Kim Petersen, an editor at Dissident Voice, recently wrote an article criticizing me for alleged dishonesty and hypocrisy. To explain the background, Jeffrey Blankfort had written an article entitled “Chomsky and Palestine: Asset or Liability?”, published originally at Pulse and subsequently at Dissident Voice, in which he effectively tried to argue that Chomsky is a Zionist who supports Israeli oppression of Palestinians. I responded with an article of my own entitled “Criticism of Chomsky: Asset or Liability?” to point out how Blankfort systematically and willfully mischaracterized Chomsky’s views. Dissident Voice published my rejoinder (Pulse refused to do so, and Idrees, an editor there, called me an “ass” for pointing out Chomsky’s actual views).
That’s the back story, with which interested readers may choose to familiarize themselves (or not). Turning to Petersen’s own rejoinder of my rejoinder, curiously entitled “The Legitimacy of Boycotting as a Tactic” (curious because most of the article consists of attacks on my person, and only at the end of the piece does he tangentially discuss the issue of the title), he makes numerous arguments to support his contention that I was the one doing the willful mischaracterization.
An examination of Petersen’s evidence for this thesis is instructive as to the intellectual dishonesty that permeates not only the mainstream, but also, unfortunately, the alternative online media, including “progressive” sites like Dissident Voice that seek to “struggle for peace and social justice” — which will never be obtained by means of propagating falsehoods that serve only to distract attention from real and important issues (which was the whole point of my original rejoinder).
via A Rejoinder to Kim Petersen’s ‘The Legitimacy of Boycotting as a Tactic’ | Jeremy R. Hammond.
Jeremy Hammond writes that I “effectively tried to argue that Chomsky is a Zionist who supports Israeli oppression of Palestinians.” That is an outright lie. I have written two articles critical of Noam Chomsky’s positions with regards to the pro-Israel Lobby, his stand against targeting Israel economically, and arguing against his insistence that Israel is supported by the US because it is a “strategic asset.” I have never said, implied, or inferred that Chomsky supports Israel’s oppression of the Palestinians or any other activities it is engaged in and why Hammond, quite aware of that, can make such an allegation is beyond me.
Hammond, until recently, appeared to be a reliable political observer and commentator. He now appears to have snapped after reading an article I had written that initially appeared on Pulse Media and and then on Dissident Voice (and was posted on Chomsky Watch entitled: “Chomsky and Palestine: Asset or Liability,” that was based on his opposition to boycotting and sanctioning Israel and his attack on those who do support such a position, advocated by Palestinians themselves, as being “hypocritical.”
See: pulsemedia.org/2010/07/…/chomsky-and-palestine-asset-or-liability/
Kim Petersen at Dissident Voice permitted Hammond to write a response to my article: dissidentvoice.org/…/rejoinder-to-criticism-of-chomsky-asset-or-liability/ and then followed with his own response to Hammond’s critique of me: http://dissidentvoice.org/2010/08/the-right-and-legitimacy-of-boycotting-a-non-violent-means-of-resisting-oppression/ which was posted on Chomsky Watch on Aug. 3 and evidently produced Hammond’s latest eruption.
If the reader visits those sites she or he will see that Hammond has now not only become obsessed with attacking and mischaracterizing what I have written but he now has extended his obsession to include Petersen.
In 2004 I wrote a longer article on Chomsky for those interested in such and it can be found here:
http://www.leftcurve.org/LC29WebPages/Chomsky.html
P.S. Chomsky has never denied that he is a Zionist. He claims that the Zionism of today is not the Zionism of his youth and that it is what has changed not him, since in its early days, the movement also included those who supported a bi-national as opposed to a Jewish state.
http://www.maxajl.com/?p=4007
The Banality of anti-Israel Lobby Doctrine
The doctrinaire anti-Lobby phenomenon on the left has found its platform most noticeably at the popular websites Counterpunch and Mondoweiss. Jeffrey Blankfort, accurately described by Left Business Observer’s Doug Henwood as a “toxic character,” holds forth regularly on both sites, including in the Comments section on Mondoweiss, where he disciplines anti-anti-Lobby heretics such as me in dismissive fashion, having accused me of “drinking Chomsky’s Kool-Aid.”
Blankfort has, incredibly, taken on the mission and obsession of convincing the pro-Palestinian community that Noam Chomsky has for all these years worked tirelessly and insidiously to undermine the Palestinian cause: first by criticizing American and Israeli policies (for the cover of credibility); second by challenging the notion of the all-powerful Lobby, and thus undermining efforts to ferret out the Zionist conspirators among those who have made it so difficult for the U.S. to control Middle East oil. Blankfort asserts that this has indeed been a conscious strategy on Chomsky’s part, and he clearly has the approval of his internet proprietors in his efforts to convince others of this astonishing turn of events in the history of Zionist and anti-American strategy.
* “Jeremy Hammond writes that I “effectively tried to argue that Chomsky is a Zionist who supports Israeli oppression of Palestinians.” That is an outright lie.”
No, it is not. It is perfectly accurate. It’s funny you say this is a lie then say “Chomsky has never denied that he is a Zionist.” So let’s move on to the part about Chomsky supporting oppression of Palestinians.
Take, for instance, your repeated assertions in the article in question that Chomsky is a self-confessed “Zionist”. Yet, in each case you state this, you omit the crucial explanation Chomsky offers for his meaning, which is that his position was one of opposition to a Jewish state and support for a binational solution (as you acknowledge here subsequent to my having pointed it out to you repeatedly). Omitting that fact, as you very well know, leads readers to draw wrong conclusions — precisely your intent, since there’s no other reason to quote him out of context the way you did.
Or take your repeated assertions that Chomsky is a self-confessed “supporter of Israel”. Yet, in each case you state this, you omit the crucial explanation Chomsky offers for his meaning, which is that he opposes Israeli crimes against Palestinians — precisely the opposite of the meaning of that phrase in its usual usage. Omitting that fact, as you very well know, leads readers to draw wrong conclusions — precisely your intent, since there’s no other reason to quote him out of context the way you did.
You stated that Chomsky “unequivocally supported” the creation of a Jewish state, despite the fact that you know he was/is opposed to the Jewish state and rejects that Israel has a “right to exist”.
You state Chomsky has “done more to undermine the Palestinian cause than to help it.”
And so on.
* “I have never said, implied, or inferred that Chomsky supports Israel’s oppression of the Palestinians or any other activities it is engaged in…”
That is an outright lie.
Take, for instance, in addition to the above, your assertion that Fayyad is “a favorite” of Chomsky’s followed by your subsequent suggestion of the possibility that Chomsky supports “the nation building priorities of the earlier Zionists” and considers “the Palestine Authority’s endorsement of Israel’s blockade of Gaza, of its attempts ot suppress a UN investigation of the Goldstone Report, and the role played by its US-trained militia in protecting Israel, to be also ‘sensible and sound.’” Here, you expressed that it was unfortunate Chomsky was not asked whether he holds these views, thereby suggesting the possibility that he does, despite the fact that you know perfectly well he does not.
That suggestion that Chomsky supports/defends Israeli crimes against Palestinians/PA collusion with Israel with regard to those crimes is intellectually dishonest, as you perfectly well know.
How about the latest Blankfort pearl: 2 days ago, saying Chomsky is the ’2010 version of the Jewish Defence League.’
I suppose that isn’t suggesting Chomsky is a racist, zionist, liability to the movement, etc.
How about the bald faced assertion in response to my posts that I am an ADL agent! Again a lie…
In what is the obvious absence from the lists in his own defense, Chomsky is apparently relying on Green and Hammond and a handful of others who by their angry responses have exposed themselves as being more interested in preserving the professor’s reputation than doing anything for the Palestinian cause. If having “outed” them as such is some compensation for the nature and the consistency of their attacks against me and against CounterPunch, Mondoweiss, and Pulse which have refused to publish their drivel.
First, from the beginning, Hammond has either misquoted me or put words in my mouth, inferring or implying that I am saying things that I have neither written nor said, such as that Chomsky “supports Israeli oppression of Palestinians.”
By implication, Hammond would have people believe that I think that all those who agree with Prof. Chomsky support Israeli oppression of Palestinians and that, is of course, nonsense.
I take Chomsky at his word. He says,”I am not a critic of Israel. I am a supporter of Israel.” I don’t care how he qualifies it, he admits to being a supporter of Israel.
Chomsky spoke admirable of Fayyad on Democracy Now!. I didn’t make up what he said. I suggested that he should have been asked about other PA positions by Amy Goodman, but she inexplicably didn’t, other than the fact that he has more of a carte blanche on DN! than I have on either CounterPunch or Mondoweiss. That he didn”t qualify what was clearly praise for Fayyad was not my fault. He had the opportunity to do so and didn’t.
I do own up to having written that Chomsky has “done more to undermine the Palestinian cause than to help it.”
I base my conclusion on the fact that he has made a special effort to deflect attention from the role of the Jewish establishment/Israel lobby in shaping US policy in the Middle East, has not acknowledged the stranglehold that it has over Congress let alone its significance while placing the primary responsibility for Israel’s crimes not on the Israeli Jews and their international supporters but on Washington that has provided it with the money and political support to carry out those crimes. By eliminating the role of the Jewish establishment in producing that support, Chomsky has been guilty of what I describe as intellectual dishonesty.
Add to that his opposition to targeting Israel with boycotts,divestment and sanctions and what we are looking at is an Israeli asset.
Chomsky, of course, cannot be held entirely responsible for the utter failure to this point of the Palestine solidarity movement. In the near 40 years that I have been involved in the struggle for justice for Palestine, ir has been Jews, who may sincerely believe they are anti-Zionist and working for the Palestinians, who have allowed their concern for Jewish sensibilities and their tribal loyalties to keep them from pointing the finger at the Palestinians’ primary enemy, namely, the majority of Israel’s Jewish population and their supporters in the international Jewish community. It is not simply in their makeup to accept that conclusion despite all the evidence that points to it. Significantly, I know Israeli Jews who don’t carry around the same baggage as Western and US Jews and who have long ago arrived at the same conclusion.
All I can say in Hammond’s behalf is that he has not stooped to the name calling as Green and several others. Green’s critique of me he has entitled “The Banality of Anti-Israel Lobby Doctrine,” which I assume is intended to place those who subscribe to the belief that the Israel Lobby is a major if not the most important factor in determining US Middle East polcy are as evil in their way as Eichmann was in his.
He accuses me of making an “obsession of convincing the pro-Palestinian community that Noam Chomsky has for all these years worked tirelessly and insidiously to undermine the Palestinian cause.” I am not saying that was his deliberate intent but I am saying that has been the result as the absence of a viable Palestinian solidarity movement attests. There is a Latin phrase which is applicable here: Res ipsa loquitur.
Moreover, if what I have had to say about Chomsky was lacking in credibility, there would be no almost hysterical need to keep attacking it.
As for being obsessed, can any be more so than Hammond who has now probably written far more words attacking me than I ever have about Chomsky although none of them have challenged anything I wrote in my first article about him five years ago, “Damage Control” Noam Chomsky and the Palestine Conflict,” from which I will close with an excerpt that quotes the late, great Prof. Israel Shahak on his friend Chomsky:
Much of what Chomsky tells us is “not controversial,” invariably proves to be very much so and particularly when it comes to the relations between Israel and the White House. The late revered Israeli scholar and human rights activist, Professor Israel Shahak pointed out that Chomsky’s analysis suffers from his
“undoubted tendency of demonizing the American presidency and the Executive in general, while ignoring the Legislature, but also from his very mistaken, in my opinion, tendency of assuming that not only the principles but literally everything concerning the American imperialism was laid in detail long ago, in 1944 or about that time, and from then on the policy is, so to say, a follow-up of instructions from a computer.
“This ignores not only the human factor in the US itself but also the completely different nature of the foes and the victims of the US during the last decades. There can be no doubt, in my own opinion, that the actual policies of the US are complex even when they are evil, influenced, as in the case of all other states, by many factors of which AIPAC is one and human stupidity (for which he never allows) is another.”
And finally, this very insightful paragraph:
“But such simplistic theories, backed by his memory and ability to pick isolated examples (sometimes from a long time ago like his stock example of Eisenhower in the case of Israel while ignoring everything else from 1967 on) can appeal to [the] young who look for certainty and also for those who don’t want to [be] engaged in actual work and so find substitute for it in crude and useless display of emotion. ”
I had written to Shahak after hearing Chomsky’s reply to a question following a speech he made in Berkeley at the outset of the first Gulf War. A member of the audience wanted to know his thoughts about AIPAC’s role in that war and his opinion of the lobby, in general. Chomsky was predictably dismissive:
“Personally I don’t think AIPAC played much of a role in this, in fact, my own feeling is that the role of the Israeli lobby, in general, is pretty much exaggerated. That’s a matter of judgment. It’s not a simple factual question. In my opinion the Israeli lobby gets its input in large part because it happens to line up with powerful sectors of domestic US power.”
