Novelists Margaret Atwood and Amitav Ghosh accepted a prize at Tel Aviv University lately and issued a statement rejecting the calls on them not to do so, including from Palestinian students. At Pulse, Robin Yassin-Kassab goes after them. Ouch.
Not only did Atwood and Ghosh choose to accept the cash, they used the occasion to launch a diatribe against the BDS strategy. I didn’t want to publicise their screed by linking to it, but I will, because it makes our argument for us... Ghosh and Atwood imply that the boycott is self-righteous and propagandistic. On the other hand,
"the novel is a creature of nuance: of perhaps, of maybe. It concerns itself, not with gods and demons, but with mortal people, with their flawed characters, their unsatisfactory bodies, their sufferings, their limited and often wrong choices; with the dubiousness of their own actions and the unfairness of their fates. … Writing a novel often requires you to see life through the eyes of those you may not agree with. It is a polyphonic form. It pleads for the complex humanity of all human beings. … Worldwide, novel-writing is under constant pressure, both from political groups who want to co-opt it, and from powerful governments who’d like to silence it. Around the world, novelists have been shot, imprisoned, and exiled for their failure to toe somebody else’s line. But they continue to write stories.”
The tone of wounded nobility intensifies:
"Writers have no armies. They have no militant wings. The list of persecuted writers is long, ancient, and international. We feel we must defend the diminishing open space in which dialogue, exchange, and relatively free expression are still possible.”
...On the surface, to someone with little experience of life and of the abuses of language, the freedom rhetoric sounds admirable. But the assumptions on which the rhetoric rests are thoroughly dishonest. Who in Palestinian civil society or the international BDS movement is calling for an attack on ‘polyphony’ or pluralism? Surely the battle against Zionism and for civil rights is a battle on behalf of pluralism, for a plural Palestine-Israel built on equality. Does acting against the seige, the ethnic cleansing, the apartheid mean not seeing things through the eyes of those you disagree with? Atwood opposed South African apartheid – did this result in an inability and unwillingness to understand the fears and hopes of white South Africans? Would a boycott of Nazi Germany have signalled an unreasoning, narrow-minded hatred of Germans?
Or is it that certain racisms, certain colonial-settler projects, are more acceptable than others?
Appallingly, our two heroes associate themselves with writers who have been shot, imprisoned and exiled. In the context, this is analogous to Nixon identifying with a napalm victim. Have Ghosh-Atwood not heard of the millions of Palestinians in exile, in refugee camps, among them many writers?
Good for Atwood and Ghosh. Good for PEN.
“the sword is mightier than the pen”???
I think they are saying ” you can’t censor me”.
I think they are saying ” you can’t censor me”.
What’s stopping you from following your own suggestions to others, Witty? Cowardice or hypocrisy?
>> I think they are saying ” you can’t censor me”.
Oh, go piss down your leg, Witty. No one is trying to censor Atwood. You know that as well as I.
Your hypocrisy is easily manifested by the following mind experiment: Would Atwood receive a price from a Hamas-approved organization? And if she didn’t, (and if she didn’t, that’s fair enough), would anyone suggest she had censored herself?
Of course not.
Go piss down your leg, Witty. Pick up needlecraft or something.
You have to be the most banal person ever to grace a discussion group.
Here is the letter sent to Atwood. She “claims” not to have received it.
Quote:
An Open Letter to Margaret Atwood from Gaza: Don’t Stand on the Wrong Side of History
Dear Ms. Atwood,
We are students from Gaza representing more than 10 academic institutions therein. Our grandparents are refugees who were expelled from their homes in the 1948 Nakba. They still have their keys locked up in their closets and will pass them on to their children, our parents. Many of us have lost our fathers, some of us have lost our mothers, and some of us lost both in the last Israeli aggression against civilians in Gaza. Others still lost a body part from the flesh-burning white phosphorous that Israel used, and are now permanently physically challenged. Most of us lost our homes, and are now living in tents, as Israel refuses to allow basic construction materials into Gaza. And most of all, we are all still living in what has come to be a festering sore on humanity’s conscience – the brutal, hermetic, medieval siege that Israel is perpetrating against us, the 1.5 million Palestinians of the Gaza Strip.
Many of us have encountered your writing during our university studies. Although your books are not available in Gaza – because Israel does not allow books, paper, and other stationary in – we are familiar with your leftist, feminist, overtly political writing. And most of all, we are aware of your strong stance against apartheid. You admirably supported sanctions against apartheid South Africa and called for resistance against all forms of oppression.
Now, we have heard that you are to receive a prize this spring at Tel Aviv University (TAU). We, the students of besieged Gaza, urge you not to go. As our professors, teachers and anti-apartheid comrades used to tell us, there was no negotiation with the brutal racist regime of South Africa. Nor was there much communication. Just one word: BOYCOTT. You must be aware that Israel was a sister state to the apartheid regime before 1994. Many South African anti-apartheid heroes, including Nelson Mandela and Archbishop Desmond Tutu, have described Israel’s oppression as apartheid. Some describe Israeli settler-colonialism and occupation as surpassing apartheid’s evil. F-16s, F-15s, F-35s, Apache helicopters, Merkava tanks, and white phosphorous were not used against black townships.
Ms. Atwood, in the Gaza concentration camp, students who have been awarded scholarships to universities abroad are prevented, every year, from pursuing their hard-earned opportunity for academic achievement. Within the Gaza Strip, those seeking an education are limited by increasing poverty rates and a scarcity of fuel for transportation, both of which are direct results of Israel’s medieval siege. What is TAU’s position vis-à-vis this form of illegal collective punishment, described by Richard Falk, the UN Special Rapporteur on Palestinian Human Rights in the Occupied Territories, as a “prelude to genocide?” Not a single word of condemnation has been heard from any Israeli academic institution!
Participating in normal relations with Tel Aviv University is giving tacit approval to its racially exclusive policy toward Palestinian citizens of Israel. We are certain you would hate to support an institution that upholds so faithfully the apartheid system of its state. Tel Aviv University has a long and well-documented history of collaboration with the Israeli military and intelligence services. This is particularly shameful after Israel’s bloody military assault against the occupied Gaza Strip, which, according to leading international and local human rights organizations, left over 1,440 Palestinians dead and 5380 injured. We are certain you would hate to support an institution that supports a military apparatus that murdered over 430 children.
By accepting the prize at Tel Aviv University, you will be indirectly giving a slight and inadvertent nod to Israel’s policy of ethnic cleansing and genocide. This university has refused to commemorate the destroyed Palestinian village on which it was built. That village is called Sheikh Muwanis, and it no longer exists as a result of Israel’s confiscation. Its people have been expelled.
Let us remember the words of Archbishop Desmund Tutu: “if you choose to be neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.” As such, we call upon you to say no to neutrality, no to being on the fence, no to normalization with apartheid Israel, not after the blood of more than 400 children has been spilt! No to occupation, repression, settler colonialism, settlement expansion, home demolition, land expropriation and the system of discrimination against the indigenous population of Palestine, and no to the formation of Bantustans in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip!
Just as every citizen knew that s/he had a moral responsibility to boycott apartheid in South Africa after the Sharpeville massacre, Gaza 2009 was the world’s wake-up call. All of Israel’s academic institutions are state-run and state-funded. To partake of any of their prizes or to accept any of their blandishments is to uphold their heinous political actions. Israel has continually violated international law in defiance of the world. It is illegally occupying Palestinian land. It continues its aggression against the Palestinian people. Israel denies Palestinians all of the democratic liberties it so proudly, fictitiously flaunts. Israel is an apartheid regime that denies Palestinian refugees their right of return as sanctioned by UN resolution 194.
