There is no way to be pro/anti-Israel/Palestine enough for anyone.
Any cause that depends on moralism and constant monitoring of all comments about it is likely one where one's input isn't as important as they're told.
Over the last month news headlines have been dominated by the death tolls and footage from the latest Israel-Gaza War. As a former IDF enlisted person who served in the mid-2000s on the West Bank, it is obvious where my biases sit. I was certainly concerned for the welfare of my aunts, uncles, and cousins living there even though most of them do not live in the area surrounding the Gaza Strip most affected by the conflict. But I did have phone calls with a cousin there to gauge the situation and the overall state of mind that he was in. Having family and friends in peril adds a certain pressure to a news topic beyond the average viewer. However, based on comment threads and news feeds, one would think that every VIP and wannabe has someone either crowded in an Ashkelon bomb shelter or sifting through the rubble of a building in Rafah.
Very little has changed between the previous flareups of what is really a permanent conflict in 2008-09, 2012, and 2014 apart from the now much more prominent role of social media and celebrity culture in the popular opinion debate over who is in the wrong. Some were not surprising such as has-been ex-Pink Floyd bassist Roger Waters, who on May 6 declared “It’s official Israel is an APARTHEID STATE”. Is it official because the other billion times he’s said that were demo tracks? Besides Waters there was the notable statement by twin supermodels Gigi and Bella Hadid: “If you don’t think this is wrong, regardless of who you are and where you come from, there is a problem with how you see humanity and Palestinians. This is on you. Not them.”
On the other side former Blossom star Mayim Bialik tweeted her indignation about the physical assaults by pro-Palestine activists against Jewish diners in Los Angeles. HBO’s Bill Maher also ripped the Hadids on his show Real Time and clashed with New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof who was on his panel. He remarked that most progressives are unaware that in Gaza a court recently ruled that unmarried women may not go out in public without chaperones. The Hadids, who are of mixed Dutch and Palestinian heritage but have spent their entire lives living in luxurious Southern California, do not catch the irony that their lifestyles would be deemed haram (forbidden) in virtually any Palestinian community.
As he does from time to time Maher tears the cover off of the deluded mindset of Hollywood and the celebrity activist class. However he is addressing a problem that is actually very far from the mind of the broader public. The American people are more divided in 2021 than ever over their political beliefs and social identities. In my work I’ve often criticized people that attribute too much importance to opinion polling. But while each poll must be kept at arms length due to sampling biases and margins of error, they serve often as buoys in the water to warn passing boats of hazards. Gallup’s tracking polls last gathered in March before the latest conflict show that support for Israel and Palestine respectively has remained steady with minor fluctuations. Furthermore, in Gallup’s tracking poll on the most important problem facing American voters the conflicts in the Middle East failed to register any responses.
I also think there’s a major element that the conflict’s partisan advocates miss, which is that often in order to defend their side they shield some damning flaws. Palestinian activists in the guise of peace activism and human rights are lending aid and quarter to some of the worst warmongering dictatorships that there are: Iran, Syria, and their proxies Hamas and Hizbullah. In their zeal to attack Israel for imperialism, they give a blanket pass to now almost eight decades of attacks and provocations made against Israel. Among Israel advocates there are many who champion this cause at the expense of other pressing ones such as the economy and state of American education. Racist and bigoted beliefs about Arab Palestinians are not uncommon among this group, and meanwhile criticism against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is often categorized as anti-Semitic. I would summarize this attitude as such: “Netanyahu might be corrupt and dishonest, but he’s a great spokesperson and he knows how to defeat the Arabs”. In reality in twelve years he has failed to break the stalemate in the conflict while constantly portraying himself as the only guardrail against Israel’s destruction. Another issue that I take with the Israel advocate groups is their constant harping about unity, even seeking to include organizations like Zioness that make it clear that they prioritize progressive feminism with the same importance as defense of Israel. How about we just acknowledge a simple logical truth: that it is possible to levy criticism against both parties, even one’s own side, when appropriate.
The Pugilistic Purists
One of the biggest charades that arises during each episode of the ongoing crisis is that of news organizations making the pretense of objectivity. In a sporting event it is often critical for the broadcasters on a national or international network to not seem too partisan to one team or another in order to avoid alienating the fans of one team. But in matters of war and peace accurate reporting cannot be objective. Real lives and agendas are on the line, and news organizations often do make the call whether to tell the truth based on their vested interests.
