Aron's Israel Peace Weblog

The Logic of Occupation - Part 2

The Logic of Occupation - Part 2
Silencing Critics

by Aron Trauring

Recently, the issue of stifling dissent has been on my mind. Here's an article by Robert Fisk on Iraq (see how I managed to sneak one in?). It's worth a read on it's own merits. I bring it to give you a feel for the writing of this articulate, passionate advocate of human rights and human decency. He is a journalist of incredible integrity and the highest professional standards. But Robert Fisk is the British journalist whom John Malkovich wants dead. Why? Because he raises questions and bears witness to truths which many find uncomfortable to face.

He is hardly the only one being attacked, of course. Here is yet another story about a British journalist under attack. And of course it's not only journalists. There is Daniel Pipe's "Campus Watch" web site, for example. Again, read for yourself what Prof. Hamid Dabashi has to say, and see if you think he is an Israel hater or an anti-semite.

One used to hear such canards only from fringe right wing groups. But today, it seems, the entire Jewish community has been caught up in this madness. Any non-Jew who criticizes Israel is an anti-semite. If he is German, he is a Nazi. If she is Jewish, she is self-hating. In last week's Jerusalem Post, one writer claimed that Jews who criticize Israel are:

Last week Sari Nusseibeh was speaking at a local synagogue on behalf of Americans for Peace Now. Sari Nusseibeh is about as moderate a Palestinian as you can find. In fact, so moderate, that Ali Abunimeh, for example, feels he has sold-out the Palestinian cause. A few years ago, American Jews would have rushed to embrace him. But now, mainstream American Jewish groups, including the Zionist Organization of America, have begun a ruthless smear campaign against Nusseibeh [You can read about it on APN's web site.] The synagogue was literally besieged by screaming Jewish protestors. It was an ugly scene.

This phenomenon as well, is part of the logic of occupation. As the occupation wears on, and the moral basis of society becomes more tenuous, the only way to stop dissent, the only way to quiet one's moral qualms, is to shout down anyone who questions the status quo. "Shouting down" can take many forms. In Israel, almost 50% of Israeli youth manage to avoid serving in the army. If you study in Yeshiva, you get a legal exemption. If you go to the army and say "I don't feel like serving," they kick you out, giving you a "mentally imbalanced" discharge. But if you say "I refuse to serve based on reasons of conscience," only then do they throw you in jail. People who oppose the moral basis of the army are a real threat.

Israel can't throw most foreign journalist in jail, although it is trying very hard to kill them. Failing that, it can try to keep out foreign media, like CNN, that it finds "unfriendly." And of course, it can muzzle and harness its own press to filter out unpleasant truths. Diaspora Jews don't have those options, so they shout down critics with the word "anti-semite." This is a most horrible insult, especially when used against human-rights activists. Someone who is called anti-American may see that as a complement. But to call someone an anti-semite, is to associate that person with one of the greatest criminal acts of human history, the Nazi war against the Jews.

There are anti-semites out there. Not a few I am sure. There are those who have a virulent hatred of Jews, including those who are Nazi supporters, and who feel it's a shame Hitler didn't succeed with his final solution. But most are just unthinking tribalists, like the man sitting across from me at a conference in Florida, who upon hearing I was from New York, told me in a rich southern drawl "Oh, you mean Jew Yawk" (a comment he found uproariously funny). Such anti-Jewish sentiment is part of the broad range of xenophobia most human beings, including nearly every Jew I know, suffers from. Such attitudes are unpleasant and distasteful. But unless they are translated into action, xenophobia is, for the most part, harmless. When I was in graduate school, a friend asked me what I thought of Marie Osbourne's comment that she would never marry anyone who wasn't a Christian. To which I replied, "I would never marry her either!" The question, however, made me feel uncomfortable, since many Jews oppose inter-marriage in the name of Jewish survival. This sounds very noble, but the reality is, there is a xenophobic element in Jewish attitudes toward gentiles as well. Moreover, since World War II, precisely because of what the Nazis did and subsequent European guilt, Jews the world over are the minority group that suffers the least discrimination and harm. Certainly in the U.S., no seat of power in government, industry or the media is barred to Jews. Joe Lieberman, an Orthodox Jew, nearly made it to the Vice Presidency. A Jew as President is certainly a possibility. No Orthodox Jew has come as far in Israel.

Yes, there are those in the Arab world as well as supporters of the Palestinian cause, (far too many perhaps), who ironically (since they too are Semites) have adopted modern anti-semitic rhetoric and mix it into the political dispute with Israel. Besides being despicable, it's also counter-productive, because it undermines legitimate criticism of Israel's policies. But it seems that such attitudes are inversely related to the distance these people are from Israel. Most specifically, Palestinians in Israel, the West Bank or Gaza (except for the Islamic extremists) rarely, if ever, use anti-Jewish rhetoric in their political attacks on Israel. On the contrary, blatant anti-Arab and anti-Islamic attitudes is quite prevalent and commonly used in political arguments by Jewish Israelis andIsraeli politicians.