Attending the symposium would violate the unanimously endorsed Palestinian civil society call for Boycotts, Divestments, and Sanctions (BDS) against Israel. This call is also directed toward international activists, artists, and academics of conscience, such as you. We are certain that you would love to be a part of the noble struggle against the apartheid, colonization and occupation that the Palestinian people have been subjected to for the past 61 years, a struggle that is ongoing.
Ms. Atwood, we consider you to be what the late Edward Said called an “oppositional intellectual.” As such, and given our veneration of your work, we would be both emotionally and psychologically wounded to see you attend the symposium. You are a great woman of words, of that we have no doubt. But we think you would agree, too, that actions speak louder than words. We all await your decision.
Besieged Gaza
The Palestinian Students’ Campaign for the Academic Boycott of Israel (PSCABI)
Endorsed by The University Teachers’ Association in Palestine
Everytime one mentions the comparison between Nazism and the current Jewish actions in Israel, the argument advocating the cause of Palestinians is automatically defeated and the mind of readers who read European history closed on the following major grounds:
1) The Jews in Europe, in 1940s are citizens of Germany under the Nazi rule; and they without argument recognizes whole heartedly the Nazi government;
2) The Jews have no preceding political conflict, or acts of war against the Nazi government;
3) In absence of declared war by Jewish militant groups, the Nazi government reactions were primarily offensive, based to destroy all the prejudged ‘social parasites’ (even without formal indictment) in the German society such as the Jews, Gypsies, Communists, etc.
I this present Palestinian- Jewish conflict the situation is totally contrast;
1) The Palestinians are not Israel citizen an that they rejected the recognition of the state of Israel;
2) The Palestinians where previously involved in acts of war or war of attrition against the Israel government.
3) In presence of declared war by Palestinian militant groups, the Israeli government reaction were primarily defensive; intended to uphold and protect the sovereignty of the state of Israel.
There is a larger context to what you say, zamaaz.
David Ben-Gurion to Nahum Goldman before he died:
“I don’t understand your optimism.,” Ben-Gurion declared. “Why should the Arabs make peace? If I was an Arab leader I would never make terms with Israel. That is natural: we have taken their country. Sure, God promised it to us, but what does that matter to them? Our God is not theirs. We come from Israel, it’s true, but two thousand years ago, and what is that to them? There has been anti-Semitism the Nazis, Hitler, Auschwitz, but was that their fault? They only see one thing: we have come here and stolen their country. Why should they accept that?” (The Jewish Paradox by Nahum Goldman, p. 99)
There is good and just reason why the Palestinians pass the keeys to their former homes to each generation.
In 1948, Zionists forced over 800,000 Palestinians from their homeland by ethnically cleansing 500+ Palestinian villages. To date, Israel has prevented the return of approximately six million Palestinian refugees, who have either been expelled or displaced. This catastrophe, the Nakba, is commemorated every year on May 15.
This year to remember the Nakba, activity is planned around the world, for example in Washington, DC., a collaborative resistence effort in which participants will sail the Potomac in solidarity with the Free Gaza Flotilla sailing on May 24th to end the siege of Gaza. July 9, 2010 will mark 5 years since the Palestinian call for Boycotts, Divestments, and Sanctions against Israel. The successes and milestones in these 5 years prove that BDS is the non-violent means to fight back against Israeli oppression, to pressure fair-minded humans everywhere for Israel to lift the seige of Gaza.
.
Posts like this are nauseating. If you take up arms against a regime that enacts violent segregation, that totally proves they were right to segregate you. Anyway, I’m going to go down the list tic by tic:
1) Wrong; Jews were stripped of Reich citizenship in the Nuremburg acts and in the territories annexed to the Reich in no way were the Jews, Polish or any one else granted citizenship. I don’t know how you got the idea Jews “recognized” the Nazi government, either. Mayhaps you’re confusing recognition with acquiescence.
2) Brilliant. The Jews had no conflict with a party that very explicitly delcared they were not fit to live in Germany. It certainly didn’t begin when that party took power and began to remove Jews from their professional positions.
3) Arguably, there was a prior conflict between the Nazis and the communists. Even so, you still hammer the non-sensical point that the Jews and Nazis had no conflict. Well, they did, because the Nazis forced the issue.
1) Uh, no, Israel rejected the Palestinian refugees as citizens whether they fought against its establishment or not.
2) You don’t have any sense of chronology here. There was no Israeli government before the British Mandate was terminated and Palestinian Arabs were stripped of their citizenship en masse. That happened concurrently (albeit de facto; the relevant laws weren’t passed until several years later) with the establishment of Israel.
3) So on the off chance there was a Jewish paramilitary group fighting the Nazi regime, the mass denationalization of German Jews would’ve been justified.
If nothing else, you just said in a roundabout way the persecution of communists was justified.
White kind of history books did you read zumbass? Apart from The bible, I meant?
Zamass
For a bit of updating to your historical “knowledge” I’d recommend you have a look at the Israeli New historians ( Benny Morris, Ilan Pappé, Avi Shlaim, Tom Segev, Hillel Cohen and Simha Flapan) have written about the subject. Basically, they say that everything you’ve been fed, poor thing, is just bunk! Here:
From Wiki (Yeah, I know, I know, but good for a start!) :
The lies of the official Israeli history and the facts:
Beautifully said.
Maybe they would have been more receptive to the calls for boycott if the amount of cash were not so great.
And people claim to wonder why the Palestinians don’t adopt peaceful means for redressing their grievances, why they have often resorted to violence. Because violence is a last resort when peaceful means have failed and appeals to the conscience of the world have been ignored.
The Handmaiden’s Fail. Just give me credit when you change the name of the post ^_^
Talking about BDS:
Why my post is like that? I clearly separated quotes from the rest with…
OH, never mind..
Writers have no armies. They have no militant wings.
As Shlomo Sand points out, without intellectuals and the producers of culture, there would be no national identity, and therefore no exclusion of the “other” on the basis of such identity.
Culture is not an innocent bystander. It can also be a weapon and a facilitator of oppression. Atwood was not asked to boycott Israeli writers (nor does BDS call for such a boycott). She was asked to boycott an institution (Tel-Aviv University) that is actively complicit in the development of weapons and strategies of oppression and violence – including the “Doctrine of Disproportionality” that threatens to undermine the very concept of international humanitarian law.
And obviously, she like Nadine Gordimer a year ago, determined that it was more unethical to boycott Israeli culture, Israeli institutions, than not to.
More power to her.
I agree. I think cultural boycott is abusive and inneffective (partially because it is abusive).
Israel and the world NEED communication to change, not isolation. That is just an attempt to force, and without clear and disciplined conditions.
A more responsible approach to dissent is needed.
Refusing to accept a prize from an institution directly complicit in apartheid and war crimes cannot by any stretch of the imagination be truthfully termed “abusive” or “unethical”. Unless your words are like Humpty Dumpty’s and mean just what you choose them to mean.
As I said, cultural boycott is both abusive and inneffective.
The oppossite of boycott is needed to change Israel.
Obviously, more than a few think similarly, that cultural boycott is not exactly the same as effective dissent.
If it were effective, then you might be able to make the “cancer treatment” argument, that it might be necessary to kill a third of your living cells for 50% chance of preserving your life.
“As I said, cultural boycott is both abusive and inneffective.”
Without ever bothering to explain or demonstrate why.
“”The oppossite of boycott is needed to change Israel”
Israel has been free of boycott since it was created, so why hasn’t it changed Witty?
“Obviously, more than a few think similarly, that cultural boycott is not exactly the same as effective dissent.”
You mean, more than a few Zionist propagandists?
“If it were effective, then you might be able to make the “cancer treatment” argument, that it might be necessary to kill a third of your living cells for 50% chance of preserving your life. ”
What’s so assinince and aburd abotu your argument, is that you are dismissing somethign that has never been tested as infefective, in favor of an approach tat for 60 years, has produced nothing.
