The "As-a-Jews" of the New York Times

Paul Krugman writes in his New York Times blog:

Something I’ve been meaning to do — and still don’t have the time to do properly — is say something about Peter Beinart’s brave book The Crisis of Zionism.

The truth is that like many liberal American Jews — and most American Jews are still liberal — I basically avoid thinking about where Israel is going. It seems obvious from here that the narrow-minded policies of the current government are basically a gradual, long-run form of national suicide — and that’s bad for Jews everywhere, not to mention the world. But I have other battles to fight, and to say anything to that effect is to bring yourself under intense attack from organized groups that try to make any criticism of Israeli policies tantamount to anti-Semitism.

But it’s only right to say something on behalf of Beinart, who has predictably run into that buzzsaw. As I said, a brave man, and he deserves better.

Also from the New York Times today, an op-ed from Stephen Robert:

How can a people persecuted for so long act so brutally when finally attaining power? Will we continuously see the world as 1938, or can we use the strength of our new power to forgive, while never forgetting the lessons of our past?

I guess he is "brave" too.

Last month, according to the monthly tally from Soccer Dad, the NYT printed 8 more "brave" anti-Israel op-eds, as opposed to 3 that were pro-Israel. Including one from that "brave" man, Peter Beinart.

In the last six months of 2011, the tally was even more lopsided: 39 anti-Israel op-eds, and 8 pro-Israel.

Any way you look at it, the New York Times doesn't seem to have any compunctions about publishing criticisms of Israel. But not only is the Times blatant about its anti-Israel bias, but its writers seem to feel that they are being remarkably bold by parroting the same arguments that have been published there scores of times in the past year.

Criticizing a tiny state surrounded by enemies hell-bent on its long-term destruction might not play in Peoria, but it plays very well in the salons of the Upper East Side. It is a false bravado, one where the people pushing their agendas know quite well that they have a large support group from the most influential ivory tower newspaper in the United States. Seriously, how have any of these critics been hurt by what they have written? They have been criticized to be sure, but they have also been praised. They are getting huge amounts of publicity and selling lots of books, giving lectures across the nation and having their faces plastered all over every Jewish periodical. Is that what NYT liberals consider "bravery" nowadays?

In fact, today's NYT op-ed is utterly boring. Stephen Robert rehashes the exact same arguments we have heard ad nauseum as he demands that Israel somehow overlook the fact that Palestinian Arabs keep demanding that it be destroyed demographically and politically. He is not an expert on Israel - a previous piece that he wrote for The Nation shows that he has gullibly believed outright lies from his Palestinian Arab friends. He has no real credentials, unless you believe heading a major mutual fund group makes one an expert on the Middle East.

So why did the New York Times choose to publish yet another op-ed bashing Israel when it breaks no new ground, makes no new arguments, and is quite tendentious to boot?

Because, like Krugman, the author is another "As-a-Jew." He says he grew up as a Zionist, coming from a family of committed Zionists, complete with experience with pogroms and fundraising for the UJA. He is pretending to be yet another recovering Zionist, someone who knows what is best for Israel far better than the people who live there and actually vote in elections. The only thing that makes his point of view interesting, to the NYT opinion editor, is that Robert is being "brave" by speaking out, as a Jew, just like the scores of other ignorant Jews who have been reading the New York Times' anti-Israel pieces over the years and believe them as the Jewish equivalent of gospel.

This is not bravery.

Bravery is to be an Arab and to criticize the PLO. Bravery is to be a Muslim woman and criticize how Muslims treat women. Bravery is to publicly protest in Syria. Bravery is to risk your life for your opinions.

It is not bravery to risk receiving some angry emails. And as awful as the Likud seems to be when you read these "brave" articles criticizing it, the authors aren't quite scared that the Mossad will come and take them out.

When someone like Krugman calls someone like Peter Beinart "brave" it illustrates how out of touch liberal New York Times "As-a-Jews" are. Their worldview is so skewed that they believe that Netanyahu - a man who accepts a two-state solution, who has all but said that he would throw tens of thousands of Jews out of their homes to make peace  - is somehow a warmonger. Meanwhile, they believe that Mahmoud Abbas, a man who honors the most notorious terrorists and anti-semites, who arrests journalists who criticize him,  and who would rather partner with Hamas terrorists than Israeli Jews, is perfectly reasonable and moderate.

How can such a complete reversal of reality even cross the mind of a sane person?

