Talking about Israel

The good doctor has articulated a view that I think many people share:

'The cartoon [...] links to a really good editorial by Tony Judd in Haaretz which, I think, nicely summarizes one reason why so many of us well-read, reasonably-informed, politically-minded American lefties find it difficult to form, or articulate, arguments about the Israel/Palestine conflict and its myriad offshoots in the Middle East. Even though the centrality of that ongoing struggle colors so much of our (Europe and America's, but especially the U.S.'s) interactions in the area (it isn't always only about the oil), I think we tend to downplay or ignore that aspect sometimes because so many of the assholes that play it up are clearly bigots.

...If, like me, this is a subject you tend to avoid in part because you don't feel well-educated about the big strategic/political picture...'

See, I'm not sure how much of a big strategic picture there is. Call me overly cycnical, I think saying the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is too complicated to be criticised serves two purposes:

1. to intimidate people into not criticising things that would be obviously wrong in any other situation
   
2. to conveniently leave it to the politicians, who may have intersts other than the welfare of civilians, to deal with the situation.

The fact is that starving a million and a half civilians supposedly because of the kidnapping of a soldier is clearly wrong. And yet a surprising number of intelligent people seem to feel unable or unwilling to state that clearly. They have to disclaim it with "Israeli must defend itself, but..." instead of simply "The handling of the situation by the Israeli military is just plain wrong." It's simpler, somehow, to talk about how wrong suicide bombings are, than the mass mistreatment (read: deliberate bombing, shooting, starving, and otherwise killing) of civilians.

Dr B hits the nail on the head, I think, when pointing out that a big deterrent to frank analysis of the situation is the association between Jews and Israel. Criticism of Israel is often seen as an attack on Jews, as anti-semitism. Jews who oppose the occupation are described as "self-loathing" and "anti-Jewish". I've been called both these things, more than once by family members.

I'll come back to this -- the "Crying Anti-semitism" syndrome another time. But for now, I'll just say that I'm glad people are talking about this and that Dr B posted about this. Yes, it seems complicated, and yes a lot of people go out of their way to make it seem that way by invoking labels like "Nazi" and "self-loathing" and "justifications" like the Holocaust, but actually it's pretty simple. Bombing civilians is Not Okay. Illegal occupation and collective punishment of a civilian population is Not Okay. Being Israeli doesn't make it legit.

And it's not anti-semitic to stand up for human rights. Anyone who appeals to Jewish identity as a reason not to stand up for human rights needs to have a long hard think about whether they really want to be saying that supporting the unjustified murders of civilians, who have nothing to do with suicide attacks, is part of what it means to be Jewish.

--IP

Technorati tags: Israel, Anti-semitism