Abunimah is a prophet without honor in his parents’ land

by on December 7, 2009 14

Pulse has posted an interview with Ali Abunimah that was conducted by a reporter for Haaretz, Rehaviya Berman, several weeks ago. Haaretz did not run the interview, and Berman then published it on his blog (once again demonstrating the importance of the internet in degrading consensus-building media). It’s a great interview. It reveals Abunimah as a generational leader among Palestinians and Palestinian-Americans, it openly discusses Abunimah’s personal connection to the Nakba through his parents’ experience, and its apparent suppression speaks to the incredible fear that even liberal left Jews/Israelis have about anti-Zionism. We wrote a week or so back that Abunimah is marginalized in the western press. It’s true for Israel too. 

About Philip Weiss

Philip Weiss is Founder and Co-Editor of Mondoweiss.net.
Posted in Beyondoweiss, Israel/Palestine

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

  1. Citizen says:
    December 7, 2009 at 11:14 am

    Who has a more righteous right of return, Dick Witty, or Ali Abunimah?

    • Richard Witty says:
      December 7, 2009 at 11:23 am

      Its not very honest to use my name as a euphemism for anything that Israel does, or any individual within Israel holds as an idea.

      It would be more honest to address my thinking, which means that first you’d have to understand it respectfully.

      • Citizen says:
        December 7, 2009 at 11:28 am

        Oh, you don’t think Israel has a right to exist as a safe haven for Jews the world over?
        Pardon me; I didn’t know that. Let us know when you declare Israel has no right
        to issue an insurance policy using Palestinian homes as collateral.

      • Chaos4700 says:
        December 7, 2009 at 11:29 am

        Notice how Witty evades the question? That’s all the answer we need.

      • Donald says:
        December 7, 2009 at 11:27 pm

        “t would be more honest to address my thinking, which means that first you’d have to understand it respectfully.”

        Okay, this is worth delurking to say. You want respect? Follow your own advice. You don’t engage serious criticisms of your thought and you ignore or sidestep facts and arguments that you are unable to refute. Sometimes you simply accuse people of being supporters of Hamas. You want respect, but you treat everyone else like idiots. Treating people with respect means listening to their arguments, acknowledging their points, admitting when you don’t have a good reply to a given argument. You don’t do this. You aren’t always treated fairly either, but in many cases that’s because people have lost all patience with your behavior.

  2. Richard Witty says:
    December 7, 2009 at 11:34 am

    Abunimah’s message changes. In this interview, his description of “right” of return for Palestinians was described as almost token.

    I personally advocate, here and elsewhere for a repeal of the 1950′s laws that created the exclusion of Palestinian former residents of Israel from their day in court to defend their property and residence rights.

    It is certainly late and then only applies to the very small minority of refugee Palestinians from that time that are still living.

    It would not apply to a national basis for all descendants of return to a general area. I get the irony of the Balzer slide from a couple weeks ago.

    In other locales, he speaks of the right of return in far more sweeping and general terms that amount to an intentional stacked deck to create an angry Palestinian majority in the region from river to sea.

    I personally consider the partitioned state as more democratic currently than the single-state proposal, which I consider barely democratic, given the strong national sentiments of both populations.

    Even though Northern Ireland violence is greatly reduced, Northern Ireland is not part of the Irish Republic, which as an island would be a more rational basis of jurisdiction, with groups that speak the same native language and share culture.

    Neither South Africa, nor Northern Ireland are parallel situations.

  3. Citizen says:
    December 7, 2009 at 2:42 pm

    Yes, this is the Dick Witty take on events. Pals need to forget and give up, e.g., the right of the right of return, while Dick keeps his Israeli insurance policy collatorised by US farm boys and our whore congress.

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