Original articles on Israel and related issues written by Steven Plaut, a professor at an Israeli university.
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Campaign of the Leftist anti-Israel Boycotters at Tel Aviv University
Huh?
Ahhh, only in Israel. Ahhh, only with self-hating Jewish
anti-Semites and their gallicfascist friends.
It seems that one of Israel's far-leftist pseudo-academics tried
to invite the anti-Israel communist French "political philosopher" to
Israel to help her peddle her pro-Palestinian wares. But, alas, he
turned her down and refused to come to Israel to bash Israel because
he was honoring the Boycott Israel movement. Isn't anti-Semitism so
confusing, sometimes?
The Israeli would-be hostess of the anti-Semite is none other than
Ariella Azoulay. She has been in the news a bit the past few years
because she failed to get tenure at Bar Ilan University, and the
academic fifth column in Israel whined that it was all a dark
right-wing conspiracy. Of course the reason she did not get tenure is
that she has an empty academic record. She is nothing but an
anti-Israel propagandist. Her entire "career" has consisted of
churning out tendentious collections of anti-Israel photographs,
edited and arranged in order to demonize Israel. Not exactly
scholarship. See this:
http://www.isracampus.org.il/third%20level%20pages/other%20-%20Ultra%20Left%20Bemoans%20the%20Canning%20of%20Ariella%20Azoulay.htm
and http://isracampus.org.il/third%20level%20pages/Editorial%20-%20Steve%20Plaut%20-%20Israeli%20Tenured%20Taliban.htm
.
Actually, the truth is that the only reason Azoulay got hired at
any academic institution in the first place is that she is the wife of
rabidly anti-Israel "philosophy" professor Adi Ophir from Tel Aviv
University. Ophir and wife are a team of regular Israel bashers (see
http://isracampus.org.il/third%20level%20pages/Editorial%20-%20Alon%20Ben%20Shaul%20-%20Adi%20Ophir%20and%20Ariella%20Azoulay%20-%20The%20Defaming%20Duo.htm
), After getting canned by Bar Ilan, Ariella's hubby got her some
sort of job at Tel Aviv University, although not anything
tenure-track. And they have been churning out their anti-Israel hate
propaganda together in bliss ever since. Ophir is probably best known
for his role in organizing and leading the "Israel Apartheid Week"
Nuremberg rallies in the UK. Here is a review of typical Ophir
pabulum: http://isracampus.org.il/Extra%20Files/IsraCampus.Org%20-%20Seth%20Frantzman%20-%20Power%20of%20Inclusive%20Exclusion%20book%20review.pdf
Ariella's most recent initiative was to try to host the rabid
anti-Israel communist French "political philosopher" Jacques Rancière
in Israel. He is essentially a groupie of Islamist terrorism. See
him rant on the Neo-Nazi web magazine Counterpunch here:
http://www.counterpunch.org/2002/04/30/prisoners-of-the-infinite/ If
you have a strong stomach you can read some of his ravings here:
http://www.egs.edu/faculty/jacques-ranciere/quotes/ His main
"academic achievement" is he wrote some commentary on the unreadable
rants and the ignorant pseudo-economics of Karl Marx in "Das Kapital."
Ranciere had been scheduled to lecture at Tel Aviv University on
Jan. 25, 2012. But while Ariella tried to get him to come to Israel,
the terrorists from the Pacbi.org "Boycott, Divest" group
(http://www.pacbi.org/etemplate.php?id=1793 ) called upon Ranciere to
stay home. Rancid Ranciere then announced through some other
terrorist web sites (like
http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/noted-french-theorist-jacques-ranci-re-cancels-israel-lecture-heeding-boycott
) that he would stay home. Leaving his anti-Israel hosts at Tel Aviv
University high and dry. By the way, there is a marvelous parody of
the Pacbi.org web site, located at Pacbi.com. Please stop in!
Now we should all be grateful for the Pacbi.org terrorists for
persuading the gallic-garbage Ranciere to stay home. Surely he can
find some cars and stores that need torching and some infidels who
need lynching closer to his home in the Paris suburbs!
By Professor Israel David, Ben Gurion University
Ope-ed in Maariv, January 30, 2012
(translated by Steven Plaut, Isracampus)
Complete closing down of the Department of Politics and Government at
Ben Gurion University is Now Essential
Ben Gurion University has found itself at a fork in the road, where
it is being required to provide clear and non-evasive answers to
Israel's Council on Higher Education, the public body that oversees
higher education in Israel. As the reader no doubt recalls, this
Council earlier appointed an international panel of professional
evaluation for the department of politics at BGU, and that panel
recommended shutting down the department of politics altogether,
unless the severe academic and professional shoddiness and
incompetence there would be cured. Numerous academics publicly
endorsed the panel's criticisms and recommendations. There was some
dissent however regarding the panel's sharp criticism of the BGU
department of politics for its absence of any balance or pluralism.
Complaints about the absence of balance have been voiced by many,
including the "Im Tirtzu" Zionist student movement. Even the
President of Ben Gurion University, Prof. Rivka Carmi, published her
own announcement in the media with reference to the recent politics
departmental "conference," in which she expressed disappointment at
the lack of balance and pluralism there.
Anyone with any sense of how academia works will understand at once
that the members of the panel were trying to avoid explicitly
addressing the heart of the problems here, and preferred to prettify
them by attributing them to the absence of "balance." Let us say
upfront that there is no real basis for mandating that "balance" be
maintained at academic conferences. A conference of physicists
describing the roundness of the earth need not grant equal time to
those insisting the earth is flat. So just what sort of "balance" is
deemed desirable and who should establish the rules for it?
There are indeed quite a few "imbalances" at Ben Gurion
University. Take for example the fact that nine out of the eleven
tenured faculty members in the department of politics at BGU, as well
as a great many of the non-tenured faculty members there, are radical
extremist seditious far-leftist activists. (Actually, all 11 are –
Isracampus) The chance that such a department could have emerged by
chance is far lower than the chance of winning millions in the
lottery. It should be noted that no similar "coincidence" can be
found at any other university! Therefore there can be no doubt that
this department was constructed intentionally using the "One friend
brings in another friend" method of nepotism, and that in turn is the
source of the absence of professional and scientific standards in the
department. When the international panel complained about the absence
of core subjects in the curriculum and research of the department of
politics, the department members themselves not only conceded that the
point was correct but expressed pride in it! The result is that the
Arab-Israeli conflict (or the leftist anti-Israel take on it) occupies
over 90% of the focus of attention in the department of politics at
BGU. At no university in the world would you find a situation where
90% of the faculty in physics are all dealing with a single sub-topic
within the discipline. There are oodles of topics in physics
deserving of attention. Nor would a basic physics course consist only
of citations of a single scientist because the instructor happened to
have studied that scientist, even if that scientist were Einstein.
The imbalance of interest when it comes to the department of
politics is the imbalance of purpose. The bulk of faculty members in
the department have no idea what the mission of an academic
institution is. The current chairman of the department, Dr. Dani
Filc, responded to the recommendation of the international panel,
speaking on Israel's Channel Two television. "It is a plot to
silence us," he said, and here we see the nucleus of the problem.
Filc believes the mission of the department is advocacy, whereas the
proper mission of an academic unit is research and instruction. Much
more serious is Filc's inability to understand that it is NOT a proper
function for an academic department to persecute and harass Israeli
army officers, smearing them as "war criminals," nor to vandalize
Israeli military security points and checkpoints, nor to infiltrate
illegally into Arafat's headquarters in Ramallah and there get
photographed in warm embrace with Arafat (which a faculty member in
this department has already done), nor to organize violent illegal
"protests" (some of which have already been the subject of prosecution
in BGU disciplinary committees). Such circus activities have no place
in academia. They interfere with and distort all efforts at education
and research. Moreover, the shenanigans of the department of politics
at BGU undermine the reputation of every one of us at BGU. Those
indeed were the very words of President Rivka Carmi in a statement
issued in response to the calls by Neve Gordon (who was department
chairman at the time) in the Los Angeles Times and the Guardian (UK)
for an international boycott against Israel!
Shutting down the department of politics at BGU is a matter of
great seriousness. There are precedents in Israel for doing so. Where
there was significant student demand for studies in such a department,
then in those precedent cases the department was completely rebuilt
from scratch after a respite. And that is what has to be done at BGU!
Israel David teaches mathematics and operations research at Ben Gurion
University
staff at the Bezalel Arts and Crafts College. He is one of the
architects for jihad who are active in Israel in promoting the
Palestinian agenda.
Elhyani is in the news this week for calling for the murder of West
Bank "settlers." He was outted (in Hebrew) at this web page:
http://www.srugim.co.il/27935-%D7%9E%D7%A8%D7%A6%D7%94-%D7%91%D7%91%D7%A6%D7%9C%D7%90%D7%9C-%D7%9E%D7%95%D7%95%D7%AA-%D7%9C%D7%9E%D7%AA%D7%A0%D7%97%D7%9C%D7%99%D7%9D
The call to murder settlers appeared on his personal facebook page.
