Lillian Rosengarten
I have such a problem with Zionism today, some kind of distorted incarnation of what was once created from the ashes of the Holocaust to be a safe haven for Jews within a model of a secular nation state. I rage against attempts to blur the distinction between Zionist nationalism and Jewish religion. Of course some Jews are Zionists but I am a secular non-Zionist Jew who strongly believes in the separation of church and state for a country to be truly democratic.
From my view, nationalism in any form is dangerous. It means exceptionalism, an attitude of moral superiority, a hotbed for racism that is heightened by propaganda. Israelis in general do not know Palestinians. They are taught from an early age that all Palestinians are terrorists, that they hate Jews and want to drive them into the sea. This form of Islamophobia has spread through Europe and the US. This is the terrorism of fear. Israelis are taught Palestinians are dirty and they raise their children to be suicide bombers or to be used as human shields. Palestinians cease to be human and Israel behaves to its citizens and to tourists as if Palestinians do not exist. They have reduced them to sub-human monsters. It all sounds too familiar. Nothing about the caricature of Palestinian life is based on reality. It is a dirty myth used as a means to put an end to the Palestinian “problem.” Tragically, Israelis send their own children into the army to fight the “reviled unknown enemy” and this is considered patriotic. We know Jews have suffered and have been victims. Is it that mentality behind the wall Israel has built? Are they still “victims” of paranoia and fear? I say no! Yet, this is the justification for abominable actions perpetrated on their Palestinian neighbors and gives power to the idea of a Jewish State that belongs only to Jews. This is a dangerous road, as we know. Jews who love Israel must recognize that Jews can also do wrong and they must question and speak up against human rights abuses. The Jewish Community throughout the world but especially in the US and Europe, must distinguish the between secular Jew and Zionist Jew. This gives permission to stand up and say “No” and to debate the issues from a human rights perspective. To support the apartheid directives and the brutal forms of ethnic cleansing is to do an enormous disservice to Israel. To pretend Israel is a peace loving democracy is to be cajoled into a deception that pretends Israel is something it is not. Most important what has been done to the Palestinians by the Zionists in the name of Jews is false. What is being done to Palestinians by the Israeli Zionists will never be in my name as a Jew. To dissent is to rescue Democracy from death behind closed doors. (Molly Ivins) To dissent is not to be an anti-Semite.
I have evidence to exemplify a crucial component of Jew against Jew. As my readers most likely know, I along with six other elderly Jews set out to sail to Gaza. Human rights activists who believe in justice, we know that without justice, there can be no peace. Our mission was to show that we were Jews who did not support Zionist Israel’s agenda. In Gaza we were to be welcomed by a waiting crowd. We never made it but from the moment the IDF navy surrounded our little boat and kidnapped us to Ashdot, from the moment our beloved Yonatan Shapira, an Israeli refusnik who was tasered in the heart, from the moment I watched the Israeli navy in their scary uniforms with high boots and guns I wondered, how could Jews do this to Jews. We were not criminals, we were dissenters who speak out against Zionist Israeli policies. I was deported and cannot enter Israel for 10 years. To these soldiers, we were enemies of the state. For us, it was insanity, a state gone crazy, paranoia startlingly strong: a fear of it’s own destruction. A military state created by fear and desire for power where dissent is criminal. It is sickening, but torments me as well because I am ashamed of what Israel stands for.
When an American who runs for president states there is no such thing as Palestinians because there is no Palestine, one recognizes both racism and dishonesty. This talk was given to a Jewish audience. A pandering for votes and I suspect an enormous contempt for Israel and Jews. Lies such as this perpetuate man’s inhumanity to man and the failure to acknowledge some of the worst human rights abuses existing right in front of our noses. No, perhaps it was not meant as anti-Semitism but anti-Palestinian. What’s the difference? Hate is hate.
Nationalism has tainted the heart of Israel in its efforts to rid the country of people who also call Israel/Palestine their home. One must visit occupied Palestine and Gaza to see the truth of the deplorable crimes perpetrated on the hated neighbors. Tourists do not see outside the myth of Israel as a beautiful free democracy. Why is it anti-Semitic to shout against such abuses? If there were in Israel a separation of church and state, the boundaries that are now so blurred might be less likely to justify silencing dissenters on charges of anti-Semitism. Dissent against Israel is not anti-Semitic for it is not a statement against Jews. It is a statement against a nationalist Zionist movement that is guilty of gross human rights abuses. Incongruous as it sounds, it is the actions of the Zionist government against its Palestinian neighbors that has shaped a world response.. How can this not create anti-Jewish sentiments? What blindness prevails that propels Zionist Israel to detach itself from the humanity of Palestinians as people just like them? This is why it is so important to make a distinction between Jews and the rabid nationalism of the government of Israel. One must be awake to the painful intermarriage of religion and politics that has deepened the Israeli crisis and creates a distortion of who is a Jew. How can there be a democracy as Israel continues to hold Palestinians hostage in order to fulfill the fantasy of a Jewish State, a dream that explodes into a nightmare on the backs of the cruel occupation and murder of Palestinians?
Against a background of fragmentation, hate, violence and a police/military-run state, as Israel strives to become a Jewish majority, Charlie Rose in an interview with Ehud Barak asked, “Is a one state solution the worst thing that can happen to Israel?” Barak’s chilling response reinforces a profound failure for the hopes of Israel as a democratic state. “Israel has been established to become a Zionist Jewish state and to create a solid Jewish majority for generations.” It is Israel’s contempt and intolerance for other religions and cultures and the desire to be a “Jewish” state that is doomed to failure.
In Gaza, where I visited this past October, living conditions are a squalid hell. Hate, racist disregard to human life, harsh, brutalizing collective punishment aimed to destroy, not the lame excuse to target terrorists. What is destroyed is infrastructure required for a viable form of sustained life. What is destroyed are schools, power lines, waste facilities, water supplies, water purification systems, hospitals, homes, killing of families, killings and confiscation of the bare, sad little fishing boats used to catch a meager fish supply that may still inhabit the waste filled Mediterranean. Yet the Palestinians struggle on amazingly. It is something to see, their pride and hopes for freedom. They are a dignified people and to be witness to their suffering as well as the work they do for the Gazan population is beyond anything I have seen. Yet, it is not difficult to understand how brutalization invites hate. We can only guess how the children of Gaza who grow up amidst the endless violence, suffering, death and so much hopelessness, will grow up to despise the people (Jews) who are their enemy.
A Jewish state created through subjugation, occupation, collective punishment and humiliation of Palestinian neighbors, is not a democracy. This is not news. But these same people cry “Anti-Semitism” at the courageous ones who deplore Israel’s actions and dissent in any form it takes. I wish to reiterate, as I have written about many times about a government that has fallen into a black hole without the ability to reflect or empathize: Israel’s hard line has taken away its humanity and poetry. It is not healthy to occupy another country, for it violates the rights of individuals to be free, to live their own culture and religion with dignity. Israel’s poets must write of death for love cannot live in the presence of racism and apartheid. Listen before it is too late, for hate begets hate until there is no point of return.
This essay also appears at Palestine Chronicle.
Israel is a mess
link to haaretz.com
The High Court of Justice’s ruling Wednesday on the legality of the Citizenship Law proves the erosion of this institution’s role as Israel’s guardian of civil rights. Let’s look at how the justices voted at the moment of truth on the law, which bans Palestinians from living in Israel with spouses who are Israeli citizens.
In a 2006 ruling, 6 out of 11 justices said the law was unconstitutional, and in the current ruling, 6 out of 11 justices said the law, which was made more strict after the first ruling, was constitutional. That’s a disappointing outcome, in part because the first ruling was made not long after the terror attacks of the second intifada, while the current ruling was made during a period of calm, due in part to coordination between Israel and the Palestinian Authority.
