Michael Massing on the Israel lobby

May 19, 2006 9:55 AM

Michael Massing on the Israel lobby and the controversy over the Mearsheimer/Walt article. Massing describes the article as having "serious shortcomings"; the reaction to the article as "hysterical"; and he provides evidence that "on their central point—the power of the Israel lobby and the negative effect it has had on US policy—Mearsheimer and Walt are entirely correct." He summarizes AIPAC's goals: "... to keep Israel strong, the Palestinians weak, and the United States from exerting pressure on Israel." Earlier article on the Israel lobby by Massing. Also: Mearsheimer and Walt respond to their critics.
posted by russilwvong (75 comments total)

Countdown to accusations of anti-semitism in 3... 2...
posted by keswick at 10:08 AM on May 19, 2006

In my view, Israel is worth protecting.
posted by Mean Mr. Bucket at 10:20 AM on May 19, 2006

Noam Chomsky's analysis of this article from M&W was that its thesis is "not very convincing." The basic idea being that the "there are far more powerful interests that have a stake in what happens in the Persian Gulf region than does AIPAC." Gabriel Ash's analysis of this reply in Dissident Voice was also interesting.
posted by Adamchik at 10:24 AM on May 19, 2006

Adamchik, did you read Massing's article? Because he mentions Chomsky's response.
posted by russilwvong at 10:29 AM on May 19, 2006

Yeah, I don't dispute the existence of an Israel lobby, but to suggest that the sole, or even primary root of the west's entanglement in the middle east is Israeli interests is a little coarse, especially considering that the west's entanglement in the region predates the existence of Israel.
posted by slatternus at 10:31 AM on May 19, 2006

keswick, don't be disgusting.
posted by ori at 10:33 AM on May 19, 2006

Could someone give me a brief summary of America's entanglement in the Middle East before Israel?
posted by keswick at 10:34 AM on May 19, 2006

Disgusting? What did I say that was disgusting?
posted by keswick at 10:34 AM on May 19, 2006

i would like to know who is responsible for the apparently false report circulating the internet today that Iran is contemplating badges for christians, jews and other minority religions. That seems like a particularly excellent piece of fear mongering.
posted by sourbrew at 10:41 AM on May 19, 2006

a brief summary--

None to speak of, as far as I know. The Middle East was a British sphere of influence until well after World War II. (Bruce Kuniholm summarizes American involvement after World War II.)

The American University of Beirut was founded in 1866 by American missionaries.
posted by russilwvong at 10:44 AM on May 19, 2006

And Standard Oil of California signed an exploration agreement with the Saudi government in 1933. Oil was discovered in 1938.
posted by russilwvong at 10:49 AM on May 19, 2006

Mean Mr. Bucket wrote "In my view, Israel is worth protecting."

I agree with you on that point, but I think that is actually a separate issue from what Messing, Mearsheimer & Walt are discussing.
posted by bhouston at 11:13 AM on May 19, 2006

sourbrew, are you sure it is false?

The reports started in Canada, apparently from exiles: "The National Post newspaper reported Friday that Iran's parliament has passed a law that would require Jews to wear yellow labels, and Christians red ones, on their clothing." PM Harper thinks it might be true, but I don't think anyone knows yet.

It would be comforting to know this was definitely not the case.
posted by blahblahblah at 11:27 AM on May 19, 2006

blahblahblah, AM940 in Montreal says it is a fake story. Since the National Post is a piece of shit right-wing rag, I'm going to have to wait for the CBC or someone else to pick this story up before I believe it.
posted by chunking express at 11:36 AM on May 19, 2006

why not make a FPP on the Iran claim with some context as to who made the claim and contradictory sources of information?
posted by bhouston at 11:44 AM on May 19, 2006

chunking express: Thanks, I hope you are correct.
posted by blahblahblah at 11:44 AM on May 19, 2006

Could someone give me a brief summary of America's entanglement in the Middle East before Israel?
posted by keswick

I dont' know about a brief summary but if you read Kevin Phillips new book you'll get a pretty good summary in the first few chapters.

