Jasmin Ramsey at Pulse:
I sat down with a group of Jewish Canadians who were conversing about
Israel’s current government. They agreed that while there are not many
significant differences between the actions of parties like Kadima and
Likud when it comes to the Palestinians, there is also a positive side
to having a conservative like Benyamin Netanyahu as Prime Minister.
This is because he projects a more accurate version of the ruling elite
in Israel to the world. Unlike someone like Tzipi Livni, who
would implement Israel’s discriminatory, oppressive policies against
the Palestinians while nodding and smiling as though she were a willing
member of the current so-called Israeli/Palestinian peace process,
Netanyahu has found it more difficult to hide his intolerance for those
who oppose his policies.
You might call this the great awakening in Jewish life, brought on by Gaza/Netanyahu/Lieberman and now Max Blumenthal's viral video. Jews are being shown the extremist faces of Israel, and they're shocked. Are these faces aberrations? No. This is the crisis I have been pushing since powerful neocons plotted the Iraq war disaster as an alternative to the peace process.
And: for those who insist that Blumenthal captured only American yokels in Jerusalem, consider that former American yokels, Dore Gold, Ron Dermer and Michael Oren, are Netanyahu's braintrust. Who are these Jews who are called to Israel? And what is it doing to Jewish identity? Put another way, How many good Jewish liberals who voted for Obama would sign up for Oren's message about the demographic threat to the Jewish state posed by Arab birthrates?
<img src="link to electronicintifada.net
Perhaps dismayed by the cabinet’s decision to reject Lieberman’s ‘loyalty oath’ proposal, Jewish communities in the central Galilee are taking matters into their own hands.
The left's approach of condemnation is not a better mousetrap than what you criticize. And that is because it dismisses the other rather than weighs the other. Two things can be true, and a rational choice and commitment still undertaken. The demographic issue is a reality for Israel as Israel. To ignore it is the immature and self-censoring approach. Awareness of the issue does not compel a reactionary conclusion, but ignoring a critical issue would.. Make a BETTER ARGUMENT. Jews that go to Israel include a VARIETY of perspectives and value systems.
It took a red-baiter like Nixon to make effective negotiations with China; no liberal could have done what Nixon did, and I suppose that is now Netanyahu? Or at least, pushed by Obama, Israel's opportunity? He can make the medicine go down the AIPAC jewish diaspora and Israeli Jews need? BTW, the Jewish settlers have the highest birthrate ("natural expansion") in the world other than one or two African states.
The right's approach has been condemnation for decades, fully supported by the USA superpower and in a myriad of most practical ways, all to Israel's right wing's high benefit. Why do you always overlook the imbalance of power, especially over so many decades, Witty? Speaking in terms of moderation, you are most immoderate. You consistently ignore the most critical issue, which is reality, not the symmetry of pleasant ideas spun in an ivory tower.
How many good American and Canadian Jewish liberals did I meet in Israel who supported what Israel was doing? Every Canadian or American Jew I met in Israel would be considered a liberal, and they all supported Israel, with the exception of one guy from New Jersey who was staying with relatives in Israel due to "legal problems back in the States." To be honest, most Israelis I met came off as PEPs. Who's being fooled here? Are we supposed to believe that the people who have overwhelmingly supported Israel for 60 years, and shouted the rest of us down as anti-Semites for even mild criticism, are just now figuring out what it takes to kick people off land and keep them off? Could it be that the same people who keep reminding the rest of us about the Holocaust and man's basic inhumanity really have no clue what inhumanity is? Is that possible? I would call the opinions mentioned a great shifting of blame rather than a great awakening. "Never Again" is sounding very hollow lately!
Richard, if remember correctly, you argued too that the video presented selective voices. As I have argued with somebody else, who made the same charge, that I don't believe the video would have looked like it does, had they met many people saying favorable things about Obama: Now, the JP cites Max on this issue: http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?apage=1&am... In an interview with The Jerusalem Post, Blumenthal, an American documentary filmmaker, defended his video. Asked about its editing, he said that in the two hours of video he collected, "no people were edited out who expressed pro-Obama sentiments." Why did he use the interviewees featured? "These were the most direct responses. I had to make the video watchable," Blumenthal said.