Institutional cultural boycott does not kill anyone. It is an inherently nonviolent approach. You have failed to demonstrate how it is “abusive”. As for “ineffective”, Palestinian civil society (across the board!) begs to differ. Who are you to decide on the effectiveness of the nonviolent means by which Palestinians have chosen to pursue their struggle for justice? For the moment (five years after the initial appeal), they are quite pleased with the results.
The Israelis I’ve met over the years, including one I knew really well, did their share to convince me of the necessity of boycott. I’m familiar with this school of thought where you can be against the post-1967 occupation and still dread Arab reproduction within the green line and believe the soft institutions are inviolate. You don’t even have to be gung-ho about greater Israel to support collective punishment. Still, you’re pretty silly to make us choose between boycott and communication. There are ways to exchange ideas without violating PACBI guidelines.
Ari Folman, a veteran of an Israeli war on civilians, made a film that glosses over Israeli brutality in Lebanon. It’s infuriating that he gets these accolades over the aesthetic quality of the film when it could not exist if not for a brutal invasion.
No one is obligated to pay attention to your art, music or hummus. There’s nothing beyond the pale about boycotting it for a political reason. If for some reason the boycott is wrong, we can resume patronizing the wonderful films and songs at any time. No one will suffer lifelong physical or mental trauma because of BDS. Hurting someone’s ego does not equal abuse.
Its as non-violent as censorship. Its as non-violent as Norman Finkelstein being denied tenure.
I can’t comment on the means that Palestinians have chosen. I can comment on what I am willing to participate in and add my voice to.
Isolation is an approach like radiation therapy. If you feel that there is a strong prospect of success, and the success is a good outcome (not just a shifting of chairs), then it is worth killing most of the rest of the bodies’ function.
If there are other alternatives, that do not risk harms on innocents, then take them. I don’t see you or other dissenters doing that, going from home to home say, and dialoguing (hearing and responding).
I don’t see you urging the establishment of cross-cultural institutions that might actually create a cosmopolitan Palestinian/Israeli nation, but only urging separation.
The cultural boycotts are far worse than the limited economic boycott proposals, though they have moral weaknesses if you bother to look, in punishing innocents more than wrong-doers.
Positive efforts are far superior morally and effective. For example, the free Gaza movement has the possibility of actually appealing to the world’s imagination, to actually gather the world’s attention, hopefully positively.
If done carefully, it is a demonstration of support, a real education.
It is also somewhat dangerous, as a potentially military confrontation on the high seas. (Thats why it needs to be done right).
RW,
The academic and cultural boycott is institutional – not individual. It does not “punish innocents”. PACBI does not target singers, artists, writers, filmakers, poets, etc. – unless they are supported by official Israeli institutions (generally the case when abroad, even requiring a signed commitment not to criticise Israel, as exposed by Yitzhak Laor).
PACBI also advocates supporting Palestinian culture and academia, but it is not enough. “Positive” and “proactive” are lovely words if you are not under brutal occupation, denied basic rights and freedoms – including academic and cultural freedom.
Nonviolent struggle does not mean making nice to your oppressor. It is only your personal definition of “nonviolence” (Humpty Dumpty back together again) that brands such a campaign “violent”, “abusive”, etc. No serious advocate of nonviolent struggle would concur.
For anyone else (RW has his own definitions), who would like to get a clear idea of what Palestinian academic and cultural boycott is about and what it is not about, have a good look at link to pacbi.org
Did you consider my metaphor of cancer treatment?
Consider the treatment of Nadine Gordimer, or Margarett Atwood, or Elton John or Santana (who relented) by BDS supporters. It was abusive. Some received death threats, plausible ones (not plants).
The definition of the cultural boycott shifts. I guess that’s a good thing.
Even the name: “Palestinian Campaign for the Cultural and Academic Boycott of Israel”.
It is NOT a clear definition.
And, the headline “All Israeli Institutions are Complicit in Apartheid”.
Positive and proactive are words that you use and apply if you believe that morality is important in every setting, as I do.
To adopt “by any means necessary” meaning willingness to harm disproportionately or collectively, in the name of opposing disproportionate or collective harms, is not humane.
The lessons of real moral leaders is that the means adopted are important, close to as important as the object of dissent itself.
If you have other options than even institutional isolation, take them. Do them. Don’t give yourself an out from doing so.
Did you consider my metaphor of cancer treatment?
A completely inappropriate metaphor, because it presumes that BDS “kills”. It does not. Occupation and apartheid on the other hand, do kill (quite literally as well).
Even the name … It is NOT a clear definition.
Read the articles and guidelines Mr. Witty, not just the names and headlines. They are quite clear.
Where were “guidelines” on that website?
The articles were nowhere near clear. You are talking to yourself, not even considering what the language conveys to others.
But, all political organizing is a communication process, and to not scrutinize what is communicated, is negligence.
If its important, it deserves a great deal of care in construction. It can’t end at “that feels good to me”.
If you were capable of honest discussion I would bother, but I think I’ve made things clear to anyone with anything approaching an open mind (even if they disagree with BDS). Further discussion with you is a waste of time. Study the PACBI site, or not. It won’t make any difference anyway.
Good dismissal Shmuel.
I think the White Rose would’ve agreed with Shmuel, Witty. Were they a cancer too?
“Did you consider my metaphor of cancer treatment?”
Oh yes, very often, but like Phil says, he refuses to police the comments section.
So I guess you won’t get banned or limited.
It was a great dismissal. I’m not sure why he bothered with you at all, but presumably his posts were really for the benefit of the rest of us.
This has been my daily response to Witty.
Shmuel,
The cancer metaphor has been used here by proponents of BDS, medicine.
Its not out to lunch. I’m asking you to be skeptical rather than just a proponent.
Even some indication, “yes, I did doubt, and on the basis that I thought BDS might be too intrusive, but I conclude that the cure is worth the risk”, would be more informative than “you are not worth talking to”.
I get that its frustrating to communicate with someone that disagrees.
Nevertheless, Nadine Gordimer disagreed, Margarett Atwood disagreed. Lots of honorable and respectable leaders of compassionate movement, disagree with a cultural and academic boycott.
It is a truth that a majority of the historical research that has exposed dirty laundry in Israel’s history and mythology, came from Israeli academia.
I hope that you wouldn’t propose that Akiva Eldar be boycotted, that Rashid Khalidi couldn’t invite him to speak in Chicago because he was affiliated with an Israeli institution. And, if you suggest that he be an exception, then you are introducing a level of arbitrariness that is not particularly endearing.
“Its as non-violent as Norman Finkelstein being denied tenure.”
But is that same measure was taken against Israel, you would deem it to be violent.
“I can comment on what I am willing to participate in and add my voice to.”
Not that we are the least bit interested, but then why do you insist on limiting the rest of us from commentjing on what we are willing to participate in and add our voices to? No one is demandign that you change your approach, yet you insist on setting the parameters for what si permissible from our apaproach.
That’s what we call Wittocricy.
“I don’t see you urging the establishment of cross-cultural institutions that might actually create a cosmopolitan Palestinian/Israeli nation, but only urging separation”
Hamas proposed that with the exchange fo Ambassadors. Israel rejected it and you dismissed it on the grounds that Palestine is not yet a state.
That’s what we call Wittocricy.
“Positive efforts are far superior morally and effective.”
No, they’re more acceptable to you. Your efforts are demonstrably ineffective and morally repugnant.
“It is also somewhat dangerous, as a potentially military confrontation on the high seas.”
And why is that Witty? Is it not becasue Israel has a reputation for being trigger happy and usingviolence as a first option everytime?
For some reason, you keep ignoring that detail.
“The articles were nowhere near clear. You are talking to yourself, not even considering what the language conveys to others.”
Things are never clear when there is criticism of Israel involved. It makes you see double and blurrs your vision and then you complain that the definitino is not clear enough.