He has also been active in the radical anti-Israel NGO calling itself
"Zochrot" (http://www.zochrot.org/content/%D7%90%D7%9C-%D7%AA%D7%92%D7%99%D7%93%D7%95-%D7%91%D7%92%D7%AA
), whose main goal is to see all Jewish names of towns and sites in
Israel erased and replaced by Arab names. Can you guess who funds
Zochrot? He is one of those anti-Israel extremists who signed a call
for the international community to suppress Israeli sovereignty and
prevent Israel from using force to defend itself against terrorism:
http://oznik.com/petitions/010427.html
Want to ask Israel's Attorney General why Elhyani is not locked away
behind bars for calling for murder? Write to him via Fax
972-2-6467001. Send a copy to Yaakov Neaman, Minister of Justice, at
sar@justice.gov.il . You can also use this form letter to submit
electronically although the headings are in Hebrew:
http://www.forms.gov.il/globalData/GetSequence/GetSequence.aspx?formType=yoetzmishpati1@justice.gov.il
Mail address is: Attorney General of Israel, Ministry of Justice, 29
Salah a-Din Street, Jerusalem, 91010
Want to ask the heads of Betzalel why someone who is issuing calls
for murder is on their faculty? Write to these people:
Bezalel Arts College
President
Prof. Arnon Zuckerman
Mount Scopus Campus
Mount Scopus P.O.Box 24046
Jerusalem 91240
Telephone: 02-5893333
Fax: 02- 5823094
Email: mail@bezalel.ac.il
Officers: http://bezalel.ac.il/en/about/leadership/staff/
Contact Info: http://bezalel.ac.il/en/contact/
Friends Offices: The Friends Organizations
Ms. Amira Ben-Dor
Chairwoman of the Jerusalem Friends of Bezalel
Ms. Jennifer Roth
President of the Friends of Bezalel New York
Friends of Bezalel Academy
of Arts and Design, Inc.
501 Fifth Avenue, New York,
NY 10017
Haaretz web site. See
http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/pro-palestinian-hackers-crash-haaretz-other-sites-1.409228
Evidently most readers of Haaretz were unaware of the hacking because
the anti-Israel content of the newspaper that had been hacked did not
differ much from its usual fare. The newspaper editors became aware
of the hacking only after a number of readers complained that the
paper was less anti-Israel than usual.
2. http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/152127
Haifa School Sympathizes Arab 'Victims' Over Jewish Victims
A Haifa school held a panel with speakers from a leftist group -
denying the father of a terror victim an opportunity to speak.
By David Lev
First Publish: 1/26/2012, 11:21 AM
A Haifa high school on Wednesday sponsored a symposium for students on
how families deal with the loss of loved ones from terror attacks.
The speakers, however, were from a leftist organization, called "The
Jewish-Palestinian Forum of Grieving Parents" - while Ron Kerhmann,
another parent whose child was killed in a terror attack, was denied
the opportunity to speak, he says.
Kehrmann father of Tal Kehrmann, who was killed in 2003 when
terrorists bombed a bus she was riding on in Haifa, while on her way
to the same high school – City School number 5 – took place Wednesday.
With his close ties to the community and given the fact that his
daughter had studied there, Kehrmann asked to speak at the symposium –
but was told by the school that he would not be listed as a speaker.
"I tried for over a week to arrange a time to speak, but was given the
runaround," Kehrmann told Arutz Sheva. "After speaking to school
officials I was told that I just was not wanted at the school."
Kehrmann angrily criticized the school for attempting to equate the
suffering of parents like him – whose parents were killed in terror
attacks by Arabs – with that of Arab parents, whose children were
killed by IDF soldiers during anti-terror raids. "My daughter was
killed in a terrorist attack on a bus while she was on her way to
school. Their children were killed during a legitimate IDF attack"
against terror activities that those "victims" were engaged in, he
added.
Kehrmann says that the school's administration has turned terrorist
victimization into a political football. "They lied to me about
respecting my opinion, but they are not interested in hearing what I
have to say," he says, preferring an overtly political organization,
whose main activities is to opposed IDF roadblocks in Judea and
Samaria. "I call on the Education Ministry to prevent such political
activity in schools. This particular group is to the left of Peace
Now," he added.
The school has not commented on the matter, despite requests by Arutz Sheva.
3. http://frontpagemag.com/2012/01/25/the-scourge-of-jewish-self-division/
The Scourge of Jewish Self-Division
Posted by David Solway
Tel Aviv University's Academic Standards on Display: PhD candidate
Omar Barghouti Does the Jihad Tour
By Lee Kaplan, www.Isracampus.org.il
24/1/2012
Recently Omar Barghouti, a Columbia graduate in electrical engineering
who is now pursuing a PhD at Tel Aviv University in Philosophy spoke
at three occasions in northern California to promote boycott,
divestment and sanctions against Israel, even his own university. Few
people know that Barghouti, who founded the Academic and Cultural
Boycott of Israel, which attacks Israel's academics abroad and Israeli
universities at home, an extension of the Arab League Boycott, is in
fact not a "Palestinian" or Israeli-Arab. He was born in Qatar and
grew up in Kuwait. His home countries are technically still at war
with Israel. Barghouti's fellow TAU students and other academics
organized a petition asking the University to expel him for his
anti-Israel political activities, but TAU's administration has refused
to do so.
Barghouti declared Israel an apartheid state throughout the evening
during his speech held at the Presbyterian Church in Oakland,
California. He saw nothing hypocritical about his own status as a
subsidized graduate student in Israel, and instead likened himself to
Nelson Mandela. The speaking engagements were sponsored by assorted
groups affiliated with the International Solidarity Movement in order
to raise funds for the Middle East Children's Alliance, an ISM group
that launders most of the ISM's "tax deductible" donations on the US
West Coast. Other sponsoring groups included the anti-Israel extremist
group Jewish Voice for Peace, which is made up for the most part of
Marxist Jews and Al Awda, the Palestine Right to Return Coalition,
which calls for the destruction of Israel as a Jewish state and an
unconditional right of anyone pretending to be a "Palestinian" to
"return" to Israel.
There were about 300 people in attendance at the Oakland event, most
aging 60s fossils. Flyers and the announcement at the start of the
evening, one made by Barghouti himself, said his speech would not be
about Israel but about the Occupy Wall Street and Occupy Oakland
movements in the United States. After making one brief allusion to the
OWS movement in the US and claiming economic exploitation and denial
of human rights was "worse in the United States even than in Israel,"
he declared Israel as part of the "one per cent" that is economically
exploiting the other "ninety-nine per cent" of humanity. It reminded
me of similar claims in Der Sturmer. Barghouti spent the next two
hours attacking only Israel and claiming it is an apartheid state like
South Africa was in the 1980's. He also criticized America's presence
in Afghanistan. The audience ate it up, applauding loudly at several
points during his lecture.
Barghouti began the lecture stating, "Israelis have been colonizing
our lands since the Nakba in 1948." Throughout the lecture he
acknowledged no Jewish history or any right to any part of the land of
Israel by Jews.
He continued, making the accusation that Israel had altered history
and "destroyed thousands of Palestinian books," and claimed that there
are still thousands more such books hidden away in the library at Tel
Aviv U. You know, the library where he is supposed to be writing his
PhD. So if the books are in that library, we guess they were never
destroyed. Hmmm.
Barghouti then accused Israel of "a worse massacre than anything done
by European colonialism." Barghouti claimed Israel purposely
suppresses Palestinian education during the Intifadas. "Israel shut
down all Palestinian universities in the 1970's, and in 1994 shut down
schools in the West Bank." Of course, Barghouti did not mention that
those universities were actually built by the Israelis in the first
place and were bases and organizing locations for terrorist groups
murdering Israeli civilians in terrorist attacks. "In 1989, occupied
Palestinians had to organize illegal classes in West Bank schools," he
said, proclaiming this an example of human rights violations and
racism.
Barghouti then made reference to the T-Shirt controversy when some IDF
sniper units had T-shirts made that said "One Shot, Two Kills," that
allegedly showed a pregnant Arab woman in a rifle view scope. The
soldiers involved in that were disciplined by the IDF, although we
think they were simply exercising freedom of speech. Arab media, even
children's programs, routinely call for murdering Jews, but this got
no mention. Barghouti suggested IDF soldiers in T-shirts promote the
idea of raping Palestinian women (which Israeli soldiers never do) and
called these examples as "part of the radicalization program the
entire country is undergoing" by Israel against the Arab population.
He then falsely described conditions in Gaza as the "most subhuman" in
the world. He failed to mention the Jacuzzis and designer stores in
the malls. He recounted an unverified tale of an elderly Palestinian
woman "shot while walking along" there for no reason at all and
accused Israel again of "ethnic cleansing."
"In 2005, " he said, "we saw that we must call for boycott and
sanctions as part of a popular struggle to help shoulder the enormous
responsibility in the oppression of the oppressed." He explained the
meaning of BDS (boycotts, divestment and sanctions), and called for…
"an end to the 1967 Occupation, ending Israel's apartheid." He vowed,
"Israel must recognize the right of refugees to return." He
conveniently left out the creation of the Palestinian Authority, the
Oslo "Peace Process" and voiced the goals of Hamas that Israel must be
flooded with as many Arabs as possible to overrun the Jewish
population.
Barghouti tried to lecture as an academic, but the problem was he kept
lying through his teeth. Besides false claims about apartheid in
Israel (Barghouti himself is proof this is untrue), he then went on to
claim falsely that 93% of the land in the West Bank is off limits to
non-Jews and said Israel has communities where only Jews can live.
Actually Israel is full of communities where Jews cannot live, only
Arabs. Meanwhile, Barghouti had no criticism of the law in the
Palestinian Authority that metes out a death sentence, even
retroactively, if someone sells his land to a Jew. Barghouti also
repeated the oft-used canard of "Jewish only roads" in the West Bank.
Barghouti trotted out every anti-Israel canard he could. He accused
Israel of a "massacre" in Jenin in 2002 when even the United Nations
said there was no massacre. In that "massacre" 20 Arabs were killed in
the crossfire of a battle started by the terrorists. Moving on to the
Gaza flotilla boats that he dubbed "The Freedom Flotilla," he claimed
Israel had conducted a "massacre" of civilians, those civilians who
attempted to murder Israeli soldiers. Barghouti proudly claimed that
local Bay Area anti-Israel activists had succeeded in getting
dockworkers to refuse to unload an Israeli ship in Oakland last year.
