Dude, rub your eyes, it really is happening: the progressive voice re Israel/Palestine is breaking into the MSM. The always great Christian Science Monitor (as a commenter pointed out) gives Steve Walt the last word in a piece debating how much money we give to Israel:
Professor Walt maintains he’s pro-Israel. The US refusal to put pressure on Israel to settle with the Palestinians on a two-state solution, he argues, is not helpful.
"Giving any country unconditional backing encourages irresponsible behavior," he says. It could lead to an apartheid state, or as Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert put it, Israel facing "a South African-style struggle."
And yesterday’s Hartford Courant offered a long profile of a Jewish activist whose dreams of a shared Jerusalem have stirred opposition from other American Jews. The piece openly pits activist Yehezkel Landau against Hartford’s Jewish establishment. Says one:
"Ultimately, I want the same thing Yehezkel wants — a Jewish state in Israel, an Arab state in Palestine and a shared capital in Jerusalem," Fuchs says. "But where we may not see eye to eye is judging just how sincere these peace offers are from Arab leaders. You have a government now in Gaza whose avowed goal is to destroy Israel militarily. There has to be a more concrete acknowledgment on their part of the right of Israel to exist."
Landau is an evolved guy, as gentle as Richard Witty, and his response is clearly the Courant’s point of view:
"Because I have befriended so many Palestinians over the years. I can distinguish between the extremists and the pragmatists in the Arab community," Landau says. "I know that Palestinians suffer terrible consequences from the extremists because I see them as humans just like me. But too many Israelis live in isolation from their Arab neighbors and they can only see them as enemies." [provocative emphasis all mine]
…A regrettable result of the dispiriting cycle of violence in Israel has been a hardening of attitudes among many of America’s strongest supporters of Israel, he says.
"The problem is that Jews, like any people under mortal threat, retreat into a kind of tribal bunker and become doctrinaire, one-sided," Landau says. "Our imagination is crippled by war."
Landau is talking in his gentle way about the Israel lobby. Walt and Mearsheimer, who support the 2-state solution, were described as inflammatory 2 years ago. Well, they blew the dam. The water’s flowing.
Related posts:
- Profile in Courage: Ron Paul Says U.S. Should Not Take Sides in Cycle of Violence
- ‘J Street’ statement on Gaza and ‘cycle of violence’ must be welcomed
- David Brooks (Mis)Uses Israeli History to Involve the U.S. in a Cycle of Violence
- Leviev Is Foiled at Last! And ‘Forward’ Refers to ‘Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine’
- Another Sign of Progress: Abe Foxman Bewails the (Alleged) Nakba Coverage
{ 31 comments }
I like Landau's comments.
They are simultaneiously assertive and kind.
For most leftists, the term "cycle of violence" is insufficiently damning of Israel.
I'm glad that you are a moderate Phil.
Unfortunately, we have long passed the point
at which a two-state solution might have been possible; there are far too many settlements, far too many powerful extremists
in Israeli politics, not to mention the
importance of the West Bank for Israel's
water requirements. All that remains is
a one-state solution, which will never be
acceptable to the Jews. Ergo, there is no
solution; ultimately the demographics of the
region will prevail, no doubt in a less than
peaceful process.
Will somebody remind the rest of us why we've given Israel over a trillion dollars with no strings attached and no regard to the angels of our higher nature, and plastered a terrorist target on our ass, especially considering the state of our own economy? That's over a trillion from us, over a trillion from German taxpayers (reparations), and millions more from other European nations (also reparations).
Is it all biblical destiny, as the Jewish diamond king says?
Why exagerate Charles?
Over the course of the cold war, Israel was the stalwart bastian against the encroachment of Russian military into the Middle East.
Since then, only moral reasons to protect a democracy that employs a peaceful transfer of power resulting from election, as norm, in contrast to Lebanon, Palestine, Iran.
America's interest.
Even if you regard keeping in the good graces of Saudi Arabia as in America's interest, Israel is probably a better friend to Saudi Arabia than Iran is.