Chomsky’s comment, notwithstanding, AIPAC, “was widely credited with having played a key role” in rounding up the necessary votes in the Senate to give Pres. Bush his majority. “[B]ecause of the extreme sensitivity to the issue, AIPAC was anxious to camouflage its role to avoid providing evidence for the accusation… that the Persian Gulf War was fought at the behest of the Jews to protect Israel.” [62] To disguise their role, the Washington Jewish Week’s Larry Cohler reported that AIPAC had prominent Jewish senators vote against the war while lobbying non-Jewish senators in states with small Jewish populations to support it. That Saddam Hussein was not removed at the time brought strong criticism from the primarily Jewish neocons and on a lower register from AIPAC. During the Clinton presidency they would press their demand for regime change in Iraq and under Bush Jr., they made sure that task would be carried out.
The most troubling part of his answer, however, was his downplaying of the lobby. Since most political observers view elected officials at virtually every level as representing to varying degrees their major campaign contributors, much like lawyers representing corporate clients—and AIPAC has been acknowledged as a leader in the field—his response answer was at best disingenuous.
Predictably, it drew applause from the supporters of Israel who were happy to have the distinguished scholar absolve organized American Jewry of any responsibility for what their co-religionists were doing to the Palestinians or for the lobby’s activities in support of the first war on Iraq. I decided to express my feelings to Professor Shahak. Here was his frank reply:
“I had the same, only greater, differences of opinion with Noam Chomsky, who is my personal friend for quite a time, on the subject of AIPAC and the influence of the Jewish lobby in general as you have. What is more, a number of mutual friends of Chomsky and me have also tried to influence him, in vain, on that point.
‘I am afraid that he is, with all his wonderful qualities and the work he does, quite dogmatic on many things. I have no doubt that his grievous mistake about the lack of importance of AIPAC, which he repeats quite often, helps the Zionists very much as you so graphically described.” .
http://www.leftcurve.org/LC29WebPages/Chomsky.html
What more is there to say? Clearly I am not alone.
It should be an embarrassment that Green and Hammond, not to mention Chomsky, have Mark Richie AKY Richey AKA Ritchey as an ally. For more than two decades he has been operating as an agent provocateur in the SF Bay Area community, having convinced me and many others in the Palestinian and Arab-American as well as anti-Zionist Jewish community, whatever its failings, that he is working for the ADL. I will not burden this list with the details about him but anyone interested can write me at jblankfort@earthlink.net and I will be more than happy to provide them.
As for accusing Chomsky of being the ’2010 version of the Jewish Defence League,” as such, in a league by himself, I did not use that phrase to describe him but rather those Jews who have circled their wagons around their guru while indulging in accusations and name calling against me worthy of Alan Dershowitz.
You, Jeff, are more interested in deceiving your readers into drawing wrong conclusions in order to damage Chomsky’s reputation than in doing anything for the Palestinian cause.
That is why I wrote my response to your article. For examples of your intellectual dishonesty, take your statement: “I don’t care how he qualifies it, he admits to being a supporter of Israel.”
Readers will observe that is a tacit acknowledgment that you wilfully take that quote of of context. If you cared how he qualifies that — which is to say, if you cared TO BE HONEST — you would note that this means Chomsky opposes Israeli crimes and oppression of the Palestinians.
As for the DN! interview regarding Fayyad, the fact remains that you suggested Chomsky holds views (e.g. support for P.A. collusion with Israel, such as on suppression of Goldstone report) that you KNOW he doesn’t hold (e.g., in that same interview, he criticized the suppression of the report).
Given your own demonstrable disregard for the truth, your accusations of Chomsky and others as intellectually dishonest is pure hypocrisy.
Jeff, Chomsky “supports Israel” like he “supports the United States.” He wants what’s best for the Israeli people and he thinks what would be best for them is if their government stopped engaging in massive crimes against the Palestinians, which makes Israeli citizens less safe. He wants what’s best for the American people, that is he’d like the American government to stop engaging in aggression, stop undermining environmental agreements, stop militarizing space, etc, because all of this is a threat to Americans, like it is a threat to the rest of the world.
To pretend that he supports Israeli crimes really reflects badly on you, not him. Anyone remotely familiar with him knows you’re attributing views to him he doesn’t hold and criticizing him for it. What a strange thing to do.
Jon, how many times do I need to say it. I have never said, written, inferred, or implied that Chmsky supports Israel’s crimes. That is just part of the contnuing smear campaign waged against me by Hammond who has made it his obsession. If I had done that he would have offered some evidence of it it by now and he hasn’t because there isn’t any.
I would guess that the fundamental difference between Chomsky and his supporters and myself is that I do not support Israel. From its very inception, it has been a European settler colonial state and has as much legitmacy as any other settler colonial state including ours. While the battle here has been long settled and the genocide of the native Americans glossed over, Palestinians who were ethnically cleansed and their immediate descendants still exist and demand the right to return to their homeland which doesn’t require a UN resoluton to be legitimate.
Chomsky does not support their demand and that is consistent wth his oppostion to targeting Israel with sanctions, deflecting attention from the pro-Israel lobby, and semanticly, opposing the use of the term, “apartheid,” to describe the situation confronting Palestinians in their own country.
Chomsky only speaks now of Israel’s crimes after 1967 which he describes as those of “conquest.” Pray tell what it was before that?
I am on the computer at my radio station and did not see the other name. This message and the one before it were sent by Jeffrey Blankfort, not Jigs and Reels, who is someone I don’t know.
Jeremy, you are like a broken record and your obsession with protecting Chomsky who is usually more than able to speak for himself (except when challenged from his left) might be considered admirable in his circles while looking like a silly fool outside of it.
For those who are able to think for themselves and who, like me, understand the nature of the Israeli state and that it’s behavior was and remains inherent in its genetic code as a settler colonial state, know that there will be neither peace and certainly not justice while it exists in its present form. Chomsky is too emotionally attached to his youthful vision of Zionism and the tribal loyalities that developed in his upbringing to understand that.
While this discussion has been tedious as it has been repetitive, it has succeeded in establishing a clear dividing line between those who are sincerely committed to bringing justice to Palestine as opposed to those like Chomsky, Green, Henwood, Hendrick, Rosenthal, and yourself, among others, who are only comitted to justice for Palestine to the point where Israel might be directly punished economically or otherwise for its criminality and that is where all you tribalists draw your blue and white line. It has all been very revealing and for that you should be thanked.
“Jon, how many times do I need to say it. I have never said, written, inferred, or implied that Chmsky supports Israel’s crimes.” — Jeff Blankfort
“I would guess that the fundamental difference between Chomsky and his supporters and myself is that I do not support Israel.” — Jeff Blanffort
“I have come to consider Chomsky, whatever his motives, to have been an asset for Israel” — Jeff Blankfort
“I assumed that Chomsky does not support [P.A.] collusion with Israel but apparently I was giving him too much credit.” — Jeff Blankfort.
“[I] DON’T AGREE [that Chomsky means he is opposed to Israeli crimes against Palestinians when he says he is a 'supporter of Israel'].” — Jeff Blankfort
“Chomsky … had … arranged to meet with Salam Fayyad, the unelected prime minister of the Palestine Authority and a favorite of both Washington and Israel and, it would appear, of Chomsky. When interviewed … Chomsky noted that ‘I was going to meet with the Prime Minister…. He is pursuing policies, which, in my view, are quite sensible, policies of essentially developing facts on the ground…. And the policies sound to me like sensible and sound ones.’ Unfortunately, Chomsky was not questioned about his support for the nation building priorities of the earlier Zionists nor if he considered the Palestine Authority’s endorsement of Israel’s blockade of Gaza, of its attempts to suppress a UN investigation of the Goldstone Report, and of the role played by its US-trained militia in protecting Israel, to be also ‘sensible and sound.’” — Jeff Blankfort
“..Chomsky has maintained that position despite the presence in the US of a number of distinguished Palestinian professors … who … could speak from personal experience that does not include prior service as ‘a Zionist youth leader [explanatory context deliberately and wilfully omitted]‘ – Chomsky’s background….” — Jeff Blankfort
“Or are we seeing something else here on the part of both Prof. Chomsky and JVP with their competing campaign, namely, damage control on Israel’s behalf?” — Jeff Blankfort
“When challenged about statements he had made strongly criticizing Israel, Chomsky responded, ‘I don’t regard myself as a critic of Israel. I regard myself as a supporter of Israel. [Subsequent explanatory context deliberately and wilfully omitted]‘” — Jeff Blankfort
“Chomsky volunteered to his Israeli interviewer that up to five or six years ago, he had considered living there as an alternative to the United States and in the 1950s, “we had considered staying there, in fact.” In other words, he seems to have no problem with the Jewish “right of return” to what, until 1948, was Palestine, but considers a similar demand by the Palestinians who were actually born there to be not only unrealistic but potentially dangerous.” — Jeff Blankfort
Jeff, I don’t think I was basing my criticism on something I read from Jeremy but something I had read from you. Something like Noam Chomsky’s statement that he supports Israel should be posted on billboards, etc. I understand your clarification. I guess I think the way you state it leaves the impression that Chomsky supports Israel’s crimes. If you say that’s not what you mean I accept that, but consider qualifying your statement about what Chomsky thinks in the future.
He has addressed your point with regards to 1948. He supported a binational state that included Arabs and Jews. That’s not so bad. He has always opposed what Israel did in 1948 in creating 750,000 refugees, crushing 400 towns, etc. He’s well aware of it and deplores it. But here’s where he would differ from you. He says that if you really want to help the world out you need to think strategically. What is the only possible means of resolving the present conflict? Is returning to the 1947 partition or perhaps eliminating the state of Israel even in the cards? No. There’s an international consensus regarding the ’67 borders. It’s the only feasible solution.
That’s not the same as saying the creation of the Jewish state as it came to be following the expulsion of the indigenous Arabs was right. It’s saying that he wants what’s best for Arabs and others living in the area. Cosmic justice is an illusion. We must think in terms of solutions, not theoretically perfect scenarios.
I’m presently arguing with liberterians with the same mindset. They want to eliminate government entirely. That’s fine for an academic seminar, but how do you resolve the massive problems we have right now, say for instance in Haiti where the gap between rich and poor is staggering? Stronger government, more responsive to the public, is the present solution. Maybe it’s an intermediate step and may lead to a future, better world. But let’s focus on that first baby step, then consider theoretical things.
Same with Israel. The ’67 borders is perhaps a baby step. Let’s push for that and not distract ourselves with theoretical solutions that are not in the cards. These are doing nothing but sapping our energy. The ’67 borders are feasible and the ’47 borders are not.
This assertion that I am an ADL agent is not only a lie, but a deliberate and calculated smear and a veiled death threat.
Blankfort is well aware of the nut pies in his liberal zionist milieu that might take this as open season on me. SOOO clever, it wouldn’t of course be his fault if I were assaulted.
He also knows that common sense would dictate that if I WERE an agent, and he had ‘exposed’ me, after more than 20 years!!!I wouldn’t still be writing on blogs and on the USQuagmire@yahoogroups.com discussion list about him!
I’d have disappeared long ago.
He and his ‘public radio’ associates who spread this slander are beneath contempt.
It’s a sad commentary on the ‘pwog’ media that he’s writing us from ‘his’ radio station…
note the proprietary attitude, .’my’ station..since most public radio political coverage is in the hands of a small clique of nearly all Jewish friends and companions of his, an informal but quite well organized network, including Alison Weir.
THe disgraceful harassment of Chomsky by Weir and Bankfot in last month’s ‘interview’ of him is proof positive of the existence of this smarmy little network of liberal zionists.
Even the usually polite Chomsky threatened to end the interview, since Weir cut off other callers to let Blankfort have the floor, repeatedly interrupted Chomsky herself, and generally carried on much as Blankfort did in this article..and in many other venues.
Don’t take lightly Blankfort’s reference to a smal number of ‘Arab’ and ‘Palestinian’ people in thrall to the liberal zionists of ANSWER and MECA, who can be depended upon to do and say whatever this network of liberal zionists ask them to.
Just for example, Mazin Qumsiyeh some years ago reprinted verbatim, without commentary, these charges of Blankfort that I am an AD agent.
I’ve neer met Qumsiyeh, who lived on the East Coast of the US for some years. I live in California.
I never exchanged e mails with Qumsiyeh, never had any conflict by correspondence with him; but when Blankfort wanted ‘Arab’ credentials for his slanders, Qumsiyeh was willing to oblige.
Note that Qumsiyeh long ago took this off his blog..but never apologized to me for this.
There are several other ‘Arabs’ and “Palestinians’ similarly willing to play PA to the MECA_JVP_ANSWER-Spartacist League–etc. etc. informal but quite well organized ‘left’ , nearly entirely Jewish network’s propaganda needs.
Don’t underestimate how this network mantains a tight, cliquist control and intervention into any initiative that might really threaten US-Israeli media dominance.
JUst a comment to Jon: Not look before the collapse of aparthied, most people felt it was not ‘in the cards’ to end apartheid in the foreseeable future, either.