The state of Israel was a pet project of Winston Churchill, if I recall correctly. The man had very few good moments in his life.
posted by nofundy at 11:46 AM on May 19, 2006

The Iranian marking Jews and Christians story made Sludge so I automatically assumed it was false. My method tends to work over 90% of the time.
posted by nofundy at 11:48 AM on May 19, 2006

Adamchik, thanks for that Gabriel Ash article! I love how he examines political science from the perspective of vector algebra (Which is unstated, but obvious. Does Ash know he's doing it? I'm from engineering, not polysci, so..).
posted by Chuckles at 11:48 AM on May 19, 2006

I thought about fpping the Iranian branding, but I really don't want to give the story any more head way. I hate teh war mongering.
posted by sourbrew at 12:01 PM on May 19, 2006

I linked to the story in the Post on my own site, because it was on the front page of the Post, accompanied with this old photography of two Jews walking together with stars on their shirts; I thought, "They wouldn't put it there if it wasn't true." But, you know, they actually probably would. It's such a crap paper.

Mind you, I could see Iran doing something stupid like this. The story states they want to mandate proper attire for everyone, Muslims included. Sounds like the sort of micromanagement you'd expect from a faux Islamic government.
posted by chunking express at 12:14 PM on May 19, 2006

Israel keeps telling us that we don't have to be concerned with their spying, their bribery of our public officials through various campaign contributions and other graft, and their occasional attacks on our naval vessels. I for one don't think Israel has ever been a true ally to the US, and its central philosophy of having a Jewish Israel in the midst of Arab Palestine is fundamentally incompatible with traditional American values such as equality and liberty.
posted by Sukiari at 12:44 PM on May 19, 2006

Proper attire. Hm. They might want to rethink that. Fashion tends not to be a strong point in totalitarian countries, at least, outside the military. I mean, does Ahmadinejad even own a tie?

As to the other thing, I see a market opportunity here. Solidarity patches in yellow and red for those of us who live outside of Iran. Like those car magnets in the shape of ribbons. Hell, even I might buy one.
posted by IndigoJones at 12:50 PM on May 19, 2006

"...and its central philosophy of having a Jewish Israel in the midst of Arab Palestine is fundamentally incompatible with traditional American values such as equality and liberty."

Spoken like a true fanatic.
posted by TetrisKid at 12:53 PM on May 19, 2006

"Spoken like a true fanatic."

Hahaha. You're funny. It's much easier to label me a fanatic than to try to disprove me, though.

Explain how a program of racial disenfranchisement and genocide, such as is being perpetrated on Palestinians, is not radical or insane. "Never Again" my ass.
posted by Sukiari at 1:04 PM on May 19, 2006

In my view, Israel is worth protecting.

At any cost to American blood, treasure, international standing and, most importantly, our declining credibility as a promoter of Democracy and human rights? No, it's not.
posted by bardic at 1:06 PM on May 19, 2006

(I think TetrisKid was pulling your virtual leg, Sukiari. Because I wouldn't have laughed out loud if he was being serious.)
posted by bardic at 1:08 PM on May 19, 2006

Your use of the term 'genocide' only proves my point. Genocide may be occurring in Darfur and other spots around the globe but the wholesale butchery of people solely based on their origins is by no means happening in Israel.

When you use terms like 'genocide' or 'Never Again' flippantly you discredit true atrocities that are occurring elsewhere. This type of dishonesty isn't bringing the hope of a Palestinian state any closer, it simply identifies your arguments as irrational.
posted by TetrisKid at 1:11 PM on May 19, 2006

TetrisKid, it's not like Israel is land of the free, home of the brave, and all that crap. The marriage laws that the supreme court just upheld? Come on. I agree Sukiari's language is a bit much, but Israel isn't peaches and cream.