I try to explain the increasing power of the Israel Lobby/the ZPC/Judonia in http://members.aol.com/ThorsProvoni/JudoniaII/JudoniaIIb.htm .
I attempt to describe how the Lobby functions in http://members.aol.com/ThorsProvoni/Judonia1.htm .
Without the establishment of a murderous genocidal state by racist Zionist thieves, interlopers and invaders, the Russians would have had no opening to penetrate into the Middle East.
By providing justification for Zionist genocidalism, Witty is himself a genocide inciter.
Because the US ratified the Convention in 1988, Witty is in violation of US law against genocide as well as of US law against providing material aid to terrorism.
In a just world, he would spend the rest of his life in prison.
Don't bother with that; he would cost too much to feed, clothe, and maintain. Plus he would whine about non-kosher meals. Just deport him to his primary loyalty, Israel.
If he had any guts, he would already be living there. When Phil referred to the "gentle" Richard Witty, I wonder if that wasn't a backhanded way of calling him a coward. I would like to think so, at least. All Jewish Zionists who live in the diaspora but hold Israel as their primary loyalty are cowards; in fact, I think the shame of that is what drives their fanatical lobbying — it's compensation.
I don't understand why you believe the USA has the right to burden Palestinians with Zionist criminals.
Also it is worth mentioning that Hitler was quite a gentle guy probably just like Witty is supposed to be.
Hitler was a vegetarian because he could not stand the idea of killing defenseless animals while Witty probably believes in weeping after whacking Palestinians.
Hitler and Witty — Two of a kind!
Joachim Martillo,
first thanks for introducing me to Isaac Breuer, interesting and pardoxical person, shaped by spacetimes.
Unfortunately I am constantly caught in a spam comment prevention filter.
Was that the correct tile can't find it. Now I want to know the whole case and how the Jewish Frankfurter discussed the case based on both git (is the problem word) and his studies of German law.
Last test LeaNder
"Why exagerate Charles?"–Witty
Anyone is free to check my total financial aid to Israel figures.
And beyond the enormous gift pure and simple, if it came with any conditions attached at all. They can then also check out and contrast the many strings normally attached to any foreign aid.
"Over the course of the cold war, Israel was the stalwart bastian against the encroachment of Russian military into the Middle East."–Witty
True, Witty. But our ever more bloated free check to Israel has
only been increasing in size since the end of the Cold War. It clearly cannot be explained as a a norm of ours or any nation's foreign strategy in our best interest. Check this out, start with Zunes who wrote about it a long time ago.
"Since then, only moral reasons to protect a democracy that employs a peaceful transfer of power resulting from election, as norm, in contrast to Lebanon, Palestine, Iran."–Witty
What the f— is moral about what happened to the Palestinians?
How does American support of this crime against humanity further American interest, either from a marketing or economc POV?
"America's interest."–Witty
Yeah, that's what I'm talking about, Witty. America First.
"Even if you regard keeping in the good graces of Saudi Arabia as in America's interest, Israel is probably a better friend to Saudi Arabia than Iran is."–Witty
I don't regard keeping in the good graces of the Saud Family in America's best long term interest. Let the really free capital market play out that the neocons always cheer but don't support. The Saud Family has nothing to sell but oil. We can buy it from their masses given freedom. The Saud's are a local Mafia; the Saud's are the biggest supporters of terrorists in the form of radical Islam–how many 9/11 hijackers were from there? And they use Israel as a scapecoat like any old western noble court from the middle ages. to divert attention from their own corruption. Any fool can see that. Bush does the same thing on this end, diverting and instilling fear in the American populace by his "war on terra." Bush and the Saud Family see eye to eye. The right-wing Israel regime and the Saud Family see eye to eye too. If you really care about Israel, should you look with fondness on American foreign policy? With Israel regime compliance and instigation it has made Israel's status in the world equal to Jews in the Middle Ages and hence forward in the Diaspora, tax collectors, usurers, the fake only Doctors, all the restricted roles most geared to make Jews die and suffer in the long run.
It's a testament to Iran's integrity and courage that it is not a better friend to Saudi Arabia than Israel is.