The truth was that the day a strike was called was the wrong day for
the arrival of the ship involved, and later the ship did land and
unload. He gleefully mentioned successes in Sweden, South Africa and
even India where dockworkers had refused to unload Israeli goods for
24 hours. This was met with thunderous applause by his audience made
up mostly of Jewish-Marxist "anti-Zionists".
Barghouti discussed the Arab Spring, particularly in Egypt, which he
called "BDS multiplied" and which he said should encourage "no
normalization with Israel." He then began discussing the 1 per cent
vs. the 99 per cent theme of the Occupy Wall Street people (that is,
their claim that 1% control all wealth for the other 99% of world
population who are "oppressed".) Making the Jews the owners of wealth
is a canard right out of the Middle Ages.
He continued, "Suddenly it makes sense to see Israel was fully
involved in the 1% agenda that included the wars in Afghanistan and
Iraq." (Barghouti conveniently ignored the profit mongering by OPEC
and the overstuffed Saudis who actually fund his BDS movement even
today and that the war in Afghanistan followed as a result of the 9/11
attacks on US soil.)
Barghouti explained, "It's the Israel lobby following American
interests that serves the 1%." "The Department of Homeland Security,
the Military, banks and US weapons manufacturers make war "on us
because it's good business," he declared, "but is it good for the
other 99%?" he asked.
"Imagine if the US spent the four billion dollars on the war in
Afghanistan, what that would do to improve the roads," he moaned. It
made me wonder what US roads would be like if we didn't spend the
greater sum than that supporting the Palestinians who only cheer on US
enemies to make war on America and Israel. Barghouti declared his
boycott movement was primarily concerned with democracy and human
justice, goals that would be possible "once our struggles emerge." He
declared, "We must unite for freedom, equal rights, social economics
and can no longer ignore the obligation to join hands in the
struggle!" He then claimed to have researched international law, even
though he is not a lawyer or even a law student, and said that the
Palestinian people should have the right to vote for national
self-determination but that the Jews in Israel have no such voting
rights. "I've researched this and international law says occupiers
have no right to vote for self-determination." 63% of Israel's Jews
were born in Israel. When I asked him why they had no right to vote
for self-determination and would have to live under Arab rule,
Barghouti merely repeated that he researched international law and
occupiers (all the Jews in Israel) have no voting rights at all about
how they should live or be governed.
Barghouti also maintained that Christians were being persecuted in the
Holy Land by Israel, not by the Muslim Palestinians (who have driven
most Christians out of Bethlehem) and that many Christians were on the
same side as him. "After all," he told the audience, "Jesus was a
Palestinian." Again, the audience of mostly Jewish radicals cheered
him on and offered no criticism.
The geriatric Marxist Jews from Jewish Voice for Peace gave him cheers
and ovations on his legal claims, too. The hosts continued to repeat
the Big Lie that Barghouti was a "human rights activist."
Barghouti claimed his movement was in line with his "heroes" like
Martin Luther King and Mahatma Gandhi (Martin Luther King stated that
anti-Zionism as Barghouti promoted all night was merely disguised
anti-Semitism and Gandhi promoted non-violence).
Barghouti concluded his speech calling for "freedom and a dignified
life" for people to not live "under savage apartheid" and declared it
a "moral obligation" and urged those attending to "rebound from their
former savaged society of your colony to find it livable again."
Referring to the Occupation Wall Street movement he repeated our
"oppression is intertwined" concluding, "After Egypt it is our time to
reassert our common humanity. I wish you Egypt!"
The rest of the evening consisted of members of the audience
demonstrating what they were doing to promote BDS against Israel. Some
sang in front of a large American chain retailer in front of shoppers
to "end apartheid" by bankrupting the Soda Stream company and Ahava
products. Barghouti took the stand again and boasted how the BDS
campaign had managed to cost the Veolia Company over a half billion
dollars.
Then Barghouti threw out this whopper: "Israel does not consider
itself a nation", he said. He based his statement on the Supreme Court
finding that a single Israeli identity card was not required when
current cards list religious and ethnic denominations. He declared
this racist but had no criticism for calls by the Palestinians to
demand a Palestinian state be Jew free or that there is a law on the
books there meting out a death sentence for selling land to a Jew. He
told the audience that Israel was responsible for the War in Iraq
insisting that Israel knew that Iraq had no weapons of mass
destruction (all Western intelligence services on their own had the
same information and not from Israel) and that now Israel is trying to
get the US to attack Iran.
The final theme of the evening could be summed up as this by
Barghouti: the only way to realize full equality for society is to
boycott and financially harm the Jews.
A video recording of the event is available should anyone wish to see
it. Anyone who would believe that the goal of the BDS movement is for
peace or any kind of settlement needs to see the audience present that
night that could only root for the destruction of Israel and its
Jewish population, no matter how nonsensical it was.
speech in Israel:
Leftists who insist that only leftists are entitled to exercise
freedom of speech - are fascists.
Leftists who insist that all people who criticize leftists are
McCarthyists - are fascists. They are also McCarthyists.
Leftists who claim that the exercise of freedom of speech by anti-Oslo
dissidents in the 1990s caused Rabin to be assassinated - are
McCarthyists. They are also fascists.
Leftists who claim that no one should be allowed to refer to
anti-Israel traitors as traitors - are themselves fascists.
Leftists who pretend that other leftists who call for BDS or Boycotts,
Divestment and Sanctions against Israel are anything other than
traitors – are liars. They are also fascists.
Leftists who endorse terrorist attacks against Jews are traitors.
Leftists who demand a "Palestinian right of return to Israel" are traitors.
Leftists who endorse Arab fascist or Islamofascist movements - are fascists.
Leftists who support or vote for the communist party are mentally
deranged. They are also fascists.
Leftists who support the elimination of Israel are traitors and fascists.
Leftists who attempt to use the courts to suppress freedom of speech
for non-leftists – are fascists.
Leftists who censor chat lists of academics in order to bar
non-leftist opinion from being expressed - are fascists.
Leftists who demand that non-leftists be silenced because their
exercise of freedom of speech produces violence – are fascists.
when even Haaretz runs a major news story about Isracampus and the
watchdog groups that are monitoring and exposing Israel's tenured
traitors.
Haaretz today ran the following news story, complete with all the
usual spins, half-truths and outright lies you would expect from
Haaretz. Distortions and all, the real message gets through. Haaretz
and the Left are hysterical! The tenured Left is being exposed! The
Israeli and overseas Jewish public are learning the truth! Can
anything be more frightening than that for the Radical anti-Israel
Left?
10 percent of Israeli academics labeled 'anti-Zionist' by campus watchdogs
Survey comes up with the names of more than 1,000 Israelis, 800 of
whom are academics but also including authors, journalists, public
intellectuals, and past and present cabinet ministers.
By Talila Nesher
Three self-proclaimed watchdog organizations have labeled about 10
percent of Israeli academics as anti-Zionist, according to a recent
study by a group of academics, artists and university students who aim
to counter the categorizations. The organizations, which are open
about their activities, are Im Tirtzu, IsraCampus and Israel Academia
Monitor.
The group's survey came up with the names of more than 1,000 Israelis,
800 of whom are academics but also including authors, journalists,
public intellectuals, and past and present cabinet ministers, that
appear on a list maintained by the trio of organizations.
Members of the group include political scientist Prof. Neve Gordon of
Ben-Gurion University of the Negev; Israeli Film Directors Guild
chairman Rani Blair; and the chairman of the Israeli Documentary
Filmmakers Forum, Uri Rosenwaks. They recently created the Blacklist
website (blacklist.co.il), which invites visitors to check whether
they themselves appear on the lists.
"There is a real concern for the future of Israeli democracy and about
McCarthyism against anyone who criticizes the government's policies in
the occupied territories or social aspects," Gordon said. "Every week
new names appear on these sites, and we wanted to examine the extent
of the phenomenon. The people who will be hurt most are junior faculty
members who are trying for university positions and are wary of being
'marked out,'" Gordon said.
Israel Academia Monitor said in a statement: "We are not a right-wing
organization, but rather an organization that is unaffiliated
politically and that keeps its distance from politics. Our role is to
protect the universities from political forces, and especially from
the extreme left, that exploits the institutions for its needs and
acts as if they were its private playing field."
University of Haifa economist Prof. Steven Plaut, one of the founders
of IsraCampus, said in a statement: "Our main function is to quote
what these teachers say and write ideologically and politically in
order to bring it to the attention of the public. The issue is not an
ideological argument, but rather publicizing the anti-Israel group
that openly supports the enemy," Plaut said.
Im Tirtzu said: "We are not familiar with the study, but spin and
manipulation cannot obscure the gravity of the deeds of the extreme
left. Anyone who signs petitions in support of the refusal to perform
military service, of Azmi Bishara and of the boycott against Israel,
and who silences students, are marking themselves."
***
First of all, the groups in question are not "Right Wing Groups" but
Zionist non-partisan groups. Isracampus has no ideology or political
stand other than the need for the public to know about Israel's
academic Fifth Column. It believes students, taxpayers, alumni,
journalists, donors, and others have the right to know what tenured
extremists do and say.
Secondly there is no "black list" at all. That is a typical Haaretz
fabrication. There are search engines and indices of names of Israeli
academics who have signed anti-Israel statements and published
anti-Israel opinions, such as calls for world boycotts of Israel.
There are no theater people or literary figures in those indices, in
contrast with the Haaretz article. Also the "1000" and 10% numbers
are all Haaretz inventions. Also, the Haaretz claim that the web
sites target journalists, writers, "public intellectuals" (whatever
that is), and cabinet ministers is another lie. Isracampus only
targets leftist academics.