The title that Justice Asher Grunis gave his opinion – “Human rights are not a prescription for national suicide” – is also disappointing. No one disagrees with this, but Justice Elyakim Rubinstein, who arrived at the same judicial conclusion, recognizes that “a small group – those men and women in Israel’s Arab minority who want to marry residents of the region – must pay a heavy price for greater security for all Israelis, including their own.”
link to haaretz.com
The landscape and nature are not holy unless they are part of a culture of power. Even collective trips belong to the culture of ownership. The antiquity of the land is important only if it is under “our ownership.” What makes that more obvious than turning the graves of sheikhs in the Galilee into the graves of “the prophet Habakkuk,” “Mordechai the Jew,” and all kinds of Talmudic sages who lived and died in Babylon and were buried here merely as part of the spread of this state’s ignorance (which began with the “sanctification” of these graves in the 1950s )? The sanctity of the land means loving the state that is destroying the land.
Indeed, one cannot deny the demographic fact that, 100 years ago, 1 million people lived on this swath of land and now, without additional water or natural resources, since these have not been discovered over the years, almost 11 million live here. That is why the greenery is being taken over by concrete. But did they have to destroy the landscape? Well, those who built the state and destroyed the land were always blind to the scenery to which they came. It suffices to compare the minute spaces the state did not dare touch – those owned by Christian churches – to see how beautiful this land is when construction blends in with the landscape
Countries descend into destructive funks for various reasons. Israel entered this state around 2001 when Sharon took over. The insanity can go on for 40 years and more. Afghanistan shows the way.
BTW thanks Lillian. A wonderful article.
Yes, I too want to register my thanks to Lillian. She inspires. For the record, I was not born Jewish, nor did I convert to Judaism. I was born into Christianity, but I left its organized structure when I was an altar boy in seventh grade. Since I never joined another religion, and I include Atheism as a secular religion, or ideology, I am an agnostic by default. I do respect the human individual because he or she is human. I don’t respect cockroaches, mosquitoes, centipedes–I kill them when I see them.
An interesting ,short interview with dr Norman Finkelstein.
“Israel has lost a lot of ground.”
“…………………….Another thing working against Israel in the long run, Finkelstein thinks, may be exhaustion within the international community, “which has grown weary of this conflict [and] recognizes that Israel bears the bulk of the culpability for its perpetuation.”
The recent leaked comments between French president Nicolas Sarkozy and Barack Obama himself indicate a certain degree of exasperation with the intransience of the current Israeli government of Benjamin Netanyahu.
“They are tired; the conflict has gone on for eternity and it is completely nonsensical at some level of abstraction,” says Finkelstein.
Finkelstein has created some surprise in certain circles with his position that the internationally recognized solution of two states — Israel next to a contiguous Palestinian state based roughly on the 1967 borders and east Jerusalem as the capital — can still happen. This is still viable legally and politically despite the large numbers of Jewish settlers illegally living on Palestinian land in the West Bank, he contends.
The proposal for minor land swaps by the Palestinians “is eminently reasonable,” Finkelstein says. That is, Israel can have 1.9 per cent of the West Bank which would enable the Jewish state to keep 63 per cent of the half a million settlers within Israel proper.
When asked about the danger posed to Israel by those that respected Israeli historian and peace advocate Yehuda Bauer calls “genocidal radical Jewish nationalists,” Finkelstein contends that those Jewish settlers who would violently resist an evacuation of the Palestinian territory represent at the most “a few thousand” diehards.
“All the Israeli army has to tell them is ‘we are leaving. If you want to stay, among 2 million Palestinians, you stay.’ And in the blink of an eye they will be gone.”
Finkelstein also suggests that if the United States alone decided to pressure Israel to seriously move on the two-state solution, that would happen.
“The Israeli government has no options or alternatives if the U.S. says you have to get out. There is nobody in the international community that Israel could lean on; and it is only the U.S. that is blocking action against Israel’s systemic and increasing violations of international law.”……………………..”
link to normanfinkelstein.com
I have great admiration for Norman Finkelstein, but on the two-state solution I feel he is losing touch with reality. The IDF works side by side with the settlers to harass and attempt to ethnically cleanse the West Bank. They cannot be relied upon to remove the settlers for a two-state solution. I think we must direct our energies to the apartheid state of Israel. The goal must be a state that has political and social equality for all regardless of ethnicity or religion. As Lillian Rosengarten says, this means a separation of church and state, the only basis for a democratic, not theocratic, society.
I will entertain a two state solution the first time I see an Israeli representative offer a Palestinian state that actually has the attributes of sovereignty every state in the contemporary world deems basic, including Israel. I’ve never seen such nor read about such. Have you?
Thank you Ms. Rosengarten for your thoughtful and passionate article.
I have noted that you refer, not to the West Bank, but rather to “Occupied Palestine” which I feel more accurately describes the situation – if this nomenclature was adopted by all who write or discuss I/P matters, I believe that it would have more impact.
Absolutely.
Words matter.
The author’s essay expresses the inherent contradiction in the Zionist/Judaism concepts and made more powerful coming from a Jew. This contradiction is lost to those who blindly accept the actions of Israel as acceptable. A nation arising from sin (Nakba) and sustained by brutal force is destined to eventual destruction or radical transformation because of Universal truths one of which is to treat others as you would like to be treated. Along with the Holocaust, the destruction of the Palestinian civilization and it’s brutal Occupation will rank highly in rating the crimes our generation.
Once again, Ms. Rosengarten demonstrates that she is a vertiable mountain of morality and compassion. I am humbled.
Her eloquent message makes even more grating and unpalatable the hateful and immoral blatherings of RW and other Zio-supremacists. It’s a pity they can’t comprehend or appreciate her message enough to want to embrace it.
Countries descend into destructive funks for various reasons. Israel entered this state around 2001 when Sharon took over. The insanity can go on for 40 years and more. Afghanistan shows the way.
The Zionists’ colonial project in Palestine should never have been attempted, seafoid.
It has always been doomed to failure. We haven’t got 40 years to waste on this colossal folly.
the author waxes sentimental about a lost safe haven for jews within a model democratic secular state. isn’t that like a southerner lamenting the loss of
the good ol days in antebellum mississippie. good ol days for whom? certainly not and never for the african slave. same goes for the settler entity israel – for the conquistadores, perhaps, but not & never for the slave, er, conquered palestinian.
There have to be differences between Jews who grow up in normal societies and Jews who grow up in a cauldron of extremism like Israel. I wish more of the normalised ones would speak up.
I wish more of the normalised ones would speak up.
I do too, seafoid. It’s beginning to happen, but far too slowly. There is such a load of lies—past and present—to dispel. It’s not surprising John Q Public and his wife haven’t been seized with this issue. It is truly a nightmare.
Brzezinski on US ignorance
link to ft.com
Excellent interview this, seafoid.
“Americans don’t learn about the world, they don’t study world history, other than American history in a very one-sided fashion, and they don’t study geography,” Brzezinski says. “In that context of widespread ignorance, the ongoing and deliberately fanned fear about the outside world, which is connected with this grandiose war on jihadi terrorism, makes the American public extremely susceptible to extremist appeals.” But surely most Americans are tired of overseas adventures, I say. “There is more scepticism,” Brzezinski concedes. “But the susceptibility to demagoguery is still there.”
This too :
“He then lampoons the standard American candidate’s response to any talk of decline, which is simply to assert that America’s greatness will return if only people would believe in it. “ ‘Help is here. Smile a lot. Everything will disappear. It will be fine’ – well, sad to say, it doesn’t work that way. People are ignorant and scared. It will take more than that.””
One of the most hopeful events in US media, in my view, is the return of Bill Moyers to PBS.