Despite all this, the word "anti-semite" should be used with great caution. Besides the distasteful aspect of insulting someone unjustly, the over-use of the word "anti-semite" is also dangerous. By applying it to everyone who disagrees with Israeli policy, we debase the word and it becomes meaningless -- the "boy who cried wolf" syndrome.

Given the very emotional nature of the dispute, even thoughtful people can fall into this trap. Recently, Lawrence Summers, the newly installed president of Harvard, accused those who were calling for divestiture of campus investment in Israel "anti-semites." In an op-ed piece in Baltimore's Jewish Week,Stuart Schoffman defends Summers:

...sloppy sloganeering on campus, online, and elsewhere turns Israel – the Jewish state – into something that folks of correct conscience need to be against, along with torture and genocide, global warming and child labor.

Ariel Sharon's policies may well be deserving of criticism. But when criticized by the Bush administration, the New York Times, or Israeli peaceniks, there's no double standard. Israel is not being unfairly fingered while other countries are let off the hook. Arab anti-semitism and Palestinian terrorism are also sternly taken to task.

When Israel is made into a special target the consequences can snowball.

In the 1980s, South Africa was pressured, by means of a campaign of university divestment at Harvard and elsewhere, to shed its apartheid policies. South Africans the world over were not, as a result, placed in physical danger. But demonizing Israel – which, for all its failings is incomparably more democratic than the bad old South Africa – inevitably has the effect of demonizing Jews.

Putting Israel in South Africa's category implies that Zionism is a form of racism. This may not be the "intent" but it is, as Mr. Summers suggested, the "effect."


Herein lies the greatest danger. If the very existence of Israel is predicated on racism, it loses its legitimacy. Israel is, alas, as Mr. Summers observed, a country that has never been able to take its existence for granted.
The first argument that Schoffmann gives, is that those who criticize Israel are "sloganeering." Schoffmann would find Ali Abunimah of the Electonic Intifada difficult to swallow. [Please note I only use Ali as an example, since he is someone who does "question" in some ways, the legitimacy of Israel, but backs up his questioning with strong moral, historical and factual arguments]. However Schoffmann would be hard put to make a case that Abunimah is sloganeering. Everything Abunimah writes is well researched, with facts and figures backed up by independant sources many of which Schoffmann himself claims as credible (e.g. the NY Times, Ha'aretz, Israeli peace groups). By Schofmann's own first argument, throwing a charged slogan like "anti-semite" at a critic like Abunimah is hardly an intelligent, responsible or effective criticism. It is, in fact, sloganeering.

Before going on to the Schofmann's next argument, let us linger for a moment on his statement about Ariel Sharon. Sharon's policies "may be" deserving of criticism? Ariel Sharon is a war criminal by any standard. The current government of Israel, led by this terrorist [if a terrorist is someone who deliberately targets civilians as a political act, then Sharon has a long history of terrorism] has been accused by Amnesty International of committing horrible crimes against children. Amnesty International let's no one off the hook, and so should certainly be viewed by Schoffmann as a credible source. I didn't raise the UN report on hunger in the territories, since Schoffmann no doubt would say the UN is biased. But there is enough evidence from credible sources that even Schoffmann has to find it hard to deny that Sharon and his government are guilty of horrific war crimes. So why then, are only Bush and Jews allowed to criticize Sharon and Israel? Must the Palestinians sit in silent suffering while horrible crimes are being committed against them? Must human rights advocates keep silent as well? Schoffmann sees no problem with him, as a Jew, or anyone else for that matter, criticizing human rights abuses in South Africa. Why is Israel an exception?

Schoffmann gives two arguments to support this strange claim. The first is that criticizing Israel endangers world Jewry. I don't think that Schoffmann is saying, like many others do, that Sharon's war crimes are justified because they are saving Jewish lives. If he is, we have refuted that argument many times on this site. He also can't be saying (like many other Jews do) that Jewish Israeli peace activists (like me) who criticize Israel, are putting it in danger. After all, in the previous paragraph he says such criticism is legitimate. If I understand him correctly, he is saying non-Jews who criticize Israel aren't disturbed by Israel's war crimes, but have a hidden agenda: to finish Hitler's work. When they criticize South Africans, it was because they were disturbed by human rights violations. But when they criticize Israel, they are closet Nazis.

This is a non-argument. It has absolutely no rational basis so it can neither be proved nor refuted. Certainly, no one can look into Abunimah's or Fisk's heart and see what their true motivation is. And no matter what they say, Schoffmann can always say they aren't being honest. Schofmann's is using a circular argument. He is essentially saying a gentile or Arab can't criticize Israel because ipso facto they are anti-Jewish, so their arguments must be anti-Jewish. By making this argument Schoffmann is exposing his own paranoia and xenophobia.

