Ariel Sharon and the AUT boycott

I don’t see how this gives the boycotters a stronger argument at all. It doesn’t make a difference, no matter which side you’re on.

Really, I find the implication that Sharon made this move with an eye on the AUT just a wee bit paranoid. Sharon has a large domestic interest group to placate — the Israeli residents of the disputed territories. His political survival depends on damping down their protests. Giving them a university, at least in name, is his way of throwing them a bone. Compared to that, I can’t believe he gives a fig about the AUT.

Sharon is facing open rebellion from the right wing of his own party over the unilateral pull-out from Gaza. Just yesterday the Russian immigrant leader, Natan Sharansky, resigned from the cabinet in protest. The College of Judea and Samaria is located in the settlement of Ariel. Half of Ariel’s population of 18,000 is composed of Russian immigrants. This move appears to be a promise to the settlers – particularly the Russians – that Sharon will not abandon them.

Having said that, it’s quite possible that the AUT boycott– which was covered prominently in the Israeli press — was an additional impetus to the decision. The pull-out from Gaza is making Sharon appear weak to his right wing- standing up to Europe emphasises his strength.

Sharon may see long-term gains from a boycott, but it is more likely that the short-term need to reassure the settlers that is driving the decision. With that said, you should not discount the long-term benefits to the right – particularly to elements well to the right of Sharon – of a spreading university boycott.

Sharon’s consolidating his hold, and making plain, his intention to hold onto the West Bank settlement blocs, which are so important to him. This is similar to the big announcement that he’s going build 3,500 new homes in Maaleh Adumim.

Like others above..I doubt he gives a rat’s ass about the AUT boycott.

I suspect that Sharon isn’t too concerned about the AUT boycott per se, but I’m sure he is concerned about the boycott movement growing. An academic boycott isn’t going to do much damage, but if people stop investing in Israeli companies, boycotts will start to cause problems. Sharon probably wants to nip the problem in the bud. And maybe kicking some sand in the AUT’s face by showing how the boycott will backfire is part of his strategy.

They should make Eve Gerrard a member of Amnesty International. They wouldn’t send out a letter in their campaigns, they’d all be squabbling about which is the worst, because only the worst cases deserve a letter.

While a few million people must do without basic human rights, (and the right of academic freedom), because of the settlement projects of Israel, Eve thinks it is appropriate to be condescending about those objecting to it.

I’d suggest you click liberoblog.com -> links/union of jewish students -> israel -> hot topics/settlements

As for Sharon willing to “nip the problem in the bud”, this campaign against the boycott isn’t exactly led by Sharon. So there’s no reason at all to feature him in any role. Just as there shouldn’t be a place for the Israeli left, since the largest exponent of that, the Israeli Labour party, is a pro settlement party. (See for example recent statements and polls regarding the Maaleh Adumim/E1 corridor expansion.)

Unwavering it will be.

Luc, if Amnesty only campaigned about Israel’s human rights failures, and not about those of any other country, including genocidal ones, then I think we might have good reason to suspect that human rights wasn’t what Amnesty was primarily interested in. But that’s exactly the position of the AUT with regard to the boycott.

louis, what an inane and mendacious article.

What is the relevance of the Warsaw Ghetto quotation? It indicates that the IDF is morally degraded and that it has the same mentality as any occupying army, such as the French in Algeria, the USA in Iraq or the South African army during apartheid. Here is how one Israeli soldier describes his experience in an interview that appeared recently in Harper’s Magazine:

Blau: Did any of you ever shoot someone?

Roi: When I first got to Hebron I wouldn’t open fire on little children. And I was sure that if I ever killed or hurt anyone, I’d go so crazy that I’d leave the army. But finally I did shoot someone, and nothing happened to me. In Hebron I shot the legs off of two kids, and I was sure I wouldn’t be able to sleep anymore at night, but nothing happened. Two weeks ago I hurt a Palestinian policeman, and that didn’t affect me either. You become so apathetic you don’t care at all. Shooting is the IDF soldier’s way of meditating. It’s like shooting is your way of letting go of all your anger when you’re in the army. In Hebron there’s this order they call “punitive shooting”: just open fire on whatever you like. I opened fire not on any sources of fire but on windows where there was just wash hanging to dry. I knew that there were people who would be hit. But at that moment it was just shoot, shoot, shoot.

full: http://harpers.org/NoExit.html

Perhaps an AUT that can be represented to Israelis as resolutely anti-semitic (and therefore emblematic of a general European disease)

My main gripes with the boycott would be that it will make life difficult for academics, achieve nothing (c’mon, you know it), and that sharon won’t care one bit.