I’ve just finished watching his first show, 45 minutes of which was taken up with an interview of the two authors of “Winner-Take-All Politics: How Washington Made the Rich Richer–and Turned Its Back on the Middle Class”.
link to commondreams.org
And where did people like Santorum grew up? Or this Harrington woman? All these crazy people, where do they all come from? All the crazy people, where do they all belong (GOP?) At least Gingrich got richly rewarded, so his vice is cupidity rather than insanity. Does Harrington expect a nice donation too?
At least I understand Santorum. There is a certain type of religious mentality that demands Holy War. Smite them all! He will take His own, if any.
Santorum is a Xtian Krusader.
isn’t that what mw is about? enabling the heretofore silent to speak out?
Thank you Lillian.
Israel is reformable.
And, many of the desparations that Israel expresses are stimulated by real concerns, that cannot be dismissed as nothing, is one is to remain a compassionate soul.
The Gaza flotilla effort was elegant in design, and less than elegant in application. Including the impatience of participants. Civil disobedience does not succeed overnight. In the case of the lunch counter sit-in’s for example, there were hundreds of attempts, patiently attempted, jails filled, heads bruised, before it attracted any and then national media.
100 entirely non-violent flotillas with an accompanying open Hamas offer to allow international mediation of Gazan ports, would succeed.
Clear limited objective, frustrating but patient and determined nevertheless.
Richard Witty said, ‘More dishonest apologetics for Israel from me:
“I’m making another false comparison. If Mississippi state troopers had attacked one group of peaceful demonstrators, murdered 9 of them at the same time, then arrested all the others, destroyed their cameras and other evidence, and held them incommunicado for days, preventing them from talking to the eager world press, then I might have a valid comparison.’
And, if there were no weapons used in attacking the soldiers dangerously rapelling onto the ship, then the claim that the mission was non-violent would have legs.
Its a GREAT tragedy for an otherwise imaginative effort.
Care to catalog these Weapons of Crass Defension, Richard?
Pointed sticks?
Basket of raspberries?
There weren’t any weaposn, which is why none of the Israeli pirates got away with blood noses, bruse and a few scratches. Israel behaved unlawfully and got away with it.
“And, if there were no weapons used in attacking the soldiers dangerously rapelling onto the ship”
What??? What kind of B.S. is that, Richard? They didn’t have weapons. There’s video to prove it–not to mention the ship was scoured before it left port–or didn’t you catch the press conference held at the UN with the footage one woman managed to sneak out in her bra? They grabbed the railings off the ship after the soldiers fired on them as they were descending. The 19-year old Turkish American kid was shot four times at close range in the back of his head. There’s a photo of that, too, with him kneeling while getting killed.
Just shame on you for your serious lapse in research (Google much?), and unforgivable intellectual laziness not to determine the facts.
There were no weapons Dick.
You guys are really deluded. Clubs are weapons. They don’t have to be guns. Its how they are used.
Even punching back would be a violation of non-violent principles, and very bad press.
Noone that has seen the many videos of the beating of some of soldiers rapelling down concludes that the Mari Mavmara was “simply” a non-violent civil dissent effort.
Again, it was a gross mistake on their part.
The Palestinian “freedom rides” are another case in point. They did one trip to demonstrate the segregation rather than a thousand disciplined, character-building, argument-building trips.
Non-violent principles? There is a difference between non-violent protest and protecting yourself from soldiers grappling onto your ship.
The IDF killed. You are blaming people for defending themselves. What about the Turkish-American who was shot in the back of the head while kneeling?
Anyways, you won’t stop BDS. You won’t stop more flotillas. Only Israeli violence will.
Those are the facts. Israel represses all kinds of resistance.
Whether it’s a rock-thrower shot in the face and killed w/ a tear-gas cannister (which are not meant to be shot at people’s faces btw Dick). Or a ISM activist who stands in front of a bulldozer with enough distance that the driver can see her.
Who are you trying to convince here?
You’re such a fraud. You don’t want peace. You aren’t even an advocate for your own side. You come to this blog to play out your pathology.
It’s absurd that you think your idiotic, racist, illogical and hypocritical arguments are ever going to gain traction w/ anti-Zionists – since you clearly love talking to anti-Zionists so much.
>> RW: And, if there were no weapons used in attacking the soldiers dangerously rapelling onto the ship, then the claim that the mission was non-violent would have legs.
The woman tells the police officer that she was peacefully walking down the street late at night. In her purse, she carried a can of pepper-spray. When the rapist attacked her and dragged her into an alley, she punched and scratched at him and did her best to pepper-spray him in the eyes. But the rapist overwhelmed her, beat her and raped her.
The police officer nods politely, but amends his report to indicate that i) because the woman had a weapon (pepper-spray) in her purse and ii) because she carried out aggression (punches and scratches and attempted pepper-spraying) against the rapist, her claim that she was walking “peacefully” down the street that night has no “legs”.
Only Israeli violence will.
That’s drawing water on his mill, and mill it is.
Since he is a compassionately lone fighter for the Light unto the Nations, how couldn’t he perceive the image of the endangered IDF soldiers as the most important part of the story? (if we leave Hamas out, as thankfully he did)
If soldiers are involved it means it is war. That completely changes the rules.
And these rules dictate that weapons of war have to be precise, as the IDF’s are. You are not suggesting, that if you e.g. would use your laptop to fight back, I mean use it as a weapon, that this weapon would be as precise as Israeli water cannons and rifles? Are you?
Maybe in a surrounding were he felt more safely understood he would tell you about his suspicions that the dead young American with Turkish roots may have been in fact a necessary preemptive strike. And very precise it was.
>> “When the rapist attacked her and dragged her into an alley… ”
Correction: “When the rapist dangerously attacked her and dragged her into an alley… ”
The dangerous nature of the rapist’s activity must be noted. Although aware that his undertaking was potentially risky, he had no way of knowing – when he darted out of that alley – that instead of encountering a non-violent female, he’d be met with armed resistance and overt aggression.
And to think that the woman claimed to be walking “peacefully” down the street! Ha! *rolleyes*
“And, if there were no weapons used in attacking the soldiers dangerously rapelling onto the ship, then the claim that the mission was non-violent would have legs.”
There were no weapons on either the 2010 or the 2011 flotillas. Israel wouldn’t even allow the 2011 flotilla out of port. The Irish boat was sabotaged.
The full horror of what Israel has done to Gaza must be shielded from the eyes of the world.
Yeah, Dick Witty, the occupants of the boat just had to rip off those side rail poles because–Y?
“Israel is reformable.”
Not with the current level of education funding.
Not with Yesha
Not with the Haredi unemployable.
Not with the Orthodox birth rate
Alcoholics have to want to change. Israelis don’t
Actually, Israel is a small country with a small country mentality. I mean, how people argue if something should be done or should not? A paramount consideration is if Israel can get away with it.
It is a tad different in USA or, say, Russia, because it is so obvious that the country can get away with a lot that you have to consider other aspects of policies. In any case, as soon as it will be clear that Israel can get away with much less than before, national consensus will change. Right now advocates of changes in Witty style use primarily the arguments that the “world” will not accept this or that, and clearly they are in the position of a boy who cried wolf, or Chicken Little.
So the reform has to start in USA and EU. Canada and Australia could help, but of course they matter less.
it proves every day that it is not. Israel has been a criminal enterprise from day 1, and has become increasingly rogue.
Israel is certainly reformable. It takes respectful effort to accomplish, not the lame chicken-hawk effort to impose.
You’ve got to persuade to make change.
Richard, you’ve got to be persuadable to even consider making change.
Israel is not, and has never been, persuadable. It never has been, and never will be, reformable.
That is because it is the fruit of an ideology that is immoral, unchanging, and relentless. It is one that mocks at persuasion from others and emanates threatening persuasion of others to maintain itself as the neighborhood bully-boy.
Lame chicken-hawks are those who imagine they can effect Zionist change by persuasion, and that Zionism or Zionist Israel can be reformed.
You are either very young, or not very informed John H.