The "blacklist" web site that is so ballyhooed in the article is an
empty web site set up this week by Ben Gurion University anti-Semite
Neve Gordon. Here is little Slapp-suit Neve whining about how those
critics of the Left are McCarthyists who stifle freedom of speech.
Stifling freedom of speech? Silencing the Left? When the whole goal
of Isracampus is to PUBLICIZE what the Leftists say and let everyone
know what they write!!
Little Neve's pathetic little web site (blacklist.co.il) has no lists
of people who have asked to be added to the "blacklist," in contrast
with what the Haaretz article claims. And the search engine on that
site, which promises to allow academics to search the watchdog web
sites to see if they are mentioned or discussed, does not work. See
this: http://isracampus.org.il/third%20level%20pages/Editorial%20-%20Steve%20Plaut%20-%20Neve%20Gordon%20website%20mocks%20Isracampus.htm
McCarthysim they said? Well, the usual McCarthyist censors at Haaretz
blocked and removed all right-wing "talkbacks" from the article on the
English web site, but on the Hebrew web site the talkbacks regarding
this article were about 4 to 1 in favor of the Right and against the
Left.
But the Haaretz article has now put the reading Left on notice! They
cannot pretend they do not know! They cannot hide! The good guys are
watching them. And they are hysterical! Not a dry diaper in
Gordongrad!
The Jew Flu: The strange illness of Jewish anti-Semitism
Flus are contagious and incurable, but containable; the ancient and
resilient virus known as Jew Flu is no different.
By Uzi Silber
Tags: Israel news anti-Semitism
Get Haaretz on iPhone Get Haaretz on Android Diagnosis
The 1930s Labor Zionist leader Berl Katznelson asked "Is there another
People on Earth so emotionally twisted that they consider everything
their nation does despicable and hateful, while every murder, rape,
robbery committed by their enemies fill their hearts with admiration
and awe?"
This is Jew Flu - the virus of Jewish Anti-Semitism, and its Jewish
Anti- and Post-Zionist mutations, afflicting a small but inordinately
loud minority of Hebrews.
Its modern symptoms are a rejection of Israel's identity as a Jewish
state and a dismissal of its right to defend itself militarily, while
embracing the goals of its nihilistic Arab enemies. Those infected
with the virus wildly inflate Israeli sins real or imagined, while
excusing or rationalizing Palestinian anti-semitism and outrages
against Jews.
Those afflicted with Jew Flu often view the notion of Peoplehood as an
artifice, which implies a rejection of Jewish national
self-determination and acceptance of the 90-year-old Palestinian Arab
contention that Jews are not a nation but merely members of a
religion, and as such don?t merit a national home of their own.
Is Jew Flu a bona-fide illness? Michael Welner, a psychiatrist at New
York University, suggests that Jewish Anti-Semitism is akin to a
personality disorder, enabling a person to "derive some psychological
benefit from this pathological thinking."
What causes Jew Flu? Harvard psychiatrist Kenneth Levin argues for
twin culprits: so-called 'Stockholm Syndrome', where "population
segments under chronic siege commonly embrace the indictments of their
besiegers however bigoted and outrageous", as well as "the
psychodynamics of abused children who blame themselves for their
situation and believe they could mollify their tormenters if they were
'good'."
Julie Ancis, a psychology professor at Georgia State University says
that it isn't "uncommon for a minority group with a history of
oppression and persecution to possess internalized self-hatred
regarding their cultural/religious identity."
I'm no therapist, but that won't restrain me from proposing my own
theory for the ultimate cause of Jew Flu. More on that later.
Since the defamations of Jew Flu victims are propagated across the
Internet and are extensively documented and challenged in many fine
books and articles, repeating them here would be redundant.
Suffice it to say that Noam Chomsky, Daniel Boyarin, Joel Kovel, Avrum
Burg, Ilan Pappe, Steve Quester, Jacqueline Rose, Tony Judt, Naomi
Klein, Michael Neumann, Ben Ehrenreich, (the apparently "outed")
Mahmoud Ahmedinejad and their ilk, spout pronouncements eerily similar
to the propaganda routinely ejaculated by representatives of Fatah,
Hamas or Hezbollah.
At the same time, a hearty "shout out" is due those who have made it
their business to forcefully rebut the Jewish defamers, including
Andrea Levin, Edward Alexander, Alan Dershowitz, David Solway and
others. Those interested in a quick and free primer on Jew Flu should
download Alvin Rosenfeld's UJA-sponsored brief, "Progressive Jewish
Thought and the New Anti-Semitism".
History
Jew Flu, of course, isn't new: It has lurked in our midst for
millennia. Jews collaborated with Greeks, Romans and Inquisitors;
Bolshevik self loathers displayed savagery towards their brethren;
their prophet Karl Marx was described by author Rafael Patai as the
"most influential of Jewish self haters", who thought "Israelite
faith" most repugnant, and whose rabid anti-Semitism was attributed by
the historian Simon Dubnow to "the natural hatred of the renegade for
the camp he deserted."
Incredibly, certain young Jews in Weimar Germany, members of a certain
Association of National-German Jews were sufficiently maddened by Jew
Flu to attempt to "identify and ingratiate (themselves) with the Nazi
Party".
Jew Flu developed its anti-Zionist strain in the decades preceding the
creation of Israel: renowned philosopher Martin Buber of Hebrew
University and others actually justified the Palestinian Arab pogroms
of 1921, 1929 and the late 30s, urging that desperate Jewish holocaust
refugees be permitted to enter Palestine only with Arab permission.
In 1944, and with the destruction of European Jewry proceeding apace,
Lessing Rosenwald, the President of the American Council for Judaism
equated the ideal of Jewish Statehood with the concept of a racial
state "the Hitlerian concept".
Following remission during the post-Holocaust years, Jewry experienced
a relapse of Jew Flu in the aftermath of the '67 Six Day War. In the
U.S., young Jewish radicals of the New Left branded Israel a fascist,
colonial power while praising Arab countries as progressive and
revolutionary - unsurprising since many were Soviet client states.
They remained largely silent as Soviet tanks crushed the 1968 Prague
Spring - presumably a 'progressive' development.
New Left sentiments found expression in Israel even during the
aftermath of the traumatic Yom Kippur War; at a Tel Aviv reception in
late 1973, my mother found herself amid a chatty crowd of cocktailing
cultural figures casually dismissive of their own country's right to
exist.
The infection among Israel's cultural elites intensified through the
Lebanon War and the two Intifadas that sandwiched the delusional Oslo
era. As author Aharon Meged lamented in 1994, there existed "an
emotional and moral identification by the majority of Israel's
intelligentsia, and its print and electronic media, with people
committed to our annihilation."
Epitomizing this "moral identification" were the certain prominent
Jewish journalists who, according to Israeli journalist Nahum Barnea,
crucially failed the so-called 'lynch test', by exhibiting an
inability to ever criticize Palestinian terror, even following the
widely televised gruesome execution of two Jews by a Palestinian mob
in Ramallah In 2000.
Metamorphosis
It was at this time that Jew Flu claimed a childhood friend of mine.
We'd come of age together in the early '80s, like-minded Zionists, he
more "Kahanish" in temperament. Immigrating to Israel the day after
graduation, he'd serve in theIDF, settle in Jerusalem, marry, spawn a
brood, and settle into the life of an Israeli academic, where anti
Zionist stances are common and open identification as an Israeli
patriot is tantamount to career suicide.
Infection struck during the Oslo years: before the millennium was out,
the youthful Kahanist yeshiva boy had morphed into a militant Jewish
Anti Zionist, mindlessly spouting hackneyed and malicious anti-Israel
canards on leftwing and Arab websites, and regularly consorting with a
posse of Arab academics in Ramallah.
This episode recalled a scene from "Radio Days", the Woody Allen movie
in which an uncle fasting on Yom Kippur indignantly watches the Jewish
communists next door brazenly barbecuing. In Holiday suit he marches
out the front door to scold the Reds on their evil ways, only to
return shortly after chewing on a chicken drumstick, indignantly
decrying religion as the opiate of the masses.
Those like my friend afflicted with Jew Flu deny their infection,
contending that criticism of Israel isn't Anti-Semitism or even
Anti-Israel.
Helpfully, Natan Sharansky formulated his so-called 3D litmus test to
clearly distinguish mere Israel critics from Jew Flu victims, and has
allowed me to diagnose my old friend.
As it turns out, the afflicted regularly engage in at least one of the
following -Demonization (comparing Israeli actions to Nazism and
referring to Arab refugee camps as Auschwitz);- Double Standards
(singling out Israel for human rights abuses while ignoring the
blatant human rights violators such as Syria, Iran, Saudi Arabia,
Egypt, Palestinian Authority, North Korea, Cuba, China, Myanmar etc);
and Delegitimization (denying Israel the fundamental right to exist as
a Jewish state)
During March 2002, Jihadist suicide murderers were exploding on
Israeli buses every other day, massacring and maiming hundreds of Jews
in a cascade of latter-day pogroms; savage images of Haim Nahman
Bialik's monumental poem, "City of Slaughter" blazed across the broken
land.
125 Jews were massacred and hundreds were wounded by Palestinian
suicide murderers that month. Yet unsurprisingly my stricken friend
declined comment.
My friend seems to amuse his Arab colleagues: Appearing at a
conference some years ago at Cairo's American University, an Egyptian
fellow panelist quipped to the audience that our mutual friend was
"more pro-Palestinian than me - I am more pro-Israel than him."
Incidentally, this college has since instituted a ban on Israeli academics.
At this point allow me to complicate things: It's easy to assume that
those struck with Jew Flu would be contemptuous of Jewish religious
observance. They often hold Marxist views, which would imply an
atheist outlook.