America would do well to talk to Iran without conditions.
It won't happen, though Obama promises a slim chance.
With friends like Witty, America does not need enemies.
Phil, I don't think you are showing Witty the way. Hint: Don't use a spread sheet. He's use to playing with walnut shells. He loves it. You wouldn't want him next to you in a trench.
Every site engaged in seeking a just, sustained Middle East Peace is beset upon by ziocon hasbara parasites like Witty. They get an income from the Jewish Lobby and pullulate like maggots across the progressive blogosphere. The more time and energy devoted to refuting their narrow, hysterical and untrue assertions, the easier it is for Israel to carry out its slow genocidal aims.
"I don't understand why you believe the USA has the right to burden Palestinians with Zionist criminals."
Joachim,
I know you disagree that Ashkenazi Jews have a historical claim to Palestine, but I think we all agree that Jews at some point in history dwelled there, and thus a historical claim to the area can be made by Jews.
As I have stated before, I believe Jewish ideologues are much more dangerous in the diaspora, as Jewish Bolshevism, Jewish Neoconservatism, diaspora Jewish Zionism and (your work in pioneering the identification of greedy) Jewish Friedmanism demonstrate.
One of the reason Jewish Zionists are able to perpetrate their atrocities in Palestine (probably the primary reason) is because diaspora Jewish Zionists infiltrate governments and use their wealth, influence and argumentative skills to enable it. If diaspora Jewish Zionist fanatics were deported to Israel — all of them — it would starve Israel of its funding and its allies, and thus dry up its ability to murder and ethnically cleanse Palestinians.
I believe you lived there, so your just streak probably sympathizes with the Palestinians subjected to Judeofascist terror, but the Arabs are no angels, either. In fact, the ability of Judeofascists to persecute the Palestinians is in part due to the greed, corruption, complicity and tribalism of selfish Arab governments. Why do Arabs tolerate it? Because that is their nature.
Nature is filled with all manner of animals, some of them beautiful, some of them ugly. It is not the West’s responsibility to try to turn ugly animals into beautiful ones the world over. The West has its own ugly animals to deal with. But there is nothing wrong with returning vicious animals native to another area. We just shouldn’t feed, house and arm them.
Ashkenazi Jews may not be native to Palestine, but their Jewish culture, and their nature, is.
Coming from the leftist perspective, you think all human animals are fundamentally the same and can all be reformed and engineered. I beleive nature and history prove otherwise. And besides, why would we even want to try to turn a jackel or a fox into a domestic dog? It's unnatural. The jackels and foxes should just be fenced off. Those who want to live as domestic dogs will make their way to the West. If they go back to their jackel ways, they can be returned.
"That's over a trillion from us, over a trillion from German taxpayers (reparations), and millions more from other European nations (also reparations)."
Please, Charles, no pity for "us poor Germans". That was the least Adenauer could do. … and the most important thing he did, if you ask me. And believe me, there are not many who dare to question it, apart from the extreme right who seems to be in the process to testing a little shift to the more bourgeois center. Arabophobia is very much to their taste. Basically not much difference to them if it is against foreigners, Turks, or Jews.
This sounds like really good news from the US. A different policy US approach to Israel/Palestine would be good for the whole world.
Fox in the hen house. A child's primer. The child is American.
Breuer's book is Die Rechtsphilosophischen Grundlagen des Jüdischen und des Modernen Rechts (The Legal-Philosophical Fundamentals of Jewish and Modern Law, 1910).
But you might be better off in starting with Mittleman's text.
Here is the info: http://books.google.com/books?id=InizGwAACAAJ .
The 227 page abridgement (lower right corner) is an easier intro than the complete 700 page book.
If you can't read this entry for some reason, send me an email at ThorsProvoni@aol.com .
Ed, I will write more later, but I have to give credit where it is due.
Naomi Klein identifies the Jewish roots of Friedmanism in The Shock Doctine but is unfortuately unwilling — possibly because of her own Jewish background — to push her analysis to its logical conclusion.