As long as Israel exists as a nuclear armed, semi-theocratic, racist and expansionist state, are ANY borders ‘feasible’ for it? Won’t a temporary agreement requiring them to withdraw to the ’67 borders just be the prelude to more Gaza type assaults?
You’re right that international diplomacy is seemingly headed in that direction. But do you think that is actually a ‘feasible’ solution to the problem? Requiring their withdrawal from the Sinai or more recently, Lebanon, didn’t solve the problem did it? Clearly they are watiing their chance to again seize at least southern Lebanon in the near future, and the Sinai probably as a longer range plan…
How about if I put it this way, Mark. Reasonable people regard the ’67 border effort as a more plausible in terms of being an effective strategy. That’s not a denial that the ’47 border is closer to what might be called a just resolution. What I find strange is that Chomsky is demonized for simply advocating a different strategy. We all want the same thing. The best, most just possible world we can give the Palestinians.
I think Allison Weir is great. I don’t know Jeff Blankfort but I assume he wants what’s best for Palestinians. I can disagree with him on strategy without dragging him through the mud. That’s what I don’t care for in the treatment I see of Chomsky. He suggests different strategies than some, but it’s clear he wants the best for the Palestinians. Why the vilification?
Jpn,
My differences with Chomsky, although never expressed publicly until 30 years later go back to 1973 when Ramparts magazine for which I used to work in the late 60s, wanted to use photographs that I had taken in Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon and Jordan for an article by Chomsky. The PLO had already put a photo of mine of young Palestinian women with guns on a poster ( and a photo I would later take of a young Palestinian girl in East Jerusalem would later be used in Palestinian groceries to raise funds for Palestine). I told the Ramparts Art Director that I had to read the article first because I didn’t want my photos used in a pro-Zionist article. I don’t remember exactly what the article said but after reading it, I concluded that it legitimized Israel and consequently would not allow Ramparts to use my photos with it. Later, I would become a friend of his daughter, Avi, and in in 1989, working on a labor conference organized by our Labor Committee for the Middle East, for Palestinian workers in Philadelphia with his sister-in-law, I stayed at his brother’s home. Even though I had differences with Chomsky at the time, it had not occuredr to me to politically criticize him until he publicly denied the involvement of the pro-Israel lobby in the build-up to the first Gulf War, despite evidence, reported in the Jewish press, that it has been critical.
After that I began to see and analyse how Chomsky’s dismissal of the influence of the Zionist Lobby on US Middle East policy had serious impacted the growth of an effective Palestine solidarity movement in the US. By “demonizing”the Executive and ignoring Congress, as Prof. Shahak pointed out, “no doubt helps AIPAC.” That was in 1991 and the situation had grown far worse today, yet Chomsky, “stubborn” as Shahak pointed out, is still in denial.
Were he not a person of such great influence, I would not waste my time criticizing him, but since he is, I refuse to be silent. Adding to his denial of the Lobby’s power, his opposition to punishing Israel for its crimes, whatever his motives, puts him in Israel’s corner. There can be no other logical conclusion.
I do not deny that he once was for a bi-national state which was also my father’s position but my father, who in 1948, put on the biggest fundraiser ever held to that time for Israel at the Hollwyood Bowl, came to see Israel as a racist state and when it invaded Lebanon in 1982, he compared them to the Nazis, a comparison from what I have seen of the Israel military in Lebanon and Palestine, was not misplaced.
This is the state that Chomsky accepts as being legitimate today, and by his words, has accepted as such since 1948, which is not the same as believing in its right to exist.
Hammond keeps yammering that I am quoting Chomsky “out of context” deliberately so. When Chomsky said, “I am not a critic of Israel, I am a supporter of Israel,” that was full stop. He then went on to say that those supporting Israel’s warlike policies were really not true supporters of Israel which is the same as those Jews on the left, a miniscule number, who claim they are more true to “the Jewish tradition” than the vast majority of Jews in Israel and in the organized Jewish communities around the world that have supported Israeli to the bloody hilt. It might make them feel better to think that way, but they are the only ones that believe it.
Finally, as I said on the radio, I think it is presumptuous of any Jew, and particularly one who claims to be a supporter of Israel and not a critic, to tell the Palestinians who are calling for BDSW against Israel what they should or should not be doing when in an interview just this past July 26, he said that would not offer advice to tthe PA and that telling Palestinians what to do was not his business or words to that effect. I guess this only applies to Palestinians who disagree with him.
On my radio program, I frequently refer to Washington as Israeli Occupied Territory or Israel’s most important occupied territory. Yesterday, I provided my listeners with some direct evidence. After the program, I opened the phones for their calls and they agreed. Give a listen:
http://www.radio4all.net/index.php/program/44851
“Hammond keeps yammering that I am quoting Chomsky ‘out of context’ deliberately so. When Chomsky said, ‘I am not a critic of Israel, I am a supporter of Israel,’ that was full stop.” — Jeff Blankfort
“In fact, I don’t regard myself as a critic of Israel. I regard myself as a supporter of Israel. The people who are harming Israel, in my opinion, it’s what I’ve said many times, are those who claim to be supporting it. They are helping [to] drive Israel towards moral degeneration and possible ultimate destruction. I think support for Israel should be support for policies which are for its benefit.” — Noam Chomsky
“Finally, as I said on the radio, I think it is presumptuous of any Jew, and particularly one who claims to be a supporter of Israel and not a critic, to tell the Palestinians who are calling for BDSW against Israel what they should or should not be doing” — Jeff Blankfort
“When Americans call for a boycott of Israel, the hypocrisy is so extreme that it is simply a gift to hardliners. There have been very clear and very harmful examples. It would therefore be an error of judgment for Palestinians to call on Americans to boycott Israel. What Palestinians themselves choose to do is another matter…” — Noam Chomsky
And, yes, Blankfort is perfectly well aware of both quotes from Chomsky.
Readers may draw their own conclusions.
Chomsky says, “It would therefore be an error of judgment for Palestinians to call on Americans to boycott Israel.” If that is indirectly not telling them what to do I don’t understand the language. He doesn’t even go that far when it comes to the PA. I have been unable to find a word of criticism by Chomsky of the PA. Presumably, if anyone can find it, you can. I’ll be looking for it. I assumed that he had but curiously, I couldn’t find any negative comments about either Abbas aor Fayyad.
Why,Jeremy, does not Chomsky speak for himself? I Are you bccing him everything? I hope that you wipe off your nose each night before going beddy-bye.
Expressing an opinion that something others do is a “mistake” is, needless to say, not the same as “telling them what to do”.
“It is not our right or responsibility to lecture the Palestinian leadership on what they should do. That is up to the Palestinians to decide.” — Noam Chomsky
You say you “have been unable to find a word of criticism by Chomsky of the PA”. Have you found a word from Chomsky where he supports P.A. collusion with Israel, such as the suppression of the Goldstone Report, as you suggested in your article?
I’ll answer that for you: No, you haven’t, because Chomsky doesn’t hold such positions as this, which you so dishonestly attempt to attribute to him.
Jeremy, Chomsky praised Fayyad’s plan for state building and compared it favorably with that of the Zionists in the 20s and 30s and mentioned that he had been planning to meet with Fayyad. Any listener with reasonable intelligence who had tuned in to Democracy Now! would have concluded that (1) Chomsky approved of Fayyad’s plans, (2) that Chomsky also approved of the Zionists’ state building plans from the last century.
Moreover, there was nothing that Chomsky said that would lead the listener to conclude that Chomsky was also a critic of the PA and I have yet to find any statement online that he has made such criticism.
On July 26 to IOA, he said, as I previously pointed out:
“It is not our right or responsibility to lecture the Palestinian leadership on what they should do.”
One may reasonable conclude from that he considers the PA to be the legitimate Palestinian leadership despite the fact that it has not been elected and that Abbas’s term ran out more than a year ago despite its open collaboration with Israel in regard to security matters and its efforts to suppress the Goldstone Report.
Now, Jeremy,to you try to switch the subject by telling us that Chomsky supported the Goldstone report and broadly condemned efforts by the US and Israel to suppress it but I have seen no evidence that he criticized the PA for being party to that suppression.
In this thread, I keep supplying evidence to support my position.You keep implying that I meant things that I didn’t write, and, now three weeks after my initial article, you are unable to come up with any argument that anything I said was untrue, either substantially or otherwise.
To just to make it clear what the thrust of my argument has been is that while Noam Chomsky has spoken critically of Israel’s crimes against the Palestinians, somewhich which I have never denied, he has consistently been opposed to ANY campaign that would directly penalize or punish Israel economically for those crimes and I documented this in detail in my article Damage Control: Noam Chomsky and the Israel-Palestine Conflict which, for late arrivals to this blog can be found at:
http://www.leftcurve.org/LC29WebPages/Chomsky.html
While I have been attacked by Chomskyites for writing that article, not a one, including Chomsky has ever attempted to refute it. As for Chomsky himself, he has told me, as well as his supporters, that he has not nor will not read it. Now, is that it is an attitude befitting someone who the NY Times (!) described as “the world’s leading intellectual?” Since you’re evidently on close terms with him, you might ask him why he won’t read it and let us know.
Hi Jeff,
I will listen to your radio program. Thanks for the link.
If you think Chomsky’s suggested strategies are harmful to Palestinians, then you should criticize them of course. I haven’t been able to draw a conclusion myself yet about the influence of AIPAC. The Mearsheimer/Walt book is next on my reading list. Chomsky’s arguments seem plausible to me, but I’m not sure yet.
What I object to from you is your charges of “intellectual dishonesty” and statements like “it is evident that Chomsky’s affection for Israel , his sojourn on a kibbutz, his Jewish identity, and his early experiences with anti-Semitism to which he occasionally refers have coloured his approach to every aspect of Israel ’s conflict with the Palestinians and explain his defense of Israel .” Attack his positions and arguments if you want. That’s useful and helpful. What’s not helpful is casting aspersions on the character of someone that has worked so hard on behalf of Palestinians and all kinds of other oppressed people.
What I see is that Chomsky disagrees with you strategically. Assuming you are right and he’s wrong then yes, what he’s doing harms Palestinians. But I think his whole life is proof that even if he is wrong strategically there is no justification for presuming character defects and lack of good faith.
On the other hand I can understand your reaction. You see his positions as harmful to people subjected to enormous suffering, and it’s easy to react in an overzealous way. At worst your statements go a little too far, but they are made on behalf of a cause that is very just. Goldwater said that extremism for the cause of liberty is no vice, and my criticism of you is that maybe you’ve gone too far in your cause of liberty and justice for the Palestinians. Not the worst thing in the world. On the other hand Chomsky is revered for good reason in my view, so attacks on his character can rile me. The key though is that we keep in mind what’s really important. I certainly will stand shoulder to should with you in support of the ones that are really the victims here, that is the Palestinians. And the poor and oppressed throughout the world.
Jon, I base my allegation of his “intellectual dishonesty” on a number of things, one of the most important being his severely distorted history of US-Israel relations as depicted in The Fateful Triangle and subsequent writings. Just a couple of quick examples:
1) He totally neglects the presidency of JFK which means he fails to mention that Kennedy (A) supported the Palestinian right of return, both publicly and privately (as revealed in declassified documents) up to two days before his murder when the US UN delegate reaffirmed US support for Res.194.
2) He portrays George HW Bush as a “friend” to Israel while failing to mention (A) that as VP, Bush Sr. wanted Israel to be sanctioned for its attack on Iraq’s nuclear reactor in 1981 and was outvoted by Reagan and Haig (B) he wanted Israel to be sanctioned for its invasion of Lebanon in 1982 but was again outvoted by Reagan and Haig (D) as president, was totally opposed to Israel’s settlement building and demanded that they be stopped and (E) not only blocked Israel’s demand for $10 billion in loan guarantees, but when faced with a veto override, went on TV before the American people on 9-12-91 and criticized “a thousand Jewish lobbyists” on Capitol Hill and told the American people how much each Israel citizen received in US aid. “It is a day that will live in infamy,” said AIPAC exec dir Tom Dine at the time. Chomsky dismissed Bush’s historic speech as being akin to “curling his lip” which caused the lobby to evaporate or words to that effect. He never brought up the subject again but when he later wrote of Bush’s presidency he said it was favorable to Israel.
He apparently is the only one who thought so. His fellow Republicans turned on him and suddenly the media was filled with articles blaming him for the economic downturn. Moshe Arens’s “Broken Covenant” tells the real story of the Israel-US relations under Bush Sr.and it is a totally different telling than what we get from Chomsky which, given the facts that Chomsky ignores is nothing less than an example of intellectually dishonesty on his part. If he told the truth about either JFK or the first Bush presidency it would totally undermine his argument that Israel only does what the US allows it to do.