But i simply can’t imagine people in israel, other than the usual right wing nuts, going “Aha! AUT! European antisemitism!” about that.

Maybe it’s me.

Given that there seems to be an overwhelming consensus against the AUT boycott, I feel compelled to ask: What, if anything, should be done about the fact that Sharon is in the process of making a viable Palestinian state virtually impossible?

I know, I know, RSL, and I’ll probably regret wading into this particular swamp.

But I’d really like an answer from those who oppose what Sharon is doing in the West Bank right now in terms of the construction of the wall, expanding settlements, and now the creation of the university. If a boycott is the wrong way to make that opposition known, what, if anything, is the right way? Or are we simply resigned to the fact that Sharon is going to do whatever the hell he wants, with the tacit approval of our (US & UK, that is) governments?

I’m really sorry that Chris has to expend effort in reversing this boycott. I’m even more greatly saddened to see the AUT expend energy in making statements about foreign lands. Presumably, there are enough issues in Britain–working conditions, education funding, education quality, academic freedom, decent pay–that the union should be attending to. Why do academic organizations find it so tempting to dillute their efforts by passing resolutions and boycotts about issues outside of their main area of influence. If people are concerned about the Israeli occupation, they should join organizations more directly concerned with that issue.

Why do academic organizations find it so tempting to dillute their efforts by passing resolutions and boycotts about issues outside of their main area of influence.

Because they feel it’s one of the only ways they can have an impact on grave human rights violations in Israel/Palestine?

Well, Uncle Kvetch, if we’re headed for the swamp, I’ll give you a quick opinion:

Personally, I’m somewhat on the fence about the boycott. I don’t think it’s particularly effective, but I do think it’s not totally bad to try to put some stronger pressure on Israel to deal with the Palestinian issue more fairly. However, I am beginning to reach the conclusion that the whole issue is a hopeless one. In 1948, the United Nations basically decided that the cost of 2000 plus years of European antisemitism should be born by the Palestinians. And that’s pretty much what has happened.

I’m not sure what’s going to happen to the Palestinian people. It seems clear to me that Israel will eventually annex the West Bank. Sharon is using the Gaza withdrawal as a cover. He’s well aware that Gaza on its own can’t survive–it is overpopulated and has no real resources on which to build a viable economy. So once Israel is out of Gaza, Gaza will dissolve into chaos. Israel (or Egypt or the UN) is going to have to come back in and occupy it to keep order. Eventually, a significant percentage of the Palestinians in Gaza will have to emigrate or starve. Gaza will essentially become a blighted Palestinian ghetto . . . more proof to hold up to the world that the Palestinians are incapable of governing themselves.

In the West Bank, Israel will maintain and expand control through the ever-exapanding settlements. I don’t know what Sharon thinks will happen to the millions of Arabs who live there and who can’t be incorporated as citizens without ending the Jewish character of Israel. But I assume he hopes they’ll leave over time. Israeli land laws discriminate in favor of Jews and against Arabs, so maybe the plan is to just wait the Arabs out in a long war of attrition, hoping the Arabs slowly emigrate to find better opportunities elsewhere. It’s not going to be easy to be an Arab in an Israeli-controlled West Bank and maybe the Arabs will grow tired of trying after several more generations. Their frustration will mean continued Arab terrorism/disloyalty, which gives a continued excuse to crack down on them and maintain discriminitory practices, including denial of citizenship.

And remember, for Sharon, this is a long term project–thousands of years in the making. As a true Zionist, Sharon isn’t thinking just a few years or even a few decades into the future. He’s thinking long term . . . real long term. He’s realizing a dream that’s been preserved thousands of years, since Moses left Egypt. He doesn’t think the Palestinians have the same stamina. And he may very well be right.

It seems clear to me that Israel will eventually annex the West Bank.

It seems quite clear to me that Israel won’t annex the West Bank, for precisely the demographic reasons you state (as well as the fact that it will be impossible to defend). Whatever Sharon’s ideology may be, he isn’t stupid, and he knows the Palestinians aren’t leaving. From where I sit, Sharon’s long term goal seems to be to annex as much of the border areas as possible – i.e., the areas within the fence, particularly those that were assigned to Israel in the Clinton and/or Taba proposals. I very much doubt he has long-term territorial designs on more than 8 to 10 percent of the West Bank; for one thing, all the construction projects he’s been talking about lately are in areas assigned to Israel on the Taba map.