I have not read Rick Perlstein's new book, Nixonland, but everything written about it indicates that he did not address the fertile group that the Nixon presidency provided for the first cross-polination of Jabotinskian Neoconservatism and Friedmanite Neoliberalism.
See http://eaazi.blogspot.com/2008/05/nixon-and-jewish-hate-politcs.html .
Big-bad-wolf, I'm sorry. What exactly are you saying? Where do you stand on the Palestinian issue, for example? What do you think the role of the USA should be in the world? Germany's?
Who should pay for what? Why?
Who are you speaking to Charles?
Hi Richard, I am speaking to Whoever posted under the name "Big-bad-wolf", today May 12, 2008
When do we get to hear the anti-Israel case in the MSM? What is the positive case for Israel for non-jews? What is shocking about being anti-Israel?
In all honesty, W&M will probably accomplish nothing, and the likely reason that they are given any recognition is that they are pro-Israel. I'm afraid that zionism will have to be beaten into a plowshare.
Excellent question, Todd: "When do we get to hear the anti-Israel case in the MSM"?
Witty calls the W & M effort a polemic. He wants reason & fairness to rule, he says.
It's like we are all in that cult church, and suddenly somebody makes an anonymous 9-11 call to the public: "Lots of bad stuff going down here, help!"
Witty shows on TV how things are great, look at the row of tiny shoes, the bare-bones of community effort, the wonder of it all.
Phil plays the intrepid reporter: " Hey, is that all the little shoes? I see one guy without a pair! And, is that girl old enough? "
Stupid Americans. Watch that TV.
The question is, what's in the best interest of the child, the American child.
We have a moot court.
Well, it's entertaining, no?
Charles, I somehow got into a comment spam prevention filter, so I had to use a magic cap to squeeze myself in: Big bad Wolf
I don't like to see the German reparation money paralleled with US support. No amount of money could wipe away that guilt. The mistake was to not build a much bigger human bridge. I can understand that Americans complain about the Holocaust Museums, they should have been build over here. But consider here, they weren't. … Money is much too easy, that's why you can point on it without completely understanding. How could you?
The Isreali's and yes the Jews were my heroes, they caught some of the swine. Over here it took 34 years for Finkelstein's mother to be invited as a witness to the Maijdanek trial in 1979, to identify their camp-masters or mainly mistresses. How could they identify them as fat gray housewives after all that time? A really vicious farce. they came and confronted 300 witnesses, if I remember correctly and after went home. And that surely was they proudly exhibited in the faces of their earlier victims as master over life and dead. Read his story, he accompanied his mother.
We didn't even touch the Holocaust in high school. I made my exams in 1970. In the last year I attacked my history teacher: Why didn't we move on? Why rest for hours, days and month on the charts of all the small parties in the Weimar times, and endless short coalition charts; the governments that were weak and didn't last long. We weren't meant to move on and he took great care to show us exactly that. It wasn't part of the curriculum, not even then. He hadn't said a word when I attacked him, but in the next hour he brought a pile of books. "You can tell your class mates something about Hitler", he said placing them on my desk.
By accident I found out a couple of years later, he was part of a resistance network that had helped people that had not the necessary money to get over the Lac de Constance into Switzerland. In another case I learned it only when someone was dying.
It took me a little while to understood, and I was deeply troubled. Then I understood: There had been many on the road that needed A "Persilschein" (Persil is like your Proctor & Gamble a detergent) many needed someone they had helped. Understand?
In the case of my history teacher, I had attacked the completely wrong person.
*That said*, I think your mail ending with "besides you in the trenches" is very powerful. My anarchical spirit drank it like wine.
And yes, I think the Germans have a huge responsibility for the Palestinians too. The Nazis and the Holocaust was an important catalyst for another disaster the Napkah. What more can I say?
LeaNder, your response is very moving. I'm not sure I fully comprehend it all. If you want to add more, please do. It will help all of us who come here in Phil's blog. (I for one, have no where else to go with my own agony and questions–that's why Phil is my hero, even though as I say that, I think in the end Phil & I will not get along, but maybe I am confusing him with Witty, his buddy, his official bad cop, shall we say). So, LeaNder, I just wish to convey to you that I was born an average lower middle class American, of German-Irish background, and with the values of that combined heritage. This blog could not have been produced without a different historical vantage point. I am just trying to add mine. Phil has tried to add us all in the vision. Again, please
keep helping us. We all need light.
