In 1991 President George H.W. Bush tried to stop Israeli settlements by linking American loan guarantees to the Jewish state with a freeze on the settlements. Pro-Israel groups in this country went haywire, and Bush backed down, and famously complained…
Here is something else about Ruth Wisse. You can see that she is going to be hosted at the San Francisco Jewish Community Center this spring as part of a program from the Jewish Forward, a generally progressive newspaper. Does…
Neoconservative Bill Kristol is still at it. In the latest First Things, a journal about religion, he praises the writings of Yiddish scholar Ruth Wisse–who has elsewhere called for young American Jews to serve as a kind of intellectual “army”…
The latest American Jewish Committee survey on Jewish opinion said that Jews are good liberals: overwhelmingly against the Iraq war, and mostly for a Palestinian state. Yes but by nearly 2-to-1 against the division of Jerusalem! I’ve already noted James…
Ever since the rise of the neocons, my liberal Democratic mother and I have had the same argument. I say, “They’re Jews, and they’re representing Jewish political aims.” She says, “No they’re not. They’re a bunch of rightwing nuts. You…
In today’s Times, there was a profile of rightwing radio host Michael Savage that made something of his Jewishness. Turns out his real name is Weiner and he has a picture of his bar mitzvah in a glass case. “Tell…
More than five years ago, Adam Shatz, then the Nation magazine’s literary editor, wrote an important piece about the left’s response to 9/11. One of Shatz’s targets was Dissent magazine liberals who were pushing for war in Iraq. For them,…
Esquire has printed a fine piece by John H. Richardson about former NSC analyst Flynt Leverett battling the neocons inside the White House during the runup to the Iraq war. The best moment is when Saudi Prince Abdullah meets with…
Last night ’60 Minutes’ did a piece on “Curveball,” the Iraqi scientist who fled to Germany in the late 90s and in 2002 provided “intelligence” that Saddam was preparing chemical and biological weapons. Curveball claimed that a dozen technicians had…