From Ian:
Letter to my Palestinian Israeli neighbors
Letter to my Palestinian Israeli neighbors
We appeal – in the very midst of the onslaught launched against us now for months – to the Arab inhabitants of the State of Israel to preserve peace and participate in the upbuilding of the state on the basis of full and equal citizenship.Martin Kramer: The New York Times Repeats Its Error regarding Ben-Gurion's Position on Giving Up Territories
–Israel’s Declaration of Independence, May 14, 1948
Dear Neighbors,
We live in the same building at the edge of French Hill in Jerusalem, an almost equal number of Jewish Israeli and Arab Israeli families. We exchange pleasantries in the parking lot, smile at each other’s children, but never talk “politics” — a euphemism for nothing less than our future in this land.
Since the passing of the Nation-State Law, which invokes only the Jewishness of Israel and ignores its aspirations for an inclusive democratic society, and which downgrades Arabic from an official language to a vague “special” status, I have wanted to tell you: That law doesn’t represent my vision of Israel. I have wanted to reassure you that I am committed to an inclusive Israel that honors its two non-negotiable identities, Jewish and democratic, and that any attempt to upset the delicate balance between them threatens our very being. I have wanted to tell you that sharing a home – symbolically and, in our case, literally – is not only a challenge but an opportunity for us to embrace our shared indigenousness in this land.
But as neighbors who cling to gestures of civility and whose only shared language is in the safety of small talk, we lack the means to discuss urgent issues. And so, I am writing this letter to you.
My starting point in navigating the relationship between us is Israel’s Declaration of Independence. To be true to its essence, Israel must continue to see itself as a continuity of Jewish history, repository of four thousand years of Jewish civilization, and concerned for the well-being of Jews around the world. So much of Israel’s vitality and achievements comes from the country’s Jewish identity, from the motivation to turn a two-thousand-year dream into an ongoing miracle of fulfillment. Remove the Jewishness of Israel – and its heart, its passion are excised.
Max Fisher of the New York Times has taken to Twitter to defend his claim that David Ben-Gurion "emerged from retirement in July 1967 to warn Israelis they had sown the seeds of self-destruction" if Israel did not give up the territories it had conquered in the Six-Day War.Shmuley Boteach: What Happened to Cory Booker?
Fisher sourced this story to a recollection by the late Arthur Hertzberg, writing in the New York Review of Books in 1987, who claimed to have heard the grim prophecy during an encounter between Ben-Gurion and American Conservative rabbis at Beit Berl in July 1967.
I'd grown suspicious of this story, so I tracked down the transcript of Ben-Gurion's remarks in his archives. I found no evidence of his having said anything of the sort. I published my findings back in April 2018, so imagine my surprise when Fisher repeated the fable on the front page of the Times on July 23.
I've uploaded the transcript of Ben-Gurion's meeting here, dated July 12, 1967. The transcript doesn't include even a hint that Ben-Gurion made the dramatic renunciation of territorial acquisition. Moreover, in Ben-Gurion's diary of July 12, his own summary of his remarks includes nothing whatsoever on territorial concessions. I've uploaded it here.
Nor is there any corroboration in the Mapai party newspaper Davar of July 14. It summarized Ben-Gurion's remarks and made no attribution to Ben-Gurion of any territorial position, except this quote about Jerusalem: "We will not return Jerusalem - and no force in the world can take it from us."
In fact, Ben-Gurion issued a press release immediately after the war that appeared in almost all the Hebrew newspapers on June 19, in which he said: "We will propose to the inhabitants of the West Bank to choose representatives with whom we will conduct negotiations on a West Bank autonomy (excluding Jerusalem and its environs), which will be tied to Israel in an economic alliance....A Jewish army will be stationed on the western bank of the Jordan river to protect the independence of the autonomous West Bank."
Last week, the US Campaign for Palestinian Rights (USCPR), one of the most radical organizations promoting the antisemitic BDS movement, posted a widely-shared photo of aspiring presidential candidate Cory Booker beside the group’s government affairs associate. Booker is smiling while holding a sign that says, “From Palestine to Mexico, all the walls have got to go.”
Really?
In an apparent attempt to win over the left wing of the Democratic Party — and perhaps prove that he can criticize Israel on a par with Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren — Cory is increasingly alienating himself from the American Jewish community, which once loved him.
That same Jewish community played an outsized role in Cory’s political success. Based on his public promises to defend Israel, Cory became one of the largest recipients of pro-Israel campaign contributions.
But then came his choice to put political expedience over principle by supporting the Iran nuclear deal. He chose supporting his party leader rather than opposing a genocidal regime that hates both the US and Israel. Despite all evidence to the contrary, which has been compounded since the agreement was signed, Cory bought the snake oil that the deal was good for the US and the world.
Then this past April the Senate Foreign Relations Committee — of which Cory is a member — held a vote to halt US taxpayer funding to the Palestinian Authority because of its despicable “pay-to-slay” policy, which pays salaries to terrorist murderers and their families.
Unbelievably, Cory voted “No” in committee.
Then came the photo this past Friday.






















