Bernard Avishai describes his blog as being "responses mainly to rash opinions about Israel and its conflicts," but the sober prof is becoming more and more despairing (and brave) about the future of Israel. His latest piece studies Nazi history for analogy. He says of Weimar, Germany:
war, that the people has suffered deadly, degrading blows which must
never be suffered again; a people encircled by mortal enemies and
nervous about internal traitors infected with a naïve liberalism; a
people grieving for the dead, bonded by blood and sorrow and an ancient
myth of transcendence.
“center” of German politics appealed to this consensus, believing that
the demagogues who appealed to it most stridently, violently,
tearfully, would remain marginal and controllable nuisances…
The mere suggestion that there
might be any parallels here to Israel’s “situation,” or to the fate of
its center, is a serious violation of the consensus here. Could any
Israeli extremist ever seriously be compared to any Nazi?
Well, yes, in the back of his mind, Avishai says. Why isn't this stuff in the American press? Because we live in fairyland here, half a world away, with one job: to protect Israel's support and image. And when American Jews should be helping these people stumble out of darkness, they just offer them encouragement. Jeff Blankfort, who sent this along, writes:
"I think Avishai's comparisons in mindset are very real….Despite the one-sided casualties, polls showed
that 90% of the Israel Jews supported the Israeli attack which
represents their Nazification, as well. In past wars, exclusive of
1967, I do not recall Israelis giving their warmakers the same degree of
backing, particularly when the nature of the casualties on the other
side became apparent. But it should be evident that the Israelis who
are leaving are being replaced by full blown racists. Who else would
emigrate to such a state? There is no one anywhere near the top levels
of the government that is interested in negotiating a two-state solution
as envisioned by Chomsky's "international consensus," and to think a
two-state solution is still viable is just delaying the inevitable and
setting the stage for the next Gaza.
I challenged Blankfort to find a milder word than Nazification.
"I wished there were a milder term, but the polls and comments from
Israelis at every level about what their military did in Gaza, leave me
without an alternative. There is more talk now, having gotten away again with mass murder, that Israel will provoke an attack on Lebanon to revenge its humiliation at the hands of Hezbollah.
At some point, perhaps too late, the world leaders will realize the
extent to which contempt for "the other" has driven deep into Israeli
society and at that point, as far fetched as it seems at this time, the
only solution will be a forced dissolution of the Israeli state. That
is the direction in which things are heading and at a frightful pace."
(Phil Weiss)
