My latest article on the Huffington Post examines the extraordinary and shocking case of Cliona Campbell, a young woman being victimized by anti-Zionist thugs.
Archive
Noam Sheizaf and Larry Derfner are worried about the possibility that Israel might attack Iran’s nuclear facilities. No surprise there. What sensible person could contemplate such an idea with equanimity? However, both of them fall into the trap of assuming that all the risks are stacked on the side of attacking and none on the side of not taking military action.
Continue reading ‘Sheizaf, Derfner And What Deterrence Means’
First-class reporting from BBC Panorama’s Jane Corbin, in Death in the Med. Says one commenter on Panorama’s website, “Another demonstration of how the pro-Palestinian lobby has been foiled again, let’s all cry Israel’s disproportionate violence and then show the truth. Jenin sounds familiar.”
Exactly. Now watch both parts of the program below.
Sorry BDSers. Looks like your sordid little campaign has suffered yet again. Why do you keep making claims that aren’t true, I wonder? Wouldn’t be Ahmadinejad’s influence, would it?
By way of Haaretz I learn of a pledge by 150 Irish artists not to perform in Israel. Most of the signatories are nonentities whose undertaking not to perform in Israel is about as meaningful as one by me not to run for president of Azerbaijan would be.
Some of you will have seen this splendid effort to think outside the box on Israel’s delegitimization by Yoram Hazony of the Shalem Center in Jerusalem. If you haven’t, I really urge you to read it. And once you’ve done so, please have a look at my essay on The Propagandist; as you’ll see, I have differences with Yoram, particularly over the use of Kant’s ideas on international politics, but these are expressed in a constructive spirit. We owe Yoram a huge debt of thanks for reframing a debate that was becoming extremely sterile.
Many readers will have already come across Jeffrey Goldberg’s piece in The Atlantic about the possibility of Israel resorting to force against Iran. Though it’s received a lot of attention, I don’t think it’s that interesting; it’s long on personal anecdote (by the way, for a seriously unflattering view of the Netanyahu family you ought to read Chapter 12 of this book) and the views of unnamed sources and short on analysis. People seriously interested in this matter still need to read Tira.
To those of you who can read Spanish I recommend following Luis D’Elía on Twitter. Why should he be of interest? Well, the rotund social activist is a prominent supporter of the government of President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner and on more than one occasion he and his followers have provided the street muscle to keep opponents of the government from holding demonstrations at sensitive locations.
Indeed, it is probable that Hamas’ future will be largely determined in the West Bank, rather than in Gaza. Its role as a spoiler cannot be underestimated, but Hamas’ long-term fortunes depend on an irrevocable failure of the national strategy of negotiations and of the PA state- and institution-building program. If either or both of these policies succeed, Hamas’ single-minded promotion of the strategy (though certainly not always the practice) of violent resistance and insistence on the non-recognition of Israel - even in the context of Palestinian independence - will become increasingly hollow and unappealing. If the PLO and PA strategies unequivocally fail, however, there is little to prevent Hamas from inheriting practically uncontested the leadership of the Palestinian movement and transforming it from a nationalist to an Islamist one.
Hussein Ibish’s reading of the stakes involved in the battle between the Palestinian Authority and Hamas, here.
Mondoweiss has reported the death of Tony Judt. I daresay they’d know. As good a moment as any to recall that he regarded Jews as morally unfit for self-government and warned that the Jews as a whole might have to suffer as a result of the alleged crimes of some individual Jews.
I think this is what psychoanalysts call “projection.” After being decisively rejected by voters in east London at the recent British General Election, George Galloway is now prostrating himself before a man for whom voters are an irritant, to be beaten, tortured and imprisoned until they realize that the right to vote should be understood as the right to vote for him alone.
Read more at the The Jewish Chronicle.
For those readers who have forgotten how George behaves in the company of genocidal tyrants, here’s a reminder. Somehow, this footage never loses its nauseating quality no matter how many times you see it, but since a) it’s the weekend and b) Saddam’s regime is no more, you may choose to laugh rather than grit your teeth.
Michelle Sieff has an interesting piece here in which she argues against what she sees as a partial application of human rights law to Israel’s responses to Hamas. Her main point is that the goals being pursued by an organization have to be considered when assessing what sort of response to it is justifiable and warns of the consequences if this is not done:
I really like the look of this new outfit.
The Propagandist’s editors put it better than I can in describing themselves: “The Propagandist magazine is for political junkies, thinking conservatives and the anti-fascist left. We see the public space being taken over by an unholy alliance of unrepentant Marxists, 9/11 Truthers and thuggish religious fanatics…We’ve had enough. Our underground conservatives and counter-revolutionary propagandists are waging a war of words against the resurgent enemies of democracy and modernity.”
More power to ‘em. Especially as they are publishing our good friend Terry Glavin.
Now that UNIFIL has substantially endorsed Israel’s account of yesterday’s fatal shooting on its border, a couple of thoughts…
A deadly conflict in Lebanon could derail the prospect of direct talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, thus boosting Hamas at just the time that the Obama Administration is urging the PA to drop its reticence. Iran also has a vested interest in opening up a western front. In the last fortnight, a host of countries from the United States to the European Union to Japan have added a new layer of sanctions to those already agreed by the UN Security Council in response to Tehran’s continued nuclear defiance. And Hezbollah - as Sheikh Naim Qassem confessed in a 2007 interview with Iranian broadcaster Al Qawathar - invariably does Iran’s bidding, to the point of securing clearance for its operations from Iran’s leaders.
From my latest piece on The Huffington Post.
