Smearing the protesters of the Gaza genocide: Dana Bash on CNN says it’s OK to criticize Netanyahu, but not the Jewish state, then says these protests “hearken back to the 1930s” and Jews across the U.S. feel unsafe. While her colleague Jake Tapper says that Jewish students are unsafe at Columbia and Tulane; and on the PBS News Hour, David Brooks says that the Columbia University protests against Israel “are hate-filled and bigoted.”
Bob Feldman, who protested at Columbia University in 1968, on the student uprising today, “I would tell these students: people will always remember what you did today . . . and I believe they have accomplished much more in 2024 than we did in 1968.”
The student uprisings against Israeli genocide are a stunning new force in U.S., representing a mass movement that demands that our politicians cease to sideline Palestinian human rights. “Edward Said once said, ‘thank God for the students.’ I just want to echo those words from this tortured place,” Susan Abulhawa said from Gaza.
The Jewish community must open its eyes to the grotesque armored thing that is modern Israel, and denounce its actions if only in order to save ourselves. And yes it’s true: Palestinians who denounce Israel are pleasing their grandparents and parents; and we are not. But that’s a lame excuse for a thoughtful person in America.
Zionism threatens political freedom in the United States and international order. There is only one way to fight this ideology. Those who oppose it must explain the truth to Americans: Zionism is racist.
Israel’s indifference to international law is destabilizing the Middle East, even establishment voices say. The head of the Center for American Progress, a Democratic Party thinktank, says Israel is not a democracy and peace will only be possible if Palestinians have equal rights.
The New Yorker asks, “Why is the most powerful country in human history essentially taking orders from a country that relies on it for aid?” and then avoids the most obvious answer.
Years before the murder of American aid worker Jacob Flickinger in Gaza brought worldwide outrage this week, and calls to cut off aid to Israel, pro-Palestinian activists condemned Israel’s murder of American Rachel Corrie. Now activists should welcome all those who decry Israeli human rights abuses.
The Biden administration “quietly” approved a new transfer of more massive bombs to Israel even as the establishment continues to turn against Israel.
The Palestinian genocide is providing a moment of reckoning for the Jewish community.