Below is the second column by Tom Mitchell. I have always told myself that the main “lesson” that can be learned from Northern Ireland is that violent, longstanding and seemingly intractable ethnic or religious conflicts eventually can be solved. It has been a source of hope. I am not sure if Tom agrees with that […]
Israel
Is Israel a settler colony like South Africa?: A guest column
This blog is fortunate to get regular contributions from Tom Mitchell, a scholar who has carefully analyzed the similarities and differences between Israel, South Africa and Northern Ireland. He sent me a summary of a longer article. I thought I would publish it, as people on the far left often claim that there is little […]
Why most checkpoints are unnecessary: a primer
When my previous post about the checkpoint at Sheikh Sa’eb was published in July, in slightly different form, I received an angry email from a friend of a friend. An excerpt: “If the IDF says we need all of them [the checkpoints], who are you to say they’re wrong? Where do you get off giving […]
Revisiting a checkpoint, and an unexpected message
The Jerusalem Post notes that Ala Abu Dhaim, the gunman who shot up the Merkaz HaRav yeshiva in Jerusalem: …did not meet the typical profile of Palestinian attackers, police said. “He is not known to the security forces,” Jerusalem Police Chief Cmdr. Aharon Franco told Channel 2. “He was a normal man … who was […]
Aaron David Miller: The pro-Israel community has won, so stop “geshraying” already
Aaron David Miller has a stirring piece in the LA Times that deserves to be quoted in full. A note on my headline:”geshray” is Yiddish for “wail.” Other than that, believe it or not (is everyone sitting down? Get ready…), I have nothing to add! Nothing more needs to be said, as far as I’m […]
Announcing the “Fleshies”: awards for the best responses to anti-Semitism on the Web
It is hard to convey the amount of bile and reductionist, blame-the-Jews-for-every-sin rhetoric that has taken over much of the blogosphere. Phil Weiss’s blog generally attracts some of the most articulate Jew-bashers, so I tune into the comments from time to time in order to gauge the level of hatred. I just noticed some great […]
Will Obama, Clinton or McCain make Israel-Palestine a priority on Day 1?
To gauge what the presidential candidates might do about the ongoing Arab-Israeli nightmare, one has to make inferences based on inflections, hints, nuances and tea leaves. What they or their campaign staffers say now is at least as important as the identity of 4 or 5 of the many “foreign policy advisors” who have communicated […]
Where are all of Clinton’s “dovish” Jewish supporters?
Newsweek now tells us that it is not only right wing, so-called “pro-Israel” agitators and Republicans who are hopping on the “Obama- is-bad-for-the Jews” bandwagon, it is also Swiftboaters in the Clinton campaign: “Clinton campaign operatives have sent around negative material about Obama’s relations with Israel, according to e-mails obtained by NEWSWEEK. In addition to […]
So just who are Obama’s Middle East advisors? Finally, some clarifications…
Clarifications –i.e., light, as opposed to heat– about Obama’s Middle East advisors are provided by Jack Levin, an Obama friend and campaign insider quoted in Gidon Remba’s Tough Dove Israel. Almost the exact same language can be found on a blog called The Sunny Side, which quotes Eric Lynn, who is on Obama’s staff. Here […]
The smears against Rob Malley continue, but former U.S. officials rise to his defense
James Besser has a balanced and informative piece on the ongoing Rob Malley fracas in New York Jewish Week. Among other things, we learn that the offensive smear campaign against Malley and, by extension, Obama has not abated: “In the days leading up to this week’s Democratic primary in Maryland, Jewish voters in Baltimore and […]