Well, it can easily happen, if your idea of reality comes from the op-ed pages of the New York Times.

(h/t Daniel)

UPDATE: To Beinart's credit, he doesn't consider himself brave. (h/t Martin Kramer)

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A new "crisis of Zionism" every decade

1930s (Ben Gurion)
1940s (Hannah Arendt)
1950s (Mordechai Kaplan)
1960s (Life Magazine)
1970s (Moshe Davis)
1980s (Zvi Kasseh et. al.)
1990s (Zvi Sobel et. al.)
2000s (Shlomo Sharan et. al.)
2010s (Peter Beinart)

Amazing that Zionism is still alive and kicking, isn't it?

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Ammiel Hirsch's response to Beinart (video/text)

Here is the video and text of Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch's sermon last Shabbat at the Stephen Wise Free Synagogue, discussing Peter Beinart's NYT op-ed last week I had written about, as sent to me by the synagogue.

Peter Beinart’s Offense Against Liberalism

By: Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch, Senior Rabbi, Stephen Wise Free Synagogue

Peter Beinart’s op-ed in The New York Times (March 19, 2012), entitled “To Save Israel, Boycott the Settlements,” crossed a red line. More than that: it is an offense against liberalism, itself.

1. Boycott

The call to boycott Israel – even the lame effort to distinguish between boycotting Israel within the Green Line and boycotting Israel beyond the Green Line – is troubling, in and of itself.

It is also hopelessly naïve. How one would actually mount such a boycott; how one could limit it to products beyond the Green Line; how it would end at the Green Line and not become a boycott of Israel – these are interesting questions for an academic thesis. It is hardly a serious political proposal.

But it is even worse than that: It is immoral because it gives aid and comfort to Israel’s worst enemies – those who seek to destroy the Jewish state. By using the word “boycott” Beinart has granted legitimacy to the delegitimizers of Israel. “Boycott” is the language of Israel’s enemies. “Boycott” means to most people: destroy Israel through international diplomacy and economic strangulation. It is an extreme position.

While thousands are being butchered by the Syrian dictator as the world stands by impotently; at a time when Americans should be devoting as much attention as possible to ensuring a democratic Egypt; at a time when Iran is rapidly developing nuclear capability; and at a time when the Palestinian national movement shows no interest or desire to engage in peace talks, and they are hopelessly divided amongst themselves – now – at this moment - American liberal Jews should be devoting our financial and political resources to boycotting democratic Israel? Really?!

Peter Beinart wrote in his op-ed: “It is time for a counter-offensive…and that counter-offensive must begin with language.” And his solution is to use the language of the BDS (Boycott, Divesment, Sanctions) crowd – a group of extremists, Israel-bashers (and some anti-Semites) who spend their lives trying to persuade the world to boycott, divest from, and sanction Israel?!

I much prefer George Orwell’s view on language to Peter Beinart’s. Orwell wrote: “If thought corrupts language, language also corrupts thought. Political language…is designed to make lies sound truthful…and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind.”

2. Settlements

Beinart is right to point out the risks to both Israeli democracy as well as its national security as long as the Israel-Palestinian dispute remains unresolved. But there are two grievous offenses in Beinart’s blanket “boycott-all-the-settlements” proposal:

First: What he calls a settlement – any Jewish apartment beyond the 1967 borders – is not understood as such by practically every Israeli and most fair-minded international observers. Many so-called settlements are considered neighborhoods of Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. Most of the people who live beyond the Green Line live in proximity to the Green Line, and all two-state solutions that have been discussed assume that these areas will be within the new borders of Israel proper.

Second: There is not one word in Beinart’s piece about the role and responsibility of the Palestinians. Many Israeli settlements are still there because the Palestinians have still not demonstrated a politically-realistic willingness for peace.

Even if you were to concede that Israel has made mistakes, surely it is not Israel’s fault alone that there is no peace. After all, it takes at least two to make peace. You cannot make peace only with yourself. Often people talk about how Israel should do this and Israel should do that as if it is in Israel’s power alone to shape events.

Most Israelis are desperate for peace. Is it that Israelis like sending their children to fight and die in wars? Surely, there is some fault on the other side as well, no? Are the Palestinians potted plants – mere decoration – as the Jews argue amongst ourselves how we should entice the Palestinians to do what we believe is in their national interest?