Schofmann's argument should be reversed. It is not the critics who are endangering Jews. It is Sharon's policies that inflame hatred among Palestinians and thereby lead to attacks on Israeli Jews. They also inflame hatred among Arabs and Muslims around the world, and thereby are leading to an inevitable clash between Jews and Muslims, as occurred in several places in Europe this past year. The critics are trying to save Jewish, Arab and Muslims lives by trying to bring about reconciliation, instead of fanning the flames of wars.

However, it is only in the final paragraph that we come to the crux of Schofmann's argument. The fact is that I agree 100% with what he says. "If the very existence of Israel is predicated on racism, it loses its legitimacy." Abunimah, like many passionate Palestinian advocates, argues that Israel, from its very creation in 1948, was predicated on racism. The very idea of a "Jewish" state, a state based on ethnic identity, is racist. It's hard to argue with that. As Benvenisti and Segev point out, there is a dark tribalist heart in the very roots of Zionism. My own view is more nuanced. I would argue that the Jews' desire to return to Palestine has legitimacy, and certainly after World War II became an acute necessity. However, whatever legitimacy there is or was in our return to our national homeland, we Jews can't deny that our own salvation was at a huge cost to someone else, as Isaac Deutscher's parable shows. Along with Deutscher, I would argue, that a rational and just relationship between Jews and Arabs in Palestine could have been created. But there is a huge gap between what could have been and what is. Sharon as the architect of the settlement colonies, did everything he could to destroy the possibility of Jewish-Arab co-existence in Israel/Palestine. Nevertheless, even a few years ago, after decades of occupation, co-existence still might have been possible.

However, Sharon's two years as Prime Minister has openly aligned Zionism and Israel with racism, ethnic cleansing and even genocide. He has thereby undermined whatever moral legitimacy Israel still retained. Schoffmann, and the rest of the diaspora Jews who are refusing to acknowledge this sad fact, are endangering the lives of Israeli Jews, since they are dooming Israel to a futile and apocalyptic war against the whole Arab nation and the Muslim world. A return to sanity and safety requires a radical rethinking of what Israel means to the Jewish people.

The blind supporters of Israel, continue to ignore the moral bankruptcy of Sharon and his government. In the name of solidarity with Israel, many Jews refuse to recognize any legitimacy in Palestinian grievances and refuse to understand the causes of Palestinian resistance. They obstinately declare that "Israel is right" even when it's so obviously wrong. They use the empty slogans "anti-semitism" and "terrorism" to close their minds from facing the truth. Sadly, many are following their Israeli kindred down a path of heartless nationalism, which inevitably leads to tribalism of the most brutal kind.

Ethnic cleansing is on the agenda of the Israeli government and of a large number of Israeli Jews, perhaps the majority. Diaspora Jews, who truly love their Israeli brothers and sisters, must stand up now, and stop the madness before it is too late. Jewish solidarity means that those of us who are silent, will bear the burden of guilt for crimes committed in our name.




Isaac Deutscher was a Jewish historian who had lost much of his family in the Holocaust. He was a committed leftist, and was interviewed for the New Left Review in 1967. Here is what he had to say:

A man once jumped from the top floor of a burning house in which many members of his family had already perished. He managed to save his life; but as he was falling to the ground, he hit a person standing down below, and broke that person's legs and arms. The jumping man had no choice; yet to the man with the broken limbs, he was the cause of his misfortune. If both behaved rationally, they would not become enemies. The man who escaped from the blazing house, having recovered, would have tried to help and console the other sufferer; and the latter might have realized that he was the victim of circumstances over which neither of them had control. But look what happens when these people behave irrationally. The injured man blames the other for his misery and swears to make him pay for it. The other one, afraid of the crippled man's revenge, insults him, kicks him, and beats him up whenever they meet. The kicked man again swears revenge and is again punched and punished. The bitter enmity, so whimsical at first, hardens and comes to overshadow the whole existence of both men and to poison their minds...

A rational relationship between Israeli and Arabs might have been possible if Israel had at least attempted to establish it, if the man who jumped from the burning house [i.e. the Jews after the holocaust] had tried to make friends with the innocent victim of his descent and compensate him. This did not happen. Israel never even recognized the Arab grievance. From the outset, Zionism worked toward the creation of a purely Jewish state and was glad to rid the country of its Arab inhabitants. No Israeli government has ever seriously looked for any opportunity to assuage the grievance...

The Germans have summed up their own bitter experience in the phrase "Man kann sich totsiegen!" 'You can rush victoriously into your grave.' This is what the Israelis have been doing. In the conquered territories and Israel there are now a million and a half Arabs, well over 40% of the total population. Will the Israelis expel this mass of Arabs in order to hold 'securely' the conquered lands?...

Yes, this victory is worse forIsrael than a defeat. Far from giving Israel a higher degree of security, it has rendered it much more insecure.

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