I should add that he also distorts the Carter presidency and doesn’t even mention the frustration of the Ford administration and Kissinger in trying to get Israel to disengage from the Sinai in 1975 which caused the US to temporarily suspend arms shipments to Israel and Ford to threaten to make a speech in which he would announce as “reassessment” of US-Israel policy,that the US was considering demanding that Israel return to the 67 borders and he was only stopped from doing so by the first and most famous letter drafted by AIPAC and signed by 76 senators telling Ford, in unambiguous terms, not to meddle with the Israel-US relationship. Ford backed down and never made the speech. The only time Chomsky refers to the Ford presidency in his writings, as far as I could determine, was in relation to East Timor and allowing the massacre there of the East Timorese. But when it comes to Israel-Palestine,I have yet to find a word. For more, please take the time to read my article on Chomsky from 2004,which I wrote after reviewing every book he has written on the subject plus a number of speeches.
My article was praised by a number of people who know Chomsky and otherwise admire him but who agree with my criticisms of his position on Israel-Palestine but for personal reasons would not put the same things that I did in writing. Here is the link:
http://www.leftcurve.org/LC29WebPages/Chomsky.html
Jon, I forgot to add (B) and (C) after JFK. (B) He was adamantly opposed to Israel’s building of nuclear weapons, publicly and privately and (C) he had hiis Justice Dept.under Bobby make a concerted effort to get the American Zionist Council, which morphed into AIPAC after the Fulbright Committee hearings in 1963 (which also Chomsky never mentions) to register as a foreign agent which would have dramatically limited its ability to play the kind of role in Washington that it was doing than and has been doing even more of since. Why, Chomsky needs to be asked, has he never, not once that I could find, ever mentioned these important aspects of the Kennedy presidency? Perhaps, it explains why he will never agree to a public debate on the validity of his position on US-Israel relations. It’s built on mostly hot air.
Jeff, while I look at some of your sources can you offer a source for your claim regarding George Bush Sr?
Jon, the sources for Bush’s demands for sanctions against Israel for Iraq in 81 and Lebanon and 82 as well as the scenario from the Israeli perspective and its friends in Congreths for the televised press conference on denying the loan guarantees, etc. can be found in Moshe Arens’s “Broken Covenant: American Foreign Policy and the Crisis between the US and Israel (Simon & Schuster, 1995) which I cited in my article along with articles in the Jewish press at the time. The exact page numbers are all in the longer article: Damage Control: Noam Chomsky and the Israel-Palestine Conflict. Again, the link: http://www.leftcurve.org/LC29WebPages/Chomsky.html.
In his introduction to “The New Intifada” published by Verson in 2001, Chomsky, who admitted to me in an email that he had not only not read Arens book but that he was not interested in reading it (!), wrote,”There is an illusion that the (first) Bush Administration took a harsh line toward Israel. The truth is the total opposite.” (p. 12). He then goes on to thoroughly distort Bush administration policy while saying nary a single word about Bush’s blocking of the loan guarantees. That is what i call intellectual dishonesty.
Just over lunch a few moments ago, I saw another example of this same intellectual dishonesty. He was quoted in a column by Alexander Cockburn on the Wikileaks disclosures as saying that “under popular pressure Congress barred Carter, later Reagan, from direct participation in virtual genocide in the Guatemalan highlands, so the Pentagon had to evade legislation in devious ways and Reagan had to call in terrorist states, primarily Israel, to carry out the massacres.”
What Chomsky is saying, not implying, but saying, is that the massacres of the Indians in the Guatemalan highlands carried out by the Guatemalan military, armed and trained by the Israelis (who I will get back to in a moment) were a policy goal of first the Carter and then the Reagan administrations and that had Israel not been ready and willing to do the job, Washington would have. This is what Israel Shahak meant by Chomsky’s “demonizing” of the presidency. Here is ready to damn Carter whatever he position he would take. Nowhere, of course, does Chomsky provide any proof that murdering Guatemalans in the highlandswas a US policy imperative or even explain why it would be, and he has repeated this libel against Carter time and again. This is intellectual dishonesty. Nowhere, of course, if you rely for Chomsky for his-story, will you be aware that in 1978, after Israel’s first major invasion of Lebanon, Carter ordered Menachem Begin to withdraw his forces or face the possible suspension of aid, and Israel withdrew. Chomsky has written this, too, out of history, and referring to Israel as a “terrorist state,” does not absolve him from omission which is yet another example of his intellectual dishonesty. What he appears to be doing by describing Israel in such a way is throwing its critics a bone to chew on and making them believe it’s meat.
We need to remember that he would say, “I’m not a critic of Israel. I support Israel,” which, spoken to an Israeli TV interviewer, was intended to shore up his reputation as an MOT before an Israeli audience. Of course, he has been critical of Israel and its actions as he was in The Fateful Triangle and has been elsewhere but what must one honestly think when the next moment he says that it is not Israel that should be punished or penalized,but the US?
I have seen the same kind of duplicitous behavior on the part of the leading Marxist and Trotskyist groups in the 80s, all of whom who loudly proclaimed in their newspapers and at their poorly attended meetings to be anti-Zionist but yet when it came down to including any reference to the struggle for justice in Palestine in the major mobilizations during the first Intifada directed against So.African apartheid and US intervention in Central America, they universally opposed it.
No doubt, it was just a coincidence that the leadership of these groups happened to be Jewish. I mention that because over the years there has been a concerted attempt from those quarters to make us believe that whether one is or isn’t Jewish is irrelevant when it comes to participating in the Israel-Palestine conflict. It is just as irrelevant as whether one was either Catholic or Protestant in Northern Ireland.
P.S. I just was informed of this overtly Zionist site that applauds Hammond for his defense of Chomsky:
http://szcnsw.auton.telligence.net.au/blog/?p=1935
It is worth noting on ChomskyWatch.
Jeff, this is very good information. Chomsky could be in error here. I don’t want to rush to judgment, but a lot of what you’ve said seems to make sense to me. I could accept that Chomsky is mistaken. What I do not believe I could come to accept is that Chomsky is really some sort of pro-Zionist or someone acting on bad faith.
Chomsky has a particular worldview which basically entails that the US is the godfather and everyone else is a junior partner. Suppose your arguments are a challenge to that worldview. An honest person can make what might appear to be outlandish arguments to retain their prior worldview. Granted, this could be stubbornness and maybe a character defect, but I wouldn’t call it dishonest. Maybe Chomsky is turning a blind eye to better arguments due to stubbornness. That’s possible.
I happen to be an ex-neocon Bush supporting pro-Israeli Republican. I became disillusioned following the war in Iraq and finally stumbled upon Chomsky because I made a conscious decision that I wanted to understand the Israel/Palestine conflict better. Mostly I listened to Chomsky’s lectures. Today I am basically outraged at the crimes of the Israeli government and I’m making concerted efforts to pressure my Congressmen about it. I send letters regarding the issue to my Congressman, in fact plan to meet during his satellite office hours (where I’ll meet with one of his staff) regarding this very issue, and make every effort to inform everyone I know about how we must do what we can to resist the Israeli government’s behavior. This mindset I have is due more to Noam Chomsky than to any other single individual. So if Chomsky is really a Zionist it seems to me he’s really bad at it. He might be wrong about AIPAC and he might have the wrong idea in terms of strategies, but to me it is obvious that he is not attempting to undermine the Palestinian cause.
Here’s a little anecdote that may interest you. Norman Finkelstein recently spoke in my area so I went to his lecture and because of your discussion with Jeremy I asked him a question, via a note card, related to this. Basically I asked why is it that Israel is treated differently in Washington? The US has strategic interests in various brutal governments throughout the world, but Congress doesn’t gather at the steps of the Capital to condemn Amnesty International’s reports on Colombia’s human rights abuses. What explains the overt and over the top Congressional support for Israeli crimes, such as the near unanimous condemnation of the Goldstone Report? Unfortunately the question was sort of truncated by the moderator that read the card, but Finkelstein addressed the issue for the most part.
And as I suppose you know Finkelstein takes the Chomsky view on AIPAC. And I think it would be pretty absurd to suggest he’s really out to undermine Palestinian human rights issues. He’s pretty much flushed his career down the toilet exposing Israeli propaganda and frauds, first Joan Peters and then Alan Dershowitz. His whole life is a commitment to the Palestinian people.
Anyway in response he made a pretty interesting point. Even though I didn’t mention AIPAC in my question he knew that this was the point and he said yeah, this is the big debate. How much is AIPAC really the culprit? And he said it’s true, they do have some influence of course. How much is the question. So take the occupation. There’s no real strategic benefit to the US in the occupation, but it goes on. Chalk that up to AIPAC. Same with the Congressional groveling and condemnation of the Goldstone report. But all told the US has strategic interest here and that’s big as well.
So I thought that was an interesting point I’d like to put to Chomsky. The occupation serves no vital US interest. What corporation benefits from that, outside of maybe Caterpillar. It’s Osama bin Laden’s main gripe with the US, so it makes us less safe and prompts violence both against US citizens and US military. It costs us clout at the UN as we continually vote against the world on a peaceful resolution. Doesn’t this suggest that AIPAC is really capable of accomplishing a lot? And if they can do it on that issue, why not others?
By the way I did listen to your radio broadcast and the Shapiro speech was pretty stunning. Thanks for the references. Also I was hoping to get a reference to Bush’s “a thousand Jewish lobbyists against little me” statement. Is there video of that?
One other question. Does it really matter what Chomsky thinks about the amount of influence AIPAC has? I’m sure he’s not a fan and believes they should be resisted. He’s not stopping anybody from attacking them as much as they like.
Jon,
To begin with the last question, it does really matter what Chomsky says and writes because there are so many people who for whom Chomsky has opened their eyes and as a consequence they tend to take everything he says as if it was the truth. In that sense his influence is unique.
I cannot speculate regarding the reasons he is simply wrong more times than not when he describes US-Israel relations and it is not a matter of having a different opinion but a case of willfully ignoring facts. When someone does this once or twice, it may be a simple oversight but Chomsky does this repeatedly, it is somewhat bewildering and I can only attribute that to his reluctance, which is more common than not, among Jews across the political spectrum, to blame Jews as Jews for anything, since in their reading of history, collectively blaming Jews for a society’s problems is a prelude to a bad end.
Chomsky is not a historian, moreover, but a polemicist, and as such,may believe that gives him more literary license than a true historian. Certainly, there are quite a few lesser known historians who are also critical of Israel but whose scholarship is on a far higher level than Chomsky simply because they follow the rules they were taught in the university when it comes to providing a wider picture of events and a more scrupulous use of sources. In this latter department Chomsky is particularly vulnerable and that is not surprising given how wrong he has been when it comes to analyzing the behavior towards Israel of the various presidents as I indicated in my previous post.
Given Chomsky’s widespread influence, criticizing him is guaranteed to bring the wrath of his fans down upon the critic’s head but it is that very influence that demands he be held to account. For, if Chomsky was actually correct and all US presidents had lined up solidly behind Israel there would be little any of us could do about it given our distance from the White House and the seat of power. But if Chomsky was wrong, as I believe I proved in my earlier article and that Congress plays a dominant role when it comes to Middle East politics and that Congress is, in turn, controlled by the Zionist lobby, then at least, on a local level, we can carry the fight to our member of Congress. Thanks to Chomsky’s influence, we have never seen that happen.
If there was a vibrant Palestine solidarity movement, none of this would be that imnportant but there isn’t one and that there has never been one obligates those who have been in the trenches for almost as long as Chomsky to begin looking for the reasons. For me and some others,the failure to confront the lobby AKA the Jewish establishment and the politicians at a local level can be traced to their following Chomsky’s simplistic analysis and if we are to change the present situation we have to step hard on some toes. If they happen to be Chomsky’s, so be it. His feelings and reputation are worth absolutely nothing when compared to the injustices that have been done and continue to be done to Palestinians.
Regarding Bush Sr.’s statement that it was “a thousand lobbyists against little me,” I am sure there is a clip of that in every network’s archives but I have yet to see or hear it. It was, however, printed in the NY Times and no doubt in the Washington Post. What was also important and what Chomsky has never mentioned is that after that press conference, the polls gave Bush an 85% approval rating and weeks later the percentage of Americans supporting aid to Israel was about 45% while those who supported aid to the former Soviet Union and to Poland was in the 70s. These percentages were not a secret but few know them now and certainly no one who has relied on Chomsky to learn what is needed to be known about the Israel-Palestine conflict and the US relation to that conflict, in particular.
Jeff,
* You’re correct on one point: Chomsky praised Fayyad’s policy of trying to create facts on the ground for the creation of a def facto independent Palestinian State. One needn’t “interpret” that he approved of this policy, because Chomsky said so explicitly.
What is NOT reasonable to suggest, as you so dishonestly assert, that “Chomsky also approved of the Zionists’ state building plans from the last century”. Nonsense. Nor is it reasonable to suggest, as you so dishonestly did, that Chomsky also thinks the PA’s collusion with Israel, such as with suppression of the Goldstone Report, is “sensible and sound”. Nonsense.
You say again you “have seen no evidence that he critized the PA for being party to that suppression”. Neither have you seen any evidence that he thought this “sound and sensible”, as you so dishonestly suggest.
