There was an emotional encounter between neocon Bret Stephens, New Yorker editor David Remnick and Fareed Zakari on CNN’s GPS today. At 12 or so, Zakaria brings up the recent Israeli interview with David Remnick, in which he said he is sick of the occupation. And Remnick responds:
I’ve always been tired of it. What I think of it is relatively immaterial.. If things seem quiet now, and I was just in Israel for ten days, and in the West Bank as well… I know this is not by any stretch of the imagination as perilous as Pakistan…but the corrosive effect of occupation on Israeli society and on the region is really serious. And so it is disappointing.. that Obama for whatever reason is going to slowly withdraw from this issue and not spend any big political capital to do it. Because the only place that will be able to bring people to the table is the United States.
Neocon Stephens then objects. Zakaria says,
It is now 43 years, you [Stephens] were the editor of the Jerusalem Post, it is 43 years, the Israelis have been ruling a population that it has not enfranchised and it has not yet let go. You can’t be comfortable with that.
Stephens: No I’m not. I’m against the occupation.
Zakaria: But what does that mean?
Stephens: It’s bad for Israel. It’s bad for the Palestinians. It’s bad for the world.
Remnick: And it’s wrong. It’s deeply wrong.
Eliot Spitzer is also on the panel. I believe he safely ducked this issue. And let me say one other thing. An all-star panel, as Zakaria advertises it, and three of the four panelists are Jews, and their opinions range from neoconservative to liberal Zionist. This is why I harp on the new quasi-Jewish establishment, because of our inevitable representation in such fora. Where are the realists? (Only Zakaria) Where are the Arab-Americans? Or the anti-Zionists? When Remnick says that what he thinks of the occupation is immaterial, he is wrong. He has the power to help shape American Jewish opinion. And that’s the ballgame.
