See Brett, on HP.
Some comments on the “Israel must lose” letter – David Hirsh
January 17, 2009 — David Hirsh
David Hirsh
[Correction: I apologize for having mistakenly claimed that this letter was also signed by the antisemite Gilad Atzmon. I misread the web page. In fact Atzmon signed the letter below in The Guardian - DH]
This letter, signed by a large number of academics, represents yet another milestone in the escalation of the demonization of Israel in British public life.
It is signed by a number of serious and well respected people such as Etienne Balibar, Conor Gearty, Eric Hobsbawm, Ernesto Laclau, Eyal Weizman, Nira Yuval-Davis, Slavoj Zizek and Paul Gilroy.
It is also signed by the usual list of people who spend their time spreading hatred of Israel and trying to have Israelis “boycotted”, such as Mona baker, Haim Bresheeth, Alex Callinicos, Keith Hammond,Ted Honderich, Ilan Pappe, Hilary Rose, and Richard Seaford.
The letter is incoherent. The final paragraph begins with the following:
We believe Israel should immediately and unconditionally end its assault on Gaza, end the occupation of the West Bank, and abandon all claims to possess or control territory beyond its 1967 borders.
This paragraph clearly favours a two state solution to the conflict and a peace between the two nations. In the previous paragraph the signatories articulate their concern for Israel’s security:
Israel must accept that its security depends on justice and peaceful coexistence with its neighbours, and not upon the criminal use of force.
So far so good. All this, the call for an immediate ceasefire, an unconditional withdrawal from the occupied territories, the characterization of its use of force as criminal – all this is within the bounds of serious and legitimate criticism. But it is incompatible with the sharp end of the letter.
The massacres in Gaza are the latest phase of a war that Israel has been waging against the people of Palestine for more than 60 years.
Here the signatories make it clear that they consider the State of Israel itself, not only the occupation, to be illegitimate. They make it clear that they believe that Israel’s use of force to sustain the occupation is part of the same war as the defensive wars with which Israel has managed to guarantee its survival. They, like the Israeli far right, deny any politically significant distinction between the occupied territories and Israel itself (see This is Really Two Wars).
Israel must lose. …we are obliged to take sides … against Israel, and with the people of Gaza and the West Bank. …We must do what we can to stop Israel from winning its war.
The signatories pledge to do what they can to ensure the military defeat of Israel.
Apparently they want Israel to be defeated militarily in Gaza and in the West Bank, they want Israeli troops to be sent home to Israel and they want that to be the basis for a new peaceful co-existence in the Middle East.
Here the signatories are imagining that the conflict is between an imperialist occupier on the one hand (the oppressors) and a national resistance movement on the other (the oppressed). They want to support the war of the oppressed against the oppressors. They want, modestly, to put their weight behind the movement for Palestinian national liberation without acting as imperialist outsiders, telling them how to fight their struggle.
But they are clever people, mostly, and they know full well that the conflict is more complicated than that.
They know that Palestine is politically divided between Hamas and Fatah.
They know that Hamas is, as well as being a nationalist movement, an antisemitic movement which is constitutionally and practically committed to killing the Jews in the Middle East and instituting an authoritarian Islamic state throughout Israel and Palestine.
They back some of this aspiration, insomuch as only half of them half believe that Israel has a right to exist, and they all know that if Israel did not exist then the Jews of Israel would be in grave danger.
They know that a military defeat for Israel would put the Jews of Israel at great risk. And yet they call for it.
They pretend to believe that a military defeat for Israel at the hands of Hamas or perhaps Hezbollah or perhaps Iran, could lead to a peace agreement which could guarantee Israel’s security. But most of these signatories are too clever and too well-read to believe that.
The letter is phrased in a curiously ‘quantitative’ language:
It is not enough to urge the renewal of dialogue and to acknowledge the concerns and suffering of both sides.
Dialogue, ceasefire, peace, a two state solution are not enough. They want to go further. Beyond dialogue is military victory for Hamas. Beyond ceasefire, beyond peace, beyond a two state solution, is war. Peace is not enough; they want victory. And they understand clearly how to build a movement against peace and for war:
We call on the British government and the British people to take all feasible steps to oblige Israel to comply with these demands, starting with a programme of boycott, divestment and sanctions.
Boycott is war against Israel by other means.
And the global campaign for the military defeat of Israel is also a genocidal campaign. And these signatories know it. They know what the military defeat of Israel would mean. And yet they call for it.
David Hirsh
Goldsmiths, University of London
Editor, Engage
NB Bob from Brockley’s response to this letter is well worth reading too.
Gerald Kaufman wins the Simply Jews 2009 prize for nincompoopery
January 17, 2009 — David Hirsh“The present Israeli government ruthlessly and cynically exploit the continuing guilt from Gentiles over the slaughter of Jews in the Holocaust as justification for their murder of Palestinians,” he said.
Simply Jews awards its prize here.