From 1948 – 1977 Israel was a liberal socialist state. Since then it has vacilated between right-wing governance and labor. In 1986, Israel had functionally annexed the West Bank and Gaza, making a single state. It assumed that no Palestinian state would emerge.
Following the first intifada, Israelis en masse realized that Palestinians actually cared about their political status, and negotiated the Oslo accords and follow up which were different than previous.
Since then, Israel has been divided, nearly equally between likud arguments and peace arguments. Until the second intifada, when the few hundred incidents of mass murder on Israeli streets created a much much much higher level of distrust of Palestinian intent.
Israeli opinion can change again, if there is a path. If activists work for the fantasy of a single-state or rationalize aggression on Israeli civilians in any way, or if activists encourage Palestinian solidarity to never compromise, then it won’t change.
“Backbone” as to continuing “resistance” in this is more dangerous than peaceful patient assertion of rights that touch imagination and change hearts and minds.
The decision to go to war in word, deed, violence, any of it, is a big decision, one that propels others into war. “Chicken-hawks”.
It takes respectful effort to accomplish, not the lame chicken-hawk effort to impose.
so now the “right/left posse” has mutated to “lame chicken-hawks”?
Hmm, that reminds me of some of my earliest post 911 impressions of sexually potent imagery used in the larger context against “disssenters”. Or simply against people asking questions. Lame, hmm?
What is the opposite of chicken-hawk? Arm-chair generals?
was persuasion what it took to reform nazi germany or imperial japan? then why would it work to reform apartheid israel?
Its a theme attributed to any of us that are remote from a conflict, rah-rah ing a side.
Witty, you are the chicken hawk. Ask the regulars here what the impact of all you say means–you are a chicken hawk all the way. Nobody here is suggesting the US should put military pressure on Israel. Where did you get that notion? And, Witty, so long as you have your proxy boot on the neck of the natives, whether its directly, as in Palestine, or indirectly via AIPAC in USA, we conclude you have no respect for human beings unless they are your type of Jews.
I stand with Lillian Rosengarten. Wonderfully expressed. I so much love her take on things.
The main question that author avoids time and time again-who is a Jew and what makes you one? Being born as one? Practicing Judaism in it various forms?
Why it is so important here to state the difference between those “Zionist Jews” and self-described “secular non-Zionist ” ones?
The same line of argumentation can be applied here from the perspective of say “liberal human being” or “peace-loving” atheist.
Why it is so important to reiterate “Jew vs. Jew” nonsense here? If you not practicing Judaism and do not believe in Israel being Jewish Zionist State, what other connection to Jewish tradition and beliefs do you have?
All other Jewish-born philosophers and liberals had publicly denounced their religious past, proudly proclaiming themselves as citizens of the world, free of tribalism and shackles of ethnocentric mentality.
So what makes you a Jew, Lilian?
If you not practicing Judaism and do not believe in Israel being Jewish Zionist State, what other connection to Jewish tradition and beliefs do you have?
Dimadok, are you being purposely obtuse?
Judaism is a religion, Zionism is a political ideology.
I did not said that these are inseparable- however my question is still here: if you are not a religious Jewish person nor a Zionist one, what makes you a Jew?
Is it being born as one but having no cultural connections to the ” tribal” beleifs still counts as being Jewish? Then what is the particular part that remains of you that is Jewish and not universal?
If Zionism is one option, then what about religious anti-Zionist Jews?
Don’t they contradict one of the paths to Jewishness (per you and eee)?
I understand what you mean somewhat but Jewish identity isn’t the same as a nationalistic identity.
I could understand accusing an Israeli who advocates the ‘abolition’ of Israel as a Jewish State (and thus, Israel as it is) of being a non-Israeli.
Like, if I wanted the US to become a Christian State that gave privileges to Christians over non-Christians – then you could criticize my conception of American identity.
However, at the same time – things change. Women couldn’t vote in the US until they could vote. Slaves were slaves until they were freed.
Identities are not static, Dim. You want Jewish identity to be THE SAME as Zionism or Israeli national identity because then it will disassociate your political opponents from their Jewish identities.
In doing so, you weaken them because one of the strengths of the Israel lobby and the Zionist zeitgeist is emotional blackmail and identity politics.
She is a Jew. There is no good reason to question any basis of her commitment or association, even if residual, unless she herself renounces it.
Thank you for the comment, Richard. However being born a Jew and having no active connections with either religious or Zionist aspects of Jewish life leaves your definition as Jew only in the eyes of the surrounding society. Should people know that your parents are Jewish or you acknowledge it , this would trigger your Jewish moment- examples are numerous to count. And this were the cognitive dissonance of the people like Lilian or Phil for that purpose lays- they do not want to be associated with Judaism or Zionist Israel, yet would like to call themselves as Jews. I am asking what is left then- the general ideals of liberty and equality, what is Jewish about them and not say Irish or Arabic. They are universal. Therefore to argue here as Jew vs. Jew is not appropriate. It would be American citizen vs Jews.
You don’t know anything about her active connections or not. There are MANY themes to Jewish association and identity, that are Jewish in substance even if rejecting Zionism.
Zionism is an inherent component of the Jewish religion, but not necessarily in its political form. That was a choice to pursue, and is now a reality.
The divorce from “my people” including Israel is significant when stated. If political ideology is what gets one to state “I am indifferent to fate of my family of family”, that is a bad thing in my book.
My vision of progressive is NOT a divorce from my own, but an intended kindness to beyond just my own.
Whether one was a Zionist Jew living in Israel or an anti-Zionism Jew living in Israel, ALL afford themselves of the protection of law and protection of defense of the named Jewish state.
I also experience some resentment when some invoke their Jewishness as immunity from accountability for dissenting words or actions, then reject the obligation to accept the presence, identification, or non-directly harming forms of identification of other Jews.
I don’t think Lillian was rejecting her Jewishness in conducting non-violent civil disobedience.
Richard Witty said, ‘Look how dimadok and I arrogantly discuss whether Lillian is “Jewish enough.” Of course, I don’t respond to the substance of her post. This is the height of rudeness.’
North,
Why this distraction? You want the assertion “she is not a Jew” to go uncontested? Or, you want to insist that points only be made in language or by people that you approve of?
Wierd.
since when isn’t being born of jewish parents (particularly one’s mother) enough to render one a jew? where do the ancient scrolls say anything about one’s having to be connected to either religious or jewish nationalism (ie zionism)? as for why people like lilian or phil or myself consider ourselves jewish, can’t speak for them, but for me it’s because i always have been and see no reason to change, simple as that.
dimadok, I think you raise a very acute question. It is the same key question Atzmon asks, and for his troubles he is basically banned from MW, which I don’t agree with at all. What better way to punch holes in Atzmon’s thinking than allowing him here on MW? What is the particular part that remains of being Jewish that is not universal?
Is Phil Weiss universal or not?
So Dim, to be a Jew, you must believe in a Jewish Zionist State?
Does that mean Judaism = Zionism? Or for all practical purposes, Jewishness = Zionism?
So criticism of Zionism = antisemitism? Or if Israel/Zionism has done wrongs = Jewishness should be criticized alongside Israel/Zionism? Or attributed to Jewishness?
You are an antisemite.
Once again you are distorting my post- I am asking again what makes a secular non-Zionist person a Jew? Simple question.
How about a simple fact that person’s parents were Jewish??
Does it count in your book??
Or a person has to be also brainwashed on top of that to be counted as one?
I am of Indian descent. I am not Hindu or Muslim though. I haven’t been to India since 2002 though.
I am not ‘White’ and not part of the majority. I am a minority and am conscious of my skin color/looks (not in a bad way, but I know I’m different from ‘the majority’).
Because of that I also identify with other Indians I know and those I don’t know.