You again repeat that “there was nothing that Chomsky said that would lead the listener to conclude that Chomsky was also a critic of the PA”. Nor was there anything that Chomsky said that would lead the listener to conclude that Chomsky “approved the Zionists’ state building plans from the last century” or that he found PA collussion with Israel to be “sensible and sound”, as you’ve so dishonestly suggested.
It’s also dishonest to say “he consideres the PA to be the legitimate Palestinian leadership despite the fact that it has not been elected”. Not only has Chomsky never expressed that view, which you so dishonestly attribute to him, but Chomsky has referred to and criticized the U.S.-backed PA coup attempt and observed that Hamas was the rightfully elected leadership of the Palestinian people many times. He repeats this constantly, noting that it was for choosing the wrong leaders that Gazans were punished with first the siege, and then Operation Cast Lead.
* Now, on Chomsky’s “intellectual dishonesty” in Fateful Triangle:
(1) What are you suggesting is “dishonest” about not talking about Kennedy in the book?
(2) Quote Chomsky where he “portrays George HW Bush as a ‘friend’ to Israel” so we may examine what it is you accuse him of dishonesty for. I’ve checked every reference in the index to Bush, and nowhere does Chomsky do so. So your entire lengthy point appears moot.
* The full quote from the Cockburn article:
Apparently, Alexander Cockburn is also guilty of “intellectual dishonesty”.
* The full quote from the interview on Israeli TV, in which Chomsky was extremely critical of Israel (contrary to what Jeff dishonestly implies):
The only person guilty of intellectual dishonesty here is Jeff Blankfort.
Hammond, I have read virtually everything Chomsky has written about Zionism and nowhere have I seen any criticism of the state building that begin in the early 20s under British rule and since, according to Chomsky, there was no unanimous decision by the Zionist leadership at the time to establish a Jewish only state (with which both Nahum Goldmann and yours truly disagree), there would have been no reason for Chomsky to criticize it. Under the circumstances it is entirely reasonable to say that Chomsky approved of the early Zionist efforts at state building.
When Chomsky speaks favorably of Fayyad’s following the early Zionist course as he so plainly did and that he had been planning to meet with him, that is a defacto recognition of the PA’s legitimacy. If he considered Fayyad not to be a legitimate leader of the Palestinian people why would he have been meeting with him in the first place?
You keep bringing up the Goldstone Report which Chomsky supported and the PA did not and, in fact, tried to suppress it. Chomsky criticized Israeli and US efforts to suppress but I am unable to find any criticism of his concerning the PA’s efforts. Nowhere did I suggest that he agreed with them, but what I had originally pointed out was that Amy Goodman should have asked him some questions about the PA and that Chomsky himself did not take the opportunity to make any critical comments about it. People can draw their own conclusions from that but there is nothing dishonest about it. The fact that Chomsky has written critically of the US backed coup attempt in Gaza does not change that in any way since Chomsky believes the US drives Israeli policy in all its aspects.
Re Fateful Triangle and JFK et al. If one is trying to make the case that Israel has been supported from the very beginning as a strategic asset by every US administration (which is bullshit), his failure to mention the actions by US presidents Kennedy, Ford and Carter that conflict with his interpretation is INTELLECTUALLY DISHONEST and if you can’t see that you are guilty of the same charge.
Re the Bush as a friend of Israel quote, obviously you also have problems reading the English language let alone being historically challenged. I will repeat what I wrote to Jon:
“In his introduction to “The New Intifada” published by Verson in 2001, Chomsky, who admitted to me in an email that he had not only not read Arens book but that he was not interested in reading it (!), wrote,”There is an illusion that the (first) Bush Administration took a harsh line toward Israel. The truth is the total opposite.” (p. 12). He then goes on to thoroughly distort Bush administration policy while saying nary a single word about Bush’s blocking of the loan guarantees. That is what i call intellectual dishonesty.”
With regard to Chomsky’s comment on Nicaragua, why would I accuse my good friend, Alexander Cockburn, of intellectual dishonesty? All he was doing was quoting Chomsky. Don’t you know by now what there (” “) marks mean?
That full quote from Chomsky illustrates what I mean about him still being a Zionist. Sixty two years after its ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians, 43 years after its seizure of the West Bank and Gaza, after three major wars and dozens of bombing raids over Lebanon beginning in 1964, only a Polyanna could write such a ridiculous statement about a country whose entire existence has been an ongoing war crime.
Let’s take these two sentences: “They are helping [to] drive Israel towards moral degeneration and possible ultimate destruction. I think support for Israel should be support for policies which are for its benefit.”
Does Chomsky think that Israel did not reach “moral degeneration” long ago? And why, pray tell, should Israel be supported in the first place and who but a Zionist would ask such a question? Obviously, you seem to be one, as well, proving you don’t have to be Jewish to be one.
Hammond, whatever reputation you had before you took up the cudgels for Chomsky three weeks ago, it certainly has taken a beating. You remind me of a friend, Avrum Dansky, with whom I used to play gin rummy and then blackjack when we both worked at the old LA Examiner years ago.
We played for money and I was beating him badly every night. Having lost consistently at gin playing four games at once, we switched to blackjack. Stupidly, he allowed me to deal as well as win the “pushes” (when we both had the same hand). In the end I was dealing 13 hands at a time at $2 a hand (it was worth more then) and winning so regularly that our workmates entreated him to quit as did I. But Avrum would just put his head down and say, “Deal ‘em.” In the end, when he finally threw in the towel, I had enough money to buy myself a two-tone green Pontiac convertible with green leather seats, I gave him the first ride. My Subaru doesn’t have the same class as did that old Pontiac, Jeremy, but any time you’d like to fall by, I’ll have the passenger door open.
“Hammond, I have read virtually everything Chomsky has written about Zionism and nowhere have I seen any criticism of the state building that begin in the early 20s under British rule and since, according to Chomsky, there was no unanimous decision by the Zionist leadership at the time to establish a Jewish only state (with which both Nahum Goldmann and yours truly disagree), there would have been no reason for Chomsky to criticize it. Under the circumstances it is entirely reasonable to say that Chomsky approved of the early Zionist efforts at state building.” — Jeff Blankfort
“[I] AGREE [that 'Chomsky means he was opposed to a Jewish state and supportive of a binational solution]. I’VE ALREADY ACKNOWLEDGED THAT.” — Jeff Blankfort
See, Jeff, this is the problem. You just refuse to be honest. No need to read past your first paragraph to recognize that easily demonstrable fact.
You are still coming around for more?
Chomsky swallowed everything Ben-Gurion was saying in his early days, believing that he was sincere in wanting to share the land with the Arab Palestinians. It was obvious, as Nahum Goldmann, WHO WAS THERE with Ben-Gurion, has pointed out, that with the Jews but a small percentage at the time he would not be about to declare the Zionists’ real intentions. Chomsky’s problem is that he is not about to let facts get in the way of his opinions. As Israel Shahak noted, Chomsky is very “stubborn.”
There is nothing inconsistent in what I have written. According to Chomsky, there was no decision to go for an exclusive Jewish state until the Nazi Judeocide. Under those circumstances, if he believed that to be true, he would have had no reason to condemn the state building activities of the Yishuv and I have found no evidence that he ever did.
In that context, it is reasonable to assume that when he complimented Fayyad on trying to duplicate what the Zionists had done, he was praising both those early Zionists as well as Fayyad. If you refuse to recognize that you have a severe mental disorder which might be called Chomskyitis.
Jeff, given the fact that you acknowledge the fact that Chomsky opposed the creation of a Jewish state, how is your assertion that he fully supported the creation of a Jewish state not dishonest?
You continually attempt to obfuscate the issue. But when you boil it down, your intellectual dishonesty is just glaringly obvious.
Jeremy, I have never made any such assertion that Chosmky “fully supported the creation of a Jewish state” and since you assert that I have, please provide this list with the proof. Why do you continue to fabricate lies about what I said? Obviously, you think Chomsky’s record is not strong enough to withstand my criticism on its own.
For the last time: While Chomsky opposed the establishment of a Jewish state he has said more than once since, including in his recent interview with Israel’s Channel 2, that after 1948 he considered Israel to be as legitimate as any other state, no more or no less. Since Israel’s founding fathers had declared THE ESTABLISHMENT OF A JEWISH STATE IN ERETZ-ISRAEL, TO BE KNOWN AS THE STATE OF ISRAEL at its inception, ipso facto, it is fair and reasonable to say that Chomsky considered that state to be legitimate and apparently, he still does, irrespective of his position prior to its establishment.
If Israel had declared itself since to be a state of ALL its citizens, there might be some rational explanation for his position. Since it hasn’t, there isn’t.
If there is any obfuscation it is upon Chomsky’s part as well as your own.
Is it fair to say that there are two separate issues here.
1-Is Chomsky mistaken in his assertions that the Lobby is less relevant to US foreign policy towards Israel and
2-Has Blankfort unfairly represented Chomsky in order to portray him as a person acting on bad faith.
With regards to point 1, Jeff I have to admit that your case seems pretty solid. The statements from Carter, the embarrassment that Netanyahu has subjected Obama to (which you mentioned in the Weir interview), etc. These things would suggest that Israeli and US interests do not align as well as Chomsky would suggest, meaning the business community perhaps is not as powerful in shaping policy as Chomsky might argue and in fact we need to look to other factors. Like the Lobby.
Jeremy, do you have an opinion with regards to point 1?
Jeff, I think you are arguing for point 1 whereas Jeremy is arguing point 2. I’m not sure Jeremy disagrees on point 1. At lest it’s not clear to me. Maybe he does.
But I have to admit you’ve taken the shine off of Chomsky a little bit in my eyes. Your case is strong. For point 1 that is. For point 2 I can understand why you might out of frustration feel that way. When someone doesn’t acknowledge truths for years you might presume they’re dishonest. But as an ex-neocon and formerly extremely religious person I know how an honest person can set rationality aside and deny facts, for instance to preserve an opinion that they might adhere to partially for emotional reasons. Maybe the issue is stubbornness. I think you would be better served though focusing on arguing point 1. Delve in to speculation about Chomsky’s motives and you will distract from what really matters. And it’s very difficult to prove. Why bother? You’re convincing me on point 1 and I think that’s the important point.
@Jon, Jeff and Jeremy,
As regards point 1 that Jon makes above, it should be noted that in an interview published today, Chomsky talks about this exact point:
“There is, of course, also a Jewish lobby – an Israeli lobby — APAC, which is a very influential lobby. And so there are many… and there’s Christian Zionism, which is a huge element. Well, you know, all of these combined to provide a background for U.S. support for Israel, and they’re facing virtually no opposition. Who’s calling for support of the Palestinians?”
Full interview – 13 pages in print or in an audio file if you prefer – is here:
http://chomskywatch.wordpress.com/2010/08/16/kathleen-wells-j-d-noam-chomsky-on-israel/
Thank you Admin, for the reference. I just completed reading the entire interview it contains substantially the same reading of history that I critically examined in my 2004 Left Curve article.
When he It is clear that he really doesn’t understand what the Israel lobby on the Jewish side is composed of and it seems it has never interested him. As he has written me, “I don’t write about it, I don’t talk about it,” and in a quasi-debate on the subject at MIT two years ago with someone not well versed on the subject, he called such discussions an “abstraction” and a “distraction” from doing more important work on which he tends to be non-specific or as unrealistic as in this current interview when asked by the interviewer what people cab do:
Noam Chomsky: That’s up to people like you, the citizens of the United States. If we have … if we care about what our country is doing, we should proceed to do something about it.
Kathleen Wells: So when you say we should proceed to do something, get me some specifics. What should we do?
Noam Chomsky: We should be organizing and acting to get Congress to compel the administration to move towards reducing the dire threat of nuclear weapons. And there are many ways to do it. One is by establishing nuclear-weapons-free zones.
Now if Chomsky had the slightest understanding of Congress which it is clear he doesn’t and of what appears to me, as an activist of six decades, the weakest serious political opposition since the pre-Vietnam days, he would talk about that and why and it is the case and what might be done to correct it.
Instead,while not in this interview, Chomsky has described what passes for an anti-war movement these days as being far advanced over where it was in the early stages of the Vietnam War. This is another example of where I find Chomsky lacking as an historian and it has nothing to do with the Israel-Palestine issue.
Thanks to the internet, during the buildup and after the outset of the Iraq war, we have had access to news and information, and as important,images from the war zone, plus programs like Democracy Now and community radio programs that were non-existent in the early 60s. Now, with email, Facebook, Twitter and whatever I don’t know about, we are able to communicate with ease, watch Al-Jazeera on our computers with ease, and yet, as Alexander Cockburn has pointed out on several occasions, the anti-war movement, such as it is, is almost invisible. Chomsky believes it to be otherwise. If he is not able to see its obvious weaknesses, what does that say about his judgment on other issues?
