focusing on the military aspect of Israeli disengagement, and giving a detailed history of Israeli military force.
The Lipinsky Institute is the outreach arm of the Judaic Studies Program at SDSU, and is celebrating its 20th anniversary, director Lawrence Baron said. He said the institute is seeking to broaden and improve.
"There's been a national initiative to promote the Israeli studies on campus," he said, "largely because in the wake of 9/11, there has been proliferation of Arabic and Islamic studies centers."
The symposium was free to the public, and the audience's reaction was varied.
Nick Shirley, a seventh grade student at the San Diego Jewish Community, was attending the event for extra credit and said most things were a review of what he studied at school, and his teacher is easier to follow than the speakers.
"We've been learning this in Judaic, in school and this is pretty much a review," he said. "But it's easier to learn it in class because (our teacher) helps us individually."
Several groups of people left during Kuperman's lecture, and after the presentation, listeners complained that the speakers stuck to the facts too much and didn't give enough commentary about the issues.
"They never really said are they pro or are they against; they never gave an opinion which way they were going," audience member Ronda Bloom said. "I think as Jews, you kind of have to have a path - draw a line in the sand and say what you're gonna do."
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