(Also, were equality and liberty ever traditional American values? I have my doubts.)
posted by chunking express at 1:13 PM on May 19, 2006

TetrisKid, hyperbolic perhaps, but cetainly not irrational.
posted by bardic at 1:16 PM on May 19, 2006

As usual, Israeli lefties, at least moderate Haaretz lefties are totally shut out of the conversation. Because on the one hand, we don't believe that the entire history of Israel is a "program of racial disenfranchisement and genocide," a "pet project of Winston Churchill's" that should be dissolved and forgotten, while on the other, we want to level legitimate and serious criticisms against the Israeli and American right. Amid all the shouting, there's no place to gather and talk. It's so depressing I can barely stand it.

The article at the center of the FPP is very good, btw.
posted by kosem at 1:17 PM on May 19, 2006

From the Jewish point of view, it's simple: having gone through the Holocaust, Jews believe that they need their own state and their own army. Without their own state, living as a minority in someone else's state, they'll always be vulnerable to expulsion or destruction.

The question is to what extent Israel's protection is an American interest. Israel has an excellent military and intelligence service, and nuclear weapons. It has peace treaties with Egypt (its neighbor most likely to pose a threat) and Jordan. For the most part, the threats facing it are political, not military.

George F. Kennan, writing in 1972:

As in all such cases, the main burden of responsibility lies, of course, with the people to whom the commitment is made. The commitment assumes a reasonable degree of prudence, restraint and good will on their part. It is not a blank check for any and all behavior. The task of American policy-makers, as they themselves have well understood, consists of trying to assure to the Israelis that which is really essential to the maintenance of their existence as a state, of dissuading them from claiming more than is essential to that purpose, and of avoiding any escalation of the situation into a serious Soviet-American conflict.

I would suggest that by following a policy of expanding the settlements in the West Bank and Gaza, Israel's leadership has not exhibited "a reasonable degree of prudence, restraint and good will."
posted by russilwvong at 1:18 PM on May 19, 2006

"Genocide may be occurring in Darfur"

Partly because Israel has been supporting anti-Islamic rebels there.

Israel is a true atrocity. I guess it's something that Israel's supporters can't admit to in public, but the wholesale genocide of the Palestinian people is the kind of thing that is debated at home in Israeli press and academia. There no reasoning with TetrisBoy because Israel is obviously a special case where the normal definition of genocide does not apply.

I've heard the same bullshit from right-wing whack jobs and fanatical Zionist Jews, spluttering and spitting and growing red faced whenever somebody points out the VERY REAL and ONGOING genocide in Israel.

And don't give me that 'there are no Palestinians' shit either. Find the borders of British Palestine, everybody inside of those borders and their descendants is a Palestinian. Even some Jews.
posted by Sukiari at 1:23 PM on May 19, 2006

Sukiari: i wouldn't call what's going on in Isreal "genocide" because they really arn't killing that many palistineans. The term "ethnic clensing" might apply, because that word works with the mass explusion of people, but it would have been ethnically clensed in the past.

What's going on over there sucks, and the Isrealis are certanly mostly to blame (IMO, counting over the last 10 or so years) but that dosn't rise to the level of "genocide" or even "ethnic clensing".
posted by delmoi at 1:38 PM on May 19, 2006

Partly because Israel has been supporting anti-Islamic rebels there.

Offtopic: I'm confused; I thought it was the Islamic rebels that were going around killing the non-Arabs in Darfur?
posted by chunking express at 1:40 PM on May 19, 2006

Applause to kosem. I agree- it is exactly the sort of rhetoric put forth by TetrisKid and Sukiari et al. on one hand and the extreme right on the other that makes it extremely difficult to have a rational conversation about Israeli policy.

Israel was not a pet project of Winston Churchill, nor was it American support that was primarily behind its early survival. Israel is not engaging in a policy of genocide against the Palestinians. On the other hand, Israel is not a paragon of all virtue, nor has it treated the Palestinians fairly, nor is any criticism of the country anti-Semitism. I don't know any other country, however, where only two options are allowed in conversation: "Israel must be destroyed" or "Israel is always right." I will say, however, that the "Israel must be destroyed statements" or "Israel is an atrocity" certainly don't help.

