[Peace-discuss] American Jews Call for Immediate Ceasefire, End of Gaza Blockade

[David Green]

Bob,

You say that 2/3 of American Jews opposed the invasion of Iraq. I've had it in my head all these years that 2/3 supported it, that same as in the general population. What Finkelstein has stressed is that Jewish institutional leadership was 100% behind it. Perhaps there's a way to look this up, if it matters. 
 
In any event, promoting Jewish opposition to American-Israeli crimes shouldn't undermine a pointed challenge to Jewish institutional leadership, including locally, in the context of the larger antiwar movement. It shouldn't matter one whit if Jews have a minyan in opposition to these mass murders. As has already been noted on this list, both JStreet and Brit Tzedek are playing politics more than principles.  Basically, they're Zionism lite. They're trying to mute a more principled critique of Jewish institutions and American  support for Israel with what amounts to insider political posturing. I think it's called triangulation.
 
Jewish Voice for Peace, which incorporated Not in My Name (Chicago), takes a principled approach, and is actually connected to the antiwar movement. JStreet and Brit Tzedek are clearly not, insofar as I can tell.
 
I think that the peace movement needs to avoid identity politics. We all get to oppose anyone on the basis of their behavior. The institutional support for American-Israeli atrocities extends from religious to secular to academic in this community, especially with an "Israel Studies" program as part of the Program for Jewish Culture and Society that in the most blatantly racist fashion is assumed to be referring exclusively to Jewish Israelis.
 
The N-G, in almost a caricature of pro-Israel bias, carries a large front page picture of the funeral of the one Israeli who has died in these events. They also have a picture of a wounded Palestinian boy, but not one of the hundreds dead.
 
In any event, as things develop, the antiwar movement needs to make it clear that Israel, our own government, and Jewish institutional leadership are promoting crimes against humanity. There should be  a huge fuss at the local level, implicating all aspects of support for Israel. Let's not worry about predictable charges of anti-semitism. We have a newspaper that at least prints all letters, and we should exploit that. One minor consequence might be that some Jews wake up to what "Jewish culture and society" really is about at the present time, academic self-absorption aside.
 
David
 



 


----- Original Message ----
From: Robert Naiman <naiman.uiuc at gmail.com>
To: Peace-discuss List <peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net>
Sent: Tuesday, December 30, 2008 6:03:36 PM
Subject: [Peace-discuss] American Jews Call for Immediate Ceasefire, End of Gaza Blockade

Here I summarize what some of the different groups are saying.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-naiman/american-jews-call-for-im_b_154353.html

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/12/30/184135/96/699/678667

http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/node/38577

--
Robert Naiman
Just Foreign Policy
www.justforeignpolicy.org
naiman at justforeignpolicy.org

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