You may have noticed that our Vice President is having a spat with Israel that’s in all the headlines because of Israel’s plans to build more illegal settlements in East Jerusalem. The other day 5000 people demonstrated against the settlements. And today Andrew Sullivan has a piece on the Sheikh Jarrah evictions.
When I got to East Jerusalem in January, the first place I went was Sheikh Jarrah, a short walk from my hotel. And my busiest day was Friday. That was the day of the Sheikh Jarrah demo and all the demos on the West Bank! I wanted to witness the rise of the anti-Jim Crow passive resistance movement and went to three demos. In Sheikh Jarrah, I saw a number of journalists, Bernard Avishai, Rick Hertzberg of the New Yorker, and the writer David Shulman.
Now here is Ari Goldman’s seminar at the Columbia Journalism School, called Covering Religion, going to the Holy Land for 10 days, and if you check their itinerary, they’re not covering any of the demos on Friday. They’re going to Yad Vashem that day, the Holocaust memorial. And Mount Herzl.
I know this is not a political class per se, but is Yad Vashem religious? If you look at the front page of "Covering Religion," they’re covering Christian Zionists (the usual dodge for the Israel lobby) and the I/P "conflict."
I wonder if the blinders on the big story don’t have something to do with Ari Goldman’s close connection to a traditional Jewish community and the time he spent in Israel.
