Roger Cohen Sees the Real Goals of BDS

In an op-ed in the New York Times, Roger Cohen says what I've been saying all along about the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement:

"I do not trust the B.D.S. movement. Its stated aim is to end the occupation, secure “full equality” for Arab-Palestinian citizens of Israel, and fight for the right of return of all Palestinian refugees. The first objective is essential to Israel’s future. The second is laudable. The third, combined with the second, equals the end of Israel as a Jewish state. This is the hidden agenda of B.D.S., its unacceptable subterfuge: beguile, disguise and suffocate."

Why Boycotting Israeli Universities Is Wrong

Three small academic associations, the American Studies Association being the most prominent of them, have endorsed a call for academic boycott of Israeli institutions. They claim they will not target individuals, but rather Israeli universities, colleges and research centers, and people representing those institutions as deans, presidents, etc. That's bullshit, for several reasons:

• Had the boycott been enforceable, American scholars wishing to go to conferences in Israel or publish in journals published by Israeli universities would not be able to do so, because it would constitute cooperation with the institutions themselves.
• University administrators would not be able to present their academic work, unrelated to their positions as administrators.
• There is a chilling effect on all Israeli scholars. As someone who is not a university official, I am not technically the target of this boycott, but I would never go to a conference organized by the ASA or any other organization that supports the boycott of Israel. It would be a hostile environment for me as an Israeli. I would not feel welcomed there, perhaps unless I was a far left-wing anti-Zionist.

Other than that, the academic boycott, just like all other forms of BDS against Israel, is extremely simple-minded. In effect, it puts all the blame for the conflict on Israel. It does not recognize the fact that it takes both sides to solve this problem. 

And how do you solve the problem? The original Palestinian Civil Society Call for BDS takes the most anti-Israel stance possible:

"These non-violent punitive measures should be maintained until Israel meets its obligation to recognize the Palestinian people’s inalienable right to self-determination and fully complies with the precepts of international law by: 

1. Ending its occupation and colonization of all Arab lands and dismantling the Wall
2. Recognizing the fundamental rights of the Arab-Palestinian citizens of Israel to full equality; and
3. Respecting, protecting and promoting the rights of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes and properties as stipulated in UN resolution 194."

I agree with Point 2, but 1 and 3 are problematic, to say the least. In Point 1, what constitutes "all Arab lands" - the West Bank, Gaza, East Jerusalem and Golan Heights or Israel proper as well? Point 3 is something Israelis in their right minds can never agree to.

Philip Weiss's Delusions About Jeffrey Goldberg

Jewish Anti-Zionist blogger Phil Weiss is so delusional and so sure of his position, that he is certain that his anti-Zionist views are winning over the Jewish world, as well as the non-Jewish world. Now he thinks Jeffrey Goldberg is about to leave Zionism, just because of Goldberg's frustration with Benjamin Netanyahu. Well, Phil, haven't you learned that Zionism does not equal Benjamin Netanyahu? He's afraid Netanyahu's policies may kill the two-state solution and bring about a one-state solution. That means he sees the one-state solution as bad, not as something he's about to start supporting.

Goldberg can't win. He's a moderate-left Zionist like me, which means the left will hate him for not being pro-Palestinian enough, and the right will hate him for not being pro-Israel enough. Indeed, that very post of Weiss's blog has a rebuttal of the "Goldberg to become Anti-Zionist" view from someone who sees Goldberg's anti-Netanyahu posts as a Zionist conspiracy meant to maintain US support for Israel. Can't it just be that he really doesn't like Netanyahu for the very reasons he writes explicitly?

I never understood why some people think Jeffrey Goldberg is a neocon. Neither can I understand how anybody in their right mind would think he might be joining the Mondoweiss blogging staff any time soon.

Dictators and Rebels Share Hatred of Israel and Jews

Syrian President Bashar Assad addressed his citizens today, accusing the United States and Israel of fomenting the revolution against him. In Libya, Muammar Qaddafi and his supporters spread the blame between a diverse group ranging from Al-Qaeda to Israel. Libyan rebels have said Qaddafi's parents were born in Israel and that he's actually Jewish.