And Sukiari, blaming Israel for the genocide being carried out by the Sudanese is total bullshit. Sudan has accused both Israel and Germany of arming the rebels, but I am not sure anyone believes them. Further, the genocide is being carried out by the Janjaweed militia, not the rebels. You are really stretching logic with your invective.
posted by blahblahblah at 1:44 PM on May 19, 2006

Offtopic: I'm confused; I thought it was the Islamic rebels that were going around killing the non-Arabs in Darfur?

In Darfur, both sides of the conflict are Muslim. And the militia that's going around killing the non-Arabs (the janjaweed) aren't rebels, they're backed by the government. Not sure what Sukiari is talking about.

International Crisis Group on Darfur.

I don't know any other country, however, where only two options are allowed in conversation: "Israel must be destroyed" or "Israel is always right."

What blahblahblah said.
posted by russilwvong at 1:48 PM on May 19, 2006

chunking express writes "Offtopic: I'm confused; I thought it was the Islamic rebels that were going around killing the non-Arabs in Darfur?"

No; the people in Darfur are Muslim, as is the (somewhat theocratic) government in Khartoum. The main conflict in Darfur divides along ethnic and racial, rather than religious, lines: Darfur is a majority Black region, but the people in charge of the central government are Arabs. Rebel movements started among the Darfuris a few years ago, and they were brutally repressed by the central government using, in part, Arab tribal militias.

There was also a conflict going on for about 20 years between the Arab Muslim-run government in the North of Sudan and the Black, mostly Christian and Animist rebels in the South. That conflict was brought to a formal close last year; we'll see how well the treaty structures hold.

There have also been some rebel movement springing up in the East of the country recently. I think those rebels are mostly Arab, but I'm not sure.

All in all, Sudan is a grand mess!
posted by mr_roboto at 1:52 PM on May 19, 2006

Thanks for the info both of you.
posted by chunking express at 1:56 PM on May 19, 2006

And for the sake of informing a discussion in which I have no desire to take part, personally, here's the "official" definition of genocide.
posted by mr_roboto at 1:57 PM on May 19, 2006

"Partly because Israel has been supporting anti-Islamic rebels there."

Huh? First I've heard of this. Any more info?
posted by PenDevil at 2:06 PM on May 19, 2006

Here's a mention (one sentence, towards the bottom) from a pretty reputable source of Israel supporting the South in the last Sudanese civil war. I don't know about Darfur, though.
posted by mr_roboto at 2:12 PM on May 19, 2006

I had not planned to get involved in this discussion but when I read Sukiari defining what isa Palestine I had to giggle. You can not arbitrarilyl pick a point in the past and then declare "that is Palestin.e" In factg, at that point it was British land.And before that Ottoman land, and well back in time before Islam,Jewish land...what was America prior to 1492?

The Brits gave up the madandate and the land was divided between the Arabs (not a people called Palestinians) and Jews. The Jews created Israel with the sanctgion of the UN.

And please look up the meaning of the word genocide before you carelessly label Israel genocidal,whatever you may think of that country. Israel has never made ilt a policy of national interest to eliminatge an entire people. If you think that, then explain why over a million Arabs live in Israel and are citizens and have no desire to leave.
posted by Postroad at 2:16 PM on May 19, 2006

...The State of Israel was created by an act of international law in 1948, largely in response to the Holocaust. It was violently rejected by an Arab world that saw it as a new Western conquest of the territory over which so much blood had been spilled to defend Muslim sovereignty during the Crusades, so like most nation states Israel had to fight its way into existence. Its victory came at the expense of another people, whose dispossession was the precondition for Israel achieving an ethnic Jewish majority. And the conflict fueled by the unresolved trauma of its birth has condemned the Jewish state to behave in ways that mock the progressive Zionist dream of Israel fulfilling the biblical injunction to Jews to be a "light unto the nations."