Yet what one should one make of my friend who performs Kiddush on
Friday nights, fasts on Yom Kippur and uses two sets of dishes in his
kosher kitchen? Would such Jewish customs be performed by an
anti-Semite?
Knesset speaker Avrum Burg is a lifelong modern orthodox Jew, a skull
capped davener whose Jew Flu was latent for years but burst out into
the open when he took to smearing Israel in Nazi-like browns.
Daniel and Jonathan Boyarin are pleasant, prominent and yarmulked
professors of Jewish history who don tefilin daily, daven on Shabbat
and holidays and are easily mistaken in appearance for West Bank
settlers.
Yet Daniel is comfortable vilifying Israel regularly as a violent
outlaw state. And Jonathan admitted to me some years ago during an
especially sweaty Simchat Torah "hakafa" on the Lower East Side that
his views are identical if not even more radical than Daniel's (if
that was possible.)
Actually, it is interesting that the views of such radical yet
observant Jews resemble the tenets of Catholic Liberation Theology.
But could such a trio be accused of outright anti-Semitism?
The Burgs and Boyarins of this world have long revered another devout
Jew, the departed Yishayahu Leibowitz, a renowned scholar, recipient
of the Israel Prize, and editor of the Hebrew Encyclopedia, a
Jerusalemite who habitually referred to drafted Israeli soldiers who
happened to be defending his charmed way of life as "Judeo-Nazis".
Was Leibowitz an anti-Semite?
Submitting their pronouncements to the Sharansky test demonstrates
that even tefilin wearing, kosher food eating Kiddush reciters can
speak and write like anti-Semites.
Prognosis
But back to the elusive cause of Jew Flu: what makes one Jew
vulnerable and not another? Wouldn't a far larger proportion of Jews
fall prey to Jew Flu if, say, Stockholm syndrome was the culprit? Is
there a prime mover, some physiological or neurological smoking gun
pointing to a root cause?
There may be. David Brooks recently reported in the New York Times on
research by a Haifa University team led by Reem Yahya who studied the
brains scans of Arabs and Jews while showing them images of hands and
feet in painful situations.
Brooks reports that "the two cultures perceived pain differently. The
Arabs perceived higher levels of pain over all while the Jews were
more sensitive to pain suffered by members of a group other than their
own."
This phenomenon was epitomized by Rosa Luxemburg, a prominent
Bolshevik and Jew Flu victim. "I have no room in my heart for Jewish
suffering," declared Rosa the Red. "Why do you pester me with Jewish
troubles? I feel closer to the wretched victims of the rubber
plantations of Putumayo or the Negroes in Africa... I have no separate
corner in my heart for the ghetto."
And then there's the modest story Ahmad the cabbie related to me last
week as we drove through Eilat-like Palm Springs: Ahmad's brother in
Nablus was employed for many years by an Israeli Jewish building
contractor. When the outbreak of Intifada in 2000 permanently barred
Ahmad's brother from work in Israel, his Jewish boss continued to pay
the brother's salary for five years.
The intriguing research out of Haifa suggests that Jews may very well
be inherently altruistic. But while exhibiting more sensitivity to
another group's pain is one thing, embracing the goals of people
openly committed to one's destruction is a form of madness.
So here's my ultimate theory for the cause of this nefarious virus:
Jew Flu is a condition in which being "more sensitive to pain suffered
by members of a group other than (one's) own metastasizes into a
malignant emotional and moral identification with people committed to
(one's) annihilation."
Like any other virus, Jew Flu is contagious but containable. Yet
ultimately incurable.
2. The Israeli treasonous Left, led by the gyno-fascists from the
"Machsom Watch" terror group, continue to demonize Israel for running
checkpoints in the West Bank. All those poor "Palestinians" getting
inconveniences there. Better that Jewish school busses be blown to
bits than some Paletsinians get inconvenienced. Well I liked the
following message, reprinted here:
Reprint of message from Dan Friedman <topcopy@mindspring.com> wrote:
[It's been some time since we've heard about Arabs being humiliated
at Israeli checkpoints. That meme seems to have run out of steam. Yet
the devilish Israelis are still at it. If you need to see proof, the
story below should provide it. Now put yourself in an Arab terrorist's
shoes. You're stopped and frisked at an Israeli checkpoint, then
caught flagrante delicto and arrested when explosives and weapons are
found in your backpack. For a Palestinian jihadist trained and tasked
to kill as many Jews as possible, can you think of anything more
humiliating than that? df]
Ynetnews.com, 1/16/2012
Palestinians caught with 10 pipe bombs near checkpoint
Two suspects arrested near military court where hearing on Fogel
family killer scheduled to take place
Military Police forces working at the Salem checkpoint caught two
Palestinians carrying 10 pipe bombs, a gun and several bullets. The
bombs were dismantled and the Palestinians were turned over to
security forces.
An initial investigation suggests that the soldiers detected two
Palestinians in their 20s approaching a checkpoint near the military
court carrying two bags. After a check they discovered the contents of
the bags.
Last week, a Palestinian man trying to cross a Jenin checkpoint was
caught in possession of 11 explosive devices.
"An investigation of the previous incident suggests that the suspects
planned on carrying out a terrorist attack at the court," the
battalion commander Lt. Col. Erez Raven said. "The other side is not
familiar with our MOs which change from time to time and we raised our
alert level in the past week. There were no terror threat alerts."
The Salem Military Court is scheduled to discuss a hearing on the
sentence of Amjad Awad, one of the murderers of the Fogel family.
3. There is a marvelous poster making the internet rounds, also
being printed on tee shirts and sweat shirts. Its wearers will no
doubt be arrested for "incitement." That will not stop me though.
You can see the poster here:
http://hayamin.org/forum/index.php?topic=25912.0
It says in Hebrew, "Sometimes you just have to take off the Kipa."
The word kipa means both yarmulka and dome. You then see people in
the poster removing the Dome of the Rock structure (not to be confused
with the Al-Aqsa Mosque) from where it pollutes the Temple Mount. The
Dome of the Rock is not a mosque.
problem in Israeli academia. The racism and discrimination in
question is anti-Jewish and is being practiced by Ben Gurion
"University." That is right, 73 years after Kristallnacht Jews are
being discriminated against and barred from attending a university
program in psychology at Ben Gurion "University" because it is only
open to Arabs. And a Jewish victim of this overt discrimination has
filed suit with the Supreme Court.
The program in question is a MA program in psychology open only to
Arabs and particularly to Bedouins. Jews who qualify are excluded.
In addition, the program is secret. Ben Gurion University has been
trying to hide it from the media and from students and even from the
government.
The program seems designed for those who wish to become school
psychologists or educators in Arab schools, particularly Bedouin
schools, although that is not exactly how it is officially defined.
Well, one Yosef Malka, who happens to be Jewish and who already works
in a Bedouin school as a teacher, applied for the program. He was
turned down by Ben Gurion "University." No Jews or dogs allowed into
the program.
Malka has filled a Supreme Court suit against the university, the
Israeli Ministry of Education, and Council for Higher Education in
Israel. In his suit he claims this discriminatory program is
operating in secret, without proper transparency. While working as a
teacher in a Bedouin school, Malka heard about the secret program and
decided to apply. In spite of the fact that he had already earned a
BA with honors, he was rejected by BGU. In one of the letters of
rejection he got from Prof. Shifra Sagi, from BGU's Department of
Education, she admitted the program was funded with a special
off-budget allotment of money from the Budget and Planning Committee
of Israel's Council on Higher Education and that it is closed to Jews.
Sagi has collaborated with and was a devotee of the late notorious
BGU anti-Zionist professor Daniel Bar-On (who equated the Palestinian
"Nakba" with the Holocaust -
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/Blogs/Message.aspx/2265 ). .
The case is now awaiting a decision by the Supreme Court.
It is not clear whether or not Malka offered Ben Gurion University
a compromise solution whereby any Jew admitted into the program could
attend while wearing a yellow star.
Fuller story in Hebrew in Makor Rishon, January 13, 2012
2. There are three details I left out of my report on the landmark
decision by the Supreme Court in Israel this week concerning automatic
entitlement to Israeli citizenship for foreign spouses of Israeli
Arabs. The Knesset had passed a law that there is no automatic
entitlement, but the judicial activists and their Leftist NGO allies
attempted to get the court to rule that the Knesset law is
"unconstitutional." (A bit bizarre given that Israel has no
constitution.)
Anyway the three missing details are these:
A. The "automatic entitlement to residency/citizenship for spouses of
Israeli Arabs" has already been used as a tactic to smuggle terrorists
into Israel and indeed was a major consideration in the opinion
written by the majority of six justices in denying the petition.
B. Among those who voted with the judicial activists to declare the
law unconstitutional was Judge Edmund Levy, a religious man born in
Iraq, usually considered to be a man of integrity and solidly to the
Right. He is about to retire (judges have to by age 70 in Israel).
Levy is an old-time Herut-nik He has often challenged the ruling
Court leftist elite and is considered a courageous man of principle.
At least he was until the vote this week. So why did he join the
moonbats on the bench in trying to create a Palestinian right of
return via marriage?
C. Ironically, given how Levy voted, the Beinisch team lost this
round of imposing leftist judicial tyranny on the country only thanks
to the legal problems of Judge Yoram Danziger. A far leftist, you
may recall that Danziger issued a court ruling that the anti-Israel
propaganda film "Jenin Jenin" is NOT slanderous when it claims that a
group of Israeli soldiers carried out Nazi-like massacres, even after
the film's director, Mohammed Bakri, himself admitted that the film is
a tissue of lies. Well, when the "citizenship entitlement" case came
up for deliberation, Danziger was under suspension from the bench
while the police and Prosecution investigated him for his intimate
dirty ties to one of the most corrupt local politicians in Israel.