Don’t get me wrong – I’m very much opposed to this plan. I don’t think Israel should build anything east of the Green Line until the final borders are resolved, and I think any annexation of West Bank territory should be paid for by a one-for-one land swap from within the Green Line. On the other hand, a long-term plan to annex 10 percent of the West Bank has different implications from a standpoint of Palestinian statehood than a plan to annex all the West Bank. It’s also something that can be resolved within the ordinary political and diplomatic process (as it came very close to being resolved at Taba four years ago). As far as disputes over occupied territory go, I’d argue that the Palestine question is far more tractable than Karabakh, Western Sahara or even Turkish Cyprus, and I don’t see anyone rushing to boycott Armenia or Morocco.

Sharon has been saying, at least since his visit with Bush, that the Maaleh Adumim, E-1 expansion wasn’t slated to start in the immediate future. That doesn’t mean it’s not going to happen, or he’s not serious about it.

It might or it might not. The E-1 plan has been trotted out every couple of years for the past decade, usually at opportune political moments, and it’s no closer to construction than it ever was. I have a feeling that Sharon will always find one reason or another to postpone construction.

If the Israeli government actually issues any tenders or building permits, that’s the time for the United States (and everyone else) to come down like a ton of bricks.

“It seems quite clear to me that Israel won’t annex the West Bank, for precisely the demographic reasons you state (as well as the fact that it will be impossible to defend).”

Jonathan, you’re probably right in the short-term, but I really think that Sharon has a very long-term view of this. I can’t imagine him allowing the two-state solution to be implemented while he’s in power (there are many others in Israel on the left who would like a two-state solution, of course–but I just can’t believe Sharon–the father of the settlement policy–has given up the hope of a greater Israel all the way to the Jordan River. If he has, it’s a remarkable transformation. But his rhetoric and actions don’t convince me there’s really been such a change.)

I think he will continue to annex as much land as he can take without alarming the rest of the world and keep putting off the two-state solution (a solution that really could be implemented pretty soon, as you suggest, if the parties just wanted it to make it happen). The territories beyond the “fence” will continue to rot slowly in economic deprivation. And at some point–maybe decades from now, maybe centuries from now–the fence will come down or move and Israel will annex some more land. Right now, about 80% of historic Palestine is securely in Israeli hands. The remaining 20% is being chipped away slowly over time (10% of the 20% with the fence). A Palestinian state is becoming less and less viable simply because there’s too little land left for the size of the Arab population. I believe that Sharon believes that eventually the Palestinians will give up as their existence in Palestine becomes less and less tenable. Then he (or some distant successor) will take over the rest of the land. In some ways, history is on his side, since the dream of Israel has been kept alive for thousands of years against tremendous odds. The Palestinian cause is just a baby in comparison, without any real track record to prove it can endure on quite the same scale.

Even Juan Cole is against the AUT action:

The American Association of University Professors (http://www.aaup.org/newsroom/press/2005/AUT.htm) has quite rightly come out against a recent resolution of the British Association of University Teachers (one of two main such organizations in the UK) that an academic boycott should be imposed on the University of Haifa and Bar Ilan University.

http://www.juancole.com/2005/05/boycott-of-israeli-universities-wrong.html

If the Israeli government actually issues any tenders or building permits, that’s the time for the United States (and everyone else) to come down like a ton of bricks.

Hence my despair. Given the last 40 years, the idea of any US government ever “coming down like a ton of bricks” on Israel over any action whatsoever just seems ludicrous. Do you honestly think there’s a point at which the US’ unconditional support of Israel could ever be called into question?

The intentions behind it (the boycott) are obviously good

Having read Sue Blackwell’s intentions in her own words, I’d argue to the contrary. In any event, for those who believe (as I do) that academic boycotts are immoral as well as counterproductive, it’s worth the effort to reverse this one, and to support a resolution urging greater cooperation with both Israeli and Palestinian universities.

ps. Ignore the italics. The joys of no preview. :)

>>>>
Is this boycott really such a horrible thing that it should produce all this frenzy? The intentions behind it (the boycott) are obviously good;
>>>>>>

I don’t know anything about Sue Blackwell, I can’t speak to her intentions (I knew more about some of the people who called for the earlier boycott, which was, in intent anyway, limited in its scope). But in people’s minds, I think, is the behaviour of Mona Baker, whose actions were not covered by the first boycott call (its organisers should have said so, but I suppose they didn’t want to encourage her employers to act against her).