Maybe they don’t believe it. Half of the Palestinian national movement makes no effort to hide the fact that they don’t believe it. They say they want to destroy Israel. The other half has rejected three Israeli peace proposals in the past twelve years, and, at present, refuses even to sit down with Israeli negotiators.

The West Bank is the West Bank. It is not, as Beinart describes, “non-democratic Israel.” It is not Palestine. It is disputed territory. In the past four decades Jordan, Egypt (Gaza), Israel and the Palestinian national movement have all claimed parts of it. If anything, during the past two decades, Israel has relinquished control over ever-larger tracts of the West Bank. If peace can be achieved, many of the settlements will be absorbed into democratic Israel; the rest will be dismantled.

3. Liberalism

I am a liberal. I worry about liberals. Some in our camp have become unhinged when it comes to Israel. I worry about Reform rabbis too. And I worry about our rabbinical students who represent the future leadership of much of American Jewry.

It is fashionable in some liberal quarters today to bash Israel as the latest litmus test of liberalism. We see it on campus as well. “We’ll let you into the club but show us your anti-Israel credentials first.”

It is actually the opposite: Israel is the ultimate test of liberalism; the testing grounds of theory and practice. Can we develop a liberalism that relates to the world as it is, not as we would want it to be? Do we offer a compelling vision of the future or just stale liberation theories? Are we prepared to make hard moral choices or shall we be satisfied with easy moralizing slogans?

In our new world, where democracies engage insurgents who hide among civilian populations and use them as shields; where terrorists store weapons in, and fire from, hospitals, houses of worship, ambulances and universities – can we develop a liberalism that fights injustice justly? That is the question.

Peter Beinart was once at the vanguard of this school of liberalism that is so desperately needed today. But observing his dash to the extremes of liberal theory over the last decade, I worry about us. If, in less than a decade, Peter Beinart moved from centrist liberalism to calling for a boycott of Israelis, what does that portend for so many others in our camp? And what does that say about the future of liberalism in the United States and in the Jewish community?

Peter Beinart’s counter-offensive is morally offensive. Israel is a noisy, argumentative, thrillingly pluralistic society, an oasis of liberty within the unrelenting desert of Middle East oppression. It is not a perfect democracy. There are many fissures and unresolved constitutional questions that need to be addressed. But Israel is a thriving democracy, conceived and developing under the most adversarial conditions of war.

Have we become so befuddled in liberal circles that of all the authoritarian regimes and brutally anti-democratic groups operating in the Middle East, we should single out the one Western democracy - Israel - as a target of economic boycott?

I am reminded of the poem of Natan Alterman, one of Israel’s greatest poets, who was troubled by our propensity for excessive self-criticism of Israel. He wrote:

Then Satan said: How can I subdue him?
For he has the courage and the ability,
The weapons, the resourcefulness and the wisdom.
And he said: I will not weaken him,
Nor curb nor bridle him,
Nor inspire fear in him,
Nor soften him as in days gone by.
I will only do this:
I will dull his mind,
And he will forget that his is the just cause.

Also worth reading is this review of Beinart's book, The Crisis of Zionism, at Tablet Magazine:

Beinart’s habit of what is either inexplicable sloppiness or extreme interpretative elasticity turns out to be one of the defining characteristics of The Crisis of Zionism. In fact, one of the challenges of reviewing the book is that it practically demands a typology. Consider a few examples:

Elasticity of attribution:

Describing the effects of Israel’s policy toward Gaza after Hamas’s election in 2006, Beinart writes that “the blockade shattered [Gaza’s] economy. By 2008, 90 percent of Gaza’s industrial complex had closed.” The source of this claim is a study conducted by the IMF—in 2003.

Of omission:

Beinart quotes former Israeli foreign minister Shlomo Ben-Ami telling Democracy Now’s Amy Goodman that “If I were a Palestinian, I would have rejected Camp David as well.” Yet Ben-Ami said in the same interview that Yasser Arafat “was morally, psychologically, physically incapable of accepting the moral legitimacy of a Jewish state, regardless of its borders or whatever.” This goes unquoted. I suspect that’s because Beinart found it in The Israel Lobby by political scientists John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt, which also quotes the first part of Ben-Ami’s statement but not the second.