Being a leftist, the Prosecution of course proclaimed Danziger as
clean as a hound's tooth. The only people in Israel who are NOT aware
of Danziger's sleaze seem to be the people working in the Prosecutor's
office. Anyway, it was only thanks to his being suspended that he was
unable to vote with the Beinisch clique and tilt the Supreme Court
ruling this week in favor of leftist judicial mindlessness, judicial
tyranny, and court-imposed Israeli self-annihilation.
3. http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Columnists/Article.aspx?id=253441
Comprehending the incomprehensible – Part I
By MARTIN SHERMAN
13/01/2012
Into The Fray: The first of a two-part analysis of why Israel is
losing the international battle for hearts and minds.
Israel has made itself defenseless. Israel has vacated the
battleground of the mind. Israeli 'hasbara' is a JOKE! – British
columnist Melanie Phillips, IBA Television, 2011
One of the gravest strategic threats facing Israel is its accelerating
international delegitimization. This is developing into a strategic
constraint that is increasingly curtailing the nation's ability to
protect itself and its citizens. Even more troubling, it is
undermining international recognition of Israel's right to exercise
self-defense, even in the most blatant cases of aggression against it.
Strategic debacle
Without wishing to diminish the significance of innate hostility
towards Israel and the Jews from many sources in the international
system, the present dismal and untenable situation has arisen in large
measure because of the abysmal job the Israeli leadership has done in
conducting – or more accurately, misconducting – its public diplomacy.
Indeed, Prof. Eitan Gilboa, a well-known authority on public
diplomacy, warns: "The lack of an adequate PD [public diplomacy]
program has significantly affected Israel's strategic outlook and
freedom of action. Any further neglect of PD would not only restrict
Israel's strategic options, it would be detrimental to its ability to
survive in an increasingly intolerant and hostile world."
Many find it puzzling why Israel – with its proven record of
extraordinary achievement in so many other fields of human endeavor –
does such a poor job in presenting its case to the world.
An inescapable truth
For anyone seeking the principal reason why Israel is losing the
public diplomacy war, the answer is difficult to accept, yet very easy
to prove.
Israel is losing the battle because it doesn't want to win.
Or to put it differently: The people charged with the nation's public
diplomacy have a worldview that prevents them from adopting a winning
strategy. Indeed, this chronic malaise was aptly diagnosed by Daniel
Pipes when he observed: "No one at the upper echelons of Israel's
political life articulates the imperative for victory." (More on this
later).
Although difficult to accept, the lack of will to win is easy to
prove. In gauging the motivation of any organization to achieve an
objective, one of the most important indicators is the resources it
allots for to achieve it.
Clearly, if the objective is considered important, more resources will
be allotted, and vice-versa.
Surrender syndrome
Israel's public diplomacy budget is ludicrously small.
Indeed, as one government minister bemoaned: "It is dreadful to hear
that Bamba (a snack produced by the Osem corporation), has a
promotional budget two to three times the size of the total state
budget for public diplomacy."
This frugality is not dictated by a lack of resources. Indeed, when
Israel has desired to achieve an un-budgeted objective, money has
rarely been an obstacle.
For example, when billions of shekels were needed for the construction
of the West Bank security barrier, that was no problem; when billions
of dollars were needed for the Gaza disengagement, that was no problem
either.
Likewise, the tens of billions of dollars required for the planned
"convergence" (i.e.
withdrawal) from Judea and Samaria were not considered an
insurmountable obstacle, even though it was clear the money would not
be coming from the American taxpayer.
In last week's column, I pointed out that if a small fraction of 1
percent of GDP were devoted to public diplomacy, this would generate a
budget of $1 billion – rather than the paltry sums provided today.
So if the Israel leadership chooses not to allot available resources
to assertively promote Israel's case abroad, to resolutely defend its
international image, to explain its operational constraints and
security imperatives, to elucidate why certain measures are
indispensable for the safety of its citizens, it must mean that – for
one reason or another – it does not wish to. There is no other
rational explanation.
How can one account for this syndrome of submissive surrender?
The key to the conundrum
This is a conundrum that cannot be deciphered without a firm grasp of
the sociological – rather than the political – topography of country
in general, and of the priorities and preferences of powerful civil
society elites in particular.
Without this insight it is impossible to understand the dramatic and
disturbing events that have taken place in Israel over the past two
decades. Without it, it is impossible to understand:
• Why a country that displays such technotactical brilliance is
afflicted by such strategic imbecility;
• Why hawkish candidates consistently win elections, but then
immediately adopt the failed policy of their defeated dovish rivals;
• Why the doctrine of political appeasement and territorial
concessions is repeatedly and consistently disproven, but somehow
never discredited – and certainly never discarded;
• Why the Israeli political establishment has not embraced more
appreciatively and mobilized more effectively the huge potential in
the support of communities such as the Evangelical Christians across
the world, and particularly in the US, as a strategic asset.
None of these phenomena makes any sense unless one understands the
decisive role that civil society elites have in setting the direction
of the country's strategic agenda – no matter who gets elected. As
will become clear later, understanding this role is also the key to
deciphering the riddle of Israel's dismal public diplomacy
performance.
Detrimental, dysfunctional, disloyal
Sadly, this is a role that is not only decisive, but also in many ways
detrimental, dysfunctional and at times disloyal.
If to some this uncharitable description appears excessively harsh,
consider the following examples and decide for yourselves how to
characterize the conduct of civil society elites in the media, the
academia and the legal establishment, who (a) accuse Israel of being
an "apartheid state" and support international boycott and sanctions
against their own county, such as Prof. Neve Gordon of Ben-Gurion
University, who declared: "Israel today is an apartheid state. I have
decided to support the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions
movement...launched by Palestinian activists."
(b) portray Israel as a bloodthirsty, intolerant nation bent on the
persecution of minorities, such as Prof. Aeyal Gross of Tel Aviv
University, who characterized Israel as "a society where shooting at
children of the 'other' is the norm" and the Israeli public as
"indifferent or worse to Israel's widespread killing of Palestinian
youth?" (c) condemn Israeli policies as being on a par with or worse
than those of the apartheid regime in South Africa, such as the poet,
writer and lecturer, Yitzhak Laor, who alleged that "Israel's
apartheid is worse... more ruthless than that seen in South Africa....
We have to get rid of Zionism. What lies behind Zionism are interests
and a huge army hungering to justify its existence."
(d) condone – and indeed appear to endorse – Palestinian terrorism
against Israeli civilians, such as Prof. Oren Yiftachel of Ben-Gurion
University, who suggested that "Palestinian shelling from Gaza should
be perceived as a prison uprising... suppressed with terror by the
Israeli state."
(e) deny the legitimacy of Israel preventative measures to ensure the
security of the country and the safety of its citizens, such as
journalist Gideon Levy, who in an article titled "The neighborhood
bully strikes again," written at the outset of the retaliatory
Operation Cast Lead, undertaken to quell the firing of thousands of
rockets at civilian communities, decried "Israel's violent responses
[which] cross every red line of... morality, international law,"
asserting, "What began yesterday in Gaza is a war crime," and such as
Prof. Fania Oz-Salzberger of the University of Haifa, who following
the Gaza Flotilla episode, when Israeli commandos were forced to
defend themselves against a mob endeavoring to disembowel them,
endorsed the international censure of Israel in a hastily published
article titled "Ashamed of My Country," proclaiming that "the
almost-unanimous condemnation is spot on. I am ashamed," and elsewhere
asserting that "the true-blue pirates were the uniformed Israeli
commandos."
(f) ignore or obscure the fact that Israel policy towards the
Palestinians is not driven by a discriminatory doctrine of racial
superiority but by proven security concerns, such as columnist Akiva
Eldar, who, in an article titled "Are Israel and apartheid South
Africa really different?" dismissed the security realities, declaring:
"As far as discriminatory practices are concerned, it's hard to find
differences between white rule in South Africa and Israeli rule," or
such as former attorney-general Michael Ben-Yair, who charged that
Israel "enthusiastically chose to become a colonial society engaging
in theft.... We established an apartheid regime."
THIS IS but a small sampling of the assault on Israeli legitimacy from
within its own civil society elites. Many examples abound of similar
distortions, misrepresentations and exaggerations, of similar
half-truths, non-truths and full-blooded fabrications from many other
"intellectuals," whether self-professed radical post-Zionists, or
self-proclaimed "liberal" pro-Zionists.
The noxious nexus
But more than a expression of the political predilections of those who
articulate them, these derogatory attitudes towards Israel reflect a
socio-cultural milieu, in which the personal and professional
interests of its members impose a code of conformity to political
correctness – irrespective of any divergence this may have from the
facts. It is a code strictly enforced – not by any formal fiat, but by
the consequences of any violation.
No deviation beyond "acceptable" limits is brooked, and any such
"delinquency" is likely to have grave repercussions in terms of
livelihood, promotion and even social acceptability of the
"perpetrator."
This brings us to the nexus between the role of Israeli civil society
elites and government policy in general and public diplomacy in
particular. This is a topic which I shall elaborate on in detail in
next week's column (Part II).
In it, I will show how the combination of their unelected positions of
power and privilege in the media, academia and legal establishment, on
the one hand, and the nature of their personal and professional
interests, on the other, confers on these elites both the ability and
the motivation to determine the direction of the strategic agenda of
the nation.
Naturally, this is a direction that reflects the worldview of the
socio-cultural milieu they belong to, and which they can impose on the
government no matter who prevails at the polls. This neutralizes voter
preferences in the governance of the nation and dangerously undercuts
the underpinnings of the democratic system.
This also impinges on the formulation and implementation of Israel's
public diplomacy.
After all, the senior professionals charged with conducting the
county's public diplomacy are drawn from – and interface with – the
elites discussed previously.