****

Different issues are, I think, sometimes being confused here. One is the manner of the boycott motion’s passing (a non-debate; very bad; also bizarre as the Executive, I thought, opposed the motion). Another is the issue of academic boycotts (I disagree with Jonathan; I am not totally opposed to them, and took part in a boycott of a university here). Then there’s the issue of boycotts generally. Then there’s the issue of boycotting Israel (Jonathan Friedland wrote a piece in The Guardian about that at the time of the previous boycott call).

So — in partial reply to your question — there is at the very least a need for a new and proper debate at Council. (I suspect there’s also a need for a good look at intra-AUT democracy in general.)

In Israel today, mass media are generally chauvinistic and unwilling to challenge the Sharon Government.

I take it Professor Kimmerling hasn’t read Ha’aretz or watched Channel 10 lately, or kept up with some of the left-wing columnists in Yediot Ahronot.

Before I bow out, I want to agree with Jonathan on one point: anyone who wants to feel some optimism should read the editorial page of Ha’aretz periodically. There are lots of pretty progressive viewpoints expressed there. Much greater willingness to criticize Israeli policy than most American newspapers in fact. And it is the largest-circulation daily in Israel, if I’m not mistaking.

And it is the largest-circulation daily in Israel, if I’m not mistaking.

Actually it isn’t. Yediot Ahronot (which also tilts left) is the largest, and Ma’ariv, which leans moderately to the right, is second.

And now I really will quit this thread.

“Actually it isn’t. Yediot Ahronot (which also tilts left) is the largest, and Ma’ariv, which leans moderately to the right, is second.”

Unfortunately though, Yediot Ahronot and Ma’ariv aren’t available in English, on the web.

And Jonathan, you don’t really think Ariel is close to the border with Israel proper, do you? :)

Sorry, “Ynet”, (Yediot Ahronot) is available on the web in English, it’s just not the same quality as Ha’aretz.

London Review of Books article written by an Israeli Jew and interviews with Israeli soldiers/
1) What are the political views of these Israelis, Gush Shalom or some other like minded far left group?
2) Particuarly the Harper’s interviews, where what the soldiers said taken out of context? Given Lapham’s record of distortions, would not be surprised if they were.

AUT:

“the AUT encourages and supports co-operation with Cuban educational institutions.”
http://www.aut.org.uk/index.cfm?articleid=106

Human Rights Watch:

“Cuba did not release any political prisoners, or grant any breathing room to the country’s beleaguered human rights activists, or make even the most token gesture in support of human rights. The government of Fidel Castro evidently felt no need to moderate its repressive policies to ensure itself a seat on the commission.

To the contrary, Cuba flaunted its disregard of the commission’s stated ideals. On March 18, the day after the commission opened its annual session in Geneva, state security agents began rounding up political dissidents, independent journalists, human rights advocates, independent librarians and others brave enough to challenge the Havana government’s monopoly on truth. The arrests heralded Cuba’s worst crackdown in decades.

In all, nearly 80 people were detained, including such prominent figures as Raúl Rivero, the poet and journalist, and Héctor Palacios, one of the leaders of Cuba’s pro-democracy movement. The Cuban security forces also searched homes across the island, confiscating dissidents’ fax machines, computers, typewriters and personal papers.

From April 3 to April 7, in a series of summary trials, the detainees were prosecuted under draconian legal provisions that ban actions meant to undermine the socialist system or support the U.S. economic embargo. Such laws criminalize a broad range of nonviolent statements of opinion, infringing fundamental rights of free expression.

A total of 75 detainees were convicted, receiving sentences of up to 28 years of imprisonment. The cumulative total of the sentences was a mind-boggling 1,454 years. There was not a single acquittal.”
http://hrw.org/editorials/2003/cuba043003.htm

Those who view Israel as somewhat nationalist but otherwise ordinary democratic state will never understand those who see Israel as a state very similar to Germany circa 1935. And that’s, I guess, about 50-50 in Europe.

I know I’d promised to quit this thread, but…

Jesus.