Imagine there was a left
January 16, 2009 — David HirshWhat would it looke like? Jimmy Bradshaw has some ideas. On Harry’s Place.
A contribution to the war of words about Gaza
January 16, 2009 — Mira VogelBob From Brockley comments on some of the protest about Gaza in today’s Guardian. He gives particular attention to the letter signed by 322 UK academics calling for boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel:
“Many of the signatories profess one or another form of Marxism. Yet, in the utterly ahistorical framing of its argument, the letter violates one of Marx’s core principles: that politics is always historical, that categories are always in movement. A “a war that Israel has been waging against the people of Palestine for more than 60 years. The goal of this war has never changed…” Here, history dissolves. “Israel” becomes a mythical beast, frozen in the endless repetition of its evil actions. Did the Israel of 1948 use “overwhelming military force”? Or, rather, were not the weapons it had to hand those the Palestinians used in the First Intifada?
And what do “the principle of democratic self-determination” and “the right to resist military aggression and colonial occupation” mean in concrete terms? What, specifically, is the democratic self-determination of one ethnic group, if it denies that to another? What, even more to the point, does “Israel must lose”? The obligation to take sides the signatories claim is no more pressing in this case than it is in the case of the Hutu and the Tutsi, where self-determination for one can mean extermination for the other in a zero-sum game. “Justice and peaceful co-existence” cannot spring from the defeat of Israel by Hamas, any more than justice and peaceful co-existence can be achieved by bombing Gaza into dust.
It is true, of course, that the conflict is not symmetrical, and that Gaza’s electorate voted for Hamas. But the signatories of the letter are stuck in the reality of the First Intifada, when the figure of “Palestinian resistance” was the child throwing stones at an Israeli tank. Since then, we have seen the militarisation of the Palestinian struggle, the evacuation of all social content from it: the suicide bomber rather than the stone thrower. And, now, in this Third Intifada, the stones have been replaced by rockets supplied by the Iranian theocracy.
So, when the signatories talk about “the right to resist military aggression and colonial occupation” and say “Israel must lose”, the reality is the triumph of a fascist state, not the beginning of justice. The Hamas regime, which continues to fire on Israel, which continues to deploy its its children as human shields, which murders its political opponents, which brutalises its own population, does not represent “the people of Gaza and the West Bank”, any more than the Ayatollahs represent the people of Iran or the Nazi state represented the people of Germany.
What the people of Gaza need, rather than this sort of hollow gestural pseudo-solidarity, is precisely a ceasefire and humanitarian assistance. Cheering on their war-mongers will not bring them justice or peace.
The reason this letter is not just nonsense, then, but pernicious nonsense, as J Frank Parnell might have said, is…”
CST figures for a-s incidents are currently at their highest level ever
January 16, 2009 — David HirshThis piece, by Leon Symons Simon Rocker and Jonny Paul, is from the Jewish Chronicle.
Anglo-Jewry is in the middle of the worst outbreak of antisemitism in Britain since the Community Security Trust started keeping records a quarter of a century ago.
Since the start of the Israeli offensive into Gaza on December 27, more than 150 incidents across the country have been recorded.
CST director of communications Mark Gardner said: “Antisemites are using an overseas conflict as an excuse for their racism, and this should be clearly condemned by all sectors of society. In particular, we are seeing the inevitable antisemitic impact of many years of anti-Israel hysteria, in addition to an enraged response to TV and newspaper images of this conflict.”
There have been assaults on individuals, an arson attack on a synagogue, dozens of incidents involving hate mail, emails and threatening and abusive telephone calls and many daubings and graffiti.
Communal leaders have been involved in a flurry of political activities this week, meeting Foreign Secretary David Miliband on Monday and Communities and Local Government secretary Hazel Blears on Tuesday.
Jeremy Newmark of the Jewish Leadership Council and Jon Benjamin of the Board of Deputies, said: “The community should feel reassured that their concerns are being clearly and regularly articulated at the heart of government during these difficult times.”
One aim of the meetings was to persuade the government to speak out about the startling rise in antisemitism. The only mention by a minister had been a letter from Mr Miliband to Board of Deputies president Henry Grunwald last Friday, in which he said: “I am alarmed at the attempts of extremist voices in the UK to use the conflict to legitimise antisemitic sentiments. I remain concerned by reports of this rhetoric manifesting itself in violent acts and threats against UK synagogues and the Jewish community.”
On Tuesday, the CST, in a deputation with the Board and the Jewish Leadership Council, presented Ms Blears and junior minister Sadiq Khan with a dossier of the incidents. They outlined their concerns about security, particularly near schools and campuses.
After the meeting, Ms Blears said: “The government strongly condemns the increase in antisemitic incidents and understands the fears and concerns of the Jewish community in Britain. British Jews, like all communities, must be able to live their lives free from fear of verbal or physical attack.”
