If you assume, as I do, that it is important to convert Jews to being critics of Israel, because Jews have more power over policymaking than anybody else, the question becomes, How do you do so? How do you convey to Jews what Israel has become?
Don’t ask me. I’ve failed at this task again and again. I’m more emotional than logical, my Zionist friends are all angry at me, and the other night I got into an argument with Marion Dreyfus at a party. I heard my voice rising, a sure sign that I was getting nowhere.
Here is one answer, Hazel Kahan’s report on Susan Nathan, author of The Other Side of Israel, which documents the second-class citizenship of fully 20 percent of the Israeli population (a much larger percentage, I would note, than blacks in the United States before the civil rights movement). Nathan has lived among Israeli Palestinians for years, and she advocates a thoughtful method of breaking through to Jews about the reality of life in Israel.
Since the publication of her book, Ms. Nathan has spoken at numerous events in Europe, where she reports that awareness and information levels among Europeans have increased considerably and continue to grow. At the same time, her energetic public presence have transformed how she sees her role as an activist:
There’s a huge division now coming between Jews who’ve understood the reality of Israel and what’s going on here and those who’ve yet to understand the reality of what’s going on here, who can’t accept it and find it very frightening and threatening. My role is not to continue to bash away at Israel how terrible Israel is…it’s very important I’ve realized by being in Europe to show compassion towards Jews who are not yet able to accept that this country has turned out to be the way it is; it’s very frightening actually to see Israel the way that it really is. My own position has started to evolve to understand you can’t frighten people into accepting the reality here…It’s important to acknowledge and understand that I was once in their position…I was very much the victim of the Zionist education which hundreds of thousands of people around the world…but the Zionist position is weakening…
Instead of the ‘barrage’ that characterized her earlier public presentations, Susan now prefers ‘fierce criticism of our people mixed with compassion’:
I’ve changed how I present (my argument): I’m far less aggressive but at the same time I’m far more dangerous…I have a far better view of what’s going on..that’s the only way you can get Jews to take on board what’s happening here…a continuous barrage of criticism will not make the changes we need. I’m very fiercely critical but I’m also very compassionate. It’s very difficult for people to accept that everything they’ve based their life on has been based on a sandcastle which is now being swept away by a wave.