Of consistency:

Beinart acknowledges that “the populism sweeping the Middle East has unleashed frightening hostility against the Jewish state.” Yet in the same paragraph he writes: “The Egyptian leaders who have emerged in Hosni Mubarak’s wake are not calling for Israel’s destruction, let alone promising to take up arms in the cause.” Maybe Beinart should acquaint himself with the Muslim Brotherhood’s Essam El-Erian, currently head of the Foreign Affairs Committee in the Egyptian Parliament. “The earthquake of the Arab Spring will mark the end of the Zionist entity,” El-Erian said recently.

Of fact:

Returning to the subject of Gaza, Beinart writes that the Strip “remains a place of brutal suffering.” This, he adds, is the case even after Israel eased its blockade following the Turkish flotilla business in 2010.

Really? Here’s what New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof (whose politics track Beinart’s, but who also visits the places he writes about) had to say on that score in a July 2010 column: “Visiting Gaza persuaded me, to my surprise, that Israel is correct when it denies that there is any full-fledged humanitarian crisis in Gaza. The tunnels have so undermined the Israeli blockade that shops are filled and daily life is considerably easier than when I last visited here two years.”

There’s more of this. Much more. In fact, the errors in Beinart’s book pile up at such a rate that they become almost impossible to track.

Still, the deeper problem isn’t that there’s so much in Beinart’s book that is untrue, but rather so much that is half-true: the accurate quote used in a misleading way; the treatment of highly partisan sources as objective and unobjectionable; the settlement of ferocious debates among historians in a single, dismissive sentence; the one-sided giving—and withholding—of the benefit of the doubt; the “to be sure” and “of course” clauses that do more to erase balance than introduce it. It’s a cheap kind of slipperiness that’s hard to detect but leaves its stain on nearly every page.

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US Jews' donations to Israel double in 12 years

From Ha'aretz:

Donations by U.S. Jews to Israeli nonprofits have doubled during the past 12 years, according to a first-of-its-kind study conducted by professors at Brandeis University.

The study, scheduled to be completed in late April, disproves the widely held view by many Israelis that philanthropic donations from the United States have dropped over time due to economic and political reasons. In fact, the study - previewed last week during a hearing by the Knesset Subcommittee for the Relations of Israel with World Jewish Communities - suggests quite the opposite.

In 2007, various Israeli organizations received $2.1 billion from U.S. donors through the Jewish Agency and various "friendship" associations, according to findings by professors Theodore Sasson and Eric Fleisch, of the Cohen Center of Modern Jewish Studies at Brandeis University in Massachusetts. This is double what U.S. donors contributed 12 years earlier, when only $1.08 billion was raised in the United States for Israeli organizations.

"Most of the income of the leading organizations in Israel increased also when adjusted for inflation," Professor Sasson said in an interview with Haaretz. There has also been an increase in the number of U.S. organizations supporting Israel, he said, with the emergence of some 150 new pro-Israel groups in the United States in the 1990s, and some 280 emerging during the past decade.

While the research indicates that there was a 10-25 percent drop in donations during 2008 and 2009 - during the period of severe economic crisis in the United States - it suggests there was a substantial rise in donations in 2010, when the crisis began to subside.

Because of a drop in contributions to the Jewish Agency in recent years, "It was thought that Jews care less about Israel, but the situation suggests that U.S. Jewry is deeply committed to Israel," he said.

One of Peter Beinart's major points is that US Jews are not as engaged with Israel as they used to be, especially young people. The proliferation of pro-Israel groups in America suggests the opposite.

Incongruously, Ha'aretz writes:

Sasson says the main reason for the increase in contributions is not necessarily linked with a rise in Zionism, but to the increase in the number of donor collectors and their improved professionalism over the years.

You can almost imagine how the Ha'aretz reporter asked that question in order to elicit that answer. While it is possible that professionalism increased the amount of donations, all charities in the US have become more professional at the same time. Unless one can prove that the amount given in donations doubled across the board, it is hard to interpret this in any way besides saying that American Jews are more engaged with, and emotionally connected with, Israel than they were in the past - the exact opposite of the conventional wisdom.

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Peter Beinart's nonsensical NYT op-ed

Peter Beinart in the New York Times has another incredibly misleading article about - well, you know what its about.

TO believe in a democratic Jewish state today is to be caught between the jaws of a pincer.

On the one hand, the Israeli government is erasing the “green line” that separates Israel proper from the West Bank. In 1980, roughly 12,000 Jews lived in the West Bank (excluding East Jerusalem). Today, government subsidies have helped swell that number to more than 300,000. Indeed, many Israeli maps and textbooks no longer show the green line at all.