When he speaks of the pro-Israel Lobby, and does so only when asked, he just mentions AIPAC, as if that was it and never mentions for example, the American Jewish Committee which is the the pro-Israel establishment’s State Dept. with institutes in Latin America, Africa, and Europe and which has been regularly lobbying countries in those regions on Israel’s behalf for decades. A visit to its site, http://www.ajc.com is something I advise for anyone seriously concerned not only with the Israel-Palestine conflict but with the fomenting of an attack on Iran as well. It has not only run ads in the NY Times warning about the dangers of a nuclear armed Iran, it has been lobbying for Israel in foreign capitals on the same issue. I have never seen any mention by Chomsky of the AJC’s existence.
Every month, according to the Jerusalem Report and JJ Goldberg in his excellent 1994 book, Jewish Power, the representatives of the major Jewish organizations meet in Washington and strategize for the coming month. Are these meetings of no consequence? Are the letters signed by 3/4 of the members of Congress of both houses that have been drafted by AIPAC and sent to Obama warning him against pressuring Israel, that are mentioned only in the Jewish press, of no concern to us? Does the fact that in the August 2009 recess, 55 members of the House, more than 1/10 of its membership, 30 Democrats, led by House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer,and 25 Republicans, traveled to Israel where they gave press conferences in which they stood with Israel against their own president not worth mentioning? Or that Rep.Dick Gephardt did the very same thing back in 1998 when Bill Clinton, finally determined to exert US interests in resolving the Israel-Palestine conflict was urging Netanyahu, who was Israel’s PM at the time, to give up more land, and members of Congress of his own party put the brakes on him, publicly?
That’s in Washington. At the local level there are Jewish Community Relations Councils in all the major cities and they act as unofficial lobbyists for Israel with local and state officials who they are regularly sending on all expense paid trips to Israel. They are a powerful part of the pro-Israel establishment. (While the Christian Zionists have numbers, all of them Republican, when it comes to lobbying they are not in AIPAC’s league. When it comes to the major political contributers, the pro-Israel Lobby is in a class by itself.)
That Chomsky has never mentioned a single one of these historical facts is not inconsequential in my estimation and it is what obliges me to take him on in a public way and to do so without apology.
If he was just another individual with an opinion with which I differ it would not bother me. But he is, without a doubt, the most influential single critic of US policy in the world, is invited on a regular basis to speak on every continent, and even has a website devoted to him. To me, what he doesn’t say is as important as what he does. Moreover, I wish he would express the same willingness to debate his positions with those who disagree with him from the Left as this site is in publishing them.
Fine, Jeff, I’ll rephrase and use your exact words, so as not to allow you to turn this into a debate over semantics. So:
Given the fact that you acknowledge the fact that Chomsky opposed the creation of a Jewish state, how is your assertion that he “approved of the early Zionist efforts at state building” not dishonest?
Now please answer the question.
(Thanks, admin, for the link.)
@Jeff, As Chomsky acknowledges in his latest interview, the Israeli lobby in Washington is an influential force on US politics. However, the reason he doesn’t make it the main focus of his study is because the evidence is that US government geo-political interests in the region are the main driver of US policy towards Israel – not the Israeli lobby. This makes perfect sense to focus on the root source of the problem.
@Jeremy, according to the 2003 interview below, Chomsky did not oppose the establishment of Israel in 1948. He just wanted it to obey international law like any other state – something it has consistently failed to do with US support. In his words:
“On the matter of legitimacy and recognition, once the State of Israel was established in 1948, my feeling has been that it should have the rights of any state in the international system: no more, no less. That includes, specifically, the right to live in peace and security within its recognized international borders, understood to be the pre-June 1967 borders, with minor and mutual adjustments.”
http://www.chomsky.info/interviews/200309–.htm
@admin, Chomsky did indeed oppose the creation of Israel as a Jewish state in 1948. He favored a binational solution — the solution favored by the Arabs themselves. Jeff is perfectly well aware of this fact (and has explicitly acknowledged it in previous discussions, elsewhere, which is the context for much of this I realize you’re unaware of), yet still asserts that “approved of the early Zionist efforts at state building”.
Of course, the early Zionist efforts at state building was the establishment of the very Jewish state Chomsky explicitly opposed (as Jeff knows perfectly well). The Zionist efforts also consisted of the explicit rejection of Arab self-determination, and the ethnic cleansing of Palestine. To suggest Chomsky “approved” of these Zionist efforts at state building is absolutely dishonest.
To say Israel, once established, should have equal rights of statehood is not to express approval for the early Zionist efforts at state building. In fact, as Jeff also knows perfectly well, Chomsky has explicitly rejected the notion that Israel has a “right to exist.”
Admin, my argument with Chomsky over his position that the US support for Israel is based on its role as a strategic asset is that it is based on questionable assumptions that he has not supported with concurring opinions of either government officials or other scholars in the field. The two examples that he always raises, Israel’s defeat of Nasser in 1967 and its dissuading Syria from intervening during Black September are not only now 40 years old, but they are also open to differing interpretations, not to mention that both these crises stemmed from Israel’s presence in the region in the first place.
Moreover, what he and others overlook concerning Black September is that key to Syria’s refusal to assist the Palestinians was the decision by the head of its airforce, Hafez Al-Assad, not to join the effort launched by then President Atassi who Assad resented because he felt Syria had become too close to the Palestinians and he had a particular animus towards Yasser Arafat. Within a few months of the Palestinians’ defeat by Hussein, Assad overthrew the Atassi regime and threw him and hundreds of pro-Palestinian officials in prison and shut down the Syrian backed resistance group, Al-Saika, which had been close to the Democratic Front.
Prior to the coup, when one crossed into Syria from Lebanon, as I did at the time, one was greeted by both Syrian and Palestinian flags and Syrian and Palestinian checkpoints on either side of the border crossing. This was too much for Assad, a Syrian nationalist, and he was determined to end that close relationship and so he did. It was Syrian forces that were also involved in the massacre of the Tal al-Zattar refugee camp in Beirut in 1976.
Jeremy, as I pointed out, Chomsky maintains that the Zionist leadership in Palestine did not decide to go for a Jewish state until WW2 and the Holocaust and that a bi-national state was one of the options up to that time (a point with which I and others, including Nahum Goldmann, one of the decision makers disagree). If that was the case, why would Chomsky have opposed the state building processes, building of industries by the Histadrut, etc? If he did, I have never seen any evidence of it. That’s up to you to provide, not me.
I am, frankly,more concerned with his failure to mention those acts by American presidents Kennedy, Ford, Carter and Bush Sr. that conflict with his interpretation of Israel-US relations, an omission that I consider to be intellectually dishonest because his view of US-Israel relations form the center of his analysis. If that center cannot hold , then his analysis collapses.
I am curious why that does not seem to trouble you and why you continue to be preoccupied with whether or not Chomsky supported the state of Israel on May 16, 1948, the day after its establishment was declared when it is clear from all the available evidence that he did. If you have evidence to the contrary, you have yet to present it.
The Chomsky quote, cited by Admin, makes his position clear as I have been trying to tell you. I will also tell you, as I pointed out in my first article, that he did not support the Palestinians demand for statehood until they agreed upon a two state solution and he considered those Palestinian organizations that called for a “democratic secular state”, such as the PFLP and DFLP to be “rejectionist.” See:
http://www.leftcurve.org/LC29WebPages/Chomsky.html
Jeff, you are trying to evade the issue. You wrote, in explaining Chomsky’s prominenced as a spokesperson for the Palestinian cause, that he obtained this position in part because “if the Jewish state was to be criticized it had to be by someone from within the tribe who unequivocally supported its existence.” You’ve repeated that theme here.
Yet when you wrote the above, you were perfectly well aware of Chomsky’s opposition to a Jewish state, which he expressed in the very interview you cited (and elsewhere): “But Zionism at that time included my own position, which was opposition to a Jewish state and a call for a binational settlement in the former Palestine.”
If Chomsky was opposed the Jewish state, how is stating that he “unequivocally supported” the “existence” of “the Jewish state” not dishonest?
Also, Jeff, you denied above that you ever asserted that Chomsky fully supported the creation of a Jewish state (despite having written that he “unequivocally supported its existence”). So which is it? Chomsky did or did not support the creation of a Jewish state?
You are so dishonest you can’t even keep all your lies straight so as to put together a consistent argument.
Jeremy, I believe you are either so blinded by your attachment to Chomsky or you need a remedial course in reading comprehension. Let’s try the latter. First read aloud the statement cited by Admin with which I am sure you are familiar:
“On the matter of legitimacy and recognition, once the State of Israel was established in 1948, my feeling has been that it should have the rights of any state in the international system: no more, no less. That includes, specifically, the right to live in peace and security within its recognized international borders, understood to be the pre-June 1967 borders, with minor and mutual adjustments.”
Does that statement indicate that the writer recognizes the legitimacy of Israel’s existence? If you answer “NO,” please explain your answer.
Bonus question: How does the position of the author of the cited statement differ from that publicly expressed by the Clinton, Bush Jr., and the Obama administrations?
Jeff. When you answer my question, which I’ve been asking you repeatedly for a long time now, I’ll answer yours.
If Chomsky was opposed the Jewish state, how is stating that he “unequivocally supported” the “existence” of “the Jewish state” not dishonest?
Hammond, I guess you need someone besides me to tell you that you are making a bigger fool out of yourself with each additional comment
Please cite the quote of mine in which, as you say, I wrote or asserted that Chomsky fully “supported the creation of a Jewish state.” Would you like to wager some money on whether or not you can find such a statement?
In the quote of Chomsky cited by Admin, however, it is clear that after Israel declared its statehood in 1948, Chomsky UNEQUIVOCALLY considered that state to be legitimate. It was apparent that although he had opposed a specifically Jewish state, he was not going to let that stop him from recognizing the state’s legitimacy, whatever it called itself.
Moreover, he clearly revealed his attachment to that state when he wrote how on the eve of the 1967 war, that he was concerned about the state’s future existence. You can find the citation in my article, Damage Control:Noam Chomsky and the Israel-Palestine Conflict:
http://www.leftcurve.org/LC29WebPages/Chomsky.html
I’m curious if by now you have read that article? Be the first to offer a refutation. Neither Chomsky, who has said/writtem that he won’t read it, nor any of his admirers, have done so. Wonder why?
Jeff, why won’t you answer the question? Why are you still trying to evade the issue?
If Chomsky was opposed the Jewish state, how is your stating that he “unequivocally supported” the “existence” of “the Jewish state” not dishonest?
I think Chomsky’s 2003 quote from the interview makes his position on Israel quite clear so there is no need for anyone to post anymore speculation on that.
@Jeremy, it seems Jeff is upset that you’re accusing him of saying that Chomsky specifically supported a Jewish state instead of an bi-national Arab-Jewish state. If you can’t provide a quote by Jeremy where he specifically says this, then I think your accusation is without foundation.
In conclusion, it seems you are both in agreement that Chomsky has never favored a Jewish state over a bi-national Jewish-Arab state so you should build on that common ground. I’m not quite sure why you are both “fighting” each other over something you both agree on!
@admin,
You’ll please observe that I’ve already quoted Blankfort asserting that Chomsky’s prominence as a spokesperson for Palestinian cause is in part because “if the Jewish state was to be criticized it had to be by someone from within the tribe who unequivocally supported its existence.”
Thus, Blankfort asserts that Chomsky “unequivocally supported” the “existence” of “the Jewish state”. Hence my question to Jeff, which I’ll repeat once more:
If Chomsky was opposed the Jewish state, how is your stating that he “unequivocally supported” the “existence” of “the Jewish state” not dishonest?
You’re welcome to try to answer the question if you like, admin, if you think there’s a reasonable explanation other than that Jeff is dishonest.
@Jeff, thanks for clarifying and highlighting the comment again.
@Jeremy, the comment Jeff is referring to is your assertion that: “If the Jewish state was to be criticized it had to be by someone from within the tribe who unequivocally supported its existence.” This answers your question, “Please cite the quote of mine in which, as you say, I wrote or asserted that Chomsky fully “supported the creation of a Jewish state.””
I now understand Jeff’s point that this can easily be interpreted as meaning that in your eyes, Chomsky supported the existence of a solely Jewish state rather than a bi-national one.
Is this what you really meant or is it simply badly worded or taken out of context?
I’m not sure where any confusion lies. No interpretation is required. Jeff asserted plainly and unambiguously that Chomsky “unequivocally supported” the “existence” of “the Jewish state”. Yet he knows perfectly well that Chomsky actually opposed the creation of a Jewish state. So my question is, how can this assertion be explained by anything other than dishonesty? I await an answer.
For the last time,Jeremy, on the basis of what he has said and written, Chomsky’s support for Israel as a state can not be questioned. That he did not want that state to be a “Jewish state” has not led him to change his position. So let me try to simplify it:
Chomsky recognizes the legitimacy of Israel as a state like any other with the same rights as every other state, no more no less, as he told the Israeli interviewer, and as he has said and written before. There is and has never been any equivocation in that statement.
Israel was established and considers itself and is considered by the world as a “Jewish state” (its 20% Palestinian Arab population notwithstanding).
Chomsky supports Israel within its 1967 borders more or less, which includes, apparently, his acceptance of its seizure of the additional territory it captured in 1948, beyond what it would have been accorded by the UN partition resolution.
