Big anti-Israeli-occupation demonstrations are being planned for the political conventions this summer. Here is a righteous post from an organizer, Shergald, describing the way that Israel has thumbed its nose at George Bush over the colonization of the West Bank.
The US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation is undaunted in its
efforts to educate the American people and our compliant leaders about
the brutal military occupation we are supporting with our taxes. This
human rights injustice would not be happening without our support.
In less than one month, tens of thousands of protesters, thousands of
convention delegates, and hundreds of media outlets will descend upon
Denver and St. Paul for the DNC and RNC conventions, respectively. The
US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation will be there as well,
talking to Members of Congress and conference delegates, distributing
thousands of fact sheets and postcards, and hiring huge mobile
billboards to circulate through downtown Denver and St. Paul with the
message: do
we really want our tax dollars to support a 41 year long military
occupation that goes on for the sole purpose of continuing the ethnic
cleansing of the Palestinian nation?
The US Campaign to End the Occupation urges you to meet with your congressman during the August recess. I see that Brit Tzedek is also urging its members to meet with their congressmen and tell them to end the brutal occupation. Brit Tzedek is telling them to do so as Jews. Is this effective? When I blogged about Meretz's noble but parochial efforts to end the settlements the other day by appealing as Jews to the Israeli Housing Minister, Teddy commented wisely:
to an Israeli Cabinet official that deals with a particular "paradigm"
that Israelis have been foisting on American Jews to stop them from
criticizing. What is wrong with that? Of course all Americans should be
weighing in. But are you so dead set against "identity politics" that
you want to ignore the particular constraints the Israeli governments
have tried to put on American Jews who criticize Israeli policies?
Seems a bit shortsighted…
Teddy's right. American Jews have been imprisoned by a bad paradigm. But now that paradigm is broken, why not break the next paradigm–and work with the non-Jewish groups that also regard the occupation as wrong? This is a hard struggle. You need all the allies you can get. We need to get past ideas of Jewish exceptionalism.
The "bad paradigm" will continue to reign
supreme until our country's elite (Zionist
Jews and philo-Semitic non-Jews) and the
MSM (dominated by the same groups) begin
to see the light; that is to say, when pigs
fly.
I have thought for years, and your column confirms it, that the battle for Palestine will be won in the hearts of American Jews.
Support for Israel is clearly against US national interests. A sensible or realistic foreign policy would favor the hundreds of millions with the oil rather than the 3 millon without it. Our support for Israel is due to the domestic political implications of Jewish money and Jewish votes.
Without unquestioned US support, political, military and financial, Israel would have already made peace. On its own, it cannot afford the settlements.
So when American Jews no longer singlemindedly support Zionist policies by our government, our government will be more even handed and Israel will finally make peace.
A "righteous post" ?
__________________
The post is right. But the term 'righteous' used in a Jewish context doesn't mean what we understand by righteous. A righteous Jew is someone who follows God's commandments. The settlers are righteous – not the ones who want to throw them off the Promisd Land.
Change of paradigm ?
___________________
The old paradigm is the Zionist concept of ingathering the Diaspora Jews in Palestine.
A change of that paradigm is a reversal of Zionism i.e. a new Diasporism.
Phil says:
"But now that paradigm is broken, why not break the next paradigm–and work with the non-Jewish groups that also regard the occupation as wrong? "
You know I made that same comment some time ago on the blog of a well known pro peace Jewish writer.
I was immediately jumped on and insulted by other commentors and told that "only Jews" could change US policy on Israel.
That attitude certainly does nothing to endear Jews as a whole to the gentile community and reveals a still underlying problem among some jews.
I think most pro peace jewish activist are motivated by the injustice. But there is no denying that the growth of the gentile and non jewish criticizism of Israel and the zionist and the Lobby and so forth has spured more Jewish activist to action on this issue. They don't want to be seen as absent on this issue now that the cat is out of the box for the non Jewish population to see.
The important thing is that non-Jewish groups work to end the occupation and indeed the wrongs of 1917 and 1948 before them. Whether Jewish groups join in or not is immaterial, and over-focusing on their possible contribution is probably unhelpful.
Maybe we need a new forward-to-the-future episode of Man Men, in a smokeless, veggie salad and wine nightspot, our players discuss the continued viability of the Exodus spot in the face of the present, emerging Nakba day; the plan is advanced to switch to Marketing the Nabka narrative to show, yet again, who is the real light to the world–now that the cat is out of the bag anyway, need to capitalize face on it, no?
I recently heard that J-Street's executive director, Jeremy Ben-Ami, said that although Jimmy Carter and Walt-Mearsheimer have the right idea, that J-Street could not work with them because they are anathema to much of the Jewish community.
I wonder if this is not another reflection of the idea that only Jews can change US Policy?
I agree with you, Phil, that this is a very bad policy. Some Jewish organization must explicitly embrace Christian leaders and issue joint communiques with them. Only then can the Christian community work without fear of being called anti-semitic.
If J-street is not for me, then who is?
"Man Men"=Mad Men (in my post above)
And, if I am only for what I believe to be my collective self, then what am I?