How should I see myself if I don’t fit several criteria? Isn’t Jewish identity similar? Jews are an ethno-religious group. You can be of Jewish descent. You can be aware of your Jewish identity as constructed by the mainstream and form another Jewish identity in opposition (anti-Zionism).
Maybe anti-Zionism is Jewish as well. Why does it have to be either Zionist or not?
Isn’t a self-hating Jew, a Jew still? And if they ‘hate’ themselves, what do they hate if they aren’t really Jews?
What if they just want to be a different kind of Jew than how you exist as a Jew?
Good point, what about the Jewish Law of Return?
How does that work, Dim?
The Law of Return is not forced on any person of Jewish descent. When you apply for immigration under it , you therefore acknowledge Israel as the Jewish Zionist state. Nobody is forcing you to do so.
You are raising a valid points here. But the answer is within your comment as well. You know your history and identify with the people who share it with you. The color of your skin is relative to the society where you are living. Say, you would move to Sri- Lanka or Bangladesh would you still call yourself Indian? I am sure you would. In the case of Lilian her Jewishness was defined from the outside and she spends her life trying to escape from it. You are accepting who you are.
Not at all, dimadock.
She is not spending her life trying to escape from her Jewishness, but to find and promote what she believes it is to be a Jew.
She looks for that in Zionism and finds A military state created by fear and desire for power. It is sickening, but torments me as well because I am ashamed of what Israel stands for.
She is ashamed because this Israel is mostly Jews, and is tormented at what she considers to be something that is standing for the very antithesis of what it is to be Jewish.
That is her acceptance, her embracing, of who she is, a Jew.
>> dimadok: I am asking again what makes a secular non-Zionist person a Jew? Simple question.
Here’s your simple answer:
>> dimadok: “And yet I identify myself as Jewish and mind you by the society as well, REGARDLESS whether I actively practice Judaism or not.”
So, if Ms. Rosengarten – who was born Jewish – regards herself as Jewish and if society regards her as Jewish, she is Jewish whether or not she actively practices Judaism.
That was easy.
Its a difficult confusion to be alienated from Israel to the point that she doesn’t speak of Israel as “we”, but does feel ashamed of Israel as “we”.
The remedy for that bifurcation would be to identify more, including with the Jewish community in Israel, rather than less.
In that way her disagreement with prevailing policies, attitudes, would be a self-improvement effort more than even a perceived attack.
That was easy
It sure was, eljay. Once Dimadok was forced to drop the Z word, he didn’t have a leg to stand on. He was just screwing us around. Irritating that!
>> Its a difficult confusion to be alienated from Israel to the point that she doesn’t speak of Israel as “we”, but does feel ashamed of Israel as “we”.
From what I gather, Ms. Rosengarten is neither an Israeli nor a Zio-supremacist, but rather a Jew. And she is shocked what Israelis and Zio-supremacists are doing to the good name of Judaism. She does not appear to be suffering “a difficult confusion” in the least.
RW, an immoral and hypocritical Zio-supremacist, is unable to comprehend this good woman’s superior sense of justice and morality, so he engages in innuendo against her. Bravo, RW, bravo.
Once again you are distorting my post- I am asking again what makes a secular non-Zionist person a Jew? Simple question.
The short answer is that Jews are considered to be members of an ethnic group and are entitled to the legal protections of US anti-discrimination laws according to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. The same principle applies to Jews in other countries, like the Race Relations Act in the UK.
FYI, the government here doesn’t impose theistic tests. See Torcaso v. Watkins, 367 U.S. 488 (1961) link to supreme.justia.com
That means that non-theistic religions, like Buddism, the Unitarian Universalist Church, or the Society for Humanistic Judaism, have the same legal status as theistic congregations, like the Orthodox Union. In the 19th century, the theists in the Reform Judaism movement formally rejected Zionism and all such Mosaic and rabbinical laws as regulate diet, priestly purity, and dress. Even members of Orthodox sects reject Secular Zionism and the right of the State of Israel to exist. So the attempts by groups, like Shurat HaDin, to equate Anti-Zionism with Anti-Semitism are pretty much doomed to failure.
You are confused Eljay.
I didn’t engage in innuendo against her. I noted a confusion of identity.
Its often played publicly “A Jew says”… x dissenting comment, therefore the comment or action has additional merit beyond just a human doing it. They are a hero, whereas others are just willing complicit criminals.
If she or the movement wants points for a “Jewish” boat (as in association as current Jews, not as residual born Jews, ‘through no fault of their own’), then it would be logical that she would feel sympathy for her co-ethnicists that are largely children of holocaust survivors, and survivors and children of survivors of war to ethnically cleanse the region of Jews.
If she bears that sympathy as a primary one, then her participation in a Jewish boat is of active Jewish identity, rather than just of residual. A larger love, larger than the Jewish community that she knows personally, and larger than any Jewish community as well.
I don’t know one way or another as to Lillian’s views. In ALL cases, it would be presumptious of me to judge her character.
I wish her well in expressing compassion for all living beings that she has come to feel for.
I had an experience arguing with a Larouchite on another blog, who cited a Jewish name among the Larouche leadership as proof that Larouche could not possibly encourage any anti-semitism.
Its a silly assertion either to claim that one is not anti-semitic, or someone else is anti-semitic, or if a dissent action has special significance or not, in the name of making one’s association as a Jew of not special significance.
Its a difficult confusion to be alienated from Israel to the point that she doesn’t speak of Israel as “we”, but does feel ashamed of Israel as “we”.
I see no reason why members of Reconstructionist Judaism, Humanistic Judaism, et al in other countries shouldn’t feel alienated by a so-called State of the Jewish people that adamantly refuses to grant its citizens equal human rights.
The remedy for that bifurcation would be to identify more, including with the Jewish community in Israel, rather than less.
The remedy would be to demand that wrong doers speak for themselves and to point out that it isn’t the role of modern states to represent ethnic groups or dictate religion.
If this is the correct definition of ethnics
link to en.wikipedia.org
Then I view a nation establishing or including protection of ethnics ‘within’ a nation in addition to and in the same catagory as race, religion and minorities as liberalism on steriods.
By the definition of ethnic used for this we could identify white Europeans as ethnics also and include them in the same laws.
Maybe it will eventually come to that.
I am continually astonished by the sight of otherwise reasonable people twisting like racing touts in the dock at dimadok’s perfectly simple question, What makes a non-religious, non-Zionist American a Jew? I can see that someone who practices the Judaic religion is a Jew. Someone who lives in Israel and avails himself of the state privileges associated with being identified as Jewish is a Jew. But for the life of me I cannot understand why secular Americans who enjoy hotdogs, pizza, basketball, blues music, etc. and whose daily lives differ in no way from the lives of their non-”Jewish” countrymen insist on identifying as Jews. I suppose if someone wants to call him- or herself a Jew, then others should respect that. But why someone would do it is beyond me. Years ago the African-American comedian Dick Gregory said that when he was drunk he thought he was Polish. The difference is, he meant it as a joke, and everyone who heard him took it that way. By the way, is a Zionist of non-Jewish ancestry also a Jew, if he says he is?
“I suppose if someone wants to call him- or herself a Jew, then others should respect that. But why someone would do it is beyond me.”
The word “tribe” seems to be important to a lot of secular Jews. The answer to your question may lie within its meaning, notatall.
“By the way, is a Zionist of non-Jewish ancestry also a Jew, if he says he is?”
I wouldn’t think so. He’s likely to be a more than normally deluded Christian Zionist.
>> You are confused Eljay.
RW is seeing confusion everywhere today.
>> I didn’t engage in innuendo against her. I noted a confusion of identity. … I don’t know one way or another as to Lillian’s views. In ALL cases, it would be presumptious [sic] of me to judge her character.
Apparently, however, it is not presumptuous of RW to suggest to Ms. Rosengarten that she suffers from “a confusion of identity”.
If this is the correct definition of ethnics . . .