In effect, this precludes them from adopting any strategy that would
undermine their own worldview and dooms Israeli efforts to failure.
But more on that next week.
No conspiracy
In closing, it is important to underscore that what is set out here is
not a theory of a conscious conspiracy, contrived by some purposely
malevolent elitist cabal. Rather, it is the elucidation of a mechanism
comprising the accumulated consequences of individual decisions and
actions driven by the short-term pursuit of prestige and profit of a
group of empowered individuals, and which trump considerations of the
long-term interest of the wider collective.
It is essential to understand this mechanism.
Otherwise, it will be impossible to "comprehend the incomprehensible,"
to understand why "Israel has made itself defenseless," why Israel has
"vacated the battleground of the mind" and why Israeli hasbara is an
ineffective joke.
More important, without such an understanding it will be impossible to
formulate any remedies.
of Return" was being implemented under everyone's noses. It consisted
of Arab citizens of Israel's marrying Palestinians from the West Bank,
Gaza or elsewhere and demanding that their spouses be granted Israeli
citizenship. Some of the marriages are fictional, like "Green Card
Weddings" in the US. Many others are multiple wives for Moslems,
especially Bedouins. No one ever stopped the Israeli partner from
going to live with the spouse in the spouse's location outside
Israel's Green Line!
The Israeli Left has long demanded that any spouse of any Israeli Arab
citizen be granted automatic residence rights and citizenship in
Israel. It goes without saying that spouses do NOT get automatic
citizenship in most other countries just because they marry a citizen.
(This includes the US.) The Left represents any reluctance to grant
automatic citizenship as a violation of human rights, especially the
"right to marry."
Now no one is challenging the right of Israeli Arabs to marry
non-Israeli Arabs or anyone else. They can marry "Palestinians" all
the want and go live with their spouses in Gaza, Jordan, Lebanon, or
Brooklyn. The real problem is the demand that unlimited immigration
into Israel be permitted to all non-Israeli Arab "spouses." It is all
part of the decades-long campaign by the Left to make Israel as
non-Jewish as possible, to minimize demographically the Jewish
majority in Israel. That is why the Left also wants unlimited free
entry to all Africans who would like to enter Israel as "refugees" and
earn Israeli wages.
Anyway, the question of the "right to marry" and the right of spouses
to automatic citizenship has been under deliberation in the courts and
media in Israel, and yesterday the Israeli Supreme Court issued a
landmark decision in the matter. The ruling affects not only this
specific issue but may signal the beginning of change in the Supreme
Court itself. At last.
Usually Supreme Court judges in Israel sit in a panel of three out of
the full set (this is very different form the US Supreme Court
practice!) For difficult cases, larger panels are used. The ruling
on this case was made by a panel of 11 judges, which is unusually
large.
The panel ruled 6 against 5 in favor of sanity and legal common sense.
It rejected the demand that residence and citizenship be an automatic
entitlement for spouses of Israelis (and of course they meant Israeli
Arabs.) The Israeli Left is squealing in indignation at this defeat
and at this "violation of fundamental human rights." Haaretz is so
livid that it turned red – ok, it was already red to begin with.
The breakdown of the vote in the Court is also instructive. The five
who voted FOR the entitlement to citizenship were the Beinisch Clique,
and included the Beinisch judicial activists. Edna Arbel and the Arab
judge Salim Joubram voted with Beinisch. Among the six who voted for
sanity were Neal Handel and Eliezer Rivlin, both of whom (with
Joubran) refused to defend freedom of speech in the Gordon-Plaut SLAPP
suit court case. Perhaps most importantly, Asher Gronis, who is about
to take over for Beinisch as Chief Justice, voted against the
entitlement and in favor of sanity!
Perhaps this augurs well for the Israelites!
2. Paychecks for Perverts:
http://frontpagemag.com/2012/01/12/paychecks-for-pedophiles/
Paychecks for Pedophiles
Posted By Steven Plaut On January 12, 2012
The Greek government does not cease to beg the EU and international
institutions for spare change in order to help the country dig itself
out of its debt debacle. But, as it turns out, the Greek government
evidently really has too much spare budgetary funds, money it is
desperate to find a way to waste.
Indeed that is the only plausible explanation for the decision by the
government of Greece a few days ago to start funding pedophiles. No,
that is not a spoof and not a misprint. According to the Associated
Press, the Greek government has just recognized pedophiles as a
population of the "disabled," entitled under law to governmental
disability compensation and added to the country's welfare roll. The
children who are the victims of those pedophiles evidently are not.
Pedophiles are not the only folks being added to the growing lists of
those who may enjoy free handouts and disability income from the Greek
government. (Notice I did not say benefits "paid for by the Greek
taxpayer," since so much of the Greek national budget is not covered
by them these days.) Exhibitionists and kleptomaniacs were also just
added to the welfare roll list that already includes pyromaniacs,
compulsive gamblers, fetishists and sadomasochists. Under the new
Greek "disability" rules and categories, pedophiles will get larger
welfare checks than people who have undergone organ transplants.
Peeping Toms will enjoy a higher level of support than diabetics.
The additions to the welfare roll were denounced by the Greek National
Confederation of Disabled People and its leader Yiannis Vardakastanis,
who is blind. They are concerned that all the additions will lead to
the reduction in support levels for people with real disabilities. Now
almost the only people in Greece who will not be recognized as
"disabled" are those who abide by the law. Under the circumstances,
those law abiders should really be the first group to be acknowledged
as disabled, because they are clearly insane.
What is one to make of all this?
The first conclusion is that this new set of insane "disability"
policies serves as a perfect demonstration of what led Greece to the
debtors dog house in the first place. For many years the Greek
governments of both the leading parties have handled their finances
like the cartoon king in the Wizard of Id, handing out massive
wide-scale exemptions from payment of taxes while ladling out populist
largess with a soup spoon so large that it could quench the thirst of
mythological Greek gods.
The second conclusion is that what we observe in Greece is political
correctness on crack and steroids. Here is the ultimate and natural
culmination of the attempts to subject society to the idiocies of
political correctness. When "approval" becomes a universal
entitlement, when all condemnation of all forms of behavior is a
reactionary manifestation of intolerance and bigotry, why should not
pedophilia and kleptomania be added to the lists of behavior about
which one must never ever be judgmental?
But perhaps the most important lesson from the Greek policies is that
there seem to be no limits to the "medicalization" of misbehavior.
For decades now, growing numbers of evil, destructive, anti-social,
and deviant behavior have been "medicalized," converted into medical
conditions. Once they are classified as medical conditions, those who
engage in such behavior get an automatic "pass" from society. They
often also get money. While not quite as insane as the Greek
policies, the United States has digested a huge bowl of similar idiocy
within the framework of the Americans with Disabilities Act, first
passed in 1990.
Definitions of disabilities are getting sillier and sillier in many
parts of the world. In the United States, the current version of the
Americans with Disabilities Act defines the term "disability" with
respect to an individual as: (A) a physical or mental impairment that
substantially limits one or more major life activities of such
individual; (B) a record of such an impairment; or (C) being regarded
as having such an impairment.
From the start, public safety was not considered valid grounds for
"discriminating" against people with "disabilities." So a group of
near-sighted people sued when they were denied jobs as airline pilots.
People with serious psychiatric problems have sued when denied various
jobs and positions in which the public could be placed in harm's way
as a result of their employment. People with contagious diseases like
hepatitis cannot be denied jobs in which they may infect others, since
that would be discrimination against the disabled. It is even more
difficult to deny positions to those with AIDS or HIV.
But that is just the tip of the disability iceberg. There are oodles
of court cases that illustrate the absurdities. An Orange County
school district was ordered to pay for private schooling for a pupil
expelled for violence, plus 360,000 dollars in reparations to him. A
violent schizophrenic received reparations when he was fired from his
post office job for threatening other employees and also threatening
to murder the president of the United States. A guidance counselor in
a school in Hartford, Connecticut won compensation after being fired
for possession of cocaine, because addiction is a disability. A
Boston professor won compensation after being fired for sexually
harassing students, claiming that his medication was responsible for
his "disability." A man, who suffers from diabetes and frequently
passes out, successfully sued when he was turned down for a job as a
bus driver in Maryland. A subway employee in New York sued when he
was fired from a job that required him to crawl under trains and into
narrow passages; he weighed more than 400 pounds. A Kansas driver
sued when he was ticketed for not wearing a seat belt; he claimed it
violated his rights as a claustrophobe. A strip club in Bellevue,
Washington was sued because it did not have a lift that would allow
women in wheel chairs to do erotic dancing on the stage. Students who
are penalized when late for tests and class are suing all over, on
grounds that they suffer from a narcolepsy disability. Almost anyone
with "depression" can also get recognized as disabled.
Obesity, alcoholism, and addiction can all be considered disabilities.
A Michigan jury granted $610,000 to an employee who fell asleep on
the job, on grounds that narcolepsy is a disability. Courts have
ruled that potential employees have the "right to lie" about any
previous behavior that might represent manifestations of
"disabilities," including stealing. Truckloads of misbehavior are
protected because virtually all psychiatric problems get counted as
disabilities, and so even those engaged in insubordination with
superiors, disruptive behavior, and theft may enjoy protection.
Costs of course are also a matter that "Disabilities Protection" laws
generally disregard and insist be ignored. In many places, every
single person incapable of boarding a bus or train could be
transported at public expense by taxi for a tiny fraction of what it
costs to implement all those lifts and special assistance devices on
vehicles, not taking into account the capacity of the vehicle lost
because of their space.
