When I was at Columbia U. Monday, I stopped at the Hillel for tea and grabbed a brochure for a group called Masa. It's the professional equivalent of the birthright tour. It offers grants to American kids to do internships in Israel after college, learning about their careers. Not just any American kids: it is "designed to give every Jewish young adult the opportunity to experience Israel on a long term program." I.e., gentile students need not apply.
The brochure I got told four interns' stories, including a certain Stephanie. She is a UVa grad who has worked in the Ministry of Justice in Israel, drafting a "report documenting Israel's adherence to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights." Now she's thinking of coming home to "go right to work in US foreign affairs." She says she's in "a unique position to advocate for Israel because I've seen, firsthand, the reality on-the-ground and Israel's unique democracy in action."
This makes me uncomfortable. Maybe lots of countries offer internships, but the idea that young professionals schooled in, say, Israel's human rights policies, such as they are, are coming into our foreign-policy scene to advocate for Israel...
Of course there's the dual-loyalty issue. 60 years ago the head of the American Jewish Committee, Jacob Blaustein, a legend in my Baltimore community, insisted to David Ben-Gurion that "the citizens of the U.S. were Americans and the citizens of Israel were Israelis" and warned the prime minister: "To American Jews, America is home… They believe in the future of a democratic society in the United States under which all citizens, irrespective of creed or race, can live on terms of equality.” Zionists have blurred these distinctions; Jewish identity has been defined now to mean devotion to a militarized state that discriminates against its Arab citizens and occupied Arab lands.
And what about American identity. Masa is specifically aimed at training American leaders. Here is how the United Jewish Communites, the giant Jewish fundraising organization, which supports Masa, describes it:
The MASA program focuses on a deeper experience of Israel, and capitalizes on that powerful force to build leadership-level connections.... [P]rograms like MASA... have the ability to transform the attitudes of an entire generation...[I]t is not only the people in Israel that benefit from this relationship - it is also all of us in the Diaspora...[O]ur fundraising efforts are affirmed as we continue to share the importance of Israel and the overseas case with others in our communities. Israel cannot live without us, and we cannot live without Israel. [emphasis mine]
Jews are so privileged in the U.S. As Blaustein said, this country honored our minority rights; now we're in the establishment, empowered; and how do we use that power-- we offer Jews-only grants for kids to go to the Jewish state, where minority rights are derogated, so that we can preserve Israel's special status in American politics. Makes me queasy. There are many universalist Jews out there; it's time for us to stand up for a different tradition in Jewish life.
Also, here is a photograph of Masa kids having fun on a bus in Israel, wearing what looks to be blackface. (And will someone grab the shot before it gets taken down... for the archives?)
Ah at last: an answer. Commenter "Weiss is a douchebag" submitted this link to suggest that the kids had dipped themselves in black Dead Sea mud, therapeutically. And my friend Dan, who has been to the Dead Sea, called me to say that it is black mud. I apologize for the suggestion. An honest mistake; but I'll be more careful in the future.
An irritating post Phil.
Your "dual loyalty" concept is flawed.
It is acceptable for individuals to have sympathies to multiple communities, and to act on it.
.
"Also, here is a photograph of Masa kids having fun on a bus in Israel, wearing what looks to be blackface."
Oh, Phil, you are so quick to jump to pejorative conclusions. Those are obviously ebony-skinned Ethiopian Jews, sharing their colorful folkloric practices with "ol' Masa" (as it were — LOL!).
Right click on picture, click "save as", press enter.
How much blatant dual loyalty has to be before the clueless Americans of the non-Jew variety wake up and start to say: "hmmmmmmm…".
Goddamit witty!
"It is acceptable for individuals to have sympathies to multiple communities, and to act on it."
NO, it is not.
when you become an American Citizen, whether by birth right or by immigrating in and actually becoming one through a process, it is NOT acceptable to have dual loyalty.
This is especially true when one has a high ranking position in the American government, and does everything possible to push America into a war for Israeli benefit (it is not, but in Likud circles they thought it would be best to de-fang Iraq and demilitarize it).
http://americangoy.blogspot.com/2008/04/dual-loyalty-case-for-dual-loyalty-of.html
or
link to tinyurl.com
Goddamit witty!
