Progressive Mal Hyman, in a South Carolina runoff for a Congressional nomination, has been outspoken about Israeli human rights violations. He blames the U.S. for supporting colonialism and sees U.S. failure in the Middle East as giving progressives an opening to bring in humane ideas. AIPAC has asked for a meeting and Hyman says, “Wonderful,” but we’ll disagree. His boldness on these issues is a sign of things to come in Democratic races.
In an article criticizing the intersectional left at the Forward, Batya Ungar-Sargon continuously reinforces the false and dangerous notion that to oppose Zionism is to be against Jews: “Jews feel that when they do show up, there’s always something wrong with them.” Zionism is an ideology, Donna Nevel asserts; and even if Jews adhere to it, it is not “anti-Jewish” to oppose it.
To determine whether demonstrations in Gaza are “peaceful protests or violent riots,” New York Times reporter David Halbfinger imbedded himself with Israeli forces. The one-sided report follows a pattern, Norman Finkelstein says, in which Times writers rely on official Israeli statements to portray the encounters at the fence as armed confrontations in which Israeli snipers return the fire of protesters.
Most of the big Democratic donors featured in a NYT article on presidential hopefuls raising money in NY are pro-Israel. Kamala Harris and Elizabeth Warren need $30 million for a campaign war chest, so they are unlikely to say anything critical of Israel. Both progressives have demonstrated as much during the Gaza massacre.
“There is no Judaism without Zionism,” Yossi Klein Halevi states flatly in his new book; and Jewish Voice for Peace and anti-Zionists are not part of the Jewish community. This intolerance has not stopped many liberal Zionists from embracing him, including J Street, Jodi Rudoren, David Gregory and Cokie Roberts.
The New York Times echoes Israeli propaganda about slain Palestinian medic Razan al-Najjar, saying she was “more complex” than the innocent woman described in reports. If Russians issued such a cynical slander of a protester, the Times would be the first to denounce it. But it’s Israel, and the Times collaborates in blaming the victim.
From Tom Friedman to Bari Weiss to Bret Stephens to Shmuel Rosner, New York Times opinion writers have supported Israel’s massacre at the Gaza border. Only Michelle Goldberg has condemned it outright, while David Brooks and Roger Cohen have equivocated, and blamed Hamas.
Congressional candidates Leslie Cockburn in Virginia, Scott Wallace in Pennsylvania and Mal Hyman in South Carolina have all been critical of Israel or supported Israel critics. And the progressive Democratic base wants to hear that criticism. Aaron David Miller fights back, saying that supporting Israel is mom and apple pie, and Israel support must stay bipartisan.
NPR promoted the Israeli occupation TV show “Fauda” on Saturday and when Scott Simon suggested that Palestinians killed in Gaza were “innocent,” Lior Raz retorted that 60 had been killed — a lie — and that almost all were members of a terror group– the Israeli government line. Simon failed to mention the killing the day before of a Palestinian medic.
Comedian Roseanne Barr lost her show for racism in a tweet this week, but she has a long history of hateful speech about Palestinians and Muslims, and of likening supporters of Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) to Nazis. In one case she impersonated Adolf Hitler in a photo meant as a joke, putting human-shaped cookies in an oven, and said the victims were Palestinians. She did not suffer career-wise for those comments.