Get your eyes checked.
In your urgency, you are arguing with me instead of speaking to your neighbors face to face (those that agree and those that disagree).
Why is that?
“I’m asking you to be skeptical rather than just a proponent.”
I see. You’re asking others to be skeptical, while agreeing with you at the same time?
“I get that its frustrating to communicate with someone that disagrees.”
No, it’s frustrating to communicate with someone that lies.
“Lots of honorable and respectable leaders of compassionate movement, disagree with a cultural and academic boycott.”
Lot’s Witty? How many?
“I hope that you wouldn’t propose that Akiva Eldar be boycotted, that Rashid Khalidi couldn’t invite him to speak in Chicago because he was affiliated with an Israeli institution”
Akiva Eldar is a foreign policy journalist, not an Israeli propagandist who represents Israel. There’s no exception becasue he doesn;t pretend to be an Israeli ambassadro or spokesman.
Does anyone else find this message an insult to people who suffer actual abuse?
Yet Nadine Gordimer supported sanctions against apartheid South Africa like Helen Suzman who campaigned vigourously for South Africa’s blacks. However, when it comes/came to Israel both have/had tribal allegiances apparently that make/made their moral outrage selective. Hypocrites heal thyselves!
MDM,
If it were only a matter of tribal allegiances, it wouldn’t be so bad. As far as I know, Atwood and Ghosh are not members of that particular tribe. It’s about Israeli exceptionalism, about how Israel sits at the heart of western consensus – culturally, scientifically, politically – yet is not held to the same standards as other “western” countries (eg. apartheid South Africa). Many who boycotted SA feel that boycotting Israel would be an “extreme” position, going both against the mainstream (even the liberal mainstream) and their own self-images as moderates, intellectuals and voices of reason.
But how can people such as Atwood and Ghosh think of Israel in any other terms, when I/P is constantly treated (in the media, by governments) as a “conflict” between “two sides” in need of “rapprochement” and “compromise”. Only a rights-based approach, such as the one adopted by the BDS movement, can change this perception of Israel and the “conflict”. Scott McConnell was absolutely right that BDS is about education.
Yes, Shmuel, as was the White Rose inside Germany proper in those days.
Atwood has spoken out against former apartheid S Africa; she never treated that situation as a “conflict” between “two sides” in need of “compromise.”
“I agree. I think cultural boycott is abusive and inneffective (partially because it is abusive).”
How is it abusive Witty? Is it as abusive as say, military occupation, ethnic cleasning, home evictions, mass murder, blockades and sieges or toture?
“Israel and the world NEED communication to change, not isolation.”
But al that is doing Witty, is giving legitimacy to Israel’s expasionist policies. Then again, that’s probably exactly what you would like to see.
“”A more responsible approach to dissent is needed. “‘
As in none at all right Witty? Jyst keep sending money.
Margaret Atwood is an avid twitterer but has been largely silent for the last few days, must be hiding in her Tel Aviv hotel, counting her money. I’ll bet another million she doesn’t visit the Occupied Palestinian Territories. You can follow / tweet her here:
link to twitter.com
Ali Abunimah has told her off, among others, including this gem:
“Odd how @MargaretAtwood didn’t use her public reading at ’86 Toronto Arts Against Apartheid gala to tell Tutu she opposed boycott”
More here:
link to twitter.com
I looked around a bit and yes indeed Maggie A stood up against apartheid in the 80′s and attended Tutu’s event against apartheid. I can only wonder what would have happened if she’s been offered some Afrikaaner Rand. In fact, scrub that, I don’t wonder at all anymore. Could she look Tutu in the eye now?
Press from the era citing Margaret Atwood’s attendance at the ’86 event:
Montreat Gazette (third paragraph below the 3 dots):
link to news.google.com
Ottowa Citizen (middle paragraph under the Salome Bey photo):
link to news.google.com
Interview with Atwood in her hotel in Tel Aviv – piles of Palestinian blood-stained shekels are out of camera view (video link is at the bottom of the page):
link to bloomberg.com
She mentions water resources in the region – hmm I wonder if she knows that more than half of Israel’s fresh water supply is extracted illegally from the West Bank aquifers – and that West Bank Palestinians are rationed to just 75L friggin’ litres a day while the settlers get a maximalist +300L/day.
Excerpt from Atwood – Do Not Accept Prizes from Apartheid Israel:
Irish composer Raymond Deane’s open letter to Atwood:
“Some say Palestine is the ultimate test of honesty.”
link to usacbi.wordpress.com
Atwoods comments were more convincing.
“Palestine is the ultimate test of honesty”.
I would add to that the question of whether proponents of BDS advocate regime change (revolution) or reform? Without that clarified, the BDS movement is also an “ultimate test of honesty”.
There is the prospect with cultural boycott of fascist-like ethnically based shunning. To distinguish BDS from that expression, it needs to be clear, limited, disciplined.
To the extent that artists and academics are selectively harrangued or overtly threatened, as was the case with Gordimer and I believe Atwood, the movement is a mob not dissent.
By your definition, Witty, any attempt to bring to the attention of an audience by non-physically violent means the unfairness of anything is just “a mob,” not dissent. The notion of “mob” directly implies physical violence and enraged property damage.
Palestine is the ultimate test of moral integrity and honest: Here’s Atwood’s stance–and why it’s wrong–and, implied, how she treats
theI-Psituation differently than the plight of women generally:
link to dissidentvoice.org
“Atwoods comments were more convincing.”
So say you. To me Atwood’s comments can be paraphrased as:
“I’ll take the money bitches”
…spoken while stepping over the corpses of Palestinian men, women, children and chickens.
I heard her say, “I will not be censored” and “I will make intellectual contact with whom I choose, not whom you choose”.
Refusing to accept the blood money (we know Israel uses culture as a weapon) wouldn’t require Atwood to give up her freedom of speech or association.
How Atwood failed the lie detector test:
link to countercurrents.org
It may or may not be a test of honesty, but it sure is a real test of courage.
We see that, alas, Atwood has come up short. It’s sad, but I think it’s hard to fault her for not showing courage in a circumstance where she clearly does not have it.
Let’s publicize and support those with courage on this issue, and who have the ability to demonstrate the courage of their convictions.
She represents ten thousand writers.
Its a strong statement on her part.
And she does not represent many writers, if you are referring to PEN, which include many writers who’ve never penned a word on the I-P conflict per se. Readers, judge for yourself her (literary advocate for woman’s rights) position as an individual on the I-P stance, and why it’s inconsistent with it when you compare her literary text much more inclusive as to the historical culture of the anti-female rights world :
link to dissidentvoice.org
“She represents ten thousand writers.”
Yeah, yeah, so does Ben Domenech, but he got caught, and fired for it.
“She represents ten thousand writers.”
Where did you get that number from Witty? The door in a public urinal?
What is the membership of PEN?
One thing she clearly represents is the repugnance to be told what political position is correct.
I’ve listened to a number of interviews with her, and she is uniquely independant. A very strong minded woman.
The idea of a unified cultural boycott on less than entirely obvious grounds (which the Israel/Palestinian conflict is nowhere near), apparently is repugnant to her.
“One thing she clearly represents is the repugnance to be told what political position is correct.”
Especially if it stands betwene her and a big fat cheque.
“I’ve listened to a number of interviews with her, and she is uniquely independant”"
Exccept when it comes to Israel.
“The idea of a unified cultural boycott on less than entirely obvious grounds (which the Israel/Palestinian conflict is nowhere near), apparently is repugnant to her.”
You’re right Witty, the I/P conflict was nowhere near apartheid South Africa, it’s far worse. A unified cultural boycott is far to soft an approach.
We should be blockading Israel and givign them a taste fo their own medicine.