"It is acceptable for individuals to have sympathies to multiple communities, and to act on it."
NO, it is not.
when you become an American Citizen, whether by birth right or by immigrating in and actually becoming one through a process, it is NOT acceptable to have dual loyalty.
This is especially true when one has a high ranking position in the American government, and does everything possible to push America into a war for Israeli benefit (it is not, but in Likud circles they thought it would be best to de-fang Iraq and demilitarize it).
http://americangoy.blogspot.com/2008/04/dual-loyalty-case-for-dual-loyalty-of.html
or
link to tinyurl.com
.
Stephanie Adickman … is a UVa grad who has worked in the Ministry of Justice in Israel, drafting a "report documenting Israel's adherence to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights." Now she's thinking of coming home to "go right to work in US foreign affairs." She says she's in "a unique position to advocate for Israel."
Here, let me rewrite this, and let's see how it sounds:
Tsu Mei-shi is a UVa grad who has worked in the Ministry of Justice in Beijing, drafting a "report documenting China's adherence to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights." Now she's thinking of coming home to "go right to work in US foreign affairs." She says she's in "a unique position to advocate for China."
Would this Beijing-planted agent be hired to penetrate the U.S. government? I would sure as hell hope not. But young Stephanie feels totally entitled to apply, and confident that her co-religionists in "U.S. foreign affairs" will cheerfully bring her on board.
As former Congressman Paul Findley documented in "They Dare To Speak Out," the U.S. State and Defense Departments for decades have been completely penetrated by Israeli agents.
Were Douglas Feith and Paul Wolfowitz acting as Israeli agents in fomenting the Iraq war? If so, it probably was the most destructive act of treason in our country's history.
Given the common interests of the American Jewish and Gentile establishment, I am surprised that Israel has limited such programs to jews only.
The non-jews would return to the US dutifully advocating for Israel every bit as much as the jewish participants.
"It is acceptable for individuals to have sympathies to multiple communities, and to act on it."–Fritz Julius Kuhn, German American Bund
Good blogs, Phillip. Namaste
Regarding your earlier comments about maps and "fair allocation", how about this one:
link to hamdden.co.uk
/>
or this one:
link to rorcongress.com
/>
or, the British Mandate map of 1944/45:
link to ipc.gov.ps
/>
(signed by Moshe Dayan)
Salaam/Shalom/Shanthi/Dorood/Peace
-ed
The real question here is how often does pig Weiss shnoor free food out of Jewish organizations that he loves to trash. We really have to get his name and picture up on a wall. Maybe a few, call it the Jews who love Hamas wall and shit on their own people so that their loved at dinner parties.
Seems to walk in anyone else's shoes is simply to ask the impossible. Birthright, birthwrong. I guess, what we should be asking, is, in 2008, does Nuremberg mean anything at all other than might makes right? Might is all about money and weapons.
With what's left, is there anything beyond the tactical, beyond using the mask of humanism as a tool for any particular group-self interest?
And, is there anything but the group?
Phil, what the hell is a "universalist Jew"? This sounds oddly like the "Internationalist" concept that was espoused by the communists. You know the same people who decided for us that there was no such nation as the jewish nation, etc.
Seeing the Arab side as one populated by pure angels and the utterly oppressed is equally as bad as the Camera/neocon side view of Israel being the 100% virtuous state that can not do anything wrong.
You know what, I wouldn't want to live in such a virtuous state because I know that it is impossible. And I also know that had things been reversed there wouldn't have been one Jew left standing anywhere in the land.
One last comment for now: I am a dual citizen of both the US and Israel. And I consider the remarks made on dual citizenship here to be highly offensive and ignorant. My loyalties are to both countries and questioning one's loyalty does smack of a certain kind of anti-semitism. For your information US citizens can have dual citizenship with other countries such as Greece, Canada, etc.
Phil,
Are you singly loyal, in the way you invoke?
And, the way your "loyal" posse "enforces".
