A very strong statement posted on the Progressive Magazine site, by international writers and scholars calling for divestment and boycott ala South Africa, and urging American writers to join up. I see only a few Americans, Amiri Baraka, Ali Abunimah, George Bisharat. An amazing group, if only for the names, few of which have an Anglo ring. We live in a new diverse world. Excerpts:
...Without endorsing its platforms or philosophy, we recognize Hamas as a democratically elected ruling party....
We call upon our fellow writers and academics in the United States to question discourses that justify and rationalize injustice, and to address Israeli assaults on civilians in Gaza as one of the most important moral issues of our time.
We call upon institutions of higher education in the U.S. to cut ties with Israeli academic institutions, dissolve study abroad programs in Israel, and divest institutional funds from Israeli companies, using the 1980s boycott against apartheid South Africa as a model.
[Phil Weiss, with thanks to Idrees Ahmad]
Thanks for that and here's another boycott we can sign:
http://usacbi.wordpress.com/
U.S. Campaign for the Academic & Cultural Boycott of Israel
"Please email us with your full name and institutional affiliation if you are an academic or field if you are a cultural worker and if you fully endorse the Mission Statement of US ACBI Campaign and authorize us to use your name publicly."
uscom4acbi@gmail.com
And here are more comments that the post-site wouldn't let me add to the Letter to Mark Green:
Yes, amazing letter, Phil, that asks everything we long to know, everything that has been "unspeakable" until you created this site.
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And, Mr. W., what a disheartening possibility. I've been aching about Mamet's "conversion" ever since he announced it, too.
I could only wonder whether he had written so insistently about con artists that he succumbed to the biggest con of all: that we Gentiles are out to get him, when we've only ever admired his work. And, by extension, Mamet assumes that we want to "destroy" Israel when we've only asked that it behave like any other nation: negotiate in good faith, consent to agreed borders, and recompense Palestinians as well as German Jews have been compensated for losses.
For a witty assessment of Mamet's paranoia that Gentiles may turn into piranha ready to chomp, see Michael J. Smith's "Wooly Mamet":
http://www.counterpunch.org/smith04012008.html
"Still, unmotivated and implausible as it is, the postulate has proven useful. The relentless campaign to legitimize the state of Israel has lately leaned on it very heavily–the point being that no matter how comfortable, and prosperous, and at-home Jews may seem to be in New York, or Miami, or Los Angeles, nevertheless there beats in every Gentile breast the heart of a Cossack. And so the homeland away from home may someday come in handy. Not that you would ever want to go there unless you had to–but you might have to. These shgutzim, you never know….
"He's saying very mean things about us dangerous goyim –in our hearing! To our very face! How are we expected to react?
Now Gentiles aren't a group–just a pseudo-category encoding a negation. We're the set of humans who are not elements of the set of Jews. There's no Gentile history to celebrate, no Gentile food to cook, no Gentile pride to bristle, no Gentile lobby to swing into action. But even so, as individuals, we Gentiles all fall under the shadow of Mamet's condemnation. We're all supposed to be potential Cossacks. We're all individually insulted by Mamet's fundamental axiom. And if you prick me, do I not bleed?"
http://www.counterpunch.org/smith04012008.html
Mamet himself on "Bigotry Pins Blame on the Jews"
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-mamet/bigotry-pins-blame-on-jew_b_26966.html
Mamet is probably just remembering his history. Germany was the most civilized nation on earth at one time, then devolved.
Great stuff Susie, thank you.
Mr. Weiss, Haunani Kay-Trask (Hawai'ian) and Andrea Smith, two of the signatories, are also American. Both are scholars and activists whose work deals with the history of indigenous peoples in the U.S.
I resent the terms "Gentile" and "goy." I do not think they should be used. They are racial epithets, and it insults everyone to be so lumped together.
Cutting ties with Israeli academia is the stupidest manner of dissent I can imagine.
If you are trying to get a country to change its views, INHIBITING dialog with other countries is one way to keep attitudes the same.
That's rubbish, Richard. As I said on the last occasion you made this inane appeal to 'dialog', there is nothing left to 'dialog' about, because we already know every tedious and neurotic detail of every variant of the jewish israeli mindset. In any case, we are not interested in "getting Israel to change its views", we are interested in over-riding its views.
Susie.
Thanks. I missed that. He captures how I felt about Mamet's book when it came out. Only he was kinder. (Michael Smith's site link to stopmebeforeivoteagain.org
is fun as well.)
Did Vermont do that to Mamet? Did someone tick him off at the village hardware? Did some old coot use the word Jooz in a bad joke the way he also uses Micks, Wops, Slits, and Niggers to be the life of the party?
How is it that Jews are not to blame for a single thing that ever happened to them for 2,000 years? I dont comprehend the positioning. It's like listening to a kid from age 3 to 6 whining every day and all day that everyone hates him and everybody wants to hurt me. At the end of three years you want to pull your hair out and shout 'Shut up'.
This Michael Smith paragraph:
What would Mamet do with Phil?
P.S. Susie. Copy your comment before you post, then if it wont accept it, refresh the page, then re-paste. I find it's a time thing.
In any case, we are not interested in "getting Israel to change its views", we are interested in over-riding its views.
Posted by: Rowan | January 29, 2009 at 02:35 AM
What an interesting viewpoint. Rowan also feels that it is okay for Jews to be slaves. I think Rowan is out for revenge for being turned down by a good looking Jewish woman.
see what I mean about amateur psychoanalysis, folks? I think I blame Fromm's ghastly anodyne "Fear of Freedom". That book was seminal, in some rotting sense.
Imagine if some famous (in literary circles only) American gentile playwright wrote a book wherein you immediately get to read the platform sentence: All Jews hate all gentiles.
The entire book is a rant against those non-jews who've dared to
question the author's new found bipolar POV and his one-sided contextual view of recorded history.
Amazing how disconnected high intelligence and verbal ability can be from even a modest amount of wisdom and intellectual integrity.
Imagine what Goebbels could've done with Mamet, a gift that would just keep giving, no?
Marilyn Hacker, one of the signatories, is American too. She also signed the recent Magnes Zionist/Tikkun Olam statement.
Or, how about, Israel is Rhodesia?
Remind me again, how is that working out for all concerned?
You have a very interesting blog. What is your background?