Haaretz reports that over 1/3 of the topics at this years General Assembly of the Jewish Federations in Denver are about Israel. And the big concern is fighting the “delegitimizers” of Israel. Some interesting analysis in a slightly paranoid vein:
“The idea behind Israel Action network is that the network of deligitimizers is connected and communicates and they see what works on one campus and move it to another campus”, William Daroff [Vice President for Public Policy and Director of the Washington Office of The Jewish Federations] says. “And we wanted to connect the communities that are dealing with deligitimization so they talk to each other, so that when there is a film festival boycott because of the Israeli films, they can talk to us and our colleagues in Toronto who might have had this experience, and assess what their options are in moving forward. …Sometimes it’s better to ignore the deligitimizing activity, sometimes it’s to counter-protest, sometimes it’s the counter program. it gives people on the ground information and knowledge and option, rather than spending hundred of hours how to get making the decision we can fast-forward it to the point where they make these decisions. Here is what Chicago did or Toronto did, you can check how their reality fit with yours. Say, in our community there might be once a year Israel apartheid week, but other than that no one pays attention to that. So do I want to bring more attention to them by having loud demonstration or should I ignore them? Or maybe every year they are getting bigger and bigger, and if people in my community feel there is no response, so each community is making different decisions, and this document goal is to help the communities to map out ahead of time what their situation on the ground looks like”.
– Is there any specific source of this deligitimization you are talking about?
“There is no one specific Dr. Evil sitting behind the controls. What’s clear, there is a network. They are in communication with each other, and we are see the same tactics used by one group popping up in another community across the world. There is a red-green alliance between the islamists and the leftists, certainly there is no total agreement among all of them, but there is philosophically an idea that they want slowly but surely waddle away at Israel’s position as a sovereign legitimate state. They want people when they think about Israel to think about apartheid. To think about suspension of civil rights. It’s baby steps but whether you see Israeli food taken off the shelves at the supermarket or whether it’s the Palestinian Authority attempting to take Israel out of the equation of negotiating the final status with Israel”.
This is also interesting: we got to get positive!
Ido Aharoni, the Israeli Consul General in New-York, argued that Israel made a mistake defining itself in terms of the conflict for the rest of the world….
“The goal was to explain the Jewish world professionals, how important it is to change the narrative. The current narrative does not serve Israel’s interests. It focuses only on Israel’s troubles, it barely speaks about its advantages and achievements. We defined ourselves to the world in terms of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict – and shoot ourselves in the leg. This research shows that when you are communicating with the world through your advantages – the world is interested in it. There is a different way for Israel to communicate with the world”.
– People will say, how is it possible to ignore the conflict.
“You can’t ignore it, it’s part of our lives. But the new narrative calls to talk about what we are good at.”
delegitimizing the delegitimizers? Brilliant, a sure recipe for success!
“You can’t ignore it, it’s part of our lives. But the new narrative calls to talk about what we are good at.”
Ido, you are good at oppressing other people.
I would say to a mixed audience that nothing would please me more than to declare Israel free of crime, free of human rights violations, free of violations of international humanitarian law, etc.
I imagine Israel retracted to its pre-1967 territory and using only the water it is entitled to use (leaving an appropriate amount of water for the Palestinians in the sovereign state next door). Wonderful! I’d celebrate. I’d declare Israel :legitimate”. (Might still grumble about the rights of Palestinians within Israel.)
But Israel wants to paint itself as conflict free whilst continuing an illegal and illegally-conducted occupation, and for so long as it does so, it pleases me to complain about all the bad stuff. If Israel thinks that delegitimizes them, then so be it, That is their own take.
They want people when they think about Israel to think about apartheid. To think about suspension of civil rights. It’s baby steps but whether you see Israeli food taken off the shelves at the supermarket or whether it’s the Palestinian Authority attempting to take Israel out of the equation of negotiating the final status with Israel”.
Yep. That’s what I want. And more. I want people when they think about Israel to think about bulldozed houses and cisterns, bombed water plants, and dead children.
I want people when they think about Israel to recoil in horror and think “Why is my government supporting all this?”
Talking about “positive” ,the following joke came to my mind.
“Samuel is reading the Stormer (der Sturmer).
His friend, Joshua, sees it and tells him: “Samuel, you should be ashamed of yourself. Why are you reading this scheisse?”?? .
“Oh, Josh, you see. When I’m reading our newspapers ,all they do is to complain and whine, anti-Semitism is there, pogrom here.
When I read the Stormer, all they say is: Jews are very rich, Jews own all the banks, Jews control the media. I feel much better after reading that.”