There are also other implications to this. Once pedophiles and the
other misfits and perverts have been added by Greece and others to the
list of the "disabled," those who engage in violence towards them or
mere criticism, mocking, or denunciations of such people could find
themselves prosecuted as perpetrators of hate crimes. A minor ruckus
arose two years back in the US when TV commentator Bill O'Reilly
predicted that someday those who attack pedophiles will be prosecuted
for hate crimes. Pedophilia is not a recognized disability under the
Americans with Disabilities Act. Yet. Neither is being a
"transgendered" person, although there is a lot of lobbying to get its
exclusion from "disability" status dropped.
Where will it all end? Perhaps when taxpaying is recognized as a
symptom of mental illness and so all who agree to pay their taxes get
an automatic disabilities discharge from paying them.
possibly Get any Nuttier
Furor in Greece over pedophilia as a disability
January 9th, 2012 in Health
(AP) -- Greek disability groups expressed anger Monday at a government
decision to expand a list of state-recognized disability categories to
include pedophiles, exhibitionists and kleptomaniacs.
The National Confederation of Disabled People called the action
"incomprehensible," and said pedophiles are now awarded a higher
government disability pay than some people who have received organ
transplants.
The Labor Ministry said categories added to the expanded list - that
also includes pyromaniacs, compulsive gamblers, fetishists and
sadomasochists - were included for purposes of medical assessment and
used as a gauge for allocating financial assistance.
But NCDP leader Yiannis Vardakastanis, who is blind, warned the new
list could create new difficulties for disabled Greeks who are already
facing benefit cuts due to the country's financial crisis.
"What's happened is incomprehensible. I think there is some big
mistake. The ministry should have a different policy on disability,"
Vardakastanis told the Associated Press. "The list contains major
changes to disability quotients, which could effectively remove many
people from access to benefits."
The new list gives pyromaniacs and pedophiles disability pay up to 35
percent, compared to 80 percent for heart transplant recipients.
"It's really not serious to grant Peeping Toms a 20-30 percent
disability rate, and 10 percent to diabetics, who have insulin shots
four or five times a day," said Vardakastanis.
Greece has been fighting to avoid bankruptcy since 2009. Public
spending on health and welfare programs has been sharply cut under
austerity measures imposed as a condition for receiving emergency
loans from the International Monetary Fund and other countries using
the euro currency.
Independently run welfare programs that survived on state grants have
been the hardest hit, leaving some disabled groups, including the
deaf, facing sudden drops in their standard of care.
The government is also battling widespread abuse in the welfare
system, forcing tens of thousands of disabled people to be reassessed.
©2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not
be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Central Asia: Lessons for the Middle East
Posted By Nodir Ataev and Steven Plaut On January 10, 2012
Just as the new calendar year was about to begin, new violence broke
out in the village of Andarak in southern Kyrgyzstan. Internecine
violence among the ethnic groups of Kyrgyzstan has been flaring up
periodically for years with the worst outbreaks in 2010. Kyrgyzstan
may be the closest thing to be found in Central Asia to a "bi-national
state," the sort of state that some are proposing be imposed upon the
Middle East as a "solution" to replace Israel. It is the second
poorest of the ex-Soviet republics. The two main ethnic groups in
Kyrgyzstan are the Kyrgyz, about 70% of the population, until
relatively recently in history a nomadic tribal population, and ethnic
Uzbeks, close to 20%. There are also ethnic Tajiks living in the
country. And there are lessons to learn from the violence there about
the viability of multi-ethnic states in the Middle East.
At first glance, Kyrgyzstani ethnic relations might be expected to be
idyllic. Both of the two main population groups consist of
predominantly Moslem people speaking Turkic dialects. The Tajiks are
also Moslem, speaking a language close to Farsi. Yet the country has
seen outbreaks of massive inter-ethnic violence. In June 1990, a
violent land dispute between the Kyrgyz and Uzbeks erupted in the city
of Osh. In the summer of 2010, southern Kyrgyzstan was again gripped
by bloody internecine violence. (The New Year's violence this year was
between ethnic Tajiks and Kyrgyz.)
The south of Kyrgyzstan is predominantly Uzbek and was sliced off and
glued into Kyrgyzstan by the Soviets in order to provide the country
with parts of the fertile Fergana Valley. In the 1990 fighting, a
state of emergency and curfew were introduced there and the border
between the neighboring Uzbekistani and Kirghiz republics was closed.
Soviet troops were deployed to stop the violence. According to
official reports 230 people died, but unofficial figures range up to
more than 1,000.
Central Asia is a part of the globe that is known by few Americans,
with even fewer who have visited it. It is composed of countries that
almost no American can identify on a map. Yet it is nevertheless an
important region, located just north of Afghanistan and near the
heartland of the forces of the anti-Western jihad, a region whose
strategic worth is increasingly valued by the West in light of the war
against terror. And it is also a region in which there are lessons
for other parts of the world with regard to "engineering" artificial
states. In particular, it illustrates the folly of proposals to
construct "bi-national" and "multi-national" states in the Middle East
as some sort of recipe for peace.
Throughout history and until very recently, Central Asians lived
within the greater states and empires of other peoples, among them the
empires of the Chinese, Mongols, Greeks, Arabs, Persians, Turks and
Russians. Most of Central Asia was conquered by Alexander the Great
and so was opened up to "Western-Hellenistic" cultural influence quite
early. Later the region was incorporated within a series of Islamic
states, khanates, and empires, including those of Islamized Mongols.
Most of the population was Islamized, although at different paces,
with those today called Uzbeks being among the earliest to embrace the
faith, and those called the Kyrgyz and Kazakhs converting much later,
many only in the last two centuries. Historically the population of
the region did not see itself as composed of separate "nations," but
rather as heterogeneous cultural and linguistic subgroups and clans
within those larger empires, and where religious and tribal ties were
far more important than "national" ties.
The nature of statehood and nationality in Central Asia was radically
and artificially altered by the Soviets, who sought to neutralize the
political ambitions and independence of the peoples of the region
through a policy of divide and conquer. The Soviets also decided to
erect boundaries for "Socialist Republics" and similar political
structures (like "autonomous oblasts") throughout the region. Stalin
and his people intentionally drew "national" boundaries for these new
"nations" that often ignored demography and the ethnic compositions of
the populations. They drew borders in an intentional way to include
large populations of "alien" peoples in each of the new "republics"
being invented. For example, two of Uzbekistan's largest cities are
in fact ethnically Tajik.
The Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, Uzbeks, Tajiks, and many others were all
interspersed throughout the territories of the "republics" in a
dizzying mosaic. Cynics suspected that the Soviets wanted such
structures to prevent ethnic-based opposition from forming, to focus
attention of the ethnic groups in conflict against one another so that
their populations would be easier to control, and to foment
Russification. The languages of these new "countries" were forcibly
and artificially transformed by requiring the use of the Cyrillic
(Russian) alphabet, although in recent years Cyrillic is being widely
replaced by the Latin alphabet. Stalinist policies of mass expulsion
of populations brought other ethnicities and other tensions to Central
Asia alongside uprooted populations from the Crimea and Georgia and
elsewhere transplanted there.
Every one of the "republics" of Central Asia sits inside artificial
borders arbitrarily drawn by the Soviets, each a sovereign
authoritarian country; Uzbekistan has retained even today its
one-party Soviet-era dictatorship. Ethnic tensions are to be found in
all the countries of Central Asia, and these sometimes produce massive
violence.
According to the United Nations, in the 2010 violence 400,000 refugees
were displaced and over 100,000 people, mainly ethnic Uzbeks, fled
across the border to neighboring Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. The
Kyrgyzstani interim government headed by acting president Roza
Otunbayeva was accused of granting shoot-to-kill powers to its
security forces in the south, and was criticized by human rights
organizations. Human Rights Watch reported some involvement of
government forces in attacks on Uzbek neighborhoods.
There are several lessons that can be learned from the violence in
Kyrgyzstan. As a predominantly Moslem country Kyrgyzstan is very much
a part of the Middle East. As such, the first lesson is that in the
Middle East, bi-national and multi-national political structures do
not work well, even under the best of circumstances, and produce
inter-communal and internecine violence. Multi-ethnic Tajikistan has
also seen civil war break out among different Muslim groups in that
country. If relations among the fellow Turkic Muslims of rival ethnic
groups break down into near-civil war, then how much less viable would
be any bi-national Jewish-Arab state of the sort that the
Destroy-Israel movement is currently proposing?
Ironically, there is a related positive lesson for the Middle East
from the same region. While relations between ethnic Slavs and local
Muslims in Central Asia have often been tense and can be potentially
explosive, recent violent confrontations have been relatively rare
largely because of the massive out-migration of the Slavs to Russia
and the Ukraine. Ethnic Germans also largely emigrated. Ethnic
Russians and Ukrainians simply moved to those nation-states in which
their kin are the dominant majority.
Could not the Arab-Israeli conflict be resolved at least partly
through a similar out-migration of "Palestinians" and their relocation
into the predominantly Arab ethnic "homelands," much like the
resettlement of Central Asian Slavs? After all, "Palestinians" are by
and large people whose families migrated into what is now Israel from
neighboring countries over the past century or so, to take advantage
of rising standards of living produced by the Zionist immigrations and
investments of capital there. And Palestinian Arabs are the only
ethnic group on the planet that can choose to move to any from among
22 different sister states composed of the same ethnic group to which
they belong.
Confrontation and civil war with Slavs have been prevented in Central
Asia thanks to "transfer" of the minority Slav population to the
predominantly Slavic countries. "Transfer" has long been the bogeyman
solution that defenders of the Palestinian agenda dismiss as a racist
and colonialist idea. They prefer the "progressive" solution of
annihilating Israel and its population and erecting even more Arab
states in its territory. The same people who want Israel dismembered
reject out of hand the idea that Iraq or Syria could be made into more
tranquil places by breaking them each into smaller states with more
homogeneous populations. After all, that would be "colonialistic,"
unlike Soviet border invention.
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