In 2010, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel called the settlement of Ariel, which stretches deep into the West Bank, “the heart of our country.” Through its pro-settler policies, Israel is forging one political entity between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea — an entity of dubious democratic legitimacy, given that millions of West Bank Palestinians are barred from citizenship and the right to vote in the state that controls their lives.

For Beinart's thesis to be correct, you must believe that the Palestinian Authority and the PLO has no political legitimacy, or power.

Yet it is recognized as a full state by 129 nations; its citizens vote (at least in theory) to elect their leaders, it has autonomy, a territory that all accept as controlled by its own security forces, a court system, an Olympic team, and its own passports. According to at least one distinguished legal scholar, it is considered a full state under international law. The World Bank is putting out reports about how ready the territories are for statehood. The entire Oslo process - that Israel still supports - was designed to give full self-determination to Palestinian Arabs in the territories, and (more recently) statehood. For Beinart to turn around and state that all of these don't exist, and that for some reason the territories are (as he tries to coin the term) "nondemocratic Israel," is nonsense. Israel has no intention of integrating Ramallah or Jericho into Israel. And as recently as January, Israel tried to hold negotiations with the PLO, and the other side refused.

Beinart, in his attempt to sound an alarm for Israeli democracy, chooses quite deliberately to ignore everything that happened to the Palestinian Arabs since 1994.

It is Palestinian Arab intransigence, not Israeli settlements, that has stopped a Palestinian Arab state. Beinart's willingness to blame only one side shows that he is not being as evenhanded and "pro-Israel" as he tirelessly claims to be.

But, you might counter, what about Area C? Israel does indeed control all aspects of the lives of Arabs who live there, and while they vote in PA elections, they do not have much say in their own political affairs. Doesn't Israel's presence there endanger Israeli democracy?

The number of Palestinian Arabs in Area C is about 150,000 (about 2.5% of all Palestinian Arabs.) Which means that the percentage of people living under Israeli sovereignty who do not have political rights is, today, about 1.9%.

By way of contrast, the percentage of people living in US territories who are not represented in Congress and who cannot vote in presidential elections - those in Puerto Rico, Guam, the US Virgin Islands and elsewhere - is about 1.3%.

So is Israel's control of Area C a danger to Israeli democracy? Not unless you think that US territories endanger US democracy too. The idea is ridiculous. It is an issue, it is not a death-blow to democracy.

To go further, if Israel would decide to annex Area C, wouldn't that solve all the problems? No demographic issue, giving the Arabs there full citizenship - and Beinart's argument is down the drain.

Somehow, I don't think that Beinart would support that solution, or even a modified version of that solution. Because he has bought into the Palestinian Arab narrative that the artificially constructed 1949 armistice lines - which were not considered international borders before 1967 and were always meant to be modified in a final peace agreement between Israel and the Arab world - are somehow special, and that no peace can possibly result from a change in those lines that would include, say, Ariel. (He sort of says that he agrees that some of the border settlements would end up in Israel, and then tells those "settlers" to throw the more "ideological" settlers under the bus. Yay for Jewish unity!)

But there is no proof that this is true. Is is simply an assertion on the part of Palestinian Arabs, who repeat it over and over again so much that people like Peter Beinart believe it. And, whether they realize it or not, "pro-Israel Jews" like Beinart - by writing op-eds that accept this false premise - end up increasing Palestinian intransigence.

They are not helping peace at all.

What does Beinart think about the Clinton parameters, or the Olmert offer? They were clearly sufficient to demolish all of his arguments about a threat to Israeli democracy. Yet instead of slamming the PLO for its rejection of those peace plans, he continues insistence on the 1967 lines. Beinart buys into the Palestinian Arab narrative.  Instead of telling them that they should compromise and bring a lasting peace, he is telling them implicitly that they should buckle down and wait for American Jews like himself to pressure Israel to accept all of their demands.

The eventual border between Israel and a Palestinian Arab state must be negotiated. Moving it a bit to the east does not endanger Israeli democracy nor does it endanger Palestinian statehood. It doesn't even endanger Palestinian Arab contiguity, as any glance at a map would prove. This is self-evident, but repeated Palestinian Arab assertions that it is not "acceptable" are swallowed whole by a lot of otherwise smart people who believe they are pro-Israel.

I'm sorry, but this is not a pro-Israel argument, and op-eds like this do not bring peace any closer. Quite the contrary.

(h/t Avi for some ideas)

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