On this issue there are Jewish and conservative media members like Mark Levin that are unabashedly partisan for Israel, and there are also Arab and leftist ones that are slanted towards the Palestinians. Many of them obsessively so. There are also Jewish reporters and commentators like Glenn Greenwald and Peter Beinart that are virulently anti-Israel as well as Arab commentators like Brigitte Gabriel of ACT! for America that insist that Israel is a beacon of hope. Some would say that this is not only confusing by wrong because there is only one correct side of the conflict. In fact, when a person from one group is insufficiently supportive of the cause they get castigated as self-hating traitors. Likewise people that don’t offer a full-throated comment for or against a given position on the conflict are derided as sell-outs or anti-Semites/Islamophobes depending on who is making the allegation.
But it’s not only not wrong for Jews, Arabs, and others to have widely varying opinions on the Israel-Palestine conflict, it indeed validates the concept of a free and open society for debate. People have the right to an opinion even if it is wrong, and their peers have the right to voice their response to that opinion or to ignore it and not respond at all. Stifling an opinion, however repugnant it is, constitutes censorship of free speech. Also important to remember is that requiring others to issue statements on a topic even if they do not support the statement is compelled speech. In both cases a person is brow beaten into adjusting their attitude through moralistic hectoring.
During the latest Gaza conflict, I’ve observed how absolutism has made the debate over the Middle East impossibly siloed.
Cenk Uygur, founder of the leftist media network The Young Turks (TYT) made a statement deriding both Israelis and Palestinians for killing each other over religion. He was instantly bushwacked by much of the leftist and pro-Palestine Twitter sphere for a reductive take on their cause that saw it as merely an Islamist Trojan horse.
The director of the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) was replaced after agreeing with Israeli media that the IDF strikes against Palestinian targets were precise and not intended to endanger civilians.
I observed a pro-Israel group assailing conservative commentator Candace Owens for not vocally enough backing Israel enough.
Also within the conservative sphere there exists a smaller anti-Israel faction that holds that it is not at all in the US interest to support the Jewish state, and that indeed Israel and the American Jewish community are in every other respect supportive of a socially liberal degenerate agenda. They argue that the presence of prominent Jews within major leftist organizations like the ACLU and SPLC show that the alliance between the two states is a thankless endeavour for America.
But in reality the American Jewish community is not marching lockstep with Zionism as these Israel opponents allege. This past month a Jewish federal judge ruled that a Georgia law restricting states from doing business with supporters of the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement was unconstitutional. At issue was a pledge that Georgia Southern University had requested for anti-Israel activist Abby Martin to sign as a term for appearing at the college. A similar law in Arkansas was struck down in federal court in February, with several Jewish leftist groups like J Street and T’Ruah being on the side of the pro-BDS Arkansas Times.
Let America Debate Again
What is the lesson to be learned here? The attempts to stifle opinions, even wrong ones, serve to deliver victories to the people that hold them. The BDS movement is not one that itself believes in freedom of speech, with one of its primary goals being to discourage musical performers from touring Israel. Pro-Palestine activists, in the demented logic that this benefits the children and civilians of Gaza, assault both pro-Israel counter-protesters and Jewish bystanders alike and then their colleagues raise money to defend them in court. And yet for all that there is wrong with the BDS movement and its real goals, Americans have the right to hear it out and decide whether to support it. Campus officials cannot bow to BDS activists attempting to deplatform pro-Israel speakers (or anyone else for that matter), and state governments should not pass legislation like the bills that have sought to prevent BDS activists from doing business with them.
https://www.bitchute.com/video/ygMxF4ae5z5J/
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It is all too rare to hear a truly curious back-and-forth discussion about the Israel-Palestine conflict, but I did hear one recently from an unlikely source: Alex Jones and InfoWars. While he is generally derided as the internet’s mad hatter of fringe conspiracy theories, Jones recently held a very cordial debate on the topic between Israel opponent Nick Fuentes and Israel supporter and trial attorney Robert Barnes, both conservatives. Each person had ample time to state their own views including the moderator Jones who made clear his apprehension at fully supporting Israel due to topical disagreements with their leadership concerning mandatory vaccination and freedom of speech. The irony is that this lively discussion, which highlighted many angles and nuances often ignored, occurred on a website banned from all social media since 2018.