We are cosponsoring a talk by French author Sylvain Cypel on Tuesday February 15 at noon. “Will diaspora Jews gradually emancipate themselves from a thug nation that claims that it alone can speak in the name of Judaism?” he writes. “More and more American Jews are awakening to the idea that its political rightward drift is a calamity, and that the consequences for them could be disastrous. And that explains the anger of those among them who turn their back on Israel.”
The New York Times’s failure to report on the Amnesty International report accusing Israel of apartheid is no oversight — it is a deliberate effort to suppress the news.
In his new book, “The State of Israel Vs. The Jews,” Sylvain Cypel paints a too-hopeful portrait of the anti-Netanyahu wing of American Jewish life as a virtuous broad tent united in their opposition to racism. What actually exists is a hodgepodge of intercommunal bickering, toothless fingerwagging, and hand-wringing– and this against an ever growing backdrop of Jewish only roads, deliberate bombings of civilian infrastructure and Associated Press offices, as Cypel himself meticulously documents. And in assigning importance to that Jewish argument, Cypel fails to treat Palestinians as autonomous political actors in the struggle.
The new two-state bill in the House promoted by progressive Congresspeople describes Israel as the “national home of the Jewish people.” This language is “unacceptable” to Palestinians, says Jafar Farah of the Mossawa Center in Haifa, because it prolongs discrimination embodied by the fact that Palestinians are not permitted to build a university in Nazareth over 40 years of demanding that right.
As Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett launches a charm offensive in Washington to show he is not Netanyahu– but will do nothing about Palestinian human rights–Joe Biden should go along with the charade so as to overcome his loss of international standing from Afghanistan and to keep Israel a bipartisan issue, leading Israel lobbyists urge the White House.
The Israeli government defused a political problem today by reaching a deal to evacuate illegal settlers from the outpost called “Evyatar.” The government wants no sources of tension with the Biden administration as the two governments commence a lovefest. But Palestinians cannot be happy with the deal, which allows a yeshiva to remain in the illegal colony.
On May 14 hundreds of Jewish New Yorkers protested in front of Senator Chuck Schumer’s house (D-NY) demanding an end to ethnic cleansing in Palestine. The Senate Majority Leader is a longtime supporter of Israel.
A bracing interview with former JVP deputy director Alissa Wise shows, When you are Jewish and come out as an anti-Zionist, you get excommunicated. That is how the Jewish community works to support Israel. If you persist in supporting Palestinians, forget about your community, because Jewish life as we know it is committed to supporting Israel, the miraculous achievement of the Jewish people in the 20th century in the wake of the extermination.
Moving on from the IHRA definition of antisemitism that bars harsh criticism of Israel, an Israel lobby group says that U.S. progressives usurp the Jewish right to identify as “unique historic” victims, and this “antisemitism” is now threatening Israel’s status as a bipartisan cause. The report singles out Rashida Tlaib and SNL! And it was written by an AIPAC veteran.
Michael Arria and Dave Reed speak with US Campaign for Palestinian Rights Executive Director Ahmad Abuznaid about the future of the Palestine solidarity movement, challenges to expanding BDS work, and how the US Campaign for Palestinian Rights is engaging with Jewish anti-occupation groups.