Former Knesset speaker Avraham Burg puts it eloquently: "The Jewish people did not survive for two millennia in order to pioneer new weaponry, computer security programs or anti-missile missiles. We were supposed to be a light unto the nations. In this we have failed. It turns out that the 2,000-year struggle for Jewish survival comes down to a state of settlements, run by an amoral clique of corrupt lawbreakers who are deaf both to their citizens and to their enemies. A state lacking justice cannot survive. More and more Israelis are coming to understand this as they ask their children where they expect to live in 25 years. Children who are honest admit, to their parents' shock, that they do not know."

...Jewish identity is always in flux and contested. The Zionist moment is a comparatively brief one in the sweep of Jewish history, and I'd argue that Judaism's survival depends instead on its ability to offer a sustaining moral and ethical anchor in a world where the concepts of nation and nationality are in decline. Israel's relevance to Judaism's survival depends first and foremost on its ability, as Burg points out, to deliver justice, not only to its citizens, but to those it has displaced. Until then, Israel's own Jewish identity also remains uncertain.

How Jewish is Israel ?
By Tony Karon
posted by y2karl at 2:19 PM on May 19, 2006

From that article: Israel on the other hand has allegedly been giving military aid and other support to the southern rebels to keep up pressure on the Arab world.
posted by PenDevil at 2:20 PM on May 19, 2006

"what was America prior to 1492"

Ah, the old "Killing Indians was cool in the past in America, thereby making modern genocide in Israel OK" argument.

I love that one.
posted by Sukiari at 3:15 PM on May 19, 2006

Can we freely criticism Israel once they've killed 6 million Palestinians or will they still find some way to claim the moral high ground?
posted by keswick at 3:24 PM on May 19, 2006

Who said you couldn't freely criticism Israel?
posted by mr_roboto at 3:28 PM on May 19, 2006

*refers you to every thread on Israel ever*
posted by keswick at 3:29 PM on May 19, 2006

Including this one? Because here, I mostly see people criticing Israel and other people calling for a moderate discussion in which the right of Israel to exist is recognized even while it's government's actions are criticized. Not one voice in this thread had condemned all criticism of Israel.
posted by mr_roboto at 3:34 PM on May 19, 2006

And now, we have managed to completely destroy the word criticize, the two of us...
posted by mr_roboto at 3:36 PM on May 19, 2006

Sukiari - if you are Palestinian or of Palestinian descent I have some sympathy for your view, or what I think is your view, that there should be a Palestinian state, and you have some legitimacy because your anger and frustration have some resonance in an terribly difficult situation. If youre not a Palestinian, then youre just a provocateur and your bombastic statements deserve to be ignored.

Assuming the former, do you really expect the Israeli govenment to just disband itself, ship 4th or 5th generation Israelis back to where ever their ancestors came from? The safe havens of Iran, Yemen, Algeria included? Do you realize how incredibley unrealitic this is for Isreal or any country?

Should every country founded since 1948 be dissolved? Is there a particular heritage necessary to stay in a country, or a territory?

As an outsider, but with some personel acquaintances in both camps, it seems to me that a two state solution is the best one. However, I don't live there, so I would refrain from demands of any extermination, especially the flippant ones you make, on either party.

By the way, the US mucks about in the middle east because of the oil, not because some fundamentalists decided the way to bring about the end times is to play with the American Jews.
posted by Gaius Gracchus at 3:40 PM on May 19, 2006

mr_roboto: "Including this one? Because here, I mostly see people criticing Israel and other people calling for a moderate discussion in which the right of Israel to exist is recognized even while it's government's actions are criticized. Not one voice in this thread had condemned all criticism of Israel."