I was going through the comments on the Haaretz article and came across this one: Title:The true face of our community. Name:AviCity: NYCState: NY Sorry guys, Max Blumenthat did not distort the picture regarding Jews and Israel. I grew up in Israel, served in the army, and I now reside in the US. The ugliness shown in this video is shared by many in Israel and the US Jewish community. Most Orthodox Jews share these attitudes, including a deep disdain towards all gentiles. What this video shows is only the tip of the iceberg. One would rightfully ask: Why didn`t Max Blumenthal interview "my aunt Rose from New Jersey who supports peace in the middle east and does not bear eternal hatred towards anyone"? The answer is: The proverbial "Aunt Rose" is irrelevant here because she is not the one killing Palestinians and confiscating their lands. Just as much as "the goog Germans" who did not paticipate in the Holocaust, are irrelevant to the story of the Holocaust. It is the "bad Germans" that are relevant. And in the case of Israel and its mischief, it is "the bad Jews" who matter.
Why not post a video of the iran training shiite militias in iraq and having them commit genocide against sunnis including palestinians in iraq. Iranian diplomats were caught with maps of where to wipe out sunni areas in baghdad. Post a video of them trying all these sunnis in a kangoroo court then mass killing them by drilling holes in them and dumping them out in the streets. Post a video of apartheid in iraq of where the garbage isn't picked up in sunni areas. Why in the world are you obsessed with Israel when the ied era which has spread to afghanistan happened because of iraq. Post videos of sadr's militia going into hospitals and taking sunni patients out of their beds. This is the maliki government we are supporting. How about Max going to afghanistan and posting the pictures of our bombings on village after village with help from the europeans who love to bash israel. How about pictures of iran museums cartoon contest against the holocaust. Or pictures of riots because of a cartoon or what the pope said.
Or how about in Lebanon all jews are marked israelis on their id cards. Or the death to america chants. Or the musuem praising the holocaust in lebanon. How about vidoes of hamas throwing fatah off buildings or blowing up music stores or ymca in gaza. Max could go to gaza and take lots of vidoes of the hamas vs fatah. How about videos of iran and hezbollah recuriting little kids. Or hamas recruting little kids. Mondoweiss a site hitler could be proud of.
We in the world is this site obsessed about israel and not iraq and afghanistan where we have troops based. There were no ied's in iraq and afghanistan before we went there. We have troops dying every day from ied's in both countries and this site is israel, israel, israel not stop. What country do you live in? We are spending over a trillion in iraq and afghanistan and Obama wants to continue the afghanistan IED quagmire and this site is obsessed about israel. 80 percent more ied's this year in afghanistan than last year. But you wouldn't know about it in this site. This site thinks magically that if Israel went away that our troops in afghanistan having ied's happen every day wouldn't happen. Why not talk about the drones in pakistan. Why not talk about this country instead of obsessing about israel all the time. Was this site obsessed with the fighting in sri lanka. Get off the israel obsession it is pathetic.
Ehud Barak the israeli defense minister warned the U.S not to go into Iraq. But what fun would it be to blame if you looked at facts instead of lies. George Bush wasn't jewish last time I recalled. This myth that jews control israel foreign policy. The commander and cheif controls foreign policy and there has never been a jewish president. But why would that stop your conspiracy theories. What to jews get for working for Obama. Look throughout his whole administration you have jews everywhere contributing greatly and instead they get these conspiracy theories about dual citizens and AIPAC. Hitler could have never dreamed of such jewish conspiracies and propaganda as this site loves. Israel isn't why there were hundreds of thousands of IED's against u.s troops in iraq. Israel wasn't why american troops are facing ied's in afghanistan every day.