Let’s consider Germany in 1935 for a second. At that point, Germany was ruled by a declared ideology of racial supremacy (as opposed to simple ethnonationalism) that gave every indication of putting its agenda into effect. The Enabling Act and the Nuremberg Laws had been enacted. There were concentration camps – not death camps yet, but concentration camps. Germany was a de jure one party state in which the legislature, courts and media had all become adjuncts of the ruling clique. Granted, it wasn’t an occupying power yet, but given its later track record (e.g., Lidice and Oradour), I think we can safely assume that it wouldn’t have been a humane one.

If 50 percent of Europeans really can’t tell the difference between that and present-day Israel, then they’ve given up any grip on history. Fortunately, I doubt that this is the case.

If you’re going to compare Israel to another ethnonationalist state with not-very-nice policies, at least pick a more recent and accurate one: Croatia (which was not only more similar to Israel in terms of policy and politics but, like Israel and unlike Nazi Germany in 1935, was involved in a multi-sided conflict). Which, I believe, has been forgiven the sins of the 1990s and is currently on track for EU membership.

“I very much doubt he has long-term territorial designs on more than 8 to 10 percent of the West Bank; for one thing,”

These percentages, which are based on the proposed route of the wall are deceptive. Here’s why:

1)the approximately 195,000 Palestinians living in Jerusalem (nearly 10 percent of the West Bank’s total population) will remain on the Israeli side of the wall, separated from the West Bank by a concrete wall, multiple checkpoints, and a permit system going into effect in July that will prevent nearly all Jerusalemites from entering the West Bank and West Bankers from entering Jerusalem.

2) the wall to be built around Maale Adumim and the fact that the entire area of Jerusalem and its environs will end up on Israel’s side of the wall mean that the West Bank will be divided into two totally non-contiguous areas, attached only by a promised highway that will permit Palestinians to skirt Jerusalem to the east; this is Ariel Sharon’s idea of contiguity, which he calls “transportation contiguity”;

3) several Palestinian suburbs of East Jerusalem to the north and the south have been or will soon be surrounded by the wall on all sides, rendering them small concentration camps to which entry and egress will be allowed only to permit-holders and only through a gate manned by Israelis; the thousands of Palestinians in these areas whose livelihoods lie in Jerusalem will be left high and dry;

4) the entire Jordan Valley, encompassing nearly one-quarter of the West Bank, will most assuredly never be relinquished by Ariel Sharon or any Israeli government on the right (even most Labor governments have envisioned retaining this strategic, settlement-filled territory in perpetuity, and Ehud Barak’s best offer at Camp David in 2000 involved Israel holding it under a long-term lease), meaning that Makovsky’s “92-percent solution” is actually only at best a “68-percent solution” that would leave the so-called Palestinian “state” in three pieces counting Gaza, each completely surrounded by and under the domination of Israel, and with no capital; each of the two West Bank land segments, moreover, would be made into Swiss cheese by the intrusion of fingers of the wall built to accommodate Israeli settlements;

5) tens of thousands of Palestinians live in towns and villages along the route of the wall that have been bisected by it, leaving rich farmland, olive and fruit orchards, and fresh water wells on Israel’s side, unreachable by their Palestinian owners except via a limited number of gates in the wall that are manned irregularly by Israeli security personnel;

6) 53 Palestinian communities, according to the Israeli human rights organization B’Tselem, will be surrounded on three sides by the wall — twice the number so enclosed under the old route;

7) the hundreds of miles of wall and fence have necessitated the demolition of hundreds of Palestinian homes, the bulldozing of hundreds of thousands of acres of private agricultural land, and the razing of thousands of olive and fruit trees; Israel has called this wall temporary, but the demolished homes and the destroyed olive groves can never be restored.

Jonathan, as abb1’s post #58 points out nearly 3/5ths of Europe think Israel is the greatest threat to world peace with the US running third with North Korea second. This shows
1) the power of the generally anti-American & anti-Israeli media (the BBC as a prime example)
2) the jealous envy and hatred of the former great powers (Britain, France, Germany etec.) towards the upstart Super Power USA and its beloved kid brother Israel.
3) Traditional anti-Semitism disguised (thinly) as anti-Zionism. Please do not insult our intelligence by saying the former Imperial countries like Britain & France (not to mention Germany & Russia) are geniunely outraged by the so-called oppression of the “non-white” Palestinians by the “white” Israelis.
I am afraid Jonathan that Europe has indeed lost all historical sense and prospective concerning both the US and Israel and must be treated as such.

I was going to stay out of this too, but I’ve got to say that comparisons between Israel and Nazi Germany seem patently unfair–not only because the facts don’t bear them out (Nazi Germany was orders of magnitude worse), but also because their only purpose seems to be to provoke Jews into a highly defensive position.