And what about the tens of thousands of persecuted, oppressed and occupied Palestinian writers that Atwood chooses not to represent? Her statement is not strong, it’s nothing less than a cope out hiding behind a flourish of abstract ideas and rhetoric.
As Desmond Tutu once pointed out, “If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor”. Atwood’s speech reveals that she has shamefully and cowardly choosen the side of the oppressor over the oppressed by laying claim to supposed “neutrality”.
Here, Atwood states her position, and is exposed as being proclaimed as a good revealer of how women have been abused by institutional pressures and culture, and as not having the integrity to apply her moral integrity to help the plight of the Palestinians. She closes her eyes and proclaims, as an individual perception, a pox on both worlds–while gathering in the Israeli prize:
link to dissidentvoice.org
Would you turn down $500,000, personally?
Are you saying your morals are for sale Witty?
Not that you had any in the first place.
Margeret Atwood, Israel’s handmaiden!
Damn, Mooser–I think that’s the most brilliant penetrating shorthand I’ve witnessed
in ages. Hats off to you.
“Hats off to you.”
Jeez, I was worried I would be about the tenth person to make the most obvious joke. So, as Randy says: You can keep your hat on.
Er, who’s Randy?
Must be the great Randy Newman. “You can leave your hat on” that he wrote was made famous by Joe Cocker.
I’ve got a comment waiting in the moderation queue – too many links – in short Margaret Atwood participated in a week-long 1986 event Toronto Arts Against Apartheid Festival, to raise money for the black South Africans. Desmond Tutu was in attendance. I’m wondering if she could look him squarely in the eye today given Tutu’s comments on Israel’s apartheid policy?
Atwood has come out writing about and criticizing oppression of women (just not Palestinian women), of black S Africans under apartheid, and of gays. But she can’t get that prize money funded by a long-time zionist, by being consistent:
link to uruknet.info
MalarkyNews (google it to read the whole article)
Pure Torture…
About Us
Atwood and Amitav Accept Soiled Money
By SYNDICATED NEWS | Published: MAY 11, 2010
Yesterday, Canadian author Margaret Atwood and Indian author Amitav Ghosh accepted the one million dollar Dan David Prize, funded by a wealthy Zionist philanthropist. Palestinian civil society urged them not to accept the prize. They did. They crossed the picket line, arguing that novelists and authors have a unique right to cross picket lines under conditions of their own choosing, as opposed to Naomi Klein, who worked through the Boycott National Committee when The Shock Doctrine was translated into Hebrew. Atwood explains that to have rejected the prize would have been tantamount to “throwing overboard the thousands of writers around the world who are in prison, censored, exiled and murdered for what they have published.”
Here’s the link: link to malarkynews.com
Trying to position this as a free speech issue is so pathetic. She did it for the money.
I’m feeling the strong urge to visit my local libraries and, armed with a pen and a few salient facts, exercise a little free speech of my own in a few of MA’s books. Think of it as the literary version of writing on banknotes.
Atwood has a reputation as a progressive figure in literature, was an outspoken critic of South African apartheid, but she didn’t stand by her principles. She couldn’t since the half million dollar prize is funded by a Zionist.
She said: “I sympathize with the very bad conditions the people of Gaza are living through due to the blockade, the military actions, and the Egyptian and Israeli walls.”
A Palestinian student replied: “We are not asking for sympathy! We want solidarity…You are either with justice or with injustice. There is no neutral zone.”
Thats the Palestinian students’ definition of truth, not Atwood’s, not the vast majority of the world’s.
What proportion of the world now actively supports BDS to the point that they would not accept $500,000 and fame? .0002%?
Would you turn down $500,000, personally?
“Thats the Palestinian students’ definition of truth, not Atwood’s, not the vast majority of the world’s.”
Thsi is a common fallback position for Witty when he can’t make his case. first he pretends to speak for the majority of the world, and then used the “everyone though he had WMD” argument.
“What proportion of the world now actively supports BDS to the point that they would not accept $500,000 and fame? .0002%?”
So your claiming that she dropped her principals for the money?
“Would you turn down $500,000, personally?”
Isn’t is always the way when it comes to support for Israel? Would any Congressman turn down $500,000 personally? Nothing wrong with that is there?
Haha. Shingo, you nailed him, and you nailed our AIPAC congressmen.
Citizen,
But you didn’t answer the question.
I think Margaret Atwood is more independant than bribed. I sincerely believe that she resented being told to be politically correct, and then harrassed about it.
And, I’m certain that she is sympathetic with the experience of Palestinians, as am I and many others.
“I think Margaret Atwood is more independant than bribed. I sincerely believe that she resented being told to be politically correct, and then harrassed about it.”
You’re contradicting yourself again Witty. One minute you’re siggesting that half a million dollars was too hard for any hsm to turn down, and now you’re suggesting that money had nothing to do with her sccepatnce of the award.
I guess when your lying, youjust have to keep lying.
“One minute you’re siggesting that half a million dollars was too hard for any hsm to turn down”
It was a practical question for Citizen (who didn’t answer, didn’t bother to be candid).
It would be a question for Phil. Would he accept $500,000 to speak in an Israeli university?
Or, would Omar Barghouti accept an opportunity to speak in the knesset? Or, would he regard that as an insult, a validation of the oppressor state?
You’re such a slimy weazel Witty. She didn’t get paid 500,000tp just speak at an Istaeli university, she revived am award snd has demonstrated that she’s willing to tow the pto Israeli line when it comes to get career.
Bullshit.
She demonstrated that she is willing to speak up for herself and against censorship on the basis of thin political correctness.
You are trying to herd dissent on this, when it is not convincing.
The goals of BDS to remove the occupation, establish full civil rights for Palestinians in Israel, and including the implications for right of return for those individuals dispossessed, are laudable.
The means of isolation (even if rationalized as “institutional”) are not laudable, not supportable without some intentional blinders and internal tension.
If there is no other way to realize a just peace, I guess that’s invasive medicine for you. If the medicine acts to kill the body (two viable and healthy states), then its not medicine but poison. And, if there is another way (“by any means necessary” including civility) then it is unnecessarily punitive and arbitrary.
RW: She demonstrated that she is willing to speak up for herself and against censorship on the basis of thin political correctness.
Margaret Atwood is not and has never been censored. She is free to say anything she likes, any time she likes and any place she likes. Had she refused the prize she would have been equally free to explain her motives and perhaps say something about the censorship and oppression of Palestinian writers (who actually asked her to turn down the prize!). Confuting one of the world’s most successful authors turning down a prize for ethical-political reasons with censorship is outrageous, to say the least.
Furthermore, as I think others have already explained, “political correctness” on I/P today is dictated by the “peace industry” that opposes boycotts and promotes endless touchy-feely “dialogue” and a solution-oriented (everything will be ok for the Palestinians once there are two states) rather than a justice and rights-based approach (as employed wrt SA, for example). Atwood followed the current “politically correct” bon ton to the letter. Making nice to the oppressors in the name of “tolerance” and “freedom”, while paying some sort of ineffectual lip service to the grave injustices to which she has indirectly lent her support.
Actually, it makes her an analyst, determining differences in the situation, rather than overly simplistic parallels.”
A very bad one who actually adopts the most simplistic and false parallels by accepting that the I/P conflict is somehow one between 2 sides with equal resources and culpablity.
She’s a fraud who happens to be a woman.
“She demonstrated that she is willing to speak up for herself and against censorship on the basis of thin political correctness.”
She’s also demonstrated that she’s willing to abandon those ideals when the price is right.
“You are trying to herd dissent on this, when it is not convincing.”
She’s not dissenting, she’s pro status quo like you.
“The means of isolation (even if rationalized as “institutional”) are not laudable, not supportable without some intentional blinders and internal tension.”
Bullshit
Internal tension meaning that any reprisals for Israel are unacceptable, though you’re perfectly happy with them when applies to Iran and Hamas.
