Kerry says a few words for Palestinians at AIPAC–and what is the sound of one hand clapping?

by on May 5, 2009 33


When he called for a two-state solution now, when he came down on settlement expansion, there was just a smattering of applause for John Kerry at AIPAC today. Settlements "empower the enemies of peace in the region," Kerry said. And as Matt Duss wrote on Twitter, "Crickets." Just a handful of applauders when he called for "freedom of movement" in the West Bank. This group knows that Israel has turned right, and they are moving with Israel.

About Philip Weiss

Philip Weiss is Founder and Co-Editor of Mondoweiss.net.
Posted in Israel Lobby, Settlers/Colonists

{ 33 comments... read them below or add one }

  1. LeaNder says:
    May 5, 2009 at 10:27 am

    what is the sound of one hand clapping?

    Funny, I had that line in mind, when I wrote my last note. Applause dies down when the two-state-solution is mentioned.

  2. American says:
    May 5, 2009 at 10:40 am

    I am curious to know how many of the six milion jews in the US support AIPAC.

    Has AIPAC published any info on how many individual members they have?

  3. 5 dancing shlomos says:
    May 5, 2009 at 2:15 pm

    '"Settlements "empower the enemies of peace"' would these "enemies of peace" be the palestinians fighting against jewish invaders to protect their homes, land, and lives?

  4. 5 dancing shlomos says:
    May 5, 2009 at 2:27 pm

    …and what is the resulting sound of one jew saying, "ISRAEL HAS NO RIGHT TO EXIST" …and what is the resulting sound of jews joining the human race

  5. Harry Fenton says:
    May 5, 2009 at 3:28 pm

    When you say "this group knows that Israel has turned right, and they are moving with Israel", you say it without context. People don't applaud Kerry because removal of settlements in Gaza and withdrawal from Lebanon has produced dangerous conditions for Israel in Gaza and Southern Lebanon. The restriction on movement in the WB has prevented the glut of suicide bombings that occurred prior to the tightening of control and their is no reasonable method put forth by Kerry to prevent the terror, other than some airy hope that the Conquest party (Fatah) in the WB will prevent it. As for settlements, most people in the room are more than willing to remove the Women In Green type settlements, but the removal of the larger settlements that are more akin to suburban communities of Israeli cities (and the prevention of their growth) has very little support and is unreasonable to focus on in light of no real impetus for peace and safety on the Palestinian side. Also, the absolute linkage of a "solution" to this problem that has been lingering unresolved for 32 years, to dealing with the situation in Iran, seems to be either disingenuous or ill-informed. And have they or Israel really turned "right"? Are they or Israel supporting anti-gay, anti-woman or race-baiting legislation? You really mean that they have turned more hawkish and have lost any real hope that Palestinians or Syria or Iran have any interest in meaningful peace – one that would stop bloodshed. They have even less hope that there will be an economic peace after the cold-peace situation with Egypt and Jordan. So, by and large, the AIPAC audience and the Israelis are to the left in the social sense of the word (most Jews who support Israel voted for Obama and Kerry and Gore), but in their view of the dangers of the world being perpetrated by Islamist fascists, they are hawkish. But even there, it is unclear whether they are "to the right" unless you view fascist movements such as Hamas, Hezbullah and the Iranian Mullah Rule as "leftist" movements akin to National Socialism, Stalinism and Chavezism. To do that, however, you would need to define FDR, JFK, and LBJ as "rightists".

  6. Citizen says:
    May 5, 2009 at 4:19 pm

    Hey, what's left after Harmon declares she is a crusader for Israel & the USA constitution? Neutered Newt knows the ball-less score. So does, see daily, Chris of Hardball. Actually, soft-ball to the extreme.

  7. RowanBerkeley says:
    May 5, 2009 at 4:51 pm

    If he uses that sort of apologetic phraseology ("empower the enemies of peace"), naturally they will take it as a sign of weakness, and ignore him, if not despise him outright. These are people who genuinely admire strength, in thought, word & deed.

  8. Declan in Ireland says:
    May 5, 2009 at 5:03 pm

    Kerry visited Gaza and clearly after his recent comments at AIPAC he will now have to be re-programmed again. btw, many thanks for your reports from inside the AIPAC spy, I mean policy Conference:)

  9. tommy says:
    May 5, 2009 at 5:27 pm

    The only confrontation Kerry is able to muster are with pro-choice advocates. Kerry empowers enemies of progressives.

  10. Jaffr says:
    May 5, 2009 at 5:35 pm

    You can view a video of Kerry's 28-minute speech here: http://www.aipac.org/about_AIPAC/Learn_About_AIPA... The Senator spent nearly the whole time flattering AIPAC and framing the dispute entirely from the Israeli side. Kerry mentioned only briefly and very timidly that the West Bank settlements are a problem and suggesting (you could see him tensing up in preparation!) that Israel might contribute to the peace process by “freezing settlement activity” – an obligation they have already agreed to under the “Roadmap” but ostentatiously ignored. AIPAC omitted even those remarks from its video highlights of Kerry’s speech: http://www.aipac.org/about_AIPAC/Learn_About_AIPA...