The terms “Nation” and “ethnic group” are derived from the same root, but are not synonymous: The terms ethnicity and ethnic group are derived from the Greek word ἔθνος ethnos, normally translated as “nation”. The terms refer currently to people thought to have common ancestry who share a distinctive culture.
By the definition of ethnic used for this we could identify white Europeans as ethnics also and include them in the same laws.
Discrimination against whites already is a violation of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. See for example Regents of Univ. of California v. Bakke, 438 U.S. 265 (1978) link to supreme.justia.com
Thank you for you comment.
They can be critical of policies and practices, and also fundamentally sympathetic with their family of families, and of the urge for self-governance after a “push-comes-to-shove” experience of the holocaust.
as more and more jews step forward and denounce the zionist entity, israel-firsters are desperate to find a way to excommunicate us as jews. they realize that jewish anti-zionists are an invitation for other jews as well as non-jews to stand up for justice in palestine – because if israel-firsters accuse them of being antisemites, they can respond, “how can i be an antisemite when there are so many jews alongside me standing up for palestine?” face it, israel firsters, us jewish anti-zionists are here for both the short and the long term, so might as well get used to it. maybe after your settler-entity is delegitimized, and the danger of zionism induced antisemitism disappears, some of us will rethink the matter of whether or not to remain jewish, but until then, your’re stuck with us and there’s nothing you can do about it.
Patm: “The word “tribe” seems to be important to a lot of secular Jews. The answer to your question may lie within its meaning, notatall.”
Tribes were relevant in the days when one band of hunter-gatherers differed from another in important ways, including the languages they spoke. Today tribes are anachronistic, at best futile efforts to overcome alienation. The solution lies not in attempting to recreate outmoded forms but in building a new world in which, as Marx wrote, “In place of the old bourgeois society, with its classes and class antagonisms, we shall have an association, in which the free development of each is the condition for the free development of all.”
>> dimadok: Thank you for you[r] comment.
You’re welcome. :-)
I’m sure many secular Jews today would agree with you, notatall. And as you no doubt know many of the early Zionists who went to Israel were Marxists.
I don’t think it’s up to you and me to insist that Jews live up to our ideals. Given their recent history and relatively small numbers, I for one can appreciate why they might wish to consider themselves members of a tribe.
Our battle is not with Jews, it is with Zionists of all stripes.
Eljay,
You are now making a fight where one does not exist.
>> Eljay,
>> You are now making a fight where one does not exist.
RW appears to be projecting onto eljay – who abhors fighting and violence – his desire to make a fight. Curious.
And this, presumably, because eljay noted and observed RW’s attempt to discredit the wonderfully moral Ms. Rosengarten by suggesting that she suffers from “a confusion of identity”.
Don’t make it impossible for Lillian to respond personally, under her own opinion and reaction, rather than the framing of “Richard is a racist, you know”.
I get that you are worried that people will be “deluded” into sympathy with my perspective.
Don’t steal from them, the opportunity to dialog and make their own conclusions.
>> Don’t make it impossible for Lillian to respond personally, under her own opinion and reaction, rather than the framing of “Richard is a racist, you know”.
eljay is certain that if Ms. Rosengarten responds to RW’s observation that she suffers from “a confusion of identity”, she will do so with her own clear understanding of just what kind of person RW is, based on the way RW has framed himself on this site.
>> I get that you are worried that people will be “deluded” into sympathy with my perspective.
eljay is not “worried” that people will agree with RW, but he is saddened by the thought that RW’s brand of Zio-supremacism could actually win over people who believe in morality, justice and equality (among other positive things).
But, well, stranger things have happened in this crazy world.
The only people who would ever share your ethnocentric supremacist perspective are those who have always had it. No one with any morality or basic nderstanin of the matter will.
richard, eljay has no power or authority here to prevent lillian from responding to you. he has every right to respond to your criticism of her. and yes claiming you ‘noted a confusion of identity’ is a criticism.
btw, just because you ‘noted it’ doesn’t mean one (a confusion of identity) exists. it means you presume one exists.
When Eljay, North, and formerly Chaos shadow me, they prohibit response that is free from noise.
You didn’t understand what I meant by “confusion of identity”, but didn’t ask.
The confusion of identity is in presentation. When one uses being known as a Jew and loves it for the purpose of promotion, but is ashamed of it for other purposes, there is a confusion (of identity).
Better to love one’s identity and to make it the best that one can.
There is an ongoing discussion of whether Israelis are “my people”, stimulated by Phil’s outburst a couple days ago.
I speak of Israelis as “my people”, pimples and all, and seek to participate in “my people” in a way that improves us, our experience, and in how we relate to others.
I was forced to either get on the bus or stay off the bus in life. I chose to get on the bus.
Externally, remaining on the fence as to one’s identity, trashes one’s credentials as a participant in that community.
As I said, in defending Lillian from the question of whether she was a Jew or not. If she calls herself a Jew, and supported by her family tree and upbringing, she is a Jew. If she participates in a Jewish community, her Jewishness is a larger part of her identity. If she participates in the entire Jewish community (including Israeli) as Jews, then her Jewishness is an even more comprehensive part of her person.
To the extent that she uses her Judaism for political ends without regarding it as important in her current life, that would be a hypocrisy.
Jews can identify as Jews in various ways, and in various layers of their person.
Many are residual Jews, meaning that they are born Jewish, grew up in a Jewish family, experienced and took in Jewish mannerisms, primary ways of thinking (in the intimate and not deliberate way that a parent teaches his/her child), comfort with other Jews. Its in their childhood memory, deep, formative, though not necessarily what they adopt later.
Many of us experienced a layer of rebellion, of actual hatred of our Jewishness, that expressed itself outwardly in anger at our parents’ symbolic references, often Jewish references.
Many of us that had experienced that proceeded to more openness with other communities, inter-marrying as doing so intimately. Inter-marrying is confusing in every person that does so, at least among those that originated from two-Jewish parent households. It is nearly always a mix of chosen intimacy with a compadre, a bridge to universalism and anger.
Many Jewish families experienced much intermarriage. Ask Phil about his family, personally. Please don’t ask him to speak here of his brothers and sisters.
I’m an only child, so in my family ALL the children married Jewish spouses. In my kids, my oldest is certain to marry a Jewish woman (as he’s a chasid, very important to him). My youngest probably 50-50.
So, an inner layer of familiarity, childhood memory (conscious and unconscious), a second layer of rebellion and worldly circumstance (who one encountered).
The last layer of identity is chosen. (I’m sure there are more layers.) What do I choose to be part of, to adopt as my own, knowing that anything external that one is part is inevitably imperfect and if one is seeking perfection and consistency, will not match up. (But a spouse is similar.)
The layer of rebellion is inherently at odds with the layers of childhood familiarity and adult choice. But, that gets reconciled. An example is my relationship with my mother. My mother is old now, and just moved to my area of the country after living far for most of her life. I see her twice a week, and my former rebellion towards her, and her former subconscious judgment and hassling me, has waned enormously.
A big part of me is still on the fence as to my Jewishness. I’ve never found a mix of political perspective, universalistic spiritual depth, and particular prayer and study path, that is comfortable for me. I have many close Jewish friends that I do share large elements of all three, most of my Jewish friends are very similar in those three areas.
The Jewish element is both fresh (noting that I/we are the forward cutting edge of tradition, what we bring to the world in our new), and very much coherent to the past.
For me for two reasons. One is the that those that are the most sincere and deep spiritually have grappled with confusions and contradictions in/through the religion for a long time, found links and approaches in scripture and people that they rely on.
The other is that the community is not just me, but all of us, and I cannot presume that my views are THE cutting edge, but just a participant in the present, with many others.
I can think freely, but I cannot represent Jewish community one way or another without a great deal of presumption.
That is or should be a theme of Phil’s the presumption of the Adelson’s of the world to speak for THE Jewish community, even if they end up ratified (or not).