Immigrants had to renounce their previous citizenship upon receiving US citizenship. That was the law that was changed only in the last couple of decades. It changed for the simple reason that there were too many Americans with dual Israeli-US citizenship and that started to look discriminatory so the law was changed.
I really have no problem with this practice. However, I do believe that any person with dual citizenship should be excluded from employment in the US State Department. Their goal is to advance US national interests and not those of another country.
We got ourselves into two ME wars because of confusion over US and Israeli national interests so the loyalty of those who make our policy should definitely be an issue.
Immigrants had to renounce their previous citizenship upon receiving US citizenship. That was the law that was changed only in the last couple of decades. It changed for the simple reason that there were too many Americans with dual Israeli-US citizenship and that started to look discriminatory so the law was changed.
I really have no problem with this practice. However, I do believe that any person with dual citizenship should be excluded from employment in the US State Department. Their goal is to advance US national interests and not those of another country.
We got ourselves into two ME wars because of confusion over US and Israeli national interests so the loyalty of those who make our policy should definitely be an issue.
David Cherson, dual-citizenship or dual-loyalty for a regular citizen would be ok in my book. However, people like Doug Feith, Richard Perle, and Eliot Abrams hold dual-loyalty while being employed as Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, a member of The Defense Policy Board Advisory Committee, and Deputy National Security Advisor for Global Democracy Strategy respectively.
These men are, or were, directing the policies of The United States of America, not the United States of America/Israel. These men are responsible for the deaths of over 4000 American soldiers in their misguided belief that America and Israel share identical foreign interests.
http://www.deadseamineral.com/item.asp?id=20
Richard i do think im singly loyal. its just the way i was raised, in America. I admit these things are fluid. i have felt loyalty over the years to vietnam when we were destroying it, and iraq when we were destroying it, and to tonga, which i wrote a book about, the State Dept manipulating it.
I think loyalties must be examined when it's an issue of foreign policy. Bostonians who were on the Irish nationalists' side,for instance.
If Jews were in danger in my country, Im sure I would develop tribal loyalty in a second. I had it when I was a kid, when Jews were outside. Today things are very different and Zionists who are not open about their agenda meanwhile insist we have the same interests, the US and Israel. We don't. The US does not have an interest in Israel occupying Palestinian land. Israel evidently does. A bright line of separation. "J Street," which is composed not just of Jews but gentiles, is on my side here.
WILL someone pleas answer my question:
Are these kids in blackface? Or is something else going on? And if they're in blackface, then why don't Ted Danson rules apply?
"Jacob Blaustein, a legend in my Baltimore community,"
Baltimore? Interesting. One of the cradles of Reform, if I remember things correctly.
Just look at the pics.
It's Springtime for Hitler, and Germany.
"Are these kids in blackface?"
Bluefaces really. That's light blue theater paint. Not sure about US terms. in German it's: Theaterfarbe.
Israeli flag? All in blue and white including clothes? Nice. The are obviously acting. But what? Israelifaces, Flagbodies, …
Third picture from top:
http://www.jewishagency.org/NR/exeres/B2EDB394-4D6A-4D2D-9E42-0383DD4FF613
Phil,
When we were kids hanging out in the Cape as teenagers, you weren't singly loyal then.
You were a humanist, and from my memory regarded the US as criminal entity for its involvement in Vietnam.
If anything, you and I were singly disloyal, or is my memory faulty, and only I became a social revolutionary? (By social revolutionary, I mean the commitment to ethics, environment, radical humanism, to the exclusion of loyalty to any state.)
I'm not a social revolutionary now. I have more personal conventional responsibilities, and appreciation for features of the status quo, even as we desparately need thoughtful reform.
My son more fits your description of dually loyal. He is assertively Jewish currently, and feels a strong affinity to Israel.