  11. DICKERSON3870 says:
    May 5, 2009 at 6:48 pm

    RE: "When he [Kerry] called for a two-state solution now, when he came down on settlement expansion…" MY COMMENT: That was very ballsy!

  12. DICKERSON3870 says:
    May 5, 2009 at 6:53 pm

    RE: "AIPAC omitted even those remarks from its video highlights of Kerry’s speech" MY COMMENT: Actions speak louder than words. AIPAC does not truly support a two-state solution!

  13. Citizen says:
    May 5, 2009 at 8:38 pm

    Kerry is not going to upset his own wonderful apple cart. He's like the frat boy who gives the brutalized newbie a band aid to cover the gaping hole. He scuttles back to his home, a castle by any standard American measure. He's not even doing a pimple on the very small back of what he did for the USA by his protests against USA Vietnam policy back in the day. OTH, next to Shrub he's a hero. That's like Israel apologists constantly telling us we are anti-semites because we talk of Israeli policy rather rather than Saudi Arabian or Egyptian policy. As if we have a "special relationship" with them.

  14. Marion says:
    May 5, 2009 at 8:43 pm

    What a bunch hogwash….Since Israel didn't take anyone's wise advice to end the occupation and stop stealing more and more lands, they must now lie in the bed that they've made for themselves, or they can remake their bed by first becoming honest with themselves concerning their actions which brought them to their present state….

  15. Marion says:
    May 5, 2009 at 8:47 pm

    The Power of Nightmares – Part I Baby It’s Cold Outside” In the past our politicians offered us dreams of a better world. Now they promise to protect us from nightmares. The most frightening of these is the threat of an international terror network. But just as the dreams were not true, neither are these nightmares. http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/video103...

  16. Shafiq says:
    May 5, 2009 at 9:16 pm

    That video is compulsory viewing in many UK University politics courses

  17. Citizen says:
    May 5, 2009 at 10:20 pm

    @ Harry "Irv Goldstein" Fenton You miss a really important fact: it was the jews who invaded the land formerly known as the Palestine Mandate. It's not chicken and egg for anyone who wants to look at history with an objective eye. Further, what did the average Palestinian muslim or christian in the mandate have to do with what happened to jews in Europe from 1942 to '45? Start there, please, unless you want reasonable people who visit this blog to dismiss you as a mere hasbara agent sans IQ.

  18. Chris Berel says:
    May 5, 2009 at 10:39 pm

    Wouldn't be. Because they aren't.

  19. Chrisberel says:
    May 5, 2009 at 10:43 pm

    You missed an even more important fact: The Jews did not invade the land formerly known as the Palestine mandate. What did the average non-jewish palestinian have to do with what happened to jews in Europe from (1933)1942 to '45? The same that the average non-jewish European had to do with what happened to jews in Europe from (1933)1942 to '45. It's started. Learn to live with the truth.

  20. Ed says:
    May 5, 2009 at 11:11 pm

    "These are people who genuinely admire strength, in thought, word & deed." These Socialist-Racists admire strength in thought, word and deed? No. They admire fellow rats who infiltrate the State and use it on behalf of their own subversive and sinister agenda. Subversion, secrecy and sabotage, which is what the average Zionist-owned Washington politico is all about today, isn't a sign of strength, but rather a sign of a ignobility and craven fraud. And in an upside down world, which is what the Zionist-infected West has become, rats rule.

  21. Jim Haygood says:
    May 5, 2009 at 11:40 pm

    Here's what some of them 'non-Jewish Europeans' have to say today about getting nailed with ersatz Holomacaust guit by the sorry likes of Chris Berel. From Haaretz — ———— A torrent of anti-Semitic epithets met Israel's ambassador to Spain, Rafi Shotz, Saturday evening as he walked home from a Real Madrid-Barcelona soccer match in the Spanish capital. Shotz said the three perpetrators, patrons of a pub, shouted slurs like "Jewish dog" and "dirty Jew" until they were driven off by Spanish police escorting Shotz. Shotz and his partner Michal chose to walk from Madrid's Santiago Bernabeu Stadium to their nearby home. Three patrons of a pub noticed the ambassador, whom they apparently recognized from having seen him on television. In a wire report Shotz sent the Foreign Ministry in Jerusalem under the heading "Anti-Semitism – a personal testimony," Shotz wrote the perpetrators stood mere meters from him, shouting slurs like "Jewish dog," "dirty Jew" and others "which cannot appear in print." Spain has seen an upsurge in anti-Israel sentiment in recent years, fueled by critical media reports about Israel Defense Forces operations in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, including Operation Cast Lead earlier this year. http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1083065.html —————– Unlike repressed Americans, Spaniards have seen fascism up close and personal, and aren't inhibited about speaking their minds. A Spanish judge is investigating some of the Israeli Cast Lead perpetrators as war criminals. Let's hope that as a result, they lose their ability to travel to the civilized world.