No , I don't understand Leander.
There had been many on the road that needed A "Persilschein" (Persil is like your Proctor & Gamble a detergent) many needed someone they had helped. Understand?
What does this mean, I am fascinated? Please explain. Who needs whom?
And the others, why don't you address Witty with arguments or not at all. The polemics don't help. It gives fuel to the zionists. Martillo, your material is so interesting, I think you are doing yourself a disservice by your rhetoric at times on this blog. It would be easy to pass you off as a mere radical hater, and you are not merely that.
peters, give us an example of something Witty posted that was not answered. If you are referring to his usual comment that W & M's nearly 500 page book (including footnotes) is a mere polemic, and Carter's book too, you need to put those books in context, that is, there was nothing in the public eye before them but endless versions of Paul Neuman battling hoardes of crazy rag heads. Fifty years of a one-sided version of history, then, finally, two books straining to counter–are polemics…
If you mean what should we do? Try using not just carrots, but
some sticks on our client state Israel.
"There had been many on the road that needed A "Persilschein" (Persil is like your Proctor & Gamble a detergent) many needed someone they had helped. Understand?"
OK, I tried to avoid this, maybe I should translate the German Wiki entry: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persilschein
Although I wasn't aware of an earlier usage, and would want to check that first.
**************************************
Go to the last part if you only need to know what it is. But let me build up a semantic field with words, that are related to the larger reality context, and that may help you to dive into the context, mentally:
The first term is: "Gleichschaltung"
When they gained power, the Nazis after first shutting down dissent, e.g. the media and clubs of their left opponents, immediately started a "complete coordination of life to the Nazi pattern" ( Koppel S. Pinson: "Modern Germany"; 1954) something called: "Gleichschaltung"
Now imagine the deep entanglement of government, public administration, schools, the economical sphere … with the Reich and or Hitler, that the Allies were confronted with.
To not dive to deeply into that. Let's take the example of the schools: The schoolteachers had been the one huge group that after the Nazis came to power, joined the party in masses. The main motivation may well have been the fear to loose their job.
Now one obviously needed to sort out the apples from the pears. so first all party member's had to go. The problem after this attempt at De-Nazification of the schools, there were only about 25% of the teachers left.
So you had to had to look below the category Nazi member …
Up pop's the "alibi Jew", a tale that went something like: You may have been an Nazi, but strictly that was only to trick to world, to be able to in fact help one of the other's of these poor persecuted neighbors. There was this one man, or that women you knew, or met …
Now if you could show and prove this all to the authorities, you got the permission to go back to school: You were "de-Nazified" and in common speech the piece of paper, the certificate you got to prove this was called a "Persilschein".
Charles: "Phil is my hero, even though as I say that, I think in the end Phil & I will not get along, but maybe I am confusing him with Witty, his buddy, his official bad cop, shall we say"
There sure is a big fight to pull Phil into a specific camp; as Richard Witty with his lonely and thankless mission is pretty much left on his own listwise. And yes he is unprepared, confused and often very, very unwise in his arguments.
But I think there is also a huge fight for "the American collective mind" of which Phil is only a very focused mirror; a breach that rives apart the whole American society.
Richard Witty is caught completely caught on one side and in deep fear. Phil is wide open to a dissenting group of both civil society and military; and my instincts tell me he is right, maybe Richard will one day understand and realize, he was right and come to understand the W/M only did something that had to be done.
In one thing I am hesitantly optimistic that America will win this fight.
AH! So, you understand why all the "viable" American presidential candidates have been producing their Persilschein?
Obliterate Iran.
Well, LeaNder, I do agree that W/M only did something that had to be done.
What bothers me is that in the land of the free, W/M are heroes.
With a more balanced playing field in the USA, they would just be
a norm, ivory tower paychecks.
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