By the time I was born, the Second World War was over and Israel
was already a fact. I have been an Anti-Zionist since the seventies when Jews
like me were all termed “self-hating.” I do not confuse supporting the struggles of the
Palestinian people with prejudice against Jews which is erroneously termed Anti-Semitism, since all people of Middle-Eastern descent are Semites.
I thoroughly and totally
condemn the brutality of the Israeli regime. I despise the whole premise of a
religious versus a secular state and I do not think that a person
expressing Anti-Israel sentiment necessarily implies will towards Jewish people. Yes, I fervently wish my relatives in Europe
had taken Germany
instead of Palestine, that
the railroad tracks to Auschwitz had been bombed, that the ships taking Jewish refugees to the USA
had not been turned away. But those things happened and, just as we are now dealing with the ramifications of slavery, the legacy of the brutal oppression of Jews has left the world with an out-of
control “Jewish homeland.”
That having been said, I would like to address something else. The blog entry I wanted to publish this week was about the
ancient synagogue and adjoining Jewish Museum in Rhodes,
Greece. I am delaying
that entry and writing this one because I don’t believe anything about Jewish
history would be well-received right now and I find that fact, in and
of itself, to be a misguided, biased reaction.
As a Jew, I would like to be proud of my ancestors the way
that Italian, Irish, Black, Native American and all other minorities are of
theirs. I should be able to post historical articles about my relatives without
fearing misinterpretation or worse. Jews are not responsible for each other’s behavior anymore than other members of minority groups are. And the actions of the Israeli government don’t represent
the will of the Israeli people just as the actions of the US
government, don’t represent our will. But getting carried away with thoughtless generalizations of an entire group of people is destructive and counter-productive.
Here is an example of the problem. A longtime, leftist comrade
recently, and I believe inadvertently, posted an article about the violence
against the people of Gaza that came directly from a right-wing, Neo-Nazi,
propaganda website. This is not okay! Read what you post before you hit that
button! Here are some things to watch out for so you don’t repeat this mistake: references to the Talmud or publications like “The Protocols of the Elders of
Zion.” The use of Yiddish words like “goyim,” concepts like,
“Jewish blood,” the substitution of the word, Jews for the word, Israelis
and frankly, just plain, nasty, stereotyping.
It is absolutely imperative that we be as critical of Israel
as we are of other imperialist, warmongering countries. But, just as drones and
smart-bombs turn out to be not all that targeted or smart, we must be mindful
of the way we categorize people and precisely how we utilize our words. The keyboard
is mightier than the sword! The end result, peace, is vitally important, but so
is what we do on that journey to get there. If we are sloppy and compromise our
ethics to reach this goal, we will have effectively thrown out the baby with
the bathwater!