As a non-Jew, I can’t claim to really understand the suffering of the Jewish people as a result of the Holocaust, but I’ve had enough Jewish friends explain the emotional horror of knowing that your grandparents, aunts, and uncles (the kind of relatives most of us love and cherish so much for what they tell us about our past) were just all wiped out completely. At best, a picture or two and a few distant memories remain to suggest what these relatives may have been like . . . and maybe more terrifying to remind you that people you live next door to and believe you can trust might suddenly, unexpectedly turn against you too, just because your religion and ethnicity is different from theirs. That’s got to be a pretty deep and disturbing realization . . . and the implication that Jews are like Nazis (which comes from the comparison of Israel to Nazi Germany) can only stimulate an extremely defensive (and, I’d claim justified) reaction from Jews, which is completely unproductive to the debate about the real issue of creating some kind of just, peaceful settlement of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

All of this, of course, gets us to heart of the dispute about Israel (and the dispute in some ways if we are honest is about Israel, not about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict)–which is the legitimacy of Zionism. While comparisons between Nazism and Zionism are extreme, it is true that Zionism has some roots in the kind of nationalism that was prevalent throught Europe in the late 1800s and that has largely been discredited and rejected, in large part because its most extreme form resulted in the horrors of Nazism. Someone who isn’t Jewish (and therefore is not directly affected by the real threat of extermination that was made manifest by the Nazis) can, with this distance and emotional detachment, look at Israel and legitimately wonder why a state should exist to promote the interests of a particular ethno-religious group, particularly when there’s a large, indigenous population in the state (or lands controlled by the state) that are of a different ethno-religious background. Isn’t this patently unjust? Shouldn’t Israel just become a secular democracy (sort of like the U.S. hopefully continues to be, if only we can prevent the theocons from taking over) that is blind to race and religion and treats all it’s citizens the same?

Well, I have to say my instinct is to answer “yes.” Israel should become a purely secular democracy, etc., etc. I believe in secularism–and ultimately the goodness (and sameness) of all humanity, regardless of individual differences in race, ethnicity, religion, etc. So there seems to be something wrong about a state being specifically Jewish–or Islamic or Christion or White or Black or anything else.

However, I then put on my “what if I were Jewish?” hat and think about the issue as Theodor Herzl did. Herzl was a very secular Jew who believed fully in the ideal that race and religion were irrelevant and Jews and Christians were on the way to complete assimilation. And then the Dreyfus affair happened in France–a stunning outbreak of atavistic antisemimtism in what was supposedly the most enlightened nation in Europe. Herzl’s only conclusion was that antisemitism was simply impossible to eradicate . . that there was (and is) some deep, intractable impulse of non-Jews to despise Jews. His conclusion is highly depressing and one ultimately I want to reject only because I want so desparately to believe that people are better than that. But I also have to admit that the empirical evidence of history makes Herzl’s conclusion not only rational, but even convincing. If Herzl is right, then, Zionism is an absolute necessity, because Jews need some place of refuge from a world that is intractably hostile to them.

And so this gets to the heart of the reason the discussion about Israel gets so emotional. We non-Jews look at Zionism and in some ways see it as an accusation that we can’t really get over our racism. To accept the notion that Zionism is necessary is also to accept, in some way, that we non-Jews are barbarians who can’t get over the atavistic impulse to kill people unlike ourselves. This is a hard, unflattering thing to admit. But for Jews, the evidence from history makes a compelling argument for Zionism. The Jews simply can’t be expected to bear the unbearable risk once again of extermination. Particularly, when it came so close to happening again just a few decades ago in this supposedly enlightened age. So the instinct to protect Israel as a Jewish state even if that means sacrificing some liberal ideals of secularism and equality (and results in some injustice to Palestinians) is not only understandable–it has to be viewed both seriously and with sympathy. It’s a matter of life and death in a way that isn’t merely metaphorical but as bluntly real as a Nazi gas chamber.

So what’s my conclusion to all this rambling? I don’t know. I just hope we try to understand the legitimacy of each other’s view and not say things that seem designed only to exacerbate fear and misunderstanding. There are two very real, deep sides to this issue, and resolving it will never be easy. That’s why the issue of Israel continues to garner so much attention and passion . . . even though Israel (from a purely objective standpoint) isn’t by far the world’s most pressing problem.

Making a very slow exit, I bow out again . . .