It's always heartwarming to see that even in the heat of battle, the two sides still have some common ground. You want to kill each other? Okay, but always remember you want to kill the Zionists even more!

Zochrot at Gaza-Sderot

A controversial 4-day  conference took place last week at Sapir College in Sderot, the often bombarded town near the border with Gaza. The theme was "moving from crisis to sustainability", from war to peace, which is a general concept most people would agree on. The question is how to reach it. That's where the controversy starts. Right wing groups tried to call off the conference, and tried to persuade different people to boycott it, criticizing the fact that groups they see as anti-Israel, such as Zochrot, UNRWA and Doctors for Human Rights, were participating. The mayor of Sderot was the only official who boycotted the conference.

Perhaps the most controversial participant was Zochrot, whose representatives spoke about implementing the right of return. Unfortunately, I could not attend, but I've heard from people who attended their panel. There's a saying in Hebrew - "they convinced the convinced". In other words, people didn't change their minds after hearing them.

The people of Zochrot did not answer the difficult questions about ethnic strife and avoided the question of how many people would return by claiming that is a racist question. Apparently, anything but the full right of return would not be enough, with any agreement capping the number of returnees being a joke. Also, they contradicted themselves. They said the return of refugees would not require Israelis to leave their homes, but who owns houses that existed before 1948 would have to be worked out.

The panel wasn't one-sided, though. The panel chair said she wasn't sure about the right of return, and another lecturer, who spoke about effective dialogue, said that she is threatened by all the points on the map where Arab villages once existed and to which refugees want to return. She said it is important for patriotic Zionist Israelis to speak with Palestinians. I think she meant the Zionist left should not leave Jewish-Palestinian interaction to Anti-Zionists.

If I had been there, I would have asked the Zochrot people a question inspired by the events in Egypt: You claim Israel should be a democracy, with complete equal rights for all, but how can you guarantee that a post-return Israel would be at least as much a liberal democracy as it is now? Most of the refugees don't live in democratic and/or liberal countries. Why would they care to make sure the rights of their former enemies (which some may see as current enemies) are not taken away?

Zochrot's participation is not a "boycottable" offense. In fact, it is better for them to be heard in the general public, so they can be confronted with the difficult questions they tend to avoid when they only meet with like-minded people, and so people who hear them can see that they don't have good answers to the agruments that don't fit their agenda.

Let's Return to Pre-1967 Zionism

Here's an interesting opinion piece from today's Haaretz:

Before and after 1967 (source in Hebrew and in English):

The wrongs committed after 1967 threaten the justice of Zionism in its entirety, while pre-'67 wrongs were wrongs of particular moves in the realization of Zionism.

By Chaim Gans

The members of a bizarre coalition of pro-settlement right-wingers (for example, the late Yosef Ben-Shlomo, and Israel Harel, long may he live) and the anti-Zionist left (recently, Yehouda Shenhav) are united in one claim. They hold that the Zionist left's support for the pre-1967 borders, and its sharp opposition to the settlements since, are hypocritical and inconsistent. The inconsistency, they say, is that Zionism has been settling at the Arab's expense since it began - not only since 1967.

In addition, they claim that even if the post-'67 settlements are the basis of unjust acts, Zionism committed many more injustices in 1948 and the following decade. At that time it not only settled on private land belonging to Palestinians, it also uprooted masses of people from their homes and refused to allow them to return.

But the position of the Zionist left is far from inconsistent. There is a huge gap between the post-'67 settlements and the injustices perpetrated by Zionism until then; the wrongs committed after 1967 threaten the justice of Zionism in its entirety, while pre-'67 wrongs were wrongs of particular moves in the realization of Zionism.

The source of this distinction is of course the well-known distinction between the jus ad bellum and jus in bello. There is no contradiction between the claim that Britain's bombing of Dresden during World War II was a criminal act and the claim that this criminality represented a step taken in a just war - even a sublimely just war, the war against Nazism.