Yes, dimadok, it’s a good question. What makes Phil Weiss a Jew, other than his mother was a blood line jew? How does that differ from the Nazi Nuremberg race laws?
That’s becauise no one is interested in what you mean by “confusion of identity”. Like all your other BS terminology, we all know know it’s bound to be a meangless attempt at dishonesty on your part. You’re subsequent explanaiton only confirms those suspicions.
it is you that is eiehr confused or tryhign to deceive. You’re conflating promotion with being proud of being Jewish. And you’re conflating shame of Zionism with shame of Judaism. One id a religious and cultural identity that dates back millenia while the others (Zionism) is a 114 year old ideology.
Gemrnas who spoke out against Nazi policies were not suffering confusion of identity”, they were moral objectors. You attacked Phil of the same crime, speaking out against the tribe and now you are doing it against Lillian, becasue you are infuratited that Lillian is using her Jewish identity to prevent Zionist propgandists like yourself from dismissing her as an anti Semite for speaking out against apartheid Israel.
That’s simply tribal Darmwinism. Again you are deliberately conflating Zionism and Judaism.
Her identity is Jewish, not Zionist. By speaking out against Zionism, she is indeed aimning to make Judaism the best it can be.
They are not your people Witty. You refuse to participate in Israeli society.
None of hich has anything to do with Israel or Zionism.
There is no evidence that she does. The trouble is that Israel and Israeli leades insist that they are the representatives of Jews aournd the world, and an increasing number of Jews are rejecting that claim. Lillian is one of them.
I am continually astonished by the sight of otherwise reasonable people twisting like racing touts in the dock at dimadok’s perfectly simple question, What makes a non-religious, non-Zionist American a Jew?
dimadok said And yet I identify myself as Jewish and mind you by the society as well, REGARDLESS whether I actively practice Judaism or not. Well, duh! I explained that our society also considers secular Jews to be Jewish.
The people who do all of the twisting are the commentators here who, for philosophical reasons, pretend that they can’t understand that secular Jews are members of a legally recognized ethnic group. The bureaucrats in our U.S. Commission on Civil Rights and other federal agencies have determined that secular Jews are members of an ethnic group entitled to equal protection against discrimination in accordance with the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
There is an Israeli corollary that you’ve mentioned, whereby the bureaucrats in the Ministry of Interior consider millions of secular Jews living there to be members of a national ethnic group entitled to equal protection against the pervasive discrimination that they and other government agencies direct towards the non-Jewish citizens in accordance with the applicable laws.
So both countries allow secular Jews to be considered Jewish by operation of the laws, code of federal regulations, or ministerial administrative regulations.
Patm: “Our battle is not with Jews, it is with Zionists of all stripes.”
I agree, but what about “the soft Zionism of Jewish peoplehood,” which expresses itself, among other ways, in groups addressing the Palestine issue set up for Jews only, which by their names relegate others to second-class standing? What would you have thought of a group that called itself Whites Against Apartheid, or individuals who stressed their whiteness in opposing racial oppression?
notatall, I know nothing about the Jewish Peoplehood program beyond what I found at the Jewish Peoplehood HUB website. Here is their mission statement:
“Our mission: Inspired by the promise of the Jewish People to realize its collective potential, we will invigorate the value of “Klal Israel” and nurture commitment to the Jewish future.” [Klal Israel apparently translates as the "House of all Israel" whatever that means.]
“Our role:
· Articulate Peoplehood language and strategies through a global think-tank
· Cultivate leaders and activists to embrace the challenges of the Jewish collective
· Incubate creative ideas for Peoplehood programming
· Generate Peoplehood actions through conversations, resources and networking
Our founders: A unique partnership of the UJA – Federation of New York, the NADAV Fund and the Jewish Agency.”
It looks to me as if they are racists masquerading as liberals. No mention of Palestinians anywhere on the two sites I checked. They are planning a big PR campaign.
Whites against Apartheid? Again, racists masquerading as liberals.
link to bky.org.uk
link to jewishagency.org
patm: “racists masquerading as liberals”
That is it, exactly. When I spoke of “the soft Zionism of Jewish peoplehood” I had no idea that the group you cited actually existed, but they prove my point: the very belief in Jewish peoplehood (capitals or lower-case) is an expression of racial ideology. Who would ever be so ridiculous as to assert the existence of Methodist peoplehood?
Who would ever be so ridiculous as to assert the existence of Methodist peoplehood?
Or the United Church of Canada Peoplehood wherein I spent my early years. It sounds not only ridiculous but pretentious in the extreme.
Zionists pretend that Judaism is more than a religion. It is not!!
“Or the United Church of Canada Peoplehood”
Do you want to deny the people of the United Church of Canada the right to self-associate, the right to self-govern, and the right of self-determination?
(Or would it be self-(self)-determination? Little help here, please, eljay.)
>> (Or would it be self-(self)-determination? Little help here, please, eljay.)
I believe the correct spelling is “self-(self-)determination”. :-)
Should it involve terrorism and a bit of ethnic cleansing, well, the people of the UCC (“pUCC-ers”, on might call them) can point out that it was a “necessary” wrong that resulted in a “liberation” and, so, they “primarily celebrate”.
What a bunch of pUCC-ers they are. ;-)
Do you want to deny the people of the United Church of Canada the right to self-associate, the right to self-govern, and the right of self-determination?
Nope. They can do what they like. As long as they don’t decide to take a run at controlling the Canadian government.
You are one courageous lady.
Keep on keepin’ on.
Cliff,
I’m glad that you stated your respect for identification as a people, even in diaspora.
I’m glad that you stated your respect for identification as a people, even in diaspora.
Here in the Americas, the Jews are ordinarily recognized as members of an ethnic group or groups, not a people. If you demanded your right of self-determination and attempted to establish an ethnic or religious Jewish state via conquest, you would be treated exactly like Jefferson Davis.
It is interesting to contemplate the implications of where this piece appears. link to spiegel.de
You’re good looking too.
Great article. Admirable lady.
“Listen before it is too late, for hate begets hate until there is no point of return.”
That is so true. The massive disregard for the most basic human rights that Israel performs on daily bases towards Palestinians, the massive disregard for international, public opinion in that matter, relying on ” paid and bought” “friendship” of the Big Brother as a source of additional power and security will backfire against Israel one not so beautiful day. It already does.
link to youtube.com
Would you say the “liberal Zionists” are a bridge between the two groups Lilian is talking about?
I would like to ask who the liberal Zionists are who contribute articles to the blog, like Jerry Slater?
I appreciate her honesty and courage, I am sure it is not easy for her to criticize Israel. Comparable to an sicilian criticising the mafia.
Richard Witty said, ‘Notice how I’ve made a number of comments on this thread, but I have absolutely nothing at all to say in response to Lillian Rosengarten’s eloquent post, even though I regularly whine that I want “dialog.” Ms. Rosengarten was actually aboard one of the peace ships trying to break the blockade of Gaza, and actually witnessed Israeli violence against that moral giant, the former Israeli pilot Yonatan Shapira.
‘I, Richard Witty, by contrast have not been in Israel for over 25 years, and I haven’t witnessed anything.
‘Lillian Rosengarten’s first-hand testimony frightens my guilty conscience. That’s why I divert and try to threadjack.’
I’m a liberal Zionist Jew, who believes that the Jews in Israel are “my people” (in contrast to Phil’s outburst a couple days ago).
I believe that the obligation of “my people” is to be secure and kind, neither of which are the case currently. So, I work for both, for Israel to be more secure, and for Israel to be more kind and accepting both within and without.
And, as I said, the flotilla was potentially an elegant (though expensive and very dangerous) method of civil disobedience, UNTIL weapons were used at all and definitively beyond self-defense in the Mari Mavmara.
It is no longer an elegant method of civil disobedience.