Maybe here on Metafilter today there isn't anyone doing this but I run into this on Wikipedia. For example, there is this article on Juan Cole whom a number of editors are trying to turn into a hit piece on him. His crime is that he has criticized Likud policies and Israel's past position with regards to the occupation. For these editors these comments of Juan overshadow everything else he's done and retaliatory criticism of Juan as an anti-Semite is legitimate.
posted by bhouston at 4:07 PM on May 19, 2006

Oops. Bad link on the Juan Cole article -- here is a more direct link to a substantive analysis of scurrious charges of anti-Semitism being layed upon him by a number of editors of this article: Talk:Juan Cole#Lawyers techniques
posted by bhouston at 4:12 PM on May 19, 2006

Gaius Gracchus: Assuming the former, do you really expect the Israeli govenment to just disband itself, ship 4th or 5th generation Israelis back to where ever their ancestors came from? The safe havens of Iran, Yemen, Algeria included? Do you realize how incredibley unrealitic this is for Isreal or any country?

Palestinians lived in their villages for years and years and suddenly in less than 100 years they found themselves with nothing, so I won't find strange the dismantle of Israel especialy that almost all israeli people have at least one foreign country passeport
posted by zouhair at 4:28 PM on May 19, 2006

Palestinians lived in their villages for years and years and suddenly in less than 100 years they found themselves with nothing, so I won't find strange the dismantling of Israel--

No outside power (not even Iran) has the ability to destroy Israel without risking its own destruction. And you can't expect any state to willingly commit suicide.

--especially since almost all Israeli people have at least one foreign passport.

Sounds like propaganda.
posted by russilwvong at 4:41 PM on May 19, 2006

Israel isn't going anywhere. The question is, what policies should the United States follow?

Right now one of the two key grievances against the status quo in the Muslim world (of one billion people) is the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. (The other is the Iraq war.) I would suggest that it'd be in the US national interest to push hard for a negotiated resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, based on the pre-1967 borders.

Hume Horan: ... the United States, with its never-equaled political and economic and military might, should peremptorily put a stop to the Arab-Israeli conflict. It has already wasted too many lives, taken up too much of our attention, and consumed resources that could have helped move the area forward. It has been too much of a distraction. The expression "confidence-building measures" has a fantastical, even cynical air of unreality to it, at least as applied in the Middle East. The so-called "peace process," has proven to be little more than a diplomatic perpetual-motion machine. It provides excuses for all to keep things on hold. Between Arab anti-Semitism, and Jewish fear of Arab revanchism, no agreement is likely to be reached or to hold unless we take a strong hand.
posted by russilwvong at 4:48 PM on May 19, 2006

Israel by doind what hes doing to palestinians is commiting suicide

and I know at least three jew moroccan families living in Israel right now and they all have moroccan and french passeport even for their children who never ever seen the one or the other and there's a lot of them, and those who can't afford it are trying too
posted by zouhair at 4:49 PM on May 19, 2006

Well said.
posted by Astro Zombie at 4:56 PM on May 19, 2006

especialy that almost all israeli people have at least one foreign country passeport

This is completely and utterly false.
posted by kosem at 4:57 PM on May 19, 2006

Kosem : This is completely and utterly false.

so they're fucked up :)
posted by zouhair at 5:02 PM on May 19, 2006

You said "almost all", not "at least three families."

Israel by doing what it's doing to Palestinians is committing suicide.

Please explain.
posted by russilwvong at 5:02 PM on May 19, 2006

What's all the fuss about? Thanks to President Bush being personally committed, the Road Map for Peace ended with a Permanent Status Agreement and End of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict in 2005.

By the way, the US mucks about in the middle east because of the oil

That explains our involvement in most of the Middle East, but doesn't our support for Israel annoy the countries that have the oil?
posted by kirkaracha at 5:13 PM on May 19, 2006

to russilwvong: the point is everyday the acts of Israel towards palestinians (camps, killng, economical choke......) bring hate all around Israel and everyday that comes bring more hate and more hate, and one day Israel will have to pay for all this suffer it create, they have two ways to stop this now, kill all palestinians (they tried but it's not possible) or give the palestinians the same right as Israeli people (that's more possible). Else the hate will evolve 'till it'll explode in front of Israel and it will be a huge amount of blood shaded, and it's very sad.