“If there is no other way to realize a just peace, I guess that’s invasive medicine for you.”
Whereas you on the other hand, insist that the cure for lung cancer is to continue smoking.
Like I said, you’re dismissing something that has never been tried while insisting that the way to fix the problem is to continue doing what has failed for 43 years.
That’s the definition of insanity.
You’re nothing but a sick propagandist who cannot contemplate a world where Israel is not given privilege and succour.
You shoot first an awful lot.
Yes, reprisals are idiotic. They are not “dissent”.
I see the illness in the region as dogma, non-acceptance of the other. So, for you to prescribe coal smoke rather than cigarette smoke, is truly not a remedy.
Everything you say is idiotic Witty, lame, dull, pathetic, narcicistic, dihonest, cuynical, I could go on..
You don’t have a clue what dissent it. You simply demand pacificifism and that Israel be indulged.
Dogma is somethign that remains in spite fo evidence to the contrary and facts. Thats what you bring to the debate.
Dogma blinds it’s followers to the obvious hypocicies, cynicim, and double standars in their argument. hats what you bring to the debate.
You’re a sick, vile, racism and inhumane scum bag.
“dissent”.
Never again this word is going to be the same as far as I’m concerned. It triggers in me a gag reflex, honest!
How are you censored Shmuel?
Margarett Atwood certainly objected to the imposition of politically correct standards onto her, your issue and in the form that you prescribed for her. (not you personally, I assume).
The reason that those that advocate for peace oppose cultural and academic boycotts are that they attack the bloodstream of the community, rather than the actions that you are seeking to contest. They intend to isolate, to shun, to demean, RATHER than to mediate.
They/we conclude that there is no basis of confidence that the movement will turn on a dime when it has reached its clear goals, and co-exist. (Maybe it will happen, but with the history and consistently rageful rhetoric applied, it is a roaring gamble.)
The humanity of Omar Barghouti, Rashid Khalidi, Ali Abunimeh, build confidence. The impatience and willingness of solidarity to ridicule, harrass, lie, demean, threaten, reduces that confidence.
Margaret Atwood has not lent support to injustice by accepting an award, reading, speaking, etc.
“They intend to isolate, to shun, to demean, RATHER than to mediate.”
Precisely Witty. You see, in your isufferable dishonesty, you continue to ignore the simple fact that even if there was such a boybott of Israel, that Israel would have every optino to put an end to it. All Isrel has to do is to end it’s criminal and inhumane policies.
Those who advocate for peace have no reason to fear BDS or boycotts because they are onfident in the outcome of peace. The reason you and other Israeli popagandists are so fearful of BDS is the fact that you know Isrel is incapble fo changing. You know deep down that mediation will not achieve an outcome and you know that if BDS would be imposed, it wodl remain for a long time.
How does one build confidence when the last 43 years of the statu quo have led to matters becomming infinitely worse? You see any criticsm of Israel has threaning and demeaning, becasue as far as you’re concenred, Israel has all the time in the world to decide if it wants to have peace.
“Margaret Atwood has not lent support to injustice by accepting an award, reading, speaking, etc. ”
No just to her bank account. She sold her soul, just like you.
Shingo,
My description of you as “shoot-firster” is demonstrated in your above rant.
I am criticizing the means to accomplish goals that I described as laudatory, more than valid.
The criticism of the choice and form of BDS stands. FEW will adopt it because of the ambiguity of it and the ambiguity of advocacy for the parties. The only way to change that observation of the BDS movement, is to change the movement itself.
If you want to discipline others to support BDS, or be called racist, then you would be better served to model discipline yourself.
I am fearful that Israel won’t change. And, I am fearful that with the vehemence that parties on both sides apply their approaches dogmatically, that that will result in war (civil war with families divided).
I’m much more confident in reason and reasoning than forceful “non-violent” dissent.
I sincerely wonder why your interpretation of “by any means necessary” does not include civil and respectful, why that is outside of your pallette.
How possibly could you describe me as “selling my soul”, or Margaret Atwood? You are so careless, Shingo.
Witty,
I’m not shooting, I just know what to expect from you and you never fail to dissapoint and disgust the rest of us.
You are an insuffereable and pompous bore. No one listens to you or has any respect for you on this blog. You have become the resident buffoon who has nothing to contribute, and who remains stuck in some time warp, obliviosu to his own irrelvance.
“The criticism of the choice and form of BDS stands”
Your criticism you mean, o h grat one who thinks the world is hanging on hsi every word of wisdo. You dont get it do you?’No one cares what you think or how you feel. You’re a cretin and a liar who simply adds noise to the debate.
“The only way to change that observation of the BDS movement, is to change the movement itself.”
So you’re no lponger interested in changing Israel, or as you woudl say “reform” Israel. Now you’ve gievn up on that idea (not that you were ever serious about it anyway) and decided that the BDS movement is the one on need of reform.
You have no intentino of bringing about a peaceul solution. All you want to do is enrur that no harm comes to Israel, one state or two. One day, when Israel is a bination democracy, you’ll be looking in the mirror and asking what you did to bring it about.
“She demonstrated that she is willing to speak up for herself and against censorship ”
RW – Who exactly is trying to censor MA? Nobody is trying to, or even suggesting it’s desirable to gag her. Atwood has chosen to not participate in the BDS movement, and has articulated her reasoning. This is one of many forums discussing that. There is no censorship, or attempts at it.
You continuously speak of justice as being laudable but then criticise all practical non-violent means of achieving that justice. Your solution is in effect to do NOTHING. You give lip service to dialogue etc – but instead spend your time on Mondoweiss, rather than in dialogue with the population that actually needs to undergo significant transformation in mindset – the Israeli population.
You need to refer again to the actual BDS call before you start talking about a medicine or poison.
link to bdsmovement.net
Specifically the third plank of the BDS call: “Respecting, protecting and promoting the rights of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes and properties as stipulated in UN resolution 194.”
It’s necessary to make a distinction between the right and how that right is handled and approached by both parties. Respecting the RIGHT of Palestinians to return needn’t mean the death of the two state solution, and it needn’t mean a shift in demographics in Israel.
Norman Finkelstein has dissected this point far better than I can using his own tenure battle and settlement as an example:
“Palestinian Right of Return – Norman Finkelstein”
link to youtube.com
The individuals that harrass Margarett Atwood into boycotting and after not boycotting, are trying to censor. You are.
You are ignorant of how I spend my time, or the positions that I take in public on Israel/Palestine, short of what I disclose here about that.
That is an example of shooting first, rather than respectfully inquiring first.
I guess the name-calling becomes “necessary” once one determines “I am a partisan”, rather than “I am a citizen seeking to get fully informed and be of help”.
Which side are you on as the most important question.
It would be useful for you guys to indicate that you hear the points made, so that we could move on, at least a little.
“You continuously speak of justice as being laudable but then criticise all practical non-violent means of achieving that justice. ”
You hi the nail on the head Sumud. This is typical of Israel and it’s supporters. They all claim that they want a 2 state solution, but the minute anyone tries to take any practical steps to achieving it, the Zionists go into complete attack mode and demonize them.
Just look at how they’re attacking Obama.
Witty is no diferent. His support for a 2 state solution is stops at the idea of it and discussing it. Any optiosn on how it is to be achieved as dismissed without consideration.
They all like the idea of a 2 state solution but are adamently opposed to the reality of one.
“The individuals that harrass Margarett Atwood into boycotting and after not boycotting, are trying to censor. You are”
So by excercising ouor free speech and right to express an opinion, we’re cennsoring Atwood. Orwell’s alive and well.
We know enough about you to know how you spend your time Witty. You spread the same BS on othe blogs that you do here. I’ve come across your diatribes on other blogs, the same lies, the same BS.
“It would be useful for you guys to indicate that you hear the points made, so that we could move on, at least a little. ”
Stop the pretence Witty, the game’s up and we have your number. The last thing you want is to move on. You want to keep everything just where it is.