THERE was never any suicide bombings in afghanistan before the Iraq war and now there are tens of thousands. But this site tries to conflate israel and iraq. Why not conflate iraq and afghistan. Why not ask what our policy is about in afghainstan. Why not ask about bagram prison instead of the same pathetic AIPAC crap. I didn't know Obama was jewish. Why not ask why we declared war on the taliban when they have never attacked us. Why not ask our drone policy in pakistan. Why not ask our policy making all the pashtuns in afghanistan the taliban. No it is far easier for this site to use hitler conspiracies and blame the jews and israel There has got to be pushback against these same old hundred years pathetic conspiracies against jews as this site worships.
How does any of what you said, make the video we saw, less shocking? These aren't ordinary people, they are kids that will grow up to hold influential positions in both the US and Israel. If these are their views, we have little hope for peace in the Middle East.
LOL. Do you think the I/P conflict meant nothing to the extremist Zionist neocons who lied us into war in Iraq? Do you think that Zionist-driven American support of incessant Israeli attacks on Lebanon, including the rape of Beirut, and Israeli creeping ethnic cleansing and colonization had nothing to do with the 9-11 attack which required us to attack Afghanistan? Nice try, James. That hasbara talking point doesn't work anymore. I hope you stick with it, though, and don't try to think up a new one that might be more successful. :)
James, why don't you articulate where this Jew-bashing arises? Are you denying that the Jewish intelligentsia (like Goldberg) were against the Iraq war? That Israeli leaders were not thrilled with the war? That the 'War on Terror' was a gift for Israel? You assume that Israel represents the Jewish people. Or that JEWISHNESS is defined by the most arrogant and obnoxious racists/supremacists in the Jewish community. It's always the same thing though. When it comes to IDENTITY POLITICS which the US facilitates – Jews are not included. WHY? Stop invoking the Holocaust to excuse the Jewish community from the same sociological analysis that is directed towards other groups. This goes without saying, but your response is to just spew an oversimplification of these arguments and make it seem like we're promoting the Protocols. That's YOUR perception and the perception of other ZioCokeheads.
Ehud Barak the israeli defense minister warned the U.S not to go into Iraq. Has anyone ever claimed that Israelis and American neocons and Israeli-firsters speak with one voice? There are factions, James. The extremist Zionist faction in America exemplified by the traitor Paul Wolfowitz pushed the Iraq war onto the already primed fool George Bush. "Ariel Sharon is a man of peace!" Indeed. George Bush isn't Jewish, but he is an extremist Zionist. American neocon traitors were pushing George Bush and the national security establishment for war against Iraq on 9/12. This fact doesn't preclude reticence or even opposition from other Israel-first factions. Many of our people, and a hell of a lot of others, are dead because of American and Israeli extremist Zionists. 'The Israelis were against it!' hasbara talking point isn't working anymore. Try again.
One more thing: We often have Jews or Zionists (it's most likely all Jewish Zionists) come here and angrily straw man everything the blog does. One tactic is to PERSONIFY Israel. So these people will make it seem as though 'Israel' is a person and we're 'obsessed' with it. Kind of like that DVD the Republicans were sending around – 'Obsession: Radical Islam's blah blah blah wants to kill your kids and steal your MTV'. These tactics are so obviously idiotic and infantile. They want to make Israel into a person to simplify ALL the analysis and all the critique that they would not give two shits about if it were directed at, gee I dunno, CHINA or some Arab country. It's not about the ACT of critique. It's not about one standard or a principled argument – it's about Israel's 'Israelness' or in quite obvious in this case, it's JEWISHNESS. So they see Israel as a symbol for JEWS (but it's only THEIR conception of Jewishness) and so criticizing Israel = criticizing Jews and criticizing Jews = antisemitism. So the line: "Why are you so obsessed with Israel!?" is equivalent in stupidity and simple-mindedness as some goon saying defensively: "YO WHY U GOTTA B HATIN" Of course you'd have to abbreviate that as much as possible in the form of text-speak (mobile phones). But yea, this is the level of intellectualism we're dealing with. Jews and Jewishness is off-limits but we're only told this by Jewish Zionists, so they clearly do NOT want people thinking about how ethnic identity and group politics is blah blah blah.
