Brooklyn College’s Corey Robin has a fascinating piece in the latest LRB about Hannah Arendt, treating three objections that Arendt, who was sympathetic to Zionism, formed in the ’40s to certain currents of Zionist ideology. Now that Israel has elevated to cabinet level a racist who supports expulsion of Arabs, Arendt’s prescient critique Read More
The Times mentioned Jimmy Carter twice in yesterday’s paper. On the sports age, he was described as “soft-spoken, cautious, reserved, conformist, reliable” (a piece on blood types). But the other article was in Arts, and labelled him a raving lunatic. This was part of the Times’ continuing series to give space to (Jewish) Read More
Leon Wieseltier expresses the Israel-lobby position by saying, Sure, hold an international conference to fix Iraq, but don’t bring Palestine into it. It’s the same line Kenneth Pollack gave us 4 years ago when he issued his manifesto for disaster (the invasion of Iraq) and said there must be no linkage between reforming Islam and Read More
I caught Ali Abunimah, the Palestinian/American activist and author of a new book calling for a single Arab and Jewish state in Palestine, at Columbia the other night. Abunimah made a few interesting points:
1. Having been to Northern Ireland, Abunimah reports that the two sides hate each other “deeply” but live with each Read More
The idea that there are two narratives about Israel/Palestine in this country, and never the twain shall meet, was reinforced last week by the Times’ two-parter on the special relationship of Israel and the U.S., titled “Anatomy of an Alliance.” The first part dismissed the claim of an “Israel lobby,” arguing in essence that there Read More
Today the Times at last quotes Steve Walt fairly, in an article by Steve Erlanger and David Sanger about why Israel and the U.S. are joined in a war on terror from Gaza to Baghdad, and maybe on to Tehran.
Though, rest assured, the Times is careful to dismiss Walt and Mearsheimer’s Read More
I caught Lieberman on Meet the Press today. The guy is an amazing politician. He’s always been a great politician, this time he outdid himself. He knows how to talk to people, he knows how to build a coalition, he is creative and synthetic and articulate. Hat’s off to him for the political Lazarus job Read More
Last night in a conference room at Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs, 20 students gathered to hear a young Palestinian woman and a former Israeli soldier, sitting side by side under the auspices of the peace organization One Voice, tell of the situation in Israel/Palestine. At the end, the two, who had Read More
The Yivo Institute, which is dedicated to the study of Ashkenazi Jews, has lately reprinted an important attack on the “Protocols of the Elders of Zion.” The attack was written in 1921 by the great English journalist Lucien Wolf, who showed that the Protocols, then circulating in Europe, were plagiarized fictions aimed at persecuting Jews. Read More
An important piece in the Forward this week suggests that Bush is at last going to do something about Israel/Palestine so as to try and redeem his failed policies in the Middle East and restore American legitimacy in the world. The Forward quotes Philip Zelikow, an assistant to Condoleezza Rice, speaking at the pro-Israel Read More