Arabs were stupid when they denied the jews the right to have a country for their own and now they're stuck with it; but now Israel is the stupid deniyng palestinains the right to have a country.

We always pay for our errors and especialy those that we want to confess
posted by zouhair at 5:21 PM on May 19, 2006

"If youre not a Palestinian, then youre just a provocateur and your bombastic statements deserve to be ignored."

Yet another nice way to write off completely valid criticism. Have you been saving that one for a rainy day?

"Assuming the former, do you really expect the Israeli govenment to just disband itself, ship 4th or 5th generation Israelis back to where ever their ancestors came from?"

Well, how old is Israel now? not even 60 years? These 5th generation Israelis you speak of: did all their ancestors breed right when they hit puberty? I'm not sure that they should be kicked out, but certainly the 'refugees' (former residents) would probably at least like to be able to vote in national elections. But if you had all the Arabs native to Palestine actually voting in Israel, you might not get a Jewish prime minister every time. And if the Prime Minister wasn't Jewish, what the heck kind of Jewish homeland would it be? So Israel continues their program of disenfranchisement and genocide.

My point is that Israel, like a lot of the 'nations' in the middle east, is a fake, fictional country that was formed for political reasons in the 1940s.

I actually am supporting Israel's disenfranchisement of the Palestinians with my tax dollars, so whether or not you think I have any right to an opinion on the subject. I don't approve of how my government just throws cash at a bunch of racist killers.
posted by Sukiari at 5:32 PM on May 19, 2006

"they have two ways to stop this now, kill all palestinians (they tried but it's not possible)"

Eh? Come again? Any valid arguments in a post are lost on me when you make statements like that.
posted by inigo2 at 7:50 PM on May 19, 2006

Israel/Occupied Territories: High Court decision institutionalizes racial discrimination
posted by zouhair at 8:10 PM on May 19, 2006

Israel: House Demolition/forced eviction/medical concern: Muhammad Is'hac Herbawi (m), Yousra Herbawi (f) and their children
posted by zouhair at 8:12 PM on May 19, 2006

in short

Israel = Apartheid

it's not a matter of point of vue, it's just that
posted by zouhair at 8:13 PM on May 19, 2006

the point is everyday the acts of Israel towards palestinians (camps, killng, economical choke......) bring hate all around Israel and everyday that comes bring more hate and more hate--

I don't disagree. (Although I would point out that it's a two-sided process: the ongoing violence reinforces the extremists on both sides.) I don't want to minimize the suffering of the Palestinians; they're certainly suffering the worst of it. But my point is that Israel isn't going to disband itself. Israel's not going anywhere. And with the memory of the Holocaust having been seared into them, Israeli Jews aren't going to accept minority status in a majority-Arab state.

The United States, the Palestinians, and everyone else have to decide how they want to deal with Israel. Destroying Israel isn't an option.
posted by russilwvong at 10:25 PM on May 19, 2006

I have a suspicion that in a few hundred years the idea and creation of Israel (as a homeland for expatriated people of many different ethnicites sharing a common class of religious behaviours categorized as "Jewishness") will be recognized as very closely paralleling the creation and development of the Ghettos in late medieval society.

These were a social innovation to the "problem" of dealing with increased migration, immigration, and multiculturalism resulting from Europe's increased trade links during that era. It's noteworthy that the first ghettos were instituted in Northern Italy to corral German traders and craft workers. Coralling people on the basis of religion was a later "innovation". Thus social engineering, new urban construction technologies, and military coercion combined to create an enduring apartheid system that inaugurated the Early Modern Era and increased the nationalistic momentum leveraged by the emerging nation states and their absolute rulers.