On Wednesday, Ms Blears sent a letter to all synagogues in Britain saying that the government would not “tolerate racists and trouble-makers disrupting our local communities” and that “international events, however distressing, provide no justification for violence”. She said it was “important to recognise, and to build on, the excellent interfaith work and dialogue that both the Muslim and Jewish communities have developed in recent years”.
A young Orthodox man was viciously beaten after last Wednesday’s pro-Israel rally in what is perhaps the most serious incident.
Daniel Lowe, from Hendon, a bearded Orthodox Jew who wears a kippah, was a founding member of MuJewz, the Muslim-Jewish dialogue group at Oxford University. He had attended last Wednesday night’s pro-Israel rally in Kensington and was on his way to visit friends nearby afterwards when he was attacked.
He said: “As I was about to knock on their door, someone behind me said hello.” He turned to find two men of Asian appearance, one wearing a Palestinian flag on his jacket, the other wearing a keffiyeh. “They asked me where I had been. When I told them it was none of their business, they punched me in the head, pushed me to the ground and kicked me.”
Mr Lowe said the attack made him even more determined to attend Sunday’s Trafalgar Square event: “Jews shouldn’t be attacked for expressing their views in public.”
On Tuesday, a gang of Palestinian supporters forced their way into the offices in central London of the Israel lobbying organisation Bicom after a man called saying he was delivering a parcel.
Eight men and women — one armed with a loudhailer — shouted at and intimidated staff, ripped out computer cables, cut telephone lines and threw leaflets out of the windows.
One staff member said: “They were very aggressive, and asked whether we were Jewish and why we were supporting Israel. It was very frightening.”
It is understood that detectives at Westminster are investigating the criminal damage and viewing CCTV footage of the incident.
Bicom chief executive Lorna Fitzsimons said: “The vandalism and thuggery at our offices and against my staff this morning was utterly reprehensible. Bicom is a pro-peace organisation that promotes understanding and dialogue, often promoting moderate Palestinian voices for the sake of a speedy and peaceful resolution to the conflict in the Middle East.”
Both Marks & Spencer and John Lewis contacted suppliers this week to ask whether goods they stocked originated from Israel.
But both companies insisted that they were regular routine calls and that the timing was coincidental.
On Saturday, three protestors were arrested after occupying an Israeli-owned cosmetics store in central London.
The protestors chained themselves to the door of the Ahava store in Covent Garden, forcing it to close for around five hours. They also hung a banner in the window accusing the company of “funding Israeli war crimes in Gaza”.
A protest in Belfast on Saturday by pro-Palestinian campaigners against a stall selling Israeli products is being investigated by police as a racially motivated incident. Video footage posted on the internet showed the Sea Spa stall, which sells Dead Sea cosmetics, being deluged with leaflets from a balcony above as demonstrators shouted “Boycott Israeli goods”.
In Bristol, one man was arrested after about 30 pro-Palestinian protestors entered a city centre branch of Marks & Spencer, filled their trollies with Israeli produce and then refused to pay.
Birmingham City Council failed to agree a statement on the Middle East crisis after a debate on Tuesday. Both the ruling Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition and the Labour opposition had released statements before the meeting supporting an immediate ceasefire, but could not resolve their differences. A discussion document supporting sanctions against Israel had been presented by four out of the 120 city councillors, from the Labour, Lib Dem, Conservative and Respect parties. But it was not tabled as a resolution, nor was any vote taken.
A speech by Muslim academic Azam Tamimi, who spoke at last Saturday’s anti-Israel rally, shouting: “We’re all Hamas now,” has been reported to the police.
A CST spokesman said it had taken “numerous enquiries” about whether the speech breached anti-terrorism legislation.
“The CST will do its utmost to ensure that the police are made aware of our community’s concerns. We have been asked about a speech at last Saturday’s anti-Israel rally that may breach glorification of terrorism legislation. This will be passed to police for their consideration and possible investigation.”
Israeli sources confirmed this week that a planned flying visit by Likud leader Binyamin Netanyahu to London had been postponed after Downing Street failed to give him the opportunity of a meeting with Gordon Brown.
This piece, by Leon Symons Simon Rocker and Jonny Paul, is from the Jewish Chronicle.
A lefty in Israel – Sharon Dolev
January 16, 2009 — David Hirsh“…In my country, I’m a traitor. Fair game. But the minute I leave Israel,
I’m an Israeli. Not a lefty. An Israeli, an occupier, and again – fair
game.”
…
“If you demonstrate, please do it in a way that will make a difference.
Not just anti-Israel, but with signs calling for a cease fire and the
acceptance of UN resolution 1860 by both sides…”
Read the whole piece on Harry’s Place.
Standing against the tide of hatred
January 16, 2009 — David Hirsh
Interesting piece on antisemitism by Elizabeth Wurtzel on Comment is Free.
See also the Cif commenters who ably demonstrate that Wurtzel is not inventing antisemitism.