I agree with your call on his personification tactic. I call it 'over-abstraction'. It is a common error in political or social analysis when one abstracts a complex thing like policy opinions among American neocons and Israeli-firsters, and the myriad views of Israeli politicians and security apparatchiks, into a single entity like 'Israel'. Sure there is a substantial overlap of views among the constituents, but there is always variation and claiming that all groups can be labeled or personified as an 'Israeli' voice is nonsense. Sometimes this is done as a legitimate error, and sometimes it is done deliberately as a tool to mislead the unwary. Of course there were a few extremist Zionists who opposed the Iraq war. This minority lost the argument, and the war happened.
In the subsequent interview with Dana, he quoted others that he interviewed as saying after the speech, religious people, "Obama is a prophet." Those strong words. He conducted his interviews in bars after 10 pm in the middle of the week.
Bush, Rumsfeld, Cheney, even Powell were the deciders. Them and Congress that ratified the war powers resolution. They deserve the criticism of ideological isolation. Obama, in contrast, invites those with varying views to contribute, to argue, to weigh in. He still chooses, but it an informed choice, not a self-talk one.
"They agreed that while there are not many significant differences between the actions of parties like Kadima and Likud when it comes to the Palestinians, there is also a positive side to having a conservative like Benyamin Netanyahu as Prime Minister. This is because he projects a more accurate version of the ruling elite in Israel to the world." This is what I've been saying all year. Lieberman is actually even better in this regard than Netanyahu. Israel's fat would really be in the fire if he had won the election, but Israel Beitenu isn't strong enough for that yet. The interview with Alex Miller that Mondoweiss posted yesterday only confirms how deranged these people are, and how completely insensitive they are to how their extremism is perceived around the world. A coalition government of Israel Beitenu with Shas and some other extreme right-wing Israeli parties would have the potential to wreck Israel's image worldwide. Maybe next election…
The Israelis were against it initially only because they wanted the USA to attack Iran before Iraq; when they were convinced attacking Iran would be next as Shrub's obsession with the guy who confronted his Dad was the lever, the Israelis were fully on board. See PNAC.
Witty, please now repeat the names of the foreign policy appointed operatives and essayists who furnished the rhetoric and slanted logic that all those gentile hacks relied on to make their borrowed stovepiped case, which we all know now was total BS. You can begin with Pearl, Abrams, Wolfowitz, Feith, Wurmser–lots more, you know who they are.
Can anyone imagine in a movie more of an agitprop NAZI or Bolshevik party hack than that revealed by Alex Miller? Juxtapose Miller's mentality to the notion of "light to the Gentiles." Miller's like a third rate Eichmann. Talk about the banality of evil. Very depressing.
They were responsible for the ideas. Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Powell, Congress were responsible for the actions.
Thumbs up to this remark of yours, Todd. Astute. "Who's being fooled here? Are we supposed to believe that the people who have overwhelmingly supported Israel for 60 years, and shouted the rest of us down as anti-Semites for even mild criticism, are just now figuring out what it takes to kick people off land and keep them off? Could it be that the same people who keep reminding the rest of us about the Holocaust and man's basic inhumanity really have no clue what inhumanity is? Is that possible?"
You have got to be kidding me. No one needed a Netanyahu, a Lieberman or even a Shimon Peres to help "demonise" what Israel is. It's as if you preferred George W. Bush to be in power because he made things so terrible that it exposed fundamental flaws in the US Empire. Terrible. Zionism was broken, is broken and will still be.
The difference, for those of us in the US, is that each of us is paying for what Israel does to the Palestinians, and that makes us complicit. Since our government is making us complicit, we have a responsibility to do everything we can to try to make them stop.
Exactly. Bush, Rumsfeld and Cheney were just acting out Jewish ideas. QED. Well done, Witty.