If that does not meet the definition for unequivocal, I don’t know what does.
@Jeff and Jeremy, I’ve found another interview by Chomsky in the New York Times which should eliminate any further doubt on this issue:
“I objected to the founding of Israel as a Jewish state. I don’t think a Jewish or Christian or Islamic state is a proper concept. I would object to the United States as a Christian state.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/11/02/magazine/way-we-live-now-11-02-03-questions-for-noam-chomsky-professorial-provocateur.html
As far as I can see, you are now both having an argument on something you both agree on! You both agree that Chomsky never favored the establishment of a solely Jewish state. I can see however that Jeff’s assertion that “If the JEWISH STATE was to be criticized it had to be by someone from within the tribe who unequivocally supported its existence” is perhaps an unfortunate choice of words. However, since Israel is officially known as a “Jewish State” I understand why Jeff used it.
I think there has been a huge misunderstanding here. I don’t think Jeff is being “dishonest” Jeremy. He’s made his honest opinion patently clear in this debate. He DOES NOT think Chomsky favored a Jewish state. Perhaps if instead of “Jewish state” he had used the word “Israel” it would have been better? If he had written “If ISRAEL was to be criticized it had to be by someone from within the tribe who unequivocally supported its existence” would that have been clearer and more accurate?
Thank you, Admin. I used the term “Jewish state” rather than Israel because that is the way most Jews, whatever their opinion of it, think of it.
My bigger concern is Chomsky’s omission of significant actions taken by presidents Kennedy, Ford, Carter,and Bush Sr., in presenting his analysis of US-Israel relations, how the pro-Israel lobby/establishment responded to those actions, and that Chomsky’ has minimized the influence of that lobby/establishment on US Middle East policies..
@Jeff, it does not follow that since Chomsky believes Israel should be afforded equal rights and priveleges of statehood, no more and no less, that he therefore “unequivocally supported” the “existence” of “the Jewish state”. As you know, that is false. As you know, Chomsky was and is unequivocally opposed to the existence of Israel as a “Jewish state”.
So, again, I ask: Given the fact that you know Chomsky is opposed to the Jewish state, how is asserting that he “unequivocally supported” its “existence” not dishonest?
@Admin, if Jeff used “an unfortunate choice of words” and misstated himself, that might explain how his statement could possibly be not dishonest. I’ll have to hear that from him, though, since he’s the author and knows what he means to say and how to say what he means. I’m skeptical of this explanation, since I’ve repeatedly put the question to Jeff and he’s constantly refused to offer any kind of reasonable explanation, such as the one you propose.
@Jeff, so, is Admin correct? Did you misstate yourself? You say “I used the term “Jewish state” rather than Israel because that is the way most Jews, whatever their opinion of it, think of it.” But that doesn’t answer the question, so let me put it to you another way:
Do you agree or disagree that it is FALSE to say that Chomsky “unequivocally supported” the “existence” of “the Jewish state”?
If Admin’s explanation is correct, your answer to this must be “yes”. Otherwise, we cannot accept that this is just a matter of “an unfortunate choice of words”. So if your answer is “no”, I still await an explanation as to how this assertion is not dishonest.
It should be obvious that if Chomsky did not support the existence of the Jewish state of Israel, he would not tell his Israeli interviewer that,”I’m not a critic of Israel, I’m a supporter of Israel.” Those are his words, not mine, and what he said afterward only confirmed that support and, indeed, affection for it..
If he did not support the Jewish state of Israel he would say so and he support a state for all it citizens which he currently opposes.
I await your explanation of why Chomsky has omitted from his historical record the actions of JFK, Ford, Carter and Bush Sr that shred his analysis of US-Israel relations.
Why do you keep avoiding this much more important issue?
@Admin, Well, there you have it. There was no “unfortunate use of words”, no misunderstanding. Just the dishonest assertion that Chomsky “unequivocally supports” the “existence” of the “Jewish state”, even after you yourself provided clear and incontrovertible proof that precisely the opposite is true, that Chomsky unequivocally opposes the existence of the “Jewish state”.
You’ll observe also that in order to try to sustain this assertion, Blankfort quotes (yet again) Chomsky saying, “I’m not a critic of Israel, I’m a supporter of Israel.”
As a little experiment, let’s ask Jeff what Chomsky said immediately after that in his next breath, in which he explained what he meant by that remark (Jeff is perfectly well aware of it, so this should be fun). Well, Jeff? What’s the answer to that one? Please enlighten us as to Chomsky’s actual views. Please provide the context of this remark and explain his meaning for us.
One thing at a time, Jeff. Once we resolve this little matter, we can move on to the next.
You tell me what he said, Jeremy, if you think it negates his support for Israel. I don’t nor do others around the world who watched or read that interview.
The bottom line is that Chomsky stands in opposition to the international campaign called by Palestinian civil society which he does not seem to take as seriously as he does the PA’s unelected prime minister, Fayyad, for a total boycott of Israel, along with divestment and sanctions.
Forget about his nonsensical and insulting charge that those Americans who support the Palestinian call are being “hypocritical” because they are not calling for a similar campaign against the United States and what we see Chomsky clearly doing what he has for years by deflecting attention from the influence of the pro-Israel establishment and that is providing damage control for Israel as I described in detail in my article: Damage Control: Noam Chomsky and the Israel-Palestine Conflict. If there is a hypocrite in all this it is Chomsky himself who will on other occasions, but not to an Israeli interviewer, will refer to Israel as a “terrorist state,” but when it comes to actually doing something that will materially affect that terrorist state, he actively opposes it.
BTW, Jeremy, by your one note comments on this thread, you are simply providing me with another avenue to get that message out there.
Jeff, you know perfectly well what Chomsky said in his very next breath in that interview. That you insist on taking that quote out of its context and dishonestly feign ignorance about that context is instructive.
In fact, I don’t regard myself as a critic of Israel. I regard myself as a supporter of Israel. The people who are harming Israel, in my opinion, it’s what I’ve said many times, are those who claim to be supporting it. They are helping [to] drive Israel towards moral degeneration and possible ultimate destruction. I think support for Israel should be support for policies which are for its benefit. — Noam Chomsky
I don’t care how he qualifies it, he admits to being a supporter of Israel. — Jeff Blankfort
Not very honest of you, Jeff.
I’m not sure where honesty comes into it but thanks for providing further proof that Chomsky is a supporter of Israel since he is concerned about those people who he says are harming it. Are you with me so far? Would he be concerned for something he did not support?
Then he says that “they are driving Israel toward moral degeneration…” which is rather mind boggling since that statement assumes it has not yet reached the immoral stage, that the ethnic cleansing of 750,000 Palestinians in 1948 and the destruction of 400 Palestinians was not immoral to the core and that despite the decades of occupation and the three major wars it has waged on Lebanon and most recently on Gaza, he still does not consider Israel to be morally degenerate and merely on the road to being so. Who is being dishonest here, Jeremy? It certainly isn’t me.
Honesty comes into it, Jeff, when you omit that Chomsky means by that statement is that he opposes Israel’s criminal policies and actions, thus willfully and deliberately leading your readers to draw the opposite conclusion, that he supports Israel in the usual sense, meaning that he supports its policies and actions.
This dishonesty, of course, explains why you “don’t care how he qualifies it”. If you were honest, you would care what Chomsky’s actual meaning is, instead of quoting him out of context and thereby insinuating he meant something opposite.
I think there are a number of issues here that are being
discussed at once. I’ll try to separate them there as I think
is appropriate:
——————————————-
#1. Blankfort’s
accuracy in summarizing Chomsky’s positions:
——————————————-
This seems to be the main spot of contention right now. Even leaving aside the
particular issue here of Chomsky’s views regarding early
pre-state Zionist policy and so on, I think the record is
pretty clear that Jeff misrepresents Chomsky’s views. There
are many examples of this, as Jeremy has convincingly pointed out, in my opinion, but I had already reached this conclusion based on my earlier interaction with Jeff, here:
http://mondoweiss.net/2010/01/chomskyabunimah-the-left-and-zionism.html
at comments 118 on. Looking at it now, i see no reason
to revise my conclusion.
——————————————-
2. Jeff’s focus on whether those who disagree with him are Jewish, and general questioning of motivations.
——————————————-
I find this the most disturbing aspect of Jeff’s rhetoric.
Jeff is so sure of his own view that he simply cannot comprehend
why others may have a different analysis. As he put
straightforwardly on Jewbonics:
http://www.maxajl.com/?p=4007#idc-container
“The sad fact of the matter is that I can find no other reason than ethnic-religious
identification that explains why otherwise intelligent Jews
have not only a blind spot when it comes to the question of
Jewish political power in the US, but are so ready with insults, as opposed to arguments by anyone who raises the issue. ”
Is it really so difficult to understand that others may have
different views? But apparently so, so Jeff has to account
for why others may disagree with him. This reached a new low with Jeff’s questioning of whether Jeremy has a Jewish background:
http://dissidentvoice.org/2010/08/the-right-and-legitimacy-of-boycotting-a-non-violent-means-of-resisting-oppression/
“Hammond, buddy boy, be like Chomsky, and tell us how about the Zionist household in which you grew up? Did you ever visit Israel or think about making aliyah.? You know how it is with names. Hammond could be Protestant, Quaker, Methodist, Catholic, or, in this case, I suspect Jewish.”
This kind of thinking caused a problem for Blankfort when
Joseph Massad and As’ad Abu Khalil took a different position
on the lobby.
http://www.counterpunch.org/blankfort02242007.html
http://dissidentvoice.org/Apr06/Blankfort11.htm
Here Blankfort did not try to ask Massad or Abu Khalil if they
grew up in a Zionist household, or whether their names might be Jewish. So he was more restrained, and limited himself to actually trying to respond to their points, although of course he had to bring up Chomsky (“Massad seems to be channeling Noam Chomsky”), although I don’t think either even mentioned Chomsky.
So it might actually be possible for Blankfort to engage in
discussion with those who disagree with his analysis without
resorting to discussion of others’ family backgrounds. But
he doesn’t.
In the particular case of Chomsky, Jeff’s inability to comprehend that Chomsky has a different analysis of the situation because, well, he’s analyzed the facts differently, or selected the facts differently, leads Jeff to some bizarre conclusions. Since Jeff is by definition correct, it follows that if Chomsky disagrees with him, it must be because Chomsky is carrying out “damage control” for Israel. But on the other hand Chomsky has spent a lifetime documenting and publicizing Israeli crimes. If he really wanted to protect Israel, why would have done that in the first place? Surely it would have been better to keep his mouth shut about Israel. With perfect logic, Jeff has the answer:
http://mondoweiss.net/2010/01/chomskyabunimah-the-left-and-zionism.html#comment-141898
“The answer is quite simple. His documenting “injustices
that had been heaped upon the Palestinians” at the hands of
Israel gave him the necessary credibility that enabled him to
gain the confidence of most of those who support the Palestinian cause, including mine at one point, and make them susceptible to his distortions of the history of US-Israel relations and to accepting his theory that the pro-Israel lobby is, as he once described it, “a paper tiger.”
Yes, so Chomsky has working all these years, writing books
like The Fateful Triangle, to gain the confidence of people
and then throw them off the trail of the pro-Israel lobby.
What other explanation could there be? Is there anybody other than Jeff Blankfort who considers this a rational position?
——————————————-
#3 Consequences
of the lobby debate for activist tactics.
——————————————-
With all the discussion about the role of the Israel lobby,
there has been remarkably little discussion about how the
different opinions lead to different strategies for movement
activism. In Jeff’s 1991 piece for the National Guardian, he
concluded that “The main problem with Chomsky’s approach – what might be described as focusing on the “big picture” – is that it tends to make us spectators in a situation where history demands that we be participants”. He put forward “two unfortunate consequences to focusing our venom on whoever happens to be president and ignoring or trivializing the role of the Israeli lobby (and other powerful special interest groups) in influencing US policy:
A) “liberal Democrats who form the core of the pro-Israeli
lobby… have been absolved of responsibility for their role
as accessories to Israel’s murderous policies”.
B) “On a practical level, this has led to a critical failure
… to publicly question, let alone challenge, liberal
pro-Israeli politicians in their districts. Understandably,
it is easier to walk up and down or even sit in at an Israeli
embassy or consulate. It is quite another matter to do it
in the office of a liberal Democrat and put at risk what may
be carefully constructed political relationships.
And above in this thread, Jeff restates this a bit:
“For, if Chomsky was actually correct and all US presidents
had lined up solidly behind Israel there would be little any
of us could do about it given our distance from the White House and the seat of power. But if Chomsky was wrong, as I believe I proved in my earlier article and that Congress plays a dominant role when it comes to Middle East politics and that Congress is, in turn, controlled by the Zionist lobby, then at least, on a local level, we can carry the fight to our
member of Congress. Thanks to Chomsky’s influence, we have never seen that happen.”