He's experienced more persecution than I did at his age. In our enlightened New England town, he's been harrassed by junior neo-nazis, and heard of his rabbi harrassed by politically correct leftists for carrying an "Zionist for peace" sign at a rally at my son's current university, in support of Palestinian weal.
richard, i think youre right and i would have been disloyal. but i was a frikkin kid. i had no idea about anything. and i remind you we were, or i was, enormously privileged. that was my parents' summer home. which i visit this day. furthermore, i took all my politics from my parents. they were antiwar jews, everyone i knew was that way, scientists, outsiders in the u.s. i didnt have my own politics, i had someone else's. generally alright, but not thought thru. and as you know if you go into that same community now, there is support for the iraq war to a surprising degree. i'd say 30 to 40 percent. and israel is a factor.
we both know a certain relative of yours, an independent thinker, who has become a rightwinger re islam….
i've met one of your sons, i believe the one you speak of. he's an admirable kid.
but im talking policy. isn't it confusing to have people coming and going from israel the way we do? especially when jews occupy such important positions here? i find it maddening, i want clarity. i think americans have a right to clarity here.
i have no problem with people who have such loyalties teaching at universities, working in businesses. it's when they enter public life in newspapers and thinktanks and politics that quite apart from any individual's merits, it becomes a real problem at a certain point. we've reached that point now. the neocons have thoroughly conflated American and Israeli interests, all the people who love israel and say we're in the same war. we're not. this has hurt my country…
let us count, on one hand or is it one finger, the jews that we love and respect – phil and….
let jews continue to be baffled and continue to ask, "why do they hate us?". weep, weep.
Maybe some people should watch Dirty Dancing?
dual loyalty would be an improvement. jews with 2 passports have only one loyalty – to israel.
"we both know a certain relative of yours, an independent thinker, who has become a rightwinger re islam."
I actually don't know of whom your speaking, except perhaps my aunt's ex-husband. Is that of whom you're speaking.
I don't see the 30-40% that you site as supporting the war in Iraq. My mother for example, is a staunch Zionist, far far more than I. She consistently opposed the war in Iraq, and still does.
I was "disloyal" throughout my life, even when I practised as a CPA. When I ran the Green Island Cooperative Library (including a nearly complete archive of Chomsky lectures), I was definitely disloyal. Actually a-loyal.
When I co-edited the Progressive Daily in DC in 1980 and 81, I was definitely a-loyal, or maybe post-loyal, I'm not really sure.
Phil,
As far as people studying, or interning, or staffing newspapers or government positions in Israel, its only a very specific group of individuals that conclude opinions and policies that I find objectionable.
The majority of Jews that go to Israel to study, intern, staff, do so for noble purposes, including civil rights issues, including ecological, including development.
Its frankly ridiculous to ridicule them for doing so.
Even those that do so under the Birthright mantle. You use the word like someone that has no insight uses the term "chosen people". Its important to be chosen. Any individual that sincerely self-inquires to any extent knows that there is no coincidence as to their birth, life, work, presence.
You yourself are chosen, and in two respects.
One, you are chosen in your particular context, skill, choices (chosen and choosing, how odd) to make of yourself a great soul, of great service to humanity, close and far.
Two, you are chosen in your particular context as a Jew, to make of your community (dually loyal), a community of tikkun olam, of transformation from broken to whole.
I like your and my parents' politics. I like them better than the neo-loyal, neo-radical, revisionist.
Jewish. In the sense of content over form.
Who do you regard as a model for your neo-patriotism?
dual loyalty would be an improvement. those with 2 passports and one is israel have only one loyalty – israel.
I would call it blue or purpleface. I think you are seeing things that aren't there.
What I see is a bunch of kids who don't look remotely Middle Eastern. One of the girls looked like a neanderthal, but that's not the same.
There is nothing "revolutionary" about "the exclusion of loyalty to any state," Richard, it's just immature.
I thought there was once an attempt to elevate humanity over
(especially ethnic-religious) statism, at Nuremberg, ironically, the site also, years before, of the old Nuremberg laws, thought to be totally justified at that time and place due to the circumstances of those times. If we really are engaged in the early years of the neocon's WW4, and we eventually don't blow ourselves up, but have new trials–how will the indictments read?
I mean, based on what?
Witty's son was bullied by neoNazis in Preppyland. Do tell, Richard, the particulars. We need to know what kind of hell hole you and yours live in, starving, eating potato skins, hiding, while the nation you were born amongst dies for your protection and gets taxed accordingly.