It is too costly and too dangerous to be used as the kind of patient, repetitive, limited civil disobedience. It is framed carelessly. As I said, the Meshal offer for an internationally controlled port was a path, but the flotilla itself is not one.
So long as Hamas and other less organized factions retain the prominent “right to armed struggle”, then the blockade will have justification, and breaking the blockade will be a functional support of Hamas, not distinguishable from support for the Gazan people, especially now that the virginity of strict non-violence is gone.
Richard Witty said, ‘I continue to threadjack, instead of having “dialog” with Lillian Rosengarten.’
Is that threadjacking North? Is that the new “racist” name-call?
“So long as Hamas and other less organized factions retain the prominent “right to armed struggle”, then the blockade will have justification, and breaking the blockade will be a functional support of Hamas, not distinguishable from support for the Gazan people, especially now that the virginity of strict non-violence is gone.”
So long as the ratio of Israeli violence to Palestinian violence is 100 to 1 and not 100 to 0, Witty will condemn Palestinian violence and justify Israeli violence.
And if Palestinian violence dropped to zero, he’d then condemn any use of rhetoric he didn’t like more harshly than he has ever condemned Israel for anything.
>> And if Palestinian violence dropped to zero, he’d then condemn any use of rhetoric he didn’t like more harshly than he has ever condemned Israel for anything.
Well, sure. I mean, why should Israel be subjected to such maximalism and destabilization?!
Hamas’ declarations create a situation in which there is no path to actual peace.
It needs to be named.
Acceptance needs to happen.
>> Hamas’ declarations create a situation in which there is no path to actual peace.
It’s been a while since RW blamed Hamas (damn you, Hamas!) for everything. Suddenly I feel a little nostalgic for chants of “San Remo!”
Funny how Israel’s 60+ years, ON-GOING and offensive (i.e., not defensive) campaign of aggression, oppression, theft, colonization, destruction and murder, and its unwillingness to enter into sincere negotiations for a just and mutually-beneficial peace, never seem to be responsible for “a situation in which there is no path to actual peace”.
Its not a blame. Its a recognition that the path to peace is blocked solidly by the assertion “we will never accept you”.
Its a request that Hamas accept the people and the nation Israel, and that dissent accept the people and the nation Israel.
It would change much.
“Funny how Israel’s 60+ years, ON-GOING and offensive (i.e., not defensive) campaign of aggression, oppression, theft, colonization, destruction and murder, and its unwillingness to enter into sincere negotiations for a just and mutually-beneficial peace, never seem to be responsible for “a situation in which there is no path to actual peace”.
I wasn’t joking in my January 15 12:12 AM post above. That’s an accurate description of his behavior. There is no finite ratio of Palestinian to Israeli violence that will make Richard condemn Israel more than he condemns Palestinians and even harsh criticism of Israel upsets Richard more than Israeli violence. Israeli violence is always defensive, if sometimes excessive–accurate criticism of Israel is an assault on the very possibility of peace.
You are addicted to that word “condemn”. I am not condemning, I am proposing.
Lets change both worlds. Israel does not accept the right of return, so if that is the basis of the war, then it will continue indefinitely.
If that is present and always the motive for harm, then that will continue indefinitely.
If there is some humanism that you bear, that says, “enough harming each other, we are human beings primarily, where we find ourselves in this real world, lets treat each other as human beings more than as political enemies”, then that should be acted on, to ALL that you make condemnations of or recommendations to.
RW :
Wrong. Excuses.
Hamas doesnt need to recognize anything. People and nation Israel goes trashcan as well. Nobody havent teach you this basic element about recognition who/where/why/how ?
Yes Richard, you do do a lot of proposing.
Lets change both worlds. Israel does not accept the right of return
You’re doing well so far. One of the changes that is essential is for Israel to accept and implement the right of return. Well done!
If there is some humanism that you bear, that says, “enough harming each other, we are human beings primarily, where we find ourselves in this real world, lets treat each other as human beings more than as political enemies”, then that should be acted on, to ALL that you make condemnations of or recommendations to.
Yes indeed, that should be acted upon by both parties. You got it again!
Here’s what:
“Its not a blame. Its a recognition that the path to peace is blocked solidly by the assertion “we will never accept you”…witty
Hey Richard…..you know the saying about ‘if you want unconditional love get a dog’?
Palestines aren’t dogs.
When Zionists (and their critics) argue interminably here over who is a Jew and who is not, their discussions sound to those of us who are not members of the tribe like a time warp from the thirties when other people worried who was Aryan or not.
I simply cannot fathom why here in America it is so important to know who is a Jew and who isn’t. Isn’t it enough just to be American? I mean, wasn’t that the deal when we all came to this country? That we let you in, no matter your race or ethnicity but in return you had to give up all your old allegiances and simply become Americans instead?
Hey, Duscany, fathom this: link to aish.com
Have you ever seriously dated a Jew, considered marriage?
Why stop at “Birthright Honeymoon”? What about Brisright (a package deal with all the trimmings)!
What I get from the aish article (beyond the obvious issue of intermarriage itself) is that the author believes that Judaism has nothing to offer young American Jews today but jingoism, military prowess and cheap marketing tricks. How nauseatingly shallow.
I’ve had two Jewish girlfriends and one Jewish wife. My sons attended Jewish supper camps.
So then, with all that direct experience in America, with American Jews, Duscany, you’ve never run into any tribal hostility? Or, if you have, what justification did the hostile ones have for being concerned if someone is a Jew or not? And, or did the hostility arise from your own side of the family? Same question there. Or in all your experience, has everybody basically subscribed to the classic melting pot theory?
I simply cannot fathom why here in America it is so important to know who is a Jew and who isn’t. Isn’t it enough just to be American? I mean, wasn’t that the deal when we all came to this country? That we let you in, no matter your race or ethnicity but in return you had to give up all your old allegiances and simply become Americans instead?
Nonsense. Jews are members of a ethnic and religious groups, so “old allegiances” isn’t the central issue. Being in America seldom, if ever, changed the social contracts or customs within ethnic minority communities. Knowing who is a Jew was, and still can be, an integral part of Jewish customs regarding marriage and the family. If you can’t remember anti-miscegenation laws and the lingering effects on neighborhoods from racial restrictive covenants then you’re still wet behind the ears.
FYI, the notion that America worked as you describe above is a recent bit of revisionist history. Until 1952, the Naturalization Acts only allowed white persons to become naturalized citizens. In the 1920s alien land acts prohibited many non-citizens from owning or leasing land. For example, in 1922 a resident alien immigrant from Japan, Takao Ozawa, petitioned the Supreme Court for naturalization. The Court ruled that Ozawa was not white, i.e. Caucasian, within the meaning of the statute and was ineligible for citizenship.
link to caselaw.lp.findlaw.com
link to supreme.justia.com
Blacks were not really “let in”, they were usually brought here against their will as slaves. The first Jews arrived in the New World as Marranos or Conversos escaping the Inquisition. Asians were viewed as a demographic threat, the Yellow Peril, and were generally kept out. The same thing eventually happened to potential immigrants from “the Jeweries” of Eastern Europe.
On a more positive note, there’s hardly a country anywhere in the modern world that doesn’t have university programs and departments or institutes devoted to aspects of Jewish civilization and ethics, Jewish interrelations with other peoples, a variety of Jewish languages, and Jewish cultures.
P.S. There was a brief period in which the Courts applied the revised statutes to permit the naturalization of non-whites, but the Supreme Court subsequently ruled that had been an error.
It seems to me that people who attach such critical importance to their blood ties are just racists. Why not just admit, “I’m an Aryan and proud of it and nothing will ever make me give up my innate superiority to the lesser races?” (For “Aryan” you may substitute whatever blood ties you value the highest.)
How the Irish, the black man of Europe, eventually became white in America:
link to pitt.edu