  22. American says:
    May 6, 2009 at 12:06 am

    Oh please…! If I had a dime for every time you little zionist tried to use the …" but we jews are liberals! ..as an excuse for your jewish Nazism I could pay off the national debt. . No one cares whether you are"left or right"…you're f' ing zionist nazis., common thiefs, cowards , a bunch of welfare con artist with your hands in every pocket you can pick, and killers of women and children…and the world's longest running and loudest whinners.

  23. Jacobwolfen says:
    May 6, 2009 at 3:59 am

    I understand that israel is demanding that the Spanish court investigate some of the high level Spaniards involved in war crimes in Serbia.

  24. MRW says:
    May 6, 2009 at 4:23 am

    I agree with Marion. Hogwash. Israel created their circumstances by their choices. Intoning on the character of what they've now created does not absolve it of responsibility. Which, of course, has never been an Israeli strong suit.

  25. MRW says:
    May 6, 2009 at 4:25 am

    Makes you wonder how many of the vaunted 6,500 were there for the same reasons Phil and Adam were.

  26. MRW says:
    May 6, 2009 at 4:27 am

    Kerry was there to deliver a message from the Admin. As I wrote on the Biden thread re Biden's comments:

    It was no gaffe, Peaceful_Idiot. He was sent to deliver the message. So was Kerry. Remember Emanuel's highly-publicized message to a 'leading Jewish leader' two weeks ago. Rahm Emanuel told an (unnamed) Jewish leader; "In the next four years there is going to be a permanent status arrangement between Israel and the Palestinians on the basis of two states for two peoples, and it doesn't matter to us at all who is prime minister."

  27. Shafiq says:
    May 6, 2009 at 10:14 am

    Tu Quoque If some Spaniards are guilty if war-crimes, how does that de-legitimise their right to investigate Israeli war-crimes?

  28. Chloe says:
    May 6, 2009 at 2:14 pm

    read this article below, then read some of the comments. http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/... The comments show the absolute contempt for any US position that opposes a 2-state solution.

  29. Citizen says:
    May 6, 2009 at 4:41 pm

    Yeah, I remember seeing documentaries of all those Palestinian death camp guards and special operations troops populating the Third Reich occupied lands during that period. Saw lots of camels amid the panzer support troops too. PS: The respective population number of Jews as compared to Arabs in the Palestinian Mandate on the timeline from 1890 through the present. I guess that land was invaded by Martians?

  30. able says:
    May 7, 2009 at 12:46 am

    To say the Palestinians are…..well stuck is a good word for it but would be such an understatement. They hav been building the settlements and wall for their own demise loosing more and more villages and more and more innocent people,,,,whom when they've reacted to the aparthied invasion and occupation of their farms and villages and fishing comminities and little of a resemblence of any beauty in the surrounding scenes as more and more is left destroyed bringing the fight with what ever they have (rockets and suicide for the destitute) all the same tactics as the invaders and are not going to win when aipac roll call is 1/3 of every branch of the USA government.

  31. able says:
    May 7, 2009 at 12:55 am

    israel would have had peace had they spent the few million it cost to print the in and make the money for reparations to the 18 million + whom have been …for lack of a better word persecuted by a genocidal cult whom has disinfranchised good honest jews and forever tarnished what could have been two cousins ( Palestinians and jews) breaking bread accross the tables from one another and living peacefully in the two separate states..it makes me wonder why they didn't want to waste the few million to prints the money but chose to me murderous and so many years ..not just a few 60+ years, and to blindly lead the public with the lies and misknowmers of the resistance as terrorism or why ham ass wouldn't accept , so to make sure no one good is there they bring in the BGUNS to hold down and train and make real terrorist out of a once group who was loyal to each other now doomed to have a civil war itself ..just as jordan and others just another group just another ruler to control the already shell shocked people force to build their own concentration camp…and like it !!

  32. able says:
    May 7, 2009 at 1:12 am

    there is settlements being exspanded daily and more rights being (what right?) taken away. along with the destruction and murder by the genocidal taliban settlers who if they get deprogrammed into reality would and should still face with other crimes against humanity charges along with all the us branches of government…you would think the us public could be stupid however they are dumber than a doorknob evidentually. really something that the galaxtic equanox and 2012 predictions co inside with the nostral dombas and what will all the right winged talibans think..what will their faces exprssion say? when and if a g-d says, " you told them you where "chosen"and could murder in my name"? needless to say ..No. so did they whom are so fevrored in the need to do "g-ds will" really doing it for g-d or themselves?

  33. able says:
    May 7, 2009 at 1:19 am

    Is this new world order what israel is to j street and aipac and the thousands of groups and organizations linked just for the 3-5% 1/3 of each of the branches of government numerous state and local levels and there is a decrease as they put it in the last five – ten years …go figure. Maybe there is something to all the sightings and interest with the costal properties. With americans and the world in general this stupid not to notice is so bizzare like they all took a stupis pill .rome and the fall…here we go again

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