So that’s it? I don’t know of any other arguments put forward on how one’s view of the Israel lobby affects activist tactics. (I am discounting Alison Weir’s outburst in her interview with Chomsky that support for Israel “damages US interests” and so we should boycott Israel, an argument that is not based on solidarity with the victims of US/Israel policy and refers to the nonexistent entity called “US interests”) (8:08, 3rd segment)
Jeff’s conclusions do not follow at all. Why would anybody
think that Chomsky’s view of the lobby would discourage people for working at a local level, including with the local congress people? It’s like saying that his analysis of the Vietnam War, or his analysis of support for the contras, discouraged people from working at a local level. It doesn’t make any sense, as far as I can see.
I don’t think Jeff ever quotes Chomsky’s response to this part
of Jeff’s argument in the Guardian, 1991:
“As always, critics will adopt tactics geared to their assessments of the factors that guide policy. If Blankfort’s judgment is correct, their task is easy: they should support our beleaguered presidents in their “peace plans” so these leaders will at last be “free to act”. If larger strategic interests are at stake, the tasks are much harder, but critics are no more “disempowered” than on a host of other issues”
Yes, like a whole bunch of other issues. Analogies are
imperfect, but to me Jeff’s argument is somewhat like someone saying in the 80s that Chomsky’s analysis of US support for the contras was disempowering activists who should be focusing on the “Secret Team” identified by the Christic Institute who had taken over US foreign policy.
Frankly I find whole “lobby” debate pretty incoherent. And I
think it’s only important to the extent that the differences,
if they can be made coherent, say something about what people should do.
——————————————-
#4 Chomsky’s position on BDS
——————————————-
Obviously Chomsky disagrees with calls for those in the US to boycott Israel, although he supports various divestment
proposals, focusing on the occupation. I personally think
his arguments make sense, but so what. So disagree, as long as it’s based on what his views actually are. Plenty of
people are able to disagree with him without descending to
Jeff’s “one foot still in Zion” rhetoric. I do think that
Chomsky can also make his points on this matter without
the additional commentary about whoever he is talking to
harming Palestinians.
I think that’s enough. I had more to say, but I’ve gone on
for a while.
Seth’s arguments just reinforce what I have been saying on this site and elsewhere. The upshot is that what passes for a Palestine solidarity movement has abandoned the political playing field to the organized Jewish establishment at every level: local, state, and national. Like the three monkeys it will neither hear, see, nor speak about the existence and abuse of Jewish power and acknowledge that it has been Jews in Israel and the organized Jewish communities abroad, particularly in the US, who are primarily responsible for the crimes against the Palestinians. Those who have the temerity to do so are called every nasty name in the book
I guess it just happens to be a coincidence that the only two sectors of society that adhere to the notion that Washington’s support for Israel is based on its value as a “strategic asset” (which gets otherwise culpable Jews off the hook, no?) are the organized Jewish establishment and what passes for a Palestine solidarity movement in which Jewish activists are predominant. That to this point in time the solidarity movement has been anything but solid; in plain terms, an utter failure. And I speak as someone who has been involved with that movement from its inception more than 35 years ago and a track record to prove ot..
Jeff, attempting equate Seth’s observations on how “the record is pretty clear that Jeff misrepresents Chomsky’s views” with a demonstration of ignorance of “the existence and abuse of Jewish power” is just another example of your dishonesty. It’s instructive you didn’t substantively address even a single point Seth actually wrote.
In answer to your question, no, observing the fact that Israel is a strategic ally of the U.S. does not in the least bit mean Israel isn’t responsible for its own actions. It’s only to observe that the U.S. is also responsible for its own actions, such as when it financially, militarily, and diplomatically supports Israeli crimes.
As someone who has endeavored for years, unsuccessfully,to get the solidarity movement to move beyond the ineffectual demand of “End the occupation!” and engage in a campaign to stop US aid to Israel, I need no instructions about the US role. What I pointed out in articles in the Middle East Labor Bulletin in the late 80s and early and mid 90s, that the pressure to increase aid came from the AIPAC controlled Congress and not from the White House. The issue was totally ignored at the time by the solidarity movement.
In 1993, when, working with the Middle East Peace Network, I created a large ad for the SF BART system that called for ending aid Israel until it ended the occupation, two groups pulled out in objection, the head of the Middle East Desk of the American Friends Service Committee and the rep of the National Lawyers Guild, even though the NLG national agreed with our position. We received no support or funding from any of the “usual” left movement groups.
BTW, I have already responded to every point Seth raised in my first article about Chomsky. What is curious is that he has been reading what I have been writing since 1991 yet I am not aware of anything he has contributed to this issue other than lurking on this blog as well as on Mondoweiss.
Your accusations that appear in all your posts about me being dishonest just make you look foolish as has your obsession with defending Chomsky against my legitimate criticism when the professor has expressed no interest in doing so himself.
I have a hunch that you are going to have to accelerate your activities in the next couple of days. Stay tuned.
Glad to hear it.
But “criticism” of Chomsky consisting of blatant mischaracterizations of his views is not “legitimate”. It’s dishonest. Hence my pointing out of that fact.
“BTW, I have already responded to every point Seth raised in my first article about Chomsky.”
Most of what I commented on referred to comments you made after that article, in some cases arising from discussions about that article, so this does not make any sense.
I do actually have some agreement with your comments about getting “get the solidarity movement to move beyond the ineffectual demand of “End the occupation!”. (Indeed,
I have my own frustrations in this regard, which may not
be too dissimilar from yours.) And also focusing on Congress, etc. Which has zero to do with the consequences of Chomsky’s analysis.
But following up on Chomsky’s suggestion about your
analysis, maybe your subway ads should have read “Support
our president so he is free to act! End the occupation!”
I wish you would get more specific in your complaints
about the left other than the sort of stuff you wrote in
your response to me, and that you repeat endlessly.
Let’s take a specific example of what you are advocating, namely following from your comments here:
http://mondoweiss.net/2009/11/paul-hodes-could-be-14th-jewish-senator.html
“Given their importance in maintaining US unconditional support for Israel, there ARE too many Jews in the Senate.”
and “They support Israel’s bloody handiwork as part of what they evidently perceive to be tribal loyalty.”
So what precisely are you suggesting that people take
away from this for activism? That there be a campaign
“no more Jews in the Senate” or that people should
work against political campaigns for Jewish candidates *because* they are Jewish? Get precise.
To tell you the truth, Seth, I glossed over what you had written when I came home from being out of town and was and am in no mood to re-explain my positions which I think should be perfectly clear.
The Jewish establishment AKA The Zionist Lobby has its tentacles in every critical sector of American society, not only the US Congress which it unquestionably controls, but in the main Washington think tanks and the media, both of which it dominates like a thick blanket. And, as far as membership in Congress goes, yes, I do object to the increasing number of Jews in its ranks since they invariably turn out to be wearing at least two hats, and one them is blue and white with a star of David. I did support Marci Winograd against Jane Harman because she was qualitatively different. Moreover, it is not their brains or talent that has propelled so many Jews into Congress as it has been the money behind them which, unfortunately, is not available to everyone, including black politicians who wish to be something other than bootlickers to AIPAC.
I’m finishing my comments on this thread with some positive news. Phyllis Bennis, who used to take the straight Chomsky line, has written an excellent piece on the importance of BDS against Israel and she finds nothing hypoicritical about it. Here’s the link:
http://www.yesmagazine.org/peace-justice/waging-peace-from-afar-divestment-and-israeli-occupation
Jeff, no offense but I asked a simple question and you didn’t answer it. I asked:
“So what precisely are you suggesting that people take
away from this for activism? ”
You responded by repeating your viewpoint from before, which I had already quoted, about how you object to the
number of Jews in Congress. The problem is that for
all your writing about the lobby and how Chomsky is
deflecting attention from it, etc., you don’t get very
specific on how your different analysis impacts upon
activist tactics. So once again, so you think there are
too many Jews in Congress. Are you proposing that
something be done about that? If so, what?
Bennis doesn’t find BDS hypocritical because she recognizes the need to apply the standard to the U.S., as well (which is perfectly in agreement with Chomsky):
“But increasingly, across the country, people and organizations are standing up to say no to U.S. support for those policies of occupation and apartheid.”
“Since that time, BDS work in the U.S. has increased dramatically. In addition to [the U.S. corporation] Caterpillar…”
“The U.S. Campaign is also working to end U.S. military aid to Israel, calling for the enforcement of U.S. laws already prohibiting Israel’s illegal use of U.S. weapons.”
“BDS is a strategic effort to change U.S. policy to support human rights, equality, and an end to the occupation rather than continued military build-up.”
As Chomksy has observed, what is hypocritical is for Americans to call for BDS against Israel, but not the U.S. Clearly, Bennis doesn’t fall into that camp.
Excuse me, my reading comprehensively challenged friend, for now you’re more to be pitied than pilloried at this point,there is nothing in Phyllis’s statement that can be remotely interpreted as boycotting the US as Chomsky demanded or anything that I have said that does not endorse every action she describes here.
You’re welcome to quote me, Jeff, where I made any statement in error (as opposed to creating a strawman argument).
It is as I said.
Seth asks me: “So what precisely are you suggesting that people take away from this for activism? ”
What I started doing once I had a computer, back in the 80s, educating the public about what their local officials are doing for Israel when there are unmet public needs, producing fliers quoting local members of Congress on their love for Israel, like Pelosi and the late Tom Lantos for who I organized a picket line at a JNF dinner after he returned from the first Durban conference which was successful even though it was boycotted by ANSWER and the mainline Trotskyist and Marxist left. Making and circulating a flier describing Israel’s attack on the Liberty for a veterans’ memorial celebration.
While I have organized or have been on the steering committee for large demonstrations, I and the others who were serious about the Palestinian cause would consistently be thwarted by the leadership of Socialist Action, SWP, Line of March (when it existed), the CP and Committee of Correspondence ( and sucking up to the Democrats), and even at time Palestinian leaders who were taking instructions from the white, invariably Jewish leadership of these groups which were on the record, if not in practice, as being anti-Zionist.
Back to Pelosi: I published on speech of hers to AIPAC and gave it the headline” Nancy Pelosi: Foreign Agent. I and friends passed out quite a few but no nominally Left, anti-zio organization would touch them, so Pelosi has had no serious opposition until Cindy Sheehan ran against her two years ago but the mobilization by the left around her campaign that needed to materialize, didn’t.
Jeff, by “this”, I was referring to your view that “there ARE too many Jews in the Senate”. I am wondering what it is
exactly that you want people to do about this. I wasn’t
asking about a general summary about what sort of work you have done.
Still, your answer was informative in a way. I have been wondering what the consequences are of your analysis for activist tactics and strategies, as opposed to those of Chomsky or whoever. In specifics, not general comments about focusing on Congress or the Zionist lobby or whatever. And you actually gave an example, finally. Instead of just publicizing Pelosi’s record, which would have been an excellent thing to do, of course, you did so with the headline “Nancy Pelosi: Foreign Agent”. And that is indeed something that I would not expect “nominally left, anti-zio” organizations to support. Of course I would agree with such a refusal.
Earlier this year, the “nominally left, anti-zio” organizations in San Francisco not only refused to endorse but tried to sabotage a $100 a plate breakfast that was being held in Pelosi’s honor by the SF Labor Council on the basis that they shouldn’t be picketing a labor council affair. Taking on the unions when they are flat out wrong is as taboo among the “nominally left, anti-zio” organizations as is taking on The Lobby. Which is why I no longer have anything to do with them.
Twenty years ago when I organized a picket of the Israeli Zim line, 25 people showed up and the longshoremen walked through it smiling. On April 20, close to a 1000 showed up on the docks to stop the unloading of another Zim ship and some of the very folks who had not supported us then could be seen controlling the microphones
As for Jewish members of Congress or prospective Jewish candidates, I would expose those who have made defending Israel their special priority by publicizing their statements to their constituents with the question, “What flag do they salute?” And for those who are planning to run I would demand their positions on Israel and for those who support it, I would ask the same question. My files are filled with statements by Jewish members of Congress regarding Israel, such as Schumer, Liebernan, Berman, Engel, Ackerman, Weiner, Berkeley, Waxman, Frank, Harman, et al, that is they had made such statements on behalf of apartheid South Africa, they would have been targets of repeated protests and sit-ins.
People will tell me, when I raise the issue of the pro-Israel actions of these Jewish politicians, that they are good on other issues and that it isn’t fair to pick on them simply because they take the wrong position on Israel.
My response to them has been, “Would you ask the same question if the issue on which they took the wrong position was apartheid South Africa?” Their response is invariably sllence.
I also object to the increasing number of Jewish members of Congress because I don’t think, simply because they have access to more money than African-Americans, Latinos, Asians, and most white Americans,that should entitle them to have representation far out of proportion to the number of Jews in the general population and given that invariably they will support Israel, I am doubly opposed to seeing them on the ballot when there is not a single black senator.
In case the foregoing is unclear, it was a picket of Pelosi organized by serious anti-zionist labor activists that was opposed by the “nominally left, anti-zio” organizations.