“The individuals that harrass Margarett Atwood into boycotting and after not boycotting, are trying to censor. You are.”
How? Specifically.
“You are ignorant of how I spend my time,”
I am, partially: you comment enough here that I will presume this is your primary activity related to I/P. I reserve the right to be wrong, naturally. I expand my definition of those who need a change in mindset to American christian zionists – heck – even the mainstream US population. Why hang around here when the unwashed masses need you Richard?
I do hear you Richard, fear not. Often, I just don’t agree.
Nothing to say about the distinction between right of respecting Palestinian right of return and it’s implementation? Surely this point is critical?
Shingo ~ I know, it’s sick-making. People babble on about the 2-state solution and nobody (with political power) has the guts pull Israel into line. Zionists eggs must be broken before the two-state omelette can be cooked – if it can be at all.
I’ve said it before – Israel wants land more than peace, and in the knowledge that Eretz Israel is a practical, legal, legitimate impossibility wants the next best thing: a comfortable occupation, and all that lovely free water from the West Bank aquifers. RW mouths words otherwise but you have his number – status quo.
I’m happy for you not to agree. I’m not happy with accusations of racism, or presumptions about what I advocate for, think, organize.
I hang around here to continue the advocacy for moderate forms of dissent, rather than punitive and confrontational.
The direction of dissent is 180 degrees different than gives me a path to be of help. I know that that is the case with the majority of liberal Jews and Zionists, of which I am of the more active and more educated on Palestinian experience.
When my suggestions of imaginative and positively stated dissent are assaulted as trivial rather than encouraged as a voice, you indicate that you desire that NO dissent occur.
It indicates that the BDS movement does not have a clear goal, that the discussion of single-state vs two-state remains a great divide.
As, it is a critical issue that affects the extent and enthusiasm of most western dissent, it is a great failing to avoid that question.
The only option that will acquire a mass following is for a two-state, so I get that puts you in a dilemma. But, the argument that you urgently desire change is challenged, as you are not advocating for the conditions that would make a single-state accepted.
“I’m happy for you not to agree. I’m not happy with accusations of racism, or presumptions about what I advocate for, think, organize.”
Most racists and liars don’t like it when these traits are mentioned.
“I hang around here to continue the advocacy for moderate
forms of dissent, rather than punitive and confrontational.”
No. you hang around here to continue defend Isral’s interests exclusily, and have convimnced yourself that if you pay sufficint lip service to a political settlement, it gives you credibility.
You’ve burned any credibility you ever had becasue you’re a fraud.
“The direction of dissent is 180 degrees different than gives me a path to be of help.”
Fine, then get lost. No one wants your help Witty. No one cares if you want to help. Get it?
“When my suggestions of imaginative and positively stated dissent are assaulted as trivial rather than encouraged as a voice, you indicate that you desire that NO dissent occur.”
What’s imaginative about suggesting more of the same? Your prescriptinos have been tested for 43 years. Is it any wonder then that your insistence that they are the best option is met with ridicule?
“It indicates that the BDS movement does not have a clear goal, that the discussion of single-state vs two-state remains a great divide.”‘
yes we know you like yo repeat that mantra, but those vagueries are either a fignment fo your imagination, or a straw man that you’ve concocted to attack a policy that makes you uncomfortable becasu you know that Israel is beyind salvation.
“The only option that will acquire a mass following is for a two-state, so I get that puts you in a dilemma. ”
No, the dilemma is yours entirely, because the only party that stands int eh way of a 2 state solution is Israel, who prefers to maintain it’s current policies which will lead to it’s own demize. Your delimea is that the only way to stop Israel commiting suicide is by means of force, yet you can’t bring yourself to accept that.
Many countries imposed cultural boycotts on the apartheid regime, meaning that South Africa was banned from the Olympic Games until 1992, as well as rugby and cricket. When the all-white national rugby team, the Springboks, toured New Zealand in 1981, it provoked public outrage, as did the decision of the British rock group Queen to perform in the Sun City resort in the bantustan of Bophuthatswana. The American singer Paul Simon caused controversy when he recorded his Graceland album with the South African group Ladysmith Black Mambazo, even though all its members were black. Until the 1990s, the British actors’ union, Equity, imposed a boycott on the sale of TV programmes to South Africa, although the state-controlled South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) happily bought US programmes instead. Atwood was totally in favor of all that.
Margaret Atwood is an icon in Canada where she is known as a fiercely independent woman. There will not be any fallout from her decision. Heard she is actually a bit of a bitch. Also, she is no lemming, so there is no way she would follow any PACBI call crap. Being contrarian, she decided to go to Israel just to piss people off because she is not the type to be told what to do. I am sure she did not do it for the money. She has enough to live on. She lives in a gorgeous part of Toronto.
On a side note -of interest to no one, I know-I once rented a cottage where Margaret Atwood spent her summers as a young girl. Her father was a scientist. It is on Lake Kipawa, Quebec. Very wild and unspoiled place in Temiscamingue. I cannot imagine anyone growing up in that environment doing anything politically correct like answering a BDS call. She is her own person and can live with her decision, and damn the boycotters.
The Toronto star had only a tiny paragrah about Atwood accepting a price in Israel which proves :
a) not everyone is obssessed like you guys
b)the world does not revolve around the Palestinians,
c)nobody cares,
d)keep dreaming, you did not get Berkley, you did not get Atwood, and you won’t get Elton John
e) your”victories” are only in your imagination
f)get the truth, follow this link for a recap of “victories” www.divestthis.com
Following Israel’s script hardly makes anyone a contrarily. The majority of the population would not even know about BDS, so her stance against it hardly qualifies as a polemic.
As someone pointed out, her reasoning abotu the I/P conflict is lazy and vacuous. She would never have suggested that both sides were being equally unreasonable with regard to Apartheid, so her hypocrisy is laid bare. The fact that she leads a conformable life in an affluent part of Toronto hardly proves she’s not susceptible to financial inducements. Indeed, the majority of people who attain financial rewards do so by steering clear of controversy and picking their battles with caution. There was certainly nothign brave about her stance against apartheid, given that it was the populist position anyway.
The fact that The Toronto star had only a tiny paragraph about Atwood proves whatever you want it to. After all, the Toronto star probably never reported about the siege on Gaza, or the fact that Israel laid waste to 1,400 Palestinians. I imagine they also gave little mention to the Goldstone Report. Canada has a long a sorry history of lying prostrate for the Israel lobby, often introducing pro Zionist laws that even the US wouldn’t consider. Canada tolerates pro Israeli groups that are regarded as terrorist organizations in the US, such as the Jewish Defence League.
She opposes the repression of Palestinians, but believes that cultural and academic BDS is an inappropriate (worse than inappropriate) method to realize change.
“She opposes the repression of Palestinians, but believes that cultural and academic BDS is an inappropriate (worse than inappropriate) method to realize change.”
She seemed perfectly happy to accept so accept that cultural and academic BDS was an appropriate method to realize change i apartheid South Africa.
That makes her, like you, a hypocrite.
Actually, it makes her an analyst, determining differences in the situation, rather than overly simplistic parallels.
A woman that makes up her own mind.
The truth is… Jews who support BDS aren’t really Jews. You follow a guy who considered a mass conversion of European Jews to Christianity (Herzl) and 120 years later those who reject his legacy are the real self-haters. This is what it means to be in the family of nations: Power and bullying are the stock in trade. Zionism got nowhere without collaborating with European anti-semites and now that it has a fully armed state, the cheerleaders get to pretend it was anti-anti-semitism all along and the real “court Jews” are, surprise surprise, its opponents.