The slightly increased vogue for ethnic and religious ghettos in the modern post-Colonial Era is self-evident. The 20th century, especially the latter half, was a period of radical "ethnic cleansing" and the dismantling of the idea of multicultural Empires and pan-ethnic hegemonic alliances. Paradoxically, considering what change a naive contact hypothesis might have predicted from omnipresent media, we live now in an Era of Celebrated Difference where every ethnicity, culture, sub-culture, faction, sect, and mutation demands its own Bantustan.

The idea that many people in Israel today would willingly construct for themselves one of the largest Jewish ghettos in history would have struck earlier observers as fantastic. That they would enable countries all over the world effectively to remove or reduce their Jewish populations and send them to one of the more dangerous, infertile, and unstable parts of the world seems almost Machiavellian, and very apropos. That some in Israel seem determined to voluntarily build around their national ghetto a Wall of enduring lethality and permanence just adds insult to injury.

Because of the effective elimination of the native inhabitants of North America, the expansionary United States always seems to have favoured Year Zero and other segregationist approaches over integrationist approaches when it comes to building socialities. This probably arises from the former widespread availability of "open canvases" upon which to write new, similar communities. this probably accounts for the relatively high sympathy of many in the US to the idea of Israel as a separate living space for people identified as Jews. After all, the Mormons got Utah. What could go wrong?

The difference is that Europe and the Middle East have been very densely populated relative to North America for several hundred years. Instead of displacing a few minute, scattered remnants of the former masters of the land, Israel found itself embedded in the middle of a demographic explosion. In the Middle East, demographics have usually won out over the long run - just ask the citizens of Edessa, Antioch, Tripoli, Jerusalem, Jaffa, or Galillee.
posted by meehawl at 10:56 AM on May 20, 2006

I doubt this is really a conspiracy, and it is really just an emergent effect of the narrative of the US. The US has a clear sentimental attachment to presumed genetic homelands - the same sort of treatment has been accorded Ireland, another country that is felt to be a source of American DNA.
posted by winjer at 12:38 PM on May 20, 2006

The opinionated Philip Greenspun makes a similar point: he compares Israel to a concentration camp.

In the Middle East, demographics have usually won out over the long run - just ask the citizens of Edessa, Antioch, Tripoli, Jerusalem, Jaffa, or Galillee.

I don't know much about medieval history, but I thought the crusader kingdoms fell to military conquest, not demographics.

A better analogy than the colonization of North America might be the 1923 population exchange between Turkey and Greece. According to Greenspun, more than 600,000 Jews fled or were expelled from the Arab countries in the 1940s and 1950s, and were settled in Israel.
posted by russilwvong at 1:16 AM on May 22, 2006

I thought the crusader kingdoms fell to military conquest, not demographics.


Conquest, yes, but conquest by superior numbers over several generations. The Crusaders enjoyed strategic and technological superiority over the Islamic forces. Their main problem was their high rates of death from disease (especially within the newly arrived), the high infant mortality and low maternity survival rates of their European population. Their intention to establish viable colonies foundered and their relatively xenophobic apartheid schemes meant that the pool of pureblood "Franks" available to populate and administer their kingdoms shrank. Without continual replenishment of their numbers by migration from northern Europe they lost ground to the Middle Eastern natives, many of whom benefitted from a genetic and social background adapted to the region's diseases. The Crusader kingdoms were hollowed out from within. Once political will within Europe for further colonisation ebbed their fate was sealed.

As Alfred Crosby notes, the next large-scale European colonisation project was the Canaries, and this involved the displacement and extermination of a low-density, technologically primitive population with naive immune systems.
posted by meehawl at 9:25 AM on May 23, 2006

Thanks for the clarification. I was under the mistaken impression that the Muslims had technological superiority.

One further aside:

The idea that many people in Israel today would willingly construct for themselves one of the largest Jewish ghettos in history would have struck earlier observers as fantastic.

A soc.history.what-if thread based on observers from World War II travelling forward in time: "So, you're telling me that the Japanese have become a nation of bankers, while the Jews have founded the modern Sparta?"
posted by russilwvong at 2:51 PM on May 25, 2006