One of the simple truths of the American discourse is that by and large, gentile Americans will not speak out against the Israeli oppression of Palestinians without permission from Jews. Just a fact, having to do with the legacy of anti-semitism. I learned this years ago from my friend Rob Buchanan, who has spent more time in Palestine than I have, and whose understanding was far ahead of mine ("They're second-class citizens, Phil; you see it everywhere you go") but who said that I had a special responsibility to speak out. I saw that he was right.
There have been notable exceptions, of course. But once American Jews are seen to be openly criticizing Israel, then gentiles will start to speak their minds too. And by criticism I don't mean Careful Criticism, which sends a signal that This is an orthodox area, step on eggshells. I mean full-throated criticism of the sort that American leftists issued around other outrages. The segregationist South. South Africa. Slavery. Etc.
And this is what the American Zionists fear more than anything. That the doors will be broken down. That the Phil Weiss's of the world will cease to be marginal shady characters, but simply Americans who care deeply about human rights, wherever. This is why the American Jewish Committee was so vociferous in attacking anti-Zionist Jews 2 years ago, as antisemitic. It was trying to marginalize us.
Long buildup. Here is what I've been waiting for. Here is Jennifer Loewenstein, associate director of Middle East Studies at University of Wisconsin/Madison, who I'm assuming is Jewish, or half, writing (on Counterpunch) in both romantic and fiercely-analytic terms about Palestinian statelessness. Her analysis is dead on. But her rhetoric is soaring. And it opens the door…
away the current symbols and language of the victims of our selfish and
devastating whims and you will find the simple, impassioned and
unaffected cries of the downtrodden; of the âwretched of the earthâ
begging you to cease your cold aggression against their children and
their homes; their families and their villages; begging you to leave
them alone to have their fish and their bread, their oranges, their
olives and their thyme; asking you first politely and then with
increasing disbelief why you cannot let them live undisturbed on the
land of their ancestors; unexploited, free of the fear of expulsion; of
ravishment and devastation; free of permits and roadblocks and
checkpoints and crossings; of monstrous concrete walls, guard towers,
concrete bunkers, and barbed wire; of tanks and prisons and torture and
death. Why is life without these policies and instruments of hell
impossible?
The
answer is because Israel has no intention of allowing a viable,
sovereign Palestinian state on its borders. It had no intention of
allowing it in 1948 when it grabbed 24 per cent more land than what it
was allotted legally, if unfairly, by UN Resolution 181. It had no
intention of allowing it throughout the massacres and ploys of the
1950s. It had no intention of allowing two states when it conquered the
remaining 22 per cent of historic Palestine in 1967 and reinterpreted
UN Security Council Resolution 248 to its own liking despite the
overwhelming international consensus stating that Israel would receive
full international recognition within secure and recognized borders if
it withdrew from the lands it had only recently occupied.
had no intention of acknowledging Palestinian national rights at the
United Nations in 1974, when âalone with the United Statesâit voted
against a two-state solution.