We must acknowledge the great injustices committed by Zionism up to 1967. We have to take responsibility for them (via reparations ) - mainly for the expulsion of refugees. We must also acknowledge the high price the Palestinians paid for the realization of Zionism, even when Zionism did not commit injustices against them. But none of these admissions undermines the justice of Zionism in the least. For in 1948, Zionism realized the right of Jews to self-determination - after a history of persecution that created a necessity to implement the right to a historic homeland. The justice of this Zionism is sublime, even though crimes were committed during its realization.

The post-'67 settlements (in contrast to just an Israeli military presence in the territories ) cannot be justified on the basis of the needs of a persecuted nation. The settlements are the bases for the continuing injustices committed by a powerful state. These wrongs are being carried out many decades after the persecution of the Jews ended. They are in effect acts of persecution committed by Jews against Arabs with the backing of the Jewish state. So the Zionism in whose name they are carried out cannot be considered just.

Zionism cannot be just if it is a proprietary movement representing the so-called "generations of the Jewish people" to acquire the deed to the entire Land of Israel and Jerusalem - the way the right wing justifies the settlements and its opposition to the construction freeze in the territories and Jerusalem. Zionism can be just only if it is an existential movement of Jews interested as individuals in maintaining their culture and living in their homeland without being persecuted. This justification supports the Zionism that existed before 1967. But not after. The settlements are therefore criminal not only in isolation. They deny Zionism of its justice as a whole.

They deny not only the justice of its present and future, they also deny the justice of its past. The acts that were committed by Zionism up to 1967 - including its criminal acts - do not have these implications. Therefore, we must return to 1967. Not because of demographics. For the sake of justice.

Nakba In the Classroom

Ha'aretz reports today that Zochrot has been disseminating an educational kit about the Nakba to school teachers, and some teachers have used it. The kit includes units about Palestinian communities before 1948, personal stories of refugees, events of the 1947-1948 conflict, a discussion of the right of return and a tour of a destroyed village.

Zochrot, whose name is the feminine form of "[we] remember" in Hebrew, is an anti-Zionist organization dedicated to remembering the Palestinian villages destroyed during Israel's War of Independence, the return of Palestinian refugees and the one state solution. It is mostly made up of Jews rather than Palestinians, which makes it all the more irritating. I have no problem with Palestinians wanting to commemorate their own heritage, but far-left Jewish Israelis whining about how evil we are just piss me off. These are not the people I'd like to see teaching Israel's children.

The Nakba is a fact and should be addressed in high schools. Zochrot's way is not the way, though. Teaching children that we are the bad guys is no less simplistic than teaching them we're the good guys. Let's not teach the anti-Zionist narrative instead of the Zionist one. Show them both, side by side, analyze the differences and think about the Israeli and Palestinian versions critically.

Do it the PRIME way, not the Zochrot way.

Angry Arab Children

I just came across a Kishkushim post about something the Angry Arab had to say: "During recent months, children in the southern town of Rahat, near Be'er Sheva, have taken up a new and cruel pastime - burning dogs alive". The title of the post was "Zionist Games".

Apparently, Angry Arab doesn't know that Rahat is the largest Arab city in Southern Israel. I doubt those Bedouin kids are Zionists, but hey, it's happening in Israel, so let's just use it as proof of the horrors of Zionism. Even if they were Jewish kids, would this mean Zionism condones animal cruelty? Does the fact that they are Arabs mean all Arabs abuse dogs? The answer to both questions is a big fat no.

It's All Israel's Fault

Ann El-Khoury of People's Geography (I'm not linking to it, find it yourself) wrote a post a few days ago about her father's sunflowers wilting exactly in time for Israel's operation in Gaza. She quickly removed it. Maybe she realized how ridiculous the post was. It was like a parody of Arabs, and anti-Zionists in general, who blame Israel for everything. Is the weather bad? It's the Israelis. Was there a traffic accident between two Arabs? The Israelis must have done something to the cars!

Yes, Ann, Israel killed your father's sunflowers. He should sue us in the Hague for crimes against vegetation.