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Sunday, Nov 8, 2009
My immediate reaction to an article with a title like this is defensive and emotional...and then I realize I agree with the basic premise. I had this argument with my family (and their rabbi) repeatedly, until I realized that it was going to go nowhere. I think it's a big problem that the most vocal government supporters of Israel are right-wing Christians who stand against every other thing I'm for. My family sort of admits it's a problem, kind of, and then says, "But they support Israel."
Look, I support Israel. I think the world still needs it. I definitely think Jews still need it. But it's going to take more than Israel to make me friends with people whose policies hurt the poor, women, gays, and trees.
Great article, great news. I will be sending them some money.
I happen to believe that the most pro-Israel position to take is a moderate position that stresses land for peace, a two-state solution, and negotiation.
That is, if the situation is not already completely hopeless.
But let those who disagree do so. The problem is not that people offer different solutions. The problem is that deviation from a particular orthodoxy is shouted down.
That's the real problem. We need a genuine debate, not a rubber stamp.
Not only is this organization needed, It feels like the perfect time for it. Wonderful coverage, and overall great journalism.
First, something I say to people -- I wish I was an Israeli because then I could criticize the Israeli government without being called a Nazi. -- fact is there is more difference of opinion tolerated in Israel itself than in the US.
Second, a footnote for those who are familiar with DC. There is and I St and a K St, but there is no J St. Perhaps a bit of irony in choosing that name.
... I get the distinct impression that AIPAC et al are not just far to the right of most American Jews, they're also far to the right of most people in Israel. That is, people are painted as anti-Israel/anti-semitic for suggesting things that most Israelis support.
It reminds me, vaguely, of the old-school Irish-American Catholics in Boston, who seem to be more strictly defined by what they see as their Irish Catholic background than most Catholics in Ireland. (Witness the harsh battles a few years ago against GLBT Irish-American groups in the Boston St. Patrick's Day Parade, despite the fact that such groups were welcome in those parades in Ireland.)
This is indeed quite necessary and important to represent moderate voices on the Israeli issue.
Thanks again Gary for publicizing this. It's about time for progressive Jews to speak out against right-wingers.
On a separate point, Jewish exceptionalism and warmongering have bred a virulent anti-semitism in the US. From a non-Jew's perspective, it's is a self-defeating cycle that seems part of Jewish identity: you position yourselves as different and better, you exclude others, you are hated by others for that, you exclude more, you're hated more, etc. The Abe Foxman style anti-semitic paranoia actually seems to create anti-semitism.
I'm open to discussion here. We need to open the discussion and get through these conflicts. Bottom line: the mother of all division is thinking you're inherently better than someone else. This drove the genocide of Rwanda, and the Holocaust, and other genocides. From an outisder's perspective, until Jews denounce as a community that they are inherently special or diffeent than others, they will be the targets of quite human and commonsensical disdain.
Fresh voices, fresh approaches, and perhaps some fresh cooperation, would be much appeciated for all who would like to see some honest undertakings for peace, clearing the stale air of the blind notion, that Israel is above any and all criticism.
I know what PTSD tunnel vision and hypervigilance feel like personally. I think post-traumatic psychology plays a big role in the debate over Israel.
Researchers have discovered that children of Holocaust survivors can pick up secondary PTSD from knowing how their family members suffered. It's probably the same for survivors of suicide bombings and their relatives.
It can be very hard to get beyond post-traumatic psychology. Even harder when political players on the right are taking advantage of it and tweaking people's traumas all the time for their own advantage.
I hope the founders of J Street will bring some healing reason to this extremely emotion-filled and trauma-filled arena.
Apart from Hamas inspired liberation theology, Gary? One would think that a journalistic article about a lobbying group would include some literal explanation of their policy planks. So, what are their positions, other than "We're not those other evil fucking Jews who are destroying the planet." $1.5million and 4 or 5 staffers should be enough to crank out a position paper. After all they're a lobbying group - they have to be lobbying about something, don't they?
Anyway when you find that intel, can you write about it here? I'd like it if you bounced the reactions in the Arab world off those positions here too. Just for 'balance' sake. Here is the Hamas Charter for reference in case you were wondering where J Street intersects with the freethinking broadminded liberals of the Hamas:
http://www.mideastweb.org/hamas.htm
Mideast Web is not a particularly left or right leaning organization. I'm sure the people here will argue that anything to the right of Mashaal is some kind of zionazi plot, but there it is.
Also, Gary, Kudos on tag teaming Glenn this week. You guys always work in units of 3 articles. Nice to see you're not just writing about pine trees in the high sierra
First: those right-wing Christians do not really support Israel. What they support is their idea of Armageddon, which they hope will happen soon and which their absurd fairy-tale holy book (the Bible) says can only happen if the Jews inhabit all of historical Israel. People like Hagee and his followers think Jews are all going to hell. Obviously then, they don't give a damn about the lives or welfare of the residents of Israel; they just consider them pawns in their quest to be sucked up to "Heaven" by a giant vacuum cleaner wielded by Jesus.
It's too bad that liberal American Jews didn't establish a strongly vocal lobby many years ago, because our country's blind support for even the most repressive measures taken by the Israeli government against Palestinians is a big reason why so many Arabs hate us and empathize with those who want to do us harm. Remember that naive question that was asked across the country after 9/11: "Why do they hate us?" It wasn't because of our "freedoms," it was because we had troops in Saudi Arabia, because we prop up oppressive regimes in Arab countries, and because we have continually sided with Israel no matter how egregious its treatment of the Palestinians.
Anyone who cares about this issue should read the book "Breaking Ranks," which is a compilation of interviews with Israeli soldiers who refused to serve in the West Bank and Gaza. They are all committed and patriotic Israelis who recognized that draconian treatment of the Palestinians was not only inhumane, but it was counterproductive to the goal of a secure and safe future for Israel.
Much of the initial coverage about Fort Hood turned out to be wrong. Is there anything wrong with that?
The accountability imposed by another country for the CIA's kidnapping and torture reveals much about our own.
Fox News' morning show plays to type, talking about whether Muslims in the Army should face "special debriefings"
The survivor and author is upset about comparisons some on the right are making to genocide
Once seen as a lunatic fringe, reactionary anti-women groups are courting respectability
Salon headlines in your mailbox
