Rabbi Arthur Waskow does not mention Palestinians in his very political Freedom Seder, he says, because he was focused on the “big empire,” the United States, not the “little empire,” Israel. But he said that many Jews are guilty of idolatry in their inability to criticize Israel.
A conversation about Israel at a dinner party of liberal media folks reflects conventional wisdom: support for the existence of a Jewish state and concern about women’s rights in Arab societies.
The simple truth about John Bolton’s appointment to national security adviser is that the Republicans need Sheldon Adelson’s money in order to be competitive in the coming midterms, and John Bolton is a tool of Sheldon Adelson. And Adelson cares about one thing, Israel. But only alternative media will connect these rather obvious dots.
Trump’s next national security adviser, the Islamophobic warmonger John Bolton, is realistic in declaring that the two-state solution is dead. Though his solution to the Israel Palestine conflict is not. It is for pieces of the West Bank to be deeded to Jordan and Gaza to be deeded to Egypt, on the theory that Palestine is “bits and pieces” of the former Ottoman Empire.
Washington Post columnist Jennifer Rubin says that Trump is especially threatening to Jews with his “blood and soil” ethno-nationalism. He reminds her of Hitler. “The Germans thought that they could use Hitler as well. We’ll control him. He’ll get us what we want. The other stuff he’s not serious about.”
Ronald Lauder, a stalwart of the Israel lobby as head of the World Jewish Congress, has published a landmark essay in the New York Times attacking Israel’s settlement program and intolerant political culture as threats to its existence, and to Jews worldwide. The tide is turning against Israel.
Senate Minority leader Chuck Schumer was one of four Democratic senators to oppose the Iran deal, which was the signature of President Obama’s foreign policy.
In a sign of growing establishment distrust of the Israel lobby group AIPAC, several writers liken it to the NRA, and the Washington Post publishes an important article by Doug Rossinow saying that the lobby originated in American Jews rallying to promote Israeli “lies” about “awful knowledge”: the massacre of more than 60 Palestinians in Qibya in the West Bank in 1953.
Pro-Israel activism gave journalist Bari Weiss quite a career. As a youth she bagged one Zionist fellowship after another, leading to opinion editing at The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times in her early 30s. Which is no surprise, given the Times’s employment of several pro-Israel columnists.
Neoconservative godfather Paul Singer explains why he gives to pro-Israel causes: “Israel may be the only insurance policy all Jews, everywhere, can rely upon for …safety.” He echoes Daniel Gordis and Roger Cohen, who say Jewish sovereignty has transformed Jews from victims to historical agents. An important argument. Is it right?