It is indeed quite the opposite of “politically correct” to be unequivically Pro-Palestinian in the stunted debate that is acceptable in the halls of normality. It is quite politically correct to maintain that this is some sort of conflict among equals. You know between 2 entities that posess equal military forces,resources,dimlomatic pull,etc. Not a diveded and ocuppied rump state lead by a beseiged and despised political party in Gaza, and a subservient Compradore class in the West Bank, neither possesing an Army, Air Force or Navy at best a rag-tag militia, in oppossition to a nuclear armed state that posses the 3rd or 4th most powerful world military, as well as the backing of the sole super-power. Sorry for the run on. But this explanation by Atwood is pure sophistry and solipsistic. Sorry to use those 2 words in the same sentance but I think they’re apt. Now I can’t use any more 50 cent words tonight, maybe tommorrow, but you get the picture.
“After all, the Toronto star probably never reported about the siege on Gaza, or the fact that Israel laid waste to 1,400 Palestinians. I imagine they also gave little mention to the Goldstone Report. Canada has a long a sorry history of lying prostrate for the Israel lobby, often introducing pro Zionist laws that even the US wouldn’t consider”
You are so wrong, it is not even funny. It is not very smart of you to be arguing with me about Canada cause you know fuck all, and it shows!
I subscribe to the Star. The Toronto Star covered Gaza, Goldstone, the T-shirts, the organs, etc.. Furthermore, they have a couple of rabid muslim writers and many pro-Palestinians columnists.
Canada has always been neutral re the I/P conflict. Harper- present PM-is more pro-Israel. But that’s a first in Canadian politics! There is no Israel Lobby but there are pro-Israel advocacy groups in the Jewish community which not a crime last time I checked. Canadian Jews are less than 500000 thousand people. And for your information, there are influential pro-Palestinian groups in Toronto and in Montreal and I am not complaining about that either as long as they don’t burn down schools like they did a few years ago.
Let me give some advice. Shut the fuck up once in a while! You can’t BS your way through every argument. Guess what? You don’t know everything! At least have the grace to admit that.
Atwood will never follow anyone’s script which was my main point, you idiot. Again, you have no clue who she is and what she stands for.
Rachel,
Just becasue you might live in Canada, doesn’t make your opinon informed.
“You are so wrong, it is not even funny. It is not very smart of you to be arguing with me about Canada cause you know fuck all, and it shows!”
Yeah, I guess the 7 years I spent in Canada were all wasted. Damn!
“I subscribe to the Star. The Toronto Star covered Gaza, Goldstone, the T-shirts, the organs, etc.. Furthermore, they have a couple of rabid muslim writers and many pro-Palestinians columnists.”
On the Rabid Muslim writers Rachel? Care to name any, seeing as you subscribe to the paper?
“Canada has always been neutral re the I/P conflict”
It’s clear who knows fuck all. Tell that to George Galloway, who never had a problem entering the US, but was banned from entering Canada.
“Harper- present PM-is more pro-Israel. But that’s a first in Canadian politics!”
That’s an understatement (link to yvesengler.com
Google, Conservatives cracking down on criticism
of Israel, NGOs war
“There is no Israel Lobby but there are pro-Israel advocacy groups in the Jewish community which not a crime last time I checked.”
Evidently you didn’t check very well. The Jewish Defense League is an extremist lobby group.
Ever heard of Bnai Brith? (link to bnaibrith.ca
What about the Council for Israel and Jewish Advocacy (CIJA)?
if you need more reading material, help yourself (link to canpalnet-ottawa.org
“Canadian Jews are less than 500000 thousand people.”
So what? Canada’s Jewish population as a percentage is half that of the US, which is the highest in the world.
“And for your information, there are influential pro-Palestinian groups in Toronto and in Montreal and I am not complaining about that either as long as they don’t burn down schools like they did a few years ago.”
Where and when? Any evidence that pro-Palestinian groups were behind that?
“Let me give some advice. Shut the fuck up once in a while! You can’t BS your way through every argument. Guess what? You don’t know everything! At least have the grace to admit that.”
You’re getting very emotional Rachel, evidently becasue you havte being proven wrong anf it’s happenejin far too often for your liking.
“Atwood will never follow anyone’s script which was my main point, you idiot.”
I know what your point was my dear. It just happens to be wrong…as is usually the case with your points.
Rachel,
Just becasue you might live in Canada, doesn’t make your opinon informed.
“You are so wrong, it is not even funny. It is not very smart of you to be arguing with me about Canada cause you know fuck all, and it shows!”
Yeah, I guess the 7 years I spent in Canada were all wasted. Damn!
“I subscribe to the Star. The Toronto Star covered Gaza, Goldstone, the T-shirts, the organs, etc.. Furthermore, they have a couple of rabid muslim writers and many pro-Palestinians columnists.”
On the Rabid Muslim writers Rachel? Care to name any, seeing as you subscribe to the paper?
“Canada has always been neutral re the I/P conflict”
It’s clear who knows fuck all. Tell that to George Galloway, who never had a problem entering the US, but was banned from entering Canada.
“Harper- present PM-is more pro-Israel. But that’s a first in Canadian politics!”
That’s an understatement
Google, Conservatives cracking down on criticism
of Israel, NGOs war
“There is no Israel Lobby but there are pro-Israel advocacy groups in the Jewish community which not a crime last time I checked.”
Evidently you didn’t check very well. The Jewish Defense League is an extremist lobby group.
Ever heard of Bnai Brith? (link to bnaibrith.ca
What about the Council for Israel and Jewish Advocacy (CIJA)?
“Canadian Jews are less than 500000 thousand people.”
So what? Canada’s Jewish population as a percentage is half that of the US, which is the highest in the world.
“And for your information, there are influential pro-Palestinian groups in Toronto and in Montreal and I am not complaining about that either as long as they don’t burn down schools like they did a few years ago.”
Where and when? Any evidence that pro-Palestinian groups were behind that?
“Let me give some advice. Shut the fuck up once in a while! You can’t BS your way through every argument. Guess what? You don’t know everything! At least have the grace to admit that.”
You’re getting very emotional Rachel, evidently becasue you havte being proven wrong anf it’s happenejin far too often for your liking.
“Atwood will never follow anyone’s script which was my main point, you idiot.”
I know what your point was my dear. It just happens to be wrong…as is usually the case with your points.
Mrs. Ratched Rachel..
By American standards I presume!
That was in response to this:
” It is quite politically correct to maintain that this is some sort of conflict among equals. You know between 2 entities that posess equal military forces,resources,dimlomatic pull,etc”
Is there a conflict between Nato and the Taliban, yes or no?
What are they having, a love fest?
How come the combined forces of Nato are fighting a truly rag tag army that did nothing to them but Israel cannot fight the ENNEMI with a long history of tit for tat violence?
I guess your 50 cents words are only reserved for you know who.
Inequalities don’t bother you as much obviously then. Not trendy enough for you? No one to notice your “human rights” concerns?
“Inequalities don’t bother you as much obviously then. Not trendy enough for you? No one to notice your “human rights” concerns?”
Rachel’s starting to lose it guys. Keep an eye out. She might self destruct.
You’re asking why NATO forces are fighting an entitie known as Al-Queda? Or The Taliban? Beats the fuck outta me. Its absolutely absurd. But I suppose if you really want an answer my opinion is that militarism needed a new Raison d’etre if you will when The Soviet Union was no longer a convient bugaboo and so for various reasons, voila new Global enemy. That’s my personal opinion, no go suck an egg.
Entity. I must have been thinking of titties. It happens.
Al-Queada, now go suck an egg. Goddammit.
Rachel’s starting to lose it guys. Keep an eye out. She might self destruct.
Yeah, yeah, whatever.
One day I am emotional, one day I am a clown. Make up your mind, dude.
“I know what your point was my dear. It just happens to be wrong…as is usually the case with your points”
To borrow Demize little bon mot, GO SUCK AN EGG OR TWO!