israel as a jewish state

I was reading this op-ed, and I wanted to point out that the writer is simply wrong about a certain point. He claims that:

They [the Palestinians] recognize the State of Israel’s right to exist, on condition that it does not define itself as the Jewish people’s national home.

Actually, my understanding is that the Palestinians have never said anything about how Israel defines itself, rather they argue that they should not have to accept it as a Jewish State in order to speak with them. Egypt didn't have to, Jordan didn't either. In fact, would you personally refuse to speak with someone because they didn't explicitly declare your personal identity?

There is much more I could say about this article, but I will leave it at that. Expect a new blog, a new voice, and a new format entirely. New adventures, new attitudes, new kind of crazy.

hungry arabs

I had never seen a truly hungry Arab until I went to Hebron. But then again, I've never been to the Gaza Strip. In my incensed and frantic search for more and more reactions to the Israeli raid on the Freedom Flotilla in international waters, I found this blog that does a great job of showing how starved the people of Gaza are:

In order to prove that there is no humanitarian crisis, Israel's government boasted that since the beginning of this current year, it magnanimously allowed 24,302 tons of fruit, 14,879 tons of flour and 600 tons of meat into the Gaza strip (all tons metric). Divided by 150 days and by 1.5 million people, that works out to 108 grams (4 oz) of fruit, 66 grams (2.25 oz) of flour and 2 whole grams (less than an eighth of an ounce) of meat per person, per day. But Israel hopes you won't do the math.

Maybe that's not the exact diet of every Gazan. I understand that some people in Gaza have more food than others and that the aid doesn't necessarily go to every individual because the "rich" ones get stuff from the tunnels (probably not for long) or whatever their source is. But then again, there are probably plenty of Gazans who never see even that food. A humanitarian crisis shouldn't be defined by how many people are dying, rather how many are starving. To me it seems like a sick Mengele-esque caloric restriction experiment, and I will have none of that done in the name of Judaism.

So one of the world's most advanced militaries decides it a good idea to drop just a few soldiers onto a boat of many more civilians, oh, in international waters. Did they expect the people on board to just put their hands up, "Oh, you guys got us! Sorry." Let me try to think what I would do if I were in a boat that was boarded via helicopter and rope by soldiers--armed to the teeth--that were sent to disable our mission in the middle of the night. Oh right! I would panic! Could the Israeli intelligentsia and military leaders not come up with a less explosive plan?

I had been following the status of the Freedom Flotilla for a few weeks now, and I thought that just maybe they might even get to Gaza. If they didn't, I had more faith in Israel than to think they would send a military operation to forcibly* take over the boats. I was wrong.

--Abraham



*Tell me they were defending themselves and I will agree, those soldiers were defending themselves in that situation, fine, but they were sent into that situation by the Israeli government, into a trap. What country uses an elite military unit to stop a civilian protest that was transferring food, medicine, and other aid to a gigantic population of people that are deprived of access to sustenance? Surely not the "only democracy" in the Middle East?

McCarthyism in Israel is Misread in America

I read my local Jewish newspaper to get a sense of the community in which I will be reentering next year in Philadelphia. I plan to be very engaged in our new local J Street chapter in addition to whatever else I find to be an important step in getting American Jews to become better informed about what happens in Israel.


But this is what they see.

I see that I have a big challenge ahead of me. In this particular article, Leslie Susser--whom I look forward to meeting one day, should I get the opportunity to discuss this article with her--creates a parallel between the New Israel Fund and Im Tirtzu. Excuse me?!

Without too much negative ranting about the latter organization, which Gideon Levy so adequately criticizes in his own op-ed, it's easy to see what kind of group this is from their own description. A "centrist group" that argues that "the Oslo Accords led to the shattering of the dream of the Greater Land of Israel." Is a prolonged occupation of millions of disenfranchised Palestinians one of the examples of the "justice" that they seek to return to Israeli national identity?

And calling out the NIF, specifically their president Naomi Chazan, is outrageous. The NIF provides funding to grass-roots organizations for humanitarian purposes, and they actually don't discriminate! This is rare in Israel, that an organization will support groups that look to better the standards of living for a certain group, even if that group is not satisfied with the ruling regime. Hell, some of these groups are flat out against the State of Israel--as many of them have not had the best time under the rule of the Knesset for the past 60-some years. But the NIF supports groups with values of democracy, including freedom of speech.

Now, that photograph above shows Im Tirtzu protesters "dressed as Arabs"--who obviously all dress like that "terrorist" in the foreground--and displaying horned caricatures of Naomi Chazan, one of the most noble of Jewish footsoldiers for peace. And Leslie Susser has the nerve to ask in the headline if the NIF is "destroying democracy."

If I had clicked on that link, seen the headline, and saw the picture, without having much knowledge about the NIF, I would probably make the following conclusion: the NIF is an Israeli group that supports terror organizations and organizations that wish to subvert the state. The problem is that mainstream American Jews read these articles without a backstory, and it is very difficult to become truly educated about who the involved parties are when Leslie Susser gives an even hand to hawkish McCarthyists and non-profit heroes.